The Black Door (22 page)

For perhaps a full half-minute she stared at me, and during the interval I saw her eyes harden and her mouth tighten. Watching her, I realized that the image of the cleaning woman had faded, replaced by that of an Italian peasant woman in her ritual black shawl, stolid and silently long-suffering—yet capable of a hot-eyed, white-knuckled passion.

She was rummaging now in her handbag. I was aware of a little lift of excitement as I realized she was counting money. Finally she neatly tapped together a small sheaf of bills, which she placed on the coffee table before her.

“There’s one thing I learned from Dominic,” she said evenly, “and it’s that everyone has his price.” She pointed to the stack of bills. “That’s a thousand dollars, Mr. Drake. It’s not for finding Dom’s murderer. It’s just for taking the time to go down and see Frankie Russo. He’s the man who’s taking over Dominic’s job. That’s all I ask: just take the thousand dollars, and talk to Russo. If he doesn’t want you around, he’ll tell you, and you’ll still have the thousand dollars. If he says you can help me—” she lifted a thicker sheaf of bills from inside her handbag “—there’s nine thousand dollars more if you can find out who murdered Dominic.”

I swallowed. Twice.

“But what’ll you do with the information, assuming I can find the murderer for you? You can’t go to the police, especially if someone from the Outfit is involved. Not unless you want to spend the rest of your life locked up in protective custody.”

She didn’t answer the question directly, but instead said, “I’ve already told you, I have to know.” She glanced almost contemptuously around my living room before saying quietly, “You didn’t come from the old country, Mr. Drake. Probably your folks didn’t either—or even your grandparents. But I was born in Sicily. I can still remember it, living there. And Sicilians never forget it, when something like this happens. We …” She shrugged, then shook her head. Plainly she herself didn’t understand the dim, almost primitive instincts driving her. In a lower, baffled voice she said, “I just can’t think of anything else, Mr. Drake. I’ve just got to know who killed him. It—it’s all I care about. It’s all I think about, anymore. When it first happened, I thought I didn’t care. I even thought I was glad, when I first heard about it. I—I started laughing, and I couldn’t stop. Then I realized that I was really crying. I thought I’d got my revenge, but I was wrong. And now I can’t think about anything but finding out who killed him. Maybe it’s something bad I’m doing. The priest says it is. But I …”

She stared down at her handbag, blinking rapidly. “Please help me, Mr. Drake. I can’t go to the police, and I can’t go to a private detective, except the crooked ones. When I read about you, I just—just thought you were the only one who could help me. I guess maybe I’m superstitious. When I was a little girl, I used to think I could see things, like you do. I used to think I could see the Virgin, and I used to talk to her. I was even examined once by four priests, like they used to examine saints. So when I heard about you, I …” Her voice trailed off. As she sat with head bowed, fiddling fretfully with the clasp of her handbag, the image of the vindictive peasant woman faded, along with that of the humble cleaning woman. She was simply a grieving middle-aged housewife, sitting forlornly on my sofa.

I looked at the small pile of bills on the coffee table—a thousand dollars, for taking a trip to Los Angeles. I would be a thousand dollars richer, just for talking with Frankie Russo—and for obeying his instructions not to help Mrs. Vennezio find her husband’s murderer. It was, I realized, a cynical calculation. Yet, almost beyond doubt, that’s the way it would happen.

And, besides the money, there was the professional advantage of actually contacting a member of the Mafia elite. Few crime reporters ever got the opportunity.

There seemed little risk, yet it was difficult to be sure. I’d been a crime reporter for five years, and I knew the vast power organized crime could wield. True, most reporters had a certain immunity, as did most police officers. But private investigators weren’t always so lucky. As for clairvoyants …

I sighed and lit a cigarette. There could be no harm in hearing her story.

“Tell me about it, Mrs. Vennezio. Tell me everything that happened.”

She raised her head.

“You’ll do it, then?” She didn’t smile, nor did her voice betray any emotion.

“I might. Tell me, though, what happened. Start with your husband’s relationship with this woman.”

