Fare Play

by Barbara Paul

  “Austin Knowles … the dead man’s son? He’s a suspect?”

  Marian sighed. “Yeah, I’m having trouble with that one. I’d say Dave Unger is our most likely suspect.”

  “That reminds me. The DA’s office says they can have an accountant at O.K. Toys this afternoon.”

  “That soon!” Marian was pleased. “I suppose it’s too much to hope that Unger’s been skimming off the top. But that whole place seems to be just a going-through-the-motions operation. Something not quite right there.”

  “Any theories?”

  Marian shrugged. “O’Toole suggested a money-laundering front. But that’s just a guess.”

  “Might be a good one. Keep me posted.”

  She left, running over in her mind what needed to be done that afternoon. She walked right past Dowd’s desk without seeing the paper he was holding out to her.

  “Lieutenant! That PI you wanted me to check out?”

  “What?” She focused on him with an effort.

  “Curt Holland. He did apprentice with a licensed detective, name of Constantine Philippides.” He handed her the paper. “Now deceased. Died seven years ago.”

  She took the paper with her into the office, staring at it while hanging her coat on the rack. Constantine Philippides. Who the hell was he? Dead seven years: not the source of information about Holland she’d hoped for. Who’d been around a long time and might know about Constantine Philippides?

  Marian stepped out of her office and looked around; no Sergeant Buchanan. She left a note on his desk to see her.

  She went back to her desk and tried to think of another way of going at the Oliver Knowles case. Knowles had gone to Lionel Madison Trains the day he was killed; the staff there all knew Knowles. One of our best customers, they’d said. He’d left his gloves there, that last day. Did Knowles pay by credit card? By check? Oh no, they said. They were always paid in cash on delivery. Was that the usual way they did business? No, but they all knew Mr. Knowles. Who actually paid them? Mr. Knowles’s secretary, Lucas Novak.

  Marian had Perlmutter and O’Toole over at Knowles’s apartment at that very moment, going through the dead man’s private papers. They’d had to get a warrant, since Lucas Novak and Ellen Rudolph—Mrs. R—were still living there; the secretary had already called once to complain. Marian specifically wanted to know how much cash business Knowles had done—and whether it looked as if he had been trying to avoid leaving a paper trail.

  Or whether she was chasing shadows.

  An hour later, Sergeant Buchanan stuck his head through the doorway. “You want to see me?”

  “Come in, Buchanan. Question for you. Did you ever run across a private investigator named Constantine Philippides?”

  Buchanan laughed shortly. “Connie the Greek.” He sat down heavily. “Yeah, I knew Connie. Died five, six years ago. Why?”

  “What can you tell me about him? What kind of investigator was he?”

  “Low-rent. He started out okay, but … Connie was a lush, Lieutenant. Drank himself into the gutter. You know how he died? Pothole got him. Not even a very big pothole. But we’d just had a good rain and it was full of water—thass all it took. Connie was sailin’ three sheets to the wind and tripped over his own feet and went in face-first. Nobody stopped to help. Nobody thought that a guy layin’ in an alley with his face in a puddle might be in trouble. Connie the Greek drowned in three inches of rainwater.”

  “God.” Hell of a way to go; poor Connie, whatever his failings. “Was he bent?”

  “Musta been. He was pretty hard up for cash, last time I saw him. Gettin’ desperate.”

  “But did he take bribes?”

  “What did Connie have that anyone—oh, you mean like for givin’ perjured testimony? Wouldn’t surprise me.”

  “What if someone wanted to skip the apprenticeship period required for private investigators and go straight to the state exam? He’d need written evidence of prior experience he didn’t have. Would Connie have signed the necessary papers? For a fee?”

  Buchanan raised his shaggy eyebrows. “Nice scam. Yeah, Connie woulda gone along. Don’t take much effort to sign a few papers. You know somebody did that, Lieutenant?”

  “Just a suspicion. No proof.”

  At that moment a bass voice boomed out from the squadroom, “Buchanan! Line two.”

  Buchanan pointed at Marian’s phone. “D’ya mind, Lieutenant?”

  “Go ahead.”

