by Betty Webb
As I stared at my lists of questions and suspects I realized I had left someone out, someone who spelled badly, had criminal connections, and whose children had been impacted by Victor’s faux-marriage chapel. Regretfully, I added Eunice Snow, my mother’s maid. Come to think of it, she was the right age to be the child of Suspect X, and so was her husband Bucky.
I sat back and sighed. While I realized that we can never fully know other people, I had a hard time believing any of my liveaboarder friends would kill anyone. The same went for my coworkers at the zoo. Two of the men on my list—firefighter Walt McAdams and stuntman Yancy Haas—were the more physical of the group, possibly more likely to become involved in violent situations. But committing premeditated murder?
I didn’t think so.
Still, someone had killed Victor Emerson and his daughter Bambi, so I opened Victor’s blackmail ledger and studied it again. The payments began little more than a year back, starting low, then gradually escalated, proving that even blackmailers get affected by inflation. From the condition of his trailer, Victor was barely scraping by, so discovering blackmailable secrets must have thrilled him to no end.
I reexamined the last page in his account book.
05/15—r’cd Taxi—$250
05/16—r’cd Scarlet—$125
05/18—r’cd Woodstock—$125
05/25—r’cd Aloha—$100
05/29—r’cd Taxi—$250
Compared to the month of April, everyone was up by twenty dollars a month. Judging from the amounts, I doubted if any of Victor’s victims were worth serious money. Added together, though, the steady income made a significant difference to a man living at near-subsistence level. The most financially comfortable of his victims appeared to be Taxi, whoever he was. A local cab driver? Probably not, because not only did Taxi fork over the highest amount, he paid twice a month. His secret must have been a big one, because in contrast, someone called Aloha paid Victor a lowly one hundred per month.
For several reasons, that particular code name made me uncomfortable. Fellow zookeepers Phil and Deborah Holt had honeymooned in Hawaii. So had the Sazacs and the Keegans, but because of the low amount Victor charged Aloha, I immediately ruled the Sazacs out; they were rolling in dough. That left Deborah. Or Phil. Even zookeepers could afford to fork over one hundred dollars a month, if they didn’t have many other bills. But I remembered Deborah once telling me their adorable little daughter needed orthodontia because she’d inherited her father’s big teeth and her mother’s small jaw.
And then there was Woodstock. Did the code name refer to the legendary music festival in upstate New York and Victor had used it to describe a blackmail victim who had attended it? The only person on my suspect list old enough to have been there was my friend and fellow liveaboarder, Linda Cushing. She hadn’t made my suspect list because she had been taking care of my pets when the murder occurred. Besides, Linda was too feisty to allow herself get blackmailed in the first place.
Scarlett was probably a woman, which made me think of Jane Olson, Caro’s auburn-haired friend. Jane had led a colorful life, if she had done something dastardly at some point, Victor would certainly have hit her up for more than five hundred a month. Since Jane’s marriage to the Gold King, her bank account was bigger than Caro’s.
This left Taxi, Victor’s chief financial supporter. The nickname conjured up movement, which could describe Walt McAdams or Yancy Haas. Neither was a refugee from the poorhouse, but a five-hundred-a-month blackmail tab wouldn’t be welcome, either. On second thought, since Taxi was the only person on the list paying Victor twice a month, did the double dip really reflect a bigger secret or merely a bigger pocketbook?
My brain hurt.
I looked at my watch. Almost midnight. If I didn’t turn in now, I wouldn’t get enough sleep to comfortably get through my highly physical job tomorrow. Problem was, I wasn’t sleepy.
I looked at my phone. The last time my father called me, I’d neglected to ask his bedtime. I had, however, saved his number.
“Hi, Dad,” I said, when he answered on the first ring.
“You sure stay up late for someone with your job.”
“Are you, ah, alone?”
“Meaning are either Aster Edwina or Mrs. McGinty sharing my cold, lonely bed? I’m sorry to tell you that neither of them are.”
“Excellent, because I want to tell you what I found out today.” Leaving nothing out, I told him everything.
