The Death of Lorenzo Jones (8 page)

At one point he was directly under the huge girders of the spuds sign. No place to hide anything there. Just raw metal, rusting
a bit.

Not finding the thermos was much better than finding it, in Lockwood’s estimation. Someone who might have poisoned Lorenzo’s
coffee, say, would be most anxious to retrieve that thermos with its telltale traces of whatever had been used.

For a while, the theory he had been forming—that Lorenzo might have been poisoned—had seemed farfetched. Lock-wood had been
hoping that someone along the way would tell him that Lorenzo had been suicidally depressed. That would be enough to get Transatlantic
off the hook, coupled with the erratic way Lorenzo veered at takeoff. Hell-bent on killing himself.

That trouble was that Lorenzo had been a cheery son of a bitch. Lockwood stood there in the weeds and pondered. I wouldn’t
let anyone I poisoned fly off with the evidence of my crime, a thermos, to be found later. Whoever did it would have been
a fool. Or perhaps, just
perhaps
, they hadn’t expected Lorenzo to drink his poisoned coffee so soon.

That could be it. The killer would have expected Jones to be in the air miles away when he drank the poisoned coffee. The
crash then would have been in some deserted area, especially if Jones had been headed upstate, as was stated.

Yeah. The thermos would have been consumed by fire along with the body and the plane. But here, where the plane had crashed
too close to the airfield, maybe someone had rushed out and found the thermos.

Satisfied that he had checked thoroughly for the thermos, Hook went back to the runway.

He walked back to Amanda, who was still fooling about in her engine compartment with a wrench.

“Amanda, I went looking for that thermos, but it’s not at the crash site, nor in the wreckage. Who went out to the crash scene?”

Amanda frowned. “Boy, what a suspicious mind! Maybe Lorenzo just didn’t take it with him on that flight?”

“Could be.”

“Well, the FAA guys went later with a tractor. Me and Rodney went right away. Rodney’s a mechanic. Rodney cut him out of the
wreck. Pretty heroic. It was burning. Stinky came, too.”

Lockwood said, “Maybe I’ll ask him a few questions.”

“Well, there’s Stinky.” Amanda pointed toward a kid. “He was crazy about that baseball player.”

The kid was tall for his age, about sixteen years old. He had a serious look and was carrying a full set of wrenches. He was
dressed in brown surplus Air Corps coveralls, smeared with grease, and had freckles and brown hair. He gave Lock-wood a look
that could kill as he approached him.

“Who are you? You look like a cop. I talked to the FAA already. They don’t believe me ‘cause I’m a kid.”

Lockwood never liked teenagers who sneered. The kid wiped his running nose on his coverall sleeve and continued talking.

“Lorenzo couldn’t have crashed, he had to have been bumped off.”

“What makes you think that?”

“ ’Cause I checked out that biplane myself. I’m studying aviation. And I’m an expert, see? And he checked it, too, and he
wasn’t drunk or nothing—that’s why.”

Lockwood pulled out his badge. “You know what this is?”

The kid studied it, sneered again. “Yeah, a phony cop’s badge. So what?”

Damn, thought Hook, struck out again.

“I’m an insurance investigator. I have suspicions just like yours. If you want to have whoever killed Lorenzo Jones fried
in the electric chair, you’ve got to help me, okay?”

The kid smiled for the first time. “You
believe
me?”

“Sure I do.” Lockwood put his arm over the kid’s shoulder, and they walked together. “Listen, what do you like to be called?
Is Stinky okay?”

“Stinky’s fine. What’s your name?”

“They call me Hook Lockwood, but Bill’s my first name.”

“Hook?”

“On account of my left hook, kid. I used to box.”

“Gee. Let’s see your fists.” The kid was impressed.

“Is there some place we can talk, in private, Stinky?”

“My place,” the kid suggested.

“My place” turned out to be a makeshift Boy’s Club tarpaper-and-sticks shack in back of the main hangar. Still, there was
a chair and enough light through the cracks in the walls to light a Camel. The kid took one, too, and spoke between coughs.

“I just know he couldn’t fly that bad, Hook.”

“Yeah, but I have to have something specific. Was anyone after Lorenzo? Did someone he know have something against him?”

The kid laughed, shook his head. “Not that I know.”

Lockwood now saw why the cops didn’t believe him. The kid felt guilty about not seeing anything wrong with the plane and besides
he was a
kid
. And he had nothing specific, just a feeling.

