A Death Before Dying (The Lt. Hastings Mysteries)

by Collin Wilcox

  “That could be Charles.”

  Involuntarily Hastings made a vestigial move in the direction of the ringing. But a quick glance from Friedman arrested the impulse.

  “He’s frightened,” Corwin said. “Charles is frightened. And he’s dangerous. He’s very dangerous.” He broke off, blinked, swallowed painfully. “And I’m frightened, too. Because I know why you left the room. You wanted to decide what to do next, how to handle this. You’ve got the scent. So there’ll be more policemen. And search warrants, too. And the reporters, they’ll find the scent. They probably have the scent right now. They’ll be next, ringing the doorbell. Then there’ll be lawyers. Courtrooms. A trial.”

  Still remaining motionless, the two detectives made no response, gave no hint that they were more than mildly interested as Corwin’s disembodied monologue continued.

  “When I realized that I was frightened—really frightened, for the first time in many years—I knew I had to sit down, here. I had to feel these stones. So I just sat down. And as soon as I did, there was a flash of déjà vu. It was probably from childhood, when I’d sat beside a fireplace like this.” He broke off again, let his eyes wander away as the silence lengthened. Then, reflectively: “Sometimes I think that the feeding frenzy is the most provocative of all images. It goes right through the animal kingdom. Sharks—rodents—lawyers—reporters—they’re all the same. Let them smell blood, and they go wild.” Sadly he shook his head. “All my life, they’ve fed off me and my family. For some families, it’s poverty, or disease, or maybe madness. But for me—my family and me—it’s always been the lawyers and the reporters.”

  Once more Corwin lapsed into silence as he sat with his body pressed against the ancient stone of the great fireplace. Then he began speaking again, this time infinitely regretful.

  “That’s what frightened me,” he said. “That’s why I had to sit down here. Because I was so frightened of what’ll happen—the police, and the lawyers and the reporters. I’m frightened of Charles, too. So—” Another silence, this one the last. “So that’s why I’m going to tell you where to find Charles. Because he killed her, you see. And I’m afraid he’ll kill me.”

  6:00 P.M. “The question is,” Hastings said, “how solid is Corwin? If Charles calls him between now and nine o’clock, and Corwin warns him off, where are we?”

  “I don’t think he’d warn Charles. I think he wants Charles caught. Badly.”

  Not replying, Hastings stared out through the rain-streaked windshield. They were sitting in an unmarked car facing the entrance to the long, graceful curve of the circular driveway that led up to the Palace of the Legion of Honor. Located in Lincoln Park, set in a grove of cypress and towering Monterey pines, the Legion of Honor Museum was an exact replica of its namesake in Paris.

  “So how’re we going to handle it?” Friedman asked.

  “I’ll handle this end,” Hastings said. “You should go back to the Hall, for communications.”

  “Or maybe I should go back to Corwin’s. What’d you think?”

  “I think you should go to the Hall, to coordinate. We’ve got three stakeouts going, after all. Four, counting the two guys at Meredith’s flat.”

  “Translated into manpower, and then into money,” Friedman said ruefully, “we’re talking about some pretty big bucks here. If we don’t get something from all this, we’re going to be in deep shit at the next departmental review.”

  “Maybe you should get approval from one of the deputy chiefs. Hallahan, maybe.”

  Friedman grimaced. “No, thanks.”

  “Just a thought.”

  “I understand.”

  Hastings lapsed into glum silence before Friedman spoke. “Basically, I’d say the terrain is with us. You drive Corwin’s Jaguar up to the steps and just wait. Charles arrives in the elusive blue Fiat. Or, more like it, the car he got after he ditched the Fiat. We block both ends of the driveway, and we’ve got him. I figure we should post about ten men with shotguns behind the pillars of the building. God knows, there’re plenty of places to hide.”

  “There’re plenty of places for Charles to hide, too, though, if he decides to come on foot.”

  “True.” Friedman let a beat pass, then said, “Well, make it twenty men altogether, ten men in the trees, what the hell. Deployed by—when—eight o’clock?”

