Killing Orders (11 page)

Pelly said, “This is the Right Reverend Xavier O’Faolin.”

I whistled mentally. Xavier O’Faolin was a Vatican functionary, in charge of the Vatican’s financial affairs. He’d been in the papers quite a bit last summer when the scandal broke over the Banco Ambrosiano and Roberto Calvi’s tangled problems. The Bank of Italy believed O’Faolin might have had a hand in Ambrosiano’s vanishing assets. The bishop was half Spanish, half Irish, from some Central American country, I thought. Heavy friends, Mrs. Paciorek had.

“And you were both old friends of Agnes’s?” I asked a bit maliciously.

Pelly hesitated, waiting for O’Faolin to say something. When the bishop didn’t speak, Pelly said austerely, “The bishop and I are friends of Mrs. Paciorek’s. We met in Panama when her husband was stationed there.”

The army had put Dr. Paciorek through medical school; he’d done his stint for them in the Canal Zone. Agnes had been born there and spoke Spanish quite well. I’d forgotten that. Paciorek had come a long way from a man too poor to pay his own tuition.

“So she takes an interest in your Dominican school in Ciudad Isabella?” It was an idle question, but Pelly’s face was suddenly suffused with emotion. I wondered what the problem was— did he think I was trying to revive the Church-in-politics argument at a funeral?

He struggled visibly with his feelings and at last said stiffly, “Mrs. Paciorek is interested in a wide range of charities. Her family is famous for its support of Catholic schools and missions.”

“Yes, indeed.” The archbishop finally spoke, his English so heavily accented as to be almost incomprehensible. “Yes, we owe much to the goodwill of such good Christian ladies as Mrs. Paciorek.”

Cecelia was biting her lips nervously. Perhaps she, too, was afraid of what I might say or do. “Please leave now. Victoria, before Mother realizes you’re here. She’s had enough shocks because of Agnes.”

“Your father and brother invited me, Ceil. I’m not gate-crashing.”

I pushed my way through a mink and sable farm glistening with diamonds to the other side of the room where I’d last seen Dr. Paciorek. About halfway there I decided the best route lay on the outside of the room through the corridor made by the potted plants. Skirting sideways against the main flow of traffic, I made my way to the edge. A few small knots of people were standing beyond the trees, talking and smoking desultorily. I recognized an old school friend of Agnes’s from Sacred Heart, lacquered hard and encrusted with diamonds. I stopped and exchanged stilted pleasantries.

As Regina paused to light a fresh cigarette, I heard a man speaking on the other side of the orange tree we stood under. “I fully support Jim’s policy in Interior. We had dinner last week in Washington and he was explaining what a burden these diehard liberals are making of his life.”

Someone else responded in the same vein. Then a third man said, “But surely there are adequate measures for dealing with such opposition.” Not an unusual conversation for a right-wing bastion of wealth, but it was the third speaker’s voice that held me riveted. 1 was certain I’d heard it on the phone two nights ago.

Regina was telling me about her second daughter, now in eighth grade at Sacred Heart, and how clever and beautiful she was. “That’s wonderful, Regina. So nice to see you again.”

I circled the orange tree. A large group stood there, including the red-faced man who’d been ushering at the church, and O’Faolin. Mrs. Paciorek, whom I hadn’t seen earlier, was standing in the middle, facing me. In her late fifties, she was still an attractive woman. When I knew her, she followed a rigorous exercise regimen, drank little, and didn’t smoke. But years of anger had taken their toll on her face. Under the beautifully coiffed dark hair it was pinched and lined. When she saw me, the furrows in her forehead deepened.

“Victoria! I specifically asked you not to come. What are you doing here?”

“What are you talking about? Dr. Paciorek asked me to the service, and Philip invited me to come here afterward.”

“When Thomas told me yesterday that you were coming I phoned you three times. Each time I told the person who answered to make sure you knew you were not welcome at my daughter’s funeral. Now don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

I shook my head. “Sorry, Mrs. Paciorek. You spoke with my answering service. I was too busy to phone in for messages. And even if I’d gotten your orders, I would still have come: I loved Agnes too much to stay away from her funeral.”

“Loved her!” Her voice was thick with anger. “How dare you make filthy innuendos in this house.”

“Love? Filthy innuendos?” I echoed, then laughed. “Oh. You’re still stuck on the notion that Agnes and I were lovers. No, no. Just good friends.”

