3 Strange Bedfellows

by Matt Witten

  She stopped me. "It wasn't George."

  "But he confessed."

  "He lied."

  "Why would he confess to a murder he didn't commit?"

  "To protect me."

  "I don't get it."

  "He thinks I killed Jack. And Zzypowski, too."

  I stared at her. "Why would he think that?"

  "Hey, I had plenty of reason to kill Jack," she said harshly. "He was abusive. He was a sadist. He cheated on me."

  A jolt of electricity shot through me. Whoa, maybe she really did kill her husband. "What about Zzyp? Why would you kill him?"

  She shook her head impatiently. "I don't know what George is thinking. He won't explain it to me. He won't even talk to me. I go to see him in jail and he just . . ." Her voice caught in her throat. "It's horrible. He's so depressed, he's losing his mind."

  She looked on the verge of crying, but I tried not to let that distract me. "Wait a minute. If he won't even talk to you, then how do you know he thinks you're the murderer?"

  "Because why else would he say he's the murderer?"

  "Maybe it's true. He did try to kill me."

  "Look, I know George. He didn't do it!"

  "There's another thing. You told me that you and George were together the night Jack was killed. So George must know you didn't do it."

  She looked abashed. "George and I weren't really together that night. I was seeing a lawyer about filing for divorce."

  "Wait a minute. Linda Medwick said your husband was filing, not you."

  Her lips parted. "He was? The bastard. But anyway, I couldn't very well use the lawyer as an alibi. If word got out I was divorcing Jack, it would ruin my campaign. I'm supposed to be the grieving widow and all that."

  I rolled my eyes. It hadn't taken this woman long to turn into a typical conniving politician.

  The widow caught my disapproval. "Look, why shouldn't I get some benefits out of my husband dying?" she declared defiantly. "After everything I put up with from that bastard, it's only fair I should get something."

  "Like a Congressional seat?"

  She gripped the edge of the table. "You don't have to like me. But George doesn't deserve to die in prison. They won't even give him bail, because they say he's dangerous. That's insane!"

  "Not to me."

  "Mr. Burns, I'm sorry about what he did to you. I'm sure he's sorry, too. He's a loving man, a good man, like you."

  "Cut the flattery, huh?"

  "Will you help me?"

  "Why don't you just go to the cops?"

  "I did. They wouldn't even listen to me." Her lips trembled and the waterworks started. "George Tamarack deserves to die a decent death, in his bed, surrounded by people he loves. I'm begging you, please. If you won't do it for George, or me, then do it for my son. You're our only hope."

  She was leaning forward, and one of her tears fell into my café au lait. I sighed. "So what's your theory on who done it?"

  "Oh, Mr. Burns," she breathed, "thank you."

  "Don't thank me yet. I haven't said yes to anything. So let me guess: You're figuring Pierce for the killer, aren't you?"

  She pushed a wayward lock of wavy black hair back from her forehead. "Do you remember, you asked me once what Jack was planning to say in that radio debate?"

  I eyed her quizzically. "Yeah, you claimed you didn't know. What, is this another lie you told me?"

  "I didn't trust you then. And anyway, I don't know, not really." She leaned forward. "But the night before the debate, I overheard Jack talking to someone on the phone. He said something like, 'Be sure to listen to WTRO tomorrow. I've got something that'll knock their socks off.' "

  "Knock whose socks off?"

  "I'm not sure. And then he said, 'They won't be calling me the Hack anymore after tomorrow night. Everyone'll know, I'm my own man.' "

  I sipped my café au lait cum tear drop thoughtfully.

  "I'm my own man. Does that mean, instead of being Ducky Medwick's man?"

  She bobbed her head vigorously up and down. "See, Jack was paranoid everyone was laughing at him behind his back. He knew people thought of him as a nobody, a yes-man to Ducky who just happened to be in the right place at the right time. Jack didn't discuss it with me—he never discussed anything with me—but I'd hear him on the phone with people. He was scared Will Shmuckler would keep calling him a 'puppet of the party bosses' and stuff like that, and eventually it would stick in people's minds, and he'd lose the election."

