Murder Can Spoil Your Appetite (20 page)

I had purposely left Thursday morning free in order to spend some time alone in the cubicle, typing up my notes. I’d accomplished quite a lot in that area prior to yesterday’s meeting with Ron Whitfield, but I still had a long way to go before I was completely caught up. Later on, once I’d made some decent progress, I would talk to Lou about our setting up some appointments, maybe even for this afternoon. I was reconciled to the fact that he’d want to include a visit to the attorney who drew up Frank Vincent’s will—if not today, then certainly very soon. Because, naturally, I hadn’t been able to let on that I knew anything about that—not without revealing how I knew it.

Before settling down at the computer, I figured I might as well bite the bullet and deal with what, at that moment, I viewed as a singularly unappealing task. I picked up the receiver and dialed Jackie, mentally whipping myself for having set aside—and in seconds, too—the latest of my intermittent pledges not to let her intimidate me.

“I was relieved to get your message last night,” she told me. “I was beginning to feel edgy when I didn’t hear from you for so long.”

Before I started to defend myself, I decided not to, having just been clobbered by instant guilt. After all, she was motivated—primarily, at least—by genuine concern.

“Are you all right?” she asked.

“I’m fine.”

I knew exactly what I’d be hearing next, and I heard it. “You’re sure?”

One thing about Jackie: There are very few surprises. I couldn’t keep the smile from spreading across my face. “I’m positive. How’s everything going with you?”

“Good,” she said tersely. Jackie prefers to be the one asking the questions. “And the case? Anything new?”

“I’m afraid not. I still don’t know a thing.”

She clicked her tongue. “Well, imagine that.” Her voice was steeped in sarcasm. “I’d have thought someone would rush up to you immediately and say, ‘I did it, Ms. Shapiro; please put the cuffs on me.’ ” And then in a more sympathetic tone she urged, “Give yourself a chance, for pity’s sake. How long has it been, anyway? A week? No, not even.”

She was right, of course. I have to admit that I’ve always been a little lacking in the patience department. Anyhow, right after this I asked about Derwin. And she told me that he, too, was good.

Which in a way—and I know this sounds terrible—I considered kind of unfortunate. But I
had
handed myself an important assignment. And Jackie was an exceptionally nice, caring person, in spite of her tendency to be overbearing at times. So on the off-chance that she and her longstanding honey had suddenly gone kaput, I’d been prepared to revise my initial thinking and introduce her to Lou.

But, of course, with Derwin still in the picture I’d have to keep Jackie off my list—which now had a grand total of zero names on it.

Don’t worry,
I assured myself.
Just let your subconscious work on it.

 

Lou stopped by around eleven.

“I’ve got some stuff to report,” he said.

“I’m listening.”

“First and most important, yesterday I found out the name of the lawyer who drew up Vincent’s will. A guy named Phister. Graham Phister. Anyhow, I told him we’d like to meet with him, but he pulled that privileged communication crap on me. Said he wasn’t obligated to disclose the contents of a client’s will, that we could wait till the thing was probated. I said, ‘Look, I can always get a judge to issue a search-and-seizure warrant. So why not make this easier on both of us?’ He kind of hesitated, then told me he’d give it some thought and get back to me. I had the idea he might have wanted to check with someone before committing himself. Like maybe the widow. Or possibly Vincent’s mentor, da Silva.

“Well, Phister just called. Seems that, for whatever reason, he had a change of heart and was ready to talk about the will. He claimed there was no reason to come to his office, though, that it was a simple document and we could do it on the phone. Actually, he was right. Basically, here’s the story . . .”

I listened with feigned interest to the same brief details I’d gotten from da Silva the day before, inserting a well-placed, “How do you like that?” along with some “Mmms” where appropriate.

“So,” Lou summed up, “if Sheila Vincent offed her husband, it wasn’t for his money. Not with less than twenty thousand bucks in their joint account. After all, when you consider the expenses involved in keeping up a house like that . . .” He hunched his shoulders expressively.

“I agree. By the way, did you happen to ask this Phister any other questions about Vincent?”

“I did. But he claims he met the victim only that one time.”

“Why did I even bother to ask?” I grumbled.

