Kent Conwell - Tony Boudreaux 06 - Extracurricular Murder (11 page)

“And that’s how Holderman made his thirty percent?”

Waldron chuckled. “Part of the game. He was one of Chu
Cheng Lee’s shills. Unknowingly, of course. Lee paid off handsomely for the first couple years to three or four of his initial
investors.” He chuckled ruefully. “Like they say, hindsight is
twenty-twenty. Anyway, most investors, like Perry Jacobs, were
greedy. They sunk all their profits back into the scheme. The
exceptional dividends drew in more suckers. Money poured in.
Then, just before the whole scheme crashed about him, Chu
Cheng Lee closed out the accounts and headed for no-oneknows-where, probably some exotic island where the USA has
no extradition treaties.”

Unlike some who can maintain layers of complex, contradictory stratagems and intrigues, I have never been able to
think in intricate and convoluted schemes. I’m a simple person,
and I think simply, which is one of the reasons I’m still number seven on Marty’s list of employees. Of course, we only
have seven PIs on the payroll. My next question echoed my
simple thinking. “So Jacobs blamed Holderman?”

Waldron arched an eyebrow. “You got it. “

“But, what about Holderman? Didn’t he lose his investment
also?”

A wry grin played over his face. “I’m no philosopher, Mr.
Boudreaux. I’m just a plain door-to-door salesman who has had
a little luck come his way. A lot of things happen in this world
that I don’t understand. But I know that at times, fate steps in
and throws me a curve, and turns around and lobs you one right
down the middle that you knock out of the park. That’s the way
life is.”

I had to agree.

He continued. “That’s what happened. Holderman pulled out
before the scheme folded. I don’t know how he knew, or if he
knew. Maybe it was just a hunch. Maybe he decided to listen to
me. I don’t know. But, from what I heard, he tried to talk Jacobs
into pulling out also.”

I grimaced. “Maybe Holderman was in it with Lee.”

Waldron shrugged. “Maybe. I don’t think so. Of course,
Jacobs swore he was. Like I told you, they almost came to
blows in this office. And Jacobs threatened to kill Holderman.”

“You heard Perry Jacobs threaten George Holderman’s life?”

The rotund salesman chewed on his bottom lip thoughtfully.
“Actually, he said ‘I’ll get you.’ Now, take that to mean whatever you want.”

“What about Lee’s records? That might indicate
Holderman’s culpability.” I knew the answer but I wanted to
hear it said.

“Forget it ” Waldron nodded to the south. “Lee destroyed all
records before he skipped. There’s no indication of how much
Holderman made or lost. All I know is when he pulled out, he
claimed he’d lost half of his investment. If you have to know
for sure, there’s always tax records. He’s bound to have filed a
return.”

“I agree. But, he might not.”

“Yeah.” He laughed. “By the way, are you sure you wouldn’t
be interested in a sound little investment? I could almost guarantee a handsome profit. All legitimate.”

I shook my head. “No, thanks. One other question.
Holderman was killed on November 11. He and Jacobs were to
meet with you that day.”

Waldron raised his eyebrows. “They did. That morning. That
was when they almost came to blows.”

“How can you be sure of the date?”

“I read about his death in the paper the next day.”

A chilling drizzle began falling as I pulled away from the
real estate agency. Putting off my visit to Seebell and
Holderman, I pulled onto 1-35 and headed north. Fifteen minutes later, I pulled into the drive at my apartment and lugged
the box of envelopes inside, dropping it on the couch.

Out of habit, I turned up the heat. Without thinking, I poured
some milk for the kitten. When I realized what I was doing, I
muttered a curse. “You don’t need another pet, Tony. Oscar’s
gone, and so is the hassle of feeding him.”

I went into the bedroom, and to my surprise, the kitten had
dutifully used the papers I had put down. After folding them and
putting down fresh papers, I called the office and brought Marty
up to date, after which I booted up the computer and went online.

I put in my request for arrest records on both Nelson
Vanderweg and Nelson Villafono from Boulder, Colorado, then
turned to the box of envelopes I’d hauled in from the evidence
room.

Holderman must have had a penchant for privacy for only
initials identified most of the individuals with whom he dealt.
After perusing a couple of months of his calendar, I went back
and jotted down each set of initials across the top of the page. Every time the initials were mentioned, I listed the date beneath
and the subject to the side. KN. Kim Nally. PJ, Perry Jacobs.
ES, Eunice Seebell. Holderman wrote out his wife’s name,
Frances, along with two or three other names. Of the remaining five sets of initials, B, HW, AW, CCL, and BN, I figured out
three; Al Waldron, Chu Cheng Lee, and the third, HW, I
guessed to be Harper Weems. But, that puzzled me.

Thinking back, I remembered my interview with Weems.
There was still something about the man that nagged at me, but
I couldn’t put my finger on it. Then I remembered. He had stated that he had no dealings with Holderman. The only words they
ever exchanged were `hi’ and `bye.’ The initials on the desk pad
plus the number of times they were inscribed on the pad seemed
to indicate more than a simple greeting or brief farewell.

While I had figured out four of the five sets of initials, BN
threw me until I found the same initials in a circled notation,
DD, Elgin, on July 12, 1994. DD?

The jangling of the telephone interrupted me. It was Stewart
to inform me he had found an apartment. “Six-fifty a month,
but I’m sharing it with my friend.”

“Sounds great, Stewart.” I was pleased, but just a little surprised he had managed a job plus an apartment in the short
time since he had arrived in Austin. I guess he knew what he
was talking about when he told his father he had a job waiting.
“What kind of job is it? You told me but I forgot.”

