The Kills (28 page)

"But
she carried it farther than that, I take it."

Logan got
serious. "She could see what was coming, Ms. Cooper. The king was losing
interest in her, she knew she couldn't make a living dancing while she was
pregnant, and she didn't know what kind of hard times she was facing back in
the States, going home to Harlem after the war."

"What
did she admit to you that she took with her?"

Logan's
fingers tapped on the desktop. "I don't remember, exactly." He seemed
to recognize that he was displaying Queenie in a negative way.

"I'm
sure you can give me a general idea." I needed to get those interview
audiotapes before he altered or destroyed them. "We're beyond the statute
of limitations for theft, Mr. Logan," I said, smiling at him. "It's
quite fascinating."

"I'm
not the only one who knows," he said, as if he were justifying his reasons
for telling me. "Some jewelry. I mean, Farouk actually gave her stuff
during the time they were together. But I guess, in the end, she got her hands
on some uncut gems he had stashed away. Sold 'em off or pawned them from time
to time over the years. Farouk also collected rare stamps and valuable coins,
odd things that she really didn't know the value of," Spike said.

Then he
looked at me, as if to gauge my reaction before going on. I didn't display any.

"Queenie
was able to survive for about ten years on one of the treasures she
scored."

My raised
eyebrows gave away my interest. Spike went on. "You know what a
Fabergé egg is, Ms. Cooper?"

The
brilliantly jeweled objects had been made by Carl Fabergé for the
Russian czars, and the ones that survived the revolution had been collected and
traded by the richest men in the world. "Sure I do. Farouk had those, too?
Queenie took a Fabergé egg? My admiration for her taste keeps
growing."

Spike
Logan didn't care whether I approved of Queenie's methods or not. "Some
antiques dealer in London bought it from her. I looked him up on the Internet
but couldn't find any recent trace of him. She joked that Farouk was better
than the goose that laid the golden egg-he mislaid it and she took it. That
single egg kept her and Fabian going for the next ten years, till the boy died.
Queenie realized she got stiffed when she sold some of these objects 'cause she
didn't have any proof of ownership. The dealers knew she had stolen goods,
otherwise she would have made enough money to live in style the rest of a very
long life."

"Didn't
Farouk miss any of these things? Didn't he send people out to the States to try
to find her and get them back?"

"You
speak any French?" Spike asked.

I nodded
my head.

"
Touche pas!
Know what that means?"

"Don't
touch," I answered.

He leaned
forward and lowered his voice for dramatic effect. "When the king wanted
to play with his toys, he'd go into the rooms in his palace where everything
was stored, taking Queenie with him. I'm talking dozens of enormous rooms.
They'd sit on silk cushions, laid out on the floor, for hours and hours. He'd
let her try on tiaras and necklaces, run gold pieces through her fingers, and
place Fabergé goblets in her hands. But when it came to the pieces he
prized dearly, the things that were most rare, most valuable, he'd scream at
her,
'Touche pas! Touche pas!'
She wasn't even allowed to hold them. Fabergé goblets, yes, but the
jeweled eggs-no."

"So
it was easy for her to tell what the best treasures were, I guess."

"That's
what she thought. Queenie told me that when she was packing her bags to leave
the palace, she made one last sweep of the joint. She figured Farouk had so
many collections, so many toys, that if she was careful, he wouldn't begin to
know what was missing. She headed right for the things that she had never been
allowed to touch. Instead of taking all his precious eggs, she just took one.
Same for the gemstones and the other valuables. When he opened his closets and
vaults, he'd still see dozens of sparkling objects-he'd never stop to count.
The most obscene thing is that he probably never knew any of the things she
took was even missing."

"She
had no trouble smuggling these things out of Egypt?"

"Farouk
had turned his sights to a younger girl, the war was over, and everyone around
the king was delighted to get Queenie out of the palace. She put her finest
prizes right in her handbag, took her chances with what she'd concealed in the
luggage, and got on the next plane to Portugal, then home."

"What
became of all the other valuables?" I asked.

"She
spent some of the money she raised by selling them. But after Fabian's death,
and because Farouk had never responded to the boy's photographs, she went into
a profound depression. Spent five years institutionalized in a private
sanitarium-mental hospital in Connecticut. That chewed up most of what she was
able to hock."

"And
the rest?"

