by Tim Cockey
“You can tell me where to find Detective Zabriskie.” It wasn’t really posed as a request.
“Unfortunately, I can’t. I wish I could.”
“You are aware of what has taken place.”
“I’ve heard that Lou Bowman was shot,” I said.
“That’s right.”
“How is he?”
“He is still in surgery. He was hit, it appears, five times.”
Five times?
“If you know where Detective Zabriskie can be located, Mr. Sewell, you have a legal obligation to tell me. Besides that, it’s best for her anyway. I hope you’re planning to cooperate.”
“Don’t bully me, Detective. I’ ve told you I don’t know where she is. I wish I did.”
“I wish you did too.”
“Can you tell me what happened?”
“That’s being investigated.”
“Well, then tell me why you suspect Kate is involved in this.”
Of course I knew the answer to that already. And my guess was that Kruk knew I knew. His answer surprised me.
“We have an eyewitness.”
“You do?”
“She claims to know you. Would you like to speak with her? She’s in the next room. Hold on.”
The phone went silent. Twenty seconds later, who should come on the line but my very own ex-wife.
“Hitch? Hey, fellow, your girlfriend’s pretty mean with that pistol of hers, I must say.”
“Julia, what the hell is this all about? Kruk said something about an eyewitness. Did you—”
“Long story, Hitch. The police don’t want me telling it to anyone else just yet.”
“Screw the police! What happened? How did you see it? Where did it happen? Is she all right?” I could have gone on like that all afternoon.
“The detective here will hang up on me if I start telling. He’s eyeing me right now.” She lowered her voice. “Some hair on that guy, huh?”
“Look, Jules, can you get the hell out of there and call me on a pay phone? Or come over. I’ve got to know what’s going on.”
“I’m with Peter.”
“Was he there too?” Damn. Here I’d been burying a dead newsman and all the action was taking place somewhere else.
“We’re at Peter’s house. It happened here.” I heard the phone being muffled and Kruk’s and Julia’s voices garbled in the background. What I could make out was Julia’s voice. “Who the fuck cares?” She came back on the line.
“I’ve got to go, Hitch. I think your girlfriend is in big trouble.” Then to Kruk she said, “That’s not a fucking state secret, is it?” Once more then to me. “I’ve got to go. The anti-Kojak is all pissed off.”
Kruk’s voice suddenly sounded. “I’m coming out to talk with you,” he said. “Don’t move.” He hung up.
Don’t move. Where was I going to go? I shoved the papers on my desk to the side and bongoed softly against the desktop as I tried to sort out what was taking place. Kate had shot and critically wounded Lou Bowman out at Peter Morgan’s estate. How? Who had confronted whom? Had Lou Bowman tracked down Kate and tried to kill her? Or had Kate gone after the man who had accepted money to shoot her husband? I was hoping against hope that it was the former, that Kate had acted in self-defense in shooting Lou Bowman. But a shiver traveled through my body as I involuntarily pictured Kate out there somewhere, a classic double grip on her pistol, the gun bucking in her hands as she fires off one … two … three … four … good Lord, five shots. Even as I tried to dispel the image from my mind, I knew the truth. The shooting of Lou Bowman was not going to turn out to have been an act of self-defense. If it was, why wouldn’t Kate have immediately turned herself in? Why was she still out there? And why so many bullets? No. It was time for Lou Bowman to pay for his crime. I could see it in the image that I had conjured up. And I knew it in my heart. Kate was settling scores. It was payback time.
And Julia had witnessed it. How? Did the shooting take place inside Morgan’s mansion? Did Julia happen to look out the window and witness the grisly scene unfolding on the front lawn? And what were Kate and Bowman doing out at the Morgan estate in the first place?
That last question was one that I could answer. Sort of. Epoch Ltd. I recalled the frozen look on Peter Morgan’s face the night before when I had brought up the name Epoch Ltd., on whose board of directors sat his slutty highbrow sister. He had lied about having never heard of Epoch Ltd. Why?
I phoned information and asked the computer voice for the number for Epoch Ltd. A human voice came on to tell me that there were no listings for Epoch Ltd.
