Nik Kane Alaska Mystery - 02 - Capitol Offense (11 page)

“And lots of people would like it to fail?” Kane said.

Alma nodded.

“There’s the oil companies, the lobbyists they employ, their political allies,” she said, “and, of course, the governor.”

“Why would the governor want it to fail?” Kane asked.

“Because if it passes,” Alma said, “the governor will have to either veto a bill that the polls show Alaskans support, or sign a bill his main political financers, the oil companies, oppose. So he’d much rather it just died in the Senate.”

Kane sat quietly for a moment.

“This is complicated, isn’t it?” he said. “And cold-blooded.”

Alma laughed.

“Complicated and cold-blooded,” she said. “That’s a pretty good description of Alaska politics.”

Kane thought some more.

“Your boss said the oil tax bill is worth hundreds of millions of dollars,” he said. “I can understand that as a motive for political action. Even for murder.”

Alma shook her head.

“That’s just politics,” she said. “Nobody gets killed because of politics.”

Kane thought about his time in Vietnam but didn’t say anything. The waitress set their salads in front of them. Kane and Alma ate for a while, then he said, “I’m not sure I understand the reason for all this political maneuvering. If it’s just a question of Alaska getting fair value for its oil, why not just raise the taxes and be done with it?”

Alma opened her mouth to speak, but Kane raised a hand.

“Don’t bother answering that,” he said. “I’m sure it is hopelessly naive and completely unrealistic. Tell me instead about what you know about Melinda Foxx as a staffer.”

Alma ate for a while longer, then drank some water.

“I know that this is, was, her second session,” she said. “I know that she was very smart and picked things up quickly. I know that the bill part of the committee ran very smoothly, and that it wouldn’t have been long before she was running Senator Potter’s entire office. If she could get around Ms. Senator Potter, that is.”

Kane raised an eyebrow.

“Senator Potter’s daughter, Letitia,” Alma said. “She spends a lot of time in his office. Some people say it’s so he can keep an eye on her. Others say it’s so she can keep an eye on him.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “He might be old, but he’s got fast hands, that man.” She raised her voice again. “Whatever the reason, she’s there a lot and acts like the chief of staff. So Melinda would have had to reach some sort of accommodation with her.”

She forked up some salad.

“Did you know Miss Foxx personally?” Kane asked.

Alma nodded, swallowed, and said, “A little. Staffers usually hang out with other staffers from their own party. But my senator loves information about what the majority is up to, so it’s sort of part of my job to keep an eye on their staff. I talk with them some, hang out with them some, drink with them some. So I knew Melinda Foxx better than I otherwise might.”

She ate more salad and seemed to be marshaling her thoughts.

“Melinda was very ambitious,” Alma said, “but in some ways very naive, too. Like you were saying, she thought that good public policy was more important than politics. Everybody comes in here like that. Most of us get over it, but Melinda hadn’t. At least she said she hadn’t.”

“Do you have some reason to doubt her?” Kane asked.

“Not really,” Alma said. “But around here you quickly learn not to take things at face value. Anyway, she seemed, I don’t know, satisfied enough with her job. And then, maybe six months ago, she started acting differently. Happier, I guess. Like something was working out well for her.”

“Got any idea what?” Kane asked.

“I don’t,” Alma said. “If it was something in her office, I’d be the last to hear about it. And as far as I know, Melinda had put her private life on hold. At least I never heard about her dating anybody.”

Kane found that his plate was empty. He was still hungry.

That’s the problem with salad, he thought. It doesn’t really fill you up.

“So you don’t know why she changed?” he asked.

“I don’t,” she said. “Maybe one of her coworkers could tell you. But I suppose you’ll find it difficult to get any of them to talk to you.”

Alma finished her salad, set her fork neatly on the plate, and pushed it away from her. Kane caught the waitress’s attention and made a writing motion in the air.

“I don’t know,” he said to Alma, “I can be surprisingly charming.”

That earned him a grin. The waitress handed him the bill. Alma reached for her purse, but Kane waved her away.

“My treat,” he said, and laid some cash on the bill. He helped her into her coat and they left the restaurant.

“I’ll bet half the people in that room are wondering who you are,” she said.

“Only half?” Kane said. “I’m disappointed.”

Alma laughed.

“I don’t know what we’d do for entertainment here without gossip,” she said.

They stepped out the door and Alma quickly lit a cigarette. As they walked up the hill, Kane said, “And what about Senator Hope? What do you know about him?”

Alma blew smoke.

“His politics are great,” she said. “He really seems to believe in good government and helping people. Some people say that’s just show, because he wants to be governor, but that’s not what I think. Politically, he’s very attractive.”

“And personally?” Kane said.

