Murder Miscalculated (18 page)

The two FBI agents were waiting in the hotel lobby when we arrived. Both men resembled a television director’s image of what an FBI agent should look like. They were both tall, broad shouldered and, as far as I could tell, devoid of any sense of humor. One introduced himself as Special Agent Cranz. The other was Special Agent Stern. I can’t say with certainty that I knew which was which, and I doubt that would have mattered to either of them.

The manager of The Broadmore had made a conference room on the second floor available. The five of us walked up the broad staircase to the mezzanine level and down a hall to the conference room. It was a room more befitting an executive board meeting than an interview with two steely-eyed federal agents. The table could easily sit a dozen people, and there was a pitcher of ice water and glasses on a credenza off to one side. The air had a sterile taste, as though The Broadmore staff disinfected the room after each use.

Cochran excused himself at the doorway, saying he needed to go to the federal building and write a report. The door closed behind him, and Lynn and I accepted an invitation to sit down and be comfortable, not an easy thing to do under the circumstances.

Once we were settled and introductions were made, Agent Cranz or Agent Stern asked me to tell them how I had gone to the Hotel Broadmore at Cochran’s request, and what I found there. It was apparent they were operating under instructions not to press too hard on my role in Talbot’s operation, though they did ask Lynn and me quite a few questions, in a roundabout way, about what we thought of Agent Talbot.

We gave our honest opinion but had to temper what we said, as we didn’t want to draw their attention to Barbara’s arrest warrant. I was still hoping they wouldn’t find it.

Then they switched gears on us.

“Why did you call Lieutenant Johnston on discovering the Agent Talbot’s body? What is your relationship with him?” asked Agent Cranz or maybe Agent Stern.

I explained how I had known Mel for years, and since he also knew Cochran, it would make sense to call him. That prompted more questions about our past history with Mel and Cochran.

“Maybe you ought to talk to Mel yourself,” I suggested after a while.

“We will be doing that this afternoon,” came the laconic reply followed by yet more questions.

The interview finished two hours later. I didn’t know if they’d gleaned any useful information from us. I certainly didn’t feel as though I’d learned anything except that Cranz and Stern were masters at keeping their thoughts hidden.

“We will be in touch if we have more questions,” Agent Stern, I think, said as he closed the conference room door behind us.

Lynn and I gladly took our leave of The Broadmore and headed back home, rehashing the interview as we walked, with neither of us certain how it had gone.

The Book Nook was in total confusion when Lynn and I returned. Book displays were shoved to the sides, and the two armchairs had been moved up against the bookshelves along the back wall, blocking half the books on them. Stage lights and a couple of video cameras on tripods were aimed at the chairs, and a dozen people milled around looking as if they were doing something terribly important without actually doing anything.

Max Carson sat in one of the armchairs, the center of all the activity, looking as contented as a cat in sunshine and basking in the light of attention.

“Max!” I shouted. “What the hell is going on?”

The room became quiet as everyone looked at Lynn and me. A woman with a pinched face and a pen behind her ear hurried over to me.

“Sir, I’m afraid you’ll have to leave. We’re shooting a segment in just a few minutes.”

I stared at her, then at Lynn and then around the room. The curtain to the back room parted, and Candy came in, holding Junior in her arms.

“Here he is, Max. He’s all ready for his close up.” She saw us and gave a squeal of delight. “Lynn! Kid! Isn’t this great? I got Channel Five to do their interview with Max right here in The Book Nook. It’ll be great publicity.”

She carried Junior over to Max and placed him in his lap. I expected Junior to take off, but he surprised me by allowing Max to scratch his ears and was soon settled in the Great Author’s lap.

Max gave me a broad smile. It was the smile of someone who has set you up for a practical joke that worked exactly right.

Candy explained to the pinch-faced woman, whose name was Vicky-the-Line-Producer, that Lynn and I were the owners of the store.

Vickie didn’t seem impressed. “Perhaps there’s someplace else where you can wait until we’re done? Maybe you can go out for an early lunch?” She checked a sparkly watch on her wrist and saw the time. “Okay, brunch. Maybe you can go out for brunch.” She held up her wrist so we could see the time. “We’re on a very tight schedule here.”

