The Wizard of Death

by Forrest, Richard;

  “Anything on who or what Rainbow is?”

  “Not a damn thing. I’ve run it past all the agencies, here and in Washington. Negative all the way.”

  “Have the Breeland or state police come up with anything?”

  “Blank everywhere.”

  The faint echo of door chimes seeped through the room, and Danny Nemo moved unobtrusively toward the hall. Conversation died out as Wilkie swiveled his wheelchair to face the door as everyone waited expectantly.

  Ted Mackay entered the room as he always did—with a broad smile and a wave. Then, with both arms extended, he crossed to Bea and kissed her on the forehead. Startled, she took a backward step.

  The majority leader swept through the room. Lyon received a hearty handshake, Rocco a pat on the shoulder, and Wilkie Dawkins a double handshake. Mackay ended at the bar, where he picked up the cocktail glass Danny had conveniently filled. He raised it in the air.

  “I don’t know what’s responsible for this—Lyon’s good offices with his wife, Wilkie and his sometimes not so subtle political pressure, or Bea’s own inimitable method of decision making; but, nevertheless, I propose a toast to Bea Wentworth, the next lieutenant governor of this state.”

  Bea’s glass slipped from her fingers to shatter on the hearth. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m afraid I don’t understand.”

  “You’ve obviously decided to back my nomination, and I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather have on the ticket with me.” Ted’s eyebrow rose above his smile as he looked from one to another. “Isn’t that why Wilkie insisted I meet with you?”

  Wilkie cleared his throat. “I’m afraid not, Ted.”

  Ted Mackay took a sip of his drink. “My apologies. I was obviously premature. I’m sure there are details to work out before the final commitment of support.”

  “I didn’t come here tonight to throw you my support, Ted,” Bea said, and then mumbled to Lyon under her breath, “and that’s the understatement of the year.”

  “What did you say?”

  “I’m concerned over the threat you made in the cafeteria today.”

  Mackay laughed. “You don’t mean the ‘You’ll regret that’ bit?”

  “I certainly do.”

  “My apologies, Senator Wentworth. I didn’t realize your political skin was so thin.”

  “It’s not my political skin I’m worried about.”

  “I’m afraid I’m not following the thrust of this conversation,” Ted said to Wilkie. “Can you clarify things for me?”

  “There was an attempt on Bea’s life earlier today. We felt you should be informed.”

  Ted handed his glass to Danny for a refill and looked thoughtful. “You think some sort of conspiracy is trying to eliminate party leadership?”

  “It’s possible,” Lyon said. “Llewyn has been killed, and now there have been two attempts on Bea’s life. We can’t come up with any possible motive except political.”

  Mackay tapped his fingers on the edge of the bar. “Well, I have to confess I’m disappointed. I expected to come here for a finalization of political support, and instead I find we’re all playing amateur detective.”

  “It was hardly an amateur who shot through my kitchen window,” Bea said.

  “I’ve always known you had far-out opinions,” Ted said to Bea. “Now I find out that you’re one of those nuts who thinks all killings are political murders, with the CIA or the commies lurking in the brush.”

  “I don’t think someone shot through my window. I know.”

  Ted Mackay threw up his arms in mock resignation. “All right, I’ll play. We’ll have a brain-storming session on who killed Randy Llewyn.”

  “If you have any ideas or even conjectures, Ted, I think at this point they would be greatly appreciated,” Wilkie said.

  “Conjecture is too honorable a word. How about a wild guess?”

  “Try us,” Bea said.

  “All right. I have the feeling there’s an ultra-right-wing radical group involved here. Randy Llewyn was a liberal. Verged on the socialist, if you ask me; and I think certain elements wanted him removed.”

  “And me also?” Bea asked.

  “Yes.”

  Wilkie nodded his head in agreement. “We discussed this earlier, Ted, and I tend to agree with you. The whole situation smacks of conspiracy.”

  Bea looked thoughtful. “I’m sorry. I don’t buy it. One of us, or someone in a governmental agency, would have had some information on the existence of such a group.”

