As Bill and I sank into a pair of modern, overstuffed leather armchairs, I found myself wondering, as I often did with married couples, What did they see in each other? For some reason, this time a possible answer popped into my head: Something they couldn’t find in themselves. Marv probably needed her quality of hardly-there-ness to balance out his quality of here-the-fuck-I-am-and-you-better-get-used-to-it-ness. As for what she saw in him, I guessed it had something to do with survival—she who mates with the biggest gorilla in the jungle gets the most bananas, or something like that.
Not that I’m an expert on this subject. I was taught to view females, and, it follows, sex with females, as harmful, if not disastrous, distractions on the road to enlightenment. One of the creation myths drummed into us in the monastery even claimed that Tibetans were descended from a wise monkey and a wily, rock-dwelling demoness.
Now that I’d read Darwin, I had to admire the fact that my Tibetan ancestors at least got the monkey part right.
Bill’s calm voice tugged me back. “We just have a few questions we need to ask, Mrs. Rudolph.”
“Yes, yes.” She waved vaguely at the dining room. “I should offer you something to drink.”
“We’re fine,” Bill said. I thought longingly about coffee, but I knew he was right. She pulled over the most uncomfortable chair in the living room, a straight-backed antique number, and perched on its edge, facing us. She sat very still, looking at the floor, neither patient nor impatient. Everything she did seemed to be a beat or two behind normal, and it was hard to get a read on her. Grief does strange things to people.
Then again, so do pills. I remembered the last time I’d seen her daughter, stoned to the gills. Maybe Mom was her role model.
“Is Harper home?” I asked, gently. She looked blank for a moment, and then said, “Harper? No, no, she’s at school. I thought it was best that she go. She’s doing so much better at her new school.” Her expression brightened at the thought of her daughter then sagged again, as if weighted down by the recollection that her husband was dead. She met my eyes. Hers were huge, but the pupils didn’t seem dilated.
Bill said, “I’m very sorry for your loss. Please accept our condolences.”
“I asked my Rabbi, why? Is this a punishment from God? For him? For me?” Her eyes filled. “Marv wasn’t always like this, you know,” she said. “He wasn’t always so . . . “ She blinked, and tears spilled over.
“I’m very sorry for your loss,” Bill repeated. I was silent.
Homicide detectives are trained to say, “I’m sorry for your loss,” to the next of kin, but I seldom connect to these words. Maybe it’s a Buddhist thing. I know it’s important to acknowledge another’s pain, but if I tune in, deep down inside, I usually don’t feel comfortable using the word sorry. Why apologize for someone else’s loss, especially when all involved are strangers? It borders on egotistical. In this case, it would also be a lie. I did not feel sad. Not for the demise of Marv Rudolph and not for his surviving wife. Most of us are in for a rough ride as we get older, even more so if we’re overweight, chronic cigar-smokers. Maybe Marv got lucky; his limited time on earth came to a fairly painless and swift end rather than a long, slow, painful one. And as for Arlene, I had a hunch she was well rid of him.
Marv’s wife wrung her hands. “This is all such a shock. I don’t know what to do.” Her voice rose. “I need to bury him. I need to put him into the ground, so he . . . so he can have some peace, and we can sit shivah. It’s almost Shabbat. Why are they keeping him so long? What are they doing to his poor body?” She doubled over, moaning.
And now, I did feel a surge of compassion. I walked over to her and put my hand on her thin shoulder, but she pulled away. After a moment, she straightened up, folding her hands in her lap like a schoolgirl. I returned to my chair.
“This won’t take long,” Bill said. “I apologize. There’s no easy way to ask these questions, ma’am.”
“Ma’am,” she said with a thin smile. “Ma’am makes me feel so old. Please. Arlene.”
“First, and again, ma . . . Arlene, I apologize, but we have to ask. Can you tell me where you were late Wednesday night and early Thursday morning?”
She blinked. “I was, I was at a lecture at my temple on Wednesday night. Temple Beth Adel. It was a talk about redemption—Jewish Women and Redemption. I took Harper. Then, I went to bed early. A few hours later, Harper woke me up. She wanted to know when her father was getting home. I said I didn’t know. Late.” Arlene’s voice faltered. She licked her lips. “She said she needed his signature for something, umm, some school trip coming up.” She smiled a little smile. “She’s doing so much better at her new school,” she repeated.