  The sergeant’s baggy face tensed as he took his phone call. He pulled Marian’s notepad toward him and started jotting down details. “Yeah … yeah. Got it. Thanks for lettin’ me know.” He hung up and looked at Marian. “Do you remember Robin Muller?”

  The name rang a bell. “Remind me.”

  “NYU grad student. Boyfriend reported her missin’.”

  Marian remembered. “They live in the Ninth Precinct.”

  “That’s the one. Well, she’s turned up. Dead.”

  Something in the way he was saying it made her sit up. “And?”

  “She was killed on the subway. Train full of people. Someone put a silenced gun up against her and pulled the trigger.” And in case Marian didn’t get it, he added, “Just like Oliver Knowles.”

  20

  Robin Muller had been riding the IRT when she was shot shortly before the train pulled into Astor Place Station. The subway car was crowded, but Robin Muller had had a seat. Only when the train swerved around a curve had she pitched forward against the standing passengers, the open copy of Sports Illustrated propped on her lap falling away to reveal the spreading bloodstain on her torso.

  But this time—this time—the killer had not been so lucky. Several people had noticed the hook-nosed man who’d elbowed aside a woman carrying dry cleaning to grab the seat next to Muller when it became available … only to get up again almost immediately.

  “This could be the breakthrough we need,” Captain Murtaugh said as uniformed officers kept gawkers away from the halted subway car where Robin Muller’s body lay.

  “Mighty costly breakthrough,” Marian murmured, looking down at the dead girl. Robin Muller had been pretty, with short black hair curling loosely around her face. She was young … so very young! An unlived life. Muller had bled heavily, the blood seeping all the way through the army jacket she was wearing and already turned black.

  Sergeant Buchanan knelt by the body and pushed up Muller’s sleeves. “No track marks. The boyfriend said she was a health nut.”

  Murtaugh asked, “Buck, how did you get in on this?”

  “I was the one the boyfriend talked to when he reported her missin’,” Buchanan explained.

  The captain nodded. “Larch, I want a cap put on this one. If the killer learns we’ve got a description, he’s going to be long gone.”

  “Right.” She stepped off the car to the platform to give the instructions. The train was stopped in Astor Place Station. Several of the officers were herding witnesses toward the stairs, to take them in for a session with a graphic arts technician. One of them was complaining loudly that he’d miss his appointment. The Crime Scene Unit came bustling in, kvetching about a delivery-truck breakdown that had backed up traffic for blocks.

  Marian followed the CSU back into the subway car to find Buchanan telling Murtaugh that the boyfriend had said Muller had been pretty flush these past few months, but he didn’t know where the money came from. “Captain, we gotta find that boyfriend.”

  “We got the boyfriend,” a familiar voice said.

  They all turned to look at the dark-skinned woman who had come up behind them unnoticed.

  “Gloria?” Marian said, pleasantly surprised. “This is your case?”

  “Mine and Roberts’s.” Gloria Sanchez jerked a thumb toward her partner, who could be seen through the subway car window talking to a distraught-looking young man. “Hello, Captain Murtaugh.”

  “Good to see you again, Detective.”

  Marian introduced the Ninth Precinct detective to B
uchanan, who asked, “Howja find the boyfriend so quick?”

  “He was waitin’ for her here.”

  The boyfriend’s name was Larry Hibler. He’d told Gloria Sanchez that Robin Muller had been staying with a friend in Brooklyn, afraid to call him because she thought the phone might be tapped. She’d finally gotten word to him through a mutual friend: be at a certain pay phone at a certain hour and she’d call.

  The call had come at the designated time. Hibler said Muller had been scared to death. She’d told him she was in deep shit, that someone was after her; she’d mentioned the name Virgil. Mentioned how? She’d said Virgil would send someone, Hibler replied. The paymaster had warned her—spitefully, she said. What paymaster? Where did she work? Larry Hibler had hemmed and hawed and admitted he didn’t know she’d been working at all.

  Marian stared. “They were living together and he didn’t know she was working?”

  Gloria Sanchez shrugged. “That’s what he says.”

