The Vig

by John Lescroart

  He motioned with his head to Matteo, who took Doreen’s elbow and began guiding her forward. The three came together at the front of the car.

  Here were two men, police, the black one leading as though he were in charge. Tortoni had seen him before. Most blacks looked the same to him, but this one—with the scar running through his lips, the hatchet nose, the blue eyes—was distinctive. But he couldn’t remember the name. The other one he didn’t know.

  The black one kept his hands in his pockets. “Angelo,” he said, low key, “how you doing?”

  Tortoni saw Matteo tighten his mouth. His son liked for people to call his father Mr. Tortoni, or Don Angelo. But Tortoni only lifted his palm—as he might restrain a well-trained dog—and Matteo settled back.

  “I am not so well.” Tortoni barely heard himself. He raised the cigar to his lips and inhaled. “Not so well if what I hear may be true.”

  “If you mean Johnny …”

  He made a show of looking around the officer. His hands went to his sides and he hung his head. “Do we know who did this?” he whispered. Doreen was standing next to him, taking his arm, helping him with his grief. He raised his eyes. “Johnny was a son to me.

  “We don’t know anything yet, Angelo. In fact, it crossed my mind I might want to talk to you sometime soon.”

  “He is here now,” Doreen said. “Talk to him now.”

  Good, Angelo thought, protective already. He patted her arm and said in Italian, “Ignore this buffoon.”

  “What’d you tell her?” the cop said.

  He smiled through his pain. “I told her you were only doing your job.” He patted her arm again. “She’s upset, too. She and Johnny were very close. You have no ideas yet?”

  “I have ideas. I don’t think he killed himself. He wasn’t hit by a truck. Like that.” The cop—Glitsky, that was it—clucked. “No, my idea is somebody did him your way.” He put his index finger to his temple and cocked his thumb.

  Tortoni, the soul of patience, shook his head. “I am a businessman, Officer. But I am not in the business of violence.”

  “Your man Johnny carried a gun.”

  Tortoni gestured, a forgiving father. “You knew Johnny? A baby. He imagines he protects me.” A smile. “Where’s the harm? … Do you mind, can we see him?”

  They moved back into the alley. Tortoni went to one knee and crossed himself over the body. He remained that way for thirty seconds. A good, clean job. He leaned over and kissed Johnny’s clean jaw.

  Doreen had her forehead against Matteo’s shoulder when he stood up. It was all right if she didn’t have the strength to look, but it was important, he thought, that she see firsthand what he could do.

  But that was enough. With a tiny move of his head he directed Matteo to take Doreen back to the car. Watching them walk off, he took another puff on his cigar. Que bello giornio!

  “Do you have any ideas, Angelo?”

  The sun had cleared the lower buildings, so that he had to squint into Glitsky’s face. He shrugged, his palms out. “Johnny was young, maybe hot-tempered. But a good boy.”

  “You don’t know any enemies he had recently? Maybe protecting you?”

  “There has been no trouble,” he said. “This I don’t understand.”

  “How about personally? Money troubles? Girls?”

  Tortoni shook his head.

  “Do you have any dealings with a Hector Medina?”

  “Who is Hector Medina? I have never heard the name.”

  Glitsky shrugged. “He knew Johnny, that’s all. I wondered how well.”

  “You think he, this Hector Medina, he did this?”

  The white cop, who had been silent all this while, spoke up. “I know who didn’t do it.”

  “Who’s that?” Glitsky asked, looking at the other man.

  “Louis Baker.”

  Tortoni stared at both of them. He’d have to check out who these two people were—Hector Medina and Louis Baker.

  Glitsky took it up again. To Tortoni, he said, “The thing is, I was talking to Johnny just the other day and he said you were having some problems—you and him.”

  Tortoni saw no point responding to that.

  “This problem—it seemed to involve Rusty Ingraham—something about his vig being short. And Medina’s also been mixed up with Ingraham. Sort of a coincidence, wouldn’t you say?”

