Only Make Believe (10 page)

His eyes swept the collection of makeup on the bathroom counter. “But, given all this, if I’d had a glimmer of what might be in store for our artificial diva, I certainly wouldn’t have taken my eyes off her.”

“Diva fooled me,” I said. “I thought he was a she. For serious.”

“Which just goes to prove the old adage,” Doc replied, looking very pleased with himself, “that you can’t always tell a book by its cover or a queen by her crown.”

As far as queens and crowns went, I was about as ignorant as the next guy. If I’d ever entertained a transvestite officer at the New Victory Club, I hadn’t noticed. Carmen talked about USO drag routines often enough, but we all knew those were mostly played for laughs. Diva Capri was no joke.

Bud leaned in through the door. “His wife helped him shop for a dress one time. Carmen says the wife understood his need to wear women’s underclothes.”

“Doc,” I said, “keep in mind that DiGennaro had two children. Ran a successful business. Played golf.”

Doc sniffed the bottle of Joy and smiled. “So do you boys presume that the deceased wanted to be a woman every day of the week?”

Bud stared at Doc. “You don’t think DiGennaro was, you know, queer? A homo? Fruitcake?”

Doc returned to the bedroom. “I was giving the metaphorical devil her due, so to speak.” He set the camera on the bed. “Most people do believe that homosexuals secretly want to be women, and that they want to play passive, feminine roles with more masculine men. Thus explaining why they sometimes dress as women.”

“And you’re saying it ain’t necessarily so?”

“Freud would say that. But I would say, medically and scientifically speaking, that the jury is still out.”

“Does it matter what Nick was?” I was looking for a little protective cover. “Will that help Bud catch who did him?”

“It might tell us something about any man present last night who will admit he was fooled by such a person.”

“Confuses the hell out of me,” Bud said, clearly wanting a definite answer. “Was he or wasn’t he? Because if he was, well, odds point to the angry housewife or her big, healthy son. I mean, let’s say DiGennaro was a con artist as well as some kind of pervert. Even so, the husband in him would of opened the door for one or both of them. Bam, bam. Case closed.”

“A good place to start,” Doc said. “If you can place one or both at or near the scene—or someone acting on their behalf.”

“Motive’s there. Husband turns funny, wife don’t like it. Son wants to defend his mom’s honor. They hire muscle to teach him how to behave.”

Doc turned to Bud, an exasperated look on his face. “As I thought I made clear, transvestite males aren’t necessarily homosexual. That’s the European theory, anyway, a prewar German theory, or so some medical journals convincingly report. Dressing as the opposite sex is a fetish, a sexual fetish, rather than a sexual identity or gender. In our Mr. Diva’s case, as you suggest, women’s undergarments may have aroused him to a certain degree. The, ah,
suggestive
photographs as well. In this case, perhaps matters got a little out of hand—so to speak. Maybe he showed the photos to some unsuspecting younger man and—”

“Doc, this here’s some kind of homicide case, not a bunch of boy scouts in pup tents.” Bud was clearly getting rattled. Loose talk about homos and men wanting to be women set off his deepest, most elemental alarm bells.

“What a man is, and what other people believe he is—that’s not always the same thing, as I think you two gentlemen will agree. Hum-um?”

I could see Bud’s cheeks go pale beneath his tan.

“You boys were on the premises at the time that a person or persons unknown entered this room and severely beat and kicked Nicholas DiGennaro. Or am I mistaken? You arrived following an in-house call from the desk clerk—as I understand it. Hum-um? Together?”

Bud turned toward the window, hunching and rolling his shoulders.

I tried to protect Bud’s back. “We did a security check of the whole property just after midnight. And then sat up talking.”

“I was filthy dirty from weekend maneuvers in the Everglades,” Bud growled. “Needed a beer and a shower. Did the inspection in between.”

“What I mean to say is this. Your close working relationship is none of my affair—except in so far as it makes the Caloosa Club possible, keeps everything safe and secure, allows Mrs. Shepherd and myself to enjoy a discreet night on the town every week or so—in private. So live and let live, I say.”

