Mixed Up With Murder

by Susan C. Shea

  “Yes. We lucked out. He doesn’t have much time, but he said if we could be quick, he’d see us. Is there anything he shouldn’t know?”

  I thought for a minute, trying to make sense of Dickie’s question. “Of course not. What do you mean? Are you asking if I’ve done something wrong, like something illegal?”

  “Not exactly,” he said in a placating voice that meant, yes, that’s precisely what he meant.

  “No. I need to tell him about the accident, and some other things I’m learning. I need some advice.”

  “You mean you’ve gotten yourself mixed up in a dangerous situation again? How do you do it, Dani?” His voice rose. “I mean, think about it. How many people outside of war zones find themselves in the predicaments you do?” He pulled the car up to the curb outside the law office and turned off the ignition.

  “That’s not fair,” I said into the sudden silence. “I can’t help it if some of the people I meet get into trouble, or turn out not to be nice. The girl who got shot the other day was sweet, but I didn’t even know her two weeks ago. I hardly even met the man who drowned. I only want to make sure I do everything I can to help in the investigation.”

  Dickie made a noise I remembered from my years of living with him. Part snort, part gargle, it meant I had said something he thought was open to interpretation and that his interpretation was that I wasn’t being completely logical. Irritated, I turned to open the door.

  “How do I get out of this thing?” If there was something as old fashioned and ordinary as a handle on the doorframe, I couldn’t see it. To make my embarrassment complete, when I looked out the window, my nose was about as high off the street as the nose of the little poodle staring at me as he pranced past on the end of a leash. I wanted to explain to the smiling passersby that it was only because of my sore neck that Dickie had to haul me out of the Ferrari’s passenger seat.

  CHAPTER 22

  Soothed somewhat by a mug of tea and Quentin Dalstrop’s leather conference room chair, I tried to organize my thoughts while we waited for him. If Gabby was one topic, Coe Anderson’s hostility and ultimatum another, and the accident was the third, how much could I say was connected? In my gut, I knew they were. To explain why, I’d have to share everything I knew about the Margoletti gift. What I wanted most to know was when I could leave Bridgetown and get back to the relative calm of San Francisco.

  Quentin answered at least part of the question by telling me that the chief of police was a smart man and knew I had no motive for killing the young researcher. My biggest value might be supplying a motive for someone else. In fact, when he spoke with the chief, he learned they wanted me to come in yet again, this afternoon. I protested but Quentin said he’d go with me and let his junior attorneys handle some of his pre-trial research.

  It was time to talk about my project, the key to everything that had happened. After all, I was the only person who knew what papers had been on the copier, and could testify that whoever killed Gabby had been careful to take all of them when he bolted. Taking a deep breath, I plunged in. I must have talked for fifteen minutes straight. Dickie tried to interrupt a couple of times, but Quentin held up his hand in a stop sign, and my ex bit his tongue. Quentin scribbled notes to himself now and then, but mostly listened, his eyes fastened on my face. When I wound down by recounting my conversations with Suzy’s cousin, the Loros attorney, and the dean, Quentin shook his head.

  “That’s some story, Dani. I think you’re right. There have to be connections and you were right to tell the police about Margoletti. If I’m getting it straight, though, you’re not sure what’s so damaging in the research that anyone would kill to keep it from coming out?”

  “That’s the problem. For a while, I thought perhaps the paintings that aren’t accounted for properly had been stolen before they wound up in his hands, but I researched online and there aren’t any stolen paintings by these artists that show up in stories.”

  “Maybe they’re fakes,” Dickie said.

  “I wondered about that too, but the auction catalogs are detailed. It doesn’t mean they couldn’t be fooled, but these are experts and I’d bet against it.”

  “Anything else jump out in the research files?” Quentin said, chewing on his pencil.

