Paper Phoenix: A Mystery of San Francisco in the '70s (A Classic Cozy--with Romance!) (16 page)

Richard put down his fork. “You’d better watch your mouth, Maggie. Do you realize how much harm you could do me, talking like that?”

“You said you didn’t like to discuss truth. But what I said is the truth. Isn’t it?”

Richard’s eyes swiveled between Andrew and me, and I could see him trying to think on his feet, work out a story that would put us off.

Andrew said, “We know it’s true. We know about the story Larry had on you.”

Something changed in Richard’s face. He was a pragmatist. I didn’t think he would fight for territory that was irrevocably lost, and I was right. He switched his ground, giving up the window dressing of protest. “If you have Larry’s story, then you only have Larry’s side of it.”

“That’s right,” Andrew said.

Nobody was eating. My throat had closed so tightly I couldn’t swallow. Although Richard seemed composed, I saw a drop of perspiration standing at his hairline. He had a look of intense concentration, as if he were playing in a chess tournament, or performing an experiment in ESP.

“Exactly what do you have?” he asked.

“Dallas, Framton Associates, a two-hundred-fifty-thousand-dollar partnership,” Andrew answered promptly.

“I see.” Richard patted his mouth with his napkin. He looked from me to Andrew and said, “Let me try to explain how it was. I know it will sound naive, but I actually didn’t realize what was happening until it was too late to back out.”

He was incredible. I couldn’t keep the sarcasm out of my voice when I said, “Surely you’re doing yourself an injustice.”

He shot me a baleful look. “You don’t have to believe me. I’m sure you wouldn’t give credence to anything I’d say.”

“I only beg you to spare us any tales of being a yokel caught out of your depth. You’ve spent your whole life making sure you’re not one.”

He turned to Andrew. “I admit Jane Malone introduced me to Bill Framton. It was a purely social occasion. We met for drinks at the Yacht Club. After that, Bill and I played tennis a few times while he was in town. He’s a great player. Wiped up the court with me.” He made an attempt at a self-deprecating grin that was almost grotesque. Getting no response, he went on. “He was in town for a couple of weeks, and I saw quite a bit of him. He’s not your typical cowboy. Very knowledgeable fellow, knows a lot about art. Collects paintings.”

The last was meant to appeal to me. I was supposed to say, “Oh, really? What artists does he like? What period? How fascinating.” I was twisting Arturo’s spotless napkin as if it were a dishrag.

“His last night in town we had dinner together,” Richard resumed. “Great evening, very enjoyable. After dinner, we were drinking brandy, and he started talking about his latest project— an industrial park in Dallas. Just casual conversation, you know. I was interested, and gave him a few pointers, and before I knew it he had offered me a partnership.” Some of the lines in Richard’s face smoothed out in the remembered glow of that evening.

“Why didn’t you tell him straight out you couldn’t afford it?” I asked.

Richard opened his hands wide. “I did. That’s exactly what I told him. I said, ‘I’m salivating, but I don’t have that kind of cash.’ I laid it on the line.”

“At which point he offered you a loan,” Andrew said.

“That’s right. He offered me a loan, and I took it because it was too damn good a deal to turn down.”

Andrew toyed with his fork. “You didn’t think it was odd when he didn’t ask for security?”

“Yes,” said Richard tightly.

“You didn’t wonder what was expected of you for this fabulous deal? Or didn’t you know already?” Andrew watched Richard narrowly.

“All right!” Richard threw down his napkin and got up so rapidly his chair fell backward, hitting the floor with a thump. “All right, if you don’t want to try to understand how it was. How could I expect a snot-nosed, self-righteous little bastard like you to comprehend anything about business?” He backed away from us. “Yes, I knew what was happening. But you won’t make me out to be a criminal. It wasn’t done in a— a criminal way.”

Neither Andrew nor I said anything. I actually felt embarrassed for Richard. Did he believe that because a bribe had been offered and accepted over after-dinner brandy he was absolved of wrongdoing?

Richard glared at us for a few moments, then sat on the sofa. “Now I want you to tell me something,” he said grimly. “Larry Hawkins didn’t broadcast the details of stories he was working on, but you’ve got details. How did you get them? Just how the hell did the two of you find out about this?”

The atmosphere in the room seemed to vibrate. So far, we’d had only confirmation of what we already knew. Now it was time to explore uncharted territory, and it was my move.

