The Art of Detection

by Laurie R. King

She laid the magazine back into its box, put a tick next to its description in the ledger, and pulled away the bubble wrap from the next item, a photograph of Queen Victoria in a worn wooden frame. They saw several more magazines, half a dozen old books, some pieces of jewelry, an old-looking typescript short story or novella in a clear plastic envelope, three pipes, and a sheaf of signed photographs, one of which showed a stocky, middle-aged man with a large mustache, dressed in outdoor tweeds.

  “I think this is Conan Doyle,” she said, turning it toward Hawkin. He studied the figure—who looked, she realized, like a distant relation of his—then went back to the loose photographs of opera singers and writers, most of them signed, each of them separated from its neighbor by a sheet of tissue.

  The arcane contents of the deposit box gave no insight into their owner’s death, however, other than the staggering sum of their appraised value. The bank had no doubt been chosen for its proximity to home, for visits to the vault were a regular part of Gilbert’s business week. He had come here twice during the week he had died, on Monday the nineteenth in the afternoon, and the morning of Friday the twenty-third. On Monday he had left behind slips of paper recording the dispatch of items to Sotheby’s auction house for appraisal and to a gentleman in London for approval; on the Friday he had made a notation on the outside of the manila envelope containing the typescript short story, “to Mr. Ian Nicholson for analysis.”

  Kate showed the envelope to Hawkin. “Does this mean that on Friday the twenty-third, Gilbert sent a copy of this to Ian Nicholson? Or does it mean that he meant to give this envelope to him, and didn’t get around to it?”

  But Al could only shake his head. “Nicholson is the friend who the lawyer thinks is out of town.”

  “And who left two messages on Gilbert’s machine during the week.”

  Kate stripped off her gloves and took out her phone, saw by its display that reception was shrouded by the bank, and closed it again.

  “Do you want to take any of this in as evidence?” she asked Hawkin.

  “I really don’t,” he said with feeling. Stashing evidence with the property clerk was one thing; leaving solid gold there was another. “Let’s just seal the box and make sure the bank knows they’re not to let anyone into it.”

  When they had finished and were back on the street, she took out her phone again, got Nicholson’s number from the list she’d compiled, and listened to a polite English accent suggesting that she be so kind as to leave a message. She did, and closed the phone. Al was also talking on his, speaking to the Medical Examiner’s office about the autopsy of Philip Gilbert. She looked around, saw a coffee shop, and tapped on Hawkin’s elbow to gesture that she would meet him there.

  She had her latte and his café Americana (plain black coffee given a fancy name and price) on the table in the corner when he entered, looking disgusted.

  “Not good?” she asked him.

  “Turns out the reason the ME’s assistant was a little uncertain about the autopsy is that Marin hasn’t even brought the body over yet—he’s in their storage locker, and now they’re too busy to bring him over to us. And because he didn’t land here, the ME doesn’t even have paperwork on him.”

  “In other words, Marin’s pissed at us. You want to hire a U-Haul and go get him?”

  “I talked to one of the drivers, told him he could have my sister in marriage if he managed to get us the body today.”

  “You don’t have a sister.”

  “So I lied.”

  “Okay, you want to tackle the headlands interviews today, or the friends-of-Gilbert?”

  “I’d say we start with Gilbert’s life, rather than how his body was dumped.”

  “Fine with me.” Kate laid a copy of her list of known associates on the table. “Here’s a beginning on Gilbert’s circle of nonfriends. The family’s a little out of reach, and I don’t know that we can question his business contacts until we know more about what he had going. Which leaves us the Sherlockian dinner club—nine members: Rutland we’ve talked to, Nicholson’s out of town. How do you want to approach these?”

  He looked at the addresses: two at the western side of the South Bay, three to the north of the East Bay. It was going to take them all day just to cover the ground.

  “You want to split up?” she asked.

  “Somehow I can’t picture a member of a Sherlock Holmes dinner club coming to the door with a shotgun in his hand,” Hawkin said. “You want to go it alone on the out-of-town names? We can get them out of the way today, meet up and do the San Francisco names after.”

