by Josh Lanyon
“You’re a real weirdo,” she said.
She turned to walk away, but she was headed for the chapel, not the cemetery gates. We followed her through the pines and majestic cypress, past the small though elaborate family mausoleums. Jake said under his breath, “Every once in a while I think you’d have made a good cop.”
Inside the chapel, it was dark and cool and private. Jinx slid into a pew and began to pray. Jake stood at the back, leaning against the wall, waiting patiently. I sat down in a nearby pew and looked around. The chapel was built in 1926 and designed by George Washington Smith, a Santa Barbara architect who was interred in one of the walls. I studied the surprisingly contemporary ceiling frescoes — the garlands of lilies and peonies, the nuns and monks with their candles and serene faces.
Jinx finished her prayers and stood up. She said to me, “All right. I’ll tell you what you want to know. It’s all over now anyway.”
I glanced at Jake. He raised his eyebrows but said nothing.
We followed her outside. The fog was lifting. It was going to be a beautiful day.
Jinx lit a cigarette, took a few impatient puffs. “I adored Jay. Everyone did.”
Not everyone, clearly. I didn’t point that out.
She added, “But he was a…a scamp. Like the song. Exactly like the song.”
“Song?” Jake inquired.
I offered, “From Lady and the Tramp. ‘He’s a Tramp’ by Peggy Lee.”
“That’s it. We used to do that number.” Jinx’s smile was reminiscent. She took another quick, almost-guilty drag on her cigarette.
“This was back when you were singing with the Moonglows?”
“That’s right. We used to play a regular gig at Danny’s.” She glanced back at the cluster of trees sheltering Hale’s plot. “Danny owned a club in Malibu called the Tides.”
“We talked to Hale right before his death. You were engaged at one time, weren’t you?”
Another one of those flashes of alarm. “You talked to Danny? When?”
“Monday.”
“What did he say?”
“For one thing, he told us you used to be engaged.”
“That’s true,” she said reluctantly.
“But you didn’t marry. What happened?”
She said with a saucy spark of the girl she must have been, “It’s a woman’s prerogative to change her mind.”
“You must have had a reason for changing it.”
“Yes.” She stared at the blue haze of ocean. “There was quite an age difference between us.”
I couldn’t help noticing that she was only in her sixties, quite a bit younger than everyone else who’d turned up in the case so far.
“If you don’t mind my asking, how old were you back in the day?”
“Seventeen.”
“Jeez.”
Her smile was wry. “I looked older. I was older. We grew up faster in those days, for all the vaunted sexual experience kids boast about now. I’d grown up on the road. Jay — well, we were all the family we had left — but yes, technically, I suppose I shouldn’t have been anywhere near the Tides.”
It was a guess based on the fact that she was the only mourner at Hale’s funeral; I said, “Even if you didn’t marry Hale, you must have still had feelings for him. You paid for his treatment at Sea View Manor. You paid for this funeral, didn’t you?”
Shock — or maybe anger — flared. “How did you know that?”
“Is it confidential information?”
“It most certainly is.”
“We’re not planning to share it with anyone.”
Jake interjected, “What did you think happened to your brother all those years ago?”
“I thought…” Jinx’s voice faltered; then she said steadily, “It’s true that I believed he was dead. I was afraid — but it’s not as though I had any idea or suspicions. It was only fear.”
That was so obviously a lie, it wasn’t even worth responding to.
“Can you think of any reason at all why someone would have wanted your brother dead?”
She shook her head. “I always assumed it was some terrible accident or misunderstanding.”
It had taken her fifty years to talk herself into believing that — and she still wasn’t sold.
Jake inquired, “Do you remember a police detective by the name of Nick Argyle?”
“Nick Argyle. My God. I haven’t thought of Nick in years.” She gave a throaty laugh, dropped the cigarette to the path, and ground it out with the pointed toe of her shoe. “Is he still around?”
“Hale and hearty,” Jake said.
“Get a load of that. He must have been older than any of us, except maybe Danny.” She still had that sentimental curve to her mouth.
“Did you know Argyle believed your brother was a criminal? He had a theory that Jay was a cat burglar and that you were his accomplice.”
She gave Jake a long, direct look — or seemed to. It was hard to tell what was going on behind the shades. “Did he?”
“He did. He said for a period of about two years, you and your brother pulled off a series of high-profile cat burglaries in the Los Angeles west side.”
Jinx gave another of those husky laughs.
“I notice you’re not denying it.”
“Sure. Well, it was true.”
“You admit it?”
“You’re the one who brought up the statute of limitations, and it’s long expired.” She added flatly, “Not that I want that information leaked.”
“Do you think your brother’s death had something to do with your sideline in burglary?”
“No.”
She said it too quickly. And why not take what was an easy out? Either she already had her own suspicion as to who had knocked off Jay, or she intensely disliked that idea for other reasons.
“You don’t think any of your brother’s criminal associates…?”
“No. My brother didn’t have criminal associates. We worked alone always.”
“Who fenced the goods?”