“The fact is, we found the story in a folder— the folder where Larry Hawkins kept his work in progress,” I said. A startled, uncomprehending frown appeared on Richard’s face. “And the way we got the folder is interesting. I found it in your safe, Richard. The wall safe in your office. We’d like to know how it happened to be there.”

It took Richard a few moments to take in what I’d said. His face blanched whiter beneath the remains of his tan, giving him a jaundiced look. Then his color came flooding back and he said, “You bitch. You’ll never give up until you’ve nailed me to the wall, will you?”

Andrew’s hand was on my arm. “Why don’t you just explain how you got the folder?” he said.

Richard ignored him and raged at me, “Christ, Maggie, what would it take to get you off my back? You mean to tell me you had the sheer gall to go in my office and ransack my safe?”

“I doubt it took more gall for me to do that than it took for you to get the folder from Larry,” I retorted. “He didn’t hand it to you for safekeeping, did he?”

Richard stood up. “Why the hell should I tell you?” He moved toward the door.

Andrew pushed his chair back and rose to face Richard. “Let me suggest why you should tell us. You should tell us because you’re in a very bad position. The folder disappeared the night Larry died, and it turned up in your safe. Don’t you think that needs explaining?”

“Larry committed suicide. That has nothing to do with me.”

We were back to Richard and me in the kitchen, the quince preserves, the telephone call.
Sure, I agree Larry Hawkins is a pain in the ass.
… “If it has nothing to do with you, how did you know he was going to do it?” I asked. “I heard you say on the telephone that he wouldn’t be bothering you much longer. I know you threatened him, too.”

Richard looked at me blankly, his stare as fixed as that of a department-store mannequin. He didn’t seem to be moving or breathing. At last, he began shaking his head— almost like a shiver at first, then in wider arcs. “Oh, no. Oh, no.”

At that moment, the possibilities were infinite. He might attack me, burst into tears, lunge toward the door in an attempt to escape. He did none of those things. He kept looking at me and shaking his head, and finally he choked out, “Are you insane? Are you saying you think I killed Larry Hawkins?”

“We’re saying the circumstances are suspicious,” Andrew said.

Richard’s hands went to his face in an age-old gesture of horror. “You can’t believe that. It isn’t true.”

“If there’s an explanation, we want to know what it is,” I said.

Richard looked at the door, hesitated, then returned to the sofa and sat down. Andrew slid back into his chair. Richard’s face worked for a moment before he began to speak. “I took the folder from Larry’s office. I may as well admit it. I had known for several months that he was working on a story about me. The rumors were flying. In fact, at one point I called him up and demanded to know what was going on. Of course he wouldn’t tell me.” His voice rose. “He was so offensive I got angry, and told him I’d damn well better not run into him on the street, or I’d personally beat his ass to a pulp. Maybe those are the threats you’re talking about.”

The conversation was easy to imagine. Richard overbearing, Larry taunting. “After a while, it occurred to me to fight fire with fire,” Richard went on. A hint of self-satisfaction was evident in his tone, and I could tell he still thought it had been a good idea. “I began investigating Larry. I have a few connections that made it fairly easy to look into the financial situation at the
Times
.” He looked pointedly at Andrew. “You know, Larry wasn’t particularly well liked in this town, so his privacy wasn’t universally respected.”

“No kidding.” Andrew didn’t sound surprised.

“Anyway, it didn’t take long before I realized there were irregularities. Money came in that was unaccounted for. I hope it won’t shock you to learn that your precious Larry’s hands weren’t especially clean. I figured knowing that would give me a fair bargaining position.”

So Richard too had uncovered the Corelli blackmail. Larry’s number had obviously been up on that scheme. Richard went on, “Once I got on to that, I knew that if worse came to worst I could have a session with Larry and use my information to try to convince him not to publish. I held off, though, because it was my last card, and I didn’t want to play it too soon. I expect that’s when I said we wouldn’t have to worry about Larry much longer. I was probably talking to Jane Malone.”

Andrew leaned forward. “What about the folder, Richard? What about the night Larry died?” he said.

