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Death Bed

Page 23

by Stephen Greenleaf


  I made my way to Army Street and then onto the James Lick and took it north to Clay Street, where I exited and made my way toward Nob Hill, where Max Kottle’s apartment was. I was going to deliver Karl in person, whether he liked it or not. What happened after that wouldn’t be my problem.

  At the corner of Clay and Mason Karl started to groan and thrash around. Because I was afraid he might hurt himself I pulled to the curb and cut the ropes around his wrists and ankles and got him up onto the seat. He slumped back against the door and began to rub his head in his hands, up and down, until I was afraid the flesh would tear. Finally he stopped and dropped his hands and looked at me blankly, then past me out the window.

  “Where are we?” he asked, the words thick and dry and idiotic.

  “About a block away from your father’s place, Karl,” I said. “I’m going to take you there. Everything’s okay.”

  He didn’t seem to have heard me. “Do you understand, Karl? Are you all right? Can you hear me?”

  A lot of time went by. I grew more and more concerned about him. There are drugs these days that change the brain forever once they get to it. I watched him closely.

  “Who are you?” he mumbled finally.

  “My name’s Tanner. Your father hired me, sort of, to get you free. He wants very badly to see you, Karl.”

  He looked at me for several seconds. I grew more certain that his mind had snapped, that whatever they had given him had made him crazy. He didn’t blink, didn’t move, didn’t seem to breathe. Then he opened his mouth.

  “My name’s not Karl,” he said.

  THIRTY-TWO

  “Then who are you?”

  The question emerged reflexively, an autonomous being, but I knew its answer before it was fully uttered.

  “I’m Mark Covington.”

  I nodded stupidly, the movement aping my self-assessment. Covington eyed me casually, his reporter’s instinct apparently unbowed despite the drugs and the bondage. “How do you feel?” I asked, trying to buy time to figure out the things I should have figured out before.

  “Lousy,” Covington grunted. “I could use some coffee.”

  “Where do you want me to take you? Home? Hospital?”

  Covington considered a moment. “I’ve got a place down off Union Street, a sort of home-away-from-home. Maybe you could drop me there.”

  I nodded. “I know where it is,” I said.

  Covington’s head had been lolling against the car seat. Now it floated upright. “You do?”

  “I do.”

  “I think I’d like to know how.”

  “I think we should talk.”

  The brightness was back in Covington’s eyes; they became beacons in the blackness, in search of unspoken truth. “Maybe we should,” he said. “But first, some coffee.”

  I drove down to Lombard and pulled into the Sambo’s parking lot and went inside and ordered six coffees to go, then drove up to Covington’s hideaway and parked. “You mind if I come in for a while?” I asked. “There are some things I need to know.”

  Covington shrugged. The ride had burned off whatever foreign substance was in him. “I don’t understand any of this,” he said. “I’m glad to be out of there, though. How the hell did you know where I was?”

  He paused for a minute. A group of revelers fresh from a big night of drinking their way down Union Street bounced past us on balls of drunken laughter. One of the men cupped a hand around one of the women’s buttocks. She laughed and pushed him away. His grin seemed evil and perpetual. Then Covington spoke again. “But you didn’t know, did you? You didn’t have any idea I was in that place.”

  “No,” I admitted.

  For the first time Covington looked at me with interest. “Come on,” he said, and got out of the car. We went inside and spent several silent minutes drinking coffee from Styrofoam cups. The coffee tasted thick and oily. After he’d drunk three cupsful Covington slipped off his shoes and climbed onto the bed and propped a limp pillow behind his head and leaned back. “Do you know who I am?” he asked.

  “Mark Covington. Reporter for the Investigator. Chet Herk and I are good friends.” I eyed him squarely. “Three days ago Chet hired me to find you.”

  Covington’s eyes rolled, like slot machine oranges. “He did? Then why did you think I was Karl Kottle?”