“Personally, he’s very attractive, too,” Alma said. “He and I came to the legislature the same year, and I know a lot of the women wanted to serve under him, if you know what I mean. More than one of them did, according to rumor. The women he’s dated say he is very nice and considerate, but he never dated the same woman for very long and none of them succeeded in snaring him.”

“Were you one of the women he dated?” Kane asked.

Alma shook her head.

“No,” she said in a tone Kane couldn’t quite identify, “I was busy with other things.”

They walked the rest of the way in silence, Alma smoking and Kane lost in thought. A large crowd had gathered in front of the Capitol, carrying signs that said things like: “Support Public Education” and “Children Are Our Future.” A tall, bald man in a suit stood on the landing. He seemed to be just wrapping up a speech over a portable sound system.

“What’s that about?” Kane asked.

“Teachers’ fly-in,” Alma said. When Kane gave her a questioning look, she went on, “People come to Juneau to put pressure on the legislature all session. There are probably two or three demonstrations like this a week, plus people visiting offices and packing the galleries and so on. Today, it’s teachers.”

“What do they want?” Kane asked.

“What most everybody wants,” Alma said. “More money. That’s why the oil tax bill is so important to the legislature. They can use the extra money to make everybody happy.”

Alma dropped her cigarette on the sidewalk and ground it out with her toe, then picked up the butt.

“Don’t want to litter,” she said. “It’s not environmentally friendly.”

Kane and Alma wound their way through the departing crowd, then climbed the steps. When they reached the entrance, Alma dropped her cigarette butt into an ashtray.

“Can you think of any reason Matthew Hope would have for murdering Melinda Foxx?” he asked.

Alma shook her head.

“I can’t,” she said, “but I can’t think of any reason anyone else would, either.”

They shook hands, and Kane found himself, as before, holding on to hers.

“Thanks for talking with me,” he said.

“Oh,” she said, “we’ll have to see each other again.”

“Why’s that?” Kane asked.

“Well, because my boss will want to know all about you, and I’ll only be able to find out so much by doing research,” she said, smiling. “Besides, you’ll soon learn that the best chance you have of getting anybody to tell you the truth here is to get them drunk.”

Kane released her hand and held the door for her as they walked into the foyer.

“Maybe I could buy you dinner tonight, then,” he said.

Alma smiled and put her hand on Kane’s arm.

“That sounds perfect,” she said. “I don’t usually get off until seven or so, so maybe we could meet. Are you at the Baranof?”

Kane nodded.

“Let’s meet in the bar and see what happens from there,” Alma said.

“I should warn you, I don’t drink,” Kane said as she moved away.

“I should warn you,” she called over her shoulder, “I do.”

K
ane’s cell phone rang as he was waiting for the elevator.

“Mr. Kane,” a woman’s voice said. “This is Mrs. Richard Foster. I was calling to see that you’d gotten settled in okay.”

“If you mean, am I at work on the case, Mrs. Foster,” Kane replied, walking away from the elevator, through the foyer, and out onto the steps, “I am.”

The woman’s laugh came through the telephone.

“I guess that is what I meant,” she said. “I understand Mr. Doyle can be difficult, and I understand you don’t suffer fools gladly.”

Kane smiled.

“Oil Can may be as strange as a snake’s suspenders,” he said, “but he’s not a fool. We’ll get along fine, and if we don’t I’ll take his toupee hostage and threaten to starve it to death.”

That brought an even bigger laugh.

“That toupee is something, isn’t it?” she said. “The first time he saw it, my late husband said he’d trapped one just like it over by Lake Minchumina.”

Kane’s smile turned into a grin.

“I believe that,” he said.

“Have you discovered anything yet?” the woman asked.

Kane watched people climb the hill, then enter one of the government buildings. Lunchtime here is like the tide, he thought. First it goes out, then it comes back in again.

“Only that Senator Hope might be a difficult client,” Kane said. “He doesn’t seem to want to cooperate with me or his attorney. Perhaps you could talk to him about that.”

There was silence on the other end of the line.

“Perhaps I can,” she said. “Well, I’m sure you’re busy, so I’ll let you go. Keep in touch. Good-bye.”

Kane stood there for a moment, looking at the cell phone in his hand. Just what is going on there? he asked himself. Shaking his head, he put the cell phone away, went into the building, and rode the elevator to the fifth floor.

