Ed McBain_Matthew Hope 12

by Gladly the Cross-Eyed Bear

  “Does the name Lori Doone ring a familiar note?” Guthrie asked.

  “Mr. Lamb, I do hundreds of videos,” Farley said impatiently. “I really can’t remember the names of all my subjects.”

  Sounds like a ruling monarch, Guthrie thought, but did not say.

  “During the Gulf War,” Farley went on, “I must have shot a hundred videos. In January of ′91, when things really heated up over there, I couldn’t keep count. I don’t know how they played them, they must’ve had VCRs there in the desert, to show them on, don’t you think? Otherwise why would all these women be coming to a professional photographer to have videos made? I had girls in here who wanted to talk sexy to their boyfriends on camera, wives who wanted to look glamorous for their men far far away, even mothers who wanted to send something more personal than a letter. I had all kinds coming to me.

  “This wasn’t the Gulf War,” Guthrie said.

  “I know. I’m only saying.”

  “And Lori Doone didn’t come to you,” Guthrie said.

  “She didn’t? Then why…?”

  “You went to her.”

  Farley looked at him again. Long and hard this time.

  “Are you a policeman?” he asked, sounding suddenly cautious.

  “No, I am not,” Guthrie said, and took out his wallet to show his private investigator’s ID card. “I’m working this privately,” he said, and winked as Farley had when he’d mentioned the future bride in Korea. “Anything we say is privileged and confidential.”

  “Mm,” Farley said, not winking back, and managing to convey in that single mutter an iciness as vast as a Norwegian fjord.

  “Perhaps I can refresh your memory,” Guthrie said.

  “I wish you would.”

  “Lori Doone was modeling lingerie at a place called Silken Secrets on the South Trail?”

  Ending his sentence in a question mark. The prod.

  “Don’t know it,” Farley said.

  “Last March?”

  “Last March or anytime.”

  “You came in one night…”

  “I did not.”

  “…and asked her if she’d care to pose in her lingerie for a video you were making? “You said you’d pay her…”

  “People pay me for making videos, not the other way around.”

  “Pay her a thousand dollars,” Guthrie went on, undaunted, “if she’d…”

  “Ridiculous.”

  “…masturbate for the camera for a half hour.”

  “You have the wrong…”

  “While you taped her.”

  “I’m sorry, your information is wrong.”

  “There are three other girls on the tape, Mr. Farley.”

  “I don’t know anything about such a tape.”

  “I have their names. They all work for Buttercup Enterprises. I can track them down.”

  Farley said nothing for several moments. At last, he said, “What are you looking for, Mr. Lamb?”

  “I told you. Information.”

  “Gee, and here I thought it might be money.”

  “Wrong.”

  “What kind of information?”

  “How many copies of that tape did you make? How many did you sell? And have you still got the master?”

  “None of that is any of your business.”

  “Right, it isn’t. Miss Doone says one of the girls on that tape is only sixteen years old.”

  “Not to my knowledge.”

  “Oh, you remember the tape now?”

  “How much are you looking for, Mr. Lamb?”

  “Say that one more time, and I’ll find it insulting.”

  Farley looked at him.

  Guthrie nodded encouragingly.

  Farley kept looking at him.

  At last, he sighed.

  Guthrie waited.

  “I made and sold fifty copies,” he said at last.

  “For how much a copy?”

  “Twenty bucks. Which was very reasonable for an hour-long video.”

  “I feel certain.”

  “Of professional quality.”

  “Who’s complaining?”

  “I am. I expected to sell five hundred.”

  “You made only fifty copies, but you expected…”

  “I made copies as the orders came in. Stupid I may be, but dumb I’m not. I had a four-thousand-dollar initial investment, a thousand to each of the girls who posed. Plus the cost of the raw stock. And my time. And the black vinyl cases. I printed the photo insert for the cover myself. Even so, you add all that up, I was maybe in for five thousand bucks. I figured if I could sell five hundred copies of the tape, that would’ve been a hundred-percent return. Espresso joints make ten times that.”

  “Who’d you sell the tapes to?”

  “Who knows? I took ads in all the girlie mags. That’s right, I forgot the cost of the goddamn ads. I was probably in for six, seven thousand. Man.”

  “Sell any of these copies to locals?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Well, did you or didn’t you?”

  “I’d have to look at my files. I’m pretty sure most of the responses came from states where there’s more livestock than people. You’d be surprised what evil lurks in the heartland.”

  “How’d you like to cut your losses?” Guthrie asked.

  “How so?”

  “Sell me the master at cost.”

  “Nossir.”

  “How much then?”

  “Seven grand.”

  “Why do I keep thinking of that sixteen-year-old?”

  “Nobody on that tape is sixteen.”

  “Try a girl named Candi Lane.”

  “Seven sounds reasonable.”

  “Five sounds even more reasonable.”

  “Make it six.”

  “Done.”

  “Cash.”

  “Forget it.”

  “Is she really only sixteen?” Farley asked.

