Suicide King (The Jake Samson & Rosie Vicente Detective Series) (19 page)

I accepted that for the moment. I looked appraisingly around his expensive-looking office. “Are you doing it for the cause— or for a fee?”

“You know, Jake, you’re not exactly charming me.”

“I’m not trying to.”

He turned to Rosie. “Is he always this easy to get along with?”

“Always,” she said.

He laughed. “Well, good. I’d hate to think I was getting special treatment.” He leaned back in his swivel chair and looked at us benevolently. “You didn’t travel to Sacramento to insult me. What’s up?”

I was having a problem. It would have been easier for me to distrust him if he’d been dressed in a business suit. He looked too much like a real person dressed as he was. I hadn’t been able to make him hostile, either.

“There are one or two people who think you’re the perfect candidate for murderer of Joe Richmond. We thought we’d ask you about that,” I said.

He shook his head. “Sorry, you’ll have to draft someone else.” He sipped his coffee and put his hiking boots up on his oak desk. “Why me?” He managed to look mildly curious.

Rosie answered. “Because you’re second in line for the Vivo endorsement. And whatever support that brings. First, now.”

He looked surprised. He was not convincing. “Where’d you get that idea? I’m running strong, yes, but Rebecca’s at least as strong. Maybe stronger.”

“That’s not what everybody else in the party says,” she insisted.

He gave her a wry smile. “Who have you talked to?”

“We talked to Maddux,” I said. “And Chandler.”

“And who else? Ron Lewis? James X. Carney? And Pam Sutherland, what about Pam?” He laughed. “Surely you’ve heard the famous story that I’m a turncoat? How many votes do you think that’s going to win me?”

Damn
, I thought.
He stole one of our best questions.

“Who do you think started the story?” Rosie asked. “Carney?” He shrugged. “Rebecca Gelber?” A much smaller shrug.

“I think it was started to benefit another candidate, certainly.”

“Rebecca doesn’t believe the story about you is true,” Rosie said. “That’s what she told us.”

He pursed his lips, a judicious look I thought he probably practiced in front of the mirror. “She’s the other candidate. She has to look clean and generous.”

That was true, of course.

“Chandler says it was all a lie made up by Carney,” I said. “To confuse everyone and make a mess of the convention.”

Again, he only shrugged.

“If your supporters can convince people that’s true, you’ll probably get the endorsement.” He gazed out the window, trying not to look bored.

“And we heard something else, too,” Rosie said. “Although it wasn’t exactly a rumor. More like a tip.” She told him about the anonymous phone call.

His reaction was odd. Others we’d told had reacted with shock, fear, even anger. Some of their reactions had seemed somehow exaggerated, as if they were trying to convince us that they were appalled. But Werner was a very cool character. He paled slightly, but showed only a moment’s surprise, then, gazing thoughtfully at neither one of us, nodded slightly. He thought for what seemed like a long time.

Then, to me: “Do you believe it?”

“I think it’s possible. I don’t want to believe it.”

“It would be incredibly risky,” he said. “One mistake could destroy Vivo as a party and every serious career politician involved in it.”

“Not only that,” Rosie said sharply, “They’d make a big mess.”

“I understand that,” he snapped. “I was merely commenting that it’s also extremely risky.”

He got out of his chair and walked to the window. He stood there, looking out, hands clasped behind his back, flexing his knees. From where I sat, I couldn’t tell if he had a view of the capitol dome, or maybe could catch a corner of the governor’s mansion. I sighed. Sometimes I miss Jerry Brown.

“Do you two have a line on who might be hatching a plot like that— if there is one?”

“We thought it might be you,” I said.

He turned and frowned at me. “I wish you’d get it through your heads I’m not the only Vivo in this race.” He sat down again. “Since you seem to be going in the wrong direction on this thing, maybe I’ll look into it myself.”

“If it’s true,” I warned, “that could be dangerous.”

He laughed, stirred his coffee with his finger, finished it off. “It already is. Was there anything else you wanted to know about?”

I told him we wanted to know where he was when Richmond died, and where he went after Richmond’s funeral.

“The day Joe died, I was here in town. I was meeting with some people who are part of a statewide conservation group. We were working on that pesticide crap I was telling you about. And I told you where I went after the funeral. I flew back here for another meeting the next day. Some of the same people.”

