Murder by Candlelight (12 page)

No
way
Z was going to get mixed up
with
this
. After
the "ghost light" case Z had worked, he'd had enough of the
"supernatural" to last a life time.

"Please? You'd really like this girl I
met. She's not ... weird. Doesn't talk or dress or act funny. You'd
like her. Her name's Jamie Stewart."

Z could feel the oxygen being sucked
from Rembrandt's air. Barely able to talk, Z's last memory of lunch
at Rembrandt's was croaking out, "Wouldn't miss it for the
world."

* * * * *

Chapter 7

The
odd
thing about the recent
Jamie-Susan meeting was that Susan hadn't tumbled to who Jamie was.
And she should have, Susan worming out of Z that he'd worked with a
"Jamie Stewart." Why diamond-bright Susan hadn't connected
her
Jamie Stewart
with
Z's
Jamie
Stewart, he didn't know, perhaps because "Jamie Stewart" was such a
common name. If that was the case, thank God Jamie's parents hadn't
named her Penelope Stewart. Or Hildegard Stewart. Or Flossie
Stewart. Or Hortensia ....

It was only a question of time,
however, before ....

Z had to stop that line of thought!
Torturing himself wasn't going to help. For now, his Jamie-secret
was holding; for the future, he had to find a way to keep Susan and
Jamie apart!

Adding to his troubles, Susan had
called Friday night with some additional excuse why she couldn't
see Z on either Saturday or Sunday.

No fun times planned with
Susan, he'd slept most of Saturday morning, going out for something
less fattening than a peanut butter sandwich for lunch -- a double
pepperoni pizza at Pizza Hut. It was at Pizza Hut, in fact --
nothing satisfying the inner man like gooey cheese and hog jowl
drippings -- that he'd begun to put together a plan to regain
control of his life. (While Z seemed to be having a lot of trouble
with Susan these days, he still loved her too much to see brash
Jamie Stewart threaten his and Susan's relationship.) It was bad
enough that Jamie had found Susan's workplace and had been
talking
to Susan.
Simply
impossible
to have Jamie invited into Susan's apartment. To say nothing
of the sick feeling Z had about what Jamie would want to see once
she'd gotten herself inside.

At the same time, Z was
thinking about a way to shore up yet
another
uneasy front of Z's
increasingly chaotic life, Z deciding -- just before scarfing down
the last pizza piece -- to give the Kunkle house another once-over.
No way the cops would be watching the house now. Anyway, Z was
pretty good at spotting a stakeout. No. Z was determined to give
the Kunkle place another toss.

Thinking about what he'd found at
Kunkle's house, Z remembered something John Dosso said about little
Howie, that Kunkle was a small-time gambler, A bit of information
that explained the decks of cards Kunkle had in the secret drawer.
As for the rest of the stuff in there ....?

The plan Z thought up,
while munching down the
final
bite of pizza crust, was to kill two birds (Jamie
and Kunkle) with one stone, so to speak. What he'd do was get Jamie
to "aid him" on the Kunkle case; ask her to use her special "magic"
to help him search the place. After tossing Kunkle's pathetic house
and pretending to pay attention to whatever Jamie came up with --
women loved to be paid attention to -- Z would find a way to play
on Jamie's sympathy in order to get her to call off the
seance.

No matter what, Z
had
to keep Jamie and
Susan apart. Nothing good could come from
those
two being together!

Going to his office from the Pizza
Hut, Z found he had a message to call D.J. Jewell, Z dialing and
getting the man sooner than Z expected.

The only day of the week Jewell wasn't
either working on his radio show or doing it, the D.J. said, was
Sunday. So he wanted Z's interview tomorrow evening at six -- Z
reluctantly saying OK -- Jewell giving him directions.

The rest of Saturday, plus all day
Sunday, passing slowly as it always did without Susan, Z set out at
5:30 for the address Jewell had given him, Jewell's apartment in
the snazzy new Valley Forge complex a couple miles off Barry
Road.

Easy to find, particularly since the
appointment was in the early evening, the sun still two hours from
going to ground.

Through the outer wall of the
development, past an eventually-to-be-manned security station, Z
had no trouble locating the row of two-story buildings Jewell had
indicated.

Parking -- to the odor of recent
macadam, new-sawn boards, fresh latex, and well-watered sod -- Z
crossed the asphalt road inside the apartment addition, hopping the
curb to pass toy shrubbery that in a year or two, would become
bushes.

This particular group of apartments
was designed to look like a New England town, the manager's
apartment building complete with a clock tower sporting a copper
weather vane shaped like a fish. The individual units were painted
blue or gray with white board trim.

Jewell had said to go to the first
fourplex down the right branch of the access road. Apartment
A-1.

Easy. Z
was
a detective, after
all.

At the proper door, set in the
proper-shaded alcove, Z pushed the buzzer to hear chimes from
inside.

Two beats and the door opened, the
D.J. appearing, Jewell dressed in a white long-sleeved shirt. Also
white slacks and shoes. Looked like he was wearing a hazmat
suit.

"Come in," Jewell said in his rich
baritone, Z entering.

Jewell was a short, small-boned guy
with big ears, tiny nose, and the eerily unlined skin of a man who
made his living under artificial lights.

Though Z knew better, he was again
struck by how little a person's voice resembled a person's
looks.

Closing the door, Jewell led Z into
what builders were calling a Great Room, a peaked, story-and-a-half
chamber that combined living room, dining room and den, these areas
set off, not by walls, but by furniture groups. The space looked
even larger because practically everything in the room was white.
Walls, sofa, chairs, carpet. All white, with accents of dark
green.