  “I didn’t know how high I could go,” Guthrie told me, “and I didn’t want to lose it by having to check with you first.”

  I was wondering what he’d have done if it had been his own money.

  “That’s fine,” I said. “I told you to get the master, and you got the master.”

  I still hadn’t heard that there were fifty copies out there.

  I heard that now.

  “Yeah,” Guthrie said, and shrugged.

  Six thousand dollars, I was thinking. With fifty copies still out there alive and kicking.

  “Twenty bucks a throw, he got for them,” Guthrie said.

  “Should have met us first,” I said.

  “Huh?”

  “Could’ve sold us the whole batch, plus the Brooklyn Bridge.”

  “I thought six was a bargain,” Guthrie said, somewhat petulantly. “This tape ever showed up in court, Miss Commins would’ve sizzled.”

  “What if one of the copies shows up in court?”

  “That isn’t likely.”

  “It’s possible.”

  “Anything’s possible. Genghis Khan could show up in court. But it isn’t likely. Especially since only one of the tapes is in Calusa.”

  “What are you saying.”

  “I’m saying only one of the copies is here in Calusa.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I got a list from Farley.”

  “A list of what?”

  “The people who ordered the tape from him. Guys from all over the country. Even some women. Only one of the customers was from Calusa.”

  “May I see the list?”

  “Certainly,” Guthrie said, and took several stapled and folded sheets of paper from his inside jacket pocket. “I highlighted the one we’re interested in.”

  I looked down the first page of typewritten names and addresses. Some twenty or so. None of them highlighted.

  “It’s on the third page,” Guthrie said.

  I flipped to the third page.

  “Near the top,” he said.
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  The name was highlighted in yellow.

  “Some Spanish guy,” Guthrie said.

  Robert Ernesto Diaz.

  Evensong II was one of the older low-rise condominiums on Sabal Key, built some twenty years ago when restrictions were still in force and before builders began reaching for the sky. Clustered around a man-made cove and canals that afforded entrance to the Intercoastal, the shingled two-story buildings in their wooded setting looked cloistered and serene, an image reinforced by the boats bobbing beside the canal docks and in the cove. A breeze was blowing in off the water. A white heron delicately picked its way along the border of the walk leading to unit 21. It took sudden startled flight as I approached. I had called ahead. Bobby Diaz was expecting me.

  He told me at once that he had an early dinner date and he hoped we could make this fast. His urgency gained credibility by the fact that one side of his face was covered with lather, and he was wearing only a towel. He showed me into the living room, told me to make myself a drink if I cared for one, and then said he wouldn’t be long.

  His apartment overlooked the condo swimming pool. Young girls in thong bikinis lay on poolside lounges or splashed in the water. An old man wearing red boxer trunks sat on the edge of the pool, his legs dangling in the water, watching the girls. I watched them, too. Diaz was back in ten minutes, buttoning a cream-colored sports shirt, tucking it into trousers the color of bran. He had trimmed his black mustache and neatly shaved the rest of his face. His long black hair, still wet from the shower, was combed straight back from his forehead. His dark eyes looked suspicious, but the wary look fled before his welcoming smile.

  “No drink?” he said. “Can I make you one?”

  “Well, this won’t take a minute,” I said. “I know you’re in a hurry.”

  “Always time for a drink,” he said.

  “Are you having one?”

  “Sure. What’ll it be?”

  “Little Scotch on the rocks would be fine,” I said.

  I would have preferred a Beefeater martini with a couple of olives, but Diaz had a dinner date and I had questions to ask. He poured Johnnie Black over a handful of ice cubes, handed the glass to me, and then mixed himself a gin and tonic.

  “Cheers,” he said.

  “Cheers.”

  We drank. Outside at the pool, one of the girls trilled a laugh that sounded like a kingfisher running a river. Diaz sat opposite me on a blue sofa against a white wall. The condo was furnished sparingly in severe modern upholstered in varying tones of blue and green. Throw pillows and paintings echoed splashes of complementary colors. Even the wedge of lime floating in his drink seemed part of the overall design.

  “What’s this all about?” he asked.

  “Lainie,” I said.

  “So you told me on the phone. But what now?”

  “A video,” I said, and watched him.

  Nothing showed on his face.

  “Something titled Idle Hands.

  Still no sign of recognition.

  I opened my briefcase. I removed from it a glossy black-and-white photograph I’d had made by a commercial photographer three blocks from my office. It showed the cover art for the video. Lainie’s hands caressing the crotch of the white panties, the Victorian ring, the title.

  “Recognize this?” I asked, and handed the photograph to him.

  He took it in his right hand.

  Studied it.

  “Forgive the photo,” I said, “but at some point I may have to introduce the actual video in evidence.”

  Which was bullshit.

  “Am I supposed to know something about this?” Diaz asked, looking genuinely puzzled.

  “You’re supposed to have ordered it from a company named Video Trends.”

  “Ordered what?”

