Death Wore a Smart Little Outfit

by Orland Outland

  KC returned with the pitcher and glasses.

  “Thank you,” Doan said.

  “Umm,” KC said, looking at the floor. “I’m sorry about what I said earlier. Stan’s my friend, and I’m worried about him, that’s all.”

  “No problem,” Doan said blithely, dismissing the subject. He filled their glasses and raised his own.

  “To success!”

  “To success!” they echoed.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Doan had his reservations about seeing Art Mill. Something had happened to Mill, and Doan didn’t know whether to ascribe it to disillusionment, midlife crisis, or something else entirely. But the wisecracking man about town was gone; Mill was no longer the man who cackled over Doan’s stories, dropped previously scheduled items to fit the newest dirt in, paid Doan off and sent him on his way with an admonition to “keep ’em talking.” The new Mill greeted Doan wearily, got a chuckle out of the stories, and told him he “couldn’t use them, sorry, but why doncha siddown and have a cuppa.” The new man reflected in the columns, as fewer and fewer of them were about current social events, and more were reminiscences about the old days, and where once the death of an old friend of his was an item, now it was a column. The plight of the homeless consumed the next day, the shabbiness of the city the next, the uglification of the skyline the day after that - that is, when Mill wrote his own column at all; he now had half a dozen assistants writing most of it for him.

  The city still loved Art Mill. But sometimes the city wondered if Art loved it as is, or only as it had been. Doan was too young to remember the people and places and things Art reminisced about. But he was old enough to know that today is never the beloved golden age until it’s already yesterday. He was hoping Art would help, for Stan’s benefit, of course, but also for Art’s own- - a good dose of adventure, Doan had decided, was exactly what was needed to bring the man back among the living.

  “Hello, Doan,” Art’s secretary greeted him.

  “Is Art busy?”

  She shook her head. “Staring out the window again. Go wake him up. Hey! What’s with the outfit?”

  Doan was wearing a man’s shirt and pants. He shrugged. “Just too wrapped up in some things to get dressed,” he lied.

  “You in pants. That’ll wake him up.”

  Doan entered Art’s office, and Art was indeed staring out the window at the depressing area around the newspaper building.

  “South of Market,” Art said, not turning around to identify his visitor. “Calcutta by the bay. Disgusting. Ball parks get bundles and Glide gets nothing.”

  “And do you remember, just a few years ago, everyone said it would all be gone, Yuppiefied, sanitized. And it’s not! There are little islands of delicious icy sterility, little ziggurat kingdoms of concrete condos, but all the filth all around is still there! It’s so reassuring.”

  Art chuckled and turned around. “Hello, Doan. I wouldn’t have lectured if I’d known it was your frivolous self. ... Oh my God those are ...”

  “Men’s clothes. Don’t give me a hard time; I don’t have the energy to deal with it this morning.”

  “Oh, yeah? What’s going on?”

  Doan poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down.

  “Awful things, with which I need your help.”

  “Go on.”

  “A friend of mine’s been arrested as the SoMa Killer.”

  Art perked up. “What? Is he guilty?”

  “Art!” Doan protested.

  Art threw his hands up. “Sorry. Still, you’ve always said the SoMa Killer was doing us all a good deed. No offense, but it wouldn’t surprise me if you told me he was guilty and you put him up to it.”

  “Would you turn me in if I did?”

  “Are you kidding? I’m getting more mileage out of this thing in my column than I’ve gotten out of anything since Feinstein’s hair. It’s a slow news week, kid, get your friend sprung so he can go kill again.”

  “Well, returning to reality, he’s innocent. His name’s Stan Parks, he’s an artist ...”

  “ ...And he’s being framed?” Art asked with a smile, completely unable to resist a play on words.

  “If you do that again, I shall have to kill you,” Doan warned him. “But yes, he’s been set up. See, the latest one to die was Mortimer Arbuthnott, would you believe they called him a traditionalist because he was still working with I beams? But he stole one of Stan’s ideas and made a mint off it.” Doan told him about the painting, and Art laughed.

