I figured out quickly enough what she meant: Was I in disguise. “Not exactly.”
“Well, neither did he.”
“Okay, maybe he didn't. But if he is Ray Zielinski, then we've done our job. The investigation is over.”
I heard her sigh. “Erica, it is in the nature of our work that the initial objective is rarely the final objective.”
“You're the boss. Follow the fat man. Check.”
Adrian left first. I slid down in my seat as he drove past. About five minutes later, the other two emerged and walked to a big maroon pickup truck and climbed in. Holloway was at the wheel.
They headed east toward the San Diego Freeway, turning south on Sawtelle to get to the entrance. They got off at Artesia Boulevard in Torrance and drove east again to where it transformed into the Gardena Freeway before exiting on Lakewood Boulevard. Eventually they pulled in front of a small house in Lakewood, got out of the truck, and went inside.
This time I did use the Nikon, with a telephoto lens big enough to swat baseballs with that I found in the case, and I got some great pics, including the license plate on the truck. I gave them ten minutes to get settled and then drove by to get the number on the house. When I called the office to report my progress, Miss Enola told me to come home. And then she said something else.
“Why don't you call and invite Adrian to dinner tonight, dear? I'm preparing a lovely coconut mango yuba knot curry.”
* * * *
“That was delicious, Miss Enola,” Adrian said. “I feel like a fatted calf.”
There were five of us at the table: Adrian Tabi, Veronica Cross, Fredericks, Miss Enola, and me. Miss Enola was at the head and Adrian sat to her right, next to me. Nicki was on her left and Fredericks directly across from me.
“I am so glad,” Miss Enola replied. “Thank you.Your compliment is particularly apropos. It is customary, after all, to provide a condemned man with an excellent repast before turning him over to the hangman.”
At first we thought she was making some kind of joke. Miss Enola had been gracious all through dinner, witty even, so everybody's first reaction was puzzled smiles at the blatantly poor taste of the gag. After looking at Miss Enola's eyes, though, our smiles slowly faded.
“Excuse me?” Adrian asked, trying to retain his composure.
“I have a confession to make,” Miss Enola said. “I asked Erica to invite you tonight so we could get to the bottom of things. Fredericks, will you kindly serve coffee?”
“Yes, Miss Enola.” Fredericks got up from her chair and went into the kitchen.
“I have no idea what you mean,” Adrian said.
“Of course you do,” Miss Enola said. “I'm talking about your murder of Oliver Long and the crew of the Chengfeng."
Adrian started to stand. “If you have evidence of any murder, you should report it to the police.”
“Sit down, Mr. Tabi.” It had been “Adrian” all through dinner. “You are not playing this at all wisely. The smart thing to do, the thing to do if you wished to deflect suspicion from yourself, would be to stay and listen. Instead, you react with the flight response.”
He slowly sat down again. “You have made an outrageous accusation against me. I don't put up with that kind of insult. If you were a man, I would punch your lights out.”
“Better. It's only fair that you be given the chance to defend yourself.”
“Enola, what's going on?” Nicki asked, her eyes wide.
“I've found Ray Zielinski, Veronica, or rather Erica has.” Adrian shot me a quick hostile look, but otherwise didn't react.
“Oh, my God,” Nicki said. “He's dead.”
“No, Veronica, he is quite alive. Unfortunately, he was one of Mr. Tabi's confederates in the commission of the crime.”
“Never heard of him,” Adrian said.
“Don't be absurd. Mr. Tabi, I give you leave to object to any of my conclusions, but please do not think that you can convince me of anything by bluster or equivocation. Let me tell you what I know, and how I know it, and then you can say whatever you like to refute it.”
“This is all crap. Oh, all right, go ahead.”
“This matter all began with Oliver Long's illegal amassment of an immense personal fortune. He was under investigation by the SEC for insider trading. We may accept his guilt as fact because it was to escape arrest that he fled from the country in the superyacht. In this, all parties are in agreement. But we must ask ourselves why he chose such an unorthodox avenue of escape. Wouldn't it have been simpler and faster to get a flight out of the country?”
