Until Proven Guilty jpb-1

by J. A. Jance

  We called from a pay phone and were directed to a real estate office on the back side of Queen Anne. Our good fortune continued. The listing agent happened to be in. She remembered the owner well. He had been transferred to London with Western Electric. He had been in a hurry to pack and move. His company bought up the equity in his house, and he had held a gigantic moving sale early in March, unloading everything but the bare essentials. It had been a good sale. A bike might have been one of the items sold. Dead end.

  This job is like that. You take a slender lead and do your best with it. Sometimes it pays off, sometimes not. You have to take the good with the bad. We called Watkins to let him know we had come up empty-handed. He told us the preliminary report had come in on the Faith Tabernacle murders. Ballistics tests showed the weapon to be a.38. It was hardly a quantum leap toward identifying the killer. Watkins also said Carstogi had called and wanted to see us.

  We went to the Warwick. A detective sat at the end of the seventh-floor hallway. Powell and Watkins were making sure Carstogi didn’t go anywhere without an escort.

  We knocked. Carstogi opened the door. He looked a little shaken. “Have you seen the paper?” he asked.

  “I don’t read papers,” I said.

  Peters shook his head. “I didn’t have time.”

  “Look,” Carstogi said bleakly.

  Peters read aloud. “”Police have sequestered the father of Friday’s slain child in connection with the subsequent double murder of the child’s mother and minister.

  “”Andrew M. Carstogi, being detained in an undisclosed downtown location, arrived in town Sunday evening and was involved in a confrontation at Faith Tabernacle in Ballard during the day on Monday.

  “”The church in the Loyal Heights area was the scene of two gangland-style murders that occurred later that night. Dead are Pastor Michael Brodie, age forty-nine, and his parishioner, Suzanne Barstogi, Carstogi’s estranged wife. The woman’s age has not been released.

  “”Arlo Hamilton, Seattle Police public information officer, said that detectives are searching for a bicycle that may have been used by the killer in making his escape.

  “”Barstogi and Carstogi, whose exact marital status is unclear, lost their only child, Angela, on Friday. She was the victim of a brutal homicide that occurred in Discovery Park. That incident is still under investigation. No arrests have been made in that slaying and police officials refuse to say whether or not Carstogi is a suspect in either the church murders or the death of the child.

  “”Inquiries in Chicago, former location of Faith Tabernacle, revealed that the group, a fundamentalist sect, left Illinois under a cloud after accusations of physical violence and alleged child abuse. At least one of the violent incidents involved Carstogi, but none of the alleged charges against the group were subsequently proven.

  “”Interviews with Suzanne Barstogi prior to her death gave no hint of any dissatisfaction or disagreement within the Faith Tabernacle organization. She expressed gratitude that the entire congregation had stood by her during the period of the loss of her child.

  “”An unidentified airline revealed that Carstogi was a passenger on a flight that arrived at Seattle’s Sea-Tac International Airport Sunday night, where he was reported to have been inebriated. He was overheard making threatening statements regarding Brodie. Carstogi allegedly held the minister responsible for the loss of his wife and child.

  “”He reportedly left the airport in the company of two homicide investigators, Detectives Ronald A. Peters and J. P. Beaumont, who are assigned to the murder investigation of Carstogi’s daughter.

  “”Funeral arrangements for Brodie and Barstogi are pending with the Mount Pleasant Mortuary, where a spokesman indicated the bodies will probably be returned to Chicago for burial.“”

  Peters folded the paper when he finished.

  “There’s more,” said Carstogi. “Look on page seventeen.”

  Obligingly Peters reopened the paper. “The top corner,” Carstogi said.

  Peters glanced at me over the top of the paper. “It’s Cole’s column,” he said.

  “Read it.”

  “”Who is the Lady in Red? The mysterious lady, although that may be a title she doesn’t deserve, first appeared in a red dress, driving a red Porsche, and carrying a red rose at the funeral of Angela Barstogi, Seattle’s five-year-old murder victim. The lady has since been seen several times in the company of Detective J. P. Beaumont, the homicide investigator assigned to the case.