  At any rate, Hibler had convinced Muller that she couldn’t hide out for the rest of her life. Afraid to go to the police and afraid not to, she’d agreed to meet him and talk it over, to try to decide what to do. They were to meet at Astor Place; she didn’t dare return home.

  “A description of the shooter and a name for the man who sent him,” Captain Murtaugh said with satisfaction. “As well as a third man—this paymaster, whoever he is. Now we’ve got something to go on.”

  The Crime Scene Unit told them more or less politely they were in the way and they moved outside to the station platform. “Captain,” Marian said, “I know two shootings don’t make a pattern—oh hell, yes, they do! We need—”

  “A computer search for the MO,” he finished for her. “I’ll put in a request. Sanchez, is Captain DiFalco in his office?”

  “He was when I left.”

  “I’m going to make this a joint investigation. Larch, I want a report when you’re finished here.” He turned and headed up the stairs to the street.

  A number of Transit Authority officials were there, trying to hurry the police so they could get the train running again before rush hour hit. Marian spared a thought for all the shuttling and diverting that was going on to keep the regularly scheduled trains from plowing into the uncharacteristically stationary one. A bluesuit came down to say the crowd on the street was getting ugly and they could use some help keeping them out of the subway station. Gloria Sanchez sent her partner to call for back-up.

  Buchanan said to Sanchez, “I know the lieutenant here used to work outa the Ninth—but how’d you know Captain Murtaugh?”

  “Worked a case for him once,” she replied laconically.

  “Midtown South borrowed her,” Marian added. “Gloria, Sergeant Buchanan is going to act as liaison on this case. And I’ll send you copies of our reports on the Knowles shooting. But right now I’d like a word with Larry Hibler.”

  “If he’s still able to talk.”

  Hibler was slumped down on the concrete floor, his back against a pillar. About Robin Muller’s age, thin, pale. His face was a mixture of confusion and pain.

  Marian hunkered down beside him. “Hello, Larry. My name is Lieutenant Larch. I’m sorry to bother you at a time like this, but there are a couple of things I have to ask you.”

  He gave her an unfocused look. “Larch. That’s a tree.”

  “Yes, it is.” She paused, and then asked, “Did Robin ever mention the name Oliver Knowles to you?”

  Hibler frowned in concentration, shook his head.

  “What about Rosalind Bowman?”

  “No.”

  “Who’s that?” Gloria demanded.

  “Bowman hired Holland’s agency to follow Knowles. But now she’s disappeared.”

  “Oh yeah,” Gloria said. “I heard there was a private op on that bus.”

  Marian turned back to Larry Hibler. “Are you sure you don’t know those names? Oliver Knowles. Rosalind Bowman. Think back.”

  He shook his head again. “I never heard of them. Oh, man, I didn’t even know she was working.”

  The remark struck Marian as out of context. “What about this Virgil? Did Robin ever tell you about him?”

  “I never even heard the name before today. On the phone. The last time I talked to her.” He started crying.

  Marian put a comforting hand on his shoulder. After a minute she withdrew it and stood up. She said to Gloria, “Have you called for a graphics tech?”

  “Right before you got here. He should be at the stationhouse by now. Wanna come? Gotta get those descriptions while they’re fresh.”

  “Yes, we’re coming.”

  At that moment two men from the Medical Examiner’s office rolled a wheeled stretcher off the subway car, its body bag strapped into place. Larry Hibler, sitting with his head drooping on his chest, didn’t see. One of the Transit Authority officials came hurrying up to Gloria Sanchez.

  She held up a hand to forestall him. “Let ’em get the body out first,” she said softly. “Then you can open for business.” The man grunted and turned away.

  Marian and Buchanan watched as Gloria gentled Larry Hibler to his feet, explaining that they’d need a statement from him but that could wait until tomorrow. She signaled a bluesuit to drive him home.

  The three detectives followed them up the stairs to the street. The crowd of frustrated passengers had fallen momentarily silent when the corpse in its body bag was trundled past. Gloria told the officers guarding the entrance to the subway to let them in.