“There is an Epoch Books,” I was told. “And an Epoch Consulting Group.”
I asked for the number for that second one, as well as the address. It was a downtown address, not Hunt Valley. But I called the number anyway. The very sweet voice that answered the phone responded very sweetly to my inquiry. “We’re a headhunter firm.”
Oh. “Do you happen to have an office out in Hunt Valley?” I asked.
“No sir. But we do do a lot of placements there.”
“Would you by any chance keep a post office box there?” This was stupid. I was wasting time. Kate doubtless covered this angle right out of the gate.
“No sir. Not that I know of.”
“Does the name Amanda Stuart mean anything to you?”
“No sir.”
I hung up and looked helplessly around my office walls. Which one should I climb first? I couldn’t just sit here. I had to think. Epoch Ltd. Okay. Whatever other business this corporation allegedly conducted, one of their monthly activities was to pay off Lou Bowman for shooting and killing a fellow cop. Amanda Stuart was on the board of Epoch. Amanda Stuart was Peter Morgan’s sister. Bowman had been shot by Kate at Peter Morgan’s estate. I had to assume that Morgan knew Bowman. I thought about Bowman’s cushy digs up there in Heayhauge. And his boat. His shiny new Jeep. That’s an awful lot of down payments. Epoch Ltd. clearly had deep pockets. And I was beginning to suspect just who it was who might have been filling them.
I reached for the phone to call information again. I doubted that Peter Morgan’s home phone number was listed, but it was worth a try. I needed to get ahold of Julia. I wanted her out of there.
The phone rang the instant I touched it. I snatched it up.
“Is this Bob?”
“No, I’m sorry,” I said. “You’ve got a wrong … Carol?”
“Hello, Bob. How’s it hanging?”
I’ve never really known what the answer to that question is supposed to be.
“As well as can be expected,” I answered cautiously.
“Maybe you want to come over and see me, Bob,” Carol said.
Maybe I wanted to do naked cartwheels down the streets of Baltimore in a lightning storm. But not today.
“I don’t think so, Carol.”
She was insistent. “Well maybe you want to think again. Maybe it’s the one and only thing you want to do right now. Maybe it’s even important. Maybe I’ve got someone here who wants to see you.”
Maybe I was beginning to get her message. Kate.
“Maybe I’ll be right there,” I said.
“Maybe that’s a good idea.”
Click.
No maybe. She definitely hung up.
I flew like the wind. Down two blocks and out to the far end of the pier.
“Carol Shipley,” I said breathlessly to the guy at the front desk. “She’s expecting me.”
The desk clerk pushed a button on his intercom. “Name?”
I took a beat. “Bob.”
The guy dipped down to address the intercom.
“There’s a Bob here, Ms. Shipley.”
Carol’s voice crackled over the tiny speaker. “Send him up.”
I was already at the stairwell. Too hyped-up for the elevator. I took the stairs like Groucho Marx, down low and long-striding, two and three at a time. Very efficient.
Carol met me at the door, looking grim.
<
br /> “She’s been shot and she’s being a pain in the ass.”
She stepped clear to avoid being flattened as I charged into the apartment.
Kate was seated on the couch. She looked up as I lurched to a halt. Almost everything about her looked darker than usual: her hair, her eyes, even her lips. I realized that this was because her skin was as white as an eggshell.
“Hello, Hitch.”
That’s when I noticed that she was gripping her left biceps, near the shoulder. She was wearing a rose-colored T-shirt and jeans. Beneath her grip was a fistful of pink gauze inexpertly held there with adhesive tape.
I moved over to the couch and sat down next to her, gingerly, as if she were a porcelain piece on a shaky shelf. She was losing her fight to keep the fear out of her eyes. We held a short staring contest. She spoke first, in a hoarse whisper.
“Is he dead?”
I shook my head slowly. “He’s in surgery. I spoke to Kruk.”
“Kruk.”
“He called me. He’s looking for you.”
“Did you tell him where I was?” Her voice was so incredibly small.
“I didn’t know where you were. Carol called after I’d already spoken to him.”
