City of Ghosts (A Miranda Corbie Mystery) (15 page)

The girl’s voice rose. “Oh, we have just the perfect thing, Miss. We’ve got a whole section on the Roaring Twenties. That’s what my mom calls them, anyway … I don’t really remember much except Lucky Lindy and Babe Ruth, I’m only eighteen, but my mom says—”

“Your mom’s right. Can you put one aside for me? I take a seven and a half hat size.”

“Of course, Miss, I’m happy to do it! I’ll put one away for you right now—when will you be by to pick it up?”

Miranda hesitated. “Probably between four and four-thirty. Will that be all right?”

The salesgirl squealed and Miranda winced, holding the phone away from her ear. “Oh, I’m so glad—I’ll be here to rent it to you. Just ask for Peg, Miss. Oh, I’m sorry—I almost forgot. What’s your name?”

“Miranda Corbie.”

An awestruck pause. “Not—not the lady detective? The one in all the papers?”

Goddamn it.

Miranda reached for the pack of cigarettes on the desk. “Look, Peg. You’ve got to keep this between us, OK? It’s very important. And very—secret.”

Peg breathed heavily into the phone. “Oh, you can count on me, Miss Corbie. I won’t tell a soul. And—and—there’s just one thing…”

“Yes?”

“Can I have your autograph?”

Miranda grinned. “Sure, Peg. See you later.”

Miranda’s stomach growled again. She ignored it, puffing furiously on the Chesterfield. Turned to the mimeographed type of Jasper’s file.

Ran through it, looking for dates of travel.

Bingo. Page three.

Jasper was in Germany in ’37. Just in time for the “Degenerate Art” exhibit. That jibed with the program in his office.

His latest trip overseas had been just last June, for only a week.

She picked up a pencil and pulled out the Big Chief tablet. Wrote
art dealer, Mexico,
and
degenerate art show?
when the pencil tip broke. Slammed the pencil down and grabbed the fountain pen.

Whisper of movement in the hallway, soft tread. She looked up, listening, saw a shadow behind the glass. Not Jerry or any of the other boys from Tascone’s. Her heart was beating too hard, and she cursed herself for leaving the .22 at home, for not opening the safe and taking out the Baby Browning or the Spanish pistol.

The door slowly swung open.

Thirteen

A tall, well-dressed man in his late thirties stood in the doorway, hat in his hands. Dark brown hair, small mustache, smaller than Gable’s but not as wispy as Mischa Auer’s. Good-looking enough to play the lead in B pictures, with a high forehead and frightened blue eyes. They were fixed on hers.

Miranda let out a breath, unclenched her hands on the desk. Stubbed out the Chesterfield in the Tower of the Sun ashtray.

“It’s been a long time, Edmund.” Her voice was even, measured, as if she didn’t know why Dianne’s escort for frigid or straying upper-crust socialites and the occasional underground queer trade had suddenly appeared at her door.

“Come in. Have a seat.” She gestured toward one of the wooden chairs haphazardly arranged in front of her desk. “Want a drink?”

He was blurry around the edges, desperation and fear welling like the little beads of sweat dotting his skin. He hesitated, nodded. Miranda busied herself with finding a semi-clean glass by the file cabinet. Made sure the safe was locked.

The cops must have gotten to Edmund, and knowing the bulls, they rode him hard. Any whiff of his Saturday nights and they’d make his life hell—probably even throw him in jail. Doyle could sniff around fourteen-year-old Chinese girls all he wanted, Phil could spend his Wednesday afternoons at Dianne’s, no questions asked—but if you fucked the wrong gender, brother, you were ridden out of town on a goddamn rail, held up in the papers as an example of immorality run amok, never mind Finocchio’s and all the drag money it brought into the City of Sin.

Miranda took out the bottle of Old Taylor and poured a shot. He’d finished it by the time she sat down.

Expensive fedora, tailored clothes. He’d come up in the world.

“How often did Mrs. Hart call you for an escort job?”

He opened his mouth, shut it again, passed a hand over his sweaty forehead. Leaned forward and set the glass on her desk.

“I noticed you at the Picasso show. I hardly thought I’d need your services the next day.”

Miranda unraveled a tube of Butter Rum Life Savers, held out the candy to Edmund.

“Want one?”

He shook his head, and she popped two in her mouth, watching him.

“Mrs. Hart was my client. Did you know that?”

