“You really believe that?” Frost asked.
“Talk to some of these kids sometime,” Burbank replied. “It’s very revealing.”
“I guess it must be.”
“Then there’s my second theory, Reuben. We—you and me—just caught the end of Prohibition. But I remember what it was like, don’t you? We worked hard, sure, but we were out every chance we got. Party as often as possible. Drink yourself silly. Even when you really didn’t want to. Remember? Liquor was the forbidden fruit, the tempting apple everybody reached for. No great harm done—lots of fun. Except too many people became drunks. Ruined their health, caused hell for their families, lost their jobs. Remember, Reuben?”
“Yes, oh, yes.”
“Well, somehow drugs have taken the place of bathtub gin. Cocaine is the new forbidden fruit, the new temptation. Recreational drugs, they call them. Fine. Great. Big party. Except once again there are the Reymans, who go too far and die, and the others who end up emotional and physical wrecks. Just like when we were growing up, except the forbidden fruit has changed. And I don’t think for the better.”
“Bill, you certainly have given me something to think about,” Frost said. “You have to be right. There must be dope-takers at Chase & Ward. I’ll pay more attention from now on.”
“Is this thing you claim is going to be resolved got to do with drugs?” Burbank asked.
“In part,” Frost said. “But I’m afraid it’s not that simple.”
Burbank’s secretary came in and announced that Detective Bautista was waiting. The banker asked him to come in and told his secretary to get the picture of Reyman.
“You know each other, I gather?” Burbank asked.
“Oh, yes,” Bautista said.
“We got to know each other when Graham Donovan died,” Frost explained.
“Oh, I get it,” Burbank said. “Well, I’m glad to make your acquaintance, Mr. Bautista. Your friend Mr. Frost has been very tight-lipped about what’s going on. I assume I won’t have any better luck getting information out of you?”
“I’m afraid that’s so, sir,” Bautista said. “But be patient. I hope everything will be cleared up very shortly.”
“Well, I’m glad I could be of help.”
“By the way, I want to take with me the promissory note Reuben—Mr. Frost—mentioned on the telephone. I’ll give you a receipt for it,” Bautista said.
The transaction was completed and Bautista and Frost left the room. They stood together at the elevators, talking in low voices.
“Are you going home?” Bautista asked.
“I guess so. Either there or to the Gotham Club.”
“Would you mind going home? I couldn’t get Cynthia before, and I’d really like that picture of Maywood. I assume you can find it?”
“It’s Cynthia’s department, but I think I can.”
“Good. I’ll give you a ride. Once I get the picture, I’m going over to the bank myself and see what I can find out.”
Bautista, after collecting the photograph of Veronica May-wood, went to the First Fiduciary branch at Second Avenue and Sixty-ninth Street and asked for the manager. A slight, middle-aged man with a prissy manner appeared, introduced himself as Lewis Frazier, and asked how he could help Bautista.
“I am Detective Bautista of the Police Department,” he said, showing his badge. “I talked to you this morning, sir, about Bernard Reyman and any currency transaction involving Bernard Reyman.”
“Oh, yes.”
“Did you find anything?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact I did,” Frazier said.
“A forty-seven eighty-nine?”
“Yes.”
“May I see it?”
“Now, look here, Officer. Your people put us to a lot of trouble last week, giving us a whole list of names to check against our records, scaring our tellers half to death, and so on. I really don’t think I’m going to do anything further about our records until I have a letter from the Commissioner.”
“The Police Commissioner?” Bautista asked.
Frazier nodded.
“You’ve got to be kidding.”
“I’m only going by the rules, Mr. Bautista. It’s what the Federal regulations say. We can only show currency-transaction reports to a state or local agency when requested by the head of that agency.”
“Mr. Frazier—may I call you Lew?—I appreciate your position. But please appreciate mine. We are involved with a murder investigation here, and one where time is important. I can spend the rest of today, and probably the weekend, trying to get you a letter from the Police Commissioner.”
“I would like that very much.”
