Murder Key

by H. Terrell Griffin

  The room was still, the quiet broken only by the forlorn sound of a telephone not answered. I heard something metal drop on the floor outside the room, making a small noise, probably a spoon or a fork. The food service people were picking up the breakfast trays. A siren wailed in the distance, becoming louder and more urgent as it approached the hospital. I wondered what tragedy was propelling the ambulance toward the emergency room.

  “Son of a bitch,” said Byron. “Hang up the phone, Chief. What do you want to know?”

  Lester smiled. “Tell me about the operation.”

  “Ain’t much to tell. The senator had a connection with some guy in Mexico who’d ship the illegals to us. We been working that deal for about five years. I told Mr. Royal all this.”

  “I need to hear it from you,” said the chief. “I’m more interested in the drugs than the Mexicans.”

  “Don’t really know nothing about the drugs. I just handled the Mexicans.”

  Bill leaned over in his chair, putting his face right next to Hewett’s. “You told Mr. Royal that the senator’s daughter was involved in the drugs,” he said. “He doesn’t have a daughter. I checked.”

  “I can’t swear to it. I just heard something about his daughter, but I never saw her. The only person I ever saw was the blonde woman, and I don’t think she even knew the senator.”

  “Why do you say that?” asked Bill.

  “I called him by name one time. Said something to her about ‘Mr. Foster.’ She didn’t know who I was talking about. When I told her that was the senator’s name, she just shrugged and walked off.”

  “How long has she been involved?” asked Lester.

  “About a year. The senator called me one day and said the next shipment of Mexicans would include drugs and the blonde woman would take care of it. He didn’t like it, but he said she had him over a barrel. That’s when he said something about it being his daughter, but I must have misunderstood.”

  “Did you or he ever bring up the daughter again?”

  “No. It never came up.”

  I stood and walked across to the door and back. My legs were going to sleep sitting on the hard chair. “Tell me about Jimmy Wilkerson,” I said.

  Hewett laughed. “Boy, I sure got you and your buddy on that one, didn’t I?”

  “You did. Tell me about the name.”

  “I just picked it out. I needed a name, and I didn’t want to use my own.”

  “How did Jimmy Wilkerson get involved in the drug trade?” I asked.

  “He wasn’t,” said Hewett. “I never got close to that end of the business.”

  I was quiet for a moment. “Do you know Merc Maitland in Orlando?” I asked.

  “Never heard of him.”

  “How about a guy named Jeep?”

  “Nope.”

  “He knows you,” I said.

  “Mr. Royal, I swear to you, I ain’t never heard of the man.”

  “He’s a black guy running drugs in Orlando. Don’t lie to me, Byron.”

  “Wait a minute. One time the senator had me call a guy in Orlando to tell him to go to a bar in Tampa to meet somebody named Tank. He sounded like a black guy on the phone. That might be the one you’re talking about.”

  I leaned over close, lowered my voice. “Why are your people trying to kill me?”

  “I don’t know,” said Byron. “The senator just told me some Mexican had tried to kill you because you was messing in the drug business. Then when you showed up out in the mines, I figured you was after me.”

  “How did you know that was me in the Vagabond that day?”

  “I’d told people out there that Jimmy Wilkerson was a friend of mine, and that some bad people were looking for him, and they might be posing as cops. They were supposed to let me know if somebody showed up. When you and your buddy started asking about me, I got a call.

  “I called the senator and he described you, and he said I should take you out. Said that you were a danger to us all.”

  “What about yesterday?” I asked.

  “The senator called and told me to go take care of you. He told me to tell you that thing about squashing bugs,” Byron said. “That’s all I know. You oughta find a better hiding place for your spare key.” He laughed, or grunted. I couldn’t tell which.

  Byron was squirming on the bed now, the pain showing in his face. “Can I have some pain killer, now?” he said.

  Bill looked at me. “I think we’re done here,” he said.