  “”Seen last in a red sweatsuit in an area restaurant, she became verbally abusive when questioned about her connection to the case. She was accompanied by Detective Beaumont at the time.

  “”Because you, my faithful readers, are the eyes and ears of Seattle, I would appreciate knowing about this lady and why Seattle’s finest are keeping her under wraps.“” Peters handed me the paper. Next to the column was a picture of Anne Corley as she had appeared at the funeral, tears streaming unchecked down her face.

  “Who is she?” Carstogi asked. “What does she have to do with all this?”

  “Nothing,” I said. “We’ve checked her out. She’s collecting data for a book on violent crimes with young victims.”

  “But he says you’ve been seen together.”

  “We happened to hit it off, just like you and that girl did the other night, except she’s not a professional. Understand?”

  Carstogi looked chagrined. “Yeah, I understand.”

  I was furious at Maxwell Cole. It was one thing to keep my professional life under the bright light of public scrutiny. It was another to expose my personal life, to make my relationship with Anne a topic of casual breakfast conversation.

  “I think you’d better hurry up and remember anything you can about that date you had the other night,” Peters was saying to Carstogi. “We’re looking for a needle in a haystack, but with what you’ve given us, we don’t know what kind of needle or which county the haystack’s in.” He shook the folded newspaper in Carstogi’s direction for emphasis. “Detective Beaumont may not think you’re the one who killed Brodie and Suzanne, but he’s going to have one hell of a time convincing us.”

  “I already told you. Her name was Gloria. That’s all I know,” Carstogi said, caving in under Peters’ implied threat.

  “Try to remember where you went.” Peters pressed his advantage, finally getting through Carstogi’s reluctance to a bedrock of fear beneath.

  “I was kind of drunk. I think we drove over a long bridge.”

  “In a cab, a car?”

  “A cab. I think I came back in the same one the next morning.”

  “Pickup-and-delivery prostitution,” Peters muttered. “Where did you go?” he continued. “A motel? A house?”

  “It was a house, I guess. I didn’t pay much attention. A man came out to the cab and took my money, then Gloria and I went inside, into a bedroom.”

  “What about the cab?” I asked. “Do you remember anything about it?”

  “No. It was blue or maybe gray. The guy chewed gum. He was a big guy, dark hair, kinda oily. That’s all I remember.”

  “Nothing other than that?”

  “No.” Carstogi shook his head.

  I looked at Peters. “What say we take him for a spin and see if he can lead us back to the little love nest?”

  “You do that,” Peters said. “Drop me at the department. I’ll see if vice has been able to dig anything up.”

  Carstogi came with us reluctantly. There had been some photographers outside the hotel when we went in, and we attempted to avoid them by leaving through the garage. We weren’t entirely successful. Maxwell Cole’s sidekick from the funeral caught us as Carstogi climbed into the backseat.

  Once in the car Carstogi seemed more dazed than anything. “Why does everyone think I did it?” he asked.

  “For one thing, your alibi isn’t worth a shit,” Peters told him. “And the place where the bike was found is well within walking distance of the Warwic
k. But most important, you’re the guy with the motive. Our finding your friend Gloria is probably your one chance to avoid a murder indictment. You’d better hope to God we can find her.”

  “Oh,” Carstogi said. From the look on his face, Carstogi was beginning to grasp the seriousness of his situation.

  After dropping Peters off, Carstogi and I headed north on Highway 99. Aurora Avenue, as it is called in the city, has its share of flop-houses and late-night recreational facilities. Carstogi recognized the Aurora Bridge, but that was all. He had no idea where they had turned off. He and Gloria had apparently played kissyface in the backseat. He said he dozed on the way back, that he didn’t remember any landmarks. We wound through the narrow streets around Phinney Ridge and Fre-mont, to no avail.

  “If I could just remember something about that cab,” Carstogi said, more to himself than to me.

  “I wouldn’t count too heavily on that,” I countered.

  “Why not?”

