Matters of Doubt

by Warren C Easley

  “While you were with him, did he ever mention a newspaper story Nicole Baxter was working on when she disappeared, an important story?”

  She shook her head. “We never talked about that woman. The only thing I knew about her was that she was some kind of reporter for The Oregonian.”

  “Did Conyers love her?”

  She smiled and looked down at her drink again. “She was a cute little thing, no doubt about it. But the only thing Mitch ever really loved was money.”

  “How about somebody nicknamed X-Man? Does that mean anything to you?”

  She wrinkled her brow and smiled. “You’re pulling my leg, right?”

  I didn’t answer.

  She took a pull on her drink and shook her head again. “Isn’t that some damn superhero movie? Last time I checked, Portland’s fresh out of superheroes.”

  When I asked about Larry Vincent, the conservative talk show host, she told me she knew of no connection between him and Conyers, and that she didn’t know him personally. However, she did admit to being a loyal listener of his show. At that point, she said, “I admire the man. He stands for the second amendment, and he’s tough on crime.”

  Fortunately, I was between mouthfuls of beer, or I might have sprayed the table. The madam of a high end prostitution ring a law and order type? You’ve got to be kidding me.

  I saved my best shot for last. “I understand Hugo Weiman’s a good customer of yours. Did you know he’s the owner of the property where Nicole Baxter’s remains were found?”

  Her eyes widened, then flared anger again as she forced her collagen-laden lips into a tight line. “My customers are none of your business, Mr. Claxton,” she said before glancing over at the bar, where Semyon had taken a seat without my noticing.

  “Did Conyers and Weiman know each other?”

  She wagged a finger at Semyon, and a moment later he was standing next to my chair. She said, “Mitch Conyers was a damn good man. He’s not even cold in the grave, and you come around trying to cook up some excuse for the kid who killed him. Well, I can tell you, people in this town won’t appreciate that. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll go back to that hick town in the valley. You’re in over your head, Claxton.” With that, she turned to Semyon. “Take him back to Couch Street.”

  I stood up. “Thanks for the chat, Ms. Armandy, and thanks for the offer of a ride, but I’ll manage on my own.” Then I fished a ten out of my wallet and tossed it on the table. “That’s for the beer.”

  Cabs don’t roam around Portland looking for fares; you have to call them. I didn’t feel like doing that, so I decided to walk the six or eight blocks back to Caffeine Central, despite the light mist I encountered out on the street. By the time I crossed Burnside a stiff breeze had kicked up, and rain was dripping from the chins of the twin lions guarding the ornate gate leading to Chinatown. But I didn’t feel so cold and damp after passing people bedded down for the night in doorways and alcoves.

  I’d decided my chat with Jessica Armandy hadn’t been a total bust. After all, I was pretty sure she knew more than she was telling me, particularly about how Hugo Weiman played into this, and her reference to Nicole Baxter as a “cute little thing” was interesting. Did I detect a note of jealousy? Finally, her threats didn’t strike me as idle. I made a mental note to watch my back.

  I got up early the next morning and walked with Archie over to Whole Foods in the Pearl and stocked up on food. Around nine I clicked on KPOC.com and began streaming their radio broadcast while I worked on a legal brief and made some phone calls. I drifted in and out of listening, catching the beginning of the Larry Vincent show. A resonant voice clicked through an introduction that included phrases like “a voice of sanity and reason in the maelstrom of our political discourse,” and “a gun toting, God fearing, pro-life warrior.”

  Ten minutes into the program, which featured frenetic commercials for gold coins and mortgage refinancing made easy, Vincent said, “We’re shocked and sickened at the murder of Mitchell Conyers, a leading business figure in Portland.” I snapped to attention. “You probably saw this in the paper, folks. Mitchell Conyers was stabbed to death in his own backyard. A young homeless punk was found at the scene with blood all over him. He has a snake tattooed on his neck. Real wholesome type. He claims he got there after Conyers was killed. Sure he did. We’ve talked many times on this program about the dangers these homeless people present to the community. They usually kill each other over drugs or booze, but this time it was an upstanding Portland citizen who got killed. Here’s the thing, folks—it’s been four days, and that homeless dirt bag is still on the streets. My question for the Portland police is, ‘What’s taking so long to lock up snake boy?’ Believe me, folks, we’re gonna follow this story until justice is done.”

