“The pathology team hasn’t sent anything yet. It’s only been two days. Maybe next week.”
“Fingerprints on the pool cue?”
“If the report’s not there, forensics are still busy processing.”
Slowly, very slowly, I counted to ten in my head. Then, just as slowly, I counted back from ten. When I reached one again, I was still fuming at the inefficiencies of the system, so I kept going. Zero. Minus one. Minus two. I was at minus forty-one before I trusted my voice to convey only polite neutrality. “From the photos I see, there were several decks of playing cards in the room. What happened to them?”
Sergeant Mpayipheli looked up from another manila folder, her expression distracted. “Sorry?”
“What items were taken into evidence?”
She closed her eyes briefly, remembering. “The pool cue. Trace evidence of hairs and fibers. We didn’t take the pool table, just photos of the blood.”
“Not the decks of playing cards?”
“No. What for? I’m sure we took prints off them.”
“Can I get access to the crime scene?”
I expected the sergeant to say no. Instead, she shrugged. “We’ve turned it over to the hotel management for cleaning. They wanted to reopen the games room as soon as possible. Understandably so. Their guests pay top dollar. Nobody wants crime scene tape to spoil their stay.”
Armed with a written authorization from Sergeant Mpayipheli, I drove to the Mount Nelson Hotel, careful not to exceed the speed limit by more than ten percent. Okay, full disclosure: twenty.
When I reached the hotel’s marble arch gate, I slowed down. Crawling at five kilometers an hour along the palm-tree-studded drive leading to the main building, I couldn’t help but wonder what sort of people could afford to stay here. Foreign tourists. Drug lords. Russian oligarchs.
Something clicked inside my brain. Russian oligarchs. Russian special forces, the Russian Preference. I pressed the accelerator, impatient to see the hotel’s guest records. I found several Russian families and one Russian businessman, travelling solo. The receptionist provided me with security footage corresponding to the day and time the Russian businessman checked in. I reviewed it three times, then made a copy for myself.
Before I left the hotel, I let myself into the Queen of Spades games room and went through the decks of cards. One of them was indeed missing the Queen of Spades. But it didn’t matter anymore.
From the Mount Nelson, I drove to the morgue. The pathologist was just writing up the Queen of Spades case. Even though I showed her my authorization note, she didn’t let me take the report to Sergeant Mpayipheli. She did let me read it, though. I skimmed the pages, looking for two pieces of information. One was that the victim had been drugged and unconscious at the time of death, the sleeping pills mixed into an alcoholic cocktail. The second was the murder weapon.
“Something sharp and narrow,” the pathologist said. “Not a knife. A screwdriver maybe.”
“An ice pick?”
“I guess. Certainly possible in theory. I’ve never seen one at the shops, though.”
Dinner was waiting for me when I got home. Three cheers to my awesome twin! We ate together, then she bathed Jack and sang him to sleep.
“Tell me,” she said when she returned to my living room, a gin and tonic in each hand.
We Googled the dates together.
April 12 : Yuri Gagarin in space, the first human and also a Russian.
March 8: the Russian Revolution.
December 26: the date the Soviet Union was dissolved.
And May 9, of course, the Russian defeat of the Nazis.
I Skyped with Nikolay later that night. “I’ve changed my mind,” I told him. “Let’s meet face to face. I’ll come to Lapland.”
“I’m travelling this week,” he replied. “Meet you in Singapore. I’ll book your ticket.”
Fifth Murder, Singapore
My ticket was Singapore Air, first class. At the airport, with a heart only slightly heavy with regret, I changed it to two business seats. They wouldn’t let me downgrade any further.
Business class on Singapore Air was better than I imagined first class to be. Separate cubicles, seats that extended into full beds, beef fillet cooked to perfection served with truffle sauce.
Despite the luxurious surroundings, I couldn’t sleep. I missed Jack, even though I knew he was safe with my mother for a few nights.
A limousine took me from Changi Airport to the Raffles Hotel. Nervous and tired, buzzing with caffeine, I barely took in the white pebbles at the entrance, the turbans on the doormen, the lobby full of air and light.