  “I said it was a wild guess,” Ted responded. “It’s far more plausible than the unspoken thought in this room that I’m behind this.”

  “We don’t even suggest that,” Lyon said.

  “You don’t have to. It’s written all over you.”

  “You ever hear of Rainbow?” Rocco asked.

  “Rainbow what?”

  “The name. Does it mean anything to you?”

  “I think I once had dinner at a place called the Rainbow Room.”

  “That’s all?”

  The Mackay smile reappeared and focused on Wilkie Dawkins. “You know, Wilkie, if I didn’t know better, I’d say this was becoming an inquisition.”

  “I think everyone here is trying to clear the air, Ted,” Wilkie said. “When you analyze the situation, and I think this may be lurking in the back of certain people’s minds, you would benefit if Llewyn and Bea were both … gone.”

  “You know, I’d laugh if this weren’t so serious.”

  Wilkie swiveled his chair to face Rocco. “I agree with Ted. I’m sure that he is not a suspect in a murder investigation. I for one happen to know that he spent the day in his campaign headquarters surrounded by a dozen people.”

  “I never made an accusation,” Rocco said. “Let’s say we’re involved in a routine inquiry.”

  Wilkie rolled his chair several paces closer to Rocco. “And let’s keep it that way, Chief Herbert. The slightest innuendo against a respected member of the legislature is hardly routine.”

  “That was a waste of time,” Lyon said as he drove back to their house.

  “I still think Mackay is involved,” Bea said. “I’m sure he’s perfectly capable of having engineered this whole thing. There’s an opportunistic quality in him that frightens me.”

  “I can see his possible motive, but you—”

  “Can’t take a man to court on motive alone.”

  The road curved in a parallel course along the river, and Lyon drove slowly and carefully as Bea leaned against his shoulder. The full moon appeared intermittently through the trees, and in the rear-view mirror he could see Rocco’s cruiser behind them.

  “Rainbow. Who is Rainbow?” Bea asked in a singsong. “Maybe we’ll get lucky, like Dorothy, and find out who the wizard really is.”

  “What’s that?” Lyon asked, but Bea had closed her eyes and burrowed deeper against his jacket.

  They had tried talking to Mackay and gotten nowhere. The answer was in the identification of Rainbow, and the only way to effect that would be through the trail leading from Junior Haney. Tomorrow Lyon would start on the re-creation of Junior Haney’s life.

  6

  Fzzt! Fzzt!

  Beer tab tops flipped across the room. The case of Bud that Lyon had brought was rapidly dwindling. Half a dozen pairs of hands reached into the case of beer, shook cans, ripped off tabs with a flourish, and spurted beer toward the ceiling.

  Beer spewed past his ear as someone cackled. Lyon sat on the edge of the pool table in the Krauts M.C. clubhouse. Wiff Stamen, wearing a sweat shirt with the legend “Feerlus Leader,” straddled a straight chair immediately in front of him.

  Fizz Nichols lay on his back with his head propped on a World War I German helmet and let beer trickle into his mouth. Other members of the club sat around the room in varying poses and degrees of hostility.

  It was the one in the corner whacking the tire chain into his palm whom Lyon found the most unsettling.

  “I want t
o write a fair article about you guys for the Sunday supplement,” Lyon said. “An article showing that a motorcycle club is interested in more than rape, plunder and pillage.”

  There was ominous silence from the group. Fizz Nichols drained half his can of beer and belched.

  “What’s pillage?” Wiff Stamen asked.

  “Looting.”

  “Like ripping off stuff?”

  “That’s the basic idea.”

  Two crushed beer cans cartwheeled past Lyon’s head and fell behind the ancient bar, where they clunked against their predecessors. Full cans were flipped around the room, tabs were torn off, and several streams of beer crisscrossed the room.

  Wiff sipped his beer and contemplated the foam for a moment. “You better take a different approach, like maybe bike safety.”

  “Come on, Wiff,” Fizz Nichols said. “Sure, we done a little pillaging, but no rapes—well, not for a long time.”

  “What’s your angle, Wentworth?”

