Face Value (19 page)
Authors: Michael A Kahn
I am in blood
Stepp'd in so far that should I wade no more
Returning were as tedious as go o'er.
Macbeth
Act III, Scene 4
To quote Macbeth or Marion Barry or maybe both: “Bitch set me up.”
Tony Manghini
Manager of Office Support Services
Warner & Olsen, LLP
Bertie Tomaso looked up from his papers and smiled at me. “Ah, it is the east, and Rachel is the sun.”
“Good afternoon, Romeo.”
He placed his hand over his heart. “Have I caught thee, my heavenly jewel? Why, now let me die, for I have lived long enough.”
“Good grief, Bertie. Falstaff, too?”
He raised his eyebrows. “I'm impressed, gorgeous.”
“You're impressed?” I said. “I better know. I was the English major, not you.”
I was standing in the doorway of the office of Roberto “Bertie” Tomaso, a St. Louis police detective, a shameless flirt, and one of the most literate people I know. As he explains, the only advanced degree he's earned is in stakeouts.
Six hours alone in a car
, he once told me,
and even a knucklehead like me can plow through a few chapters of
War and Peace.
He gestured toward the chair facing his desk. “Sit. Let's talk.”
I took a seat.
Bertie is a dear friend. He and his wife Sue came to my wedding and to Jonathan's funeral, and, though he is an old-school Catholic raised on the Italian Hill, he came to my house several nights during the week I sat shiva for Jonathan and made a contribution to the St. Louis Holocaust Museum in Jonathan's memory on his first yahrzeit.
In his late fifties, Bertie is short and burly and has one of those dark complexions that make it seem like he just returned from a week on the beach. He has a warm smile and a pair of eyes that can be playful or intimidating, depending upon the situation.
“So,” I said, “you reviewed Sari Bashir's file?”
“I did. I talked to both detectives, too.”
“And?”
He grimaced and shook his head. “Suicide seems a reasonable conclusion, Rachel. Wasn't robbed. No evidence of sexual assault. According to friends and family, she'd seemed withdrawn the last few days.”
“But you can't rule out murder, right?”
He shrugged. “I suppose. The external walls in that parking garage are fairly low. She could have been pushed, but it's more likely she jumped.”
“What about the hunting death? Bill Dayton?”
The day after my meeting with Len Olsenâwhich was two days agoâI'd given my copy of the Oxford County Sheriff's file to Bertie when I asked him to look into Sari's death.
Bertie raised his eyebrows and chuckled. “That's some file.”
“Oh?”
“The sheriff's men could star in a remake of the Keystone Cops. I don't have a basis to challenge their conclusion, but they missed some key evidence.”
“Such as?”
“They did a so-so job of examining the immediate area around the body, although they didn't secure the area. There were plenty of stray footprints around the body. But that doesn't really matter, since the shooter wasn't standing in the immediate area. According to their own estimates, he was at least two hundred yards away from the victim, apparently in the woods on the other side of the clearing. They never did an evidence sweep over there. Never. We have no idea what the shooter may have left. If nothing else, it might have helped ID him.”
“It could have been murder, right?”
“Could have been? Sure. But that would require the shooter to have some detailed knowledge about the victim.”
“What do you mean?”
“Think about it, Rachel. It's not like getting into position to shoot a target when he gets out of the car in front of his house, which you know your target does around six o'clock every evening after work. Here, the shooter has to set up in the trees on the far side of the clearing and just wait and hope. How's he know whether Dayton is ever going to step into that clearing? He could sit there all day and never see the man.” He shook his head. “Without more, it's hard to move this from the accident column over to murder.”
I pressed him some more, but he had answers to each of my questions.
“Here's the bottom line for a cop,” he explained. “I'd never be able to get a prosecutor to touch either one of these files based on what you have so far.”
“What about the financial stuff?”
“Structured Resolutions? Now that is intriguing.”
“But outside your jurisdiction?”
He raised his eyebrows and shrugged. “Maybe eventually. But depending how you look at it, Len Olsen might be a victim, and he's sure local. Sounds like there are other locals, too. Could be interesting. Now I admit that we may have to notify the Feebs at some point, especially if this operation goes interstate or international, but we can start with a little home cooking.”
