Nothing's Certain but Death

by M. K. Wren

Chapter 12

  After a lunch protracted by the unanticipated pressure of in-season business on an off-season staff, Conan drove Steve back to the police station, went in long enough to find out that Kleber was still in Westport, then departed, offering Steve the vague assurance that he would return sooner or later.

  A rising wind flung desultory sprinkles of rain that demanded windshield wipers, but after a few strokes left them squeaking like fingernails on a blackboard. Conan winced and flipped them off to wait for the droplets to collect, finding in that a bent metaphor for his present situation.

  When he reached the highway, he turned south and after a few blocks gave the wipers another chance just before he turned into the empty parking lot beside a forlorn prefab building where a miniature marquee announced, “BCH FRT BDRMS IDEAL INV PROP.” A sign in the door assured the world that F. Conrad Van Roon was open for business.

  As Conan walked to the door, he looked in through the expanses of dirty glass and saw Conny Van Roon hurriedly preparing for his arrival. His preparations consisted of snatching the pint of whiskey from the top of his desk and secreting it in a drawer. When Conan opened the door, Van Roon was on his feet and ready with a welcoming smile.

  “Mr. Flagg—come in, come in!”

  He was already in. He looked around, noting the tracked, unwaxed floor, the faded photographs of real estate bonanzas decorating the walls, and the three empty desks, none of which showed recent signs of occupancy.

  “Well, Mr. Flagg, this is a real pleasure. You’re probably thinking of some investment property, I’ll bet, and there’s no sounder place to put your money than beach property. No, sir, not these days. You just have a seat. I’ve got some listings here.…” He shuffled through the piles on his desk with shaking hands. “I know you’re going to find just the thing you’re looking for…if I can just find the—heh-heh—listings…”

  “Conny, I’m not here to look at property.”

  Van Roon slowly collapsed into his chair, which, luckily, was right behind him.

  “Oh.”

  “I’m sorry.” And he was; Van Roon was such a sorry human being. Conan sat down in one of the chairs waiting hopefully in front of the desk. “I’m investigating Eliot Nye’s murder, and I’d like to ask you some questions.”

  “Nye? But I thought…”

  Conan waited, then asked, “You thought what?”

  “Well, I…uh, heard Brian Tally was…” He stopped, then made a hasty retreat. “Well, nothing, really. Just talk, you know.”

  “Sure. Monday night after Brian floored me, you followed Nye into the hall to ask him about Brian’s tax case.”

  Van Roon treated that as a question, or even an accusation. “I was interested, that’s all. I mean, Brian was always a good friend to me.”

  “How did you know about his problems with the IRS?”

  “Well, he…he told me about it. That’s right, he told me.”

  Conan gave him a direct look, waiting until his eyes dropped, which took about three seconds.

  “Okay. Now, you tell me about the Nevada backers you had lined up to buy the restaurant.”

  Van Roon flared, “I do have backers lined up. They’re ready to lay out half a million just like that!” He meant to snap his fingers, but got no snap out of it. “They’re still ready, and Brian’s a fool not to take it. Hell, he could build two restaurants for half a mil, or spend the rest of his life soaking up the sun in Acapulco.”

  “Or in Vegas or Reno?”

  Van Roon’s eyes wavered. “Well, sure. Anywhere he wanted.”

  “You seem to enjoy the sun in Nevada.”

  “Me? Well, why not? Lots of people do.”

  “And lots of people gamble, but not many quit winners. The house always wins in the long run, right, Conny?”

  His shoulders twitched in a shrug.

  “That’s…what they say.”

  “And the house always collects its IOUs—one way or another. The trouble with some houses is their collection methods are rather crude.”

  At that, Van Roon’s thin face went gray.

  “Listen, Mr. Flagg, I…I don’t know what you’re getting at, but I don’t think I like what you’re insinuating.”

  “Insinuating? I’ll spell it out for you. It’s no great secret that certain Nevada interests have been trying to get a toe hold on the Oregon coast for years; it’s relatively virgin territory. However, Oregonians are an independent lot, and they haven’t offered the Nevada interests much of a welcome. But they keep trying. Now, Brian has made an impressive success of the Surf House Restaurant; impressive enough to entice any potential investor in resort property, and it hasn’t escaped the attention of those Nevada interests. And conveniently for them they have a local real estate dealer under their thumb.”