“Not if he were on a watch list,” I said.
“Exactly, Erica. The Chengfeng is under Dutch registry. The Netherlands take the strictest view of any nation on earth concerning the territorial sovereignty of vessels under their flag. Unfettered by the security constraints at an airport, Chengfeng's departure from the United States was simply a matter of weighing anchor and leaving. And she was capable of traveling several thousand miles before needing to refuel. What could be better?
“But where would Long go? His first priority would be a safe haven. His second would be the money. At first blush, one would suspect somewhere in the Caribbean or Atlantic—the Caymans or the Bahamas. That would mean going through the Panama Canal, though, where he could be stopped. Besides, Oliver Long was a man of the Pacific Rim, being Chinese.”
“Chinese? Not American?” I asked.
“He had an American education, Erica, but he himself was from Hong Kong. The surname Long is a common Chinese one, meaning “dragon,’ and he had even given the yacht a traditional Chinese name.”
I mentally kicked myself. I had been so busy looking for the boat that I forgot to take a good look at the man.
“Offshore banking is a burgeoning industry in the Pacific,” Miss Enola continued. “Hong Kong has a thriving international banking trade, as does nearby Macao. Several Pacific Island nations have established offshore banking facilities. So on balance, a better option was to head west. This conjecture is supported by the discovery that Chengfeng crossed the San Pedro Channel on her departure instead of entering its southbound lane, as she would have done had she been headed for the canal. The only way her actual course made sense is if she were transiting the open ocean.”
“But even the Chengfeng couldn't hope to cross the whole Pacific Ocean on a single tank,” I said.
“Of course not. Long must refuel somewhere, but this was simple because the only place within reach is Hawaii.”
“But wouldn't he be taking a big risk by refueling in the U.S.?” Nicki asked “He could be arrested.”
“A small risk, rather. If he remained on board and if the yacht refueled at anchor from a barge instead of pierside, most people would never know he'd been there. So I subcontracted an agency in Honolulu to check for any superyachts contracted to be refueled by barge in any Hawaiian ports within the time that Chengfeng might be expected to arrive. As it turned out, such an engagement was made for the port of Hilo on the Big Island. After learning that, the next thing I needed to know was if the yacht would make the rendezvous. I had a strong feeling that it would not.”
“Why not?” I asked.
“You provided the necessary data yourself, Erica. You found out that the LM-200 fire suppression tanks had been replenished.” She pointed to the ceiling at one of the sprinkler heads. “Do you see those nozzles? You would be correct in assuming that they are there to combat a fire should one erupt, but you would be wholly incorrect to assume that they spray water. In fact, they are part of an LM-200 fire suppression system. LM-200 is a suppression agent stored as a liquid but discharged as a gas, designed to immediately extinguish flames without causing water damage. It is the preferred agent for many applications, such as vaults containing precious art, and for ships’ engine compartments.
“The Chengfeng's LM-200 tanks were replenished, most likely replaced. Why?”
“The stuff must have been past its sell-by date,” Adrian sai
d, smirking.
“Nonsense. It is entirely stable and does not require replacement at any interval unless it is used. The only reason for changing the tanks would be to prevent the system from putting out a fire. But that is a rather baroque method for disabling the suppression system, since it could have been done by any number of less detectable means, and makes little sense—unless whatever substance replacing the agent was itself designed to actually exacerbate the problem.”
She looked up at the sprinkler heads again. “I told you that LM-200 was discharged as a gas. There are other agents that are discharged as a fine spray, like gasoline through a fuel injector in an internal combustion engine. What if the LM-200 were replaced by something as volatile as gasoline?”
“Uh-oh. It would turn the whole engine room into one big bomb,” I said. “It would still need something to spark it, though.”
“Precisely. Something like a cigarette, my dear,” Miss Enola said. “The tanks were replaced by Herbert Holloway, the engineer, who could be safely numbered among the conspirators. He would have a plan, something simple. What if he knew his assistant would provide the spark himself?”