  “Is this for real?” he asked.

  “Yes. It’s rather sad to have to say it, but yes.”

  “You want that in the column, is that it? I don’t think that’s going to help get your friend off. It’ll sure get him some sympathy, but ...”

  “No ... that’s not exactly what I came for.”

  “Okay, Doan. You know I owe you a few. Shoot.”

  Doan eyed him levelly. “You’re going to help me find the SoMa Killer.”

  Art laughed. “Come on, Doan. What the hell am I supposed to do?”

  “You’re a journalist. Dig for facts. Think, Art. Who wants artists dead? Jealous artists, extremist critics, those I can handle. But what about gallery owners and collectors? I know everyone worth knowing, certainly, but there are a staggering number of people in this city who wouldn’t give me the time of day. jealous of my wardrobe, no doubt. That’s where you come in. You can see who sank a lot of money into stuff by the dead men, who might benefit from their sudden death.”

  Art shook his head. “Why don’t you tell this to the cops?”

  Doan laughed. “Art, I got all these ideas from a cop. Luke Faraglione is handling the investigation. ...”

  “Oh, the one who nabbed the Belli dognapper?”

  “Right. So I just sat there and listened to him tell me what kind of leads he was going to check out. However, he is a policeman, and they do make people nervous. You, my love, are a columnist and a social fixture, and are quite well acquainted with most of those people. You can ask them questions in a manner that won’t put them on guard, at least not right away.”

  Art sighed. “All right, Doan. I’ll see what I can find out for your investigation.”

  “Our investigation.”

  “Right, right.”

  Doan smiled to himself, knowing Art was hooked.

  Binky was in a bad mood. It was as if the fates had decided that her tropical jaunt had been too much fun; she’d exceeded her happiness quota for at least a year, judging from the way things were going now. No job meant no paycheck, which she could live without. That only meant no luxuries for a while. No trust check, however, was a different matter. That meant no necessities: no coffee beans, no weekend pastry, no champagne, no new outfits. So rather than bite the bullet for a month, she had committed what her upbringing had instilled in her was the cardinal sin - she had dipped into capital.

  Now she had to go to an art gallery. This was not something she was looking forward to, either, for another childhood lesson had been “if it’s in a museum, it’s art. If we own it, it’s art. If it’s for sale in a store, it’s trash.” To the Van de Kamps, even the most prestigious art galleries were still only stores. This was an attitude that proved useful to her in resisting certain peer pressure at college, where every clench-jawed deb was majoring in art history and encouraging her to do the same. They did this not out of any interest in art, but because it would be important in their future careers as Main Line matrons to make people think they were interested in art. Not to mention that there was great social cachet in having an artist at your dinner party, and if you couldn’t speak knowledgeably about art, how could you expect to dominate conversation? And how could you be a social lion without at least one museum wing named after yourself?

  The Van de Kamps were old money, older money than even Eleanor Ambermere’s, and that venerable family looked with slight disdain on the philanthropic ways of the social climbers. Nouveau riche give to museums named after them; old mon
ey gives to museums named after their grandfathers.

  So Binky had not been expected to absorb too much on the subject, much to her relief. She was so busy not doing all the things she was expected to do that one more thing to not do might well have been the end of her.

  But she had been the one chosen to go to the gallery by Doan, who had assumed a military bearing as of late (along with a tendency toward khaki skirts and sailor dresses) to go with his new position as general of the resentful forces of Binky, Luke, and Art Mill.

  “Why me?” she had wailed in protest.

  “Because,” Doan had explained. “You’re the only one who can pull it off. KC looks like he has beefcake posters on all his walls, maybe a Remington print in the living room to show his tricks how butch he is, and a Rockwell in the bedroom from his mother. I look like I’m into famous dead female drug addicts, which I most certainly am not, but that’s another story. But you, my dear, ooze class and money. People see that jaw shaped like an old style cash register, and they think that when it opens it’s going to spit money everywhere. And that accent you’ve worked so hard to be rid of? Punch it up a little, and people are your slaves. They despise you, but they’re your slaves.”

