Authors: Gay Hendricks
Tags: #ebook, #book
A job. An actual job. Maybe Julius couldn’t hear my hum of interest, but it was there, and getting louder.
He pulled a second, thicker file from a side drawer. He slid out a detailed drawing of a broad-faced, stocky woman in a dark cloth coat, a scarf covering her hair. Her expression was part fear, part defiance. She pulled at the hand of a little girl who was turned away, straining to get loose. Dark hair cascaded down the child’s back.
I pointed to the child. “Sadie?”
Julius nodded. He slid a second drawing across the desk. Sadie, from the front. Round face, clear eyes, and a radiant smile. Same cascading hair.
“Tell me,” I said.
“That was the moment—the last time I saw Sadie. It seared itself into my brain, invaded every waking moment, haunted every dream, even followed me here from Brooklyn.” Julius shuddered. “I was going mad, and Dorothy was getting desperate. Finally, she sat me down with a sketch artist. It took forever, me describing, the artist drawing, but she finally got it right. And I finally had something to work with.” Julius sighed. “I spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on detectives, historical search firms, anything else I could think of, to see if I could find out what happened to Sadie and that woman.” Again, his eyes shifted away.
“Ten years ago, I called off the search.”
Again, I felt a little twinge of off-ness.
He’s lying. Why?
“So, why now?” I asked.
“Some days I’m the real Julius,” he said. “Some days I don’t know who the fuck I am.” His head dipped forward. “All my life I’ve been the smartest guy in the room. Never any doubt. Now, I’m not even in the room half the time.”
“I can’t imagine,” I said.
“You know that old poker saying—if you’ve been in the game for half an hour and you haven’t figured out who the pigeon is, the pigeon is you?” His eyes flashed. “Well, I don’t plan to go out as anybody’s goddamned pigeon. Understand me?” His eyes lost connection. Had he slipped off the rails again?
A chilly ball formed in my belly.
I need this job.
I breathed warmth into the anxiety. The sensation eased.
“Anyway. This just arrived.” Julius passed me a photocopy of the first drawing, a message hand-scrawled in blue ink across the middle. “I know what happened.” A business card was paper-clipped to the photocopy, a single name, in bold black type: HELMUT ZIGO.
Another notation was hand-scribbled on the card, same writing, same blue ink: Contact me. After eleven pm best at Skype ID HelmutZigo.
“Have you contacted him?” I asked.
He shook his head. “You’re the first person I’ve showed this to. It arrived exactly one day before you walked into my life. Do you believe in coincidences, Tenzing?”
“Not really,” I said.
“I find it fascinating the very day I needed some detecting done, a detective arrived at my doorstep.” He pointed at the card. “Any idea what ‘Skype ID’ means?”
“No,” I said. “But I know someone who does.”
“Then you’re one step ahead of me.”
“So you’d like me to contact Helmut Zigo and see what I can learn?”
“I suspect it’s a scam, but you never know. In any case, I’m not able to run this down right now. Want the job?”
I briefly wondered why he wasn’t using his own people. They’d done a pretty fucking good job of running me down. Down, and back up the other side. But I needed the job. I wasn’t going to push it. As for hiring me . . .
He hasn’t asked. Don’t tell him.
“I’ve got to tell you something,” I said. “I’m still waiting for my liability insurance. Technically I’m not licensed yet.”
“Yes, yes, I know all about that,” Julius brushed my words aside. “I didn’t get where I am by being a stickler.”
“I’ve also never worked a missing persons case where the person has been missing for such a long time.” Might as well get it all out now.
The sheen had reappeared. He swiped at his forehead. “Please, Tenzing. My mind is Swiss cheese half the time. I need you to be my full-time brain on this one.” He opened his desk drawer and pulled out a business check. “I took the liberty of improving slightly on Marv Rudolph’s rates,” he said. “He’s a notorious skinflint.” He handed the check over. I had to lean close to make out the tiny handwritten letters and numbers. I blinked, sure my eyes were deceiving me. Nothing changed. The check was made out to Tenzing Norbu, in the amount of $25,000. Twenty. Five. Thousand.
“This is too much,” I said.
“I’m a childless billionaire, Ten. Indulge me. Give it everything you’ve got. If you don’t find anything in, say, ten days, we’ll call it quits.”
I couldn’t stop staring at the check.
