The Prodigal Son (24 page)

“We’d like to keep the family busts,” Max said timidly, “but you can have the rest. None of her pieces is glazed or fired yet, though.”

“I’ll have that done in Florida.” Chez blew his nose quite daintily. “See you later,” he said, and went off toward Emily’s house.

Max allowed himself to tremble, but by the time he came in his own front door he was calm and composed. Which was more than could be said for Davina, in a temper.

“How dare you, Max!” she began.

He cut her short with a chop of his hand through air that whistled, the gesture was so fast. “For once, Davina, you will shut up and listen!” he snapped. “You’re a cock teaser who can’t resist teasing cock, but don’t try it on Chez Malcuzinski. He is a gangster — a
real
gangster! He’d as soon put a bullet in the back of your head as look at you. If you tease him into making a move, you’d better be ready to deliver, because he won’t like no for an answer after you’ve led him on. And you’ll look in vain for me to rescue you, because I won’t lift a finger for you. I love you, but I love living more.”

Her lusciously lipsticked mouth had dropped open, her fixed blue eyes had forgotten to blink; she had never seen this side of her husband, and it came as a shock. “I …” she said feebly.

“I haven’t gotten where I am by being unintelligent and naive, Vina. I may not have a college degree, but I’ve been
associated with C.U.P. for over twenty years, and the culture wears off as well as the learning. So I’ll repeat my warning about Chez Malcuzinski — he’s a bad man, stay clear of him.” He transferred his attention to Uda. “As for you, take care of your mistress. Now I’m going upstairs to play with my son.”

While Max played with his baby, Davina went for a walk: a long one. A mile up Route 133 sat Major Minor’s Museum of Horrors and Motel, which happened to be Davina’s destination.

It had changed out of all recognition since the days (not so very long ago) when it had catered for afternoon trysts between businessmen and their feminine targets. Now it was run in conjunction with a house on the opposite side of the road that contained a chamber of horrors that had rocked Holloman, Connecticut and the entire nation. Major F Sharp Minor had found his metier at last, renovated his motel into premises some felt better than the Cleveland Hotel downtown, and, besides a haute cuisine restaurant, offered an excellent coffee shop. Here Davina shed her outer wear and walked to a table in a secluded corner.

“I guess you had to come, but I wish you hadn’t,” was her opening remark, then, with a smile to a hovering waitress, “Coffee with cream, nothing to eat, thank you.”

“Was Val’s story about not being able to find me true?” Chez asked, eating mixed breakfast grills with pleasure.

“Of course it was!” she said rather crossly, then smiled at the returning waitress, who thought her beautiful in every way —
such manners! “I couldn’t very well inform him that I knew where you were. As far as the Tunbulls are concerned, you and I don’t even know each other. Otherwise it might be a bit difficult to explain how I just happened to appear at Max’s printery from my new premises down the road that you just happened to help me buy. As well as pointing my nose at Max.”

“What’s going on?”

“I wish I knew, but I don’t. On one level, this poisoner got us out of a hole, but on another, he’s put us in the soup. The cops are breathing down our necks, and they’re not stupid. When this stranger called last December and announced he was Max’s long lost son, I was stunned. Well, don’t sit there, stupid! You must know all about Martita and John because Emily always got the blame for their running away.”

“That was never fair! Thirty years ago I was just a kid — no way I could help Em.”

“Your beloved sister, Chez, was a bitch,” Davina said, chin out. “She tried her tricks on me too, but I’m no Martita.”

The dark eyes flashed. “You’re asking for trouble, Vina.”

“Crap, I am! I go down, you go down, Chester Derzinsky. Save your malice for people you can terrify.”

“Yeah, you’re safe,” he admitted reluctantly. “So you had to kill the long lost son to protect your son, right?”

“That’s just it, I didn’t!” cried Davina. Her voice fell to a whisper. “The poison is some stuff so rare that only a handful of people can make it. I know the husband of the woman who did make it, but no one seems to suspect
her
— she’s related to half the police force and her dad’s the Medical Examiner. It’s
not foxgloves or nightshade, things I could make. Even if I had some, I wouldn’t know how to use it.”

His breakfast finished, Chez lit a cigarette and beckoned for the waitress and coffee. “You trying to say we’re mixed up in this by accident?” he asked incredulously.