“So you asked me to find out if the assistant engineer was a smoker.”
“Correct.”
“That's crazy,” Adrian said. “You decide the ship exploded because you guessed somebody liked to smoke? How could you know he'd light up? How would you get the system to discharge even if he did? It only goes off if there's an actual fire.”
“There are any number of means of forcing it to discharge, Mr. Tabi. Such systems have manual releases—one of them could have been tampered with. I'm sure you came up with an elegant solution. An infrared sensor designed to trip the system at the flick of a lighter would be very simple to install.”
“Then why didn't the Chengfeng blow up in Santa Monica Bay, the first time the guy lit up?”
“Because the sensor wasn't activated. It would be configured to some other device, perhaps a timer, to make sure that the explosion occurred far away from likely observation. Personally, I like the idea of it being activated by GPS when Chengfeng would be safely in the middle of the ocean.”
“More unsupported guesswork.”
“Nevertheless, let us accept it as an hypothesis. If true, then Holloway would have needed help setting it up. Hence my reference to him as a conspirator, since he couldn't have accomplished it on his own. I would guess, for example, that the nozzles required replacing to effectively distribute the aerated gasoline or whatever replaced the LM-200. A time-consuming task. Obviously, he couldn't enlist Clint Roland, the assistant engineer, who was intended to be a victim. So to whom else might he turn? Again, Erica provided the answer.”
“I did?”
“Do you remember what Marshall said about Ray Zielinski? “Good guy, ex-Navy snipe like me.’ Snipe, Erica, is Navy slang for engineer. Who else better to assist Holloway in his crime?
“This also explained a discrepancy regarding Zielinski's disappearance. Melita told Victoria that her husband had been missing for five days, but Marshall informed Erica that the yacht had been gone for only three. So either his disappearance wasn't related to the yacht at all, or it was more complex than his simply having been on board when she got underway. If he was Holloway's helper, the last thing he would want was to be aboard when it went to sea, and that meant he would have to be unreachable before the yacht got underway.
“I suspect what he wanted, aside from money, was to get out of his marriage. His wife is a Filipina, and traditional Filipinos have strong family ties. When a man marries into such a family, he is not taking his bride away from her parents. In effect, he is marrying not only her, but also her parents, and her brothers and sisters, and even her cousins—he is expected to provide what he can to the entire clan.”
“So he deserted her. That son of a bitch,” Nicki said.
“Where's your evidence?” Adrian asked.
“Thank you, Mr. Tabi, we are coming to that. The test of an hypothesis is made by observing if its predicted results occur. If the boat were to blow up, the hypothesis would be validated.”
“But nobody would know about it if it happened in the middle of the ocean, because there wouldn't be anybody around to see it. The fact that the yacht never made it to Hawaii doesn't prove anything.”
“Nobody would see it. But that doesn't mean that somebody wouldn't hear it.”
“That makes even less sense.”
“Only because I presume you are unfamiliar with the Integrated Undersea Surveillance System, the U.S. Navy's worldwide network for tracking hostile submarines. Its primary component is acoustic. If there is an explosion at sea, especially anywhere close enough to our coastline to be a possible strategic threat, the Navy is virtually certain to know about it.”
“Sounds like science fiction. Anyway, that sort of thing is so highly classified that they wouldn't tell you squat, even if they did know about it.”
“You show a lack of understanding as to the nature of intelligence apparatuses, Mr. Tabi. They collect information, so the way to deal with them is to offer information. I accordingly contacted CUS, the office of Commander, Undersea Surveillance, and told them I could explain the mysterious explosion they detected in the middle of the Eastern Pacific. If I were wrong, they would ignore me and write me off as a crackpot. But if I were right, then I was in possession of data they needed, and I would certainly hear from them right away.