  “Fine.” Nodding absently, Hastings was surveying the terrain painstakingly. Except for the driveway and the front portico of the museum, there were no lights. Like Golden Gate Park, Lincoln Park after the sun set was a dark, dangerous place.

  “I don’t think I should drive the Jaguar,” Hastings said. “I’m a lot bigger than Corwin.”

  “Those lights along the driveway are pretty dim, though. Unless you’re silhouetted, he won’t see you until it’s too late. However—” Friedman reached for the cruiser’s microphone. “However, that’s up to you. I’ll stick with the big picture—out of the rain.” He keyed the microphone and called for a squad car to pick him up and take him to the Hall of Justice.

  6:15 P.M. “And will that be on Visa?” the clerk asked.

  “Yes. Visa.” Charles took the card from his wallet, slid it across the counter. The clerk took the impression, handed back the charge card, folded the rental contract, slipped it into its Avis folder. With a small flourish, she handed over the folder and the car keys. “If you have any problems,” the clerk said, “anything you need, just give us a call. We’ll answer twenty-four hours a day.”

  “Yes. Thank you.” Charles took the keys, slipped the folder into an inside pocket, and picked up the plastic shopping bag he’d put on the floor beside the counter. The bag was filled with everything he’d taken from the Fiat: a flashlight, maps, an auto club membership, repair bills, a tire gauge—and the .38-caliber revolver that Edwin had loaned him the night Meredith Powell had died. Two hours ago, at a sporting goods store on Clement Street, he’d bought a box of. 38 cartridges, which weighed heavily in an inside pocket of his jacket, distorting the drape. It was a cashmere jacket, bought less than a month ago, when he and Edwin had gone shopping on Grant Avenue. The bill for the jacket and two shirts and a pair of coordinating slacks had come to more than fifteen hundred dollars—for Edwin, pin money.

  7:00 P.M. “Will there be anything else?” the clerk asked, smiling. “A scarf? A sweater?”

  “No, thanks.” Charles took the parcel, thanked the clerk, and left the department store by the main entrance. He would go to a gas station men’s room, take the sack inside, and change into the jeans, dark jacket, sneakers, and the black watch cap he’d bought at a surplus store. Then, dressed for the part, a predator on the prowl, he would drive to Clement Street, where he would park the rented Tempo. There would be an hour left, to make his plans.

  7:35 P.M. Except for a low-intensity baby spotlight focused on the platform, the chamber was in darkness. Soon he would go to the ceremonial carved wooden chair with the electronic console placed on a small table beside it. He would press the button that lowered the screen over the platform. He would depress the switch that activated the projector. The videotape would begin: two figures, he and Meredith Powell, both of them beginning the passage that would end in oblivion.

  Oblivion? Was that the word?

  A lifetime came down to days, then to hours, then minutes, finally to seconds. Time compressed, stopped on zero. Then time crossed over: exploding fragments propelled at random through infinity.

  Lost on earth, would he be lost in space, wandering through infinity, oblivious to oblivion?

  With luck, oblivious to oblivion.

  Were there memories that he could take?

  He stood in front of the window, staring out into the night. The house was silent, empty. There was no moon, no stars. Low scudding clouds obscured the twin towers of the Golden Gate Bridge. Soon the rain would begin again.

  When he’d been a small boy, left alone in a large house that was empty except for servants, he’d made up stories. Fantasies, drenched i
n blood. The fantasies had often been more real to him than the sights and sounds of ordinary life. Once, imagining himself a masked avenger, he’d taken a knife from the kitchen. In darkness, he’d gone to his mother’s room. He’d entered her huge wardrobe closet. Still in total darkness he’d begun slashing at her clothing, imagining they were dragons. Then reality had twisted, turned, fell away. Suddenly the dragons were real: phantasms pressing close, cloth transmuted into flesh, into horrible scales and glowing eyes and monstrous claws, dripping blood.

  He’d never known how they’d found him, never known who took him to the hospital. His next clear recollection had been morning light coming into his window—and the nurse in white, sitting on a chair beside his bed. She’d been reading a magazine. When she realized that he was awake she’d smiled, and nodded, and then gone back to her magazine. Later, the doctor had told him that they were trying to locate his mother in Switzerland.