“Did you see the plane go down?”

“Yeah.” The kid turned his sneakers into the gravel floor, looked sad. “It nosed over and went straight down.”

“Stinky,” Hook confided, “you might, as I said, be right. I heard Lorenzo was a great pilot. Listen, if someone did that to
Lorenzo, I mean to catch them. I need some information. My next question might sound silly.”

The kid looked surly again, but didn’t say anything.

“My question is: Did Lorenzo take a thermos with him in the plane that day?”

“Why?”

“It’s important.”

“Yes, he did. Mrs. Jones filled it with coffee. Lorenzo was to go up to Albany for a package. He was late getting off. All
these people were here to see him off. His boss, Cyrus Wade—that ugly-faced guy—and Mrs. Jones. I don’t like her. Wade was
telling him to be careful because he needed him to pitch.”

“Mrs. Jones gave Lorenzo a thermos?” Lockwood pressed.

“It was Lorenzo’s thermos, Hook. She filled it for him from the old percolator over in the hangar.”

“Did you watch her fill it?”

“Of course not. Why?”

“Just hoping.”

“Lorenzo was late getting off because a plane was landing. He likes coffee. So he unscrewed his thermos and had a cup before
he took off.”

“What?”

“Well, why not? What’s so important about drinking a cup of coffee?”

Hook’s mind went wild. This would explain what had been bothering him. He thought it unlikely that Lorenzo would have drunk
the coffee just as he was getting the plane off the runway. That Lorenzo drank from the thermos
before he took off
would explain the immediate dive of the plane—the poison hit his intestines. The killer, if he or she were watching, must
have seen the fire crew rush off to the crash and realized that the thermos might not be consumed by the fire. And realized
he or she had to retrieve it.

“Did Mrs. Jones look upset when Lorenzo drank the coffee?”

“No. Why?”

“Nothing.”

“She poisoned him! That’s it, isn’t it?” The kid leapt up.

Lockwood stared into space. Could the kid be right? Mrs. Jones
had
filled the coffee thermos.

“Yeah, the only trace would be in the thermos. And someone had taken it from the wreck. Maybe,” Lockwood mumbled. “But this
is just a
theory
of mine, Stinky.”

Lockwood admonished Stinky to keep his mouth closed about all this. The kid agreed.

Lockwood next went over to two guys who were fooling with a plane with the oil leak.

One had the look of a mechanic, as Lockwood would picture one: strongly built, firm-jawed, steady, and with energetic eyes.
He held a huge wrench like a caveman might hold a dinosaur bone before he whacked you one. Or maybe the guy’s five o’clock
shadow just gave him a primitive look.

The caveman was Rodney Kepper, and the pilot was Hank Deacon, a small, effeminate blond man with a nervous look and thin hands.
Lockwood made him out to be some rich creep with a penchant for flying.

Deacon was from out of state, so he wasn’t important. He had made an unscheduled stop. But Kepper was one of the people Amanda
had said were present the day of the crash.

Kepper gave Lockwood five minutes after Lockwood told him who he was. Seems Transatlantic insured Rodney Kepper also, and
Kepper didn’t want to jeopardize his policy.

“Yeah, I was here, but I just saw the smoke, that’s all. I was in the hangar. Heard screaming and went out to take a look.
Stinky was crying, Mrs. Jones was screaming, and Wade was taking it coolly, just standing there. Stinky loved that guy. Lorenzo
got Stinky a pass to the games and taught him about planes and all. Stinky and Amanda and I ran out to the wreck. It was hopeless.
I burned my hands.”

“What’d you see at the crash?”

“Well, by the time we got the portable extinguishers playing on the plane, it was way too late for Lorenzo. I cut him out,
after smashing what was left of the cockpit window.”

“What next?”

“Amanda vomited. The body wasn’t pretty, what was left of it. We just let the plane burn.”

“Did anybody happen to see a thermos?”

Kepper’s eyes became like slits. “Mister, you’re asking about a thermos, and I just was talking about a man dying. What kind
of guy are you?”

Lockwood had to admit it sounded callous. “But it may be important,” he finished.

Kepper didn’t accept that. Or maybe he wanted to stop talking. He gripped the huge wrench tighter and said he was through
talking.

Lockwood thanked him and gave him his card. Not that he figured he would ever hear from Kepper.