  “What do you mean by that?” His attempt at indignation only produced a squeaking admission of fear.

  Conan turned hard black eyes on him.

  “How much do you owe them, Conny?”

  “Owe—what do you…now, wait a minute!”

  “Will your commission on the sale of the restaurant cover it, or is that just earnest money?”

  “You—you got no right—what do you mean, coming in here and saying—”

  “And what’s the alternative if you don’t come through with the restaurant sale? A place in the Nevada sun—six feet under?”

  “No! Damn you, stop it! Get out! Get out and—and leave me…alone.…” He had a handkerchief out to wipe his sweating forehead and finally buried his face in it.

  Conan waited and again felt sorry for him, but he was reminded of one of his father’s maxims: Even a rabbit’ll fight like hell if it’s cornered.

  At length, Van Roon composed himself, and if he was surprised that Conan hadn’t obeyed his summons to leave, he gave no hint of it.

  “Mr. Flagg, I fail to see,” he began with some dignity, “what all this has to do with the murder of—of Eliot Nye.”

  “Do you? Well, there’s usually more than one road to the top of the mountain. The trouble with Brian is he didn’t want to sell the restaurant at all; it’s his pride and joy, his life’s blood. At least, it used to be. And you made an error when you told him your moneyed backers hailed from Nevada. That settled it for him. He said no deal, no way. So you had to find that other road. A letter to the IRS; that’s all it took. Then you had two possibilities: once they put the screws on him, he might change his mind and decide to sell after all, but even if he didn’t, the chances were good that you could pick up the restaurant for a fraction of its value at a tax sale.”

  Van Roon came erect with a jerking wrench. “What did you—what’s this about the IRS?”

  “I talked to Luther Dix this morning, Conny. The assistant district director.”

  “But they—they wouldn’t…they promised me…” He was too stunned to be aware of the admission implicit in that.

  “Nye is dead. Murdered. That…changes the picture.”

  At those words, Van Roon hunched back in his chair, eyes narrowed warily.

  “I was only doing my duty. I pay taxes, too, and it’s not right when somebody else gets by without paying what they owe. That’s a crime, you know.”

  Conan’s sympathy was evaporating rapidly.

  “What made you think he wasn’t paying what he owed?”

  “Well, I…I keep my ears open.”

  “What did your open ears garner that made you think the IRS might have a case against Brian?” Then, when Van Roon puffed himself up for another display of righteousness, “Brian has retained Marcus Fitch to defend him, and don’t kid yourself that he won’t subpoena you just for the hell of it. I doubt your Nevada backers want to see you in any court of law.”

  He deflated suddenly. “In court? But—but you can’t—”

  “You’d only be doing your duty, Conny, if you have information bearing on a crime—and murder is also a crime. But all I want is information. I’m not interested in putting you on the witness
stand.”

  He grasped at the straw of the unmade promise. “Okay! I’ll tell you. I mean, it’s no big thing. Nothing wrong about it. I was having a few drinks in the Tides Room one night and happened to be talking to a couple of the people who work there. It wasn’t anything solid, you understand, just they thought something fishy was going on.” He laughed nervously. “Fishy. That’s funny.”

  “Hilarious. But explain it to me.”

  “Well, it’s just that they thought there was some funny business going on with the suppliers’ accounts, especially the gypo wholesalers who come through maybe once or twice with a load of goods, then just disappear. One of the dealers was a fish supplier.”

  “The humor is beginning to reach me.”

  “The guys I was talking to—well, one of them—saw some of the invoices. That’s where the…fishy part comes. He said the invoices didn’t match up with what was delivered.”

  “Names, Conny. I want your drinking buddies’ names.”

  He supplied them willingly. “Claude Jastrow and Howie Bliss, and they should know what goes on in that kitchen.”

