Spiced to Death (30 page)

“There are better ways of phrasing it,” I said, “but that’s what happened.”

He continued with his questioning, using that same gritty voice, and I did my best with the answers. He called in a young Hispanic woman, who took me into a cheerless room where I read a magazine interview with the “current” president, George Bush. She came back and took me into a lab where my hands were tested under ultraviolet light, presumably for stains indicating that I had fired a gun recently. I was given a cup of vile coffee and taken back to the room with the magazine, then into an office where Gabriella sat.

“So how was your day?” she asked sardonically.

“Don’t ask.”

She nodded and there was a trace of sympathy. “Any idea what Cartwright was doing there in the Spice Warehouse?”

“No,” I said. “I was astounded to find him there.”

She leaned back. “We were still trying to locate him when we got your call. So now it’s a double murder case. The pressure’s really on and even Hal Gaines agrees that the Ko Feng is the key to both murders.”

“I don’t see how there can be any doubt about that.”

“Hal doesn’t either—not really. It’s just the idea of a spice that’s worth more than a million dollars—he has trouble with that.”

“But you’re the Unusual Crimes Unit. You must have had a lot weirder cases than this.”

“Sure,” she agreed readily. “But they didn’t involve food.”

“You mean if someone murdered the Kentucky Colonel, he’d be right on the case?”

“Fried chicken, he can understand. A million-dollar spice—no way.”

“So what’s our next move, Sergeant?”

She smiled at my eager question. “You’ll see. Now if you’ll sign this, you are free to go.”

A shower, a couple of hours of mind-numbing television and some heavy reflecting brought me to thoughts of dinner. I decided to go to a sidewalk cafe on nearby Seventy-fifth Street that I had noticed a couple of times in passing. With a name like the Right Bank, it was clearly aiming at a French ambiance but doing it with a sense of humor that avoided pretension.

It had only a fleeting—even hypersonic—resemblance to a Parisian establishment but the management was trying. The tiny tables were crowded close and the steel-tube chairs belonged in a torture museum. An attempt had been made to render them tolerable with small cushions, which kept slipping off. I was lucky to get a table between four elderly matrons who were making unflattering comparisons with their native San Francisco and a German family grimly determined to enjoy it.

At a neighboring table, an unexpected breeze nearly lifted the umbrella into the air. “Hang on,” someone called out, “or we’ll do a Dorothy and find we’re having lunch with the Wizard.”

A boy in white plastic clothes with silver ornaments went by, on his shoulder a radio big enough to be heard in Canada. The reverberations crushed all conversation and provoked a barrage of glares. A truck passed, belching out black fumes. An old man waved his cane at it angrily and someone else commented, “Suddenly, my salmon’s smoked!”

“I love sidewalk cafés,” said one of the matrons from the city on the bay. “They’re so French.”

Despite the number of customers, the service was fast and I had just made my choice when the waiter came to take my order. I had decided to pass on the French items and have something typically American—something I could not get in London or at least not an authentic version.

But what is typically American? I didn’t want a hamburger or a hot dog. Tacos, tamales and enchiladas were on the menu but they are basically Mexican even if they do taste better in America. Similarly, pizza is really Italian even if the American version is far superior. The fact is that American cuisine has taken in, adapted and in most cases surpassed the originals.

I decided that a charcoal-grilled steak came the nearest to what I was searching for. American steaks are the finest in the world although I knew that the unfortunate fact is that most steak houses—especially in New York—use gas-fired briquettes. The Right Bank however offered what they claimed to be real charcoal-broiled steaks in a good variety and I chose a six-ounce filet mignon. It came with a baked Idaho potato with sour cream and chives and, in true American style, no vegetables. A comparable restaurant in Paris would serve at least three vegetables with a steak but I was making no comparisons. Wine by the glass is a rare commodity in Europe but happily a commonplace in the U.S.A., so I ordered from the wine list a glass of Pinot Noir from Santa Cruz.

The waiters were determined not to set precedents for service. “No, we don’t have cappuccino,” snapped one. “Where do you think you are—Rome?”