A couple of women were laying papers on the big table in the Senate Finance Committee room, and a couple of men sat talking quietly on one of the pewlike benches. Kane walked through the room, looking at nameplates next to the doors that opened off it. Senator O. B. Potter’s office was at the far end. The reception area was dominated by a short flight of stairs that led to a fire door. The reception desk was empty. The door to Kane’s right was closed, but the one to his left was open to a room stuffed with two big, metal cabinets, several metal bookshelves overflowing with paper, and two desks, one of which was occupied by a fit-looking man in his thirties reading a thick document and eating an egg-salad sandwich. He had tightly curled blond hair and a bulb beach tan. He wore a dark, chalk-stripe suit and a pink shirt, set off by an even pinker tie festooned with Looney Tunes characters. A black band circled his left biceps.

“Excuse me,” Kane said. “I’m looking for Senator O. B. Potter.”

“Take a number,” the man said without looking up from his reading. “Everybody wants to see the Finance chairman.”

I wonder how snotty he’d be if I cinched that tie up some more, Kane thought.

“I’m here to see Senator Potter on a matter not related to the Finance Committee,” he said.

The edge in his voice drew the man’s eyes from the document.

“No kidding?” he said. “Something like a murder? You’re only the three-hundredth reporter to try to interview the senator. Or me. Or even the poor pages, who don’t know a thing.”

He shrugged.

“Not that I care. I don’t do appointments,” he said. “I should be writing a five-billion-dollar operating budget, but because Melinda managed to get herself killed, I’m reading some really long and boring backup on a bill to reauthorize the board of hairdressers. Can you believe it?”

“That sounds like a real tragedy,” Kane said. “Can you tell me how to make an appointment with the senator?”

The man shook his head, took another bite of sandwich, and went back to his reading. Kane walked over and stood above him.

“I’m being polite, but I can be less polite,” he said. “You may be a very important guy in this crowd, but I’m not part of this crowd. I’m not a reporter, either. I have a legitimate reason to see your boss, so if you continue to be so puffed up over how important you are, I might just decide to dribble you around the room to see how you bounce.”

The man looked up at Kane and smiled.

“That’s very butch,” he said. “With a personality like yours, I can understand how you got that scar. I don’t normally work in this little nest of offices, but I think that if you take a seat out in the committee room and wait, a mousy-looking, middle-aged woman named Anita will return from lunch and sit at the reception desk and you can ask her.”

He popped the rest of the sandwich into his mouth, made a shooing gesture with his hand, and went back to his reading.

I guess I can beat the crap out of this guy, Kane thought, or sit and wait.

He walked out and sat in one of the chairs that lined the wall. People came and went, more coming than going, so the benches began to fill. The crowd seemed to be more women than men, overwhelmingly white and tending toward middle age. Most were wearing business clothes and carrying briefcases or armloads of files. A bearded kid in jeans and a polo shirt rolled a TV camera in and positioned it at the back of the room. A small woman hustled past Kane into Potter’s office, hung up a coat, took a seat behind the reception desk, and put on a telephone headset. Kane went and stood in front of the desk.

The woman had generic brown hair of standard length and regular features. She wore a blouse, vest, and skirt of muted colors.

If she were any more ordinary, she’d disappear, Kane thought.

The woman seemed to be listening to something in her headset while writing on a message pad.

“My name is Nik Kane,” he said. “I’d like to see Senator O. B. Potter.”

She stopped writing, raised a hand, punched a button on the phone, listened, wrote some more, punched the button again, listened, wrote, punched, listened, wrote, punched. When she finished, she removed the headset.

“I’m sorry,” she said, “but Senator Potter is very particular about getting his phone messages.”

“You mean, Ms. Senator Potter is very particular,” the man called from the adjoining office, stretching the “Ms.” out until it sounded like a big bee buzzing.

“Oh, Ralph,” the woman said. Then, to Kane: “He’s such a scamp. How may I help you?”

Kane repeated what he’d said, which seemed to fluster the woman.

“I’m afraid the senator is very busy,” she said. “Could you tell me what you’d like to see him about?”

“The murder of Melinda Foxx,” Kane said.

That seemed to fluster the woman even more. She touched the black cloth circle on her arm and said, “Oh, what a terrible thing. Poor Melinda. Poor, poor Melinda.” She seemed to gather herself. “But the senator has left strict instructions. No reporters. The reporters have been very brazen since the…since the tragedy.”

“Can’t blame him for that,” Kane said. “But I’m not a reporter. I’m a detective.”

“Are you with the authorities?” the woman asked.

“You mean, the investigators haven’t been here?” Kane replied.

The woman must have heard the surprise in his voice.

“Well, not here in the office,” she said. “Are you one of them?”

“I’m working for the defense, for Senator Matthew Hope,” he said.

The name set the woman blinking very rapidly.

“Oh,” she said. “I’m not sure what to do about that. Let me go ask.”

She got to her feet, walked around Kane, knocked on the closed door, and let herself through.

“Good luck,” the curly-haired man called, laughing.

