Forgive Me: A Xanadu Marx Thriller

by Joshua Corin

  “How?”

  “Well, for starters, you boys seem to be fixated on an assumption that could be one hundred percent false.”

  “Which is?”

  “That this guy Lucia described, this guy with the scar, this guy you and Detective Chau obviously recognize, this guy who any five-year-old could figure out is a cop—you’re assuming he also was the one who snagged evidence from the crime scene last night.”

  “Forgive me, Miss Marx,” said Detective Konquist, “but weren’t you the one who just a few minutes ago was going on about Venn diagrams and how it had to be the same person?”

  “That’s because I forgot about the neighbors. I always forget about the neighbors.”

  Konquist looked around the strip of motel rooms. The newly arrived uniforms were already going door to door, interviewing each of the guests. Maybe one of them had seen the McCormicks get into a car. Maybe one of them had taken notice of the car’s make and model. Maybe one of them had jotted down the car’s license plate.

  “Not those neighbors,” Xana told him. “Last night. The couple who called it in.”

  “The whatever-their-name was? What about them?”

  “Did you get their statement?”

  “Their statement? Gosh. What a great idea that would have been! No, we just clucked at them like chickens until they went back to their room. You’re so smart.”

  Xana smirked. “You’re ornery when you’re tired, Detective.”

  “I’m sorry. I’m really not enjoying this case. I like squares. Squares make sense. But then you got to add rhombuses and trapezoids and people think they’re more interesting because they’re different, but they’re not more interesting. They’re trying too hard. There’s nothing wrong with a square. Or a circle. I like circles too.”

  He called Chau over and asked him to bring up his notes on whatever-their-name was from last night, the elderly couple.

  “Friedrich and Alice Van Dyke?”

  Konquist shrugged.

  Chau recalled his notes on his phone.

  “Now show them to Miss Marx.”

  “Why am I showing them to Miss Marx?”

  “Because she thinks they’re the droids we’re looking for.”

  “I didn’t say that,” replied Xana. “What I said was we need to rule them out.”

  “Ma’am, all due respect, we ruled them out last night.”

  “You ruled them out last night.”

  “Seriously?”

  “What does it hurt?” Konquist muttered to his partner, and his partner agreed, and summarized his notes. Xana listened with concerted patience. Her nicotine gum was starting to harden in her mouth. She listened for any discrepancies, any unusual observations, and wasn’t surprised when she heard none. As Chau said, the Van Dykes had been ruled out, not that there had been much reason to rule them in. By the sound of it, they were simply good citizens who had responded to a late-night disturbance, called 911, and then dutifully stuck around for the police to arrive even though it was already past midnight and they were in a strange city.

  Much like the McCormicks, the Van Dykes were from out of state. Florida, in their case. They were slowly driving up the East Coast. They hoped to be in Maryland by Halloween. They had family in Maryland. How were they able to stay in a penthouse suite at a four-star Marriott? Friedrich Van Dyke used to work for corporate in Bethesda.

  “And that’s it,” said Detective Chau. “They were a nice couple.”

  “So were the McCormicks,” Konquist added.

  Xana nodded, semi-satisfied. “I’m just trying to cross all my t’s. You think they’re still at the hotel?”

  “They said they’re staying till the end of the week.”

  “Excellent. Call them up.”

  Chau frowned. “Why?”

  “Humor me.”

  “Why?”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I have better things to do?”

  Again, Chau looked to Konquist for guidance. Wasn’t this annoyance supposed to be on her way back home? Meanwhile, Xana googled the phone number of the hotel and dialed it herself.

  “Hello? Yes, hi. I was wondering if you could put me through to one of your guests. His name is Friedrich Van Dyke. It’s his doctor’s office. Oh, you can’t transfer me without his room number? One second…”

  “2704,” grumbled Detective Chau.

  “2704. Thank you. I’ll hold.” Xana cupped her hand over the phone’s speaker. “I’m on hold.”

  Chau exaggerated a wave good-bye and rejoined the forensics team at the threshold to the McCormicks’ room.