  Tortoni nodded. “I was you, I’d look into that. But Johnny told me Ingraham was dead.”

  The two cops exchanged glances. The white guy spoke again. “Johnny told you that? He see him? Dead, I mean?”

  Tortoni said that when Johnny told him somebody was dead it usually was the truth. “What, you guys didn’t see him?”

  “Technically he’s a missing person,” Glitsky said. “You lose a lot of money on him?”

  “Some. In business you take some risks.”

  “Did you know that last week he came into, like, thirty thousand dollars?”

  Tortoni made a note to have somebody check out Johnny’s apartment, his mother’s flat, his friends. The son of a bitch. But he only said, “Good for him.”

  The white cop said, “You wouldn’t have seen any of that, would you?”

  Tortoni glanced down the alley. His son had put Doreen back into the car and waited, arms crossed, leaning against the hood. He took a step in that direction. “I got an accountant takes care of things like that. You want to know, make an appointment. I claim every penny I make.” He stopped and pointed to the body on the ground. “I’m talking to you both so nice ‘cause I want to help you find the sumbitch did in my boy here. You need help, time goes by, I got connections might do some good. Everybody cooperates. This guy Medina, you talking to him?”

  Glitsky nodded. “He works at the Drake. I’ll be going over this afternoon.”

  “You find anything, I’d consider it a personal favor you let me know.” Tortoni wondered if going back over to the body would be laying it on too thick and decided it would be. He straightened himself, bearing up under the loss. Nodding at the two cops, he started back to his car.

  Hardy was reflecting on the difference between Abe’s professional attitude and his own, why Abe was probably on his way to seeing Hector Medina again, and Hardy was here eating ice cream at the Gelato just off Stanyan, waiting for Courtenay Moran to show.

  Glitsky had another murder, committed by someone probably in his jurisdiction, and the killer was walking the streets. So Abe’s job was to follow the threads from that and bring that new person in. If it tied into Maxine’s death, all to the good. But the fact that it hadn’t been Louis Baker didn’t seem to make all that much difference to Abe. Somebody, after all, had killed Johnny, and Abe’s job was to find that person. Hardy had to remember that Louis was in as much for the killing at Holly Park as he was for Maxine, and Abe just left it like that.

  In fact, the more he thought about it, the theory he’d laid on Moses last night was starting to make more and more sense. He, Hardy, was involved in this whole thing only because Rusty had come to him. Period. And why had he done that?

  He had done that, and made it as convincing as possible, because he needed someone with impeccable credentials, with no ax of his own to grind—somebody exactly like Dismas Hardy—to preach the gospel of the dead, not the missing, Rusty Ingraham.

  Because the mob didn’t look for a dead man.

  And setting up Louis Baker? No problem. Guy deserved life in prison anyway. Him getting out after nine years was a mockery of the justice system, wasn’t it? Serve him right, after all the crimes he’d gotten away with, to get him for something he didn’t do.

  And use Hardy to do it.

  Putting it together: the call to San Quentin making sure Baker was getting out. Three days later, after you work out the plan, you ditch your car and report it stolen. You go through some inconvenience for a month taking buses to establish some credibility. Then you see your friend Hardy and tell him Baker’s getting out and is planning to kill both of you.
You do your best to scare the shit out of him, then you order a gun—the picture of a man terrified for his life.

  You pick up Louis Baker in the bus station, making your only mistake, which is driving your car. Risks proving you a liar, especially if they ever get to questioning Baker about it. You want him to leave some—any—physical evidence that he was on your barge. A thumbprint would be plenty to police, who were already predisposed—because of Hardy’s testimony—to believe the ex-con did it.

  Then what?

  You shoot Maxine, administer yourself a flesh wound, leave a bloody trail to the edge of the barge, drop the gun overboard, dress the wound, get in your car—which no one thinks you have anymore—and head out. But where to?

