Night Game (12 page)

Tiny listened closely to the stories I had heard from Cal and Hank Cartwright, interrupting me occasionally to ask questions, all his shuck and jive shelved.

“This looks good for Dommy,” he said. “There are lots of other folks who had more reason to shoot her than he did.”

“And if the gun was planted, it looks even better,” I agreed. “But the fact remains that the people in that condo are the ones who knew how to frame him. That means, among others, that we have to know which of the ballplayers who stayed there were involved with Lucy.”

“It’s mainly just the rookies and minor leaguers she goes with. They stay at the hotel. They can’t afford the condo.”

“What about Dommy?”

“Alex wanted to look after the kid, so he let him move in. They stick together, you know. The team pays what Dommy’s hotel room would have cost and Alex takes care of the rest.”

“The players stay there year after year, don’t they?”

“Sure. It’s pretty handy to the ballpark. There’s a pool for the kids. There’s a pier out back for fishing, and it’s near the mall for the wives.”

“How does it work? Is it arranged through the team?”

“At first, it was, but now we rent them directly.”

“It’s a pretty good deal for them, then.”

“Sure. They know that they’ve got guaranteed rentals for six weeks every spring. They just keep the booking open. And it’s good for us, because we get a break on the rent, and don’t have to hassle to find a place every year. It works good.”

“You’ve forgotten again, Tiny,” I teased. “What’s this ‘us’ you’re talking about?”

“Hey, give me a few weeks to get used to the idea, girl!”

“But is that why you’re not staying there this year?”

“Maybe that’s part of it. But I’m not here for the whole time, and my family is back home. The hotel is better for me.”

“You’ve stayed before, though.”

“For the last six years.”

“How easy would it be for someone to get into the individual condos?”

“Security is pretty good,” he said. “There’s the guard at the gate. The apartments have good locks. But if you’re asking if somebody already in the place could get into someone else’s apartment, I don’t think it would be too hard. People are in and out of each other’s places all the time. Having a beer, borrowing stuff, like that. When there are people around, the places are open. You can see any strangers who come around.”

“So if you belong there, no one is going to notice if you go into the wrong apartment.”

“I didn’t say that,” he said, shifting on the narrow bench. “There are places some people wouldn’t be expected to go.”

“Stinger Swain or Goober Grabowski wanders into Joe Kelsey’s place, say,” I said.

“You got it. Or if anybody goes in for no reason. Someone might ask. I’m sitting by the pool and I see Flakey going into my pad. Well, Flakey’s a nice guy, but he got no reason to be in my pad. So it would stand out, you know what I mean?”

“I should get a chart of who is living where.”

“I don’t know everybody. Some are in the same places, but other ones move when they have another kid or if their family doesn’t come down. Karin could tell you.”

“I’ll go see her,” I said. “Now let’s get back to Lucy’s lovers. Did any of the guys in the condo have affairs with her in the past?”

“I wouldn’t call them affairs, exactly,” he said.

“Let’s not quibble over semantics. Flings, one-night stands, blow jobs in the car,” I said, impatiently. Tiny winced. He can’t stand women talking dirty.

“Kate, please,” he protested.

“Come on, Tiny.”

“I never did, for one,” he said. “By the time I got to the Titans, I was too old for that foolishness. Besides, I’m too scared of Darlene to be messing around with someone like Lucy. She got wind of it, my marriage would be history.”

“Not to mention your manhood. But not all your teammates have your remarkable good sense.”

“You’re right about that one. All right. Some guys I know about, others I’ve just heard about. Okay?”

“Sure,” I said, taking out my notebook. Tiny looked at it and grimaced.

“All right. Eddie Carter, a long time ago, three years ago maybe. Alex Jones. Flakey Patterson. These are the guys I heard talking about her, anyway. I think maybe Atsuo, the Japanese kid, the way some guys were teasing him. I saw her coming out of Stinger’s place, one time about two in the morning, last spring when Tracy was home having the baby. Like I said, you notice when something don’t seem right.”

“What about David Sloane?”

“Are you kidding?”

“Goober Grabowski?”

“That time I saw her last spring? I think Goober was there too, at Stinger’s.”

“I’d heard they like group stuff,” I said. “It’s good for sublimating homoerotic urges.”

“Say what?”

“Never mind. Who else?”

“There are a bunch of guys from other teams who would know about the condo,” Tiny said.

“Could you check and see if any of them have been hanging around this spring?”

“I’ll see what I can do,” he said. He looked at his watch.

“We’d better go,” he said. “It’s three-thirty and I’m meeting with my producer at four.”

“Okay. I’ve got work to do, too.”

We didn’t talk much on the way back. I was trying to figure out what to do next. It was probably time to visit Karin.

Most of the players had left by the time we got to the park. Joe and Eddie were taking turns with the pitching machine in the batting cage; Olliphant had Watanabe and a couple of rookies out on the far practice field and was hitting them ground balls; Stinger and Goober were playing cribbage in the clubhouse. The equipment kids were sitting in the sunshine brushing dirt out of rows of cleats and polishing the shoes. Wet uniforms hung out on racks to dry. It was all very homey.

