Crescent City Connection (36 page)

“They’re going to love that.”

In fact, Steve said, “Oh, peachy. ‘General Hospital,’ here I come. Oprah, you’re my girlfriend. You’re calling Dee-Dee, right? I can’t face him this time of day.”

Dee-Dee said, “Darling, what’s up? I’ve still got my sleep goggles on.”

“House arrest, Dee-Dee.”

“Oooo, baby. You must know what I did last night.”

“I think it’s only a crime in Georgia, but here’s the deal.” She explained.

“Good thing Layne spent the night. He can play games with the kids.” Layne, a puzzle maker by profession, knew every board game, card game, and parlor game ever invented in any country.

“Layne spent the night?” That was something new, given his allergy and Dee-Dee’s discretion.

“Separate bedrooms, of course.”

The FBI car was there in less than fifteen minutes. When Skip walked into Homicide, a smallish man with a shaved head was waiting for her, wearing black, not white. Bits of grass and weeds clung to his T-shirt, as if he’d slept outside. He had five o’clock shadow all over his skull.

She said, “I thought you wore white.”

“This is my disguise.” To her surprise, he smiled. “You can’t say it didn’t work.”

As she shook hands, she noticed he smelled as if he hadn’t showered lately.

“Sit down, won’t you? Would you like some coffee?”

He looked pathetically grateful, and Skip realized that she liked him. There was something infinitely sweet about this man, something uncomplicated and basic. She hoped he wasn’t a murderer.

She got him his coffee. “Shall we go someplace private?” The only choice was an interrogation room, but she sensed he’d do better there than in the detective bureau, with its noisy comings and goings, and the random prisoner sitting shackled, waiting to be transferred.

He seemed to relax a little once he’d had some coffee. She tried to put him at his ease a little further; she didn’t think bullying would work on him. “Isaac, we’ve been worried about you.”

“I know.” He seemed slightly ashamed.

She turned on the tape recorder she’d brought into the room. Isaac said, “What’s that for?”

She smiled. “Just something we do.”

“Am I under arrest?”

“Of course not. We’re not going to arrest you unless you committed a crime.” She paused. “What’s this about killing somebody?”

“I’m all right here. I can’t hurt anyone while I’m in here.”

He didn’t seem as if he’d hurt a fly.

“You’re a monk, aren’t you? A religious man. I’m sure you wouldn’t hurt anyone without a good reason.”

“I might’ve. I’m trying to think—I might’ve.”

“Do you have a problem with your memory?”

“No. It’s not that. I just can’t be sure. Listen, I might know where Daniel is.”

“Daniel? Is it Daniel you might have killed?”

“I don’t know. I need to see Lovelace.”

“I can’t let you see Lovelace if you’re dangerous.”

“I’m not dangerous to Lovelace. The last thing I would ever do is let any harm come to her.”

“Tell me where the person is you think you might have killed. He could be lying there hurt—we might be able to get to him in time.”

“You don’t understand. I think I might have killed someone; I just can’t be sure I didn’t.”

“Tell me about it.”

“There’s nothing to tell. I just might have killed someone, that’s all.”

Her frustration was mounting. She was quiet, sipping her own coffee.
Count to ten, Skip. Don’t blow this.

She said, “Can I ask you something? If you don’t want to tell me what happened, why did you call?”

“To tell you where I saw Daniel.”

“And where was that?”

“A house on Magazine Street.” He gave her the address.

“How did you happen to see him?”

“I followed him there. I was watching Lovelace to make sure she didn’t get into trouble. I saw those two guys go in the juice bar, and I went to call 911 and then you were there. I hung up and took shelter, and then when I saw Lovelace get in a police car, I left to try to meet her here. But on the way I found Daniel.”

“You found him.” He sounded perfectly sane when he was explaining himself, precise even—until he got to the punch line.

“I just saw him on the street—in a pickup. I followed it, of course.”

“You just happened to be at the place where there was a shooting, and then you just happened to see a man the police were searching for, whom nobody else could find….” She heard her voice rising.

Isaac shrank down in his chair. “You don’t have to believe me.”

“All right. You followed the pickup. Then what?”

He spread his arms, palms open. “Then Daniel went in.”

“And after that?”