She drew a deep breath, then took the purse from her lap and placed it on the couch beside her. She clasped her hands and gazed off across the room. Something in her slow, wooden speech and tightly clasped hands reminded me of the confessional. This was how she must sound to her priest, I was thinking.

“It all started almost two and a half years ago,” she was saying. “Dom hired this—this woman away from someone else. She was working for one of the real estate companies that Dom used. Dom was very interested in real estate. He was always buying and selling houses and apartment houses. So then, one day, he told me that he was going to start his own real estate business. He said it’d make him a lot of money if he had his own real estate office.”

“This was his own private business,” I interrupted. “It had nothing to do with the Syndicate.”

“That’s right, just his own. But really, see, it was all a—a front, to get this woman to work for him. I heard later that he offered her twice the salary she was getting.”

“What’s her name?”

“Faith Hanson.” She pronounced it with difficulty.

“Did she have a husband?”

“Her husband drank, I think.”

“Children?”

She nodded. “She has a boy. A teen-ager.”

“Was she actually a real estate broker?”

“No. She was just a secretary. Dom hired a broker, too. And before they were done, they had three or four salesmen working, too. It turned out to be a good business. I have to give Dom that: he could make money. Even on the square.”

“And this real estate business was on the square?”

She nodded.

“Do you think Dominic had been seeing this woman before he hired her?”

Again she nodded. “They’d been seeing each other for two, three months.”

“Then what happened, after she went to work for him?”

“Well, they—they started seeing each other all the time. It got so, once a week, Dom wouldn’t come home. He’d always say it was business, but we both knew he was lying. So, one day, I asked him right out whether he was keeping another woman.”

“Did he admit it?”

“Yes.”

“What explanation did he give?”

“He just said that he loved her, and couldn’t help himself. It didn’t have anything to do with me, he said. He still loved me, he kept saying. It was just that he couldn’t help himself.”

“How old is this Hanson woman, Mrs. Vennezio?”

“She’s about forty.”

“And how old was Dominic?”

“He’s—he was fifty-nine.”

“What about her husband? What happened to him?”

“He drank, like I said, but that’s all I know—except that, just after Faith Hanson went to work for Dominic, her husband disappeared.”

“You mean …” I didn’t quite know how to put it.

“No, it wasn’t like that, I don’t think. I never knew, but I don’t think it was like that. I’d’ve heard.”

“Was the husband ever seen again?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think so.”

I sat for a long moment regarding her—trying to decide whether she was evading the question. In assessing her mannerisms, it was difficult to separate guilt from embarrassment.

“You’ve got to tell me everything, Mrs. Vennezio,” I said finally. “Otherwise I can’t help you.”

“I know.”

“And you’re certain Dominic didn’t—do away with Mr. Hanson?”

“I don’t know one way or the other. I told you.”

“What about Mrs. Hanson’s son? Is he living with her?”

“He lived with her for a year. But then, last year, she sent him to a private school. One of those fancy schools in the Ojai Valley.”

“When the boy left, did Dominic actually move in with the Hanson woman?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“They wouldn’t’ve liked that.”

“The Outfit, you mean?”

She nodded.

“But Dominic was the head man down South,” I prodded. “He was the one that made the rules.”

She looked at me briefly before saying, “Dom used to say that the higher you got, the closer they watch you. And it’s true. There were a dozen guys out for his job. Everything he did wrong, it got back East.”

“Did they know about his romance with Mrs. Hanson, back East?”

“Sure they did.”

“And they didn’t mind?”

“Not as long as he used his head and didn’t get out of line.”

“And did he use his head?”

She didn’t reply. As she’d been talking, her gathering tension was more and more evident. Still, I needed information.

“How did the actual murder occur?” I asked. “Tell me everything you know about it—especially anything that might not’ve got into the papers.”

For a moment I thought she hadn’t heard me, or didn’t intend to reply. She simply sat staring off across the room, her lips pressed into a tight, painful line.

“How did it actually happen, Mrs. Vennezio? If I’m going to help you, I’ve got to know. Tell it to me from the beginning.”

She was silent for a moment. Then, haltingly, she began to speak. “He’d gone to the beachhouse. It used to be our beachhouse. They—they spent weekends there. And that’s when it—it happened. On Sunday night.”