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.” Her eyes widened. “Chez, I’m afraid! I’m deliberately being incriminated, I know I am!”

“Don’t the cops have other suspects?”

“A black man — I mean a
black
man! A genius biochemist who’s written a popular book on his work. The long lost son, John, knew him and his wife in California. The wife — she’s white — is very beautiful. She could have been a model, except that she’s another biochemist, the one who made the poison. They’re a striking couple, Chez. When I saw them at the C.U.P. banquet, I was amazed. She looks at her husband as if he’s God.”

“Anything else to report?”

“No. And I hope you remember that I’ve paid back my loan.”

He laughed. “I don’t need your dough, Vina. There’s not a high end property in my part of Florida doesn’t come through me, and some of my commissions run into six figures. You’re safe, and you have to admit that Max Tunbull was just what you were looking for.”

“I admit it freely. I had no intention of continuing to model until the work stopped coming in, Chez. But never think you masterminded me through a marriage connection. You didn’t. I have a great talent for design that suits book publishing. I am
grateful for the loan that enabled me to buy Imaginexa. Grateful too for the hint to approach Max Tunbull. But my debts are all paid back and I owe you no favors, my shady New York friend. That part of
both
our lives is best kept closed.”

“Are you still smoking Sobranies?” he asked.

“When I need to make an impression.”

Chez leaned across the table, his head close. “Did the same guy poison my Em as well as the other two?”

“The cops think so.”

“But no one knows who it is, except it’s a man.”

“They’re not even sure of that.” She prepared to leave. “Now I’m going home to my baby.”

“How old?”

“Three months.”

“Did the worst happen?”

“Yes.”

“And the guy who wrote the book is black?”

“Yes.”

“Caught on the horns of a dilemma, Vina?”

“No. Max is a very good and a very loyal husband.”

Ivan and Lily gave Val lunch; Chez had gone off somewhere in his rental car, a Cadillac, without saying when he would be back, and Lily was the kind of wife would effortlessly produce a lunch for Uncle Chez when he returned.

His advent was the main topic of conversation.

“He seemed very nice to me,” said Lily, who was one of those fortunate people can find nothing to dislike in others. “I love his hair, it’s so trendy.” She ran an affectionate hand over Ivan’s thatch, which did cover his ears as a homage to the fashion, but longer than that he would not go. “And his clothes! Hip as well as trendy.”

Lily was far lower class than Emily had hoped for in Ivan’s wife, but it hadn’t taken Emily long to understand that there was no social class for saints, and Lily was definitely a saint. So she had never suffered the sharp edge of her mother-in-law’s tongue, and didn’t appreciate for one moment the significance of Davina’s gift for her — a strappy garden plant called mother-in-law’s tongue.

The two children came in, panting and laughing. Maria was seven, had the Tunbull hair and yellowish eyes, and promised to be very pretty when she matured; Billy was five, the same in coloring, and a little rotund; he had his mother’s sunny nature and a lust for adventure that kept her in a lather of worry.

“Mom, it’s starting to snow,” said Maria. “Please may we stay outdoors a while?”

“Yes, yes!” Billy trumpeted.

Lily considered it, smiled and nodded. “An hour,” she said. “Maria, keep an eye on your watch, you can tell the time. Bring Billy back whether he wants to or not.”

Off they trooped; she sat down.

“Chez has changed out of all recognition,” said Val, still prone to dissolve into tears. “Em would have been so impressed.”

“I hardly remember him,” Ivan said, tackling his creamed chipped beef and toast with enthusiasm; he hadn’t much liked his mother, especially after he married Lily and discovered how lovely women could be. “Except,” he said, swallowing a delicious mouthful, “he looked like a greaser.
And
a hood. Didn’t he hang out with Vito Gianotti, Dad?”

“He sure did. He must have been arrested a dozen times for this or that, but the cops always had to let him go. He had a brain. He also had a high opinion of himself. About fifteen years ago he moved to New York City and never bothered to come back, even on a visit. But he sent Em really good jewelry on her birthdays and Christmases. It’ll all go to you now, Lily. A New York City cop up here making enquiries told me he was running a racket involving good-looking, sexy girls, but not as prostitutes. Used them to blackmail old guys of some pretty big payments. If one was unco-operative, he had a special girl he’d send to see the wife. But he was clever, the cops couldn’t pin a thing on him or his stable. Then about five years ago he skipped. Even Em had no idea whereabouts he’d gone,” said Val, less fond of creamed chipped beef.