  “Fine with me. You want the peninsula or the East Bay?”

  “I’ll take Berkeley and Napa, you can have Palo Alto and Sunnyvale. We’ll meet up for the two in the city.”

  Kate circled the names Geraldine O’Malley and Rajindra Pandi, then noticed a link she hadn’t caught before. “Venkatarama lives in Berkeley, but he works at the same address as Pandi. They’ll probably both be there now.”

  “Fine, I’ll just do Alex Climpson in Napa, circle over to Berkeley for Wendell Bauer, and come back for Jeannine Cartfield and Soong Li. Call me when you get back in town,” Al said, and left her to pay for the coffee.

  GERALDINE O’Malley might have been given a name straight out of Blarney, but the woman Kate tracked down in her real estate office on the outskirts of Palo Alto looked about as Irish as Jon’s Samoan partner Sione Kalefu. Kate assumed that it was her mother who had been the African-American in the mix, with her father providing the O’Malley, but California was too full of ethnic blends for it to be a sure bet, or even to matter much. She merely introduced herself and asked O’Malley if there was somewhere they could talk.

  Wordlessly, the sturdy woman with the tidy dreads and pantsuit led Kate into a sort of boardroom office with an oval table and a dozen chairs. She shut the door and stood, braced for Kate’s explanation.

  “I’m with the San Francisco Police Department, assigned to look into the death of Philip Gilbert.”

  O’Malley blinked: She hadn’t expected the name, looked almost relieved at it. “Philip. Yes, certainly. Look, why don’t we sit down?” She pulled the nearest chair away from the gleaming table and went around to sit on one facing it. Kate took the seat.

  “You looked surprised when I said why I was here,” she told the woman.

  “Did I? Yes, I suppose I did. I just, well, it’s my nephew. He’s a problem kid and he hasn’t been seen in a couple of days, I was afraid…But Philip. Yes, God, what a tragedy.”

  “You heard about his death, then?”

  “Of course. Tom Rutland—you know Tom?” Kate nodded. “Of course you do. Tom called me about it on Saturday night, and said someone might be by to talk with me. I guess I’d expected you before this, so it had sort of left my mind. Anyway, what can I tell you?”

  “When did you last see Mr. Gilbert?”

  “I went to the dinner at his house, the first Wednesday in January. I haven’t seen him since then.”

  “What about talking with him, communicating by e-mail?”

  “No. Oh, wait a minute, there was a thing. Maybe a week later, there was something in the paper, a rumor about a lost Sherlock Holmes story. It came without comment, but I’m pretty sure it was from Philip. You want me to check?”

  “In a minute. But first, tell me something about Philip Gilbert,” Kate suggested. “Help me get a sense of him. Did you like him?”

  “Did I like him? I suppose so, although he could be pretty abrasive at times. It helped if you didn’t take him too seriously.”

  “He seems to have taken this Sherlock Holmes business quite seriously, himself.”

  “He wasn’t all light and fun, that’s for sure. But Jeannie—Jeannie Cartfield? She and I had a good time, tweaking the boys. A lot of BSI scions—branches of the main Sherlockian group—are men-only, in other parts of the country, and she and I belong to a couple of the women-only ones. But here, they integrated a long time ago.”

  “Te
ll me about the dinner club.”

  “It’s mostly just that. We eat dinner, usually at some restaurant that we think Holmes might have enjoyed—you know, hearty English fare, beef and potatoes and cream poured onto the desserts. Every so often we pick an ethnic one, on the argument that Holmes would have eaten curry, say, on the London docks. You do get tired of beef and boiled vegetables.”

  “But sometimes you meet at the home of one of the members?”

  “Three of the men like to host dinners, Philip was one of those. They’d choose a menu, one or two of us would go early and help, but it’s a lot of work, and ten people takes a sizeable dining room. Those of us who live in apartments have trouble with that, so we scrub carrots and set the tables. Personally, I rather enjoy having the men wait on me.”

  “The dinner last month was at Philip’s house.”

  “Yep, with the full English fare: standing rib roast, Yorkshire pudding, Brussels sprouts, roast potatoes, candied carrots. Trifle for dessert, and a couple of very nice wines.”