“Was Faith Hanson with him when he got killed?”

“She got there just afterward. She found him.”

“Was she questioned by the police?”

“Yes.”

“What did she say?”

“Just that she walked in and found him lying in the living room, dead. Shot.”

“Did the police think that Dominic knew his murderer?”

She nodded. “They think he let him in.”

“How did the police learn about the murder?”

“A phone call.”

“Anonymous?”

“Yes.”

“Man or woman?”

“A man, the papers said.”

“Did your husband usually have a bodyguard with him?”

“Usually. But not—not on weekends.”

“Who did the police question?”

“Everyone. They put on a good show.”

“What do you mean by that, Mrs. Vennezio?”

She hesitated before saying, “We live in La Palada. Do you know anything about La Palada, Mr. Drake?”

I did, but I wanted to hear what she’d say. So I shook my head and waited for her to continue.

“There’s only three thousand people in La Palada,” she said. “It’s right outside Los Angeles, but it’s a separate town. It’s incorporated, and everything. It’s where most of the big shots live, and it’s got the lowest crime rate in the whole state.”

“The big shots from the Outfit, you mean.”

“Yes.”

“And they own the town, including the police.”

“Yes.”

“Did the police turn up a suspect, as part of the show they put on?”

“No. They just questioned a lot of people, and made a big noise for the papers. Then, after a couple of weeks, it all died down. No one really expected anything different. It’s like when Bugsy Siegel got killed. No one ever expected the murderer would get caught. And he never was.”

“Yet you still insist your husband wasn’t killed by someone in organized crime?” I asked incredulously.

“I’m not saying that, Mr. Drake. There were probably fifty men who would’ve liked to see Dominic dead, for different reasons. Anyone makes enemies, no matter what business he’s in, and Dom made his share. Maybe more than his share. What I’m telling you, though, is that his murder wasn’t ordered. Siegel’s murder was ordered, but not Dominic’s. The Outfit didn’t—”

“Everyone I’ve ever talked to about the murder thought it was a professional job,” I interrupted. “And that includes several policemen.”

She moved her clasped hands fretfully before her.

“Talk to Russo, Mr. Drake. That’s all I’m asking you to do. Go down to La Palada and talk to him.”

“Will he talk to me, do you think?”

She nodded.

“How can you be so sure, Mrs. Vennezio?”

“I made a bargain with him.”

“What kind of a bargain?”

“The letters—the four letters I wrote. Two days ago, I told Russo about the letters. I said I’d give them to him, if he’d talk to you. And he said he would.”

“And you gave them to him?”

She nodded, silent and resigned.

“But—but what’s to prevent him killing you?”

“He promised,” she said simply.

“And you believed him?”

“Yes, Mr. Drake. I believed him. I made promises, and so did Russo. If we both keep our words, there won’t be any trouble. That’s the way it’s always been, Mr. Drake—for hundreds of years.” She reached over for her purse and got to her feet, heavily. She pointed to the small pile of bills on the table between us.

“Take the money, Mr. Drake. Go see Russo. He’ll be expecting you. He’s in the phone book, and he’s expecting you. If you keep your word with him, he’s not a bad man. He’s like Dominic was. They’re just the same.”

She turned and walked to the door. Hastily crossing the room, I opened the door for her. I wanted to say something, to comfort her. But she was already outside. I watched her get into a car parked at the curb. As the car pulled away, I saw two men in the front seat.

I closed the door, locked it and walked back into my living room. I picked up the small stack of bills—a thousand dollars, in hundred-dollar bills.

Automatically I took out my wallet and slipped the money inside. As I did, I was conscious of a sudden, chilling sense of forboding. I’d felt it first as I’d watched the car pulling away, with the two figures in the front seat and the single figure in the rear. Remembering the slow progress of the car, it seemed as if the figures inside were part of some strange procession, traveling to some dim and distant place.

I
AWOKE SATURDAY MORNING
to a feeling of apprehension. Over coffee, glumly, my thoughts kept returning to the legend of Faust, irrevocably selling his soul to the devil.