by Burl Barer
Introductions exchanged and hands well-shook, the Saint searched Arthur Rasnec's facial expressions and body language for tell-tale signs of predatory underpinnings. Rasnec's emotional infra-structure remained an impregnable fortress of self-containment.
"There’s always something," said Rasnec, shaking his head in mild dismay as he pocketed his blatantly expensive and stylishly unobtrusive cellular phone, "Someone pilfered my office tonight and made off with my little .22."
Krogstad, remembering the cold steel in Simon's pocket, laughed nervously.
"The Saint didn't do it," insisted Karl jokingly, "He has an alibi, don't you Simon?"
"Absolutely," responded the Saint, "I was drinking beer with Detective Dexter Talon of the Seattle PD until only minutes ago."
Again, Simon searched the lawyer's boyish visage for reaction, but saw only an inscrutable mask of practiced social graces. What the Saint next perceived caused him to momentarily catch his breath --a vision of feminine beauty gliding effortlessly towards the three men. Karl poked him in the ribs.
"Here she comes."
If a woman can make an entrance when she is already in the room, that is exactly what she did. Had there been an orchestral overture accented by the sudden illumination of a single spotlight, her arrival could not have been more enrapturing of male attention.
Perched upon exquisite heels, she embodied every cliched attribute of the hackneyed phrase, "drop-dead gorgeous". From the fine points of her precision nails to the lustrous tips of the reddish-golden-brown hair cascading down to her shoulders; from her well turned ankles to her lightly rouged high-boned satin cheeks, she was deft and dazzling testimony to natural beauty brought to perfection by cosmetic artistry.
Her figure and features were undeniably attractive, and even a man as potentially jaded as Simon Templar found himself unabashedly fascinated. The knowing curve of her smile communicated a degree of familiarity to which even the Saint was unaccustomed from a stranger, and her eyes' unalloyed alertness was almost tangible.
The woman did not exactly stop moving upon joining the all-male trio, but rather softly undulated herself to the side of Rasnec where she continued the most subtle hints of suggestive motility. Despite the encircling of her waist by Rasnec's arm, her luminous gaze did not shift from the face of Simon Templar.
"So you're the Saint. Nice to see you in a social environment. Call me Diamond," said the vision, with a hint of humor. She offered Simon her hand as if proffering a gift to a king. He accepted the benefaction, giving it a proper conventional squeeze before bestowing an unconventional second press of measured lingering intensity.
"Social environment?" Simon anticipated a humorous reference to the illustrious illegality of his notorious past. The expectation of his anticipation was misdirected by several decades.
"I recognized you `window shopping' downtown earlier this evening," stated Diamond pleasantly, her oblique reference to Uncle Elmo's did not pass undecoded by the Saint. " Are you a fan of the performing arts, Mr Templar?"
"The art is in the performance," said the Saint, and he noticed an encouraging increase in her smile. There was more to Diamond than glitter, and more than Simon's interest was piqued by her telegraphed inferences of privileged knowledge and laser insight.
Rasnec, giving Diamond's waist a possessive squeeze, interrupted the one-to-one atmosphere with exclamatory verbal intrusion.
"Yep! Diamond's going to be star alright. Look's like one doesn't she? We're going to put her on the big screen in one of Karl's films. Isn't that right, Krogstad?"
All eyes swiveled to the red-faced director who loosed another trademark guffaw and nervously hid his hands in his pockets.
Diamond, as if mocking herself rather than the self-conscious director, batted her luxurious lashes and dropped her voice to a throaty resonance. "Do you have an authentic casting couch?"
"No, but we have seats waiting for us," recovered Karl, gesturing toward the auditorium, "Shall we?"
The timing was perfect. A short bald man with an impressive moustache was about to address the crowd, detail merits and shortcomings of the upcoming feature, explain why he selected it for viewing, and announce the annual anniversary showing of his personal favorite, Casablanca.
"You kids go ahead," said Simon. "I have an imperative appointment with my caterer."