  That unleashed a fusillade of angry phone calls lasting the next forty minutes—“hobo teens” were a criminal threat, panhandling was chasing tourists and shoppers out of downtown, tougher laws or outright eviction from the city were needed. At one point a caller said, “Yeah, Larry, show me a homeless criminal who’s free on the street, and I’ll show you some bleeding heart liberal with a law degree who’s working pro bono to keep him out of jail. Those are the people that ought to be run out of town.”

  Shaking my head, I clicked off the web site. Archie looked up at me expectantly. “Well, at least I’m not working pro bono,” I said to him. And that reminded me—I needed to talk to Picasso about my fee.

  I called KPOC to see if I could get Larry Vincent to meet with me. The receptionist told me he handled his own appointments, and since he was still on the air, gave me his voice mail. I left a message. I figured the chance of him calling back was low, so I looked up the address and drove over to the studio, a small building on Macadam, south of St. John’s Landing. I figured he’d be looking for lunch when he finished, so I parked in the lot and waited. At one end of the Staff Only section I noticed a new, cherry red BMW M3 with a cloth top and a vanity plate that read IMRIGHT. I figured that was Vincent’s car.

  At twelve eighteen, a man came out of the station and headed for the BMW. He was of medium height with a high forehead and thinning, brownish hair. Nearly pear-shaped, his torso widened below narrow shoulders and a thin chest. I recognized him from the picture on the KPOC website. “Mr. Vincent,” I said as I approached, “can I have a word with you about Nicole Baxter?”

  He turned and gave me a pained look. “Who?”

  “Nicole Baxter. She’s the woman whose body was found recently on the Deschutes River. She’d been missing eight years. ”

  “What about her?”

  “My name’s Cal Claxton.” I handed him a card. “I’m an attorney looking into the case for her son, Daniel Baxter.”

  His eyes narrowed as he looked me over more carefully. “You mean you represent that kid who killed Mitchell Conyers?”

  “Last time I checked Danny Baxter hasn’t been accused of anything.”

  He pulled a ring of keys from his pocket and spun around. “Get lost, asshole.”

  “I’d like to know why you had an appointment scheduled with Nicole Baxter for the week after she disappeared,” I shot back.

  “I don’t remember that,” he answered with his back to me.

  “Yes you do. You handle your own appointments. There’s no way you wouldn’t have made the connection, considering what happened to her. We can either discuss this now or later at your deposition.” Using the d-word is often a good bluff. I had no grounds for deposing anyone about Baxter’s disappearance, but I was hoping Vincent didn’t know that.

  The driver’s side door lock released with a solid click, but instead of getting in, Vincent turned to face me. His narrow-set eyes were sepia colored, evasive. He had a thick, crooked nose and a chin that fell away too abruptly below thin, bloodless lips.

  “She called one day and made an appointment. Said she wanted
to interview me for a story she was doing. She didn’t show, and then I realized she was the missing woman I’d heard about. That’s it. That’s all I know.”

  I took him through the rest of my questions and got nowhere. So much for shaking anything loose, I said to myself as he drove off in his shiny new M3. However, there was one thing that caught my attention. By the time we stopped talking, a couple of beads of sweat had formed on his brow, and it was a cool Oregon morning.

  I went back to Caffeine Central and spent the afternoon on the phone with clients who thought they were going to meet with me in Dundee. Needless to say, they weren’t particularly pleased to be talking to me on the phone rather than in person. By the time I’d finished up and fixed something to eat it was getting dark, but both Archie and I needed some exercise. I leashed him up and we headed for the river. From the Burnside, we jogged past the Hawthorne Bridge, then turned around and came back. The night was clear with a soft wind, and the city lights shimmered on the dark mirror of the river.