“I hate to keep sounding suspicious, Phil, but how about you give us their names and numbers, just so we can double-check?”

“No problem, Jake,” he said, imitating my ironic friendliness. He consulted a leather-covered address book, and wrote out three names and numbers. “And maybe it would help if I showed you this stuff.” He went to an oak file cabinet in the corner, opened it, and pulled out a file labeled “Fielding Agricultural Products.” He handed it to me. I looked through the papers, passing them on to Rosie. Correspondence, newspaper clippings, copies of testing information. I read some of it. He was definitely involved in working on the project he described. There was definitely some time pressure involved in it. Other than that, we’d have to talk to the people whose names he’d given us.

“Where were those meetings in Sacramento?” Rosie asked. He gave her the name of a motel.
Good move
, I thought. A backup check in case some of the people whose names we had weren’t telling the truth. Rosie obviously trusted Werner as much as I did.

We said good-bye, wished him a pleasant hike, or whatever it was he was planning on doing in his hiking clothes, and left. The sky was clouding up. Looked like a late-season rain was coming, probably the last of the year. We climbed into our rental car and prepared for a damp Sunday in the metropolis of the central valley, checking up on Philip Werner. I hoped his pretty hiking clothes got wet.

WE didn’t reach everyone on our list, but close enough. We even found a motel employee who remembered the meetings, and Werner was on the books— he’d reserved and paid for the meeting rooms. It wasn’t until late evening that we finished, so we stayed over and drove home the next morning.

We had agreed, by this time, on a couple of possible solutions, and were planning return visits with several people in the Bay Area. We weren’t sure how we could force the issue and knew it would have to be attacked from more than one side, since there was no way to be sure yet who was involved in what. But we were beginning to feel we were coming close.

Rosie went off to pick up Alice from the friend who’d been keeping her and I took care of my own housekeeping. Tigris and Euphrates had stayed home, fed by a neighbor who had also carried my mail to the front porch and stuck it under a long-unoccupied flowerpot. The cats were waiting in the kitchen, with numerous complaints. I fed them, told them they were gorgeous, dropped my suitcase on the bed, and glanced through my mail. My dentist was concerned that I was neglecting my dental health and urged me to call for an appointment soon. A couple of bills. I checked my answering machine for messages.

Marietta had called.

“Hello, Jake. This is Marietta Marple— just a joke, she was old. Marietta Richmond, of course. I wanted you to know that I have continued to be hot on the trail of my daughter-in-law. Actually, she’s my former daughter-in-law now, isn’t she? That, at least, is a relief.

“I stole Emily’s little diary, or journal, or whatever it is. I went to visit her to extend my mutual grief and I stole it. I don’t think she had anything to do with killing my son. There’s nothing in that book but poetry. Not a word about murder, although with poetry it’s hard to tell, isn’t it?

“Anyway, I can’t think of anyone else in the family who could have done it and Emily’s gone back to L.A. I need your advice, dear. Please call and set me moving again. Bye.”

Set her moving again? That was the last thing I wanted to do.

The second message was from Gerda.

“This is Gerda Steiner. This is Saturday afternoon. I am calling because I think something is funny with Cassandra. She will not talk to me. I think you must talk with her again.”

The third message was from Cassandra.

“Hello. This is Cassandra calling. It’s Monday morning. I don’t know why I’m calling you, but I don’t know where else to go. Please call me back.”

Hearing her on the phone helped. It was a habit of speech, her way of saying “I don’t know,” with strong emphasis on the “know.” Something small, that stuck in a crevice in my brain. I’d heard her say it when we’d talked to her about Richmond’s fling with Gelber. And the anonymous caller had whispered it the same way. I was almost sure.

There was a fourth message, too, this one from Rebecca Gelber.

“Jake, please call, or come over. I’ll be home all day and evening— this is Monday. It’s very important.”

This was still Monday. I tapped out Gerda and Cassandra’s number. No answer. No machine. I called Rosie and told her about the messages, about Cassandra’s voice. We met in the driveway, jumped into Rosie’s pickup, and drove the few blocks to the storefront apartment.