Fronting the sofa were two end-to-end,
flat topped trunks, the containers serving as a coffee table. Two
limed-oak chairs completed the "living room" part of the open
area.

A freeze-dried tree decorated one
wall.

A tall fern, another.

Covering what looked like an entire
wall of windows, were full-length, pleated draperies -- also
white.

Specialized furnishings marked off
other areas, one end of the room set off by a bookshelf, a grouping
of chairs and a low couch.

The other end of the Great Room
contained a small, but formal

dining table -- enameled a dark shade
of white -- and four slender, ivory-colored chairs with padded
nubby-silk seats.

WHITE OUT, was Z's overall impression,
Z feeling that without an Eskimo's slit glasses in this quietly
howling wilderness, he would soon go snow blind.

"Nice," is what Z said.

"This is just temporary.
Until the house I'm having built in Leawood is finished. For all I
know, Kansas
City
may be temporary. My show's mix of talk and rock is doing so
well it's attracting national attention. Could find a spot in L.A.
or the Big Apple."

After proclaiming his excellence,
Jewell pulled up one of the smaller wood chairs, then, the other,
placing the chairs on either side of the trunks coffee
table.

They sat.

"Before we start," the D.J. said, his
voice a rich rumble even without amplification, "let me get us a
drink."

"Don't drink."

"Never?"

"Well ...."

"I've found in this
business that people being interviewed sometimes feel a certain
amount of stress. Perfectly normal, I assure you. On my radio show,
people call in from the comfort of their own homes. And even
they
have trouble saying
what's on their minds. Hem and Haw. Stutter around. What I'm trying
to say is that a drink would help you relax. Help you to just be
yourself."

"OK."

Rising, Jewell went to a cabinet that
Z hadn't seen -- its off-white hue blending with the wall's shadow.
Opening the double-swinging doors, Jewell pulled down a foldout
bar; took a flat bottle from a narrow glass shelf; got two
medium-sized glasses.

Unstoppering the decanter, he poured
each of them a drink.

Returning with the glasses in one hand
and the uncapped bottle in the other, Jewell sat
wearily.

Putting the frosted flask on the
table, taking a quick gulp from one glass, he handed the other
drink to Z.

Accepting the amber-colored liquid, Z
took a swig. Stifled a cough.

Now and again, Z drank a
little beer, but was not used to ... whatever
this
was. .........

The second sip went down more
smoothly, though.

"That's better," Jewell said, wiping
his mouth with the back of his free hand. "Being a D.J. looks easy.
All the D.J. has to do is talk. Yak, yak. All day long. Men come up
to me in the street and tell me their wife would make a perfect
radio personality. Nag, nag, nag. Day and night."

"I've been doing this job, or one
similar to it for twenty-five years, my friend. And this is the
first time I've hit it big. Got to have snappy patter, sure. Helps
to have transcripts of what other jocks are saying across the
country. But the secret is something deeper. Talent. That's the
secret. Some got it, some don't. I always had it. It just took me a
long time to find the right vehicle. And that's talk
radio.

"In the bad old days, I spun
'platters' -- golden oldies. Did weather. Hell, I did farm market
reports when I was on Radio Nebraska. Sow bellies. Hog futures.
Done about every damn thing there was to do around a radio station.
When I was a pup and there were still a few radio dramas trying to
compete with TV, I did sound effects. But the right vehicle is talk
radio.

"There's a lot of competition, though.
Got to be timely. Got to shock the listeners so the great unwashed
will call in and shoot off their mouths. It helps to have a crazy
or two out there. Regulars who call in. The kind of fools the rest
of us love to hate. Ku Kluxers. Black militants. Fem libbers.
Dykes. And if you pick up a mad bomber, that's heaven!"

Z didn't know what to say. He hadn't
heard much talk radio; and what he had, he didn't like. Seemed to
him like an opportunity for folks to show their prejudice. Display
their hatred for people unlucky enough to be on welfare. Show
disrespect for young people. Women. The government. (While, at the
same time, hiding their faces.) He'd heard some people brag about
how they'd made their pile all on their own, so they shouldn't have
to pay taxes. What they meant -- but didn't say -- was that, though
they'd gone to public schools themselves, they didn't want to pay
to educate "nigger" kids.

Call-in radio was the place to say
nasty things about community leaders who were trying to help the
poor. Calling them leftists. Or liberals, said with a sneer. The
attitude seemed to be, I got mine and to hell with everybody
else.

Z didn't say that, of course. Took
another drink to calm himself down.

Z's parents were proud, hard-working
people who, through bad luck in the depression, never had a pot to
piss in. The insurance company had reneged on his Father's life
insurance policy, leaving his Mother destitute. His mother, who
sewed and even did other people's wash, never could save up two
nickels to rub together, to say nothing of being able to afford
health insurance. It was because of self-satisfied people saying
that folks like Z's Mother were trash, that she'd refused to go to
a "charity" hospital. It was people like that who'd made his Mother
too ashamed to live!

Z took another nip to bring some
warmth back to his cheeks.

"Well, to business,"
Jewell said, picking up the bottle, freshening up his drink and
Z's. "I know what the
police
are supposed to be doing, whether or not they're
doing it. I know about county sheriffs. And federal law
enforcement. And security guards of one kind or the other. Falling
through the cracks, are private investigators. Just what is it you
do?"

"Anything."

"By which you mean ...?"

"What the client wants."

"And if the client wants something
done that's illegal?"

"That's different."

"I ... see. Perhaps if you told me how
you make your living, it'll be a place to start."

"Security work, sometimes."

"By that I take it you shadow someone
suspected of stealing business secrets. Stealing
clients."