  “Because a week before that someone else hired me to find Karl. For some reason the two of you came together. Leads that turned up in one case shoved me into the other one. I thought you were Karl because I saw a picture taken at a place called the Encounter with Magic. I assumed it was a picture of Karl, but it was you, because you were there, too.”

  “Amber’s place. Yeah. Karl took most of the pictures that day. But how did you get to Potrero Hill from Amber’s room?”

  “By following Karl Kottle’s half-sister.”

  Covington nodded. “Woody,” he intoned.

  “Woody. The question is,” I went on, “where’s Karl Kottle?”

  He didn’t respond right away. He was clearly tired, but agitated underneath, a lengthy barge driven by a hidden engine. I was certain he’d either fall asleep or leave, and I needed some questions answered before he did either one. “Where is he?” I repeated.

  Covington smiled wearily, then chuckled. “I’d say he’s about ten feet from where you found me. Before they gave me my nightly sleep potion, Karl and Woody and Wes were all in the living room, snug as bugs in a rug.”

  The information didn’t make me feel any better. I felt depressed by the thought of tasks undone, of toil to come. “Is Karl all right?”

  Covington shook his head. “He’s sick as hell.”

  “Other than that?”

  “Sure. He’s fine. Why wouldn’t he be?”

  “Kidnap victims sometimes aren’t.”

  “Victim? Are you kidding? Karl’s not a victim of anything, except maybe his own idealism.”

  “But a ransom demand was made on his father.”

  “Of course it was. And do you know who thought of it? Karl. A neat little way to raise money for the cause.”

  “What’s the cause?”

  Covington blinked several times and rubbed his eyes. “Well, that’s where it becomes a little fuzzy. The other guy, Wes, he talks like he wants to blow up every high rise in town and shoot down every guy wearing a three-piece suit just mainly for drill. Sort of a militant anticapitalist, you might say. Karl, he’s more idealistic. He wants to open people’s eyes to the forces of oppression and the plunder of the planet. He keeps talking about how it was in Berkeley back in the sixties, how the students finally stopped the war, finally woke the country up. He wants to wake it up again, I guess. What he really wants is to bring back the days when he didn’t have a doubt in his head. Then Woody, she does whatever Karl says, except when she’s sleeping with Wes. Then she wants blood, too.”

  “Is anyone else involved with this outfit?”

  “Only one that I saw. A guy named Renn. But he may be out of it now. I haven’t seen him around for a while. And then Karl keeps talking about all these other people who were at Berkeley when he was and are just waiting for someone to tell them to march and what tune to do it to. Apparently they’re all over the place.”

  “Renn’s dead,” I said.

  “Jesus. How?”

  “Murdered.”

  “Wes,” Covington said, simply and immediately.

  “Are you sure?”

  “No, but Renn was flaky. When Karl brought the kidnap ruse up, Renn didn’t want any part of it. Wes probably was afraid Renn would talk. That’s all it would take for Wes to snuff him.”

  Covington slid over Renn’s death too lightly. I was starting not to like him much once again. “What’s this guy Wes look like?”

  “Tall. Curly hair. Dresses like a lumberjack. Handsome, I guess, at least Woody thought so. Smart, like a raccoon. A rabid one.”

  It was the same guy I’d seen in Renn’s house and followed to Cicero’s, the same guy Randy
had described, the same guy Mrs. Renn had seen hanging around Howard’s place. Curiously, Wes seemed to be someone Covington envied, a kindred spirit. Whether it was because of Rosemary or because of something else I couldn’t be sure. “How did Wes hook up with Kottle and Rosemary?” I asked.

  Covington shook his head. “I don’t know, really. They were all together by the time I got into the act.”

  “About the kidnapping. They didn’t get the money, did they? At the drop?”

  “No. Why? Do you know anything about it?”

  “I was there.”

  “Are you the one who got the dough?”

  I shook my head. “Some guy on a motorcycle got it, at least that’s the way it looked to me.”

  “Well, Wes about had a fit. He claimed he shot the old bastard who made the drop. Did he, or was that just more of Wes’s act?”