I shocked Lynn with the enthusiasm with which I greeted Vicky. Max was watching, too, his eyebrow cocked in puzzlement at my antics.

“I’m very pleased to meet you,” I gushed to Vicky and insisted on shaking her hand, both her hands, with enthusiasm. “I just love watching Channel Five and am thrilled at having you here.
Mi casa es su casa
.”

That puzzled her.

“My store is your store,” I told her.

Vicky freed herself from my grip, eyeing me with some wonder. “Thank you, Mister Smith. Now if you’ll excuse us, we’ll get back to work.”

I took Lynn’s arm and hustled her toward the doorway to the back room. We passed the chair where Max was holding Junior, and I held up my hand as though waving at him.

Max looked at my hand and let out a loud guffaw as we passed through the curtain and escaped into the back room.

Lynn shook free of my arm as soon as we were through the curtain and glared at me. “Why on earth did you let her get away with that, and what was Max laughing about?”

I opened my hand and showed her Vicky-the-Line-Producer’s sparkly wristwatch.

Lynn tried, but she couldn’t help laughing. “Oh, Kid. Okay, this time I forgive you, but you will give it back, won’t you?”

A young woman with the television crew passed us, carrying a tray with cups of coffee on it. Lynn stopped her and asked her if she knew how long the interview would take. Lynn kept her distracted while I picked up a cup from the tray and slipped the watch around it. When she started to leave I pointed to the cup with the watch.

Her eyes widened.

“Make certain Vicky gets this cup first,” I told her and sent her on her way.

The back room was almost as crowded as the front of the store. A well-dressed Asian woman sat at the table, where two other women worked on her hair and makeup. She was familiar, and I realized I had seen her on television, reporting on local stories. Over by the kitchen counter I saw April Quist sitting on a kitchen stool. She was paging through a notebook, studying it intently.

Lynn and I went over to her, the only person we knew in our own crowded kitchen.

“Hi, Lynn,” she said and then added as almost an afterthought, “Hi, Kid.”

Lynn squeezed my wrist, and I got the message. “If you two will excuse me,” I said, “I’ve got some work to do upstairs.”

Once upstairs, I wandered from room to room, wondering what it was I had to do up there. Soon I found myself in the room where I had set up the dressmaker’s dummy for practicing. I went over to it and straightened the jacket hanging on it.

I idly slipped my hand into the pockets, one after the other, picking up a billfold from one, dropping it into another, without really thinking about it. Instead I found myself thinking about all the pockets I’ve picked in my life, all the lives I’d touched. I realized that every pocket I picked was like casting little pebbles into a lake, each with its own set of ripples spreading outward and each ripple disturbing the surface long after the pebble disappeared.

“I thought I’d find you up here,” Lynn said from the doorway.

“What did April want?”

Lynn smiled as she came over and stood next to me. “She was showing me the notes she’s been making about the girls who work at The Poodle. She’s really interested in their stories.”

My eyebrows went up. “I wonder if Max minds his assistant spending her time on things other than him?”

“I don’t think Max has to worry about someone spending time on him.”

“What do you mean?”

Lynn smiled at my naivety. “Kid, haven’t you noticed how much time Candy has been spending here since Max moved in?”

I shook my head. I had no idea what Candy saw in him, but it reminded me of something else. “Speaking of which, when the heck is Max moving out? Hasn’t Donnie been able to square things with Dom DeMarco yet?”

Lynn had the grace to look embarrassed. “Well, the fact is, that got taken care of right away. Max made an appearance at a book club Dom’s wife belongs to, and everyone is happy.”

“When did this happen? Why’s he still here?”

“The thing is, Kid, Max likes it here, helping out behind the counter, meeting customers. And,” she added, “it’s been good for business, you’ve got to admit.” She had a point. “Come on, Kid.” She tugged on my hand. “The television crew should be wrapping up by now. Let’s go downstairs.”