There were no other reporters in the media centre. I had some messages stuck to my phone. One from Andy, one from Shelley Mitchell, the
Planet
city editor, and one from Esther Hirsch.

I called the lawyer first.

“What’s up?” I asked, when I got through.

“What’s up yourself?” she said. “I’m just on my way to court. Want to get together later?”

“Maybe,” I said. “Can I call you?”

“Sure, you’ve got my home number,” she said. “Hey, it’s great news about the second gun, huh?”

“I guess so,” I said. “It’s getting pretty complicated, though.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll work it all out,” she said. “I’ve got my clerk looking into Barwell’s messy past. I’ll talk to you later.”

I called Shelley Mitchell next. She wanted to know whether I would be filing anything for the front section.

“I doubt it. There’s nothing much going on. The funeral was today, but I don’t think it’s worth a story.”

“Probably not,” she agreed. “But you will have a feature for Saturday, won’t you?”

“That’s what I’m working on,” I said.

“Do you have any idea of length yet?”

“Not really,” I said. “I won’t be able to talk to her mother until tomorrow afternoon, which means I won’t be writing it until Friday. Is that a problem for you? And is there a length you have in mind?”

“Depends on what it’s worth,” she said. “Maybe we can talk again after you’ve interviewed the mother. And I’d appreciate it as soon as you can manage on Friday. The earlier it’s in, the more space I can get you. But aim for twenty-five inches, thirty, tops, unless you’ve really got a blockbuster.”

“That’s a fair target,” I said. “I’ll try to make it short and early.”

“Thanks,” she said, then hung up without saying goodbye. Mitchell lacks in the social niceties. Maybe she thinks she has to make up for her gender by being ruder than the boy editors.

I decided not to call Andy until I got back to the apartment. I found the Gardiners’ number in my notebook and called Karin, who agreed to see me right away.

Karin and Gloves were both in. He was lying on the couch with a can of beer, watching a golf game on television. He got up and turned it off when I arrived.

“Would you like something?” he asked. “Karin can get you a beer or a soda or something.”

“I’d love a coffee, if it wouldn’t be too much trouble,” I said.

“I’ll put a pot on,” Karin said.

“Sit down,” Gloves said, “and tell me how it’s going.”

“Not until I get back,” Karin called, from the next room.

“What did you think of the funeral this morning?” I asked.

“I hate funerals,” he said.

“Who loves them? I thought this morning was particularly awful. If that sanctimonious creep of a minister could have gotten away with not mentioning Lucy’s name, he would have.”

“Maybe he didn’t approve of her.”

“Still, it’s his job to find something nice to say. She must have been nice to stray dogs or something.”

“She certainly took care of stray ballplayers,” Karin said, coming back into the room. Gloves looked uncomfortable. She sat on the arm of his chair.

“But you’re no stray, are you?” She put her hands around his neck.

“No, I have a rightful owner,” he said, pulling one hand away from his throat and kissing its palm.

“But she was a good-hearted girl,” Karin continued. “I liked her. She was great with kids, a terrific babysitter when she was a teenager. Our daughter adored her. I’m sure her sexual behaviour was just another expression of that generosity.”

“That’s a very enlightened attitude,” I said. Karin shrugged.

“A man does it, we say he’s a real super-stud. A woman does it, suddenly she’s a slut. I don’t think that’s fair.”

She paused.

“But if she had trashed around with my husband, I would probably have a different attitude.”

“Well, maybe,” I said. “But you would be assuming it wasn’t Gloves’s fault. Women seldom get men into bed against their will.”

“True,” she said.

“Can we change the subject here?” Gloves asked.

I turned on him.

“How do you handle it when you know about infidelity in one of the other players? Where does your loyalty lie?”

“It’s their business,” Gloves said.

“Yes, but you tell me,” Karin laughed. “I know about all the bad habits on the road.”

“Not quite all,” Gloves said.

“And do you tell the other wives that their husbands are unfaithful?”

“No,” she admitted. “I don’t really know why I don’t.”

“I don’t write about it, either,” I said. “I see it, on the road. Married guys getting into the elevator with women.”

“But why would you?” Gloves asked. “It has nothing to do with the game. You’re not supposed to cover our personal lives.”

“Yeah, but what if, say, I see a guy in the hotel bar at closing time, two in the morning. He is drunk, he leaves with a woman, and the next day he strikes out twice, grounds into a double play, and makes an error? Then it has something to do with the game.”

“Maybe,” he said. “But what if he hits the game-winning home run?”

“I’d vote for the woman on the player-of-the-game ballot!”

We all laughed.

“Anyway, enough about my journalistic ethics,” I said. “I need some help.”

I ran down the highlights of the information I had gathered so far, and asked them to help me make a map of who lived where in the complex. Gloves went to get paper while Karin poured our coffees.

“Let’s go outside,” she said. “We can do the layout better if we look at it.”

The Gardiners had one of the larger ground-level apartments in the two-storey complex, with a patio under the overhang of the upper floor’s balcony. We sat at a round table looking out over the pool. There were half a dozen kids splashing in the shallow end, being watched by a glum-looking teenager, while the mothers tanned their oiled bodies. I guess they hadn’t heard the news about skin cancer.