  I nodded in agreement. “I’ll send the nurse in,” I said as we left.

  We were in the hall when Bill used his cell phone to call his office and ask them to check out the phone number Byron had given us to call the senator. By the time we got to the car, the dispatcher called back with the answer.

  Bill looked exasperated. “No joy in Mudville,” he said. “We struck out. The number belongs to one of those pre-paid cell phones. No idea who bought it.”

  We drove back to the key, and Bill dropped me off at my condo. I called Jock in Houston to tell him what had happened.

  “Maybe,” he said, “you’re off the hook. With Byron locked up and the senator gone, I’d think you’re safe.”

  “Except that we still don’t know who was running the drug operation. I think Byron was telling the truth about that. And Bill Lester tells me that the senator never had any kids. His wife died about ten years ago, and he lives alone on his spread out in eastern Sarasota County.”

  I also told him about the puzzling development with Marie Phillips. “I don’t know how she fits in,” I said, “and Lester hasn’t come up with anything on her, yet. The deputy is some kind of hotshot with the sheriff’s office, and they don’t think he’d be involved in anything dirty.”

  “Hang in there, podna,” Jock said. “If you need me, I’ll fly back over.”

  “No. You enjoy your Thanksgiving. I’ll keep you posted.”

  The next day I had my holiday dinner at Logan’s, along with fifteen other people who were made a little less lonely by our friend’s generosity.

  37

  Murder Key

  THIRTY-NINE

  On the last Monday in November, I went jogging on the beach. It had been a quiet weekend and I’d used the beach each morning for my workout. I kept a sharp eye out for go-fast boats, but none came in close to shore.

  I returned to my condo, showered and met Logan for breakfast at Izzy’s. He was on his way to the airport for a trip to Atlanta to begin his work-week traveling the state of Georgia.

  He took a sip of his tomato juice. “Think you’ll be safe without me around this week?” he asked, grinning.

  “It looks like things are settling down. Maybe we took the wind out of their sails. The senator’s gone and Byron’s in jail. All in all, a pretty good Thanksgiving.”

  We chatted and ate our breakfast. I ordered another cup of coffee. Logan didn’t drink what he called “that noxious brew” and had once declared that coffee-drinking was about the only vice he’d never indulged in.

  Logan stood to leave. “Take care of yourself. I’ll be back on Friday, and we can go fishing. Maybe K-Dawg can join us.”

  That seemed like a good idea. K-Dawg was our usual fishing buddy, and the only one who took it seriously. I finished my coffee and sat for a while reading the paper. As I was paying the check, my cell phone rang, and I stepped outside to answer.

  It was Rufus Harris. “I’ve had a forensic accountant spend the weekend going over the senator’s books. He made an interesting find.”

  “He got a line on the drug money?”

  “Not yet, but he found some strange payments going to a lady in your hometown.”

  “Orlando?”

  “Nope. Sanford.”

  Sanford is a small town just north of Orlando, and it’s the place where Jock and I grew up.

  “What’s that all about?” I asked.

  “Don’t know yet. The lady’s name is Janet Horvath. Know her?”

  “Never heard of her
. Was it a lot of money?”

  “No. But it was steady. Every month the senator wrote a check to Janet for a thousand bucks out of his personal account. There’s no notation as to what it was for, and the payments stopped about ten years ago.”

  “Why do you think that’s significant?” I asked.

  “I’m not sure it is, but I thought the coincidence of the payments going to a woman in your hometown was too much. Could this be a reason they were trying to kill you?”

  “That doesn’t make sense to me. I never heard of the woman. Let me do some checking in Sanford and see what I can turn up. I’ll let you know.”

  I went home, and did a computer search for Janet Horvath. Nothing. I accessed the Property Appraiser’s web site in Seminole County where Sanford was located. If Janet had ever owned property in the county, she didn’t now, and the historical record was devoid of any mention of her name as a deed holder. There was no phone listing for her, so I called the information operator. Nothing.