“He’s long gone. An antique dealer in Chinatown on Chun King Road. His name was Turkey Lancaster.”
I repeated. “Turkey?”
She shrugged. “It was so odd, I never forgot it.”
Jake said, “I heard a rumor that your brother might have been killed because he knew something about valuable World War Two artifacts.”
She stiffened. She was fast on the recovery, though. “No.”
“You never heard anything like that?”
“No.” Unwisely, she added, “I’d be the first to know, right?”
“What do you think happened to him?”
“That hotel was a dump. Dopers, whores… Believe me, you’ve no idea. There were scumbags there who would have robbed Jay blind in a second if they could’ve got away with it. I always thought that it must have been something like that. A robbery that went wrong.”
“Were you living there too?”
She shook her head. “I was living with Dan.”
At seventeen. Terrific. Speaking of statutes, that was statutory rape right there. One thing was for sure. Jay Stevens might have been a charmer, but he was one hell of a guardian for a young girl.
She looked at her watch. “I’m sorry. I’ve got to go. If I spend any longer, it’s going to cause comment.”
With whom? I wondered.
Jake asked, “Is there a private number where we could get in touch with you?”
She was shaking her head. “I’m sorry. No.”
“You’re not going to claim your brother’s body?”
“I’ve had fifty years to come to terms with the idea that my brother is dead. That…that shell you found is not my brother. And Jay would understand my decision.”
Her chin rose challengingly. Neither of us argued.
Jinx walked unhurriedly down the asphalt drive, past the Celtic crosses and stone monuments. As she disappeared into the shade of the tall trees, Jake ordered, “Wait here.”<
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He went after her, moving fast but unobtrusively through the manicured grass and flat grave markers. I doubt if she had any idea she was being followed.
He was back a short time later with the license-plate number of her black limousine.
“Well done,” I approved, rising from the stone bench where I’d been waiting.
He tucked the slip of paper into his pocket. “Not a bad morning’s work.”
“She’s married. She’s wearing a wedding ring.”
“She could be widowed.”
“True. Either way she’s worried about someone finding out about her connection to Hale.”
“She’s a woman of affluence and position now. You can tell by the clothes and the car.”
“And the attitude.”
His mouth curved. “That’s the attitude of privilege. You have it too.”
“I have it?”
“You’re more gracious about it, but you were born to it. And you have nice manners. But you’re definitely used to getting your way.”
“I’m used to getting my way?”
He frowned and looked around the graveyard. “Is there an echo out here?”
It took me a second to catch on — the bastard was laughing at me. “Hey, they’re hiring at the Comedy Club, Riordan.”
“I’ll keep my day job.”
That reminded me of a couple of things, and my smile faded. “Jake? Listen…”
We were headed back to the parking lot ourselves by then. He glanced at me.
“You’re right. I mean, what you said in the car when we were driving back on Tuesday. I don’t know what’s wrong, but I’m all over the map right now. I know I’m not being fair to you.”
He seemed to be waiting for me to say something else. When I didn’t, he said, “Here’s what I believe. Based on what I know of you, I don’t believe you allowed yourself to think much about what happened between us for the last two years. So you’re trying to deal with it now — along with trying to come to terms with getting shot, and heart surgery, and the fact that I want back in your life. And the truth is that, in addition to not trusting me, you’re angry and you’re hurt by what went before.”
He sounded as cool and clinical as a lab technician discussing a suspicious slide.
“Not bad, Dr. Freud,” I retorted. “What treatment do you suggest?”
Bewilderingly, he put his arm around my shoulders and pulled me over to him as we walked. I was so nonplussed that Jake — Jake — was hugging me in public (if you were willing to count a graveyard), I missed half of what he replied. Sure, it was merely a casual hug, a hug between buddies, but there was a time, and not long ago, when he wouldn’t have touched me in anywhere resembling public with a ten-foot pole.
“…then there’s Guy and Mel and who knows who else,” he was saying. “If it was only a matter of giving you time to work through it, I’d give you all the time in the world. If you think I don’t know I owe you that —”
“You don’t owe me,” I said irritably.
“But I don’t think it’s that.”
“So you’re leaving?”
He said carefully, “It’s not an ultimatum. I think it’s the best move for a lot of reasons.”
I shrugged off his arm. Stopped walking. “What if I ask you not to go?”
He stopped too. “Is that what you’re asking?”
“Jesus, Jake. You say you’re not giving me an ultimatum, but…you are. I told you I didn’t want you to go.” I shook my head. “Don’t you get it? I can’t think clearly about this with the threat of you leaving hanging over me.”
“Is that what it feels like?” he asked slowly. “A threat?”
“That’s what it feels like, yeah. You said you’d give me time, but it feels like you got fed up after five minutes and decided to walk. I can’t promise you” — I stopped, tried again — “that I can let go of everything that happened between us. As much as I want to. As much as I feel like I should. You’ve called it right. I’m angry, and I guess I am hurt. I want to trust you…but I don’t even trust myself anymore. All I know.” I had to stop again. I took a deep breath, steadied my voice. “All I know is, I can’t…face you leaving right now.”