The condo was built around three sides of the pool, opening to the west, overlooking the gulf. There was a ten-foot-high wall between it and the beach, with a wrought-iron double gate in the middle.

The Gardiner’s apartment was in the central wing, second from the end. There were five apartments up and five down. The side wings had three up and three down each, with stairs curving up each end of the units.

“The ones at the sides are the smaller apartments,” Karin explained. “That’s where the bachelors stay, or the ones whose families aren’t coming down.”

“Are all the places rented by Titans?” I asked.

“All but one in this building are,” Gloves said, “same in the north wing over there, except for the super’s place. The other wing is being renovated, so it’s empty right now.”

I got out my pen and drew three boxes to represent the buildings. I divided them lengthwise in halves, then made four vertical divisions in the main building and two in the side ones.

“All right,” I said. “Looking from the pool towards this building, who is where?”

Karin leaned over my shoulder and pointed, indicating the first apartment on the left.

“Here is Eddie Carter and his family, then comes us, then the Sloanes. Goober Grabowski is in the next one. His family isn’t arriving until next week. The Swains are on the far end. Upstairs is Jack Asher, the new DH, and his family. The one next to him, right above us, is the retired couple from New York. Then comes Bobby Marchese and his family, next to the Costellos.”

“We call that Little Italy,” Gloves said.

“Kid Cooper is in the last one with his wife and new baby,” Karin continued.

“Where was Dommy staying?” I asked.

“Okay, that’s in the other building,” she said, pointing to the corner unit. “He was in Alex Jones’s place, on the bottom floor, nearest this building. Archie Griffin was next to him, then Joe Kelsey. On the second floor, Flakey lives on top of Alex and Dommy next to Atsuo Watanabe, who sort of keeps to himself. The far one on that floor is Axel Bonder, the super.”

“Who is one seriously weird guy,” Gloves said.

“So I’ve heard,” I said. “He also could have a connection to this case.”

I told them about his mentally ill son, Lucy’s former boyfriend.

“He is also rumoured to have a pointy hood and white sheet hanging in his closet, so framing Dommy would make him happy. And, he has access to the apartment. So I think we should check him out. Where was he that night?”

“Probably spying from behind the curtains,” Karin said. “He’s a real whatchamacallit. Voyeur. He always waits until there are a bunch of us out sunbathing before he does the pool and garden work. I can’t remember if he was around that night.”

“And aside from him, it’s just the team staying here?”

“Right now, yes.”

“And last week, when the murder happened?”

“Well, there were some outsiders at the party,” Gloves said. “Most of the players were here and some brought local girls as dates.”

“Including Lucy,” I said.

“Yes, including Lucy” said Gloves.

“Was she here as a date?”

“I think she was doing an interview and was sort of asked to stay.”

“Who by?”

“I guess Dommy and Glen Milhouse,” Karin said.

“My competition,” Gloves said.

“He’s a cute guy,” Karin teased.

“Who was she mainly with?” I asked.

“I wasn’t keeping track,” Gloves said.

“I was,” interrupted Karin. “She was flirting with everybody, and Dommy wasn’t happy about it. Although I hate to say it. But he was sulking, while she danced with other guys, especially Glen.”

“Was there anything else?”

“Go ahead, sweetie, tell her,” she said to her husband.

“Okay, I’d better,” Gloves said. “There was kind of a scene when she was talking with a group of guys and their wives. She was asking Tracy Swain about their little girl and Stinger lost it. He was screaming at her and calling her all sorts of names.”

“I thought he was going to hit her,” Karin said. “All Lucy did was ask when her first birthday was.”

“What happened then?”

“Goober grabbed Stinger and got him out of there. Lucy went back to dancing.”

“That was pretty cool of her,” I said.

“She seemed to think it was funny,” Karin said. “I asked her if she needed anything, but she said she was fine.”

“What time did this happen?” I asked.

“I wasn’t paying attention to the time, but it was pretty late,” Gloves said. “Everyone was pretty much out of it.”

“Especially Stinger,” Karin said.

“And Lucy,” countered Gloves.

“Would it have been after midnight?”

“Maybe,” Gloves said. “We went to bed not too much later.”

“So you didn’t see Lucy leave? Or see Stinger again?”

“No, as far as I know, Goober took him to the beach to cool off.”

“But I saw Goober again, honey,” Karin said, urgently. “Remember? He was throwing up in the garden when I went to the kitchen to get ice water for you.”

“And Stinger wasn’t with him?”

“No. I didn’t see Stinger at all.”

“It doesn’t necessarily mean anything,” I said.

“But that was around the time Lucy got shot,” Karin said.

“What was?” asked a new voice. We looked up.

“You keep playing detective, one day you’re going to get into trouble,” said Stinger Swain, standing not two feet away in his bathing suit, with a towel around his neck.

“It’s a waste of time, anyway,” he continued. “The little spic did it. No question. She was showing him up. He had the gun. Maybe smoked a little too much reefer, had a few too many beers, and he snapped.”

He sighted down the barrel of his right index finger.

“Kapow,” he said, then blew away imaginary smoke. “Goodbye Lucy.”