Now to give Amanda a little bit of her own medicine. Lockwood made his way back to the hanger where Amanda, smiling like the
Mona Lisa, had slipped into a green dress she filled out well for the ride he had promised.

“Will this do? It’s all I keep at the field.”

“Fine.” It was fine. “Much better than the coveralls.” He marveled at the transformation. She didn’t look tough at all now,
and he had that old feeling. This independent woman! A few years older than Robin, a lot more knowledgeable. He wondered about
this guy in the army that used to be her buddy in air shows. Maybe they had been lovers. Probably.

They got in the Cord and roared off. “She has twelve cylinders,” Lockwood said.

“She?”

“All cars are female.”

“My plane is a
he
. Freddie Freestrut.”

They got off the bumpy service road and onto the White-stone. He paid the ten-cent toll and they took the Hutchinson Parkway
into Westchester. He opened up the Cord a bit. Then a bit more. It wasn’t crowded at this time of day. He had done 60 m.p.h.
on this road many times and gotten only one ticket.

“This car needs wings,” Amanda remarked. “How fast can she really go?”

“In a few minutes I’ll show you.”

He floored it. “Hold onto your hair, Amanda. I’m now going to see if you can hold
your
cookies.”

He floored the accelerator pedal, and the twelve cylinders responded. Amanda’s hair streamed out behind her. The car hurtled
on faster and faster, zipping past the few cars on the road as if they were standing still.

The roar of the engine opening up seemed to startle Amanda.

“Heavens,” she yelled over the rising wind, “what kind of an engine do you have in there?”

“Packard Twin Six. I didn’t like the regular Cord engine. It’s a bit underpowered for my money. This Cord can burn rubber
for a block and still be accelerating.” He delighted in speaking about his car and showing her off to a pretty dame. He was
never more at home than behind the wheel.

“Good Lord! How fast can she go?” Amanda yelled over the roar as the needle wobbled above 105 miles per hour.

Before Lockwood could reply, she exclaimed, “Look out!” Indeed, there was a car going half that speed in the left lane forty
yards ahead. Lockwood saw it, too, and put on his police siren. The car ahead pulled over sharply, and they didn’t have to
brake at all. The needle crawled over 115, and still moved on. The speedometer readings went up to 120.

“Holy Jesus,” was all Amanda could say. Lockwood steered them easily around another Sunday driver, and the velocity crept
higher.

“She has racing shocks, so the potholes don’t bother her much. Also,” he yelled over the siren, “she has front-wheel drive.
Otherwise, by now we’d be in a ditch.”

“Stop,” Amanda panted. Then she laughed. “No, Bill, don’t stop, go faster. Anything you can take, I can take.”

“That’s the old moxie.” Lockwood didn’t turn to see if she meant it though. The road commanded his full attention; they were
now up to 125.

The siren seemed to get louder. Actually, it wasn’t his siren. It was, he saw, a police car trying to catch up. It made a
valiant effort, but eventually they lost it.

The tachometer was showing some strain. The oil heat was up. Lockwood reluctantly slowed to 100. The traffic for the upcoming
traffic circle was starting to crimp his style, too.

“Ooh, I loved it,” Amanda cooed sensually next to him, putting her arm over his shoulder. “It seems like we’re almost standing
still now, by comparison.”

Thrills warm her up, he realized. Good.

They were still managing, despite the occasional car, a good 90 m.p.h. The lines on the parkway looked like dots. Damn, he
couldn’t scare her. She nudged closer to him. A lot closer.

They braked, and he stopped in a turnoff he knew, a lovers’ lane used by some teenagers. It was shielded from the road by
a grove of trees, and other cars were there.

“I suppose you ran out of gas,” she said.

“You could say that.”

Lockwood pulled the handbrake, then leaned over and kissed Amanda, tentatively at first. She responded willingly, eagerly.
Her tongue searched his out as she pressed against him. Encouraged by her willingness, his hand slid into her blouse, caressed
her full, pear-shaped breasts, then slid down to unclasp the fastening of her skirt and plunged lower.

Her kisses grew more frantic.

“Oh, darling—darling,” she was muttering. “Keep doing that, yes, yes.”

His left hand played over her flesh. No girdle. All that curving body was her own.

“I want you, Bill. But we can’t—not now. But, I can do something for—for you here, if you let me… .” she said between moans
of pleasure as his hand pressed her.