It was my turn to make supper. Since it was fall, I elected to make a large batch of turkey chili with butternut squash. I prepared it early in the afternoon and tended it while catching up on the bookstore paperwork. The chili simmered on the stove all afternoon and filled the kitchen with its autumnal aroma. My timing was right for once, and both the chili and a pan of cornbread were ready when supper was called.

The table was comfortably crowded with Lynn, Barbara, me, Cochran and Max. Junior was having a bite of supper from his food dish. April had gone back to The Pink Poodle with Candy with no set time to return.

Max expressed his admiration for at least the tenth time at the way I had lifted Vicky’s watch that afternoon. “Hell, Cochran, you should have seen how smooth he was. I was watching him the whole time and didn’t see a thing.”

Cochran began telling Max about the techniques I had tried to teach him.

There was a quiet knocking at the back door. Cochran stopped mid-sentence while we all looked at each other. That door opens onto an alley where the garbage bins are kept. During the day we receive shipments of books, but never at night. The knocking came again, even quieter than before.

Cochran and I got to our feet.

“Can you see who it is without opening the door?” Cochran asked in a low voice.

“No,” I answered, matching his tone of voice.

He brought his pistol out from under his jacket and worked the slide. I didn’t like the sound it made.

From the look on her face, Barbara didn’t like the sound either, but Lynn put a finger to her own lips, and she got the message.

Max was already near the door, holding his walking stick over his shoulder. For a big, boisterous guy he could move like a cat when he wanted to.

Cochran took up a position facing the door, his pistol pointed down. I switched off the light and went to the door and, with Max next to me, pulled back the deadbolt, opened the door, and stepped back to one side.

A large figure stumbled in and said in a hoarse voice, “Shut the door, quick.”

Max brought the door closed and threw the deadbolt. I flipped the light switch, and we viewed our visitor.

It was Joey. His clothes were disheveled, and there were bruises on his face. His knuckles were scraped and bleeding, and his wrists were tied together with twine.

Max and Cochran helped him to a chair while I grabbed a knife from a drawer and cut the string. Lynn brought a couple of wet washcloths from the sink and placed them on his wrists.

Barbara offered him a tiny glass with an amber liquid in it. Joey accepted it, downed it in one shot and then grimaced.

“Jeeze, what is that stuff?” he gasped.

Barbara took the glass back from him. “It’s apricot cordial. I make it myself.” She took the glass over to the sink and rinsed it. “We usually just sip it,” she added.

Lynn brought over a bowl of chili, a couple of slices of cornbread on a plate, and a bottle of beer. Joey accepted it gratefully and dug in. He ate so fast that his bowl was clear before we could ask him any questions. “Any chance I can get some more of that?”

Lynn smiled. “Of course, coming right up.”

This was our chance, and we took advantage of it. As Lynn took his bowl over to the stove to refill it, I asked, “So what happened, Joey?”

Joey took a long swallow of beer and launched into his story.

The car we had seen take him away had driven him to a house outside of town. There was a man waiting there who asked Joey if he had the data card Zager had been carrying.

At that point Joey stopped to open another bottle of beer. He seemed surprised to see the looks on our faces. “I told him I didn’t have it, but he kept asking, like he didn’t believe me.”

“So then what happened?” asked Max. “How’d you get all those scrapes and bruises?”

“And who tied your hands?” chimed in Barbara.

“The same guys who took me to that house,” answered Joey. He went on to explain, between spoonfuls of chili, what had happened next to him.

He was locked in a bedroom in the house. His captors brought him food twice a day. Each day he had been taken downstairs and questioned while tied to a chair. They had used their fists, Joey’s own belt and even a length of classic rubber hose.

“The thing is,” Joey explained. “I couldn’t talk if I wanted to. They kept asking me stuff I didn’t know, and I kept telling them I didn’t know.”

“What kinds of questions did they ask, Joey?” asked Cochran.

Joey frowned in concentration. “Well, most of the time they wanted to know things like, did I know who took Mister Zager’s wallet, which I did.” He looked at me. “You took his wallet, Kid, and I told them that. I’m not in trouble here, am I?”

Lynn put her hand on Joey’s arm. “Don’t worry, Joey. We believe you. It’s just that Agent Cochran here …”