Kate closed her eyes and leaned back against the couch. She stayed that way for nearly twenty seconds or so. I almost thought she had drifted off to sleep, but then her eyes opened and she looked over at me again.
“He shot first,” she said in that hoarse whisper.
“That’s okay. We can talk about it later. We have to get you to a doctor.”
She shook her head. “I’ll be fine.”
I pointed at the pink gauze. “That’s blood, Kate. We human beings need to keep that stuff inside our bodies.”
“I’ll be fine,” she repeated.
Carol was standing over by the doorway to the kitchen. “See what I mean? Pain in the ass.”
This got a little smile out of Kate. Out in the harbor, a tugboat let off a loud BLAUUUUUU. It was fairly distant, but it gave Kate a start anyway. She jerked and then she winced.
“Let me see that,” I said.
“Hitch, you’re no doctor. Why do you want to see it? It’s a bullet wound. It hurts like hell. It’s not going to kill me.”
“Fine,” I said, slapping my hands down on my thighs. “No problem. So, what do you gals say? Want to go out and grab some lunch?”
“Don’t be angry,” Kate whispered.
“Then don’t be so stubborn. You can’t just sit here with a bullet in your arm.”
“I don’t have a bullet in my arm. It went straight through.”
She forced me to say it. “Whatever.”
We were all three silent for a moment. I broke the moment by reaching out and getting Kate’s hair our of her face for her. I tucked it behind her ear. Or tried to. Half of it slipped right out again. Kate’s large hazel eyes were watching me closely.
“You need bigger ears, darling,” I said.
And suddenly Kate’s face was against my chest and she was sobbing. Good for her. I stroked her back. “It’s okay,” I told her. “You just go right ahead. It’ll be all right.”
Carol stepped discreetly out of the room and left the two of us alone. We remained folded into each other that way. Kate muttered “I’m sorry” several million times. I didn’t try to stop her. It was time to empty out. At one point I noticed Kate’s silver-blue pistol sitting on a magazine on the edge of the coffee table. The magazine cover was a photograph of a celebrity actress and her six-or seven-year-old daughter. The gun was pointed at the daughter. Not a pretty sight.
Kate’s sobbings finally subsided and she pulled back from my chest. We were eye to eye, nose to nose. Kate sniffed back her tears after another minute and located a crooked smile.
“Wow, huh?”
I kissed each of her damp eyes. “Okay, good-time girl,” I said. “Is it time to tell Mr. Sewell a story?”
Kate nodded. “How about a drink?” When she saw me hesitate, she added, “Pretty goddamn please? My arm is killing me. It’ll help.”
I called out to Carol. She popped her head around the corner. She’d been listening.
“I’ll call downstairs.”
“Bourbon,” Kate said.
Her cry had done her good. While we waited for a bottle of bourbon to arrive on a cart, Kate began. She started with her perusal of the tax records for Epoch Ltd. She said that besides Amanda Stuart’s, there were two other names listed for the board of directors. She also said that the corporation had not been a particularly active one. As best as Kate could make out, Epoch Ltd. had come together several years ago to conduct a single pair of transactions. They bought a plot of land and then they sold it. Not terribly exciting. What was interesting, though, was how well they did on their investment. Between the time that the Epoch Ltd. board of directors agreed to purchase their piece of property and a year later, when they unloaded it, the silly little sum of ten million dollars had poured into their collective pockets.
Carol and I both echoed the sum.
“Ten million dollars?”
“That’s right,” Kate said. “Three people. A ten-million-dollar pie.”
“Who were the other two?” I asked.
“Names I doubt you’ve heard. Mitchell Tucker and Joe Pappas.”
She was right. The names meant nothing to me. “Who are they?”
“Mitchell Tucker. Lawyer. Low profile, except for the fact that he happens to be the son-in-law of Harlan Stillman.”
“Senator Stillman?”
“Yes. Married to the old gentleman’s daughter. The quick and easy way to keep the Stillman name out of the picture but very much in the game.”
“And Joe Pappas?”