  “Sounds great,” Kate commented, reflecting that breakfast had been a long time ago. “Philip cooked?”

  “He and Jeannie.”

  Kate eyed the woman, her attention caught by the noncommittal flatness of the response. “Did Philip and Jeannine Cartfield have a relationship?”

  “We all had a relationship. We were the Strand Diners.”

  “I meant—”

  “Yes, Detective, I know what you meant. The two of them were closer in some ways than the rest of us. But that may have been because they’d known each other for so many years. They went to college together, what, thirty years ago? If you’re asking me if they were sleeping together, I’m sorry, you’ll have to ask Jeannie that. They are both private people. Were, in Philip’s case.”

  “Remarkably private,” Kate agreed. “So much so, it’s difficult to get a clear image of him. What would you say he was like?”

  O’Malley sat for a minute, twisting the ring she wore on the index finger of her right hand. “He was sad, in a way. Oh, I know that a lot of people would say that about most of us Holmes fans, but really, we just have fun with it. But with Philip, it was something else. It was his job, sure, but more than that, he took it all extremely seriously. He took it personally if someone made a mistake about one of the stories during one of the dinners, as if our lack of seriousness was a failure on his part.”

  “Sounds a bit hard to live with.”

  “I guess it does. But it wasn’t like he was scolding us or anything, he was always good at making a game out of it. It was more like you could feel his pain, if you’ll pardon the cliché. Making a goof was like, I don’t know, stepping on your partner’s toe when you’re dancing, maybe. Any teacher expects to get stepped on a lot, but that doesn’t make the toes any happier. Philip was a mile better than any of us at the game, but I think he honestly took great pleasure in turning us all into better players.”

  “What do you mean by ‘the game’?”

  “Immersing yourself in the world of Sherlock Holmes. Treating Holmes and his fellows as more real than Conan Doyle was, conversing about the stories as if they were historical fact. Some Holmes groups insist on scrupulously accurate costumes and Victorian speech, but we only don costume some of the time. Dinner at Philip’s was always in costume. Which is fun, but damned uncomfortable. You have any idea what those dresses weigh? And the hats—to say nothing of what the corsets do to your ribs! God. The men have it easy.”

  “Would you have said that Philip had any enemies?”

  The left hand fiddling with the ring went still, and O’Malley looked at Kate. “So it’s true, that he was murdered?”

  “We really don’t know at this point, but we’re proceeding under the assumption that he was.”

  “Philip handled some extremely valuable items. Some of which were things that people had strong feelings about, completely apart from their monetary value—there was a very private and personal note from Conan Doyle to his second wife that Philip sold a while back, with a lot of controversy, because people thought he shouldn’t have made it public. Certainly Philip had rivals. Whether some of those turned into enemies, I wouldn’t know. His sort of collection was way too rich for my blood.”

  “Did he show you his copy of that magazine?”

  “The Beeton’s Annual? Yes, he showed it to us at the dinner after he’d bought it, in October I think it was. I wouldn’t even touch it, knowing what it was worth. He’s got something else, too. I don’t know what it is, but he said something in passing during the January dinner, that he might not have to sell the Annual after all.”

  “Was he thinking of selling it?”

  “Even for Philip, I gather that was a lot of working capital to have tied up in one object. I know he’d been eyeing a couple of things that came onto the market, but after buying the Annual, he couldn’t quite swing the price. He was torn, because the Beeton’s Annual made his collection authoritative in a way it would not have been without it.”

  “How is it ‘authoritative’?”

  “An already rare piece, in pristine condition, and signed by Doyle: Nobody has that. Nobody in the world. If this is genuine, and if the signature is not a forgery, it would be absolutely unique. Yes, it’s priceless—by which I mean enormously valuable, but beyond that, the magazine puts its owner on the map. As collections go, Philip’s was very, very good—he even had two original manuscript stories by Doyle; with this copy of Beeton’s Annual, his collection shoots to the top of the heap. If, that is, he could afford to hang on to it.”

  “And this other thing he’d found, that would have made it possible to keep the magazine?”