  Conan leaned back, eyes slanting as he considered that. The source wasn’t as surprising as the information, and he wondered if there was any truth to it. Apparently, the IRS case against Brian was based on the discrepancy between the restaurant’s reported profit and the expected averages compiled by the IRS—not on the kind of outright fraud Van Roon had implied.

  But Conan reminded himself that he had very little information on the IRS’s case. He only knew Howie Bliss to be unstable, unpredictable, and generally unsober, while Jastrow’s arrogance hinted at a fragile ego which would make him vulnerable to jealousy, and he was still in love with Tilda. And she was in love with Brian.

  At any rate, the truth behind the fishy rumors was irrelevant. The IRS had made its case and served Van Roon’s purpose.

  Conan studied him, noting the glint of furtive wiliness behind the fear in his eyes.

  “Conny, did you discuss your plans to betray Brian to the IRS with Howie or Claude?”

  He licked his lips. “I…don’t remember.”

  “Don’t you?”

  “I said I don’t remember!”

  Conan nodded indifferently. “So, you did your duty and reported Brian to the IRS, and whether he finally gave in and sold the restaurant, or you picked it up in a tax sale, your Nevada backers would be satisfied. Besides, the informer’s fee on the deficiency Nye turned up would finance another trip to Vegas. Things were looking good, weren’t they—until Nye came into the bar Monday night with the news that something had changed the picture.”

  Van Roon asked cautiously, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Disaster for you if it meant a reprieve from ruin for Brian. And it’s interesting that you left the restaurant within minutes of the time Beryl said she saw Nye leaving, yet according to your statement, you didn’t see him at all after your departure.”

  “Well, I didn’t! I didn’t see anybody.”

  “You were faced with potential disaster, yet you just shrugged it off and went home without making any further effort to talk to Nye? Conny, I don’t believe that.”

  He crouched, hands clenched on the edge of the desk.

  “I went straight home! Ask my wife. She can tell you when I got home. She bitched enough about it. Damn it, I went home!”

  “But was Eliot Nye alive then?”

  He seemed to quiver in the backwash of that question, and at first he didn’t move a muscle. Then suddenly he began scrabbling at the top drawer, his shaking hands defying him, then jerking up, locked around the butt of a fist-sized automatic.

  “Get out!” he shrieked. “Just get out of here!”

  Conan did, but slowly; no sudden movements to make the trembling finger on that trigger jerk.

  It was a long way to the door.

  Chapter 13

  Having a gun pointed at him was an unnerving experience under any circumstances, and all the more so when the pointer was a desperate drunk, but when Conan arrived at the police station, he didn’t report his experience to Steve. It would keep, and there were other things to occupy his mind. Like Kleber.

  The chief, Steve informed him, hadn’t yet returned from Westport.

  Conan scowled at the clock on Kleber’s wall. Three-thirty. The Damoclean sword still hovered.

  “What about Hancock, Steve? Anyone found him yet?”

  “Mm?” Steve was pecking out a report on an electric typewriter that seemed to get away from him occasionally, stuttering out half a line before he could restrain it. “No, he’s still at large.” While Steve continued his contest with the typewriter, Conan availed himself of one of the phones on the desk and called the Surf House. Tilda told him in a constrained tone that Brian had returned; he was working in the kitchen.

  When Conan hung up, he relayed that information to Steve and added, “I’m going down to talk to him.”

  “What about?”

  “The weather. I don’t know. At least I think he should be prepared for Kleber.”

  Steve glowered at the sheet emerging from the typewriter, then ripped it out and rose.

  “I’ll go with you.” Then as if Conan had questioned that, “Maybe I can look around for a likely not-so-blunt instrument.”

  *

  Business was still good at the restaurant, and when they arrived they had to wait for Tilda to seat a bevy of local ladies, a task she executed with unflagging grace and efficiency. It was only when she approached Conan and Steve that she let her guard down and her smile slip.

  She didn’t waste words on amenities. “Conan, Brian is in the kitchen. I…I’m glad you’re here.”