“I’ve got a couple more things to tell you, too. While you’ve been holed up in here—most likely reading dirty magazines—I’ve been having myself a busy morning. I tried to get in touch with what’s-’is-name, Sheila Vincent’s publisher, a little while ago.”

“Morgan Sklaar.”

“Right. His secretary says he’s out of town and not due back until late tonight.”

“I suppose we should also see if we can set something up with Marsha Whitfield.”

“No kidding,” Lou retorted with a self-satisfied smile. “I already spoke to the woman, and she offered to come in tomorrow morning. I gave Joe Maltese a call, too. He’s home sick. The poor, fragile little guy has himself a cold. Being the sport he is, though, he agreed to let us drop by the house. I told him we’d be there around three. Okay with you?”

Naturally, I knew this had to happen. What’s more, now that I was no longer so sure that the widow did the deed, I had to concede that Lou’s theory might be on the money. Maybe one of da Silva’s people
was
the perpetrator.

Still, I was far from gleeful about the prospect of exploring this new direction. In fact, I was already reaching into the top right-hand drawer of my desk for the Tylenol bottle.

But then earning myself an “A” in rationalization, I immediately concluded that things might be worse. It could be my client we’d be questioning later—and I could inadvertently end up betraying the fact that he
was
my client.

“Joe Maltese at three. Sounds good to me,” I answered brightly.

Joe Maltese lived in a middle-class neighborhood in Englewood, New Jersey, which is slightly more than a half-hour’s drive from Riverton. His two-story, wood-frame house was the same as every other house on the block, except that his was the brightest: shocking pink.

Maltese close up seemed even larger than he had at the cemetery. He was maybe six-two and well over two hundred pounds. He had thick, dark hair, huge hands and feet, and a neck about the size of my niece Ellen’s waist. At present he also had a very red nose.

Mrs. Maltese was a thin blonde in chartreuse Spandex capri-length pants, high heels, and an even higher hairdo. She looked like a caricature of somebody in a Joe Pesci movie.

The two Maltese progeny, Eddie and Joe, Jr. (who, the boys informed us proudly, were ages four-and-three-quarters and seven-and-a-third, respectively) were sawed-off replicas of their father.

We were in the living room where Maltese, dressed in a short-sleeved Hawaiian shirt, was sprawled over a good portion of the avocado cut-velvet sofa, a tissue-strewn coffee table in front of him. “Grab a chair,” he invited, immediately after which he turned to his wife. “Why don’t you start supper?” The tone of his voice led me to appreciate that this bore no actual resemblance to a question.

“You kiddin’? It’s too early, Joe,” she protested.

“Not if you’re gonna make me a decent meal, it isn’t. And you’d better be, is all I’m tellin’ you. I’ve had enough already with a lousy little bowl of soup and a coupla pieces of leftover chicken. You never hear of feedin’ a fever?”

“It’s feed a cold,
starve
a fever, for your in-foh-mation, Mr. Know Everything,” the woman countered. Nevertheless, she got to her feet and with mincing steps made her exit on her towering heels.

Now Maltese directed his attention to his sons, both of whom were sitting cross-legged on the floor in the middle of the room, faces buried in their comic books. “And you two—get off your heinies, and go play outside. You can use some fresh air, for crissakes.”

“But it’s supposed to rain soon,” Joe, Jr. whined.

“So what? You think you’re gonna drown if it begins drizzlin’ a little?”

“But I still got my cold,” Joe, Jr. protested.

“Like heck you do. I’m the one who’s got your cold now, thank you very much.”

When the boys had reluctantly left us, Maltese stated the obvious. “So. You’re here about Frankie’s murder.”

Lou nodded. “That’s right.”

“Geez, what a tragedy that was. I just can’t get over it. Frankie Vincent was a helluva sweet guy.” His jaw shot out. “I’d sure love a piece of the son-of-a-bitch who did him.”

“I suppose you know we’ve discovered that Vincent was deliberately murdered, that somebody wanted the man dead,” Lou told him.

“Yeah. I heard. Damn shame,” he muttered. “A God damn shame.”

“You really liked Vincent, I gather.”

“I thought the world of Frankie, Lieutenant. If there was any justice, he woulda been a state senator today insteada layin’ in the ground in some cruddy cemetery.”