I was glad. She needed to be doing better.
Bill was jotting down Arlene’s information for later corroboration.
“Anyway,” she said, “I went right back to sleep. The next thing I knew, it was light out, and those two detectives were ringing the doorbell. That’s when I realized Marv never came home.” A small “oh” escaped her mouth, and she curled tighter, around the pain.
“And where did your husband say he was?” Bill said.
“Some sort of business meeting, he said. I really don’t know.”
“Did your husband seem preoccupied in any way? Worried about something, maybe?”
“No. No, in fact he’s seemed much happier lately. Excited about his new movie, of course. And he loves awards season, all the parties and premieres. Especially now that he feels successful again. He’s been out almost every night. It’s that time of year.”
Bill scribbled a few more things. He looked up from his notebook.
“Right. Now, Arlene. You were given some details by Officers O’ Sullivan and Mack, concerning an . . . injury to your husband’s body, yes?”
A rush of blood turned her throat pink. “They said someone took his skin,” she whispered. “Is that how he died?”
“We’re still not certain how he died, I’m afraid.”
She waited, anxiety coming off her in waves.
“The piece of skin was removed from your husband’s inner forearm. Someone seems to have cut something off of there. Do you know what it might be?”
Her flush deepened, staining her pale skin. How odd. She looked ashamed.
She made a small choking sound and started to gasp for breath. Bill shot me a “do something, we’re losing her” look.
I squatted in front of her, a little awkwardly, as if she were a small child. “Breathe, Mrs. Rudolph. Breathe.” I took a deep inhale and exhale, hoping it would prove contagious, like a yawn.
It seemed to work. Arlene, too, took a deep shaky breath, and let it go. We breathed together for a few moments. I should have quit while I was ahead, but I decided to go one step further.
“That’s right,” I said. “Just feel what you’re feeling.”
She stiffened, aiming her words at the floor like darts. “How am I supposed to know what I’m feeling? One day I’m sitting here doing what I’ve done every day forever, and then my doorbell rings and I’ve got some strangers telling me my husband’s dead, maybe murdered, and now I’ve got another one saying somebody defiled him, tore off his skin!” She met my eyes, a wild-eyed look. “Can you imagine that?” Her voice rose. “Can you?”
“No,” I said. “There’s no way I could ever know how that felt.”
She ignored me and turned to Bill.
“Somebody cut his tattoo off his arm? Is that what you’re saying?”
Bill and I met eyes. Bingo.
“I’m afraid that’s it,” Bill said. “Please, Arlene, can you tell us about the tattoo?”
“Numbers,” she said. “Numbers.”
“Numbers? Do you happen to know what they were?”
“No,” she whispered. “No. I, I can’t . . . “ She started to twist the heavy gold wedding band on her finger. “It was wrong of Marv to violate his body like that. Terribly wrong. I told him so, but he wouldn’t listen.”<
br />
“Was this recent?”
“Two years ago.”
“And you’re sure you don’t remember the numbers?”
Her face cleared. “I wrote them down.” She excused herself and hurried upstairs.
“Violate his body? That seems a little harsh,” I said.
“I think tattoos are taboo for Jewish people,” Bill answered. “Same reason they don’t want autopsies . . . “
Arlene came back downstairs, a piece of lined note paper in her hand. She gave it to Bill. He copied some numbers off of it and handed the paper to me. I wrote them down as well: 481632.
She took back the paper and stared at the numbers. “Now I remember,” she said. In a singsong voice she recited, “Double four, makes eight. Double eight, makes sixteen. Double sixteen, makes thirty-two. I used to be a whiz at numbers when I was Marv’s bookkeeper, back in New York. When we were happy.”
She’s losing it, I thought.
“What do the numbers refer to?” Bill asked.
“I don’t know,” she said. “He wouldn’t tell me. He got angry that I didn’t already know. Know what? Know what?”
Bill studied her with the flat unsentimental gaze only acquired by being lied to a few thousand times. He turned to me and flared his eyes. I knew the look: I think she’s telling the truth. What do you think?
