City of Ghosts (A Miranda Corbie Mystery) (42 page)

Careful walk, step by step, back down Mason, not tasting the bites of sandwich. Thinking of Edmund.

Smuggled gin in a flask at Dianne’s, a whisper and a laugh at the opera behind a fan, the businessman who pretended to be escorting Miranda but who was really there for Edmund …

Late night and sad stories, tears on cheeks, his sister who disowned him, still married and living at the old house in Bakersfield, only family left, parents died when he was fifteen, and she hadn’t seen him in eleven years, vowed never to see him again …

Edmund with his smile, his flair, his gentility. How he could remember birthdays, even if you’d rather forget, how he could remember everything in a room and everything he ever saw …

Miranda’s eyes opened wide.

Edmund.

Memory.

*   *   *

She raced up the stairs, Roy calling something after her, probably about her luggage. Reached the landing, out of breath.

A burly man with a bald head turned around and grinned at her, blue suit crumpled and tie stained with mustard.

Allen.

“I’ve been worried about you, kid … there’re easier ways of getting out of interrogations.”

She grinned back at the Pinkerton. “C’mon, let me put this food up and I’ll buy you a drink at the Rusty Nail. That’ll prove I’m in the pink.”

Allen snorted while she turned the key in the lock. “That’ll just prove your stomach’s still cast iron, sweetheart. But better your stomach than your head, I always say.”

He looked around the apartment while Miranda shoved the remains of the sandwich and Coca-Cola in the refrigerator.

“Pretty rooms. You ever get my message?”

“Yeah. That’s what I want to talk to you about.”

The bald detective fell in beside her as they stepped across the threshold and Miranda relocked the door.

“I thought this whole business was done—that’s what the papers say, anyway. Mrs. Hart was murdered by a gang of thieves and then they turned on each other.”

“You should know better than to trust the papers.”

The Pinkerton scratched under his vest sheepishly. “And we should both know better than to drink at the Rusty Nail. But—like they say—what doesn’t kill you will cure you.”

The heavyset, pudgy detective took her by the elbow. He and Miranda hurried down the steps together, footsteps keeping pace.

*   *   *

Mostly sailors and fishermen and workmen in the Rusty Nail, a few girlfriends and the occasional wife, listening to juke music and cooing over the stars above the Bay Bridge, oohs and ahhs at the colored lights on Treasure Island. Ships in at Piers 9 and 7, work and a paycheck and the glory in muscles that paid for the kids’ shoes, salt air and sharp wind carving old faces on young bodies, bite of the bourbon keeping the dark away, loneliness forgotten, lumps and arguments and bruises to pride dead and temporarily buried.

Miranda gulped her shot, looking around at the faded wood paneling, the thick nautical rope, the old buoys and lanterns covered in rust.

“You got me drunk last time we were here. I remember that much.”

“You needed it, kid. Hell, that was just in February or March, wasn’t it? You’ve been through a lot in the last few months.”

She stared at the thick brown liquid. “So has the whole goddamn world. What time is it? I forgot my watch.”

He glanced at his, underside of the wrist. “Five forty-five. You got somewhere to go?”

She nodded regretfully. “Yeah. Office. Gotta make some calls.”

The burly detective sat back in the booth, shaking his bald head. “Miri, Miri. What the hell am I going to do with you? You just woke up from a concussion and exhaustion—yeah, your lawyer told me when I called—and you get right back on the goddamn horse. Kid, you’re a fine shamus—more guts than most men—but you gotta learn to pace yourself, use your head. And not just as something to land on.”

Miranda laughed, drained the bourbon. “All right, Father Time. Teach me the Pinkerton Way. In the meantime, I’ve got some calls to make.”

The detective lit an Old Gold, inhaled and puffed and met her eyes.

“I’m serious. You’re young, but not that young. You push yourself too hard. Take a few days off.”

“I’m OK, Allen.”

He stared at her, the stubborn line of jaw, the glint of green in her eyes. He sighed, smoke billowing from his nose and mouth.

“Yeah, yeah. I’m thankful you sat down long enough for a drink. And thanks for the story, or what there is of it you can tell me. The papers made it sound like you’re a combination of Mata Hari and Lizzie Borden, then all of a sudden you’re in the clear again. I’m glad it’s over.” He took another puff on the Old Gold.

“You ever find out anything about your mother?”

Miranda’s eyes flickered. She picked up the shot glass and fiddled with it.

“Yeah. A little. Thanks to Rick.”