When I was done, Dad gave a low whistle. “Victor was a nasty piece of work, wasn’t he? But he was what my friends call a Small Time Sam, a guy who wastes his talents on piddly stuff. Speaking of my friends’ usage of slang, there’s something you mentioned in his ledger you should think about. You say someone named Taxi was paying Victor twice a month? Well, in certain circles the word ‘taxi’ is used for a certain kind of prison inmate.”
I sucked in my breath. “Are you sure?”
“I’ve heard Long Louie use the word when referring to men he did time with, those he counted on for certain favors, such as getting the right drugs or weapons or hooking somebody up with the right lawyer. Basically, a taxi is a guy who arranges things. A fixer.”
“That puts a different slant on things, doesn’t it?”
“Possibly. But maybe I’m wrong and Taxi is just a guy who drives for a living, like a chauffeur or a trucker. Or, and here’s something to think about, someone who owns a cab company.”
The city of San Sebastian had no cab company. Anyone needing taxi service had to call Yellow, Associated, or Coastal, all operating out of Monterey. There were a couple of independents floating around, but no one I know used them, not even Victor. He owned a seven-year-old Taurus, which the police had towed to the crime lab. Maybe it was parked next to my pickup.
While I was still thinking about taxis and towed cars, Dad mused aloud, “Yes, the cab theory is interesting, but let’s consider this. When an inmate successfully escapes from prison, he always has help. Remind me how Victor escaped.”
“The newspaper accounts said he hid in a laundry bag and rode out with the laundry truck. At some point along the way, he exited the truck and hid out until someone picked him up. The driver was later fired, but no charges were brought.”
“You see? He’d need help to arrange that, both in prison and on the outside.”
The question was, if Taxi could help Victor escape, why didn’t Taxi escape along with him? The answer might be that unlike Victor, who was a lifer, Taxi was a short-timer due to be released soon. This scenario raised another question: if Taxi had helped Victor escape, why would Victor pay him back by blackmailing him? When I asked my father, he had a ready answer.
“Life situations change, Teddy. Maybe Victor fell on hard times. There used to be quite a bit of money in the wedding chapel racket, but these days, with all the short term shack-ups and hook-ups the younger generation prefers, marriage has lost its popularity. I read somewhere that marriage ceremonies are down twenty percent, proving that not everyone’s as fuddy-duddyish as you and your mother. Now, think about this. Victor lived in a trailer. What was it like? One of those big doublewides? They can be fairly nice, I’m told. Not that I would ever live in one.”
“Yeah, you prefer your Costa Rican casita. And Dominga.”
I thought about Victor’s battered singlewide with its thrift shop furniture. Even his wedding chapel, once you went beyond the public area, needed work.
“Victor’s trailer was ready for a major overhaul,” I told my father. “Or the junk heap.”
“There you go. The guy was hurting financially. I’ll bet he…” Suddenly he began to whisper. “Gotta go, Teddy. I hear the pitter patter of bare female feet approaching my bedroom door.”
Dial tone.
I sat there for a few minutes, thinking about honor among thieves. The friendships deve
loped in prison might not hold once the freed prisoner moved on to a new life. Especially when hard times came calling.
There was something about this entire scenario that bothered me, although I couldn’t put my finger on it. But thinking about jailhouse friendships turned my mind toward Caro’s unlikely friendship with her own cell mate, Soledad Rodriguez.
How would that play out?
There being nothing more I could do at this time of night, I went to bed.
Chapter Eighteen
The first thing I did Thursday morning was to call my father again. He wasn’t as quick to pick up the phone this time and when he answered, his voice was raspy with sleep.
“It’s not even five o’clock, Teddy. What’s the matter with you?”
“Ask your contacts if they can find out the name of Victor’s cell mate.”
“Will do, but never call me this early again.”
He hung up.