Rasnec's plasticine smile never wavered, Diamond pursed an impressive pout, and Karl seemed relieved.
"And good luck with your movie career," added the Saint, making the word "your" inclusive of all three.
Diamond posed majestically as Simon moved towards the double exit doors.
"My parents named me Diamond because I am a gem of inestimable value," she declared, "but I am destined to become..."
The Saint, in a flash of both recognition and precognition, discerned her surprising allusion to Dagfinn Varnes' alledged memoirs, and knew exactly what she was about to say. She said it.
"...the new Dolores Costello."
Chapter 3
How Viola Berkman Searched for Herring, and Salvadore Alisdare Battled a Doorknob.
Stepping out onto Harvard Street, his mind swirling in response to Diamond's blatant references to Salvadore Alisdare's suspect Costello Treasure scenario, Simon Templar walked briskly southbound, cut across the A&P Market's illumined parking lot, emerged one block east, and secured a Jet City taxi near the corner of Broadway and Denny.
"Take me to 14th and Madison, if you don't mind," instructed the Saint.
"And if I do mind, what am I supposed to do?" countered the crabby cabbie from beneath her Seattle Mariner's baseball cap, "Take you some place else?" She had used this line so many times that it was part of her nightly repertoire.
"I've been some place else already, and this will be a new experience for me," Simon stated casually. He glanced out the cab's window towards Ernie Steele's Checkerboard Room, wondering if Detective Talon was still sucking smoke and swallowing beer.
A familiar object, and a familiar face slid between Simon's view and the bustling sidewalk. Inching in the opposite direction was Viola Berkman in her black BMW. Their eyes locked in recognition, and each quickly lowered a window.
"I've been circling this block forever," admitted Vi with sheepish enthusiasm, "I'm dying of curiosity about your meeting with Talon."
Simon considered transferring to Vi's vehicle mid-street, but the taxi's rear view mirror reflected the driver's preemptive look of disapproval.
"14th and Madison. Meet you there." Simon added a circular hand gesture indicating she should reverse direction.
The driver, pleased at not losing her fare, stopped scowling and wiggled her abundant eye-brows.
"That your girl friend or your wife?"
"Neither," clarified the Saint, as if she was entitled to a clarification.
"Yeah, well I figured she looked a little young for you anyway," the cabbie asserted emphatically. She retrieved a battered 8-track tape from the glove box and slammed it into the aged player.
"I like music while I drive," she announced as if declaring a political conviction, "I play Grand Theft and I play it loud." The final five words were stated with the implied conclusion: "And there is nothing you can do to stop me."
The Saint, forever the essence of courtesy, offered one delicately phrased observation.
"It is traditional to torture the hero when he is in the hands of villains, not while he is in transit."
The driver cranked up the volume and tossed back a retort over the cacophony of screaming guitars. "Who said you was the hero?"
"I'm the last hero you'll have in this taxi," muttered Simon, and the vehicle's aural atmosphere was submerged in a deluge of reverberating electronic feedback.
Crowbar Schwartz, lead singer and rhythm guitarist for the power trio Grand Theft, was really named Crowbar Schwartz. The circumstances surrounding his distinctive appellative were the stuff of contemporary urban legend: while rushing his ever-loving spouse to the maternity ho
spital, the senior Mr Schwartz -- a virtuoso Chicago musician with several tiresome compositions to his credit --lost control of his pristine Falcon Futura and wrapped it around a lamp post.
Trapped in twisted heavy metal, the laboring Mrs Schwartz—a beauty specialist and personal grooming consultant—remained miraculously unharmed. Her talented husband, dazed but uninjured, used a crowbar to free his wife at the exact moment their infant son emerged. Mr and Mrs Schwartz, perhaps still suffering from shock, agreed that the boy should be forever known as Crowbar Avon Schwartz.