“As I did. You yourself were present when I received the call. By the way, via aerial surveillance, they have subsequently found exactly where Chengfeng sank. You destroyed the vessel, but you could do nothing about the fragments of the wreck floating on the surface. The weather has been particularly fine in the Eastern Pacific lately, and it was all still there.”
He clenched his jaws. “All right. Maybe you're right about the Chengfeng. But it doesn't have anything to do with me.”
“Then why has almost everything you've told us about the case been a lie? For example, you let Erica believe that MTRG was the beneficiary of the insurance policy on the yacht. The yacht was leased, Mr. Tabi, as you must have known. The beneficiary of the policy would be the owner, not the lessee. And perhaps you might explain why you followed Erica home from Marina del Rey when she was performing a follow-up to our investigation.”
“Easy. I was there following up the matter myself, and I saw her go into the store. I knew as soon as I saw her that our meeting at MTRG hadn't been a coincidence. I needed to find out who she was, so I followed her. It's what any competent P.I. would do.”
Miss Enola shook her head. “You were not there conducting a follow-up. You never investigated the yacht's disappearance in the first place because you already knew what had happened to her. In fact, you directed attention away from what had happened to the yacht, as you were in a perfect position to do as the investigator assigned by Lloyd's America. Erica, do you remember what Marshall told you about someone asking about the yacht before you did?”
“Yeah. He said somebody else had been asking around, and he didn't like it. I knew it wasn't the SEC because federal officers always identify themselves.” I looked at Adrian. “I thought it was the guys in the pickup truck.”
“What pickup truck?” Adrian asked.
“The one that attempted to intimidate Erica after her first visit to the marina, Mr. Tabi, which we've since established belongs to Herbert Holloway. He and Zielinski were staking out the marina after you learned questions had been asked. Somehow, Zielinski and Holloway recognized Erica as a threat. How could that be, unless you were there, too? You saw her, and as you say, realized that your encounter at MTRG was no coincidence. It must have shaken you badly, so you sent them after her to scare her off. But they weren't the men who interrogated Marshall. Marshall knew both Zielinski and Holloway, so whoever asked him about the Chengfeng had to have been someone else.”
“All right. Who?”
“Who else had an interest? Whose money was miss
ing? MTRG's. We know firsthand that Colin Pippinger, the head of MTRG, was inimical to your presence. He must have been conducting his own inquiry. At first, you thought their inquiries had yielded nothing, but to be certain, you and your accomplices kept watch at the marina in case they returned. Instead, Erica showed up. Now you had to worry about her too. So to see if your scare tactic had worked, you waited to see if she would come back. It must have been an unpleasant shock when she did. You accordingly forced a meeting with us to promulgate misinformation.”
This time, Adrian just stared at her.
“Now let's examine the matter of the offshore bank where Long stashed the money. After Hawaii, his only logical destination could be Tahiti; first, because other than North America, it is the only place within Chengfeng's reach after refueling, and secondly because it is in French Polynesia, and France has no extradition treaty with the United States. He would be completely safe there. This suggested to me that his bank might not be in China, but somewhere closer to Tahiti.
“Many Pacific Island nations now have offshore banking industries. Among them, Vanuatu is less than three thousand miles from Tahiti. Not close, but close enough, comparable to the distance between Los Angeles and New York—a five-hour flight. Unlike France, though, Vanuatu does have an extradition treaty with the U.S. If that's where Long put his money, he would need someone else to retrieve it for him, a hidden partner who could travel there and back without arousing suspicion.
“Is it a coincidence, then, that “Tabi’ is a male Vanuatan surname?”
Adrian shook his head. “This is unbelievable.”
“Is it? The destruction of Chengfeng would only be possible if the murderers knew her exact itinerary. And who would have known about it except for Long's partner? You decided to cut Long out of the picture and keep the money for yourself. Holloway and Zielinski would take much smaller slices of the pie than Long.”
“Except that I don't know any Holloway or Zielinski.”
“Drivel. You met them at a bowling alley in Mar Vista this very morning. Erica took your picture.”
AHMM, July/August 2012 Page 25