“Good, then.” The phone dangling around Julius’s neck let out an alarming squawk. He started to stand and fell back into his chair with a little grunt. He fumbled for the phone, but his fingers weren’t working either. He looked at me, his eyes scared. “Otilia,” he said.
I found her in the kitchen. One look at my face and she grabbed the wheelchair. It took our combined strength to get Julius into the chair—his body had hardened, like concrete. I pushed and Otilia fussed as we rattled our way down a series of corridors. I took the final corner too fast, caught a footrest against the wall, and almost dumped Julius. Otilia flung open a pair of doors leading into a large bedroom, furnished almost exclusively with a small hospital bed. Otilia took firm hold of the wheelchair handles.
“Goodbye, Señor,” she said to me.
I turned to leave. Julius grabbed my arm and pulled at me. I bent to hear.
“I changed my mind, Norbu,” he said, his voice soft. My heart sank. I reached for the check in my pocket, but he pulled me even closer. “You’re not getting near my Bentley. You drive like crap.” Then he winked.
I climbed into the Mustang, inhaling its musky scent of worn leather and time. Before I placed the key in the ignition, I allowed myself a few moments to simply sit and absorb the change. I had a ridiculously well-paying job with a man I admired. When solutions like this arrive, seemingly out of the blue, but more often than not after I’ve at least made space for their possibility, they carry with them buoyancy, a lightness of heart. Such moments affirm that hope is not a dead end, and joy is often just a small perceptual shift from despair. The hard edges of my body softened and expanded. I smiled. Gratitude, that’s what I was feeling.
Before I left the estate, I sent Mike a text.
NEED YOUR HELP TONIGHT. I’LL COME TO YOU. 10PM OK? ALSO, WORK YOUR WONDERS ON HELMUT ZIGO. EUROPEAN.
Ten at night was midday for Mike. I’d bring my laptop. He’d get me Skyped up in no time.
Until I met up with Mike and communicated with this Zigo fellow directly, there wasn’t much else I could do for Julius.
Which left me with the murder mystery known as Marv. I still didn’t have any official connection to the case. If anything, Bill was actively discouraging my involvement. I should move on, right? But. But. But. Once my mind gets a hold of something, I have a hard time letting it go. My spiritual life may embrace nonattachment, but when it comes to unnatural deaths, I’m doggedly persistent.
What did we have so far? A dead producer, whose death was caused by someone smart enough to conceal its source but stupid enough to leave not one, but two calling cards, therefore completely wasting the original secrecy. One event, Marv’s mysterious death, felt calculated. Another, the skinned tattoo, seemed vindictive. And the third, the dropped knife, was impulsive. The only thing these three had in common, so far, was Marv Rudolph’s obese body.
I knew that S & M were tracking down all Marv’s incoming calls—checking alibis, interviewing his entertainment associates. But I had a hunch these would be dead ends. Studio honchos didn’t kill you outright. From what I had just read about Marv’s world, they were more likely to cut off your balls, metaphorically speaking, and leave you only wishing you were dead.
But the knife meant something. So did the skinning. They may not have been the cause of death, but they were an indication of
something
. I grabbed the little notebook I kept in my glove compartment and jotted down some thoughts:
Who would want Marv Rudolph dead?
1. Pissed off family member. (Harper. Arlene. Others?)
2. Jealous girlfriend. (Tovah?)
3. Angry underling/associate/employee. (Julius? Tovah? Keith Connor?)
Like Bill, I felt we could probably rule out Arlene. She had an alibi and seemed genuinely distressed by Marv’s death, and frankly, she was too wispy to pull such a thing off. It looked like Harper was out as well, if her mother was to be believed, though their alibis were conveniently interdependent. Though Harper’s little return jaunt to the Robinsgrove vaulted her to the top of my suspect list. I underlined her name. I wondered if Sully and Mack had even questioned her?
4. (Talk to Harper?) I added.
Julius, Parkinson’s or not, had some fire in him, and I felt he was lying about something, but his dismissal of Marv felt genuine. I also believed him when he said he never left his compound. And Keith Connor needed Marv alive, it seemed to me. Tovah, however, was also a real possibility, for obvious reasons. Availability, motive, you name it. I had no idea what her current relationship was to Marv, though I could guess. But Tovah was gone for now, and I couldn’t track her down through her license or credit card use without letting Bill know I was still deeply involved in his case.
An idea nudged its way in.