  Lyon knew damn well that his angle was a complete re-creation of Junior Haney’s life in the hope that some clue or lead toward Rainbow would be discovered. But revealing that to the assembled group would be an invitation to a stomping. “An article. I feel that motorcyclists have been maligned.”

  “Yeah, they bust us a lot,” a voice said as several others nodded in assent.

  “You written something before?”

  “Yes, several books.”

  “Like what?”

  At this point Lyon needed a beer. He opened a can before replying. “Well, my most successful was The Monster on the Mantel, and The Cat in the Capital hasn’t done badly.”

  “You’ve got to be kidding.”

  “I try to be versatile.”

  “What do we get out of this?”

  “I buy the beer.”

  “And you want to ride with us?”

  “Do whatever you guys do.”

  “We’ll take a vote,” Wiff said.

  “How much beer?” Fizz asked.

  The vote was taken while Lyon made a quick trip to the nearest liquor store for three additional cases of beer. On his return, he found that he had been officially elected a temporary probationary member of the Krauts, but of course not entitled to wear colors.

  Since Lyon had only $63.50 in cash, and the members refused to take a check, the poker game was over in an hour. Three other members, back from the night shift at a local factory, joined the group and aided in the demise of the remaining beer.

  After he raked in the last poker pot, consisting mostly of Lyon’s money, Fizz Nichols got unsteadily to his feet. “All right, let’s ride. Man, let’s scratch rubber and roar!”

  “Get Wentworth a hog,” Wiff ordered.

  “I’m not really hungry,” Lyon replied.

  “Oh, Jesus,” voices said simultaneously.

  They borrowed a hog from one of the members who was entertaining his old lady in an upper room. It was the largest motorcycle Lyon had ever seen: 1200-cc displacement, factory outfitted, sheepskin seat, curved windshield and metal saddlebags. He approached the monolithic machine with trepidation.

  “Watch for the suicide clutch,” Wiff whispered in his ear as the club mounted up.

  “What’s that?”

  “Don’t kick off until you want to go; otherwise the hog goes without you.”

  “Move out!”

  They rode two abreast, with Fizz and Wiff in the lead. Traffic gave them a wide berth, and Lyon felt as if they were playing the adolescent game of King of the Hill. In downtown Breeland they made two circles around the town square and headed out Cumberland Street. As they approached the Exxon station where Junior Haney had been employed, Lyon revved his engine, held up his hand and pointed to his gas tank.

  The cycles made a loop into the gasoline station and stopped on the tarmac near the pumps. Junior’s replacement, an acned man in dirty jeans, shuffled over to Lyon. Because of the huge consumption of beer, the remainder of the club lined up outside restrooms, disregarding the sex differentiation signs on the doors.

  “Fill it up,” Lyon said and climbed off the motorcycle. “Rainbow been around?”

  “Huh?”

  “I heard Rainbow was coming around.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about, mister, and this hog is only taking a gallon.”

  As Lyon borrowed sixty-three cents from Fizz to pay the attendant for his gallon of gasoline, three City of Breeland patrol cars swerved into the station. Two cars blocked the station entrance, while the third swiveled to a stop near Lyon at the pump island.

  Captain Sean Murdock grunted his way from the third car as the Krauts lined up around Lyon.

  “Why the hassle, Murdock?” Wiff asked.

  “No safety helmets. We’re writing you all up for violation of the helmet law.”

  “Off our backs!” Fizz yelled.

  “Shuddup and pull out your licenses and registrations. You, with the sneakers and no socks, over here.”

  “Me?” Lyon asked.

  “Yes, you. What’re you doing playing with the kiddies? Over here, fast!”

  Lyon fumbled for his wallet as he walked slowly toward Captain Murdock. Murdock grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him around the car.

  “What in hell are you doing, Wentworth?”

  “Riding with the club.”

  “What kind of crap is that?”

  “I thought I might learn something.”

  “Get back to Murphysville, where you belong. Where’s Herbert?”

  “Following another lead.”

  “I don’t like amateurs fooling around in my town.”

  “I’m doing an article on the club.”

  “Bull crap! I’m taking you back to your car and escorting you out of Breeland.”

  “I’m not through here, Captain.”