He hesitated. “Delivery. A courier for Austin Expediters. We
carry documents from business to business. Not much now, but
I can move up as we expand.”

“That’s good. You call your Dad?”

“Sure did. Gave him my home address. You want it too?”

“Yeah.”

He rattled off the address, which I recognized as the one I
had driven past the night before.

I nodded. “Got it. Hey, what have you got on tonight? I
thought I’d treat you to a big steak.”

With just the right touch of disappointment in his voice, he
replied, “I’d like to, Tony, but, truth is, I made other plans. You
understand.”

I understood. If his friend was the soft voice I’d heard in the
background the previous night, I would prefer her company
myself. “No problem. Listen, anything you need, let me know.
You hear? We’ll go out tomorrow or the next day, okay?”

“Gotcha, bro. Talk to you later.”

As soon as he hung up, I called Leroi with the good news,
and if the truth were known, with a great deal of relief. Looking
after a relative’s child would keep anyone’s nerves on edge.

Hanging up, I turned back to my computer, linking up to my
white pages database. I searched for the initials DD in Elgin by
inputting business, Elgin, Texas.

After a few minutes of searching the Ds, I stumbled across
Dreamstreet Dancing Emporium. I grinned. Emporium? You
bet, except in Texas emporiums are spelled h-o-n-k-y t-o-n-k-s.

And I remembered Chief Pachuca mentioning a topless bar
in Elgin where Holderman picked up his wife, Frances Laurent
Holderman.

At that moment, I would have bet my life savings, all $300,
that this Dreamstreet Dancing Emporium, aka DD, was where
George Holderman found his future wife.

Then I went back and listed each business he had noted on
the pad, keeping a record on the number of times each was
placed on the desk pad. Most were ordinary businesses; Hanks
BarberShop,OlympicGym,the YMCA,a handful of restaurants, pharmacies, supermarkets-nothing out of the ordinary.
Nothing unusual until, after about three or four years of desk
pads, I suddenly noticed the single letter B beside Lupe’s Tacos
on the February 2001 pad. I thumbed back to the earlier years.
The name Lupe’s never appeared. Skimming forward, I found
the B on the March and April 2001 desk pads. For the next few
years, Lupe’s Tacos was mentioned once a month, each time
marked with the B until June 2004.

Going back I rechecked all the pads back to ‘99, then forward to 2004. I was right the first time. There was no mention
of Lupe’s Tacos prior to 2001, and a reference to B only during
the same time sequence.

Could that mean something? Who was B? I frowned at my
notes. Or was I reaching too far? After all, Luby’s Cafeteria
was also mentioned once a month, same as Hanks Barber Shop,
Willis Cadillac, and a dozen other businesses. And on occasion,
some had initials beside them.

I shrugged off the question. If there was something significant regarding the initials, I’d learn it when I visited each of the
businesses with a photograph of George Holderman.

That was one of the drawbacks of PI work. Usually it was
days and days of tedious boredom and routine, shattered by
unexpected moments of absolute panic.

I finished just before midnight. Exhausted, I skipped my
shower and sprawled across the bed, telling myself that I might
have wasted the entire evening. Every one of my fancy deductions might be wrong. Only time would tell.

Next morning, I turned my head and stared into the eyes of
the tiny kitten curled on the pillow next to mine. I studied him
a few moments. “You aren’t staying Cat but I’m not throwing
you out. I’m going to find you a home. A good home. Until
then, don’t sharpen your claws on my furniture, you hear?”

He started purring.

Rolling out of bed, I showered, shaved, and filled my insulated cup with coffee and nuked Cat a bowl of milk. I needed
to pick up a bag of nuggets for him, a small bag because he
wasn’t going to be around very long, and I might as well pick
up a litter box at the same time.

I checked my e-mail. Nothing from Boulder yet. I decided to
wait for the report before calling the Ranchman’s Motel.

I headed to the office, a folder full of notes at my side. The
drizzle continued. The weather deteriorated throughout the day, but I had become so engrossed in reorganizing my notes, I
failed to notice. I was amazed at Holderman’s detail even
though I didn’t understand it completely.

KN was Kim Nally, and most of the notations concerning
her were two and three years old, cryptic notes such as kn 2:30
coco or kn 7 es. Coco I interpreted as the Coconut Palms on 35
South or one of the four other nightspots with the same initials.
Es could have been Embassy Suite or Eastern Steak House. For
all I knew, it could have even been Emfingers Siding, but I
couldn’t see Holderman and Kim Nally meeting at Emfingers
Siding at seven o’clock for a clandestine rendezvous among the
vinyl sidings.

Of course, my entire premise was nothing more than a crapshoot, but it was the only crapshoot in town. For almost eighteen months, Kim Nally was a regular on Holderman’s notepad.
Abruptly, her name disappeared, after a June 8, 2003 note that
read kn 100 bcp, dr h.

“Doctor H,” I mumbled, “oneo’clock.” June 8, 2003, I discovered, fell on a Sunday. I stared out the window at the drizzle running down the panes. Why does anyone see a doctor on
a Sunday? Obviously, an emergency. But, Holderman had it on
his calendar. Nobody puts emergencies on a calendar.

On a hunch, I thumbed through the yellow pages. “Why am
I not surprised,” I muttered a few moments later, reading the ad.
“Birth Control Planning, Dr. Evan J. Hodges.” I shook my
head. “The abortion Rita Viator had mentioned.”

I gave myself a pat on the back. “Move over, Sherlock
Holmes,” I muttered, turning to the next set of initials.