“Doc,” Bud said, trying to explain without doing so, “you don’t—”

Doc picked up the big box camera, pointed it at Bud and set off the flash. “Not everyone thinks as I do. Some people in Myers will no doubt make assumptions about a man in a dress, will speculate about a mature man perhaps meeting younger, stronger men in out-of-town hotel rooms, may even imagine some connection between you boys and the, ah, deceased. Especially given the violence to the genital area.”

Bud gave Doc the kind of look that must have turned Japanese warriors into rice pudding.

Doc, sure of his ground, returned the look. “Not that I would make such a connection, of course. Or my wife. But you have to expect it. I’m warning you. There could be talk.”

Bud’s shoulders dropped an inch. He took a couple of deep breaths.

Doc pulled off his gloves and turned to me, smiling. “Mr. Eeew-ing, do you suppose we might break for lunch now? It seems we’re all growing just a bit peckish.”

Admiral Bruce Asdeck opened the humidor on his desk, selected a Havana cigar, clipped the tip, lit the mahogany-colored stogie with a sterling silver Zippo and drew and exhaled two long puffs of rich, sweet smoke before beginning the discussion. “Nicholas C. DiGennaro,” he muttered. “I don’t think I ever met the man. Hell of a thing to have happen.”

Asdeck had arrived from Miami while Doc, Bud and I were finishing lunch. After greeting Doc cordially, he’d asked Bud and me to brief him in fifteen minutes, ridden the elevator upstairs and changed from business suit to black bathing trunks.

“Hell of a thing for us, I mean,” he continued. “Right at the beginning of tourist season.”

Asdeck, managing director of the investors syndicate behind the Caloosa, kept a top floor suite with a view of the city marina. He stood at the corner window now, rolling the cigar in his fingers as if gathering thoughts. Out on the water, a Chris-Craft cruiser cut in front of a lumbering shrimper. Both captains hit their warning horns. The boats missed each other by what looked like inches.

“You men were in the house at the time DiGennaro was assaulted, I believe?” Asdeck checked his Cartier wristwatch. “That was at least twelve hours ago. Do you have a suspect? How fast can we wrap this up?”

When Asdeck resigned from the Navy, I’d followed him home. By 1951, the Caloosa was one of three stateside properties developed by Asdeck and run along the lines we’d perfected at the New Victory Club in Tokyo.

“You men are each other’s mutual alibi, I presume?” Asdeck scratched his chest, watching us. For a man in his forties, he kept himself in good shape. Like many submariners, he was lean and compact, with dark, unsatisfied eyes and close-clipped hair. I knew his workouts were as regular as mine. “Will anyone else question that—anyone that matters?”

I said I hoped nobody would bring it up.

Asdeck shrugged and rubbed the VJ-USN tattoo on his right shoulder. “Hirohito
hoped
he’d win the war in one decisive battle. General Custer
hoped
the Indians would cut and run. Hope sucks, gentlemen. Intelligence, planning and coordination are the keys to victory. So listen up. You men slept in separate rooms—if anyone should ask. Bud, you sacked out in a room you knew to be empty. Used your pass key. Couple of doors down from Dan.”

“Yes, sir. Understood, sir. Dan knew the room number. Didn’t bother to tell the desk clerk because it was so late, sir.”

“Exactly.” Asdeck examined the cigar as if suspecting it might be made of inferior materials. “We’re all agreed on that. Now, I made some early morning inquiries about the late, lamented Mr. DiGennaro. He had an excellent line of credit at his bank, his school book business was a going concern and he threw money at charities with both hands. He wasn’t a veteran but a couple of Navy League members in Tampa vouched for him. I took their word for him when he applied for membership. Clearly, that was a mistake. The man had some very bad habits.”

“Besides dressing up like a woman and doing a song-and-dance act in public?” I figured Asdeck needed to know the worst, first.

Asdeck flicked his cigar in the general direction of the heavy crystal ashtray on the desk. “He did what? Here? Last night?”

“Fooled the two of us and at least a few of the members. Was wearing a corset, garter belt and Nylons when the medics got to him. ”

“Hell, the man was an even bigger ass than I thought. The Caloosa’s not that kind of place, you know what I mean. Miami’s the town for female impersonators. How did we let this happen?”