  “Only that Margoletti has a somewhat shaded reputation and that he has huge positions in investor stock at a handful of private companies. If any or all of those companies fail, his asset base will be seriously undercut. If there’s anything he took part in that leads to a scandal, his name on the building might not be such a good thing, PR-wise. Someone tried to scare me, the dean’s mad as hell at me right now, and they’re prepared to go ahead without a recommendation from me even if that upsets the college’s board. These guys are rushing to get this deal done before I dig deeper.”

  Quentin worried his lower lip with his teeth. “Did you come across information about Margoletti having a criminal record? What I’m getting at is that if he has any history of physical coercion or violence that brought him to the attention of the police, the cops here will see him as a person of interest.”

  “No, nothing.” Even as I said no, however, an idea began to take hold in my brain. Could the paintings given to Margoletti by the company founders have been a way of laundering money? Maybe Margoletti was moving illegal funds for a client through his art collection. Dickie liked the notion but Quentin was dubious. “I’m not saying there aren’t attorneys who get involved in illegal activities, but it doesn’t compute for this guy. He’s already rich, famous, and from what you say, immensely powerful.”

  Dickie was up and pacing the room. “Do you really trust the cops here? Would they take on the local college president or a rich man? You know what I mean.”

  “I do,” Quentin said. “In a small town, not every policeman is going to be as unmoved by status as one would like, but it’s what we have, Richard. My job is to see that Dani is in no way pulled deeper into this than the circumstances warrant, no matter who else they should be thinking about.”

  “Look,” I said, changing, or rather returning to, the topic of Vince Margoletti, the man at the heart of all this. “I have to talk to Vince. He may be behind all of this, or he may be totally in the dark, focused only on making a splash with his gift.”

  “You think he could be innocent?” Dickie said, surprised.

  “I don’t know. Coe Anderson is pushing me like crazy and I think he’s nervous, something about paintings and the exact tally of what’s included in the gift.”

  “But you’ve said you suspect Margoletti,” my ex said. “I’m confused.”

  “So am I. Quentin, what do you think? Is it dangerous?”

  Quentin nodded. “It could be. You’re stirring up the weeds, hoping to flush a bird. But you might get a rattler instead. If you have ideas about the kinds of questions that might help solve the crimes, bring them to Detective Kirby. Let him ask them.”

  I had to be content with that, at least until I had a better plan and a perfect question. I begged for an hour of quiet time at the hotel before my meeting with Kirby, and Quentin and I agreed to meet at the police station. Dickie insisted on driving me back to the hotel in the yellow Batmobile. He pulled away from the curb with a roar, and zoomed up to the next traffic light. When it turned green, Dickie turned left and had not shifted out of first when an amplified, disembodied voice came in the window. “Pull over here, sir. Pull over right here. Now.”

  “Damn,” Dickie said. “This is ridiculous. A traffic cop. Well, this’ll be short. I wasn’t speeding. I’m guessing he stops everybody in a Ferrari.” Like there are others of you, I wanted to say.

  The police car drew up behind the Ferrari and the uniformed officer sauntered slowly to the driver’s side of the Ferrari. No, no, let it not be him. The mirrored glasses, the muscled arms displayed to advantage in a short-sleeved uniform shirt. Yes, the person least likely to form a positive bond with my ex-husband.

  ****

  Macho Cop leaned way
down to peer into the car. “Well, how about that? Hello ma’am. Is this the loaner for your rental car?” He laughed and straightened up before I could ask him how he knew about my traffic accident. Probably the stranger from “Frisco” was good for a little gossip.

  “Not him,” my ex groaned. “I would get stopped by the village idiot.” Fortunately, McManus couldn’t hear Dickie over the sound of the engine.

  “Excessive noise,” Officer McManus said five minutes later, for the third time. The first two times, Dickie had been insisting that there was nowhere in the world where going twenty miles an hour would be illegal, and was too passionate in his self-defense to hear what he was being stopped for. The only reason he heard it the third time was that he stopped for breath. The explanation didn’t sit well with him when he did hear it. But, then, I wouldn’t have expected a man whose vanity license plate is FAV4DSN to buy into the notion that he could get a ticket because his engine sounded like a small jet.