Someone touched my elbow before I reached the check-in desk. I didn’t turn around. “Nikolay,” I said.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you at last, Luca.”
“The pleasure is all mine.” It wasn’t a lie.
The pressure on my elbow increased. “I’ll show you to your room. The paperwork is all taken care of.”
“Not just yet, all right? I’d like to try that famous Singapore Sling first.”
Nikolay consulted his watch. “The bar is still closed, but we can get room service.”
He steered me out of the entrance again, and to the left. “Yours is one of the courtyard suites,” he said. “The limo driver took care of your bags already.”
I bet he did, I thought.
We crossed a very green, very thick lawn and Nikolay unlocked one of the doors. “After you,” he said, releasing my elbow.
I stepped over the threshold, turned, and landed a punch straight into his nose. Uppercut. He swayed but didn’t fall, which suited me just fine. I didn’t want to drag him any more than was needed.
Leia appeared in the doorway and shoved Nikolay between his shoulder blades. He stumbled deeper into the room, recovered his balance, turned to face her.
And froze. For a fraction of a second, his brain couldn’t comprehend why he was seeing double. It gave me time to grab the syringe and plunge the needle into his neck. I’d carried it through customs with all the medical certificates for type I diabetes, but it wasn’t insulin in the chamber.
I pumped the poison without regret. It was either Nikolay or me, I knew that much. Inside the room, I’d already spotted a deck of playing cards and a curly sword. Probably a kris. No doubt my Singapore Sling would have come with an additional ingredient, just like for the other victims.
The paralysis of the limbs was instantaneous. He could still talk well enough to ask, “How did you figure it out?”
I didn’t tell him.
We didn’t bother setting the scene. Nikolay’s body lay where he fell. I wondered whether to remove a card from the deck, a joker perhaps, but in the end, I decided it was a waste of time and energy.
I glanced at Leia and I knew we were thinking the same thing. Unlike with Jack’s monster of a father, this time we didn’t need to get rid of the body.
A Little Tennessee
Williams Drama
O’Neil De Noux
For Debb
There’s a story that Tallulah Bankhead used to host parties naked.
That evening, when she greeted us at her apartment door, she wore a long silver dress and gave us that deep-throated, Alabama drawl, “Dahlin’. Dahlin’, ouu, dahlin’.”
The “ouu” was for me. She patted my chest and gave me a wicked grin.
This was the woman who was the first choice to play Scarlett O’Hara, only she photographed poorly in Technicolor. Every southerner knew stories about Tallulah. She had to be in her mid-forties now, still a pretty woman but not wild enough to host a part in her birthday suit anymore. She had a wide face that seemed long at the same time. Probably due to her pointy chin.
“You must be Lucien,” Tallulah said in her husky voice. “Tennessee told me you looked like a young Cary Grant. And
he was right.” She brushed her hair back. “Tennessee’s not here yet. He’s next door finishing his latest opus.” She turned to my date and extended a hand. “And who is this ravishing beauty?”
“Miss Bankhead, this is Carolina Leigh.”
“As in Robert E.?”
“No, ma’am,” Carolina said. “As in Vivien Leigh.”
Tallulah had to look up at my five-foot-nine date. “Carolina Leigh. How perfectly southern. But you don’t sound southern.”
“I’m from Milwaukee.”
“No wonder you are here, dahlin’. Who the hell wants to be in Wisconsin? Wherever did you find this lovely Yankee, Lucien?”
Miss Carolina Leigh brushed her long black hair from a face made up for a movie star shoot, her full mouth accentuating sculptured lips with its slight peak painted with deep, crimson lipstick. Faded bluish-green eye shadow drew attention to her green eyes.
“Find her?” I said. “She’s a stripper at Hotsy Jazz.”
Carolina poked me in the ribs. “I’m a secretary.”
Tallulah leaned close and lowered her voice. “How old are you, dahling?”
“Twenty.”
Tallulah laughed. “When I was that young, I was very wicked. Are you wicked?”