At my laughter her face suffused with crimson. I was afraid she might have a stroke on the spot. The red-faced white-haired man stepped forward and took my arm. “My sister made it clear you’re not wanted here. I think it’s time you left.” His heavy voice was not that of my threatening caller.

“Sure,” I said. “I’ll just find Dr. Paciorek and say goodbye to him.” He tried to propel me toward the door but I shook his hand loose with more vigor than grace. I left him rubbing it and paused in the crowd behind Mrs. Paciorek, straining for the smooth, accentless voice of my caller. I couldn’t find it. At last I gave up, found Dr. Paciorek, made some routine condolences, and collected Phyllis and Lotty.

Chapter 13 - Late Trades

FERRANT DROPPED BY late in the afternoon with a copy of Barrett’s list. He was grave and formal and declined an offer of a drink. He didn’t stay long, just looked over the brokers with me, told me none of those registered as buying the stock were Ajax customers, and left.

None of the firms listed were familiar to me, nor were the names of the stock registrants. In fact, most of the registrants were the brokers themselves. Barrett’s cover letter to Roger explained that this was typically the case right after a stock changed hands—it generally took a month or so for the actual owner’s name to be filed.

One company appeared several times: Wood-Sage, Inc. Its address was 120 S. LaSalle. Three of the brokers also had addresses there, a fact that seemed more interesting than it really was. When I looked it up on my detailed map of the Loop, I discovered that it was the Midwest Stock Exchange.

There wasn’t much I could do with the list until Monday, so I put it in a drawer and concentrated on the NFL Pro Bowl. I sent out for a pizza for supper and spent the night restlessly, the Smith & Wesson loaded next to my bed.

Sunday’s
Herald-Star
had a nice little story about my acid burn on the front page of
Chicago Beat.
They’d used a picture taken last spring at Wrigley Field, a bright eye-catching shot. Readers who made it to Section III couldn’t avoid seeing me. The personal ads included numerous thanksgivings to St. Jude, several lovers seeking reconciliations, but no message from Uncle Stefan.

Monday morning, I stuck my gun in a shoulder holster under a loose tweed jacket and drove the Omega into the Loop to begin a day at the brokerage houses. At the offices of Bearden & Lyman, Members of the New York Stock Exchange, I told the receptionist I had six hundred thousand dollars to invest and wanted to see a broker. Stuart Bearden came out to meet me personally. He was a dapper man in his middle forties, wearing a charcoal pinstripe suit and a David Niven mustache.

He led me through a maze of cubicles where earnest young people sat with phones in one hand, typing on their computer terminals with the other, to his own office in the far corner of the floor. He brought me coffee and treated me with the deference half a million dollars commands. I liked it. I’d have to tell more people I was rich.

Calling myself Carla Baines, I explained to Stuart that Agnes Paciorek had been my broker. I was getting ready to place an order for several thousand shares of Ajax when she’d warned me away from the stock. Now that she was dead I was looking for a new broker. What did Bearden & Lyman know about Ajax? Would they agree with Ms. Paciorek’s advice?

Bearden didn’t blink or blench on hearing Agnes’s name. Instead, he told me what a tragedy her death was; what a tragedy, too, that you couldn’t feel safe working in your own office at night. He then punched away at his computer and told me the stock was trading at
543 3/8. 
“It’s been going up the last few weeks. Maybe Agnes had some inside news that the stock is cresting. Are you still interested?”

“I’m not in any hurry to invest. I guess I should make up my mind about Ajax in the next day or so, though. Do you think you could scout around and let me know if you hear anything?”

He looked at me closely. “If you’ve been thinking about this move for some time, you must know there’s a lot of talk about a covert takeover bid. If that’s the situation, the price will probably continue to go up until the rumor is confirmed one way or another. If you’re going to buy, you should do it now.”

I spread my hands. “That’s why I don’t understand Ms. Paciorek’s advice. That’s why I came here—to see if you knew why she’d warn me
not
to buy.”

Bearden called his research director. The two had a short conversation. “Our staff hasn’t heard anything to counter-indicate a buy order. I’d be very happy to take it for you this morning.”

I thanked him but said I needed to do some more research before I made a decision. He gave me his card and asked me to let him know in a day or two.

Bearden & Lyman was on the fourteenth floor of the Stock Exchange. I rode the elevator down eleven floors to my next quarry: Gill, Turner & Rotenfeld.