  I was getting pissed. “Enough, Dickie. Stop. Right. Now. Okay, Officer McManus, give us the ticket. We need to be somewhere soon.” I didn’t say we were headed to the police station to meet with his boss.

  “Well, I wouldn’t want to make you late,” he said, and laughed again as he straightened up and slapped a hand on the roof of the Ferrari.

  Big mistake. Richard Argetter III was having none of this car slapping. He struggled to open his door and get out, which probably appealed to him because he would look less like a small child once his long legs were upright. Officer McManus obviously didn’t approve of Dickie getting out of the car because he said, “Do not exit the car, sir. Do not exit the car,” in the sternest monotone he could muster while trying to hold his ground. By now, the testosterone was almost visible, swirling around the yellow Ferrari, and passersby were slowing to watch, maybe hoping for a fight.

  Neither of them noticed when I got my own door open, leveraged myself out and onto the sidewalk, and walked away. A cab let someone off at the next corner and I grabbed it and gave the driver the hotel name. When I got to my room, I took the phone off the hook, took two aspirins, called the reception desk for a wake-up call in forty-five minutes, and pulled a pillow over my ears. I didn’t sleep, but at least it was quiet.

  When I got down to the lobby, Dickie was waiting, seemingly relaxed, reading the local paper. I hadn’t been married to him for four years without learning to read his body language. This was a man loaded for bear.

  “Hey, feeling better?” he said with a big smile as he jumped up. “Ready to meet Quentin at the police station? My chariot awaits.” He carefully folded the paper and replaced it on the lobby table. Dickie never folds discarded newspapers. In fact, he never picked up his socks or his jackets, or the dog’s leash. This was a clue to how tightly wound he was at the moment.

  “So, did you get a ticket?” I said as I kept walking toward the door.

  “Oh, yeah, I guess.”

  “You guess?”

  “Two, actually. That idiot small town cop gave me two tickets.” He laughed, not convincingly.

  “For?”

  “Stupid stuff. No big deal. The bellman told me this guy gives tickets to college students all the time. Chip on his shoulder, big time. He’s kind of a campus joke.”

  “You checked with the bellman?” I couldn’t see Dickie sharing an embarrassing moment with a kid.

  “He saw the tail end of it. Said the cop wanted to get a close look at the Ferrari. They don’t get many, well, any, around here, he said.”

  “Oh brother. Guys and cars.”

  “Here’s the car. Hey.”

  I walked past the Ferrari’s door, held open by a young valet whose eyes were caressing it, and up to the other guy on duty. “Can you get me a cab?”

  “Uh, sure,” he said, looking back at the Ferrari. “But, I mean, wouldn’t you rather ride in that?”

  “Nope, whiplash,” I said, unwilling to explain to a kid why my ex-husband was going to drive me crazy if I couldn’t get away from him.

  Dickie was glaring at me from the driver’s side of his car. He did not like to be ignored, another trait I remembered all too well. While I waited for the cab, he revved his engine, noise abatement be damned, and roared up to me, reducing both bellmen to abject awe. “I’m only trying to help, you know,” he said, looking up from his seat, “but if you don’t want me around, that’s fine. I should be getting back to the reunion anyway. I’m already late, and I left….”

  As in left my sophisticated, trouble-free, self-reliant Roman girlfriend waiting for me to return in my show-offy car. “Fine. I have a lawyer and we can handle this now. I wouldn’t want you to miss any of the fun.”

  He stared hard at me for a moment, then wished me luck in a curt voice and roared off.

  CHAPTER 23

  Quentin was waiting on the front steps of the police station, and briefed me on how this would work before we went in. They’d ask a question, I’d look at Quentin and only if he nodded yes would I answer. Even then, if I didn’t want to talk about something, I was to shake my head and he’d jump in to remind them I was there voluntarily and only to help where I thought I could.