“But I’m not going to do it, Lew. Lewis. Correct me if I’m wrong, Lewis, but I believe First Fiduciary just paid a fine of some three million dollars to the Treasury Department for failing to report cash transactions, for failing to file forty-seven eighty-nines. So don’t talk to me about the rules. And second, if I have to delay my investigation until Monday because of some goddamn letter, I can assure you I won’t come back alone Monday morning. There will be a squad of detectives here asking your depositors where they got the money they’re putting in their accounts.”
“But you couldn’t do that! We’d have you thrown out!” Frazier said with great indignation.
“Fine. Then we’ll ask them when they leave the bank. ‘Excuse me, madam, I notice you just came out of the friendly Fiduciary Bank. I’m from the Police Department and I’d like to ask you a couple of questions. Did you make a deposit just now? You did? Let me ask you, and I apologize for the impertinence, but did your deposit have anything to do with a bordello operation? Or pornographic movies? Or drugs?…’”
“Okay, okay. Let me get the form. But all this is highly irregular.” Frazier went off in great dudgeon, but returned with the branch’s copy of a form 4789, which he handed to Bautista. The detective read it carefully, noting with some excitement that it was dated the same day—March 2—as the promissory note from Maywood to Reyman. The form, signed by a teller named Lucy Menotti, indicated that $24,000 had been withdrawn by Reyman on that date, in bills of at least $100 denomination, the withdrawal being made from his money-market account.
“This is very interesting and very helpful, Lew,” Bautista said. “Is Miss Menotti here?”
“Yes, she is. But this is our busy time of day. Couldn’t you come back later?”
“No, I could not. And if she cooperates, I’ll only be talking to her for about three minutes.”
“I suppose I have no choice. Wait over there in my office,” Frazier said, gesturing to a small cubicle in the corner. Within a minute, a diminutive and not terribly friendly-looking woman came in and introduced herself.
“Miss Menotti, this will only take a few moments, I’m sure. Is this your signature here on this form?” Bautista showed her the forty-seven eighty-nine concerning the Reyman transaction.
“Yes, it is.”
“Do you remember the transaction? Do you remember Mr. Reyman?”
“I don’t, really.”
“Even though this transaction involved twenty-four thousand dollars in cash and you had to do up this report, you still don’t remember it?” Bautista pressed.
“No, I’m afraid not.”
“Even though it says here, right here on the form, that you verified Mr. Reyman’s identity by looking at his driver’s license?”
“That’s right. We have lots of these transactions, you know. Twenty-four thousand dollars is probably a lot of money to you, but we have large transactions all the time, every day.”
This was not going to be easy, Bautista thought. “May I say, Miss Menotti, this is a matter of great importance to us. We have reason to believe that the money Mr. Reyman withdrew back in March was used to hire a murderer. So every detail is important.”
“I wish I could help you, Officer, but I don’t recall this transaction at all.”
“Perhaps this will refresh your recollection, Miss
Menotti,” Bautista said, producing the photograph of Reyman.
The woman studied the likeness carefully. “Oh, yes. It comes back to me a little. Yes, he was the man. Came in here in the morning, almost first thing, I remember, and wanted twenty-four thousand dollars in one-hundred-dollar bills. I had a deuce of a time getting that amount together, but I did. He was very patient.”
“Do you remember anything else about the transaction? Was Reyman nervous?”
“No, he was patient, as I said. He had to wait, oh, probably five minutes while we got the money together. Then there was the business of checking his I.D., and all that.”
“Was he pleasant? Was he laughing?”
“No, he wasn’t laughing. He was just polite and patient.”
“Was he alone?”
“I don’t honestly remember,” Miss Menotti said.
“Was he perhaps with this woman?” Bautista asked, showing the picture of Veronica Maywood.
“That rings a bell,” the teller said. “Yes, he was with a woman. She was right in line with him. Squeezed his hand once or twice. It comes back to me now. He actually had her take the money.”
“And was it the woman in this picture?”
“It sure looks like her, but I can’t be a hundred percent sure.”
“Do you think you could recognize her if you saw her again?”
“I think probably.”