  “Prostitution is illegal in this state. If they say you were with them, they’ll blow their little business wide open. I’d guess, from the sound of it, that they’re probably a group of free-lancers, independents. If we don’t get them, the Mafia will.”

  “You mean they’d lie and say I wasn’t with them?”

  I looked at Andrew Carstogi with some sympathy. The young man seemed ill-equipped to deal with the real world.

  “That’s exactly what I mean.”

  Carstogi hunched miserably in the front seat. “But I didn’t do it. I would have taken her back. I wanted to kill Brodie, but never Suzanne. I still loved her.”

  I shook my head at my own stubbornness. “Alibi or no, I believe you.”

  “Thanks,” Carstogi said, his voice crackling over the word.

  “It’s cold comfort,” I acknowledged. “That and fifty cents will get you a cup of coffee.”

  “Not at the Warwick.”

  I laughed at his small joke, and he did too. I think he felt a little better when I dropped him off, but I didn’t. I figured it wouldn’t be long before the room at the Warwick would be traded for somewhat plainer accommodations in the city jail.

  Chapter 16

  I stopped by the Doghouse and had a cup of coffee after I dropped Carstogi at the hotel. I talked with the waitresses, the cashier, the bartender. I asked them all the same thing. Did they know of a gum-chewing cabbie who might be involved in a prostitution ring? No one mentioned anybody right off, but then I didn’t expect them to. I had at least gotten the word out. That was worth something.

  The apartment was close by. I went up just in case Anne was there. She wasn’t, although the subtle fragrance of her perfume lingered in the room. I lingered too, drinking it in. Anne Corley secondhand was better than no Anne Corley at all.

  I went back to the department. There was a message on my desk saying that Peters, Watkins, and Powell were having a meeting in Powell’s office. I was expected to join them as soon as I returned. I looked at my watch. It was four-forty on Wednesday afternoon. It didn’t take a Philadelphia lawyer to figure out what the topic of discussion might be. If we arrested Carstogi right then, he wouldn’t stand a chance of getting out before Monday. By the time his seventy-two hours were up, it would be right in the middle of the weekend.

  “Where’ve you been?” Powell growled as I came into the room.

  “With Carstogi. We were looking for the place he went night before last.”

  “I’ve checked with vice, Beau,” Peters said. “Gloria seems to be a popular professional name these days. At least ten have been booked for soliciting in the past three months. How about bringing Carstogi in to look at our pinup collection? Of course, all of them will just jump at the chance to have the book thrown at them one more time.”

  “I’ll bet they will,” I said.

  “Look,” Watkins interjected. “This Gloria story won’t hold water and you know it. Why’re you so dead set against Carstogi being our suspect?”

  “He didn’t do it,” I insisted.

  “Oh, for Chrissakes!” Powell was exasperated. “Whose side are you on, Beaumont? He’s got motive, no alibi, physical proximity. What more do you want? I say book him. We’ll never get a confession out of him while he’s down at the Warwick living in the fucking lap of luxury. What if he blows town while we’re standing around arguing about it? Let’s get him in here and ask him some bare bones questions.”

  “What about Brother Benjamin?” I countered. “He lives nearby. Did we get anything back from Illinois on him? What if he had the same kind of beef with Brodie that Carstogi did?”

  Watkins shuffled through a sheaf of papers. “Benjamin Mason alias Clinton Jason. Wonderful guy. Ex-junkie, ex-small-time hood. According to this, he stopped being in trouble about the time he hooked up with Brodie. At least there haven’t been any arrests since then.”

  “Is that when he stopped renewing his driver’s license?” Peters asked.

  Watkins consulted the paper. “Looks that way. How’d you know that?”

  Peters shrugged. “Lucky guess,” he said.

  Powell had been sitting quietly. “Now wait a minute. What’s all this about Brother Benjamin? You got anything solid that points to him?”

  “We’ve got as much on him as we do on Carstogi,” I said.

  “Brother Benjamin didn’t have a plane reservation to leave town yesterday. Carstogi did. I want him in here for questioning. Is that clear?” Powell was in no mood for argument.