By noon, having talked myself dry in three different brokerage offices, I beat a discouraged retreat to the Berghoff for lunch. Ordinarily I don’t like beer, but their homemade dark draft is an exception. A stein and a plate of sauerbraten helped recoup my strength for the afternoon. Everyone had given me essentially the same information I’d gotten from Stuart Bearden. They knew the rumors about Ajax and they urged me to buy. None of them showed any dismay on hearing either Agnes’s name or my interest in Ajax. I wondered if I’d taken the wrong approach. Maybe I should have used my own name.

Maybe I was barking up an empty tree. Perhaps a late-night burglar, intent on computer terminals, had found Agnes and shot her.

I continued to prove that a woman with six hundred thousand dollars to invest gets red-carpet treatment. I’d talked to no one but senior partners all morning and Tilford & Sutton was no exception: Preston Tilford would see me personally.

Like the firms I’d visited that morning, this one was medium-sized. The names of twenty or so partners were on the outer door. A receptionist directed me down a short hallway and through the trading room where a score of frantic young brokers manned phones and terminals. I picked my way through the familiar stacks of debris to Tilford’s office in the far corner.

His secretary, a pleasant, curly-haired woman in her late forties, told me to go in. Tilford was nervous, his finger-nails bitten down to the quick. This was not necessarily a sign of guilty knowledge, at least not guilty knowledge about Agnes— most of the brokers I’d seen today were high-strung. It must be nerve-racking following all that money up and down.

He doodled incessantly as I pitched my tale to him. “Ajax, hmm?” he said when I’d finished. “I don’t know. I have—had a lot of respect for Agnes’s judgment. It so happens we’re not recommending anyone to buy now, either, Ms., uh, Baines. Our feeling is that these takeover rumors have been carefully placed by someone trying to manipulate the stock. The bottom could crash out at any time. Now, if you’re looking for a growth stock, I have several here that I could recommend for you.”

He pulled a stack of prospectuses from a desk drawer and shuffled through them with the speed of a professional card dealer. I left with two hot prospects tucked into my bag and a promise to call again soon. On my way to number seven, I called my answering service and told them to take messages if anyone phoned asking for Carla Baines.

At four-thirty, I’d finished with Barrett’s list. Except for Preston Tilford, everyone had recommended buying Ajax. He was also the only one who discounted the takeover rumors. That didn’t prove anything one way or another about him. It might mean only that he was a shrewder broker than the

rest—after all, only one man in one brokerage firm had recommended against buying Baldwin when its stock was soaring, and he was the only one out of the entire universe of security analysts who had been correct. Still, Tilford’s recommendation against Ajax was the sole unusual incident of the day. So that was where I had to start.

Back home I changed out of my business clothes into jeans and a sweater. Pulled on my low-heeled boots. Before charging into action, I called the University of Chicago and undertook the laborious process of tracking down Phil Paciorek. Someone finally referred me to a lab where he was working late.

“Phil, it’s V.I. There was someone at your house yesterday whose name I’d like to know. Trouble is, I don’t know what he looks like, only how his voice sounds.” I described the voice as best I could.

“That could be a lot of different people,” he said dubiously.

“No accent at all,” I repeated. “Probably a tenor. You know, most people have some kind of regional accent. He doesn’t. No midwestern nasal, no drawl, no extra Boston
r’s.”

“Sorry, V.I. Doesn’t ring a bell. If something occurs to me, I’ll call you, but that’s too vague.”

I gave him my phone number and hung up. Gloves, pea jacket, picklocks and I was set. Cramming a peanut butter sandwich into my coat pocket, I clattered down the stairs into the cold January night. Back at the Stock Exchange, a security guard in the hall asked me to sign in. He didn’t want any identification so I put down the first name that came to me:

Derek Hatfield. I rode to the fifteenth floor, got off, checked the stairwell doors to see that they weren’t the kind that lock behind you, and settled down there to wait.

At nine o’clock a security guard came up the stairs from the floor below. I slid back into the hallway and found a ladies’ room before he got to the floor. At eleven, the floor lights went out. The cleaning women, calling to each other in Spanish, were packing up for the night.

After they left, I waited another half hour in case anyone had forgotten anything. Finally leaving the stairwell, I walked down the hall to the offices of Tilford & Sutton, my boots clopping softly on the marble floor. I’d brought a flashlight, but fire-exit lights gave enough illumination.