“Then let me just make certain I’ve got everything straight, Miss Menotti. On the morning of March 2, Mr. Reyman, accompanied by a woman, who was more than likely the woman in the picture I showed you, withdrew twenty-four thousand dollars from his money-market account. The money was in hundred-dollar bills and he had to wait several minutes while you got it together. The woman was with him the whole time and occasionally squeezed his hand. When he got the money, he gave it to her. Is that all correct, Miss Menotti?”
“Yes, that sounds right.”
“And you would be prepared to swear to all this in court, if necessary?”
“Yes, I believe I would.”
“That’s all, Miss Menotti,” Bautista concluded. “Oh. Just one more thing. This woman didn’t give Mr. Reyman a piece of paper at any time, did she? A sheet of paper with writing on it?”
“No, I didn’t see anything like that.”
“Very good. Thank you for your help, Miss Menotti.”
Bautista felt there was no harm in asking about the promissory note. But he was not surprised, or disappointed, at the answer he got; after all, he had been quite lucky in what he had already discovered that morning and he shouldn’t, he told himself, be greedy.
Luis Bautista used the branch manager’s telephone to set up his next action and to call for assistance. Within two hours, the detective, armed with a search warrant and accompanied by two other policemen, went to Veronica Maywood’s apartment on West Seventy-third Street.
The ballerina was not in, but the superintendent unlocked her door for them. Within another hour they found what they were looking for. Twelve thousand dollars in one-hundred-dollar bills, concealed in a box tucked under the springs of Veronica Maywood’s bed.
22
LOOSE ENDS
Reuben Frost was in a state of exhilaration after receiving a call at home from Luis Bautista that Friday afternoon. The person who had hired Clifton Holt’s murderer was unquestionably discovered, and discovered without frenzied disruption to NatBallet.
At Bautista’s request, Frost tried discreetly to find out May-wood’s whereabouts through the NatBallet office. He learned that she was out of town, making a guest appearance in Pittsburgh. But she was scheduled to return the next day and to dance with NatBallet Saturday evening. Ironically, the role she was to dance on Saturday was the lead in Paganini Variations, perhaps Holt’s greatest ballet and the most important part the choreographer had ever created for Maywood.
He relayed his intelligence to Bautista, who cursed at the complication of Maywood’s absence. Since the NatBallet office did not know when or on what flight she would return, Bautista decided that the best course would be to stake out her apartment building and arrest her when she arrived.
“I don’t see any point in making a big stink in Pittsburgh,” Bautista said. “We’ll just have a welcoming committee waiting for her when she gets to West Seventy-third Street. Will you be home during the day?”
“I’ll be right here,” Frost replied. But then he had another idea and corrected his statement. “I’ll be here off and on. I may have some other appointments. But one of us will certainly be around.”
“I’ll be in touch,” Bautista said, ringing off.
Frost immediately called Andrea Turnbull. Except for their brief conversation at the Holt memorial, he had not talked to her since she had made her ridiculous proposal about her role in the Company earlier in the week. There was no question that he would reject it; the well-being of the Company—not to say of his marriage—required it. The financial difficulty that the withdrawal of Turnbull’s support would create would be severe, but he was sure that with some extra effort new sources of funding could be found. And continuing on the terms she had dictated could only lead to the diminution—if not the destruction—of the Company’s reputation.
Now that the criminal-justice system would not be solving the Turnbull problem for him, the sooner he confronted the woman the better. Reaching her on the line, he asked if she would be free for lunch the next day or, failing that, would have some time to see him in the afternoon. Turnbull declined lunch—to Frost’s relief—but said she would be happy to see him at his convenience Saturday afternoon. Two-thirty was finally agreed upon as the time, Turnbull’s apartment the place.
Frost then called Arthur Mattison at the Press. Could the critic meet him for drinks at their club Saturday afternoon? Mattison readily agreed, but fought like a terrier to find out the purpose of Frost’s unusual invitation.
“I just have a couple of things I wanted to chat with you about, Arthur,” Frost said, enigmatically. “I’ll see you in the bar around five.”