“I’m getting to that.” Richard hesitated a moment or two before going on. “The night of Larry’s death was the night I picked to have a showdown with him. The whole subject had been preying on my mind for weeks. I had worked late, and I went out for a few drinks and thought about it, and then, all of a sudden, I couldn’t stand it anymore. You know how that can be? One minute a situation is tolerable and the next minute it isn’t? So I decided to see if Larry was in his office. Right then. It must’ve been about eleven o’clock. I suppose I was a little drunk.

“I drove to the Times. Maybe I didn’t really think he’d be there. When I went by, though, I saw a light on the seventh floor, so I thought I’d see if I could get into the building. I parked, and the door was unlocked, so I went in and took the elevator up. Nobody was around. I found the office with Larry’s name pasted on the door and went in. The light was on and the window was open, so I figured he’d just gone out to the can and I decided to wait. When I read the newspaper the next day— I swear that’s the first time I realized he must have gone out the window sometime before I got there.”

I didn’t look at Andrew. The fact was that I was finding Richard’s story quite plausible. Yet what had I expected? That he would break down and confess to murder? Appearances had always been Richard’s strong point, and his talents in that direction hadn’t deserted him. Naturally, when his need was most desperate he’d call all his resources into play.

“So you’re in Larry’s office,” Andrew said.

Richard nodded. “I stood waiting for Larry to come back, wandering around looking at the books in the bookcase and so on. As I was passing the desk I saw the folder lying on top of a lot of other papers. I wouldn’t have looked twice at it, but it was open, and sticking out a little way was a piece of paper that looked like my letterhead. That’s what caught my attention.”

When Richard didn’t continue Andrew prompted, “So you saw your letterhead.”

Richard shifted in his seat. “You have to admit, the temptation was pretty irresistible,” he said in a belligerent tone. “It was all right there in front of me. Of course I looked at it.”

“It shook you up?” Andrew said.

“What the hell do you think? I never imagined he could have so much. I had thought the story was going to be a serious nuisance, not a major disaster.” Richard ran his hands over his face, his long fingers pressing for a moment on his eyes. “Then I did a very stupid thing,” he continued, almost lightly. “I panicked. All I could think about was getting the information away from Larry. I didn’t stop to think that he could reconstruct it, that he’d probably suspect I took it— I didn’t consider anything at all. It was like— like being stripped naked in public, and the only way I could get my clothes back on was to take that folder. So I took it.”

“And you put it in your safe,” I said.

“I thought it wouldn’t be disturbed there.” Richard shot me a caustic look. “I read through the stuff that night, and it got worse and worse. Of course I realized how irrational it had been to take the folder in the first place, but it was too late. I thought Larry would’ve come back and missed it by then. I should’ve gotten rid of it right away, but I wanted to go over it once again and see if I could tighten up any loopholes, figure out how Larry had managed to ferret out his information.”

Richard sat back. “That’s what happened. I didn’t kill Larry. If you still think I did, you’re seriously wrong.”

Andrew said, “Did anybody see you at the
Times
? Entering or leaving the building, I mean? Or did you see anybody?”

Richard shook his head. “Nobody. Nobody at all.”

I felt empty. I had insisted on hearing Richard’s story, and now, having heard it, I had learned nothing. Richard was a smooth man, and he had a smooth story. Whether or not he had pushed Larry out the window was as much a mystery to me as ever.

After a short silence Andrew said, “Richard, Maggie and I discussed the situation this afternoon. She wanted to find out what you had to say before we took our information to the police. Now that we’ve talked—”

“Just a minute,” Richard said, with fear in his voice. “You can’t take this to the police. You can’t. It would ruin me.”

“You’re ruined already,” I said. “A bribery scandal won’t get you any medals.”

“Christ, yes, that’s bad enough,” he said wildly. “But not a murder investigation! I did not kill Larry Hawkins. You have to believe me. Please!”

Andrew shook his head. “You can’t expect us to ignore this. If you’ve been telling the truth, you won’t have to worry.”

Richard made a beseeching gesture, his eyes staring. “No! For God’s sake!”

He looked harassed, disheveled— and very small. In that instant, I saw that the compelling, cruel, demonic Richard I had been carrying around with me had shrunk into this craven, frightened, pitiful man. I realized that even if he had killed Larry Hawkins, it would have been from weakness rather than mystical, menacing strength. Richard no longer had a hold on me. It was a separation much more powerful and far-reaching than the physical one had been. At last, we were truly disconnected.