  I let us back into the building through the front door. The moment I closed it behind me I knew something was wrong without knowing why. Archie halted beside me and we stood silently in the dark, listening. There wasn’t a sound. Then it hit me—I was feeling a cool breeze wafting in from the rear of the building, which could only mean the back door, the one I’d left bolted, was open.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Arch and I moved cautiously through the swinging doors and stopped dead when we saw what had happened. The back door was open alright, and the battered door knob hung from a single screw. The dead bolt was on the ground among splinters and scraps of wood that lay in a spray pattern in front of the door. Arch whined nervously and pulled at his leash in the direction of the stairs leading up to the apartment on our left. I couldn’t tell whether he thought someone was up there or whether he just locked onto the scent they’d left. In any case, I hustled us out of the building and called 911 and Nando Mendoza, in that order.

  No one was in the apartment, and the cops left after dusting for prints and completing an incident report. They told me break-ins like mine were a common occurrence, perpetrated by druggies looking for cash and electronics to sell. Nando got there shortly thereafter bearing a tool box and an assortment of lumber. As we worked to temporarily secure the door, he said, “So, they cleaned you out, huh?”

  I shook my head in disgust. The enormity of what had happened was settling in. “Shit, not just my computer, which wasn’t backed up by the way. They got Picasso’s briefcase. It was filled with important stuff about his mom’s disappearance. And my briefcase, too, with a bunch of client files. I should have been more careful, but with that deadbolt on the back door, I just wasn’t worried about a break-in. How do you think the bastard did it?”

  Nando scratched his head and scrunched his bushy eyebrows together. “Someone used a very heavy lead pipe or steel bar. One sharp thrust and bang, the deadbolt is ripped from the wall. Very violent, but very effective. This was not the work of a common burglar or someone seeking money for drugs. They look for easier prey. I think whoever broke in had decided how to take that deadbolt out ahead of time. Besides, most people would think this is a vacant building, hardly a target for burglary.”

  I nodded in agreement. “I think someone wanted my computer and anything else that would tell them why I’m here in Portland and what I’m up to.”

  “Will they learn much from what they took?”

  I shrugged. “There was a summary of a discussion I had with Picasso, an email I sent him, as well as a bunch of emails and files from Nicole Baxter’s computer, her appointment book and some notes I made. Hell, I hadn’t even finished reading it all. But, who knows? At the very least, whoever stole the stuff knows my initial take on the information.”

  When we’d finished the temporary fix of the door, Nando said, “I’ll send someone over tomorrow to replace it and put on a heavier lock. You’re welcome to stay at my place tonight, if you wish.”

  “No. I’ll stay here.”

  My friend looked at me and smiled. “I thought you would say that.” He reached behind his back and pulled a revolver from his belt. “This is a Glock 19, nine millimeter. It will stop a man, even one with a large pipe.” I didn’t reach for it, so he extended the gun to me, handle first. “Don’t be foolish. Take it. These people you are playing with are dangerous.”

  After Nando left, I set about cleaning up the mess upstairs. I had to chuckle about my reluctance to accept the Glock, a testament to the power of Picasso’s anti-gun mural. It’s a handgun, I told myself, not a damn assault rifle. I straightened my clothes up, placed the books I’d brought back on the nightstand, and put the mattress back on the bed and the cushions back on the couch. Tomorrow I would have to go buy a new laptop, a depressing thought. Even more depressing, I would have to call at least four of my clients and inform them confidential information contained in their files had been stolen and would have to be replaced. I wondered how many of them would fire me after hearing the news. And worst of all, I’d have to tell Picasso I’d lost the information he’d entrusted to me.

  When I finished, I put the Glock on the nightstand and fell back on the bed without undressing. It was clear that the break-in was both fishing expedition and warning. I thought about the hostile reactions from Jessica Armandy and Larry Vincent to my questions, the veiled warnings from Pete Stout and detectives Scott and Jones. Hell, even my friend Nando had questioned my involvement in this case. The message seemed to be—walk away, this homeless kid doesn’t really count. But I wasn’t about to walk away. I don’t know which act I loathed more, the murder of a young mother or the attempt to frame a young man for a murder.