Once at the zoo, I had enough work that I didn’t think about Victor, Bambi, or Mr. Rat until I made my way to Monkey Mania, where Central American squirrel monkeys ran free and intermingled with zoo visitors. James Dean, one of the juvenile monkeys, was playing Hide and Seek with Marlon, the alpha. Instead of getting irritated, as the feisty Marlon was prone to do, he was enjoying the game. Both monkeys took turns being “it,” hiding in the underbrush or behind trees. When discovered, the hider would make a mad dash for the rock designated as “home.”
This back and forth hiding game reminded me of something, but it wasn’t until I arrived at Africa Trail that I figured it out.
Marlon was like Victor Emerson—mature, cagy, a better hider than James Dean. But James Dean had his triumphs, too, and at one point had been cheeky enough to reach out from his hiding place and pull Marlon’s tail.
Two monkeys hiding from one another.
I realized what had been troubling me about the entire Victor blackmail scenario. Regardless of the man’s lack of funds, he was much more suited to be someone else’s blackmail victim, not the other way around. During the convenience store holdup, he committed murder, and before his escape, was serving twenty-five to life. If law enforcement had learned of his present whereabouts, he would have been sent back to Nevada to serve the remainder of his sentence.
The fact that Victor had been the blackmailer, not the blackmailee, could mean his victims knew nothing about his past. If they had, one of them would have turned him in.
Unless the intended victim had more to lose than Victor.
I thought about Victor bleeding out at Alejandro’s feet from a mortal crossbow wound. I thought about Bambi’s swollen face, the stocking wrapped around her neck.
I thought about Mr. Rat.
For the first time I truly understood how foolish it was for me to remain on board the Merilee, where a vicious killer knew where I lived.
My hands began to shake.
***
Somehow I finished out my day at the zoo, but as soon as I made it home to the Merilee I packed a suitcase. An hour later, Bonz, Feroz, Miss Priss, and I were ensconced in my old bedroom at Caro’s house.
Dinner was a strange affair. Soledad Rodriguez, who occupied the bedroom next to mine, sat at the long table across from me. Next to her sat Bucky, Eunice Snow’s ex-con husband, enlisted by Caro to guard us from Viking Vengeance and other assorted killers. The couple’s twins were upstairs asleep, leaving us adults to entertain each other. As Eunice served up heaping portions of lasagna, we tried talking about the weather but that lasted about three minutes. Once you’ve described coastal fog, there’s nowhere else to go.
“I love fog,” Eunice said, sitting down next to her husband. “I just wish it wasn’t so damp.”
“Fog’s damp, no two ways about it,” Bucky observed.
“At least it burns off by ten,” Soledad threw in.
“Fog isn’t so bad inland,” was my contribution.
“Nope.”
“No.”
“Nah.”
Having nothing else in common but fog and lasagna, we stared silently at our plates.
“How’s the lasagna?” Eunice finally said.
We all agreed that the lasagna was really, really delicious and fell silent again.
About five minutes later, Bucky said, “I saw a good movie the other day.”
“Tell us about it,” I asked, desperately.
“It was this Italian thing, subtitles and all. The Bicycle Thief. Anyone ever hear of it?”
Eunice and Soledad shook their heads, but I raised my hand. “Saw it a few years ago.” In Rome, with Caro.
Bucky grinned, revealing a missing front tooth. “I found it depressing but somehow uplifting. It revealed man’s inhumanity to man, and the difficulty of rising above one’s given station in life. But at the end the shared tragedy drew father and son closer together.”
This surprising speech made me study Bucky more closely. Thin, pink-skinned with white-blond hair and pale blue eyes, he resembled a poorly nourished Angora rabbit, not a pundit.
“You got all that from the movie, Bucky?”
He shrugged. “When the guy from San Sebastian Cinema called and offered me the job as an usher, I thought it might be a good idea to read up on film, so I went to the library and got a book.”
“That’s where they keep them,” Soledad muttered.
“They’ve just begun a series of old classics, so they’re showing Wings next week. The book I checked out, History of Cinema, describes it as a1927 silent movie about these World War I fighter pilots. Clara Bow, Gary Cooper, and even that old Hollywood gossip columnist Hedda Hopper, were in it. Wings won the very first Oscar for Best Picture. Is that cool, or what?”