  “I don’t think he likes me,” observed Xana.

  “I am in awe of your deductive reasoning,” Detective Konquist retorted. “What are you going to ask the Van Dykes?”

  “You’ll find out in a sec. Their phone’s ringing. And it’s ringing. And it’s ringing. And it’s ringing. And it’s going to voice mail.” Xana hung up. “Do you have an alternate contact number for them?”

  “Probably. But why the suspicion? Is this just a hunch or am I missing something?”

  “A little bit of both. I’ll explain in a minute.”

  Konquist wandered over to his partner. They had a small chat. Chau shot Xana the evil eye. Xana replied with a queenly wave. Konquist returned. He recited the first four digits of Alice Van Dyke’s cell phone number, then stopped, then cursed, then wandered back to his partner. They had another small chat. Konquist returned to Xana and recited the remaining six digits.

  Xana punched in the number and put the call on speakerphone.

  It rang once.

  Then: “We’re sorry, but the number you’re trying to reach is no longer in service.”

  Xana pressed END.

  Konquist repeated his curse from a minute ago, and then added, “How did you know?”

  “Let’s say you’re setting up someone to, oh, get their hands chopped off. That’s going to create a heck of a mess. Plus, presumably, you want to make sure the fellow who suddenly has no hands doesn’t die. Did you find any medical equipment in the McCormicks’ suite?”

  “No. But maybe they didn’t care if he died.”

  “Then they still have to dispose of the body.”

  “Unless the priest was going to dispose of the body.”

  “Maybe if he showed up with a housekeeping cart, but he showed up with a platter. Was he going to slice Wilkerson into little bits and sneak him away on the platter? I’m guessing not. So that means there was someone else stationed nearby who was in charge of the cleanup. Now, it could be the same cop or cops who whisked the McCormicks away from here. But I don’t think so.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because the Van Dykes knew about the list. How did they know about the list? How did they know Wilkerson had a list of names and dates in his pocket? And how did they know to take the list of names and dates from his pocket?”

  “The room could have been bugged.”

  “You all tossed the room last night,” said Xana. “Did you find any bugs?”

  “We weren’t looking for any bugs.”

  “A simpler explanation is the people in the suite next door were eavesdropping on the whole thing. They were there to make sure everything went kosher with the priest and then they would go in and clean everything up.”

  “If they were next door the whole time, why didn’t they rush in when they first heard the gunshot?”

  “Maybe they were unarmed. Maybe they weren’t prepared for things to go off-script.”

  “That’s a lot of conjecture.”

  “So let’s prove it. I’ve never been to the Peachtree Marriott. I hear it’s luxurious.”

  Chapter 17

  Chau rejoined them with two uniforms in tow. “Miss Marx, these officers will escort you home.”

  “Actually,” said Xana, “I believe I’ll be staying. Although when we’re done here, I’d highly recommend we stop at the Peachtree Marriott. You see—”

  “I don
’t care. Officer Patemsley, Officer Vance, if you could take Miss Marx home now, please.”

  Xana shot a glance to Detective Konquist, who literally backed out of the conversation. Chicken. Ah well. Time to repeat her threat.

  “You know what’s weird,” she said to Chau. “I don’t see any FBI around here. Isn’t that weird? I think that—”

  “They’re on their way,” Chau replied.

  That shut Xana up right quick. Again she looked to Detective Konquist, but the absentminded flatfoot had made himself conspicuously not there.

  “But the Van Dykes are in on it. Their phone number is a sham. They’re the ones who stole the list.”

  “That’s good to know. Have a pleasant day. Officers, if you please. This is an active crime scene and Miss Marx is a civilian.”

  And so Officer Patemsley and Officer Vance escorted their civilian, Xanadu Marx, off the premises. They placed her in the backseat of their squad car and they drove away and Chau felt the knot in between his shoulders untie itself. Ding-dong, the witch was dead. No, not dead. But gone. Gone, baby, gone.

  Konquist was at the vending machine next to the front office.

  “It ate my dollar bill,” he said.

