Paper Doll (11 page)

“Bob Stratton,” he said when I answered. “I think I’ve got some explaining to do to you, and I’d like to do it over lunch today if you’re free.”

“Sure,” I said.

“Excellent. How about Grill 23, twelve-thirty. I’ll book a table.”

“Sure,” I said.

“Just the two of us,” Stratton said. “You and me, straight up, check?”

“Sure,” I said.

“I’ll have my driver pick you up,” Stratton said.

“My office is two blocks from the restaurant,” I said.

“My driver will stop by for you,” Stratton said.

I said, “Sure.”

“Looking forward to it,” Stratton said.

We hung up. I dialed Quirk and didn’t get him. I dialed Belson.

“Quirk back yet?” I said.

“Nope.”

“You talk to him?”

“Yeah. The old black guy, Jefferson, doesn’t say anything he didn’t say to you. The old man doesn’t say anything at all. Quirk agrees with you that Jefferson’s lying about Cheryl Anne Rankin, but he can’t shake him. The old lady at the track kitchen seems not to work there anymore. Nobody knows where she is. Nobody ever heard of Cheryl Anne Rankin. If he can’t find the old lady from the track kitchen today, he’s coming home. Travel money gives Command Staff hemorrhoids.”

“Thanks,” I said and hung up and sat and thought. Stratton had called me himself. That meant a couple of things. One, he wanted to impress me. Two, he didn’t want other people to know that he had called or that we were lunching. So what did that mean? Why had Cheryl Anne’s mother disappeared? Why would Jefferson, who was so forthcoming about everything else, lie about knowing Cheryl Rankin? Since Jumper Jack seemed to be his life’s purpose, Jefferson probably was lying for him. Which meant that Jumper had something to do with Cheryl Anne.

I finished thinking because Stratton’s driver was knocking on my door. I didn’t know anything I hadn’t known before, but at least I didn’t know less.

The driver was a polite guy with blow-dried hair, wearing a gray gabardine suit, and a pink silk tie.

“The Senator asked me to make sure you’re not wearing a wire,” he said. He seemed sorry about this, but duty-driven.

I stood and held my arms away from my sides. The driver went over me as if he’d done it before.

“May I look at the gun?” he said.

I held my jacket open so he could make sure it wasn’t a recorder disguised as a 9mm Browning.

“Thanks,” he said.

We went out to the Lincoln Town Car, which he had parked under a tow-zone sign. He held the back door open for me and I got in. Berkeley Street is one way the other way, so we had to go via Boylston, Arlington, Columbus, and back down Berkeley. I could have walked it in about a quarter of the time, but I wouldn’t have been certified wire free.

Grill 23 is high-ceilinged and hard-floored. It is the noisiest restaurant in Boston, which is probably why Stratton chose it. It is hard to eavesdrop in Grill 23. The maitre d‘ managed to show me to Stratton’s table without losing his poise. Stratton had a dark, halfdrunk scotch and soda in front of him. He stood as I arrived, and put out a hand, made hard by a million handshakes. It was a politician’s handshake, the kind where he grabs your hand with his fingers, no thumb, and spares himself squeezing. It was also damp.

“Bob Stratton,” he said. “Nice to see you, nice to see you.”

We sat. I ordered a beer. Stratton nodded toward his drink, which, from the color, was a double. Around us the room rattled with cutlery and china, and pulsed with conversation, none of which I could make out. For lunch the crowd was nearly all men. There was an occasional sleek female, normally lunching with three men, and one couple who were probably on vacation from St. Paul. But mostly it was men in conservative suits and loud ties.

“Well, how’s the case going?” Stratton said. “Loudon Tripp is a fine man, and it was a real tragedy for him. You making any progress on running the son of a bitch to ground?”

It was a bright room, well lit, full of marble and polished brass and mahogany. Through Stratton’s carefully combed and sprayed and blow-dried hairstyle, I could see the pale gleam of his scalp. His color was high. His movements were very quick, and he talked fast, so fast that, particularly in the noisy dining room, it took focus to understand him. I didn’t answer.