At the outer door I shone my flashlight around the edges to make sure there was no alarm. Offices in a building with internal security guards usually don’t have separate alarms, but it’s better to be safe than sorry. Pulling my detective’s vade mecum from my pocket, I tried a series of picklocks until I found one that worked.

No windows opened onto the outer office. It was completely dark, except for the green cursors flashing urgent messages on blank computer screens. I shivered involuntarily and ran a hand across the burn spot on the back of my neck.

Using my light as little as possible, I picked my way past desks and mounds of papers to Preston Tilford’s office. I wasn’t sure how often the security guards visited each floor and didn’t want to risk showing a light. Tilford’s door was locked, too, and took a few minutes of fumbling in the dark. I’d learned to pick locks from one of my more endearing clients in the public defender’s office, but had never achieved the quickness of a true professional.

Tilford’s door was solid wood, so I didn’t have to worry about light shining through a panel as I did with the outer door. Closing it softly, I flipped a switch and took my bearings. One desk, two filing cabinets. Try everything first to see what’s locked and look in the locked drawers.

I worked as quickly as I could, keeping my gloves on, not really sure what I was trying to find. The locked file cabinet contained files for Tilford’s private customers. I picked a couple at random for close scrutiny. As far as I could tell, they were all in order. Not knowing what should be in a customer statement made it hard to know what to look for—high debit balances, maybe. But Tilford’s customers seemed to keep on top of their accounts. I handled the pages carefully, leaving them in their original order, and refiled them neatly. I looked at the names one by one to see if any of his customers sounded familiar. Other than a handful of well-known Chicago business names I didn’t see any I knew personally until I came to the
P’s.
Catherine Paciorek, Agnes’s mother, was one of Preston’s clients.

My heart beating a little faster, I pulled out her file. It, too, was in order. Only a small amount of the fabled Savage fortune amassed by Agnes’s grandfather was handled at Tilford &Sutton. I noticed that Mrs.. Paciorek had purchased two thousand shares of Ajax on December 2. That made me raise my eyebrows a little. Hers was a blue-chip portfolio with few transactions. In fact, Ajax was the only company she’d traded in 1983. Worth pursuing further?

I could find no other clients trading in Ajax stock. Yet Tilford had registered many more than Catherine Paciorek’s two thousand shares. I frowned and turned to the desk.

This was carefully built, of dark mahogany, and the lock in the middle drawer was tough. I ended up scratching the surface as I fumbled with the picklocks. I stared at it in dismay, but it was too late now to worry.

Tilford kept an unusual collection in his private space:

Besides a half-empty bottle of Chivas, which wasn’t too surprising, he had a fine collection of hard-core porn. It was the kind of stuff that makes you feel we should work toward Shaw’s idea of a disembodied mind. I grimaced, flipping through the whole stack to make sure nothing more interesting was interleafed.

After that, I figured Tilford owed me a drink and helped myself to some of the Chivas. In the bottom drawer I uncovered file folders of more clients, perhaps his ultrapersonal, super-secret accounts. There were nine or ten of these, including an organization called Corpus Christi. I dimly remembered reading something about it recently in
The Wall Street Journal.
It was a Roman Catholic lay group, made up primarily of wealthy people. The current pope liked it because it was conservative on such important points as abortion and the importance of clerical authority, and it supported right-wing governments with close Church ties. The pope liked the group so much, according to the
Journal,
that he’d appointed some Spanish bishop as its leader and had him—the Spaniard—reporting directly to him—the pope. This miffed the archbishop of Madrid because these lay groups were supposed to report to their local bishops. Only Corpus Christi had a lot of money and the pope’s Polish missions took a lot of money, and no one was saying anything directly, but the
Journal
did some discreet reading between the ledger lines.

I flipped through the file, looking at transactions for the Corpus Christi account. It had started in a small way the previous March. Then it began an active trading program, which ran to several million dollars by late December. But no record existed of what it was trading in. I wanted it to be Ajax. Tilford & Sutton was supposed to have taken largish positions in Ajax, according to Barrett. Yet the two thousand shares Mrs. Paciorek bought in December were the only trace of Ajax activity I’d seen in the office. Where were copies of Corpus Christi’s statement showing what it was actually buying and selling? And why wasn’t it in the file, as was the case with the other customers? Tilford’s office didn’t include a safe. Using my flashlight as little as possible, I surveyed the other offices. A large modern safe stood in a supply room, its door to be opened by someone who knew which eighteen numbers to punch on the electronic lock. Not me. If Corpus Christi’s records were in there, they were in there for good.