  Maybe I could find out something in Sanford. I grabbed a change of clothes and my shaving kit and pointed the Explorer toward I-75 and Sanford.

  * * * * *

  My timing was good. At Tampa, I turned onto I-4, and passed through Orlando shortly after mid-day. The traffic on the expressways had not begun to build for the afternoon rush hour, and I cruised through the city heading east, which on that part of the Interstate is actually north. Go figure.

  I took the Highway 46 exit and drove into my childhood. Many things about Sanford had changed over the years, but as I entered the restored downtown, I felt as if I’d stepped through a time warp.

  The old buildings, some dating to the late nineteenth century, lined the brick-paved First Street. In my childhood these buildings had housed department stores, drug stores and other commercial establishments. Now there were mostly antique and other specialty shops.

  The town sits on the southern bank of Lake Monroe, a 9,400 acre body of water through which flows the St. Johns River. For many years Sanford had served as a great inland port, and later a rail center. It had always been home for me, and though I had no relatives left there, I felt a stab of nostalgia as I drove into downtown.

  I called an old friend, Mick Columbus, who had practiced law in Sanford for more than fifty years. He knew most of the people who had ever lived there. He invited me by his office for coffee, a ritual that is largely missing from the modern practice of law.

  Mick’s office was in an old two-story building that once housed a hotel. It sat across from a decaying structure that in Sanford’s heyday had been the railroad terminal, long since fallen into disrepair, the tracks ripped out of the ground and sold for scrap. The new terminal, older than I am, was out of Highway 46, between downtown and the Interstate.

  Mick greeted me effusively, and we spent some time chatting about the old days and people long gone. Finally, I told him I was working on a legal matter, and I asked him if he had ever known Janet Horvath.

  “Oh, sure,” he said. “She used to waitress down at the Colonial Room. Quite a gal. Died a few years back.”

  The Colonial Room was a small restaurant on First Street that served breakfast and lunch and was a favorite of the locals. At noon on weekdays, most of the courthouse crowd was there, savoring the daily special.

  I sipped my coffee. “What can you tell me about her?”

  “Not much. She came to town twenty-five or thirty years ago, pregnant. She didn’t bring a husband with her. She’d been here about three months when she had a baby girl. Rented a house out by Pinecrest School and went to work at the restaurant. Nobody ever knew who the girl’s father was. It was quite a topic of conversation when Janet first came to town, but like everything else, that died down, too.”

  “What happened to the daughter?” I asked.

  “I don’t think I ever heard. I seem to remember that for a while she was bartending down at Wolfy’s, but I don’t know whatever became of her. I can’t remember what her name is, either. I haven’t seen her since her mom died.”

  We chatted for a little longer, and I took my leave, promising to stop by the next time I was in Sanford.

  I drove the three blocks to Wolfy’s to see if anybody remembered a girl named Horvath. The bar and restaurant sat on a city-owned peninsula that had been dredged from the lake bottom years before. It was a popular nightspot with an unbeatable view of the lake. The municipal marina and a small hotel shared the spit of public land.

  The bartender filled my beer order, putting a Miller Lite and a cold mug on the bar. I asked her if she knew a girl that used to work there named Horvath. She said she didn’t.

  She took a swipe at the bar with her towel. “I’ve only been here a couple of years, though,” she said. “The manager will be here in a few minutes. He’s been running this place forever.”

  I sat quietly, taking the occasional sip of beer. The flat water of the lake reflected the late afternoon sun, causing a glare that turned everything to shades of gray. It looked as if all the color were being leached out of the earth. I saw the snout of an alligator poking out of the water near the marina docks. Further out, a bass boat skimmed the surface, its wake curving behind, as the fisherman brought it in toward the marina ramp. At the far western end of the lake, I could see the I-4 bridge, full of vehicles heading through the rush hour traffic toward Deltona and Orange City. Orlando workers going home.