“Who's the chef?”
He raised his fists in front of him with his thumbs pointed toward his chest. “
Moi
.”
“Last time I checked, Bertie, you were in homicide.”
“True. But didn't you come to me with suspicions of homicide, Rachel?” He winked. “Just pursuing your lead, my dear.”
Four days later, I met Stanley, Jerry, and Rebecca at Kaldi's coffeehouse in the DeMun area on my way home from work. It was 5:50, which was during the dinner break for Stanley and Jerry. I wanted to meet them away from downtown and thus minimize the chances of their being seen in my company. Rebecca was able to join us, which was good for two reasons: she could drive them to the meeting, and I had some more hunting information to share with her.
I filled them in on my initial meeting with Bertie Tomaso, including his skepticism about Bill Dayton's death being a premeditated homicide given what he viewed as the fortuitous nature of the shooting.
“Even with the yellow vest?” Rebecca asked.
I nodded. “He told me I was assuming the shooter was a pro. He said there were plenty of dangerous amateurs out there, especially on opening day of the deer season. He said the shooter could have been aiming at a deer, maybe even the same deer Dayton was aiming at, and simply missed.”
Rebecca looked skeptical.
“I know,” I said. “So I contacted Bill Dayton's widow again. I talked to her this morning. I asked her if any of his lawyer buddies from Warner & Olsen had gone hunting with her husband. The answer is yes.”
“Who?” Rebecca asked.
“She recalled three times. Once was an elk hunting trip for clients that the law firm sponsored about five years ago. She wasn't sure of the names or numbers but she thinks there were about a dozen clients and several lawyers from the firm. She's pretty sure Len Olsen was one of them. But the other two hunting trips were down in Oxford County, both times for the opening of deer season. The first timeâtwo years before he diedâthere were four in the hunting party.”
I paused to check my notes.
“There was Dayton, two of his longtime hunting buddiesâa real estate developer named Jack Cheever and a dentist named Art McKenzieâand Len Olsen. She knows because they all met at her house at three in the morning for the drive down to Oxford County. Apparently, the goal is to be in position at the break of dawn. Three of the four went the following year. Len Olsen had some sort of conflict, and guess who took his place? Donald Warner.”
“What about the year Dayton died?” Rebecca asked.
“Only Dayton and Cheever. The dentist couldn't because he'd had back surgery earlier that month. Olsen had to cancel because he was getting ready for a big jury trial.”
“And Mr. Warner?” Rebecca asked.
“Not that year.”
“But both years the group went hunting in Oxford County?” Rebecca asked.
I nodded. “Same area, all three years. Dayton had a college buddy who owns a big tract of land down there. That's where he'd been going for more than a decade.” I took a sip of coffee. “What's your reaction?
Rebecca thought it over. “Each hunter has his own preferences. If you hunted down there with Mr. Dayton, especially given that he went there every year, you'd have an idea where he liked to set up before dawn and where he might wander after sunrise.”
“That's at least something to work with,” I said. “I'm meeting again with Tomaso tomorrow. I'll pass this along.”
Stanley twisted his neck and then said, “You should also inform your detective of two additional pertinent facts.”
I turned to Stanley. “Okay.”
“While I cannot speak to Mr. Warner's proficiency with a rifle, Mr. Olsen is not, in Detective Tomaso's derogatory characterization, a dangerous amateur.”
“How'd you know?”
“The information is publicly available, Ms. Gold. As disclosed in his law firm biography, Mr. Olsen was an Army Ranger during his tour of duty in Vietnam. Among the skills required for that position is sharpshooting. Accordingly, Mr. Olsen does not fall within the category of a dangerous amateur with a long-range rifle.”
“Interesting,” I said.
“During your meeting with Detective Tomaso, Ms. Gold, you should also inform him of the location of Mr. Olsen's beach house.”
“Mozambique, right?”
“You are correct.”
“And where is that again?”