The waiter returned with my beer and Stratton’s scotch. It was a double, soda on the side. Stratton picked up the soda and splashed a little in on top of the whiskey.

“Gotta do this careful,” he said, and smiled at me with at least fifty teeth, “don’t want to bruise the scotch.”

I nodded and took a sip of beer.

The waiter said, “Care for menus, gentlemen?”

Stratton waved him away. “Little later,” he said. “Stay on top of the drinks.”

The waiter said, “Certainly, sir,” and moved off.

Stratton took a long pull on his drink. There was a hint of sweat on his forehead. He looked at me over the rim of the glass like a man buying an overcoat.

“I’ve had my people check you out,” Stratton said. “They tell me you’re pretty good.”

“Golly,” I said.

“Tell me you are a very hard case, that you’ve got a lot of experience, and that you’re smart.”

“And a hell of a pistol shot,” I said.

Stratton smiled because he knew I’d said something that called for it. I was pretty sure he didn’t know what.

“Ever think of relocating?” he said.

“It’s often suggested to me,” I said.

“That a fact?” Stratton said. “I was thinking that there would be some real challenges for a man like you in Washington.”

“Really?” I said.

“Absolutely,” Stratton said. He drank most of the rest of his dark scotch, and his eyes began to look for the waiter. “Absolutely.”

“That’d be great,” I said. “I love those Puget Sound oysters.”

The waiter spotted Stratton and came over, Stratton nodded toward the almost-empty glass. The waiter looked at me, I shook my head.

“What was that about oysters?” Stratton said.

“Nothing,” I said. “I was amusing myself.”

“You bet,” Stratton said. “Anyway, I think I could help you to a pretty nice setup in Washington. You could be on staff, and still free-lance.”

“Gee,” I said.

The waiter returned with Stratton’s double scotch-soda on the side. The open bottles of club soda were starting to pile up. Stratton paused long enough to splash in very little soda, from the newest bottle.

“So whaddya think?” he said.

I took a swallow of beer. It had gotten warm sitting there while Stratton inhaled his winedark scotch.

“I think you have your ass in a crack,” I said.

Stratton laughed professionally. But his eyes seemed very small and cold and flat, like the eyes of some small predator. He put his scotch down carefully.

“You got to be kidding, my friend. You have got to be kidding. I have been in some tight places before, and I know a tight place when I see one. I mean, I’ve been a United States Senator for twenty-three years, and let me tell you something, I have faced down some hard moments.”

“You sicked the Alton County Sheriff on me,” I said.

Stratton started to speak and then stopped and sat back in his chair and stared at me.

“And a couple of ex-federal shooflys,” I said. “And one of them hit me on the knee with a stick, and it’s still sore. And you either tell me what your interest in the Olivia Nelson case is, or I am going to raise a great ruckus.”

Stratton didn’t move. I waited. A broad, charming smile spread across Stratton’s face. He let it rest there for a while for full effect.

“Well, by God, I guess my ass is in a crack, isn’t it?” he said. “They were right about you; you are a guy doesn’t miss a trick. Not a damned trick.”

He laughed and shook his head. The waiter came over and asked if we’d care yet to order. Without looking at him, Stratton said, “Shrimp cocktail, steak rare, fries, a salad, house dressing.”

“Very good, sir,” the waiter said.

He turned to me. I ordered a chicken sandwich and a fresh beer.

“Would you care for another drink, Senator?” the waiter asked Stratton. Stratton shook his head and made a dismissive gesture with his hand. The waiter departed.

Stratton folded his hands and rested them on the edge of the table. He examined them for a moment after the waiter left. Then he raised his eyes and looked steadily at me, his face a mask of sincerity.

“Okay,” he said. “Here’s the deal. I was, ah…” He looked back at his knuckles. “I was…” He grinned at me, still sincere, but now a little roguish too. “I was fucking Olivia Nelson.”

“How nice for her,” I said.

“This is off the record, of course,” Stratton said.

“Of course,” I said.

“I got to know her at a few fund-raisers. Her husband’s one of those Beacon Hill old money liberals, and one thing led to another, and we were in the sack.”