I nodded slightly to him. I agreed.
Mrs. Rudolph stared off into space. “Marv wasn’t the same after the tattoo. Something in him got . . . hard. I mean, he was always ambitious, but after that, there was no getting in. Pretty soon, all he thought about, cared about, was Hagar.”
Bill stiffened, on high alert. “I’m sorry? Hagar?”
I knew that name. Why did I know that name?
Arlene’s eyes flashed. “Loving Hagar! Loving Hagar! He was obsessed.”
“Who is Hagar?” Bill’s voice was gentle, but there was steel underneath.
Arlene said nothing.
“Ma’am, are you saying Marv was having an affair?”
She stared at Bill.
“You don’t know anything, do you?” she said, and that’s when the penny dropped for me.
I put my mouth close to Bill’s ear. “I’m pretty sure that’s the name of a film Marv was trying to produce,” I murmured. “Loving Hagar.”
“Oh. Great,” Bill muttered. “That’s just great.”
“Anyway, none of this matters now.” Arlene’s voice was dull.
“It matters if we’re to find out how your husband died. Who or what might be responsible . . . “ Bill answered.
“No. No, detective. That’s not important.”
I could almost hear Bill’s mental teeth grinding in frustration. Ever the diplomat, though, he said, “What is important, then, Arlene?”
Arlene picked at a loose thread on her cardigan. “How Marv lost his way,” she said. “How he got to a point in his life where somebody needed to kill him. How the sweet devout goofball salesman I married came to die a lonely, angry crook with too many enemies to count.” Her words hung in the air like storm clouds, fat with rain.
“I’m tired,” she said, the tears spilling over. “I have people coming, friends, from my temple, and my daughter will be home any minute. Can you leave me alone now?”
Bill hesitated. “Sorry, one last question.”
Her voice shook with exhaustion. “What is it?”
“You said crook a moment ago. Was your husband involved with criminals in some way?”
Now it was Bill’s turn to receive a long look, this time from the weary wife’s eyes. Arlene’s smile was bitter. “You must be joking, detective,” she said. “He was a movie producer.”
CHAPTER 6
As we stepped outside the house, a chorus of strident voices accosted Bill. “Detective Bohannon? Detective! Bill! Over here, Detective!” A fresh gaggle of photographers and news reporters had landed on the sidewalk in front of the Rudolphs’ lawn, no doubt hoping for a saleable glimpse of wifely grief.
They are vultures, I thought. Carrion-eaters. Useless, hateful creatures. My hands tightened into fists. I’d like to . . .
I caught myself mid-surge: righteous indignation is the straightest route I know toward blind ignorance and away from any possibility of insight.
Vultures, too, have their place in this world. They recycle rot, rot the rest of us help create.
Bill said, “How the hell did they find me here?” His phone beeped notice of an incoming text message. He checked his screen.
“Shit. I’m due at the airport right now. Martha’s parents land in half an hour.” He pushed through the media mass, tossing off “No comments,” jumped in his Taurus, and took off. A couple cars sped after him, and I smiled, imagining them tailing Bill all the way to the airport, praying for a scoop. Well, if any journalists actually made it there, Bill’s German mother-in-law would soon make schnitzel out of them.
The remaining reporters looked at me hopefully, but I didn’t register as anyone important, and they resumed their vigil on the house. As I walked to my car, I noticed the black Impala, parked a block and a half further ahead. I continued on foot, until I was next to it. A light-skinned African American slumped in the driver’s seat. Something pinged in my brain. I looked more closely. It was the photographer, the one from x17 who’d gotten into the dust-up with Marv. Clancy Williams, fast asleep. His front seat was crammed full of disturbingly familiar items: a laptop computer, empty fast food containers, crushed coffee cups, a pair of binoculars, and a digital camera with a huge telephoto lens. If I didn’t know differently, I’d have assumed he was a fellow PI, staking out Marv’s house.
In the back seat, I noted a banged-up boogie board, a well-thumbed catalog for high-end digital equipment, and a glossy trade magazine, American Cinematographer.