“Did Emily like him?” Lily asked.

“No. She thought he dragged the family down.”

“Not any more,” said Ivan, running a finger of toast around his plate. “He doesn’t look like a businessman, but he sure doesn’t look like a greaser or a hood. In Florida, what he wears is probably what businessmen wear instead of suits.”

“When are you away again?” Val asked his son.

“The week after next. I have to be here for the inquests, I can understand that. But it’s time to distribute reader’s copies of the book.”

“Is Jim going to do signings?” Val asked.

“I hope so. The Tattered Cover wants him, so does Hunter’s — his namesake bookstore, huh?”

“Somehow I can’t see Jim sparing the time.”

A car engine sounded; Ivan looked out the window. “It’s Uncle Chez.” He looked puzzled. “Why
is
he here, Dad? Sure, Mom was his sister, and we know he loved her, but it doesn’t make a lot of sense. He’s always eased his conscience with diamonds. No, Uncle Chez is here for a different reason.”

“That’s as may be, Ivan, but whatever you say, don’t say that,” Val implored. “He may not look crooked, but Chez is.”

The door opened, Chez strolled in bearing a package. He came around the table to Lily and pressed the package into her hands. “Thank you, Lily,” he said.

“What for?” she asked, bewildered.

“Cleaning up after Emily.”

The package contained a magnificent diamond bracelet.

“You just let me know if anyone ever makes you unhappy,” said Chez to Lily once the bracelet was on her wrist. “Anyone does, he’s a dead man.”

Lily laughed. Ivan smiled. Val looked horrified.

MONDAY, JANUARY 13, 1969

T
he inquest into the death of John Hall was a brief business that tendered a verdict of murder by a person or persons unknown.

Carmine’s concerns were not for the inquest. John Hall’s adoptive father, Wendover Hall, had not thus far arrived in Holloman. His booking on Saturday night’s red-eye special out of Seattle had not been canceled, and no further booking had been made. Though he lived in Gold Beach, Oregon, he had chosen to shuttle to Seattle rather than to San Francisco. Two brief conversations with Wendover Hall had convinced Carmine he did have information to impart, but disliked conversing with people whose faces he couldn’t see. He would save his news for a face-to-face confrontation in Holloman.

At noon on Monday, the inquest over, Carmine called Hall at Gold Beach. No one answered. Not for one moment did foul play cross Carmine’s mind; if Hall stood in danger, it would be after he got to Holloman. Even so, he called the
local cops to see if they knew anything, like whether Hall was still home.

“The poor old guy died of a heart attack Saturday morning on his way to Seattle,” said a cop voice that obviously knew Wendover Hall in person.

“Natural causes?” Carmine asked.

“Without a doubt. Silly old geezer shouldn’t have been traveling anywhere, his heart was so bad.” Came the rustle of papers. “On autopsy, a massive myocardial infarct.”

Delia was looking enquiring; Carmine hung up. “Died of a heart attack, doesn’t seem any doubt about that. And we are fated not to know more about our first victim.”

“Sometimes it seems to me that this country is
too
big,” said Delia, sighing. “West Coast people are quite different from East Coast people, and the people in the middle are very different again. Not to mention northerners and southerners. Poor old man! We should have gone to see him.”

“Try telling Accounts that,” Carmine said ruefully.

“Where now, chief?”

“I wish I knew.”

“Do you have any ideas — as to the guilty party, I mean?”

“Jim Hunter is still my chief suspect, but unless I can prove he took the poison from his wife’s refrigerator, the evidence is pure supposition. Nor does it answer the riddle of why John Hall had to die. Tinkerman is obvious. Had his been the only death, we could have built a circumstantial case. Then there’s Emily — what on earth could she have known?”

“If Jim Hunter is guilty, then the first and the third deaths could be red herrings. You know as well as I do that killing one person is enough to institute a mindset. If more deaths ensue, the killer doesn’t seem to experience additional remorse, or emotional travail of
some
kind. If the first and the third victims take the heat off Jim Hunter, they have a purpose.”