While psychologists and sociologists later quibbled in print over the name's influence on his career choice and lifestyle, Crowbar achieved considerable wealth by dedicating the fruit of his musically predisposed genes to replicating screeching tires, broken glass, and crashing metal on his guitar. As for stage make-up, Crowbar gratefully acknowledged his mother's loving, professional, color-coordinated guidance. None of this, of course, was of particular interest to Simon Templar. His exposure to the atonal caterwaulings of Crowbar, despite their international and relentless air-play, was limited to this particular cab ride on Capitol Hill. Thankfully, as Broadway Avenue's boutiques and restaurants gave way to the more educational trappings of Seattle University, the 8-track player devoured the tape.
So garbled and distorted was the original recorded performance that no deviation from its normal sound was initially discerned. Soon, however, the stretched mylar strangulation of Grand Theft's earnest efforts became unmistakable as the ironically entitled selection, "Scream," was ensnared by the capstan and entangled in the machine's swirling metallic innards.
The driver ripped the plastic case from the dash and threw it violently to the floor. Long slender entrails of twisted, lifeless recording tape dangled death-like from the gaping hole in the console.
"Look at that," exclaimed the aggravated cabbie.
"It looks better now than it sounded before," said the Saint seriously.
She wheezed out a long, laborious sigh, turned on the radio, failed in a knob-spinning attempt at retrieving any of Seattle's numerous AM signals, and barked an overworked and un-ladylike oath as she clicked off the dysfunctional receiver.
"Devoid of art, woman despairs," observed Simon objectively, "I suppose we must now amuse ourselves with romantic conversation."
"I don't date customers, so you can save your breath," she growled with believable menace.
The Saint, not easily menaced, allowed a faintly thoughtful smile to linger on the corners of his mouth, rather recklessly and dangerously. But that was like Simon Templar, who never got worked up about anything, let alone a lippy cabbie cursed by sudden mood-swings.
"I believe this is the first time anyone has ever actually told me to save my breath," replied the Saint amiably. "Apparently, in the best pulp fiction tradition, I am about to be bludgeoned to death by clichés."
"Hey!" The cabbie tugged down the bill of her Mariner's cap, "You complainin' about my drivin'?" While Simon Templar serenely contemplated the evening events, conversations, characters, and escapades, Viola Berkman easily maneuvered the irregular traffic patterns and unorthodox block structures of capital hill, eventually managing to position her BMW two car lengths behind Simon's taxi. Equal distance behind purred a perfectly restored black Jaguar XKE.
"Blackmail? Serves the jerk right," commented Viola as the Saint recounted scintillating details of the Checkerboard Room encounter, "But that business about Buzzy looking every inch a woman is delusional hogwash. Even a pig like Talon..." Vi stopped in disgust and tightened her overcoat against the night.
Simon had paid the cantankerous cab driver, met Vi at her parked vehicle, and walked her graciously to the provisional shelter of a green and white awning gracing the entrance of a tiny Italian bistro.
"You are about to enter the mind of a confused and desperate criminal," stated the Saint flatly.
"Looks more like a pizza joint to me," admitted Vi after a cursory appraisal of the bistro's exterior.
"We're not going in there," clarified Simon, "we're taking a brief walk to the non-existent Madison address of SeaQue Salvage."
He took her arm and led her paternally to the end of the block. En route, he fished out Alisdare's business card and showed it to Vi.
"You will notice that the address on the card corresponds not to any actual location of SeaQue Salvage, but only to..." He pointed across the street to a small store-front who's exterior sign proclaimed "Mail Boxes for Rent."
"In fact," continued the Saint, "I am willing to wager that SeaQue doesn't even have a mail box there."
An electric Metro Transit bus, drawing power from overhead lines, passed through the intersection. Bright blue sparks crackled skyward in a minimal display of short-lived fireworks.
"Those bus sparks are one of my favorite things about Seattle," she said, "but you didn't bring me down here to watch buses and look at an unused mail-drop." The light changed and Simon signaled for Vi to follow him to the other side of the street.