When the steak came, it was tender and juicy. It was also done just the way I had ordered it—medium rare. No other country can satisfy a diner’s order so accurately. The potato was a little mushy but the wine was rich and vibrant, if a year ahead of its time.

I paid the check and when the waiter returned with my change, with it was a note. I opened it, expecting perhaps some thanks from the management for patronizing them, but it said, “If you want to authenticate the Ko Feng, get into the taxi nearest you.”

I looked up in astonishment but could see no one I recognized. Before the waiter could get away, I asked him where he had got the note. He shrugged. “I don’t know—some guy.”

A taxi stood there at the No Parking sign, engine running. The driver’s face was pockmarked and Arab-featured. “Are you waiting for me?” I asked.

“Guess so,” he said idly.

I hesitated.

“Gonna get in?” he said impatiently. “It’s paid for.”

I got in and he drove. No, he told me in response to my questions, he didn’t notice who had given him the instructions—just the portrait on the banknote.

The journey was short. Our destination was on the northern edge of the theater district. We passed the Neil Simon Theater on Fifty-second Street, made a couple of turns on one-way streets and stopped in front of a restaurant with a brown-painted front, slightly weathered and chipped, white curtains at the windows and a simple sign,
MARTHA’S.
The driver jerked an uncaring thumb at it and left me standing there.

It was dark inside. Then I noticed the sign on the door—today was the day it was closed. I leaned on the handle in exasperation … and the door opened.

I went in. It was quiet and I was contemplating a strategic retreat, but
no
I told myself sternly. This is the chance I’ve been waiting for—a step toward recovering the Ko Feng. It had been neatly done so far, giving me no opportunity to phone for support.

The white tablecloths were ghostly shapes in the dim room but then I saw the reservation booth, a small high desk by the door with, of course, a phone behind. I moved to it and a spurt of light flashed across the room. A curtain at the back had been pulled and the silhouette of a figure stood there.

“You the guy that wants to taste this pasta?”

I had hardly expected the thief to show himself. In fact, I didn’t know what to expect. The thief had a problem in concealing his identity but then the buyer had a similar problem. All I could do was go along with it.

The man’s voice was deep. He came forward, leaving the curtain open behind him. I had a glimpse of several people sitting at a table. Surely it wasn’t an open auction?

“Are you Martha?” I asked.

“Marty,” he said, coming closer. “This is my place. Martha took off five years ago with one of the waiters.” He motioned behind him. “Angie replaced her—in my bed as well as in the restaurant. Those are her folks. It’s her birthday.”

All these domestic details were confusing me but Marty seemed to be well drilled in what he was supposed to do.

“Siddown,” he said, motioning to a table near the front. “The pasta’s ready.”

He went back through the curtain and returned with a Styrofoam container, carefully sealed with tape, in one hand and a glass of water in the other. He turned on lights overhead.

“There,” he said. “That’s what he told me to do. Said you’d open it.”

I nodded. Voices were raised in the back room and Marty shook his head in despair. “That cousin of hers—she should have stood in Bosnia. Well,
bon appétit,
as they say.” He rejoined the birthday party.

I used a knife to cut the tape and lever up the plastic lid. I held my breath as I lifted it. In the bottom of the container lay eight or nine small, blackish pieces.

I sniffed. My memory banks recalled for comparison the fragrances of that day at JFK—cloves then cinnamon but no, more like cardamom. “Anise,” Don had said, “and a hint of orange …”

I turned the pieces over with a fork, examining their shape. I separated one and chopped it as finely as I could with the knife. I drank some water, waited then tasted the chopped fragments.

Laughter came from the back room in a sudden gust and strident voices argued. More laughter came. I drank some more water and sat for a while. I repeated the process, then put the cut pieces into the container and closed it.

I should know what my decision was, I told myself. I had had plenty of time to prepare it. After all, the choices were simple …

Should I declare the Ko Feng phony or genuine?

Should I tell the truth or lie?

Crockery rattled and cutlery clinked in the back as the meal gradually took priority over family disputes. I sat, thinking.