  "Get real. There's no way he was gonna lose."

  "Everyone knew that but him. Jack was always insecure. He knew his Dad didn't approve of him, and deep down he felt like he didn't really deserve to be a congressman. So he wanted to do something to prove himself."

  I circled the rim of the coffee cup with my finger. "And you think he was planning to prove himself how—by saying something in the debate that would be damaging to Ducky? That doesn't seem logical."

  She threw me a frustrated look. "I'm telling you, he wasn't logical. He was so scared of losing that election, he went off the deep end! He beat me for looking at him the wrong way. He screamed constantly at our son. And he was fucking Ducky Medwick's wife! So don't tell me about logical. What that man did has nothing to do with logical!"

  The veins stuck out in the widow's forehead and the pulse in her neck was throbbing. It struck me that she might not be acting too incredibly logical herself. Again I wondered if her father-in-law/lover was right, and she really did kill her husband and Zzyp.

  But if that was the case, then why would she come to me? Maybe she felt guilty about George taking the rap for her, and she was hoping against hope that I could find some plausible alternative suspect to toss to the police.

  "Mr. Burns, if you want money, I can pay you—"

  I put up my hand. "Enough already, I'll take the case."

  As soon as the words escaped my mouth, I regretted them. I mean, the man who had confessed to both murders and almost certainly committed them was behind bars; my wife and kids were calm again, and so was my mother-in-law; and my man Shmuckler was about to become the first-ever Jewish liberal Democratic congressman from the 22nd District. Why couldn't I just leave well enough alone? All I had to do was say no to this woman, and I'd get to spend a quiet morning sipping yuppie beverages and doing the New York Times crossword puzzle.

  But I guess just like everyone else, I was a sucker for a grieving widow. I picked up my café au lait and drank some more of her tears. Then I got down to work.

  Susan and I went out to her car, a Volvo that used to be her husband's. We searched the glove compartment and map tray for any slips of paper or other stuff that might possibly tell us what he was planning to say in the debate that never was. But we came up empty.

  I decided to confess to Susan about stealing her mail. She glared at me for a moment, then shrugged it off. We went to my Toyota, pulled the box of the Hack's personal effects out of my trunk, and scavenged it anew for evidence. But we found nothing striking, just the same random personal miscellany and boring official documents. I thought Susan would break down when she found a photograph of the Hack with their son, but she bit her lip and kept on going.

  Then we went to her house and scoured for clues there. She hadn't gotten around to going through his clothes and things yet, so they were pretty much the way he'd left them when he died. We tried the pockets of his suit jackets, the drawers of his bedside table, and the desk where he paid his bills. But we didn't hit on anything that seemed useful. We did find a long computer printout in his desk, entitled "Campaign Finance Disclosure Form," which recorded all of his campaign income and expenses; but I saw nothing in there that looked suspicious.

  No, let me rephrase that. I saw a lot of suspicious things in there, since big contributions from big corporations always make me suspicious. However, I saw nothing that looked positively illegal.

  Apparently this operation was a bust. I sat back in the Hack's chair and closed my eyes for a moment.


  "How about calling Linda Medwick?" the widow suggested. "Maybe he told her what he was planning to say."

  Just what I needed—another skirmish with the blonde bombshell. That New York Times crossword felt mighty inviting right about now. "Did your husband have a safety deposit box?"

  "Not that I know of."

  "There must be some special place where he kept his private stuff. All men have one." Maybe not all men, but I certainly do. Excess cash, condoms, etc., always go in the back of my sock and underwear drawer. Come to think of it . . . "What about his sock and underwear drawer? Have we checked that yet?"

  "No, but there's nothing there. I should know, I washed the man's dirty underpants for ten years."

  I stood up. "Let's check anyway."

  About twenty-five seconds later, I was sitting on the Hack's bed feeling like Sherlock Holmes. No, I hadn't found a copy of that final undelivered radio speech. But in the very back of that drawer, stuffed inside a pair of long underwear that Susan said the Hack never wore, I'd found something equally fascinating: a second computerized printout of the Campaign Finance Disclosure Form.