  Now, tonight, staring out into the stormy night, his fantasies were more mundane, more matter-of-fact, more serviceable.

  In tonight’s fantasy, Charles would drive into the curving driveway that led to the broad, pillared arcade of the Legion of Honor Museum. Holding the revolver, Charles would walk slowly to the Jaguar. Every nerve would be stretched impossibly taut; every demon would be shrieking. In the darkness, with rain falling, the figure behind the wheel would be indistinct. Sensing danger, Charles would hesitate. And at that moment, out of the darkness, the police would spring at him. The revolver would come up. Police guns would roar. Charles would fall, dead.

  Later he would give the police a statement. Charles, he would say, was a deviate, a psychotic, a sex maniac. He’d been terrified of Charles, he’d tell the police. For more than two years, ever since he’d been forced to participate in the ritual that had ended Tina Betts’s life, he’d lived a life of terror.

  As if he’d lived through the scene he’d imagined, Charles’s death scene, he suddenly felt drained, utterly exhausted.

  It was necessary, therefore, that he go to the carved chair, and lower the screen, and begin the show.

  Because if the police ever returned and questioned him again, seriously, as a suspect, then he must surely destroy the two tapes. Even though they were concealed, ignominiously concealed, it would nevertheless be possible for the police to discover them.

  And that could never happen. Ever.

  Even with Charles dead, unable to incriminate him, the tapes would reach beyond the grave.

  8:50 P.M. “I’ll tell you, Lieutenant—” Dolefully Canelli peered out into the darkness. “I don’t think we’ve got much of an edge here. I mean, if he comes by the road, then we’re okay. But if he comes through the trees, well, hell, it’s kind of a toss-up, it seems to me, whether he’ll see us before we see him. I mean, Jeez, this is like jungle warfare or something.”

  Drumming on the car’s dash with impatient fingers, Hastings said, “It’d take a hundred men to seal off this place, Canelli. You know that just as well as I do.” Frowning, Hastings raised the microphone he held in his right hand, clicked the TRANSMIT switch. “Phil, are you ready?”

  “I’m wet, Lieutenant. But I’m ready.”

  “It shouldn’t be too much longer. Remember, I want everyone in your section looking into the trees, not at the road or the driveway. If he comes by car, we’ll see him. But if he comes through the trees, that’s up to you.”

  “Right.”

  “Pass the word.”

  “Right.”

  Hastings changed channels, spoke again into the microphone. “Sections, give me a radio check, please.”

  In succession, four unmarked cars and two patrol sections acknowledged the call. As they checked in, Canelli counted the sections on his fingers, nodded to Hastings.

  “All right,” Hastings said, still speaking into the microphone. “I’m switching frequencies, but Canelli’ll monitor this frequency on his hand-held while I’m talking to Communications. Don’t transmit on this frequency unless you actually see him, see something suspicious. And remember, Thompson’ll be driving the Jaguar. If the shit hits the fan, he’s going to block the driveway and drop down beneath the dash. We’ll be covering him. Don’t forget: I want absolute radio silence unless you spot him, no popping off. Acknowledge.”

  In succession, six voices acknowledged the order. Hastings nodded for Canelli to take over, then switched to Communications. “This is Lieutenant Hastings. Give me Lieutenant Friedman, please. He’s at the Hall.” Waiting for the connection, Hastings glanced at his watch: 8:56. In four more minutes, the Jaguar would appear, driving toward them on the badly lit road that connected Clement Street to the Legion of Honor. The road was narrow, and ran through Lincoln Park for almost a mile. Thompson had been instructed to switch off his headlights as he turned from the road into the circular driveway that led to the museum.

  “Friedman” came the voice on the radio.

  “We’re all set here,” Hastings said. “Anything on our rich friend?”

  “Negative,” Friedman answered laconically. “But our guys are sure looking. And they’re listening, too.”

  The listening devices, then, were in place at the Corwin mansion.

  “Good. Who’s in charge, out there?”

  “Marsten.”

  To himself, Hastings grimaced. From the first hour they’d worked together, he’d never liked Marsten. And Marsten, he knew, had never liked him.

  As if he’d sensed what Hastings was thinking, Friedman said, “I’ve been thinking about going out to Jackson Street.”