He looked pale beneath his tan. “All right.” His voice was gentle.
“And I know it’s not fair. I know you’ve got this great job offer, and I know you’re losing the house and your family’s flipping out. I know —”
“Baby, you win. You can take the brass knuckles off.” His smile was crooked, though the tone was still uncharacteristically gentle. “We’ll leave it for now. Okay?”
The relief was staggering. I felt almost giddy. Not once had it occurred to me that he would concede. “Okay.”
After that we couldn’t change the subject fast enough.
“The logistics of the thing puzzle me,” I said when we were in the car once more and on our way back inland.
“Which thing?”
“Stevens was killed and buried under the floor of his room. That requires foresight. At the very least it requires hammer and nails. Not what you’d expect to find lying around in the average jazz musician’s bedroom.”
“Not exactly the kind of thing you bring when you come calling either.”
“You’d have to plan ahead.”
“You think someone went to the hotel that night planning to murder him?”
“Doesn’t it seem that way to you?”
“The whole thing feels hinky — and has from the first. Why hide the body?”
“Well, that’s not unusual, is it?”
“No. It’s unusual to hide it under the floor.”
“He obviously couldn’t move Stevens’s corpse out of the hotel without being seen.”
Jake was following his own line of thought. “He’d have to rip up the floorboards, lower Stevens down. But that would work. Building standards were a lot looser back in the day. There would have been room for a body between the joists. He’d have to hammer the floorboards back down again. That wouldn’t be a quiet process.”
“Maybe it wasn’t a quiet hotel.”
“Even so.”
“There’s something else that’s been bugging me. The construction crew found a bunch of dead rat skeletons in the attic. In the walls, under the floor.”
“Nice.”
“Too many to have died naturally.”
“And you think there’s a connection?”
“Both the attic and the third floor were sealed up at one point. I think that explains why Stevens’s body was never discovered. I think there was some kind of infestation of vermin, and that part of the building was closed off.”
“You think there was construction going on around the time Stevens was killed?”
“I wish there were a way to know for sure. It would explain a few things. It might even help narrow down potential suspects.”
“Well, it’s pretty clear who Jinx Stevens thinks killed her brother.”
“Dan Hale.”
“‘It’s all over now anyway,’” he quoted.
“What would Dan Hale have to do with Nazi treasure?”
He shrugged.
It was a quick drive back to Los Angeles. No side trips today.
As I got out of the Honda, Jake said, “I’ll pick you up tomorrow at one thirty for the appointment with Newman.”
“Thanks.”
I opened my mouth to… I don’t know. Say something. It felt like we had crossed some bridge.
He nodded crisply. “Later.”
And that was it. He was gone.
I walked inside the bookstore, nearly bumping into a customer coming out.
I apologized and took a closer look at the tall, skinny young man with long blond hair and a goatee. If it hadn’t been for the John Lennon specs, I could almost have mistaken him for Warren.
He was staring at me as though I should know him.
I looked closer. Recognition dawned. “Angus?”
Chapter Thirteen
“So when I got your letter, I thought I’d come home.”
“Did you want another?” I nodded at the empty plastic cup on the table between us. We were sitting in the indie coffeehouse down the block from Cloak and Dagger. Angus had already had two ice-blended blueberry drinks. Judging by how thin he was, they were the first things he’d had to eat in a while. He made me look robust. Heck, he made Jay Stevens’s skeleton look robust. “Or would you like a bagel or a sandwich or something?”
He shook his head. “Did you mean it? About my having my job back if I wanted it?”
“I meant it.” If I hadn’t been sure before, I was now. The kid had obviously had a rough time of it. He looked years older beneath the mahogany tan. “We’re going to have to figure out what your legal status is.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that you were cleared of involvement in Kinsey Perone’s murder, but you might have been implicated in the deaths of Karen Holtzer and Tony Zellig. I don’t know. I’ll talk to Jake.”
“That asshole Riordan?” he said, energized by loathing.
“That’s the guy. If you have a problem with that —”
“No problem,” he said, instantly cowed.
“Have you been in Mexico the whole time? What did you do for two years?”
Angus said hopelessly, “Whatever I could. I worked as a mason, as a houseboy…I picked fruit.” He sounded exhausted, as though he’d done all of it in the last hour.
“Why didn’t you come home?”
“There was nothing to come back for. Wanda didn’t want me anymore. My family didn’t even want to talk to me.”
“Where are you staying?”
He looked at me, his sad eyes meeting mine, flicking away, darting hopefully back.
I sighed, studying him, drumming my fingers on the table as I tried to think what to do. “Okay, listen. I’ll loan you a sleeping bag and an air mattress, and you can stay in the bookstore till you figure out something better. I’ll pay you to be my…I don’t know. Night watchman, I guess.”
His breath caught, and he looked like he was going to burst into tears.
“In the daytime, you can have your old job back, but…you need to pay attention to this. My sister — my stepsister — is now also working in the bookstore. You need to…I don’t know. Be careful of her.”