“Then I watched the house for a while, but no one came out or went in. I couldn’t decide what to do, but I knew I couldn’t go home because you were watching my house.”

“Yes?”

“So I found a place to go and I saw that thing on television. That Jane Storey thing.”

“Umm-hmm.”

“I didn’t know they had that little girl. I had to do something.”

“Did you see the artist’s sketch?”

“Yes.”

“Did you recognize it?”

“I think it was Daniel. It didn’t really look like him, but if my dad’s behind this thing, it’s him.”

“Why didn’t you call us immediately?”

“I didn’t know what to do.” He jumped at a noise behind Skip; Shellmire came in.

Skip said, “Hey, Turner. This is The White Monk.”

“Well, hey, Mr. Monk. We been mighty worried about you.” He was giving Isaac his good ol’ boy routine; he must sense the same thing she had about Isaac. That he wasn’t a man to push.

“This is Agent Shellmire, Isaac. Why don’t you tell him what you told me?”

Patiently, Isaac told him, Shellmire saying, “Uh-huh, uh-huh,” every time he paused. When he had finished, Shellmire said, “Tell us about the person you think you killed.”

“I don’t really think I killed anybody. I just think I might have.”

Skip found herself grinding her teeth. She excused herself, and sat at her desk rubbing her temples, trying to think what to do. In a moment, Shellmire followed. She said, “What do you think?”

“Let’s get somebody on that house,” He used her phone to order surveillance, and she was grateful. She could have gotten someone herself, but the department was so hugely understaffed any help was welcome—even from the feds.

Especially from the feds; they had money.

“Okay. Let’s divide the labor.”

Skip looked at her watch. “Why don’t you work on The Monk some more? I’ve had him for half an hour. I guess I better wake up the assessor.”

“I was hopin’ you’d say that. I hate gettin’ cussed out this early in the day. The Monk’s more my speed; too holy for cussin’.”

“Hey, I just remembered something—Lovelace told her roommate he didn’t talk much. Maybe this is what she meant.”

Shellmire shook his head. “He’s a case for that good-lookin’ police shrink.”

Skip snapped her fingers. “Great idea. Let’s sic her on him.”

She called Cindy Lou. “Lou-Lou? Get up.”

“Girlfriend. It’s not even seven yet—and you kept me up late.” But it was a feeble protest; Cindy Lou couldn’t stand to miss anything.

“We got The Monk. He says he might have killed somebody, but he won’t give us any details.”

“So? Interrogation’s your department. Whatever happened to the rack and the iron maiden?”

“I’ve got a feeling something’s off here, but I can’t be sure. He seems sane; he just talks crazy.”

“Sounds like half my exes.”

Skip called the assessor next, asked who owned the house on Magazine Street, and after that, it was hurry up and wait till he could get to City Hall to look up the address. She rejoined Shellmire and The Monk.

For a grueling fifteen minutes she listened to the same phrases over and over: “I might have. I don’t know. How can I be sure?”

Finally, she and Shellmire decided to vary the routine. They asked The Monk about his father, his brother, his art, his relationship with Lovelace, everything they could think of that might shed some light. When he wasn’t confessing to murder, he seemed normal—if you didn’t count the shaved head, the vow of silence (which he told them about), and the all-white house (which Skip had seen for herself).

At seven-thirty, the assessor called with the name of the property owner—a Mrs. Julia Diefenbach, who was evidently an absentee landlord, as her tax bills were sent to Los Angeles.

Oh, boy
, Skip thought,
five-thirty on the West Coast. She’s going to nominate me for a medal.

A woman answered on about the fifteenth ring—the merest trickle of sound. “Hello?”

“Mrs. Diefenbach? Sorry to bother you so early. This is Detective Langdon, calling from New Orleans.”

The voice said, “Oh, my Lord. Oh, my Lord. Has something happened to Jamie?” Skip thought she must be about ninety-three, and not too well.

“No, no. Everyone’s fine. I’m just calling to find out who lives in your house on Magazine Street.”

There was a long pause; a pause so long Skip feared she’d gone back to sleep. But apparently she’d merely been paging through her too-crowded RAM space. Finally she said, “I don’t b’lieve I own anything on Magazine Street anymore. I used to, but I don’t b’lieve I do now.”

“Do you know a Daniel Jacomine?”