  “The video.”

  “I ordered a video?”

  “Titled Idle Hands and starring four women performing respectively as Lori Doone, Candi Lane, Vicki Held, and Dierdre Starr.”

  “I thought you said this was about Lainie.”

  “It is. She used the name Lori Doone. It’s a porn flick, Mr. Diaz.”

  “A porn flick, I see.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you’re saying I ordered this video from…”

  “Yes, that’s what I’m saying.”

  “Well, I never heard of this video.”

  “The man who did the photography…”

  “I’m sorry, but I never heard of it. That’s that.”

  “Then how’d your name get on the list of people who’d ordered the video from him?”

  “I have no idea. Anyway, I didn’t know it was against the law to buy a pornographic video.”

  “It isn’t.”

  “Then what the hell…excuse me, Mr. Hope, but I still don’t know what you’re doing here.”

  “If we can get past…”

  “There’s nothing to get past. You’ve got the wrong person. I didn’t order a video from any magazine, and I don’t know how…”

  “Who mentioned a magazine?”

  “What?”

  “I didn’t say anything about a magazine.”

  “Well, I…I just assumed that someone advertising a pornographic video would…”

  “I didn’t say anything about anyone advertising it, either.”

  We looked at each other.

  “Okay?” I said. “Can we at least get past this part of it?”

  “Depends on which part we go to next.”

  “Did you at any time own a video titled Idle Hands?”

  “I did.”

  “Okay.”

  “So?”

  “Did you ever watch it?”

  “I did.”

  “Did you recognize Lainie Commins as one of the performers in that video?”

  “I did.”

  “When was this?”

  “When I first received it. A week or so ago.”

  “Would you remember the exact date?”

  “Well, yes. But only because it got here on my birthday.”

  “Nice present.”

  “Better than a tie.”

  “When was that, Mr. Diaz? Your birthday?”

  “The eleventh.”

  “Of September?”

  “Yes. September eleventh.”

  “The day before Brett Toland got killed.”

  “Well…yes. I suppose it was. I recognized the ring the minute I looked at the cover. Lainie wore it all the time. I thought, Hey, what’s this?”

  “So you knew it was Lainie even before…”

  “Well, let’s say I suspected it. Then when I watched it, of course…”

  “When was that?”

  “That night.”

  “The night of the eleventh.”

  “Yes. UPS delivered it that afternoon, it was waiting in the manager’s office when I got home from work.”

  “So you watched it that night.”

  “Yes.”

  “The eleventh of September…”

  “I’m sure it was.”

  “And recognized Lainie Commins that same night.”

  “Yes.”

  “What did you do then?”

  “I went to sleep.”

  “What I mean, Mr. Diaz, is when did you tell Brett Toland you’d seen Lainie Commins performing in a porn flick?”

  “I don’t know what you mean.”

  “I think you know what I mean.”

  “I never told Brett about it.”

  “Then how’d the tape get in his possession?”

  “I have no idea.”

  “You didn’t give it to him?”

  “Never even mentioned it to him.”

  “Do you still have the tape?”

  “I’m sure I do.”

  “May I see it?”

  “I’m not sure I know where it is.”

  “Could you look for it?”

  “I’d be happy to. But as I told you…”

  “I know. An early dinner date.”
>
  “Yes.”

  “Mr. Diaz,” I said, rising and putting my empty glass down on the coffee table, “here’s what I think. I think you called Brett Toland the minute you spotted Lainie on that tape…

  “No, I’m sorry, I didn’t.”

  “I think you told him he had nothing to worry about anymore because…”

  “He had nothing to worry about, anyway. The bear was ours. Lainie stole it.”

  “How’d that happen to come to mind just now, Mr. Diaz?”

  “What?”

  “How’d you happen to make that connection?”

  “Because the only thing Brett had to worry about was Lainie’s false claim.”

  “So now he didn’t have to worry about that anymore, did he? Because you had a tape of Lainie Commins masturbating.”

  “Please.”

  “Well, isn’t that what she was doing, Mr. Diaz?”

  “Well, sure, but…”

  “What’s the matter? Does the word bother you?”

  “No, but…”

  “Does the act bother you?”

  “No, but…”

  “You’re the one who ordered that tape, you know?”

  “I realize that. But what an adult does privately…”

  “Ah.”

  “…isn’t always a suitable matter for discussion.”

  “Do you think Mr. and Mrs. America would buy a teddy bear from someone who’d masturbated in a porn flick?”

  “I don’t know what Mr. and Mrs. America would buy.”

  “Well, you design toys for Mr. and Mrs. America, don’t you?”

  “I design toys for children.”

  “The children of Mr. and Mrs. America.”

  “I’m telling you I never once discussed this with Brett Toland.”

  “Never told him you’d watched Lainie Commins masturbating on your birthday?”

  “My birthday was a coincidence.”

  “Never called and said, ‘Hey, Brett, guess what’?”

  “Never.”

  “Never gave him that tape.”