  This disclosure form was different, though. It was unexpurgated. There were several "contributions" that hadn't been listed on the other printout, and some expenditures, too. The expenditure that grabbed my eyeballs and held them was one dated May 31 that read: "$20,000—Zzypowski Research."

  I felt goose bumps rising. May 31—that was right before Robert Pierce dropped out of the race. I'd bet my entire nest egg the timing was no coincidence: The Hack had paid Zzyp for info, then immediately used it to blackmail Pierce into dropping out.

  My goose bumps rose even higher when I realized the $20,000 figure rang a bell. It was the identical sum Hack Sr. had mentioned to me.

  I stared down at the printout, which shook in my excited hands. Everyone and his brother had been blowing smoke at me for a week and a half, but now at last the fog was clearing. When you came right down to it, the solution to these murders was really simple.

  One man had the exact same motive for both killings. Jack Tamarack spent $20,000 to blackmail Robert Pierce—and Pierce whacked him. Then George Tamarack was about to spend $20,000 so he could blackmail Pierce—but Pierce stopped that by whacking Zzyp.

  And finally, I had the kind of evidence that even cops would have to pay attention to.

  "Find anything good?" Susan asked, looking over my shoulder.

  "You bet your ass," I replied.

  18

  Unlike Chief Coates's office in Troy, Chief Walsh's office in Saratoga had mucho class. But as Walsh leaned back in his antique leather chair and frowned at me from behind his oak desk, it occurred to me that despite his distinguished silver hair and perfect unwrinkled suit, the man himself had about as much class as Joey Buttafuoco.

  "For Christ's sake already," he said, irritated, "your boy Shmuck is off the hook. The other guy confessed. Quit bothering me."

  I angrily slapped the two campaign finance forms onto Walsh's desk. My gesture would have been more impressive if the forms hadn't slipped right off the desk and onto the floor. "Look, this is major new evidence."

  "Yeah, major new evidence you got a bug up your ass. I'm not going off half-cocked on some half-baked vendetta against Robert Pierce."

  "It's not a vendetta—"

  "What's the problem, you got the hots for the widow?"

  What a jerk. "At least let me look through Zzyp's files, see if I can find proof for this blackmail scenario."

  "You already went through his files, remember? When you found his body."

  "I was in a hurry. Maybe I missed something."

  "You didn't. We went through them ourselves. Nothing there but seedy sex and insurance scams."

  "Come on, Chief," I wheedled, "just go in your back room, get me the files, and then I'll leave you alone."

  "Can't do it. We examined Zzyp's files on-site. They're still there."

  I gave him a look. This sounded like yet another example of his sloppiness—or unwillingness to get involved in any political controversies. Sensing my exasperation, the chief defended himself. "You can't just confiscate a P.I.'s client files. They're confidential, like a lawyer's."

  "You don't expect me to believe a mere technicality like that would stop you."

  "Believe what you want. I don't like having my evidence thrown out in court. We did take a quick peek at his files right after the murder. And we were gonna ask the judge to let us examine them in detail. But now that the killer's confessed, we don't need to."

  "Yes, you do. You need to reopen the whole—"

  "Wrong. You need to get the hell out of my office."

  I grabbed the campaign forms off the floor and stood up. Clearly it was useless asking the local police chief to investigate crooked local politicians. "You'll look pretty damn stupid when I crack this case."

  "Crack your head is more like it. Don't blame me if you piss someone off and get yourself killed."

  "How sweet. You're actually worried about me."

  "That'll be the day."

  I would have stayed and bantered some more, but since Walsh refused to help me out, there was a mission I wanted to accomplish pronto: sneak into Zzyp's office somehow and search through his files again. This time I'd do it right. Maybe the chief was bothered by legal impediments, but I wasn't.

  How would I get in there, though? I wasn't in the mood for another AAA B and E. I'd had more than enough of that lately, thank you very much. Also, I had a better idea. I'd go see the mall manager and tell him I was interested in renting out Zzyp's old office.