  And the world comes to believe you’re dead. You’ve got a lot of money, in cash. You’re washed up in San Francisco. Your vig is eating you up. All your old friends have written you off. Go someplace else. Start over …

  “A man in deep thought.”

  Gourtenay, in black and hot-pink Spandex, was six feet of impressive woman. When she had told Hardy she would run on down to meet him, she had meant it literally. Her face was flushed with a light sheen of sweat, set off by a pink band around her forehead. The close-cropped blond hair was nearly white in the daylight.

  She pulled up a stool across from him at the window. “You’ve already had some.”

  Hardy looked down at his empty dish. “I’ll have another one with you. What do you want?”

  He went to the counter and ordered—two chocolate chocolates. When he got back to her, she said, “I was mad at you.”

  “You didn’t have to come down here.”

  “Yes, I did. You never told me you were a cop.”

  Hardy popped a spoonful of ice cream. “I’m not.”

  She was still breathing heavily from her run. After a minute she said, “I came down to ask you please not to tell Warren. Ray said you—”

  He held up a hand.

  “Let’s leave Ray. Ray’s not important.”

  “He’s important if Warren ever finds out.”

  “I thought you had an open relationship, you and Warren.”

  “Let’s put it this way. We don’t ask each other. Maybe one or the other assumes, and it’s safer to assume your partner is not faithful because it’s probably true. But that’s not the same as wanting to be confronted with it, especially if it’s one of your best friends.”

  “And especially if you and your regular partner work together.”

  “Okay, especially then.” She put her spoon down. “Look, I’m not making excuses. Ray and I did what we did. Maybe it helped him a little, made him feel better. I’m sorry about the timing of it being the night Maxine got killed, but remember, we didn’t know that at the time.”

  “So you’re not really having an affair with him?”

  A slow smile spread into a wide grin. “Why? You interested? I thought you were just being a cop, the other night and now.”

  Hardy shrugged. “I told you, I’m not really a cop at all. I used to be. Now some things have happened around this whole thing with Maxine and Rusty Ingraham—”

  “Like what?”

  Hardy took a bite of ice cream, knowing it was going to sound melodramatic. But it was the truth. “People are dying, getting killed. I’m not too happy thinking I might be on the list. If I’m right about some things, it could make me a threat …”

  “How?”

  Hardy ran down most of the events of the past week, but tried to stick to facts only.

  She put her hand over his on the counter as he finished. “Since we knew them—Rusty and Max—do you think we’re in trouble, too?”

  “I don’t know. The loop seems to head in a different direction. Rusty was evidently into the mob for a lot of money.”

  “But why you? You’re not in with those people, are you?”

  “That’s the big question. I got into it the day everything started. I’m part of it.” She waited, and he decided to open up some. “Well, if Rusty’s still alive, for example, and let’s just say he killed Maxine and set up Louis to take the fall, then do you think he’s going to let me walk around? I’m the only guy can put this together, which means I’m the only guy who’s a threat to him. He may or may not realize it yet, but it’s sure to occur to him, and I’d prefer not to wait around for that glorious moment to arrive.”

  “But Rusty’s not alive. You said—”

  Hardy held up a hand. “From the beginning, Rusty’s body has been missing. I went to a lot of trouble to prove how it could have disappeared because I kept assuming he was dead. It was possible, plausible, even reasonable, but mostly it was what I wanted to believe because of some other preconceptions, courtesy of Rusty, so I believed it.”

  Slowly, she licked ice cream off her spoon. “So why did you want to see me?” she asked.

  “Because maybe you know something and don’t know you know it.”

  “About what?”

  “Maxine. Rusty. Both of them.”

  She licked the spoon again. A bit of ice cream remained on her lower lip. Hardy itched to reach over and wipe it off.

  “Well, I didn’t know Rusty that well. It was a little tense with Ray around so much, you know? I mean, who are you friends with?”

  “But Maxine came around with Rusty?”

  “Oh yeah, of course. She was in the movie. She wanted to see how it came out.”

  “And she came with Rusty?”