“As I previously informed you, Ms. Gold, the Republic of Mozambique is located in southeast Africa directly below Tanzania. The ocean visible in the photograph on Mr. Olsen's desk is in fact the Indian Ocean.”
“Okay, I will pass that along, Stanley.”
Stanley snorted. “I should hardly think that your detective will be interested in Mozambique's proximity to the Indian Ocean. He should, however, be interested in the absence of an extradition treaty between the United States of America and the Republic of Mozambique. Given your increasing concerns over Mr. Olsen's potentially felonious conduct, one can assume that the location of his beach house is not entirely, or even principally, the result of Mr. Olsen's desire to body surf in the waters of the Indian Ocean.”
“Still too many ifs.”
“No more than two, Bertie, and maybe just one, namely,
if
he wanted to kill Dayton.”
“And
if
the he is Len Olsen or Donald Warner and
if
he decided to kill him and
if
he decided to do it on that hunting trip and
if
he knew where to set up for the shot. And assuming the answer to all those ifs is yes, there's still not a shred of evidence that either of those two men was there that morning or pulled the trigger. And even if we satisfy all those
ifs
, you can be sure we'll never find the weapon. Right?”
“Maybe.”
“Then there's the young lady's deathâthe one that got you dragged into this craziness. Start with Len Olsen. All you have so far, Rachel, is a bunch of ifs, beginning with
if
he decided that he had to kill her and
if
he decided to do it by pushing her off the garage ledge. Those are big ifs, especially since there's not a shred of evidence that Olsen was there. According to that printout you gave me, he wasn't even in the garage that night. Donald Warner was there that night, and I suppose he'd have some sort of motive
if
he's planning to run for the Senate and
if
she had threatened to expose his gay sex life. But there's too many ifs there as well, beginning with
if
she even knew about those liaisons and, if so,
if
she had any reason to threaten him with that knowledge. Why would she even care?”
“That's why I don't think it was Warner.”
“And your printout says it wasn't Olsen. And maybe it wasn't anyone, Rachel. Maybe she jumped on her own. It happens.”
“So that's it?” I said. “No interest in Olsen or Warner?”
“Well, not entirely.”
“Oh?”
“I told you last time that we might need to notify the Feebs if that outfit was operating interstate or international. Well, we did notify them, and now we got federal agents sniffing around from every branch of the damn government except the EPA.”
“Really?” I leaned forward. “Tell me.”
“Structured Resolutions doesn't seem to check out. Our own folks, including our IT guys, couldn't find anything. You're right about the registered agent. Some old guy with dementia in a nursing home. We talked to him. Totally out of it. Clearly been used solely to satisfy the registered agent requirement. We can't figure out who put him in that position or who filed the forms. As you also discovered, the auditors on those quarterly statements don't exist. Couldn't find a Missouri bank account for the outfit, and the feds can't find a U.S. bank account for the outfit. As near as they can tell, the money coming in from investors gets wire-transferred direct from the investor to a bank down in the Cayman Islands, but it doesn't stay there long. It gets wired out the same day to a bank in Switzerland. They think it leaves Switzerland the same day, but they can't figure out where it goes from there. Part of the problem is all the banking secrecy laws over there, and part of the problem is there hasn't been a deposit for at least a month, so the trail is cold.”
“Do the feds think it's a scam?” I asked.
“Definitely. But they don't know what kind of scam or who's pulling it. Other than those two country club findersâBrenner and Teeverâand maybe Olsen and Warner, they have nothing to go on.”
“So what's the next step?”
“Next step?” Bertie smiled and shrugged. “Remember, Rachel, I'm just a local yokel to them. I used that gal's death and the possibility of St. Louis fraud victims to get my foot in the doorâbut it's barely in the door. From what I gather, they may try to bring Brenner or Teever in for questioning, see if they can scare one of them into pointing a finger.”
“If the finger points to Olsen,” I said, “you should mention to your federal amigos that he has a vacation home in Mozambique.”
Bertie gave me a curious look. “Okay. Why?”
I told him.
He leaned back in his chair and rubbed his chin. “Interesting.”