  She didn’t have time to explain that—a new customer appeared—and perhaps it didn’t need explaining. Conan led the way through the pantry, sidling cautiously down the middle after nearly being decapitated by a passing tray, wondering through every foot of the crowded gauntlet whether he was supposed to dodge or simply drop to the floor when someone shouted, “Behind you!” The waitresses and busboys seemed engaged in a hectic quadrille, which they managed without a missed step, their exchanges spiced with a casually foul vocabulary that would call forth blushes in the dining room, but here the roar of the exhaust fans acted as a damper.

  Brian was at the cutting table by the side entrance reducing a slab of beef to steaks, each perfectly consistent in thickness, a succulent two inches of prime filet. The foot-long blade of the knife was as red with blood as his hands, and he wielded it with violent finesse.

  “Brian?” Conan had to shout over the general uproar.

  Thunk. The blade slipped at an errant angle and struck the table.

  “Hell.” He turned to glare at the source of the distraction, then the corded tension in his features relaxed.

  “Conan—well, I was wondering… Hello, Mr. Travers.”

  Steve touched his finger to a nonexistent hat brim, a gesture that was a holdover from his youth.

  “Mr. Tally. Mind if I look around the kitchen a little? I’ll stay out of the way.” He ducked as a busboy sailed a tray of dirty dishes past. “At least, I’ll try.”

  Brian laughed. “Go ahead, but it’s at your own risk.” When Steve had wandered off toward the dishwashing assemblage, Brtan asked with forced lightness, “Well, Conan, what’s the good news?”

  While Conan gave him the news of his impending arrest, tempering it with the assurance that Marcus Fitch was on stand-by, Brian took up the knife again, his big hands seemingly functioning independently of his thoughts. The surface of the table was soaked red.

  But when Conan finished, the deft movements of the knife stopped, Brian stood for a moment with his eyes shut, the muscles of his jaw flexing spasmodically.

  “Oh, God, Conan, I can’t…I can’t take much more.”

  “You can take more. I don’t know how much.” His tone was detached, almost cold, and served its purpose; Brian pulled in a long breath and finally nodded.
/>
  “Sure. But about this lawyer—look, I can’t afford any high-class city lawyers. Hell, I still owe Herb Latimer.”

  “Don’t waste any worry on that. Marc owes me a favor, and this seemed like a good time to call him on it.”

  Brian reached for a damp rag to wipe his hands.

  “But what’ll you do next time you land in jail?”

  Conan laughed with him. “Well, I guess I’ll have to do him another favor before it comes to that.” His laughter faded as quickly as Brian’s. “I’m sorry I can’t offer much in the way of encouragement now. All I can say is I have some leads, but I don’t know where they’ll take me.”

  “Just knowing you’re working on it is encouraging. It’s about the only thing I’ve got going for me right now.” His jaw was tightening again as he began mopping the blood from the table. “You know, it wouldn’t get to me so much if I just understood about Nye. I mean…” Brian’s fist doubled in the rag. “For God’s sake, why? He nailed me to the cross with those damned initials! Why!”

  Conan stared down at the table, at the smeared patterns left by the rag, and perhaps it was his recent encounter with Jastrow that brought the words to mind: Yet who would have thought the old man to have so much blood in him?

  “Sorry, Conan.” Brian had himself under control again. “I guess I better pull myself together before Kleber comes.”

  Conan didn’t seem to hear that, nor did he look up from the table, rather, from the corner where the layered wood made a sharp angle barely softened by years of wear and scrubbing. His intent gaze dropped to the floor, tracing lines that Jastrow had created in his imagination.

  “Conan? What’s wrong?”

  He looked up at Brian, but didn’t answer the question. He’d just answered another.

  “Steve! Where the hell did he—Steve!”

  That shout turned heads in the pantry and brought Steve at a run from the back of the kitchen.

  “Holy mud, Conan, what’s going—”

  “Steve! I found your not-so-blunt instrument!” He pointed to the corner of the table. “Something with three sides coming together at right angles. And the scuff marks—no one makes scuff marks as long as Jastrow described them in normal walking, and not two parallel. That would happen if someone slipped. For instance, if they slipped on a wet, freshly mopped floor. Maybe Nye was pushed or hit first, but one way or another, he slipped and fell—fell against this poised not-so-blunt instrument.”