  This was war. The only question was—who the hell was the enemy?

  I woke up the next morning with my clothes still on. After a shower, a shave, and a bowl of granola, I made phone calls to the clients whose files had been stolen. I was handling a divorce for the first client I reached. She was irate and downright rude when she heard the news. The second client was facing a DUI and took the news gracefully. I left messages for the other two. I slipped across the street and bought a copy of The Oregonian. There was a follow-up article with photos on the Conyers’ murder on page two, which gave more of the victim’s background and stated that his restaurant, the Happy Angus, would continue to operate under the management of Conyers’ stepbrother, a man named Seth Foster.

  I was surprised to read that Conyers owned similar establishments in Seattle and San Francisco. That got me wondering what Conyers’ will looked like, if he had one. The article also mentioned that a memorial service would be held that day at eleven at the Old Church, a landmark in the center of the city. I turned to the editorial page and read the letters to the editor, which bristled with dire warnings about the homeless menace. Portland had a reputation as a progressive haven, but Larry Vincent’s message seemed to hit a nerve. I wondered if part of the anger was simply because these kids were there, on the street, reminding the rest of us of an unpleasant truth—that we all owned a piece of the blame. I know I felt that way most of the time.

  I leashed up Arch and headed over to the clinic to touch bases with Picasso. It was half past eight, and the clinic was closed, but his bike was leaning against the corner of the building. I walked around to the side of the building and stopped dead. Picasso was standing with his hands on his hips looking at his mural. The words Murderer and Go Back To Dignity Village Snake Boy, accompanied by a liberal sprinkling of swastikas and obscenities, had been spray painted across his work.

  “No!” I exploded. “Who the hell did this?” Archie started barking.

  Picasso turned to face us, his demeanor catching me completely off guard. He looked calm—a lot calmer than me and my dog—and almost amused by what had happened. He ran a hand through his spiky hair and shrugged. “I don’t know who did it. There’re plenty of assholes out there with spray cans, and th
is guy’s no Jerry Moses, that’s for sure, although I kind of like the name Snake Boy.

  “Jerry Moses? Who the hell’s Jerry Moses?”

  Picasso smiled, fueling my exasperation. “He’s a Haitian graffiti artist, works with a spray can in each hand. The guy’s awesome.”

  I rolled my eyes and turned my hands palms up. “Aren’t you upset about this?”

  “Sure I’m upset. Shit, I was about ready to start painting. This is going to slow me down.”

  I exhaled and Archie stopped barking. “You mean you can fix it?”

  “Yeah, I can fix it. I’ll have to paint over this shit, then re-sketch what’s lost. That’ll go pretty fast, I think.”

  “Aren’t you worried this will happen again?”

  “A little bit. I’ll have to think about how to protect it until I have a finished product. After that, the work is on its own. See, the thing is, if your work’s good, really good, it will last, people will respect it. If not, well…”

  “That’s a high standard to hold yourself to. Like you say, there are a lot of assholes out there.”

  “Yeah, I guess so. But it’s reality. It’s not like art hanging in a gallery somewhere. A street artist has to accept the fact that his work won’t last forever. That’s part of the beauty of it.”

  I nodded. “You’re right, I guess. There really aren’t any guarantees.”

  “Nope. No guarantees.”

  “But what about all the work you put into it?”

  He smiled and scratched the spot where his eyebrow ring had been. “It’s the journey, man, that’s what’s important. Not the ego trip. When I finish a mural, I’m done with it. I try to say something true and then I let it go. It becomes part of the city.”

  “How are you going to protect it when you’re not working on it?”

  “I don’t know yet, but I have a couple of ideas.” With that, he turned on his heels and sauntered off toward the back of the building to get his supplies. When he returned, I handed him a green tea I’d gotten across the street. While sipping my double cap, I began filling him in on what had happened the night before.