“Also a lawyer. A graduate of the University of Virginia law school. Have you ever been down to Charlottesville? It’s a beautiful campus they’ve got there. Thomas Jefferson founded the university. They still have about a dozen or so of his old slave quarters on the campus, these little shacks which they’ve converted into housing for upperclassmen. It’s considered prestigious housing.”
“And the award for irony goes to …”
“Guess who Joe Pappas shared his slave quarters with when he was a student there?”
“Surprise me.”
“Alan Stuart.”
“Our Alan Stuart?”
Kate nodded her head. “Joe Pappas is scheduled to announce for lieutenant governor in another week.” She winced. “Where the hell is that whiskey?”
As if on cue, a knock sounded at the door. Carol answered it. In came a bellhop. Carol only let him partway in, took the bottle and handed him a tip, then shooed him back out the door. She brought the bottle in to where Kate and I were sitting and set it on the coffee table, next to Kate’s pistol.
“I’ll get some glasses,” Carol said. As she was on her way into the kitchen, another knock sounded at the door.
“What is it now?” Carol muttered, pulling the door open.
I guess we all expected to see the room service guy standing there. So I guess we were all surprised when, instead, Detective John Kruk stepped into the apartment. He barely acknowledged Carol as he stepped right under her nose and into the front room.
“Hello, John,” Kate said.
He nodded once, tersely, then began to read her her rights. Beside me it felt as though Kate were melting. Though when I glanced at her she was sitting fully erect, completely attentive to Kruk’s recitation of her Miranda rights. When Kruk had concluded and asked Kate if she understood her rights as he had just explained then to her, she lifted her chin.
“What am I charged with, John? Assault with a deadly weapon?”
“Not anymore,” Kruk said. “I got the call on my way here. You’re under arrest for murder. Bowman’s dead.”
Kate rose from the couch. I rose with her. It was as if we were being pulled up by the same string. The only difference was, Kate had another string pulling at her as well. It started pulling th
e moment Kruk said the word “dead.” It pulled at the sides of her mouth; and it was pulling her face into an unmistakable smile of unmistakable satisfaction.
Kruk saw it too, plain as day. He cocked an eyebrow.
“Charley,” Kate said simply.
Kruk nodded. He uncocked his eyebrow and he took Kate Zabriskie into custody.
CHAPTER 38
The following morning, Police Commissioner Alan Stuart released a statement through his campaign manager, Joel Hutchinson. For “personal and professional reasons,” Hutch read—his hands literally shaking as he clutched the prepared statement—Commissioner Stuart was dropping out of the race for governor. Hutch answered the barrage of questions in a manner most uncharacteristic of him. “No comment.” His single ad-lib was an innocuous mumbling about quote family considerations unquote.
Two days after Stuart’s departure from the race, readers of the Baltimore Sunpapers were able to pursue their own “considerations” of Alan Stuart’s family, specifically of Mrs. Alan Stuart, whose grainy image appeared in a photograph above the fold, smoking a cigarette in bed, her arms crossed over her breasts, the blurry head of someone evidently not her husband resting on her vivacious thigh. There was some confusion caused by the two photographs that accompanied the story on the inner pages. These were stock shots of former police detectives Charley Russell and Lou Bowman, both deceased. If you didn’t read the whole story, you could get the impression that one or the other of the two faces belonged to the blurry image of the man who was using Amanda Stuart’s thigh for a pillow on the front page. The rookie cop photograph of Kate cropped up later, and finally one of Guy Fellows, looking like an advertisement for Rakish Good Looks Unlimited. No wonder the general public was confused. Everything was going into the blender at once.
My personal favorite was a photograph snapped of Amanda Stuart getting out of a car, failing to remain incognito behind a pair of sunglasses. In the photograph she is lashing out at the photographer. Her lips are curled like a junkyard dog’s and her perfect hair is… well, far from perfect. I liked the picture best both because it is such a nonglamorous shot of the woman and because I liked to imagine Alan Stuart having to confront that sort of anger on—I hope—a daily basis. The Stuarts were finally being forced out of their golden limousine. And the mud outside the door was knee-deep.