Andrea Turnbull was wearing one of her ill-fitting discount-store dresses, this time in a paisley print, when she let Frost into her Beekman Place apartment.
“I’m sorry I couldn’t have lunch today, Reuben,” she said. “I already had a commitment,” she added, without further explanation. Given her raiment, Frost doubted this, but he let the matter pass.
“That’s quite all right,” Frost said. There was something different about the apartment, he thought as he sat down in the ill-kept living room. Then he realized what it was: no loud music and no stale reminders of marijuana.
“How is your son?” he asked.
“Oh, he’s gone off to Florida with some friends. They’re having a little holiday.”
Florida seemed a long way from the University of Maine, but he kept still. Instead, he got down to his distasteful business.
“Andrea, I’ve given a lot of thought to what you said the other day about NatBallet,” he began, telling a slight lie about the consideration given to her proposal. “I’ve also had a chance to discuss it with some other members of the Board,” he added, telling another lie.
“Before I give you our answer, Andrea, perhaps I ought to review a little history,” he continued. “NatBallet was started over a decade ago, as you know, by a group of very dedicated people, including my wife, Cynthia, and Clifton Holt. They were determined to start a Company that would enable young artists to excel, to develop an eclectic repertoire of the best ballets wherever they could be found, and to provide Clifton with a base from which he could develop his own choreography. Financially it was not easy, since so many individuals with money and so many institutions were already committed to the other major companies with better-established records. But we did it—we begged and scraped and cajoled, and we got support.
“On the artistic side, we were very lucky. We brought along good dancers—first the famous American ‘defectors,’ and then more and more young ones
just out of school. And we had the luxury of having Clifton’s prodigious output, which has given the Company a unique body of work.”
Turnbull, sitting opposite Frost, shifted uneasily in her chair. Frost ignored her signal and continued his explanation.
“We have always tried—and we’ve been pretty damn successful—to keep the financial side of things and the artistic side separate. Oh, sure, Clifton and Cynthia had to beg and grovel with the rest of us to attract donors, but never, ever have those donors had any control over what works are performed and who dances them. The result has been an artistic reputation that just keeps growing—to the point, I think, where NatBallet can hold its head up with the very best companies around today.
“I know I sound a little like I’m making a sales pitch, but I wanted to emphasize to you, Andrea, a basic principle that’s been absolutely essential to the integrity of the Company.
“We have been deeply grateful for your part in making the Company what it is today. I don’t want there to be any mistake about that. But I—we—do not see how, in good conscience, we can appoint you co-Artistic Director. I know you love the ballet and that you’ve had administrative experience running that group up in Syracuse. But we simply cannot—”
“Reuben, let me interrupt. It’s obvious what you’re going to tell me. You don’t want me involved with NatBallet. You’ll be happy to take my money, just as long as I keep my mouth shut. Clifton’s death hasn’t changed a thing. He wouldn’t have anything to do with me—and now you won’t either. That’s fine. I now know where you stand. And you know where I stand. I have told you that quite clearly. So let’s just say that NatBallet will not see another dime of my money. It’s that simple.” Andrea Turnbull’s face had turned a mottled red. She was extremely angry and was having difficulty controlling herself. But having started to administer the coup de grâce to her lunatic ambition, Frost had to continue.
“Andrea, I’m sorry to disappoint you. And sorry about the way you feel. To my mind—though I can’t speak as a rich philanthropist, because I’m simply not one—supporting NatBallet is one of the finest things that a rich, cultivated person can do. I know there are those who say charity should go to the hungry and the homeless. I’m all for that too. But if there isn’t support for those things that make us civilized, that represent the best part of our natures and our culture, then what kind of a society would we have? Cynthia said the other night—I don’t mean to quote my wife, but she was right—that NatBallet, and companies like it, are civilizing. And perhaps can reach at least some of the Jimmy Wilsons of tomorrow. And can expose not only New York but some of this country west of Manhattan to beauty and wonderful artistry. You are in a position to help make that possible, and it will be regrettable if you decline to do so.”
Murder Takes a Partner Page 22