I tapped on the glass. He startled awake. We met eyes—his were bleary and suspicious. He lowered the window.
“Clancy Williams?” I said. He nodded, even warier. “My name is Tenzing Norbu. I’m a PI. Can we talk?”
He was momentarily distracted by another news van pulling up in front of the Rudolph house. He shrugged. “Why not,” he said. “I’ve obviously fucked up any chance at a grieving widow shot.”
Strike one, Clancy, I thought. One count of felon-ious insensitivity.
He cleared off the front seat, transferring the trash and equipment to the back, and released the door locks. I climbed inside. The car smelled faintly of fried potatoes and sweat.
I handed Clancy my business card. Mike had printed up a box of them for me after my Marv job, and I had taken to carrying some around, in anticipation of my actually getting licensed sometime this decade. Clancy studied my card, and I studied him. He was a good-looking fellow, despite the dark smudges of fatigue under his eyes. Early to mid-thirties, muscular, light brown skin, fine-featured, with a halo of curly black hair. When he looked up, I saw his eyes were hazel flecked with green.
He was a hybrid, just like me.
“Tenzing Norbu. What is that? Korean or something?”
Strike two.
“Tibetan,” I said.
Light flooded his features, evaporating the tiredness. He looked like a totally different person. “Tibet! Fuck, man, I’d sell my left nut to shoot there. I pretty much nailed a gig assistant-DP-ing a documentary about Tibet straight out of Alabama State. I mean for real, it was a lock.” His face fell. “But there was no green in it. None. Had to turn it down.” He shook his head. “Nope, this is me now. Chasing people down, exposing their shit, so other people can feed on it.”
I had never been this close to a vulture before. I wasn’t passing up the chance learn more. “Why do it, if that’s how you feel?”
He pulled out a pack of cigarettes and offered me one. I shook my head. “This is one of the few recession-proof jobs left, you know? People will give up their car payments before they give up the gossip. Why do I do it? Two words: Student. Loans. Lady Gaga and Madonna in a lip lock? Miley Cyrus sucking
on a bong? Fifty grand. Boom. Freedom! I am one big money shot away from getting out from under.” He lit his cigarette and cracked his window, dangling his hand outside, where the smoke spiraled into the blue sky. “Or I was, until I walked into that piece-of-shit firestorm called Marvin Rudolph. My agency dropped me, none of the others will touch me, and all my contacts have completely dried up. Even the other paps treat me like I’ve got herpes.” He stubbed out his cigarette. He’d hardly taken a puff.
“Trying to quit,” he said, at my look. “I got a little girl now. Meanwhile, the competition keeps getting worse. Ever since Rupert Murdoch’s people got nailed, we’ve been swamped by European scumbags willing to do whatever it takes to claw their way in. Used to be, you could make six, even eight K a month. Now?” He shook his head. “Jesus, listen to me. Whining like a baby. So. What’s your story?”
“I’m a private investigator,” I said, leaving out the “licensed” part. “I did a job for Marv Rudolph a while back. Right now I’m helping a friend investigate his death.” Enough truth to satisfy, I hoped.
“That’s cool,” he said. “Listen, man, I didn’t mean to sound so harsh about Marv. I feel for his wife, a-right? She seemed like a nice lady, the few times I saw them together. But that dude? He was nothing but bad news. So, yeah, I mean, I came straight here soon as I read he’d bought it. I already knew where he lived, a-right? I wasn’t going to harass Mrs. Rudolph or anything. I was just hoping for a ‘human interest’ shot, before the others showed up. Make a few bucks, ahead of the herd.”
I nodded. I now had my own herd of 30,000 private dicks to compete with.
“Truth, dawg? My heart isn’t in this anymore. I just want to pay off my loans, so I can maybe start doing some good in the world with my camera. Make my wife and kid proud of me.”
I couldn’t believe it. I was starting to relate to this guy. A hairline fracture weakened my rock-hard prejudice against paparazzi, and a crazy idea snuck inside. My scalp tingled, a sure sign I should pay attention.
“Listen, Clancy,” I said. “I’m just getting started in my business, you know? And the thing is, I could use another set of eyes.”
The Second Rule of Ten Page 5