After the woman had been gone several minutes, Kane stuck his head into the adjoining office.

“Is there a back way out of there?” he asked.

The man laughed.

“Nope,” he said. “There’s the way you came in and the fire escape. That’s it.”

He got to his feet, put on an overcoat, and climbed the stairs to the fire door.

“Smoke break,” he said and went through the door, kicking a brick into the opening to keep the door from closing fully. Through the crack, Kane could see him light a cigarette, lean against the railing, and blow smoke into the air.

The door to the other office opened and the mousy woman came out, followed by another woman. The other woman was half Kane’s age, nearly his height, and probably a significant fraction of his weight, but her shape would have made the Venus de Milo weep with envy. Her dark hair was cut short, and she wore understated makeup and a suit that was both conservatively cut and bright red. Her features, particularly her nose, were too strong to meet conventional ideas about beauty, but all in all she looked like a junior high school boy’s wildest fantasy.

“Mr. Kane?” she said in a voice that sounded like angels singing, “I’m Letitia Potter. The senator is my father. May I help you?”

She held out a hand. Her nails were short and polished in the same color as her suit. Kane took the hand. It felt as cool and hard as marble.

“Pleased to meet you, Ms. Potter,” he said. “As I told this lady here, I’m working for Matthew Hope’s defense team and would like to speak to your father about Melinda Foxx. You, too. In fact, everyone who works in this office.”

The woman nodded as Kane spoke, and when he was finished, said, “I’m not sure what my father could tell you. He and I were at home together the night poor Melinda died. They made me come in and identify the body. It was horrible.”

Kane thought for a moment about the lack of emotion in her voice, then said, “Well, Ms. Potter, since Ms. Foxx worked for the senator, I was hoping there were some things he might tell me about her. Or perhaps you might. Or her coworkers.”

The woman nodded again.

“Please, call me Letitia,” she said. “Ms. Potter is so formal. And you are…Nik? Is that short for something?”

Kane nodded.

“For Nikiski,” he said. “My father hoped to homestead there but never managed it.”

“Nikiski. How Alaskan,” the woman said, then paused. “I’m not sure what my father might be able to tell you, Nik. He can’t see you now, because he’s got a committee meeting in”—she looked at her watch—“three minutes. The other senators get so cranky if they’re kept waiting. And I really think he, and I, and everyone else in the office should speak to the authorities before we discuss poor Melinda with anyone else. So perhaps you could leave a card, and we’ll call you when it’s an appropriate time to talk.”

Kane tried to remember the last time he’d been told to kiss off so nicely, but couldn’t bring anything to mind. So he handed the woman his card and walked out into the now-crowded committee room. At the door to the hall he stopped, turned around, and stood. The curly-haired man came back in from the fire escape, went into his office, and reappeared carrying a bunch of folders. He took a seat near the head of the committee table and spread the folders out in front of him.

A minute later, a short, solid-looking old man came out of Potter’s office and took a chair at the head of the table. Letitia Potter followed him, moving like she was on ball bearings. She took a seat behind the old man. When they were seated, Kane could see a strong family resemblance in their hairlines and eyes and the jut of their jaws.

Senator O. B. Potter looked around, banged a gavel on the table, and said, “The committee will now come to order.”

The small clumps of people who had been talking together broke up. Some took seats at the table. Others returned to the benches.

“Today’s agenda is,” Potter said, then paused as the curly-haired man crept forward to whisper in his ear. Potter picked up a piece of paper and read the names and titles of several bills in a strong, clear voice tinged with a southern accent. When he was finished he ran his fingers through his thick white hair and said, “Carrie, are you here to testify for the administration on the bill to extend the board of hairdressers and cosmetologists?”

A woman got up from the front bench and walked to a small table that faced the committee. She set several folders on the table, adjusted the microphone, and said, “Carrie Lawson for the Division of Occupational Licensing in the Department of Commerce, Community, and Economic Development, Mr. Chairman.”

Potter nodded to her and said, “Please proceed.”

The woman opened the top folder, picked up a piece of paper, and began reading.

If anyone at the committee table listened to the woman, he or she did a good job of concealing it. Potter leaned back to have a whispered conversation with the curly-haired man. A couple of the committee members read documents and made notes on legal pads. Another seemed to be reading through her mail. A young, thin, black-haired man got up from the table and walked past Kane, through the doorway, and out into the hall. As he passed, he jerked his head at an older man with a mustache, who got to his feet and followed him out. Members of the audience whispered to one another. People came and went.

The woman finished reading. Potter asked if anyone had any questions, thanked her, and asked if there were any other witnesses. A woman in a big, blond, beehive hairdo took the seat at the witness table, introduced herself as the director of the state’s hairdressers association, and began reading a statement.