  So once more her past had caught up with her, and she found herself in Le Gallerie (which, despite appearances, was not owned by the same people who owned Le Club - phony French names were again the rage). On prominent display were several paintings by a man famous not for these paintings, but for the fact that he did not paint them; rather, he hired people to paint them for him. Each one was done in the same style, necessarily very simple as to be duplicated by anyone: Casper the Friendly Ghost figures wandering in and out of vague settings, with the whole painting looking more like the sort of thing airbrushed onto the side of a van than anything else.

  “It’s very gripping, isn’t it?” the woman who had appeared at her side asked her.

  “It gives me a chill,” she said, unable to resist one comment before slipping into character.

  “Notice the use of shading, the absence of vibrant color ...” The saleslady went on in this vein while Binky nodded dutifully in agreement.

  “Yes, yes,” she said. “Due to the artist’s belief that the world is a colorless place.”

  “Yes!” agreed the saleslady heartily, smiling at Binky the way a professor will smile at a student who has spouted the correct answer.

  “I understand,” Binky began, “that this gallery represents the late Mr. Arbuthnott.”

  The saleslady assumed the proper look of mourning. “A terrible tragedy. A shock to us all. So young and talented.”

  “Indeed. And did he, by chance, make any last deliveries to the gallery for sale before he...met his unfortunate end?”

  “Oh, yes,” she nodded. “Mr. Arbuthnott was most prolific. We received two sculptures and four paintings the week before he died. What is your favorite of his?

  Binky panicked. A name, a name, she was supposed to know the name of at least one of his works. Grasping onto the most repulsive topic she could think of, she stabbed in the dark. “Sores.”

  The saleslady lit up. “ ‘Funeral of Sores’?”

  “Yes, that’s the one.” Good Lord, she thought.

  “Do you have that one?”

  “Oh, no. As a matter of fact, our entire catalog of Mr. Arbuthnott’s works were bought out last week.”

  Binky’s interest rose. “Really?”

  “Yes, and all by the same customer. Right before...the tragedy.”

  “Ah. And who would that be?”

  The saleslady frowned. “I’m sorry. Client information is privileged.”

  “Oh, yes, of course. So sorry. Does...does that happen often, that someone’s whole catalog is purchased all at once?”

  “Oh, almost never. At least, not while they’re alive.”

  Binky smiled sweetly yet demandingly. “Could you at least tell me, was it a private collector or a museum? If it’s a museum, I’d love to view his last works.”

  “No, I’m sorry. It was a private buyer. Could I interest you in one of our promising new artists...”

  She took Binky by the arm and began leading her toward the back of the gallery.

  “Oh, no, so sorry, thank you ever so much, I really must be going now. You’ve been a great help. Thank you.”

  Once outside, she swore Doan would pay for the rest of his natural born days for what she’d just been through, and then she made a beeline for the liquor store.

  As it had been easier to lie to Binky about his appointment with Eleanor than to explain the extensively complicated truth, so it was easier for Doan to tell Art he was dressed as a man because he just felt like it than to give the real reason. But, truth be told, Doan never really felt like wearing men’s clothes. The fact of the matter was that Doan was going to the Pacific Union Club, none too affectionately known as the PU by many residents, Art Mill included. Mill had been blackballed more than once.

  The PU was a fairly unprepossessing - hell, downright ugly - building on Nob Hill, an old San Francisco mansion converted into a gentlemen’s club. The house and surrounding lawn (on which nobody had ever been seen doing anything but cutting it) took up nearly a square block in the heart of the luxury hotel district. It was a signal banner of the power and infinite wealth of its members that they held onto this property as if to say that the money to be made from selling a square block of prime real estate wouldn’t really impact their financial worth enough to warrant the bother of relocating their club. And that, my friends, is rich.