  “Stubborn bastard, aren’t you?” With his pinkie, Murdock signaled to his car’s driver. “Write this guy up.”

  “What for, Captain?”

  “Violation of the helmet law, driving without a motorcycle operator’s permit, lack of registration.”

  “Wait a minute, Murdock.”

  “Resisting arrest and breach of peace.”

  “Hey!”

  “Cuff him.”

  With the exception of the time that Rocco Herbert’s wife had kicked the poker club out of the house and they had adjourned to the Murphysville jail for completion of the game, this was the only time Lyon had been in a jail cell. He didn’t like it. Nine feet long and six wide. He paced angrily until reminded of a large leopard incarcerated in a zoo. He smiled. The Cheetah and the Cell—it might work. He sat back in the bunk and put his hands behind his head and began to think about the large cat with the streamlined musculature, held imprisoned, all the while yearning.…

  The clank of metal on metal awakened him, and he sat up to see Rocco Herbert in the corridor outside the cell. The chief’s fingers curled over the bar as he looked at Lyon sardonically.

  “Resisting arrest. Jesus Christ, Lyon.”

  “Damn it all, Rocco, I didn’t do anything.”

  “Captain Murdock says you did.”

  Murdock appeared behind Rocco to unlock the barred door. “I didn’t book him. But get him out of town. He’s a troublemaker.”

  Lyon and Rocco walked out of the Breeland police station into a bright afternoon sun. Lyon squinted a moment until his eyes adjusted to the light. As they walked to the Murphysville police cruiser, Lyon turned to Rocco.

  “I thought Murdock was a little overzealous.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “His insistence that I was meddling.”

  “Are you trying to suggest that he’s somehow mixed up in this? That’s paranoid, Lyon. That’s paranoid as hell.”

  “Maybe. I’m getting suspicious of everyone at this point. You come up with anything?”

  “Nothing. Come on, I’ll drive you to your car.”

  “Leave me at the clubhouse.” />
  “Your car.”

  “Like I said, the clubhouse.”

  In honor of Lyon’s bust, Wiff and Fizz called another club for a protest ride-in to the state capitol. The very mention of the helmet law made the bikers shake with anger, and voices and yells crossed the clubhouse parking lot as two dozen motorcycles revved engines in preparation for the start. Lyon had again been loaned the large Harley and given a position of honor immediately behind Wiff Stamen.

  The onslaught of the long line of motorcycles had obviously been called ahead by the state police. As they approached the gold-domed state capitol, they saw that barriers had been erected, and a dozen state police were positioned around the circular drive.

  The officers, in wide-brimmed hats, directed the cyclists and allowed them to park directly in front of the building. Over the months of helmet protests, a code of unwritten laws had sprung up. The police, on their part, would not issue summonses to the bikers while they were protesting, if the bikers followed directions for parking, stayed off the grass, and were moderately well behaved.

  The club members began to chant; signs appeared. As Lyon, with a sore rump, climbed off the Harley, he wished he could ride back in an automobile.

  “WENTWORTH, WHAT IN HELL ARE YOU DOING?”

  He looked up to see Bea leaning from an upstairs window. “Protesting.”

  She shook her head.

  State police impassively lined the steps under the glinting dome. After the obligatory circling of the drive combined with a crescendo of revving engines, the bikers formed a phalanx of machines by the steps and began to chant. After a little difficulty, Lyon managed to align himself next to Wiff Stamen. “What now?”

  “Not much. We make noise for a while, and then they let one of us go inside to present our demands to a politico.”

  “What are our demands?”

  “No helmets, stop the harassment, anything we can think of.”

  “Sounds fine,” Lyon replied as the sound of engines drowned out his voice.

  Captain Norbert of the state police walked slowly down the capitol steps and glared at the impatient riders. He tilted his hat over his eyes, folded his arms across his chest, and walked slowly across the driveway. Bikes swerved out of his path in order to avoid hitting him, and he continued his slow progress as if oblivious of the motorcycles buzzing on either side. When he reached the end of the drive, he held up a hand and the moving bikes formed a semicircle around him.