Eunice beamed at him. “Bucky’s real smart.”
“He can read, too,” Soledad muttered again.
I shot her a dirty look. She caught it and threw it back. With her black lip liner and thin black eyebrows she looked pretty scary so I let it pass.
“I really, really like this lasagna, Eunice,” I said.
The others agreed again that they really, really liked the lasagna, too.
***
In my room later, I opened my laptop and renewed my acquaintance with the Google gods.
I started with stunt man Yancy Haas, and what I found raised the hair on my arms. Stunt man Yancy Haas had so violent a history I had no trouble believing he could easily kill a dozen people.
Ten years earlier, while living in a Hollywood apartment, he had been booked for assaulting his roommate, a fellow stuntman. When the victim, one Dave Mason, didn’t show up in court to testify, nothing happened with the case. Yancy’s trouble didn’t end there. Not long afterward, he was popped for two DUIs less than three months apart. He had been sentenced to six months in jail and his driver’s license had been suspended for two years. A year after his release from jail, and while still living in the Los Angeles area, he had been found guilty of attempted homicide when he attacked his girlfriend with a knife. A man in the neighboring apartment heard the commotion and broke in and saved her. Once the woman had been transported to the hospital, it took ninety-three stiches to close her wounds. That crime, ostensibly Yancy’s last to date, earned him a five-year stretch in California State Prison in Centinela. He was paroled twenty-eight months later for good behavior.
Curious, I looked up Centinela on GoogleMaps. It was in the far southeast corner of the state, nowhere near Nevada’s Ely State Prison. Not that it would matter, Victor having escaped from Ely years earlier. Still…
I moved on to Willis Pierce. At first glance I found no newspaper articles linking the drama professor to old crimes or questionable relationships with students, but having already learned that the nicest people sometimes had the dirtiest pasts, I kept looking. Eventually I discovered that before moving t
o San Sebastian County more than a decade ago, he had taught acting for a few semesters at Atlantic Cape Community College in Mays Landing, New Jersey. When I looked up Mays Landing on GoogleMaps I saw it was just a hop, skip, and jump inland from Atlantic City. Mob ties? Gambling debts? There was no way of knowing. I found no mention of the marriage I’d heard him make a disparaging remark about. Maybe that had happened later. After Atlantic Cape, he left to direct a community theater group in South Africa. Two years later, his wanderlust apparently slaked, he returned. After a brief vacation, took the job in San Sebastian.
What was his ex-wife’s name? Ah, yes. Serena Sue.
When I typed in “Serena Sue+Pierce+New Jersey” nothing came up, but when I dropped the Pierce part, photographs of two Serena Sue Tagilossis popped up. One was a wizened Serena Sue celebrating her one-hundredth birthday at the Egg Harbor Retirement Home. The other Serena Sue Tagilossi, possibly the centenarian’s great-granddaughter, turned up in a blurry wedding snapshot taken in front of the Egg Harbor United Methodist Church. It showed a newly minted Mrs. Serena Sue Tagliossi Moss standing next to her beaming, clean-shaven groom, one Anthony James Moss. The accompanying article described him as an employee of the Lucky Lady Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey. Although the quality of the photograph was poor, Moss resembled Willis enough to be his cousin. Reading further I found Willis listed as Best Man. The two men didn’t have last names in common, since they were probably related through their mother’s side of the family.
Willis must have married his cousin’s cast-off. The idea seemed a bit creepy to me, but it certainly wasn’t creepy enough to be blackmailed over. One of my cousins had married his own former sister-in-law, for Pete’s sake.
Letting the quasi-incest slide, I continued searching but never found a story announcing Serena Sue’s remarriage, which meant little. Second, third, and fourth marriages rarely made the papers unless the beautiful bride was Gunn Landing socialite Caroline Piper Bentley Hufgraff O’Brien Petersen. Every time Caro married it made headlines on the society page of the San Sebastian Gazette. Her divorces always made the papers, too.