“No.” Carolina turned to me. “He might wish otherwise, but no. I’m a good Catholic girl.”
“Ouuu,” Tallulah patted my chest again. “Fertile ground waiting to be corrupted. When Catholic girls break out of their shell. It can be delicious.”
The door behind us opened and Tallulah’s eyes went wide and she excused herself.
We moved through the front room of this small apartment on Saint Peter Street, where a sax echoed outside, to mix with the faint echo of a jazz band up the street, reminding me it was Saturday night in the French Quarter.
I’d met Carolina three days earlier when I returned a stolen bracelet to Delta Insurance Company. I had managed to locate the emerald bracelet on the wrist of the woman who had reported it stolen at Christmas. She made the mistake of wearing the bracelet to the Proteus Mardi Gras Ball back in February. In my deep research into the claimant, I found a photo in The Eagle newspaper’s quarterly society page review. She was the queen of the ball and raised her arm with scepter in hand at the ball, bracelet in plain sight. She wore a mask, of course, but that’s why Delta hired Private Eye Lucien Caye.
Carolina Leigh was the personal assistant to the elderly chief claims investigator. More than a secretary, her boss relied on her sharp mind. I liked what I saw and asked her out on this jazzy Saturday night. We had dinner at Fabacher’s before I brought her to Miss Bankhead’s.
Carolina stood taller than most of the women at the party. Her clingy black dress had buttons down the front. She had strategically left the top button and two bottom buttons unfastened to show a hint of cleavage and thighs. We moved to the wet bar at the back of the room, where I asked a thin black fellow for a Falstaff. Carolina asked for ginger ale.
Two men came up, one heavy-set and balding, one thin with a pompadour and a pencil-thin moustache. Both with cigarettes.
Mr. Pencil-Thin Moustache said to Carolina, “Have you had a screen test yet?”
Oh, boy.
“I’m not an actress.”
He introduced himself as H. H. Clark, but everyone called him Clark, and his friend was Ferd Chesterfield and all I could think of was—named for a cigarette.
“We’re producers,” Ferd said as I passed Carolina her ginger ale.
She nodded to me. “This is the one looking for a screen test.”
I closed my eyes.
“He has the dark, rugged look.” Clark ogled her breasts. “But you, darlin’, you got all the goods.”
A third man came up as Carolina took my hand. I eased in front of her. The third man ran a hand through his curly blonde hair and let us pass.
I led Carolina through the men to the French doors that were cracked open to a typical French Quarter lacework balcony. A fresh breeze flowed into the smoky room and Carolina whispered “thank you” in my ear.
“Wasn’t sure. We are talkin’ Hollywood. You don’t see yourself on the big screen?” I asked.
“Nope.”
A screech turned us to the front door as Tallulah enveloped a smallish man in a hug.
“Thomas!” She kissed his cheek. “I’m sorry. Tennessee!” She looked back at the room. “Hey, y’all. It’s my neighbor from the apartment next door, Tennessee Williams, originally from the backwoods of the great state of ignorance, Mississippi, lately the toast of Broadway.”
The curly-haired, mustachioed man, who stood maybe five-eight and wore a dark shirt and tan slacks, smiled broadly at his neighbor and kissed her cheek back.
Tallulah patted his chest. “So, how is it going?”
Tennessee spread his arms. “The first draft is complete.” His southern drawl wasn’t as pronounced, but definitely Mississippian. Whereas my accent, like most New Orleanians, was a southern-flavored Brooklynese with flat As and quick-paced speech, short and clipped. Our “dahlings” were “dawlins,” just like our city was New Awlins.
Admirers moved around Tallulah and the playwright, who hadn’t spotted me yet. Smartly dressed people, older than me and dripping jewelry, even the men. I knew my friend Tennessee’s work, had seen The Glass Menagerie. I remember the newspaper proclaimed Tennessee a new, important “New Orleans-based” author. Of course, if you weren’t born and raised in New Orleans, you really weren’t from the city. You were “New Orleans-based.”