  “Where’s Roberts?” Gloria asked, looking around for her partner as the crowd surged past them down the subway steps. “Hey, Marian, if you’re lucky Captain DiFalco will still be there. You can catch up on old times.”

  Marian rolled her eyes.

  Buchanan watched the exchange with interest. “Don’t get along with your old captain?” he asked Marian with a grin.

  “It’s nothing serious,” she said. “We merely hate each other’s guts, that’s all.”

  “I’d laugh,” Gloria said heavily, “but I’m still stuck with him.”

  “And whose fault is that?” Marian asked unsympathetically. “As long as you refuse to take the Sergeants Exam, you’re going to stay right where you are.”

  “Don’t start.”

  “I’ve already started. We’re short a sergeant at Midtown South right now. I’d put in a personal request for you myself. And Captain Murtaugh would add his own request, I’m sure.”

  “Hey, I told you before. I don’t wanna be no sergeant.”

  “What’s wrong with being a sergeant?” Sergeant Buchanan asked.

  “I don’t wanna talk about it, okay?” Gloria was adamant.

  Her partner chose that moment to come running up, out of breath. “Back-up is on the … way.” His voice faded as he saw people going into the subway entrance.

  “Great timing, Roberts,” Gloria said sardonically. “You better stay here and tell ’em they’re not needed. We’re going to the stationhouse.”

  “Shit,” Roberts said.

  Gloria turned to leave and called back over her shoulder to Marian, “You know the way.”

  “Unfortunately,” Marian said with a sigh. “Come on, Buchanan.”

  They headed toward their car, leaving Detective Roberts standing by the subway entrance and glowering at a world that moved faster than he did.

  21

  Marian drove. The distance between Astor Place and the Ninth Precinct stationhouse was short and she could probably have driven it in her sleep.

  Buchanan cleared his throat. “Lieutenant, I know this is outa line—but can you tell me what to expect from this Captain DiFalco? If I’m gonna be the liaison, I gotta know what I’m walkin’ into here.”

  Marian didn’t think the question out of line, although Buchanan was clearly uncomfortable asking one superior officer about another. “DiFalco has all the necessary stuff to make a good cop,” she said. “He’s smart, he’s quick, he’s observant. He has a way of bur
rowing through extraneous detail and putting his finger on precisely the one thing that matters.”

  “So what’s the problem?” Buchanan asked.

  “The problem is ambition,” Marian answered tightly. “He’s let it get out of hand. DiFalco’s more interested in building up his record of cases solved than he is in making sure the right perp is behind bars.”

  Buchanan whistled two notes. “One of those, huh.”

  “It’s what we had our final falling-out about,” she went on. “It was a big case, an important one. And so complicated that Major Crimes wouldn’t touch it. Have you ever heard of that happening before? DiFalco wanted to bust that one so bad it was killing him. So he fingered one man, declared the case closed, and called a press conference. And all the time I kept yelling that he had the wrong guy. DiFalco didn’t like that.”

  “Who was right?”

  Marian gave him a big grin.

  Buchanan laughed. “Which made him love you all the more. Okay, I get the picture.”

  They pulled into the police parking lot across the street from the Ninth Precinct stationhouse on East Fifth Street. To her bemusement, Marian found she didn’t want to go in. There were people still working there that she knew and liked, but the place just had too many bad associations for her.

  It was strange. The desk sergeant was surprised to see her, started to say “Hey, Marian,” and changed it at the last second to “Hello, Lieutenant.” She got that same awkward reaction from everyone she knew. She spoke pleasantly and called everyone by name—the ones she could remember. Buchanan took it all in, said nothing.

  Gloria Sanchez was on the phone when they went into the detectives’ crowded squadroom. Marian perched on the corner of Gloria’s desk and waited until she’d hung up. “Is the graphics tech here?” she asked, looking around.

  “We had to put her in the lieutenant’s office,” Gloria said. “No room out here. Let’s go—uh-oh.”

  Marian turned her head to see Captain DiFalco headed their way.

  He stopped about a foot away from Marian. “Lieutenant.”

  She stood up as gracefully as she could in the space he left her, forcing him to take a step back. “Captain.”