  “If Wes drives a BMW, that’s just what he did.”

  “That was Wes. I thought he was all talk. I guess there was something there after all.” Covington didn’t seem pleased.

  “I’m starting to put it together,” I said, “but there’s one more thing. On Sunday the media reported that Max Kottle had died. Why didn’t that put a stop to the ransom demand, or at least slow them down?”

  “Because Wes knew it was a lie. Or claimed he did. Wes said Max Kottle was as alive as I was, and that they should just go ahead as planned.”

  “Where’d Wes get his information?”

  “Beats me.”

  “The source who put you onto the Sons and Daughters. Who was it?”

  Covington shook his head. “Sources are confidential. Totally.”

  I stood up and stretched my legs. Down below I heard some muffled grunts and shouts. I looked at Covington.

  “Little guy down there used to be a jockey,” he explained. “Reruns his big races every night. Like goddamned Churchill Downs around here.”

  I smiled at the image of Eddie Winkles riding an imaginary horse to an imaginary winner’s circle, an act more rational than anything I’d read about in the morning paper for days.

  “Tell me about Karl’s illness,” I said to Covington. “What exactly is wrong with him?”

  “I don’t know and he doesn’t either. From what he said he’s been going to a doctor for it for years, but nothing seems to help.”

  “What’s his problem, though? Is he a junkie?”

  “I guess he must be. He shoots up, that’s for sure. But the main thing is his hands and feet. They hurt like hell. He can hardly walk; he can’t even pick up a toothbrush without pain. You know those pictures taken at Amber’s place? Well, I’ll bet they’re real blurry, because every time Karl pushed the shutter button he grunted like he’d just been shot.”

  It seemed interesting but unimportant. “Does Karl know his old man’s dying?”

  “Sure,” Covington said. “He calls it justice.”

  I walked the length of the room and back. “Now let’s talk about you for a minute,” I said.

  Covington shook his head and smiled. “First you. What the hell are you, a private eye or something?”

  I bowed. “John Marshall Tanner. Investigator. At your service.”

  “Jesus. I didn’t know they made those anymore.”

  “The species is endangered, no question about it. I myself am under careful study by the Smithsonian.”

  Covington chuckled. “So, Mr. Detective, how did you get to that pigsty on Potrero Hill?”

  There didn’t seem any reason not to tell him the outlines, so I did, editing as I went. “It started when Max Kottle hired me to find his son. Max wants to see Karl before he dies. Then, when I got pulled off that because Max had died, or so I thought, Chet Herk hired me to find you. He wasn’t sure you were missing, but he was plenty worried.”

  “Good old Chet.”

  “So I went after you, but the two cases started getting mixed up, beginning when I found one of Howard Renn’s poetry books in your files, and ending when Rosemary Withers came by here to search your files.”

  “That’s when you tailed her.”

  I didn’t see any reason to mention Pamela Brown’s role, so I just nodded.

  “How did you find out about this place?”

  “Good detective work.”

  “Bullshit. Some broad squealed. Who was it?”

  “Forget it,” I said. “Let’s talk about something that might save someone’s life. How did you end up hog-tied on a mattress on Carolina Street?”

  “Why should I tell you?”

  “Because half an hour ago you were ass deep in trouble, and now you’re not.”

  Covington didn’t buy it right away. He’d traded for tips for so many years it was heresy for him to give anything away for free. “Max Kottle isn’t really dead, is he?” he mused carefully. “Wes was right.”

  “He’s not dead,” I agreed.

  “Big story there.”

  “Not so big. From the looks of him he’ll be dead in a month. Maybe sooner.”

  “But still.”

  “But still.”

  “You know all about that, right?”

  “Not all. Most.”

  Covington devoted a few more seconds to thought. I devoted the same seconds to measuring my obligation to Pamela Brown. “I want the whole story,” Covington said. “A promise.”

  “Promise,” I repeated. He hadn’t said when and he hadn’t said he wanted it first.