When the phone rang, it jangled every nerve in my body and sounded loud enough to be heard all over Manhattan Island. After the third ring, the curtain pulled open and Marty appeared.

“It’s for you,” he said.

“How do you know—” I began but he had already closed the curtain.

I went over and picked up the phone.

“Have you examined it?”

The words were measured and deliberate. The speaker was also using some means of disguising his voice—or her voice, for it was an indeterminate huskiness that could have been either. I knew there were easy ways of changing the sound of a voice over the phone.

“Yes.”

“We must be absolutely sure what we’re referring to. What is it supposed to be?”

“Who are you?” I asked.

“The buyer.”

“It’s supposed to be Ko Feng.”

“All right. You have examined it. Is it really Ko Feng?”

I took a couple of breaths. “No, it isn’t.”

There was a silence. It was louder than any noise. “Repeat that.”

“I said no, it isn’t.”

Another silence.

“You know what you are saying?” Despite whatever means were being used to disguise the voice, the emotion showed through.

“Yes.”

I awaited the inevitable question:
Are you sure?
It didn’t come. The voice said, “Your fee is with the container” and the line clicked dead.

Several queries about how the thief had made contact with Marty had passed through my mind and I had intended to ask them before I left but now it didn’t seem like a good idea. My instinct was to get out fast.

I looked underneath the Styrofoam container. An opaque plastic envelope was attached. I opened it and found five one-hundred-dollar bills. I put them in my pocket, took the container and shouted to Marty, “Thanks for the service!”

His face appeared through the curtain. “Everything okay? Some kind of new pasta they’re trying out, huh? Weird way to do it but hey, this is New York, right?”

“It is,” I agreed. “It certainly is.”

I departed quickly and walked along the block. The Ziegfeld Theater was on my right and Tom Hanks was appearing in
Hamlet,
but the theater was not uppermost in my mind. I was concerned now only with making sure I was not being watched or followed. At the intersection, I waved for a cab. When one slowed and pulled over in a unique example of lightning service, I stepped back and waved it on. Another came only seconds later and I took it as far as Lincoln Center where I alighted in the middle of the busiest traffic I could find and then took another cab back to the hotel.

I was just getting out of this one when I realized that most of the players in this bizarre game knew where I was staying anyway.

H
ERE I WAS AGAIN
in the home away from home of Lieutenant Gaines and Sergeant Rossini. This visit was more voluntary than the previous ones. I had called Gabriella to tell her of the incident at Martha’s Restaurant, she had checked with Hal Gaines and they had agreed that I should come into the station.

It was a different room this time but only one degree less grim than before. The two detectives sat facing me. Gaines looked much better, no chewing, no twitching and no more stress lines than might be expected, considering the pressures of the case. Another triumph for King’s Balm. Gabriella looked prim and official, making her even more comely than usual.

“No intonation, no spacing of phrases, nothing to give away the voice?” Gaines was still trying to learn more from my account of the phone call to the restaurant after I had tasted the sample in the box.

“Nothing that struck a chord,” I insisted.

“Most people have characteristic bunching of words or ways of breaking up sentences,” said Gabriella. “Think back.”

“I’ve tried. I was too caught up in the situation at the time but I’ve reviewed it in my mind since and no, I just can’t pinpoint anything identifiable.”

A woman in uniform came in and handed Gaines a folder. He glanced at it, put it down and shook his head.

“We checked the call to the restaurant. It was made from a drugstore phone in midtown.” He examined me keenly. “So you told this person that the stuff was phony?”

“Yes.”

“And it wasn’t?”

“No, it was the real thing right enough.”

“You’re absolutely—”

“Yes, absolutely sure.”

“So we got ourselves two possibilities.” He drummed stubby black fingers on the metal table and it hummed softly in response. “One is that the murderer is so monumentally pissed off at you that the only important thing is to knock you off and soon.”

I looked from him to Gabriella. She shrugged.

“You screwed up the murderer’s chance to sell the spice,” she said. “What can you expect?”