“No, I don’t b’lieve I do. Jamie handles all that; my grandson.”

“Does he live in New Orleans?”

“Why, yes, he does. Let me see now, does he live on Magazine Street? No, I b’lieve it’s Prytania.”

“Jamie Diefenbach? The same name as yours?”

“Well, it’s James really, but we just always called him Jamie.”

James Diefenbach was awake, alert, and a pain in the butt; he was a lawyer and a hard-nose, who absolutely declined to give information until Skip told him what the call was about.

She went and got Shellmire, who was still talking in circles with The Monk. “Mind getting tough with someone? People quake in their boots when they hear those three little letters.”

“Ah. Famous But Incompetent. Isn’t that what you people call us? And then you come around begging when the chips are down.”

Nonetheless, he performed the extraction like a dentist—a referral to a rental agent named Jay Fingerer.

Skip looked at her watch again. Nearly eight. Bad and good— bad, because chances of a confrontation before the streets got crowded were pretty much gone. Good, because everyone was probably up now, and not so grumpy.

Or so she thought. The rental agent was plenty grumpy, and an hour away from his office, what with taking kids to school, and another appointment. “Mr. Fingerer,” she said, “this is a matter of life and death. Could you possibly send someone else to look up the record?”

“Life and death? It doesn’t have anything to do with those kidnappings, does it?”

Damn. All I need
. “I’m afraid I can’t say what it’s about. All I can tell you is we badly need your help, and there’s really no time to spare.”

“Hey, I hope they don’t have a time bomb in there.”

Me, too.
She also hoped Fingerer’s immediate circle didn’t include members of the media.

Apparently, she impressed him with the urgency of the problem. He called back in fifteen minutes. “I think I’ve got something hot for you. The guy gave his name as Melvin Gibson. Like Mel, you know? Like it was the first name that came into his head. Know what else? He paid us in cash. I remember him now.”

For a moment she considered asking if Gibson looked like the police sketch of the McDonogh kidnapper, but she decided against it. If it was Daniel, his own brother couldn’t identify him from that.

Fingerer was still talking. “He rented ’em both.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“That’s a duplex. He rented both sides of it—paid first and last month’s, plus a security deposit.”

“When?”

“About two weeks ago.”

THEY MOVED TO FBI headquarters—Shellmire; Skip; Cappello because she was Skip’s sergeant; the FBI psychologist and Cindy Lou; Abasolo; Joe Tarantino, the lieutenant in charge of Homicide; and Captain Marshall King, one of the superintendent’s stooges. King wouldn’t make a move without calling the chief, but Skip preferred him to the superintendent—he had a reputation for half a brain at least. She finally had the department’s attention.

But now it was the FBI’s case—technically. Department lore had it that the FBI assumed command only when they thought they could get some good fast ink. If they were optimistic, there was going to be skirmishing.

King left the room and stayed gone a long time. When he came back, he was accompanied by Harold Goerner, the Special Agent in Charge, and he was tight-lipped.

The fighting over command was over—at least for the moment—with predictable results. The feds could always unload it if they thought the case was turning to dog poop.

Goerner was a short, thick man, not pear-shaped like Shellmire, not soft-looking, just ursine. He was alert and as straight-backed as a recent Marine recruit. He had dark hair, a dark mustache, and a slightly irritated manner, as if he’d snap at you if you offered him a cup of coffee. Skip disliked him almost on sight.

She and Shellmire exchanged glances. They had ridden over together, speculating on who would “assume on” the case and what the consequences would be in each scenario. Skip said the feds would dump it. “Want to bet?” Shellmire said. “You don’t know about our secret weapon.”

“What?” she said, “What? Tell me, dammit.”

“Uh-uh. But you’re gonna like it. I wish I could say the same for Goerner.”

“What’s he like?”

“He’s like some dude whose father was in the military and woke him up every day at five
A.M.
and threw him in a cold shower. And then later he couldn’t decide whether to rebel or conform.”

“I don’t get it.”

“It’s like he’s pissed off all the time, because he thinks he’s supposed to be a real hardnose and he doesn’t want to, but he’s got to or he’ll disappoint his daddy. So he’s not only a hardnose, but a pissed-off hardnose.”

“Charming.”

“Tell me about your guys.”

“They’re all solid except for King—I don’t really know him.”