Allen’s eyebrows raised. “Sanders still away? I was surprised not to see him with you.”

“He joined the navy.”

The detective’s eyebrows climbed even higher. Long pause, while he puffed on the cigarette again, sipped the whiskey. Watched Miranda turning the bourbon shot glass around and around, lines around her mouth and eyes. His voice was gentle.

“So … before you go. My message wasn’t much, but I did look up garrote cases for you. Nothing lately, but there was a rash of robberies with the same M.O. about three years ago in Baltimore. Pinkerton office out there handled it. One of the ops spent months—nearly a whole year—on the case. He testified against a vagrant they picked up but couldn’t make it stick. That particular op isn’t with Pinkerton anymore—I take it from the report that there were some political repercussions to the case not sticking—there always are—or I would’ve wired to get his name for you. I was thinking that since they never really nailed the guy, maybe you could look for Baltimore connections.” He shrugged. “Wasn’t much, but you never know what could turn out to be important.”

Miranda nodded thoughtfully. “Thanks, Allen.”

She slid out of the booth and stood up. Held out her hand. He took it in his.

“Thanks for everything.”

He let go of her fingers, stuck one in his own ear and made a face. “Goddamn itchy ear canals.” Looked up. “Be seein’ you, Miri.”

“Be seein’ you, Allen.”

The bald detective exhaled another cloud of smoke, watching Miranda twist her way through the dark, narrow bar and into the soft neon of Battery Street.

*   *   *

Gladys dropped the
Harper’s Bazaar
she was leafing through and rushed from around the counter, enveloping her friend in a hug.

“Sugar, I’ve been so worried—the papers said you were in trouble, hinting around at all kinds of things, calling you ‘notorious’ and all … I wasn’t sure if you were even coming back! I’m glad I worked the evening shift tonight, so I could see you for myself.”

She held Miranda at arm’s length, looked her up and down. The blond curls, piled on her forehead, wiggled as she shook her head.

“We-ell … you don’t look so bad, but then you don’t look so good, either, Miri. You need more rest. Maybe some time with that nice Inspector Gonzales?”

Broad wink, wide smile, and she hurried back around the counter to wait on a dyspeptic businessman holding his stomach and frowning at the delay.

Miranda smiled, watching Gladys for a few minutes. Less than a week and it felt like a month. She looked up at the high ceiling of the venerable Monadnock, the constant traffic from the railroad offices, a few footsteps making their way to the Pinkerton offices.

It was good to be back.

She climbed in the automatic elevator, stomach still full from the bologna sandwich lunch, bourbon dulling her appetite, though the smells of beefsteak and fried chicken and spaghetti from Tascone’s caught her nose and made her think about dinner. She checked the wall clock above the elevator bank: 5:10.

Time enough for food later. Edmund came first.

Edmund and his memory, a photographic memory. Handy for an architect, not so much for a man who had to hide his bed partners. He said he never forgot anything.

So awkward when you run into ex-lovers, especially at social functions …

She’d thought he’d been referring to Jasper, but that was before finding his photo on Wardon’s table. So who was the client—the client he traveled to Mexico with, the client Dianne wouldn’t divulge? Jasper or Wardon or someone else?

She flicked on the light in her office, smell of old paper and stale cigarettes. Relocked the door, tossed her purse in a wooden chair, and sank into the oversized seat behind her desk. Pulled out the Big Chief tablet.

Miranda studied the coarse lined paper, chewing her bottom lip. Grabbed a pack of Chesterfields from the top drawer, shook one out and lit it.

Dialed the phone number.

Franklin answered after four rings.

“It’s Miranda. Were you able to get the name of that client for Edmund Whittaker? The one who took him to Mexico?”

She picked up the pencil on the desk and started drawing circles on the tablet, around and around and around. Nodded her head slowly, exhaled a cloud of smoke.

“All right. Thank you, Franklin.”

She dropped the phone in the cradle gently, staring into space.

A Mr. H. Wardon had taken Edmund to Mexico City about four months earlier.

She nodded, heart beating fast, and scribbled
forgery
next to Edmund’s name. Underlined it three times, and sat back against the leather, eyes closed, inhaling the stick.

Edmund had been a lover to both Jasper and Wardon. Not so unusual. He liked art, moved in the same circles. Maybe he met one or the other through Dianne’s, Jasper, for example, and then Wardon moved in.