Stratton winked at me.

“You know how those things go,” he said.

“No,” I said. “How?”

“Well, tell you the truth, it wasn’t even my idea, I mean, Livvie was a hot item,” Stratton said.

He leaned across the table toward me now, a couple of good old boys talking about conquests.

“You know there was the official versiongreat wife, perfect mother, charity, teaching, patron of the arts, all that public consumption bullshit. And Loudon, the poor, dumb bastard, probably believed it. He was one of those my-wife-this, my-wife-that guys, you know. Didn’t have a clue, the dumb bastard. And every time there’d be a party or something, she’d pick out some guest and…” Stratton shrugged and spread his hands slightly.

“She was promiscuous,” I said.

“The queen of the star fuckers,” Stratton said. “You haven’t had Livvie Nelson’s pants off, you simply aren’t important in this town.”

“Always stars?” I said.

“Sure, it was like belonging to an exclusive club; you fucked Livvie Nelson, you knew you’d made it,” Stratton said.

Was it a long affair?“

“Not really an affair. It was great for a guy like me, just wham bam, thank you, ma’am. Usually she’d come to my office, when I was here in town. Very discreet. Nothing in public.”

Stratton grinned at me again. “I’m a married man,” he said.

“I could tell,” I said.

He shrugged and grinned at me further.

“And you were afraid,” I said, “that my investigation would turn up this connection?”

“Exactly, my friend. Exactly right. At first, we thought you’d just go through the motions and take Loudon’s money-he’s got plenty. But then you went down there and we realized you were serious. And we figured maybe we lean on you down there, away from me, so there’d be no way to connect me to it, and off your home turf, you know, so you’d be a little more vulnerable? And we have a good friend in South Carolina, and he’s holding some markers on the Alton County Sheriff…” He spread his hands again. “It’s how things work.”

“Who’s the we?” I said.

“We? Oh, myself and my staff.”

“So you went to all that trouble to keep me from finding out about you and Olivia Nelson.”

“Yes. I told you, we had you checked out. We didn’t like what we heard. You seemed to us like trouble and we wanted to get it under control right now.”

“So your wife wouldn’t know,” I said.

“Well, Laura and I have a kind of understanding. But… we’re planning for the presidential nomination, next time, maybe,” Stratton said. “It could have hurt us.”

“Still could,” I said.

“Hey, this is off the record.”

“What record?” I said. “You think this is an interview? I’m a detective. You could have killed her.”

“Me?”

“You and your staff,” I said.

“Don’t be absurd,” Stratton said. “I’m a United States Senator.”

“I rest my case,” I said.

“He’s back,” I said.

“Yes, he’s just down the hall.”

“Do you handle his checkbook?” I said.

“Mr. Tripp’s? Not really, why do you ask?”

“His check bounced,” I said and took the bank notice out of my pocket and showed it to her.

“Mr. Tripp’s?”

“Un huh.”

“Oh dear,” she said. “Probably a mistake.”

“Oh, I’m sure it is.” I said.

I waved it off and she showed me into Tripp’s big office and sat me in the leather chair by his desk. The office was done in green. The walls and woodwork were green. The rug was a green Oriental, the furniture was cherry, the high-backed swivel chair behind Tripp’s desk was cherry with green leather upholstery. The long desk had a red leather top, with a gold leaf design around the edges of it. There was a wet bar at the far end of the office, and a fireplace on the wall behind Tripp’s desk. It was faced in a sort of plum-colored tile with a vine pattern running through the tiles, and it was framed on each side by big cherry bookcases. The books looked neat and mostly unread. A lot of them were leather-bound to match the room. In two of the four corners there were cherry corner cabinets with ornate tops, and gold leaf dentil molding highlighting them. The corner cupboards were filled with designer knickknacks, and in the middle shelf on one of them was a picture of Olivia Nelson, or whoever the hell she had been, as a younger woman. Tripp’s desktop was empty except for the onyx pen set, a telephone, and a big three-check checkbook. The checkbook was set square in the center of the desk as if to demand reconciling as soon as you sat down. I picked it up and opened the ledger pages, and ran back through them looking for my check. As I read, I noticed that there was no running balance. Each check was carefully entered, numbered and dated, but there was no way, looking at the checkbook, to know how much you had. I found my check, right below a check to Dr. Mildred Cockburn. I read back further. There were checks every month to Dr. Cockburn. All the entries were in the same thin hand. I’d seen it on my check. Most of the other checks were obvious. Telephone, electricity, insurance, cleaners, credit card payments. The only recurring one that was not obvious was Dr. Cockburn. Many of the check entries had Returned written across the original entry, in red ink, in the same hand, including several of Dr. Cockburn’s. I looked a little harder. There seemed to be no checks rewritten to make good the ones that bounced. Something else was off in the check register. I didn’t get it for a minute. I went back through more pages. And then I saw it. There were no deposits. In the whole ledger, there was no deposit entry. I put the checkbook back, and sat, and thought about that, and in a while, Tripp came into his office carrying a folded copy of The Wall Street Journal.