We finished our drinks and I was easing through the people for refills when a small man rose from an armchair in front of me. That face. Oh, Lord.
“Excuse me,” said Peter Lorre, weaselly Joel Cairo from The Maltese Falcon and the slimy thief in Casablanca. “Anybody ever tell you you look like an American version of Rudolph Valentino?”
“No.” I turned away and turned back. “Liked you in Arsenic and Old Lace, Mister Moto.”
I moved to the wet bar for another Falstaff and ginger ale.
Carolina met me halfway back, holding up several business cards. “I’ve met two Hollywood producers, a screenwriter, an actor, and two agents.”
“They promise you anything?”
“The casting couch.” She caught me with a mouthful and winked at me as she took a sip of ginger ale.
Tennessee Williams came straight to us, raised his highball glass and said, “Bourbon makes the world warm and golden.” He took my hand. “Lucien, introduce me to this raven-haired beauty.” He leaned close enough for me to smell his liquor breath. He wasn’t drunk. Yet. “I do appreciate a pretty woman with a sharp mind. Do you have a sharp mind?”
Carolina nodded slowly as she sipped her drink.
Tennessee touched my arm. “I may not indulge myself with feminine beauties the way my friend here does, but I adore women at a deeper level.” He turned to me. “I just finished the first draft of…a masterpiece. Set right here in New Orleans.”
His gaze moved back to Carolina.
“Have you kissed him yet, my dear Carolina?”
“What makes you think I want to kiss him?”
“The way you look at him when he’s not looking.”
Carolina took the offensive, putting a hand on Tennessee’s shoulder, and looked down as she toyed with her shoe. Nice, smooth move.
Tennessee leaned close to me and said, “If she throws herself at you, I’m sure you’re wily enough to keep it quiet.” He backed away, raising a finger to his lips. “Let everyone wonder.”
He almost tripped over an ottoman and pointed at Carolina. “If you do want to talk, talk to me. I am always gathering material.”
We stepped back to the open French doors and the cool breeze smelling of rain, Carolina pressed against my side. Voices rose and fell, Peter Lorre’s nasal voice, Tallulah’s t
wang, Tennessee’s drawl. A couple guys with Midwest accents stepped close enough for us to hear them.
“One hit. That’s it,” Clark said, tapping the pencil-thin moustache.
A pretty boy with a thick mane of blonde curls said, “Flawed people limping about.”
Ferd stepped up, said, “Macbeth is full of flawed people and Richard III limps all over the stage.”
“You can’t compare him to Shakespeare,” said Clark.
Pretty Boy lowered his voice but not enough. “He’ll never top Menagerie. I heard his mama told him the story.”
Ferd grinned. “One never knows.”
The three eased away to the wet bar and I turned to Carolina.
“Amused or bored?”
“This is interesting.”
The breeze increased and I reached up to brush a strand of her hair from her eyes, then my gaze moved to those glistening lips. We finished our drinks, her shoulder pressed against mine. She caught me smiling.
“What?”
“Ginger ale. Keeping your wits about you.”
She drew a finger up to my throat.
“With you, I think I have to.”
We let our eyes do some talking for a few minutes. I saw a hint of excitement in those green eyes, as well as a little worry. I opened my mouth to say something clever when Tennessee’s unmistakable voice cried, “It’s gone!”
Tennessee stood just inside the apartment door with Tallulah, cigarette raised, and Peter Lorre. Tennessee looked as if someone had just yanked his curly hair into an Albert Einstein hairstyle.
“I tell you, it’s gone.” Tennessee’s eyes darted about. “Someone stole my play!”
Tallulah patted his shoulder. “Now. Now. Tell me what happened, dahlin’.”
He shoved her hand away and his eyes narrowed.
“Someone went next door and took my play off my desk. It’s gone.” His eyes panned the room. People talked over each other, I could make out nothing now.
I moved to Tennessee and Tallulah, the frazzled playwright explaining he’d just stepped next door for cigarettes and saw his play was gone.
The Book of Extraordinary Amateur Sleuth and Private Eye Stories Page 16