  “It’s a cruel world,” Chau philosophized.

  “She could have helped us, you know.”

  “I ran it by LT. He said no.”

  “You ran it by LT?”

  Chau nodded. “Seemed like the thing to do.”

  “And the FBI really are on their way?”

  “Not yet. Not to the best of my knowledge. But you know them. They’ll show up eventually.”

  Konquist punched the vending machine. It didn’t even rattle. “She could have been a help.”

  “Because without Xanadu Marx, we’re just two idiots twiddling our thumbs. That’s what she thinks, at least.”

  “I’ve never twiddled my thumbs in my life,” said Konquist mildly, “and I don’t know anyone who has.”

  “So what’s this about the Peachtree Marriott and our couple from last night?”

  Konquist updated Chau on what Xana had learned. Chau listened, nodded, sighed, and nodded some more.

  “It’s not conclusive,” he concluded.

  “It’s something.”

  “We’ll check it out. But it’s not our top priority.”

  Konquist stuffed his hands into his pockets. “I know.”

  The air sizzled with the unspoken name, their top priority. Henry Hoyt. He of the receding hairline and the facial scar. Officer Henry Hoyt. He had been at the crime scene last night.

  “Is he still on duty?” asked Konquist.

  “No. And I got his home address.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  Reluctantly, they went.

  Henry Hoyt lived in a town called Conyers, located a solid half hour east of the Airport Motel. Chau and Konquist had to cross a pair of centuries-old railroad tracks to arrive at a decidedly white-collar neighborhood, the kind of place where every house had a garage but everyone still parked their cars in the driveway. Basketball hoops were nailed to telephone poles. The streets had potholes, but not many of them, and all the streetlights were intact and illuminated, with not a shattered bulb among them.

  They parked in front of the stout two-story Colonial at 8212 Jessup Lane.

  “I don’t like this,” said Konquist, shifting into park.

  “All I did was ask for his address. Not even LT knows why. So we’re flying under the radar here. If we’re wrong and Hoyt’s clean, there will be no blowback.”

  “And if we’re right?”

  Chau shrugged.

  “That’s what I don’t like.”

  “So how do you want to play this, Abe?”

  “I don’t want to play this.”

  “We’re just following the evidence.”

  “I hate evidence.”

  “Now you’re just being ornery.”

  “That’s what Xana called me.”

  Chau smirked.

  “What’s so funny?” asked Konquist.

  “I don’t know what’s more remarkable, Abe—that you just called that nutcase by her first name or that you remembered her first name at all.”

  “Go fuck a tree.”

  “See? Ornery.”

  They ascended the hilly drive to the front door. The doorbell chimed out a few notes from Pachelbel’s Canon in D.

  “He could be asleep,” said Konquist.

  “You wish.”

  “I do wish.”

  They heard footsteps. The door opened. A bone-thin brunette in her mid-thirties stood there. Her hands and lower lip were trembling.

  Terror? No. The rhythm was too haphazard.

  “Can I help you?” she asked. Her vowels slurred.

  Drunk? No. Her gaze on them was too focused. A hazel-beamed gaze. Intense.

  “Mrs. Hoyt?” asked Detective Chau. “Is your husband home?”

  “He’s asleep,” she said. “Do you work with him?”

  Chau showed his badge. “Same precinct, different department. My name is Victor Chau. This is my partner, Abe Konquist.”

  “Make yourselves at home. I’ll go poke Henry awake.”

  The detectives stepped into the foyer while Mrs. Henry Hoyt limped up the carpeted stairs.

  “ALS?” whispered Chau.

  “Or Parkinson’s.”

  “Could be cerebral palsy.”

  “Could be.”

  Mrs. Hoyt took a left and disappeared somewhere on the second floor. In the foyer, the front door was offset on either side by an impressionistic oil painting. One depicted Savannah harbor dyed green for St. Patrick’s Day. Thousands of partygoers lined the coastal pubs. Each of their faces was a smudge of color, and each color was different. But that couldn’t be. There weren’t thousands of colors, right? Either way, most of the painting was that dyed bay, shimmering out toward the viewer in various shades of shadow.