I took the hit. “Sir, it’s my fault. I was busy and never got around to reading the special requests file.”

Asdeck threw me a hard glance and sucked more smoke. “God damn it, Ewing. You have to know what’s going on under your own roof. Every minute. Every goddamned detail. That’s what we pay you for. Both of you. Turn this into a ha-ha club—that’s just asking for trouble. Most of our members wouldn’t like it, either. At least Carmen knows where to draw the line as far as his own appearance is concerned. One of you should have stepped in.”

Well, yes and no,
I thought. “My fault entirely, sir,” I said. “Carmen brought in the beautician to do his hair and makeup. He arranged a rehearsal with Tommy. I let it all get by me.”

Asdeck set the cigar on the ashtray. “Carmen and Tommy, eh? In that case, you’d better put them both on a tighter leash. Tell Carmen to wash his face while you’re at it. I don’t want anything like this happening again. Ever. And I want it cleared up fast. And quietly. Understood?”

Bud’s heels clicked together. “Quick and quiet. Do my best, sir.”

Asdeck had never used such a tone to either of us. “Understood, sir,” I said. “Perfectly, sir.”

“As to DiGennaro, from what they tell me, it couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy. Rumors are that he got rich in the black market during and right after the war. Specialized in Canadian newsprint and retread tires. Entered the school books and wholesale paper business in 1946 using payoffs and muscle.”

“Sir, do you think he was connected?”

“To the Mafia? Bud, you’d better ask around on that. On the QT. We sure as hell don’t want any of those bastards operating in Lee County—coming in and killing people. Things are bad enough in Tampa and Miami.”

“His son suggested somebody forced him to dress up like that,” I said. “The boy himself seemed to know about the Caloosa, and as much as said he didn’t like what he knew. So I’m thinking it’s possible somebody powerful heard about his daddy wearing dresses and decided to put a stop to it.”

“We think he ran around on his wife,” Bud said. “And she knew about him dressing up and didn’t like that. So she’s got a couple of motives.”

Asdeck waved the cigar. “Sounds reasonable enough. But the truth is: we can’t just assume a connection between Mr. DiGennaro’s ha-ha routine and what happened in room 522. It may have been a simple case of a burglary gone wrong, something like that.”

“Except that the alleged burglar left Nick’s watch and diamond ring behind,” I said.

“Right. Yes. But cleaned out the wallet.”

Asdeck turned and checked the river traffic. “Could be one of our esteemed members, I suppose. Somebody with a hard-on for swish. Spotted DiGennaro as a pervert—you men know what I mean. Decided to teach the fairy queen a lesson. It would be easy enough to find out which room he was in.”

“Right. Yes, sir. It would.” Bud looked at me. “We might ought to review the procedures there. See if anybody did ask for his room number. I’ll speak to Phil.”

“And see if there was any ugly talk among the staff,” Asdeck added. “Dirty jokes about pansies and cocksuckers, off-color remarks, anything like that. Ask the part-timers, too. Betty, for instance. ”

I nodded. “Betty was right there at the bar. I’ll check.”

“What a mess,” Asdeck said, turning to the room-service tray set before the sofa, “Nobody can be ruled out. Coffee, gentlemen?”

“My list ain’t done,” Bud said. “So I better get back to that now.”

“The school books connection,” I said. “That rings a bell. I know a man I could call.”

“Ding-a-ding-ding,” Bud said. “Glad you reminded me. Bradenton. My reserve-unit deputy commander lives up there. Captain Yeomans. I ought to phone him, too. Nine-to-five, he’s a lawyer fella. I bet he knows what’s what.”

We used the secure line in my office. Kenneth Yeomans was willing to cooperate. With his permission, I listened in on an extension.

“A lot of people didn’t like the man. My dad bought tires from him during the war, said they were good tires, too—Firestones right out of the factory in Akron. Mom worried they were army rejects or stolen. Told Dad he shouldn’t trust a man who’d sell tires like that. Dad said he needed tires to run his grocery business.”