  “A lot at first. Then it kind of got old. I think Max just lost the dream.” She smiled, making a joke. “The vision thing, you know?”

  “I don’t really know.”

  She pushed out her beautiful lower lip. “You know, before, the dream had always been making it in films …”

  Hardy smiled. “As opposed to movies?”

  “Stop.” She pointed a threatening finger. “Anyway, after she and Rusty got together, it was like they both decided what they were doing wasn’t working. I mean, Maxine was like thirty-three or something like that, which is really pretty old for making it as an actress, I mean the kind of actress she was—the looks thing, you know. And Rusty, he just said he wanted to stop being a lawyer, go someplace else, live another life, get away from all the stress, as he called it. I think they fed each other that way.”

  “Did they say what they wanted to do?”

  “Oh, you know, take the money and run. Live on the beach, do nothing, get a tan.”

  Hardy shook his head. “That doesn’t sound like Rusty. He was a pretty driven guy, wasn’t he? Type A to the max.”

  “Well, I guess that’s why they picked Acapulco.” She scraped the last of the ice cream from the bottom of the bowl, giving it her full attention. “I mean, Rusty could be as Type A as he wanted around his gambling, which he said relaxed him but it really didn’t seem to, and Maxine could lie around on the beach and drink margaritas.”

  “Are there casinos in Acapulco?”

  “Yeah, I think so, but that’s not it, that kind of gambling. They talked about jai alai. It’s like horse racing, except with people. Rusty was going to make their living betting on jai alai.”

  “This was really their plan? They talked about this? Why didn’t you mention this before?”

  “What was to mention? As far as I knew they were both dead. Which pretty much means they weren’t living in Acapulco, doesn’t it? And it wasn’t really both of them with that plan anyway. At least not at first. Then it was mostly Maxine. Another big dream of hers that didn’t come true.”

  23

  Hardy felt like a horse’s ass. What was he really doing here in Acapulco at a cliffside restaurant waiting for the sun to set and the boys holding torches to dive off the cliffs into the oncoming surf?

  A mariachi band was serenading an American couple at the next table. Hardy poured his Tecate into a glass and squeezed a lime into the beer. He didn’t particularly like Tecate, but he liked Corona less, and those were the options.

  Sometimes, he�
��d told himself, you’ve just got to do something. And he thought he’d been sure.

  Certain enough in any case to risk crossing the border with his .38 Special taped under the fender of his Samurai. He didn’t want to think about what would have happened if they had stopped him in Tijuana and searched the car. But he’d driven into Mexico perhaps twenty times before in his life and had never been hassled going in. Coming back, of course, they’d inspected his car three or four times. Hardy had come to the conclusion that if people wanted to bring something—anything—into Mexico, the official word was bienvenidos. It was a poor country. They’d take anything you wanted to provide.

  For the two and a half nonstop days that it had taken him to get here, sleeping only an hour or two at a time in the car, his hunch had grown more and more into a conviction. Rusty Ingraham was alive—and he was in Acapulco.

  Rusty Ingraham, he had been sure, had come to him for no other reason than to have him point the finger at Louis Baker and let nature take its course. And that course ought to lead, with the other clever little games such as buying a gun, presumably for protection against Baker, that he never picked up, to the conclusion that Rusty was dead, killed by Louis Baker.

  And that, in turn, gets Rusty off the hook for his crushing vig and puts Louis where he belongs back in the slammer. Or the gas chamber. Either way, Louis Baker was a pawn. Dismas Hardy was a tool. Rusty Ingraham would be free to live out poor Maxine’s dream.

  The sun kissed the Pacific. Flaming red bougainvillea covered the trellis that bounded the patio where he sat. A warm offshore breeze lulled. He sipped his Tecate.

  Across the chasm that divided him from the divers, one of them, still torchless, fell forward. Hardy watched the slow arc as the body cleared the outcropping and fell the long long way down. It was the fourth boy he’d seen go off since arriving here, and he found he couldn’t work up a casual touristy feeling about it.