"It is a theory, about to be proven," proclaimed the Saint once the two of them stood before the darkened store front, "that Salvadore Alisdare selected this Madison mail-drop as SeaQue's fictional location without any great master plan in mind. I believe he chose it simply because he passed it everyday, or because it can be seen easily from...." Simon scanned the diverse businesses and outlets within view, and smiled with happy triumph as he pointed to large older building kitty-corner from Madison. "Right over there."
Viola Berkman took a good look at the Saint's prized discovery.
"Emerald City Custom Catering?"
"The sign says they are `The Seafood Specialists,'" confirmed Simon.
"Seafood?"
"They delivered the dynamite lobster fra diavola so pleasing to the media mavins at this afternoon's reception. I believe Connie Cain put a daub behind each ear to win the heart of Emilio Hernandez."
"A romantic gesture," concurred Viola, "let's all visualize that, shall we?"
"And," continued Simon undaunted, "I am absolutely positive that they also do brisk business with Neptune Salad and dill pickles. Blackmail, extortion, and the exploitation of children are not, you will notice, advertised on the marquee, but comprise a significant portion of their fishy activities."
Viola Berkman watched the late-night traffic cruising Madison before asking the obvious questions.
"Dill pickles as in `packed by Snookums'?"
"And sold by Salvadore Alisdare, purveyor of pickles, seafood, condiments, perversion, persecution, extortion, and illegal substances to boot. A man becoming increasingly irrational, desperate, and unpredictable; a man who handed me a $10,000 cashier's check to search for the Costello Treasure."
"Does this mean you have everything all figured out? You know what happened to Dan and Ian, how to stop Talon from victimizing children, and what the real story is on Dolores Costello?"
Simon put his arm around her and they began the walk back to her car.
"If I were that brilliant, this would only be a novella," explained the Saint, "but I firmly believe that some simple breaking and entering, coupled with full-scale burglary of Salvadore's fish and pickle palace, may give us more answers than we anticipate."
They walked back across the street in silence. As they continued towards her BMW, he broached a serious and sensitive subject.
"Vi, there are a few things I haven't told you. And I believe there is something you haven't told me."
The Saint's blue eyes seemed iridescent in the dark, and his tone displayed none of the light playfulness which had characterized their previous banter.
"What do you mean," asked Vi. She was neither overtly defensive nor offended.
"I haven't told you that I met Arthur Rasnec tonight."
Vi stopped.
"With Talon?"
"No."
"I've never met him, myself. Where did this happen?" asked Vi.
"He was with Karl Krogstad, the director of The Pirate, at some
silly double feature playing at the Harvard Exit. But there was a woman with him, a rather remarkable and attractive woman named Diamond, a woman who seemed to know more about what I was doing than she had any right to, including details of Alisdare's bogus Costello Treasure story."
Vi Berkman appeared momentarily surprised and unmistakably abashed. She averted her eyes, but Simon sensed it was not from guilt. He walked her to the driver's side and held the door while she entered, then circled the back of the car. Vi released the door locks and Simon took the seat beside her. A few drops of light rain speckled the windshield; Vi adjusted the rear-view mirror; the Saint chuckled softly and shook his head.
"C'mon, Vi. What's the story on Diamond? Your silence is deafening."
She leaned her head back on the seat and sighed with a slight smile.
"Quite a looker isn't she, Saint? Her name, so she says, is Diamond Tremayne. I honestly had no idea that your paths would cross, at least not tonight. All I know is that she has personal interests in getting to the bottom of this for reasons similar to mine, although I have the impression that her motivations may be more vengeance than justice. She told me that a cousin's daughter got into some trouble a few years ago, ran away from home in Massachusetts, wound up in Seattle," Vi sighed as if telling the story increased the burden of knowing the details, "and after her experiences here at the hands of a certain respected law enforcement official, she committed suicide. A scrawled note of drug-fuelled rumblings makes for poor evidence, especially out of town, but it was enough for Diamond. But not enough," added Vi with a practiced air of professional detachment, "for the Federal authorities to whom she complained. They said they would look into it...."