Maybe, with a little help, I could bring Tovah to me. Then I could deliver her to Bill on a platter, no questions asked. I put in a call to Sully and got his voicemail.
“Hey, Sully, it’s Ten. How’s it going? Listen, I have a question about your door-to-door at Robinsgrove, for the Rudolph case. Also wondering if you questioned the daughter, Harper, yet. Call me, okay?”
I made a note: “10/29 - Called Sully re: Robinsgrove/Tovah. Harper.”
I paused. I should call Bill and tell him about Harper’s visit to the Robinsgrove. But his sharp words had left residual sting-marks on my heart. I wasn’t ready to let them go.
And then there was Arlene’s reference to “crooks”—her implication that anyone in the movie business, Marv included, was automatically in bed with gangsters and criminals.
5. Criminal element? Mafia? Gangs?
Which led me to the tattoo. Where had Marv gotten it? What did it mean?
6. Tattoo.
I turned the key and the engine growled to life. As I put my car in reverse, something caught my eye: two figures, a man and a woman, hurrying across the lawn from the direction of the guesthouse, beyond Julius’s cloud-room. They appeared to be arguing. The man was stabbing the air. He stopped abruptly, as if he’d just caught sight of me. He was broad-shouldered, his face shielded by a hat. Manuel, the gardener. Even from a distance I sensed hostility radiating off him in waves. He wheeled around and hurried back toward the guesthouse. As the woman got closer, I saw the red nylon medical bag. Dr. Alvarado, making a house call. I was relieved—Julius had looked in need of medical attention. I rolled down my window to acknowledge her, but she passed by without a glance.
I rested my hands lightly on the mahogany frame of the steering wheel, and it responded to my touch like an old friend, as I wound my way down the long, curved drive. About three-quarters of the way out, I passed a familiar stocky figure, built like a fireplug, kneeling by a sprinkler valve. Manuel looked up and tipped his hat, his curved moustache framing an unsmiling mouth.
Impossible. Unless the man could teleport his body, there was no way he could be back there and also here.
So who was the other Manuel, the one back at the house?
I tucked the question next to all the other unanswered ones currently crowding my mind and drove home.
I changed into my running clothes. Now that I was back on somebody’s payroll, I was somehow more inspired to keep my muscles toned. Before I ran into Topanga Canyon Park, I hauled a protesting Tank outside for a quick tree-climbing lesson. He pretends to hate this, but once I deposited him on the peeling bark of a eucalyptus branch, Tank acted quite happy to scratch his way upward for a few yards. I felt encouraged. Silly me. He stared from his perch, flicking his shaggy tail, as if to say: Up is one thing, buddy; down is another.
“C’mon, Tank. You can do this. Use your claws.”
He turned away, peering into the distance to contemplate the absurdity of this idea.
I had to climb up after Tank and drag 18 pounds of furry, boneless deadweight off the branch. The minute we were back on firm ground, he erupted out of my arms and darted to the deck, where he proceeded to groom himself, as if none of this had happened. The lesson, for me, was 2 percent progress, 98 percent humility.
After a long run and a short shower, I was ready to browse the Internet. Julius had said Marv got his tattoo somewhere in the San Fernando Valley. I got to work.
There were well over 100 parlors. Where to start?
As Julius would say, time to use my noodle. If I were Marv, getting this particular tattoo, what would be my priorities? Quality: It had to look authentically old. Hygiene: I couldn’t afford an infected arm, and all the accompanying embarrassments. Most of all, I’d require confidentiality. If this tattoo was to be my Holocaust calling card, no one could know when or where I had actually gotten it.
I assumed cost was no object.
I got to work, and soon had narrowed the list to a dozen high-end parlors located in and around there. All catered to a celebrity clientele, promised a superior artistic product, and, most important, guaranteed complete privacy. I browsed their websites. Several had online galleries displaying anonymous limbs, festooned with ornate tattoos. I scrolled through jeweled images scaling torsos, wrapping around biceps, decorating muscled backs. I clicked past a snarling dragon, a pipe-smoking cat in a pinstriped suit, a skull nibbling on a rose. My attention got roped into an endless loop, surveying multiple renditions of the Buddha: rotund buddhas, emaciated buddhas, laughing buddhas, praying buddhas.
I had to close the computer and pick up the phone, before I lost an entire day staring at bodhisattvas inked on skin.