  The mall was in such dire economic straits that I guessed this approach would get quick results, and I was right. The mall manager was a guy in his twenties who looked eager and freshly scrubbed, like this was his first Big Responsible Job. When I entered his brightly lit, faux-cheerful office and told him what I wanted, he almost began drooling right before my eyes.

  "Sure, I'll be glad to show you the office. We can go right now," Freshly scrubbed said, jumping out of his chair. "It's a wonderful space. Mr. Zzypowski was very happy there, and please rest assured, we've never had any crime problems before. We have complete twenty-four-hour security with at least two well-trained security guards on the premises at all times . . ."

  He babbled on for the entire walk to Zzyp's office. It was almost as irritating as the Muzak version of "Eleanor Rigby" playing over the loudspeakers. People who turn beautiful songs into Muzak should be strung up, shot, and sent to outer space.

  Freshly Scrubbed's oral motor kept right on running as he unlocked the door and we walked in. Then he took a break from his monologue at last and asked, "So what will you be using this office for?"

  I didn't want to mention my name or my million-dollar movie, in case he recognized them and realized I was connected with Zzyp's death. "I'm a writer," I said.

  "A writer? How interesting," he said doubtfully. I could hear the alarm bells going off in his brain: This guy's a writer? That means he won't be able to pay the rent. "What do you write?"

  "All kinds of things," I blustered. "National magazines, internet marketing, and so forth."

  He frowned. "Internet marketing—is that well paying?"

  I threw him a wink. "Very. Listen, this office feels very promising, but I need to see if it's a good writing environment."

  "I'm sure it would be—"

  "There's only one way I can really find out for sure."

  "What's that?"

  "I have to actually, you know, do some writing here. Do you think I could hang out here for thirty minutes while I test the place out?"

  He eyed me warily. "I don't know, that's kind of an unusual request."

  I gave a self-deprecating smile. "It's an artistic temperament thing. You know how writers are."

  He smiled back condescendingly, as if to say he knew exactly how writers are. "Okay," he said, "no problem. I'll be back in half an hour."

  "Good. I have a real positive feeling about
this space. It has writer vibes."

  "Writer vibes. Glad to hear it," Freshly Scrubbed said as he walked away. No doubt he'd go back to his office and tell his colleagues about the eccentric writer who was testing out the "writer vibes" in Zzyp's office. I'd better get those files examined fast, before people wandered by to gawk at me.

  First I went through Zzyp's desk and found the same paper clips and Wite-Out I'd found last time. In fact, everything was just like it had been before, with one exception: The quart of Jack Daniel's in the bottom drawer had gone from almost full to almost empty. Hmm. Maybe this was how those well-trained security guards entertained themselves on dull weekday afternoons.

  Then I headed for the back room to search through Zzyp's cabinets. Since I didn't really know what I was looking for, I looked through everything. I began with the insurance files and their seedy tales of arsons, fake thefts, and accident victims who were supposedly crippled for life but actually played handball daily at the Y. All very enlightening, but there was nothing even remotely related to my murders.

  The divorce files looked even less useful. No variety here: every single case was about infidelity. I must admit, though, I enjoyed the photographs of all those adulterous couples kissing, petting, and, well, coupling. You know those reality-based TV shows like Cops and Rescue 911? Somebody could make a lot of money off of a show like that called Adultery.

  But after thirty or so files, even the most pornographic of the photos began to lose their charm. As I flipped rapidly through the nude bodies in the "Wilson, Kate" file, I wasn't paying too much attention. Then suddenly something hit my eye. Startled, I took a closer look at the happy-go-lucky adulterers in the photograph.

  I didn't recognize the woman. But I recognized the man, all right. Kate Wilson's philandering hubby—or by now, I suppose, ex-hubby—was none other than Dennis Sarafian.

  Kate must have gotten a hefty divorce settlement, because there were a lot of other hot photos in this file, too. They featured Denny baby with no less than five different women. I couldn't help getting jealous. The guy was ferret-faced and balding, but here he was with his willowy brunette receptionist, a cute redhead, a petite Japanese woman in a miniskirt, and a—