  “That was the impression I got. No details, just one of his raised eyebrows and a knowing look. But for Philip, that was excitement.”

  “Would he have told anyone what it was?”

  “If he had, it would have been Tom, Ian, or Jeannie.”

  “He was closest to them, then?”

  “He worked most closely with them, certainly.”

  “The way people talk about Gilbert makes him sound inaccessible. Aloof.”

  “He was. But like I said, there was a sadness there. I don’t know where it came from, but something in his past was painful. He never talked about his past at all. I only know what university he went to because Jeannie told me.”

  “I see. So you never, oh, I don’t know, went with him to Marin on a wine tour?”

  “With Philip? No, I’d have a hard time imagining that.”

  “But he was into wine, he had a lot of expensive-looking bottles in his basement.”

  “Yes, but I can’t imagine him hanging out in wineries talking about nose and overtones.”

  “Do you go up to Marin often? Not necessarily to the wineries?”

  “I have family in Santa Rosa, a cousin I see a couple times a year. Why?”

  “I just wondered if you knew the headlands at all.”

  “That’s where he was found, wasn’t it? No, it’s one of those places I keep meaning to explore, and never have.”

  “Well, thank you for seeing me. If you think of anything else, please call me.” She asked O’Malley for her fingerprints, to eliminate her from the prints in Gilbert’s house, and got them without objection. She handed O’Malley one of her cards, and the woman walked her to the door.

  “You’d be welcome to join the Strand Diners this Wednesday, Detective. As my guest if nothing else.”

  “You’ve decided to go ahead with it, then? Tom Rutland didn’t know what the others would want to do.”

  “We thought we might. As a wake, if nothing else.”

  “Thank you, but I’ve got some family commitments Wednesday night,” Kate lied easily.

  O’Malley looked at her sideways, her face suddenly transformed by an unexpected sparkle. “Probably for the best. Rajindra and Johnny want us to solve the case among ourselves.”

  “Thank you for the warning,” Kate told her, returning the gr
in. Which faded as soon as she had left the office. All she needed was a collection of earnest Sherlockian amateur sleuths running around in their deerstalkers and magnifying glasses. And here she’d thought the press might pass on this case.

  RAJINDRA Pandi and Johnny Venkatarama were business partners and, apparently, some sort of distant or honorary cousins on their mothers’ sides. She found them at their office in Sunnyvale, in one of those sprawling and featureless office parks that could conceal the next earthshaking discovery or a stash of terrorist weaponry. In this case, she was not exactly sure what the office held, other than a receptionist who answered the phone with the phrase “Diagram Research.”

  Whatever Diagram Research entailed, it did not require a large staff. Its blank front was broken by a door, which to Kate’s surprise was not locked. Inside was an entrance foyer with a glass back wall, through which could be seen a second room with an angular leather-and-steel sofa, two paintings, and a receptionist with a desk. The woman was wearing a thick sweater and reading a book, and she looked up, startled, at the movement in her outer room. Kate tried that door’s knob, found it locked, searched for a speaker, failed to see one, and held her badge up to the glass. The woman took one hand from her book and reached below the surface of the desk. A buzzer sounded, and Kate leaned against the door. She had to put some effort into it, and the air sucked and swirled as the door popped open.

  “Good afternoon,” she said. “I’m looking for Rajindra Pandi and Johnny Venkatarama.”

  “They’re busy,” the woman said.

  “This is an official matter.”

  “You’ll have to make an appointment.”

  “I’m not going to make an appointment, I just need a few minutes.”

  The woman was so nonplussed she laid her book down on the desk and stared at the intruder. Kate just stood before her and returned her gaze, until the woman finally picked up the phone.

  “Mr. Pandi? I have a policewoman here who wants to see you and Mr. V.—I don’t know.”

  “Tell him it’s about the death of Philip Gilbert,” Kate said.

  “She says it’s about the death of Philip Gilbert,” the receptionist parroted. After a moment, her eyebrows rose and she hung up the phone. “You can go in,” she said, sounding astonished; her job, clearly, was less to receive visitors than to repel them.