His hands folded and wound together, thumb rubbing the palm. His right cheek looked powdered, faint blue and yellow showing through.

Souvenir from the SFPD.

“Certainly I knew it. Lois told me she’d hired you to find the jade and that you’d been successful. She was gloating over how little she had to pay you.”

Miranda bit down hard, cracking the Life Savers. “Your Lois was quite a prize. All the same—the way it works, Edmund, at least for me—is that she is still my client. That means I protect her interests. That means I can’t represent you.”

Skin bleach white, then red, gradually pink again. Voice the slow, syrup tone before panic.

“Miranda—I need—you’re the only one who is safe for me, the only one I trust. You worked for Dianne. You—understand—the situation. And from what I could determine from the police and saw in the papers … you are under suspicion, too.”

Eyes large, blue, thick lashes, tears behind them like the bruises and scars behind the powder.

Like the man behind the mask.

Edmund Whittaker, small-time architect, cultured, good-looking and debonair, perfect decoy for blind husbands. Knew his Bach from his Beethoven, an escort only for the very rich and very exclusive, but his personal tastes ran to older men, a habit that brought him to Dianne’s and later kept him there.

Dianne’s Escort Service and Tea Room, 41 Grant Avenue.

They all met there, the dying and the already dead, trapped by the fat southern spider, another fly on her web, soft curls coiffed like an extra in
Gone with the Wind,
scent of magnolias and Cuban tobacco, while poison dripped from small white teeth splattered red with tea and burgundy.

No one escaped from Dianne Laroche.

Miranda lit another Chesterfield with the One-Touch on the desk. Someone put another nickel in the Tascone jukebox, Tommy Dorsey again.

If it’s the very last thing I do …

She leaned forward, hands on the desk. “I said I couldn’t represent you. That doesn’t mean I won’t help you.” She glanced at the clock above the file cabinet. “I don’t have much time. Listen, Edmund, let me ask some questions and then we can meet tomorrow or the next day. All right?”

The promise calmed him down a little. “All right. You know I had nothing to do with her death or the theft of the jade and other jewelry, nothing. The police … one of them hit me, he’d heard about—heard about me somewhere. I’m scared, Miranda. Scared to death.”

She frowned. “Hit the sonofabitch back next time. They’ll throw you in the cooler anyway, may as well hang for a sheep. Was it Collins? Red face, beady eyes. Number 598. All-American Fascist.”

Edmund shrugged, eyes drifting to the bottle still on the desk. “I don’t know. Could have been, I guess. Probably was. I wasn’t paying much attention … all I could see were the guns and the sticks and all I could think about was that it was the end. The end of everything.”

Miranda reached for his empty glass and poured another shot of the Old Taylor. “Tell me what you were doing at the Picasso show.”

He threw the whiskey back in a long toss, wiped his mouth, and sighed. Set the glass down on the desk again, gazing at the pale brown drops clinging to the side.

“All right. Here it goes. Lois calls me out of the blue the day before, tells me about the Picasso show. She knew I like art and that I know something about it, just a little knowledge here and there I’ve picked up along the way. Anyway, her husband was in Sacramento on business and her lover won’t—wouldn’t—go out in public with her at all.”

Miranda wrote a few notes in the Chief tablet. Murmured: “That would be State Senator Bodwin, yes?”

The architect smiled for the first time. “I’ve got to protect Lois, too, Miranda. If you heard it, I won’t deny it. But you won’t get it directly from me.”

She looked up at the man in front of her. “You’ve always been an honorable sort. Too honorable to work for Dianne.”

“I don’t work for her anymore—at least, not unless she threatens me with exposure, which she has done on occasion. No, I’ve been on my own for a while.”

“For decoy dates or the real thing?”

Discreet smile. “Both. I’ve developed a few connections.”

Miranda gulped the stick once more and rubbed it out. “Don’t let her pull you back. Whatever happens. She won’t go through with the blackmail. Dianne just likes to toy with her prey before she eats it.”

“I hardly think she’d call me now.”

Miranda shook her head. “Let’s hope so. So you took Mrs. Hart to the Picasso show, and she told you about the jade. What happened afterward?”

Panic started up again, and his eyes wandered around the room, coming to rest on the window, two or three inches left open. He spoke apologetically. “Mind if I close it?”

The door rattled under a loud knock. Edmund froze, face drained of color. The odor of grilled beef filtered through the room … Tascone order.