  The chief himself met us in the reception area, although he explained he wouldn’t be at the interview. We walked together to a plain room with a painted but scuffed concrete floor, white walls that had seen better days, and an ugly metal table with four metal and plastic chairs grouped around it. The chief shook hands and told us Kirby would be along in a minute.

  As we waited, I looked around at the depressing décor. One wall had a dull mirror that obviously was two-way glass. There were several laminated signs taped to the walls, but none were readable from where I sat, Quentin at my side. The room made me feel like a criminal. Duh, you think that’s an accident? said my inner voice.

  Just when I was getting impatient enough to speak, the door opened and Detective Kirby hurried in. “Sorry to keep you waiting,” he said, “but I was pulling together some faxed information.”

  The chief left and we settled into our chairs. Over the course of the next thirty minutes, I was walked through my vague suspicions about the documents that Gabby had been trying to copy for me.

  “I still don’t get it,” Kirby said. “The paintings weren’t stolen and weren’t fakes, so why would the material motivate anyone to kill the victim? You think they’re supposed to be given to the college? So who owns them now?”

  “That’s a problem. I don’t know who owns them or where they are, only that there are two lists that don’t match and Larry Saylor and Gabby Flores apparently were asking the same questions.”

  “And they’re dead,” the detective said, tapping his pen on the table.

  Thank you for that. “May I ask if you’re looking at Mr. Saylor’s death as suspicious now that Gabby’s been killed?” I said, looking over at Quentin to see if he thought I was overstepping. He was looking at the detective curiously.

  “The investigation is open. Since Ms. Flores was shot, we need to re-examine the circumstances of Mr. Saylor’s death. Now, I’d like to check out a few things, Ms. O’Rourke.” He held up several sheets of paper, presumably the faxes he had been gathering before we arrived. “You work for an art museum. Do you buy paintings like the ones you’re investigating?”

  “I don’t buy anything. I’m involved in raising money and getting people to give their artwork to the museum. The curators buy art.” I was trying to read the fax sheets upside down to find out if he had made my life harder by going to Peter for information.

  “Do you do this sort of consulting a lot?”

  “This is the first consulting job I’ve been offered. I was flattered at first.” I sighed and when he looked a question at me, explained. “The chairman of the Devor Museum’s board recommended me for it. It seemed straightforward at the time.”

  “You didn’t know any of the players before this—Saylor, Margoletti, Flores, anyone at Lynthorpe?”

  “Only Geoff, the Devor contac
t. He’s on the board here.”

  “He knows the big donor?”

  “Slightly. They both graduated from Lynthorpe in the same class and they both live in California. But Geoff told me he doesn’t know Vince well.” No need to say he didn’t trust Vince.

  “I don’t believe in coincidences,” the detective said.

  “Neither do I,” I said. “But if you mean the two knowing each other, wealthy people tend to be recruited to alumni volunteer positions. That’s nothing unusual.”

  “Okay, I hear you,” Kirby said. “At the risk of seeming to beat a dead horse, can you think back to the time period from when you got up to leave Mr. Saylor’s office until Mr. Kennedy joined you on the second floor? I know you’ve said you can’t recall anything specific, but I’m going to run you through it again and I’d like you to close your eyes and think carefully as I ask you each question.”

  “I can’t see how it will help,” I said.

  “Try to put yourself back into that office. Ms. Flores has left, carrying the papers. You’re sitting there. What do you hear?”

  I was sitting there again, with the quiet sounds of the campus at the end of the day coming in the open window, birdsong, maybe an air conditioner somewhere, a car. “It was quiet except that the copier started up. Then, it was noisy the way these machines are, you know?”

  “And was anyone speaking?”

  “I thought I heard Gabby’s voice, talking with a man.”

  “And you didn’t recognize his voice?”

  “I hardly recognized hers. I’m sure it was a man’s voice, though.”