Wardon and his glasses and goatee, the unctuous, silky force of his voice, the casual anti-Semitism, the predatory pseudo–sales technique, now revealed as a secret message for Jasper and an effective way to needle him. Wardon was competitive, for art, for Miguel. And Jasper was jealous. Maybe Wardon had moved in on Jasper before, taking Edmund away, to his bed and to Mexico to meet Miguel …

She frowned, crushing out the cigarette with a twist. Goddamn it, all conjecture, make-believe, a fucking detective story. Maybe Jasper had a motive to kill Wardon, but who had the motive to kill both of them? Cheney? He was the security man, good job at the Fair, kept it safe and hidden—why risk it all for a larger cut?

Miranda stood up and shoved open the windowsill. Her head still hurt, body still numb and tired and sore from hitting the floor of the goddamn
City of San Francisco.
She needed the cold, moist air, the smell of the City.

Her City.

You’ll always come to a bad end, my girl, it’s in your blood, wind up in the gutter like your mother …

And Hatchett nodded sagely, sipping gin in the teacup, and Miranda clutched the short muslin dress closer, waiting for night and the San Francisco fog to cover her tracks to Purcell’s or Spider Kelly’s or even the Hippodrome, once or twice, the ladies in big hats and corseted waists, breasts pushed up from clouds of lace, feeding her steak and potatoes, then a penny to go away when one of the men in bowler hats and mustaches walked up, eyes on fire and teeth reflecting light.

The neon blinked across the street, yellow and pink, blue and green.

Someone dropped a nickel in the Tascone Wurlitzer, Ray Eberle singing about imagination.

Imagination. The cops imagined that Edmund was guilty, but he was innocent—that much she knew. Innocent of it all. Whether he traveled south with Wardon or met Miguel or even Lestang, he didn’t know about the forgeries. And Jasper, the costumed Faust, chemistry professor and spy and professional smuggler—Jasper was innocent of Edmund’s murder. She knew that, too.

But Wardon …

Wardon, the ambitious art smuggler and forger, the dealer who’d taunted Jasper openly at the Picasso exhibit, the man who’d managed to get control of their priceless Miguel—had Wardon been frightened by a chance remark, an innocuous question? Edmund and his perfect memory, recalling, for example, a painting from Jasper’s apartment … one he saw again, in Wardon’s?

Did you buy that Kirchner back from Jasper, Hugo? I never thought he’d part with it …

And then—maybe—Wardon panicked, figured he’d better keep Edmund’s mouth shut.

Imagination is crazy …

And then there was the mark.

Robert Sterling Clark was a rich man, known in certain circles as a Nazi sympathizer, heir to the Singer fortune and money behind the failed plan to oust FDR in ’33. The papers dumbed it down, calling the Business Plot a cocktail putsch, but the threat—according to Bente—had been real. The McCormack-Dickstein Committee agreed, though the people involved were too powerful to be indicted, and Clark was one of those people.

Maybe that’s why James had told her the Pioneer Fund was out of the picture, nothing to follow.

She picked up the phone. “Long-distance operator, please. Yes, Chicago. The Drake Hotel.”

Miranda tapped her pen on the desk, faint tinkle of a piano drifting from the pool hall across the street and blending with Miller’s brass. Neon blinked on and off, on and off.

“Yes? Hello?” Her voice was smooth, silky. “Yes, I’m terribly sorry, but my associate left his cigarette case in Mr. Robert Sterling Clark’s room … yes, he was there yesterday, on the 30th. On a business call, naturally, the sale of some artwork … What? Are you sure? That’s odd. Our records show that—well, never mind. I’m sure there’s been a mistake somewhere, and the Drake’s not at all to blame. What? Oh, I’m sorry, I should have mentioned it earlier. The Lestang gallery. Yes. Well, thank you—I’m sure we’ll clear it all up.”

She hung up the phone.

According to the Drake manager, no one had visited Mr. Robert Sterling Clark on June 30th.

*   *   *

Miranda opened the safe and withdrew five C-notes and the Spanish pistol. Felt a pang when she realized, again, her Baby Browning was gone.

A cabbie outside leaned on his horn and her thoughts drowned in the rumble of a White Front hurtling toward the Ferry Building.

Maybe Wardon was a murderer, maybe not, but something about Wardon and that painting, the one that unaccountably reminded Miranda of her mother, the woman with plaintive eyes clutching a robe, trying to cover herself, his outstretched hand pointing, reaching, grasping toward the canvas. Wardon was trying to tell them something.