  “Good idea.”

  “How long’re you going to stay at it, out there?”

  “It’s supposed to come down at nine. I thought I’d give it until nine-thirty.”

  “If you shoot a blank, then the Jag goes back to Jackson Street. Right?”

  “Right,” Hastings answered.

  “Who’s driving it?”

  “Thompson.”

  “Okay. Tell Thompson to contact me on surveillance channel three before he actually drives into the garage. Clear?”

  “That’s clear. Channel three,” Hastings said.

  “Right. I’m leaving now for Jackson Street. Keep in touch. And good luck.”

  “Thanks.”

  8:56 P.M. Underfoot, wet leaves and small fallen branches clutched at his feet. Overhead, wind and rain lashed at the restlessly blowing tree limbs. Close by, surrounding him on every side, tree trunks had turned the night deadly dangerous. Each of the trees, each bush, could hide a man with a gun.

  As he’d done just moments before, Charles stopped, stood perfectly still, listening, looking. Above the sound of the wind-whipped branches and the drumming of the rain, he could hear nothing. But he could see the streetlights of the Legion of Honor Drive, to his right, and the curve of lights that traced the circular driveway, straight ahead.

  Would Edwin come?

  Had the police found Edwin, connected him to Meredith Powell?

  At the thought, he realized that his hand had sought the cold steel touch of the revolver thrust into his belt. Edwin’s revolver.

  And Edwin’s money. And Edwin’s videotapes, hidden somewhere in the house, in the chamber.

  When they’d first done it—stumbled into it, breathless as two small boys, desperately clutching and gouging, he’d suspected the camera was rolling. Right to the end, until they’d discovered she was dead, the sudden cadaver that had once been an art student named Tina Betts, he’d suspected the camera was rolling. And then, even while he still stood breathless, chest heaving, looking down at the dead girl, he’d realized that the video could change his life. He and Edwin were equals, because of the tape. Never again would he beg. Never again would—

  From his right, down the narrow Legion of Honor Drive, a car was coming, one single car, a set of headlights, intermittently flashing between tree trunks. If it was Edwin, he was on time.

  Edwin, who was never on time, was on time now.

  Was it an omen?


  Was it really the Jaguar, now drawing close to the circular driveway? Was it …?

  The lights deflected; the car turned into the driveway. It was a sedan, possibly the Jaguar. Through the rain and the rising ground fog, positive identification was impossible. Therefore, one cautious step at a time, he must approach the car. Now the sedan had come to a stop; the lights had been switched off.

  Edwin, waiting.

  Fifty thousand dollars, waiting. The first payment on a debt that would never end.

  9:05 P.M. Canelli’s voice was hushed, a half-whisper: “Maybe you should’ve gotten Corwin himself to drive that Jag, Lieutenant.”

  “If there’s shooting, and he caught one …”

  “Yeah, that’s true.” Canelli sat silently for a moment, staring at the entrance to the driveway. Then: “Jeez, I hope he didn’t drive by and see our cars, or something, and just keep driving.”

  “If he was driving the blue Fiat,” Hastings answered shortly, “he didn’t drive by.”

  “Well, that’s true. But I mean, if he—you know—ditched the Fiat, or something, and if he saw us, then …” He shrugged, shook his head.

  Hastings decided not to reply. On stakeout, Canelli apparently felt obligated to keep the conversation going, regardless of its effect, or content.

  Headlights were approaching from Clement Street, the first car since Thompson had arrived in the Jaguar. Watching the headlights come closer, both men stiffened slightly, sitting straighter in their seats. They’d checked out a short-barreled shotgun, which rested on the seat between them. When they left their car, Canelli would handle the shotgun; Hastings would take the walkie-talkie.

  The approaching car was slowing, probably to turn into the driveway. Was it the Fiat? With the headlights bright in their eyes, it was impossible to know. Hastings’s hand unconsciously moved to the door handle; Canelli touched the shotgun.

  Now the car turned. It was a large American sedan, a Buick, or an Oldsmobile. With the pale light from a streetlight briefly illuminating the car’s interior, Hastings saw two figures, probably a woman and a man.