  Covington looked like he wanted to dicker further but was too exhausted to make the effort. “Okay,” he began. “I’ve got a lot of sources on the street. Better snitches than any cop. About a month ago I started hearing about a new terrorist group that was looking for people and weapons and money, all the things it takes to give this whole town the blue horrors. My source was a good one, an old radical from the Automobile Row and Palace Hotel days, so I took it at face value. If it got to be anything like the scale of the Red Brigades it would be the biggest story of the decade. So I decided to infiltrate the group. I went under cover. Took a long time, and I had to listen to an awful lot of radical bullshit, but they finally let me in.”

  “And then someone blew your cover.”

  Covington nodded disgustedly. “I still don’t know who, but just before they pulled the Laguna Oil bombing Wes marched in and said he knew I was a reporter for the Investigator. I’ve been a captive ever since.”

  “What were they going to do with you?”

  He shrugged, newly heedless. “I think at first Karl wanted to convert me to the cause. When that didn’t work they decided on extortion. Making the Investigator print their demands, that kind of thing.” He laughed. “It might have been interesting to see what they’d have gotten for me in trade.”

  “What’s their next move?”

  He shrugged. “They’re going to make another try for the Kottle money, I know that. They want weapons, and I mean big weapons. Rocket launchers, grenades. Hell, Wes even talked about tactical missiles. Apparently there are people around who have them to sell if the money’s right.”

  “What do they think happened at the first drop?”

  “Well, Wes thinks he gave old man Kottle too much time to counter their plan, told him where the drop would be too far in advance. Woody thought Howard Renn talked to someone before he died. Karl just kept looking at Wes real funny. I think Karl thought Wes popped off somewhere or other, to someone smart enough to cut himself in.”

  “Could Wes have dealt himself in and everyone else out? That’s a lot of money.”

  Covington frowned. “Possible. Karl was too sick to move, just about, and Woody was just a piece of ass to Wes. He didn’t need them. But I always felt there was someone behind Wes, someone pulling strings.”

  “Who?”

  “No idea.”

  Covington began to rub his face again. His eyes closed momentarily, then opened slowly, reluctantly. He’d be asleep before long.

  “What does Karl Kottle think about his father?” I asked.

&nb
sp; “Hates him,” Covington said. “The old man’s just a source of funds.”

  “That’s kind of strange, isn’t it? They haven’t seen each other for years. What’s keeping all that hatred alive?”

  “Who knows? It’s funny you say they haven’t seen each other, though. Karl seems to know a hell of a lot about his father. Always talking about what he did or didn’t do that proved he was a neofascist. That’s Karl’s favorite term: Neofascist.” Covington paused. “Funny,” he added.

  “What is?”

  “That I’d link up with Karl Kottle again.”

  “What do you mean ‘again?’”

  “The first story I ever covered for the Investigator was the ROTC fire over at Berkeley. A girl died in it. They all said Karl must have done it, mostly because he’d threatened to so many times. You know about that?”

  “A little. Anything strange about that whole thing?”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know. Just fishing.”

  “Well, I don’t know much. They pulled me off the story right away and stuck me onto something else. Chinatown gangs, as I recall. The Investigator was very big on Chinatown gangs there for a while.”

  “What’s the name of the girl who died?”

  Covington shrugged. “Who knows? That was ten years ago, man. What difference does it make?”

  “Who knows?” I said, with truth.

  “Well, there’s probably a file on it somewhere in there if you’re really interested,” he said, pointing to the file cabinets.

  I lit a cigarette and tried to stay up where the adrenaline had put me, but I couldn’t. I started falling like a stone. Covington inhaled and let the breath out slowly. “Hey. Tanner,” he said. “I got to get some sleep.”

  “I’ll take off,” I assured him. “There’s just one more thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  “What’s the Biloxi Corporation?”

  Covington opened his eyes and frowned. “Biloxi? How’d you know about that?”

  “ESP. What is it?”

  “It doesn’t have anything to do with this.”

 

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