  “It’s clear, all right.” I could see I was out-gunned. “But I think you’re making a hell of a mistake.”

  A newspaper had been lying open on Powell’s desk. He picked it up. “Talk about mistakes. Since when do investigators become personally involved with someone from a current case? Maxwell Cole is having a field day. Who is this broad anyway?”

  “She’s an author,” I said maybe a tad too quickly. “She’s collecting material for a book. That’s why she was at the funeral. It has nothing to do with the investigation.”

  “Right,” Powell said, dragging the word out sarcastically. “If you’re going to have a little roll in the hay, I’d suggest you do it a little less publicly.”

  Peters rose to his feet, placing himself between Powell’s words and my flaring temper. “All right, we’ll go down and bring him in,” he said.

  We waited for an elevator. I was still fuming. “You know, Powell does have a point,” Peters said. “Maybe you should cool it for a while.”

  “Mind your own fucking business,” I muttered.

  We started for the Warwick in silence. In my fifteen years on homicide, I’ve developed a gut instinct. I know when it’s right, and when it isn’t. This wasn’t. Carstogi wasn’t a killer. He didn’t have the killer instinct, the solid steel core it takes to pull the trigger. I knew I did. I had done it once. Maybe it takes one to know one.

  “Wait,” I said. “I want to go see Jeremiah. Before we pick up Carstogi.”

  Peters clicked his tongue. “You are one stubborn son-of-a-bitch, Beaumont. I’ll say that for you.” But he headed for Ballard.

  The traffic was snarled on Fifteenth. We had to wait for the drawbridge. “You almost blew it on the driver’s license thing,” I said. “The only way you could have put that together was from the sermon on the tape.”

  “Sorry,” Peters said.

  I had written Jeremiah’s address in my notebook. We found it without difficulty. Jeremiah was sitting on the front steps of a tiny bungalow. He watched us get out of the car.

  “Your folks in there?” I asked, approaching the steps where he was sitting.

  He shook his head without getting up. I sat down beside him. “I’m here alone,” he said.

  “How are things?”

  He shrugged. “Okay, I guess.”

  “You been in any more hot water?”

  “Probably am now,” he said. I knew he meant for talking to us.

  “Were your folks both home Monday night?”

  “You
mean after we left the church?”

  I nodded. He continued. “Someone asked me that yesterday. I already told him.”

  “Tell me, Jeremiah.”

  “We were maybe the last ones to leave. Mom and I waited in the car for a long time.”

  “Was your stepfather upset when he came to the car?”

  Jeremiah nodded gravely. “He and Mom had a big fight. They yelled at each other.”

  “What did they fight about?”

  “Someone at church.”

  “What did they say?”

  He called one of the ladies a…“ He groped for the word.

  “A whore.”

  “Which one, do you know?”

  “Sister Suzanne.”

  “Do you know if he left the house again? Later?”

  “I don’t know. I went to sleep.”

  Peters had been listening to this exchange. Now he became a part of it. “Does anyone call Benjamin Uncle Charlie? Have you ever heard that?”

  Jeremiah shook his head.

  “You ever hear of an Uncle Charlie?”

  “Only Angel’s.”

  “Does he belong to Faith Tabernacle? Is he a member?”

  “No. I never saw him. Angel said he lived far away from here. She said he was nice, that he promised sometime he’d take her for a ride in his van. Some of the other kids thought she made him up.”

  We asked Jeremiah for more details, but he clammed up. He kept watching the street nervously, as though afraid his folks might drive up any minute. We beat a hasty retreat so they wouldn’t see us talking to him. I didn’t want them to know we had been there. I didn’t want Jeremiah to have to suffer any consequences.

  When we got in the car, Peters asked, “Where to?”

  “I guess we go pick up Carstogi.”

  Peters started the motor. “You think Benjamin’s voice is the one we heard, not Carstogi’s?”

  “I don’t know what to think,” I replied.

  Carstogi wasn’t surprised to see us. I think he knew it was inevitable. When we came into the room he was sitting on the side of the bed, shoulders hunched, face buried in his hands.