“Spenser,” he said. “Good of you to come.”

We shook hands, and he went around his desk and got into his padded leather swivel. He put the paper on the desk next to the checkbook, which he straightened automatically so that it was exactly square with the desk.

“Do you have a report for me?”

“Not exactly,” I said. “Maybe a couple of more questions.”

“Oh, certainly. But I am disappointed. I was hoping you’d have something.”

I had something all right. But what the hell was it?

“Have you ever met any of your wife’s family?” I said.

“No. She had none. That is, of course, had she one once, but they all died before I met her. She was quite alone, except for me.”

“Ever been to Alton?” I said.

Tripp smiled sadly.

“No. There was never any reason.”

I nodded. We were both silent for a moment.

“Sometimes,” Tripp said, “I think I ought to go down there, walk around, look at the places where she walked, went to class, had friends.”

He gazed past me, up toward the ceiling. Far below us, where State Street met Congress, there was traffic, and tourists looking at the marker for the Boston Massacre, and meter maids, and cabbies. Up here there was no hint of it. In Tripp’s office you could just as well be in the high Himalayas for all the sound there was.

Tripp shook his head suddenly.

“But what would be the point?” he said.

There was something surrealistic about his grief. It was like a balloon untethered and wafted, aimless and disconnected, above the felt surface of life.

“How well do you know Senator Stratton?” I said.

“Bob’s a dear friend. I’ve supported him for years. He was a good friend to Livvie as well, helped her get her teaching appointment, I’m sure. Though he never said a word about it.”

“And you and your wife were on good terms?” I said.

Tripp stared at me as if I had offered to sell him a French postcard.

“You ask me that? You have been investigating her death for days and you could ask me that? We were closer than two people have ever been. I was she. She was I, we were the same thing. How could you…?” Tripp shook his head. “I hope I’ve not been mistaken in you.”

I plowed ahead.

“And you were intimate?”

Tripp stared at me some more. Then he got up suddenly, and walked to the window of his office, and looked down at the street. He didn’t speak. I looked at his back for a while. Maybe I should investigate other career opportunities. Selling aluminum siding, say. Or being a television preacher. Or child molesting. Or running for public office.

“Look, Mr. Tripp,” I said. My voice sounded hoarse. “The thing is that stuff makes no sense. I know you’re sad. But I’ve got to find things out. I’ve got to ask.”

He didn’t move.

“There’s pretty good evidence, Mr. Tripp, that your wife’s name is not, in fact, Olivia Nelson.”

Nothing.

“That she was sleeping with Senator Stratton, and maybe with others.”

Still nothing. Except his shoulders hunched slightly and his head began to shake slowly, back and forth, in metronomic denial.

“I’ve seen pictures of two different people, both of whom look like your wife.”

His head went back and forth. No. No. No.

“Have you ever heard of anyone named Cheryl Anne Rankin?”

No. No. No.

“Your retainer check bounced,” I said.

The silence was so thick it seemed hard to breathe. Tripp’s stillness had become implacable. I waited. Tripp stood, his head still negating. Back and forth, denying everything. I got up and left.