  “I’m Tommy Bradseth,” said a man, as he slid in next to me. He had a head full of unruly gray hair that looked like a Brillo pad. It hadn’t seen a comb that day, or maybe that week. He wore rimless glasses perched low on his nose. Gesturing toward the bartender, he continued, “Paula said you were looking for somebody who used to work here. I’m the manager.”

  I turned to him, introduced myself, and we shook hands. “I’m trying to locate a woman whose last name is Horvath. I don’t know her first name, but I was told she used to work here.”

  “Yeah,” Bradseth said, “that’d be Beth Horvath. Her mother used to work over at the Colonial Room. She died a few years back.”

  “Beth’s dead?”

  “Not that I know of. Her mom died of cancer about ten years ago.”

  “What can you tell me about Beth?”

  “She was a good kid. Hard working. She was going to school at the community college and working here at night. When her mom got sick, Beth had to drop out of school to help out. She worked double shifts every chance she got.”

  “Do you know what happened to her after her mom died?”

  “Not sure. Last I heard she had gotten a waitressing job over in Orlando and was back in school at UCF.”

  The University of Central Florida was located on the eastern edge of Orlando. It had grown over the years into one of the largest universities in the country. One could get pretty well lost in a school with over forty thousand students.

  I’d finished my beer, and signaled Paula for another one. “Can I buy you a drink?” I asked the manager.

  “I could handle a Coors. Thank you.”

  I poured beer into my new cold mug. “Do you know where she worked in Orlando?” I asked.

  “No idea. Some bar. That’s all I know.”

  We finished our beer, talking about how Sanford had changed over the years. I left Wolfy’s and drove to the Hilton in Lake Mary, just down the road from Sanford. I got a room and spent the evening with a mystery novel.

  * * * * *

  On Tuesday, after a breakfast of eggs, bacon and grits in the hotel coffee shop, I headed to Seminole High School. The campus was off 25th Street, its buildings no longer new. It was from Seminole High School that I had left for the Army and Jock for college. It seemed a long time ago.

  The building where I had gone to school no longer existed. It was a gracious old Greek Revival structure built in the 1920's. After seventy years, the school board decided to get rid of it. A lot of memories died that day at the working end of a wrecking ball.

  I checked in at the office an
d told the secretary that I was an old grad, and wondered if I could peruse some past yearbooks. She took me to the library and pointed to the shelves where row after row of the books called Salmagundi were stored.

  I had come looking for Beth Horvath. I pulled down several years worth of books, extrapolating from what I knew about Beth’s age to come up with the years when she was most likely to have been in high school.

  I looked at the senior pictures, because they were bigger and closer in time to the present. If I didn’t find her there, I’d check out the club pictures or sports teams. It’s almost impossible for someone to spend four years in a small high school and not be in at least one picture in the yearbook.

  On the third volume, I found her. I looked at the face that went with the name, and felt something like an electric shock course through my body.

  A large piece of the puzzle clunked into place, and the answers I’d been seeking were, like a developing Polaroid photograph, coming rapidly into focus.

  I knew Beth Horvath.

  37

  Murder Key

  FORTY

  I drove out 25th Street, past the Mayfair Country Club, and took the State Road 46A ramp onto I-4 Westbound. I wasn’t sure what to do with the information I’d stumbled upon in that old yearbook. I’d have to think on it.

  As I was passing through downtown Orlando, my phone rang. I checked the caller ID. It was Bill Lester.

  “Hey, Chief,” I said.

  “Where are you?”

  “I’m going through downtown Orlando, on my way home.”

  “We’ve found the senator,” he said.

  “Where?”

  “In Mexico, dead. Somebody called the police about a small jet that seemed to be abandoned on an airstrip outside of Veracruz. When the cops got there, they found the senator’s body in a passenger’s seat, shot once behind the ear.”