  The other painting offered a blurred approximation of the Confederate battle flag. The brushstrokes gave the flag an illusion of movement. Ever-waving, this flag, at least in the foyer of the Hoyts.

  “This was a mistake,” muttered Konquist. “We maybe should have gone to Alicia Cumen first.”

  “His partner?”

  “It would have been less confrontational.”

  “It would have been very confrontational to Alicia Cumen.”

  “I know Alicia,” Konquist said.

  Mrs. Hoyt reappeared at the top of the stairs. “He’ll just be a minute.”

  In the meantime, she served them coffee in Atlanta Police Department mugs. Apparently the Hoyts had a bunch. The coffee was delicious, though, and the small talk they bandied about while waiting for Henry to show up was not quite as painful as it could have been. Dotty Hoyt was an excellent conversationalist. She didn’t drink any coffee and instead kept her hands folded out of sight under the kitchen table.

  “I’m finishing up a degree in cultural studies at Georgia State,” she told them. “Actually, I’m ABD, so if you know anyone who’s hiring…”

  “ABD?”

  “All-But-Dissertation,” her husband explained, sauntering into the room. “That means Dotty’s eligible to teach again, except nobody’s hiring.”

  “Not yet,” Dotty added.

  “Not yet,” Henry acknowledged with a loving smile.

  “Again?”

  “She used to teach kindergarten. Before the accident.”

  Ah. An accident. Significant damage to her motor skills would preclude her from wrangling a mob of children. Henry and Dotty rubbed noses. This affectionate gesture must have been her cue to leave them to their privacy, for leave them she did. Henry took her spot at the kitchen table.

  “So, Detectives, how can I help you? Would you like some gum?”

  “No, thanks,” replied Chau. “We just have a couple questions about last night.”

  “Something wrong with my report?”

  “We just want to go over it, if you don’
t mind.”

  Henry shrugged. “Go ahead.”

  Chau looked to Konquist, who was mid-sip and had not expected to take the lead. So be it.

  “Officer Hoyt, you and Officer Cumen were the first responders to the scene, correct?”

  “Yes, sir. We got the call about a possible Code 48 at approximately twelve ten A.M. We were only two blocks away at the time and so we were the first on the scene.”

  “That’s convenient, you being two blocks away.”

  “It was because of the cupcakes, sir.”

  “The cupcakes?” interjected Chau.

  “You know, that new cupcake place in midtown, the one that’s open till two A.M. It’s called Sugar Hills.”

  “Do you and Officer Cumen stop there often?”

  “Not really. They’re very expensive. But, well, I had a craving.”

  “A craving for cupcakes?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “At midnight?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What flavor?” Konquist asked.

  “Red velvet. Mind if I pour myself some coffee?”

  “It’s your house.”

  Henry Hoyt grabbed yet another Atlanta Police Department mug from his kitchen cabinet and upended the remains of the coffeepot into its ceramic maw. He blew on it and then took a gulp. Ahh.

  “So what’s this about?” he asked them. He remained by the counter. “Is there a discrepancy I need to be made aware of?”

  Konquist thought about the paintings in the foyer. Suddenly, he had the perfect non-evasive reply.

  “It’s the feds,” he said. “They’re about to take over the case and they want to make sure every duck is in a row. You know how they can get.”

  “Ugh. My condolences.”

  “Oh, before I forget, do you remember who transported the McCormicks from the hotel?”

  “We did. Me and Officer Cumen.”

  “Ah yes. And what time was your shift over?”

  “Eight A.M.”

  “You must have been tired.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Head straight home?”

  Henry lifted his cup to his mouth again, concealing it from view. “Yes, sir.”

  Konquist and Chau passed each other a visual signal and stood at the same time. They tied things off with the customary remarks—thank you for your time, you have a lovely home, etc.—and allowed Henry to walk them to the front door. It wasn’t until they were back in their vehicle and putting Jessup Lane in the rearview that the two detectives spoke again.