  San Francisco is a city full of rich people. Rich, rich, rich. There are more rich people per capita in this town than any other in the nation. (We are also proud to be the pedestrian death capital of America!) And not a one of them will ever admit it. “I’m not rich!” a fabulously wealthy woman Doan once worked for used to cry, in between calls to her personal banker, her housekeeper, and her fellow board members of her children’s’ private school. The PU flew in the face of all that, in typical alpha male fashion. “We are so damn rich,” the PU trumpeted, “we could kill you and get away with it three times over.”

  Doan was there to meet a member - nay, the member’s member, Martin Hart, celebrity lawyer extraordinaire, who was familiar to millions for his talent for popping up on TV whenever a notorious murder trial took place. Hart was pure San Francisco in the way that San Francisco likes to think of itself: colorful, always in the papers, more than a bit of a rogue, a little shady in his financial dealings...the sort of person who, in other cities, is driven out of town on a rail by zealous reformers, but who, in San Francisco, gets elected mayor.

  Doan had not rescued Mr. Hart, Esq. from a speeding wheelchair, but had met him in more pedestrian circumstances. To make a long story short, especially since nobody except Hart himself understands how it works, Doan had yet another part-time job appearing as “co-respondent” in divorce cases in states without no-fault divorce, in place of some actual co-respondent who wished to remain anonymous. When Hart’s clients found out that their spouses were putting private eyes on them to build up a good divorce settlement, they hired Hart to hire Doan to make dramatic entrances into hotels with said clients, giving the spouses the ammunition they needed to get the divorce, which the clients secretly wanted, often because they were about to strike it rich and didn’t want their imminent fortunes to become community property. Suffice it to say it was all very complicated, and perhaps it would be best to say that Doan worked part time for Martin Hart and leave it at that.

  Needless to explain, it was Stan Parks’ plight that brought Doan to the PU on a rainy day. Doan was ushered into a small private room with two fat, lazy leather armchairs, one of which was already occupied. “So, Doan,” Martin Hart asked silkily, “what criminal activity of yours brings you to see me?”

  Doan’s eyes widened and he put a hand to his chest. “Oh, it’s not for me. You know me, Martin - I’d never do anything illegal. That I could get caught doing.”

>   Hart laughed. He was one of those people Doan liked in spite of himself. He really should hate Hart, defender of murderers, drug kingpins, and anybody else who would guarantee him a headline. But Doan liked Hart for his blatant disregard of the rules, and he’d learned long ago that sometimes it takes a rule-breaker to get things done - like, for instance, catch another rule-breaker.

  “It’s about the SoMa Killer,” Doan began, but Hart held up a hand.

  “Say no more. You wish me to defend Stan Parks on murder charges. I’ll do it.”

  “Of course you will, darling; la publicitee will be huge. That’s not what I was going to ask you.”

  Hart’s studiedly bushy white eyebrows lifted. “Oh? Now I’m interested.”

  “Stan is innocent. I need your help to prove it.”

  “That’s what I do.”

  “No, I mean now. Look, Stan didn’t do it. No, seriously! Martin, you know me, you know my instincts about people.”

  “Hmm. Yes, I do. Go on.”

  “I need your devious mind to help me. Don’t arch those eyebrows at me! You are devious and you know it. Help me think who might have a motivation to kill these artists. The police don’t care - well, one of them does, but that’s another story - because they’ve got someone under arrest. The papers don’t care; ‘jealous Artist Kills Six’ is a great headline. But I want your help to think of who else might have done this.”

  “Is there a personal connection here?” Hart asked tactfully.

  “He’s my boyfriend,” Doan said. “I know, I sound like Cloris Leachman in Young Frankenstein. Nobody in authority seems to care about catching the real killer and exonerating Stan, so...I’m marshaling my resources.”

  “Well, Doan, if I know you and your resources, this shouldn’t take long. All right.” Hart put the tips of his fingers together and made a pyramid under his chin, a device that worked like a charm in court, and which he had thus incorporated into real life, making it all the more natural-looking in court. “We’re talking about the art world. I suppose I know about as much about that as anybody outside it. You’ve got artists, dealers, critics, collectors ... any other types?”