She stood up, patted him on the arm. “Go ahead and shut the window and keep your back to the kid. It’s my lunch.”

Miranda opened the door halfway, holding it in place with her foot. Jerry was carrying her hamburger and fries on a tray, skin blushing red to the roots of his hair.

“Sorry it took so long, Miss Corbie. The cook lost your order, but I checked up on it, and found it again.”

“Thanks. Just set it down over there.”

She pointed to the front end of the desk. The kid was looking around the office as if he expected Sam Spade to climb out of the file cabinet, followed by Casper Gutman and Brigid O’Shaughnessy. His eyes wandered over Edmund’s back. The architect faced Market Street, hands gripping the windowframe tight on both sides. Miranda dug into her purse and pulled out a dollar.

“Here. Keep the change.”

The kid’s eyes protruded and he stared at the money. “Gee … thanks, Miss Corbie. Sorry to bother you.”

She ushered him out the door. “Never be sorry when you’re bringing lunch, Jerry.”

*   *   *

Miranda concentrated on the food. Edmund declined her halfhearted offer of sharing the sandwich and weathered the interruption well, lighting a Dunhill cigarette and walking around the office, pausing to notice the Wells Fargo safe and the dusty Martell’s calendar on the wall.

Bun crusts and a few French fries littered the Buffalo China when she shoved the tray aside. Held the napkin to her mouth and stifled a burp. Pulled the Chief tablet over and picked up the Esterbrook.

“Sit down. I’ve only got a few more minutes. What happened after the Picasso show?”

He stiffened again, rubbed the cigarette out in the ashtray. His voice rose. “We were followed, Miranda. That’s what I came here to tell you.”

“Someone shadowed you when you left the Veterans Building? How, on foot, in a car? Did you get a look at him?”

He picked up the Borsalino fedora from the next chair and held it with both hands.

“No, not really. A man in a dark hat and suit, mid-thirties, maybe, from his posture. First on foot, when we walked to the parking lot … that’s when I got the feeling, you know, when someone is staring at you. Then in the car behind us, until I dropped Lois off on Kearny, corner of the de Young Building. She said her chauffeur was picking her up promptly at Lotta’s Fountain on Market. She didn’t want anyone to see her enter the Monadnock.”

Miranda nodded. “Too many detectives. Cops question the chauffeur?”

“Three times, from what I’ve heard.”

She made a note. “Go on.”

“I caught a glimpse of him in the mirror when the light hit us right—just an impression, really. Medium height, medium build … light skin, no facial hair, probably a blond, but I couldn’t say for sure because of the hat. It looked like a wide-brimmed, dark gray fedora, the kind that was popular about five years ago. There was nothing exceptional looking about him at all.”

“What make of car was it?”

He shook his head. “I’m not sure. Nothing large, a two-door coupe of some kind, newer than the fedora.”

“Did you tell this to the police?”

“Of course—and I assured them that I’d be able to spot the man again, if they could come up with a suspect. They didn’t believe me, of course, but it’s true—I’ve got a photographic memory. I always recognize something if I’ve seen it before.”

She stared at him thoughtfully. “Handy talent to have. You ever see this man before last night?”

He hesitated. “I—I can’t really say, Miranda. As I said, it was a brief impression. He reminded me of someone, a photograph, perhaps, but I couldn’t be sure. I’d know him if I saw him again, but I couldn’t make out his features exactly—”

“Would be better for you if you had seen him. The bulls don’t trust photographic memories. They barely trust photographs. They’ll be dying to nail you on a moral turpitude charge, anyway, and any chance of linking sodomy to murder is a chance the D.A. might take. They’ll think you either knew this guy or made him up. Anything else to tell me?”

His eyes held hers, large, sorrowful, light welling in the corners where the small red lines made a map in the white.

“It’s the truth, Miranda. I don’t lie. I’ve never lied.”

She sighed and bit her lip. “I believe you, Edmund. Though that doesn’t do you a whole hell of a lot of good right now, considering I’m persona non grata. But I don’t think they’ll expose you. Exposing you would mean exposing Mrs. Hart—and that would embarrass Mr. Hart. Embarrassing Mr. Hart is a criminal offense … even more than sleeping with the wrong gender.”

His shoulders relaxed. “I hope you’re right. I don’t have much of an alibi. I stayed up and listened to some music on the radio—Beethoven—had a drink and went to bed.”