Lou’s brow furrowed. “I thought Vincent ran for the assembly.”

“Yeah,” Maltese responded, flushing. “You’re right. Assemblyman’s what I meant.”

“I understand you were active in his political campaign. How did that come about?” I asked.

“I volunteered my services. He was the best man for the job, and I wanted to see him get elected. I’ve always been interested in politics.”

Sure,
I said to myself,
about as much as I’ve been interested in bungee jumping.

Lou turned toward me then so Maltese wouldn’t notice his grin. Funny how, until that moment, I hadn’t been aware of what a really cute grin my partner had.

“Do you know of anyone who might have had a grudge against Mr. Vincent?” I put to the mobster. “Anyone in your organization, for instance?”

“Organization? I’m not in no organiz—” Maltese’s nose twitched, and he sniffled a couple of times. He tried again. “Organ—” The denial was interrupted by a sound that seemed to have originated in his toes. It was one of the loudest sneezes I’d ever heard. He made a halfhearted attempt to cover his mouth, but since this was a split-second after the eruption had already occurred, he sprayed most of the immediate vicinity. And while I managed at the last minute to jerk back from the line of fire, Lou hadn’t fared as well. When I looked over, he was grabbing a handkerchief out of his pocket and frowning down at his pant leg. I wasn’t keen on witnessing the mop-up operation, so I went back to concentrating on Maltese.

“You were attempting to say that you weren’t in any organization.”

There was a slight delay while Maltese honked into a fistful of tissues half a dozen times. “That’s right. Listen, I’m a building contractor, in business for myself. Period.”

“Okay, so you’re an independent contractor,” Lou conceded sarcastically. “But that hasn’t affected your ears, has it? Sometimes even independent contractors hear things.” He leaned forward in his chair. “Who had it in for Frank Vincent? And if you were as fond of the deceased as you’ve been claiming,” he added quickly, “you’ll give us a straight answer.”

“I don’t know nothing, honest to God.”

“You’re acquainted with Vito da Silva, I believe,” Lou brought up now.

Maltese’s eyes darted around the room, as if searching for some assistance. Then he responded carefully, “I’ve met the man.”

“Well, was there anyone close to da Silva who resented Vincent, who maybe was jealous of the relationship there?”

“How would I know a thing like that? Like I keep trying to make you unnerstand, I’m in—”

“Yeah,” Lou mocked, “in business for yourself. We got that.”

“It’s the truth,” Maltese maintained lamely.

Nobody was more surprised to hear my next words than I was. But they slipped out before I could stop them. “Can the crap, will you? We thought you wanted to help.”

“I do,” Maltese insisted. “But as far as I know, everyone liked Frankie. I swear.”

Now, as much as I’d have preferred to not even be here, the fact remained that I
was
here—and I was obligated to wring as much information from Maltese as I could. “No one in the organization felt he was being pushed aside by this new guy with a college degree—you, for instance?” I persisted.

“You got some mouth on you, lady. Anybody ever tell you that? And how many times I gotta repeat it? I’m not in no organization.”

“Of course you’re not,” I agreed in this saccharine tone. “So I don’t imagine you’d mind my asking where you were between six and eight the night Vincent was shot.”

“Why should I mind? Was—” That was as far as he got before being interrupted by another sneeze. This one was a lot lower on the Richter scale than its predecessor, and I was pleased to note that Maltese’s hand even made it to his mouth on time. “That was a week ago yesterday, wasn’t it?” he inquired a second or two later.

I verified that it was.

“Well, I was right here with the ball and chain.” I fixed a withering glare on the man, which he appeared not to notice. “Why don’t you ask her? Terri!” he bellowed.

“That’s okay,” Lou told him resignedly. “No need to bother Mrs. Maltese. I have no doubt she’ll confirm that. In fact, it’s the surest bet on the boards.”

It was the first day since I began looking into Frank Vincent’s murder that I would be getting home at a decent hour.

When Lou and I returned to Riverton at around five-fifteen, I’d considered going back into the office and spending some more time on my notes. But I suddenly realized that it wouldn’t be any great catastrophe if I loosened my grip on that whip I’d been holding over my head. Not if I didn’t make a habit of it, at any rate.