“Gerda’s car isn’t here,” Rosie said. “Or Cassandra’s.”

I banged on the front door. Nothing. Put my eye to a two-inch gap in the canvas window covering. No one. Rosie had found another gap in the one on the other side. She didn’t see anything, either. We went around to the back of the building and found the outside stairs. The back door had no window. I banged on it. There was a good-sized, uncovered window about two feet from the tiny, railed back porch. I climbed up, one foot on the railing and the other on a narrow ledge that ran just below the window, holding tight to the back door molding and grabbing the window frame, and looked in. A clean kitchen, with two doors leading to two bedrooms just beyond. All very tidy. No immediate sign of any violence. If there were any corpses, they were lying tucked up on a bedroom floor in a corner. I edged my foot backward along the ledge, brought it to the railing, turned, and jumped back down to the porch floor. I looked at Rosie and shrugged.

“Should we break in?” she asked.

I was reluctant. There was no sign of anyone, no cars. Everything pointed to an empty apartment. I looked around. Just down the block, an elderly woman was peeking over her fence, watching us. All we needed at this point was to have to waste time with the cops.

We drove to College Avenue, found a phone booth, and called Gelber.

The husband answered.

“Samson? Good. Rebecca’s been trying to reach you. You’d better get over here right now.” He hung up. Wonderful. I loved the guy.

We headed north to Benicia.

REBECCA Gelber looked harassed and confused. Her hair wasn’t perfect. She almost looked her age.

“Jake, Rosie, I’m glad you’re here.” She waved us in. “My husband and I have been trying to have dinner for three hours now. First Cassandra, then Phil. At least you were invited.” She sat down heavily in an armchair and waved vaguely at us, indicating we could sit.

I didn’t know who to ask her about first. For a second, I just sat there, stunned. “Phil?”

She nodded.

“Start at the beginning,” Rosie said. “Please. First Cassandra?”

“Yes. She showed up here looking very nervous. She said she wanted to talk to me about something, but she couldn’t seem to get it out. Then she asked if she could stay here for a few hours, maybe overnight. I said she could. I didn’t want to press her about why, or what it was she wanted to tell me. She looked so awful. I had her sitting down in the kitchen with us, finally, at dinner. Then the bell rang again. Bruce got up. He came back and told me Phil Werner was here and wanted to talk to me. I was surprised, to say the least. Phil is not an informal man. It must have been soon after that that you called. I heard the phone ring while I was talking to Phil.”

“What did he want?” I asked.

“That was very confusing. He was so oblique. He asked me about an anonymous phone call, wanted to know what I knew about one. He was, well, he seemed accusing, as if I knew or had done something, and he acted as if I were keeping some secret from him or telling a secret or some peculiar thing. He wanted me to admit this secret without telling me what it was. He kept asking me, ‘Did you make that call?’ It was really rather ugly.”

Bruce Gelber walked into the room and glared at us. We said hello. He nodded.

Rebecca turned to him. “I was telling them about Phil.”

This time, there was no word from Rebecca letting him know we were talking about her business. He was in on it.

“Pretty damned peculiar, too,” he snarled. “I went back into the kitchen. Couldn’t have been more than a minute later when you called. But I could hear Werner, out here. He sounded threatening. I got off the phone and made short work of that.”

“Uh huh,” I said. “Maybe even a good thing you did. He left?” They both nodded. “Did he say where he was going, by any chance?” They both shook their heads. “And Cassandra?”

“That was strange, too, Jake,” Rebecca said.

“It was,” her husband agreed. “No sooner had I told Rebecca that Werner was here, and sat down at the table with Cassandra, when that young woman slipped out the back door. We haven’t seen her since. I feel like I’m living in a movie. And most of it on an empty stomach.” His beeper went off. “Oh, shit,” he said and left the room. “Never a minute…”

I told Rebecca about the anonymous call, the warning that someone was planning a catastrophe. She looked at me as if I’d lost my mind.

“And I think Cassandra made the call,” I said.

“And just yesterday,” Rosie added, “we were sitting in Werner’s office in Sacramento questioning him about it.”

“Is it true?”

“I’m beginning to think so,” I admitted. “Since asking people about it seems to have stirred things up so much. I’m really afraid it’s so.”