"She
didn't have legitimate title to these things, so she found herself selling to
some pretty shady characters. There was no way to prove-what do you call
it?"

"Provenance,"
I said.

"Yeah.
She had some rare stamps that don't go for much on the open market. And some
foreign coins that might have been worth something as part of a larger
collection, but she never got more than face value. And then she just ran out
of juice, Ms. Cooper."

Why, I
wondered, did Spike Logan ask us about what had become of McQueen Ransome's
possessions? Why had he let himself into the empty apartment, and had he been
looking for anything in particular when the police arrived?

"Do
you think, Spike, that she still had any of Farouk's valuables that she kept in
the apartment? Objects she had mentioned to you? Or possibly something that she
didn't even know had current worth?"

He
stretched his legs again and crossed his arms. "I think she would have
told me. Queenie trusted me, Ms. Cooper. I think this watch was about all she
had left to give."

She may
have trusted him, but could we?

"Did
you ever see a fur coat?" I asked.

He shook
his head. "In her crib? Nope. But I never had reason to look in her
closets, and we never went outside together in the winter. We could look
through the old photographs and I'm sure they would tell the story. It wouldn't
surprise me at all. Queenie would have liked a nice fur coat in her
prime."

Mike
Chapman came back into the room with lunch for Spike Logan. "Would you
excuse us for a few minutes?" I said, walking out with Mike before going
upstairs to my office.

I filled
Mike in on what Logan had told me. "The uniformed guys give you any sense
of what Logan was doing in the apartment when they arrived?" I asked,
opening the lid and sipping the hot coffee Mike had brought me.

"Sniffing
around pretty good. You believe he didn't know Queenie was dead when he got
there?"

"All
I have to go on is what he says. We'll see if phone records tell a different
story."

"You
gonna honor your word?" Mike asked. "Let him go home?"

"All
we got is a trespass. No judge is going to hold him on that. Might as well get
the goodwill by showing we trust him."

"You
got enough Vineyard contacts to get the local police to keep an eye on
him."

"I'm
not as worried about Logan as I am about getting my hands on the tapes that
he's got stored in the bank before he does anything to them. Queenie may have
said things that would have no significance to him, but would give us some
direction. I gotta get started on that. Would you be sure to get all his
contact information before you let him go? And the key to the apartment."

"You
wanna hold on to that gold watch from the Duke of Windsor, too?"

"Absolutely,"
I said.

Sarah
Brenner offered to work on the interstate subpoena, since she would be handling
the grand jury investigation of the Ransome homicide. I went to my desk to
phone the Oak Bluffs Police Department, to give them a heads-up on Spike Logan.

As I hung
up the phone, I noticed Laura standing at the doorway between her desk and the
hall. A man was speaking to her, and she was keeping him out of my way until
she determined whether I wanted to see him, guiding him to the conference room.

"It's
one of those days," she said, coming back to tell me about it.
"Doesn't anybody call for an appointment anymore? It's Peter Robelon-and
actually, he's with that other lawyer, Mr. Hoyt. They were in the building and
wanted to know whether you had a few minutes for them."

I took my
coffee down the hallway, curious to know what delaying tactic they had in mind
at this point.

They
stood up when I walked in the room. "Alex, I'm so sorry about Paige
Vallis. We both are."

I was
stone-faced. "Let's not put your credibility on the line, guys. I've
really been trying to take you seriously up to this point. I take it this isn't
a condolence call."

"C'mon,
Alex," Graham Hoyt said. "You can't take every one of these cases
home with you. Don't blame yourself for-"

"I
don't, thank you very much." Stay out of my personal life, I thought,
looking daggers at him. "I blame the killer."

"Look,
Alex, Graham's been working on me all weekend. I just spent the last couple of
hours with Andrew Tripping. I think maybe we ought to revisit our discussion of
a plea, especially now that the circumstances have changed so dramatically.
Will you sit?"

I pulled
out a chair and joined them at the table. "You've been jerking me around
since the get-go, Peter. If that's what this is about, forget it. Why would
Tripping possibly see the light of day at this point?"

"Because
the girl was the sticking point. With all due respect, Alex, he wasn't ever
going to jail because he did anything he would admit was wrong to Paige Vallis.
She's dead now. Can you understand you've got nothing to go forward with in
regard to the charge of rape? You're headed straight to a mistrial."

I hadn't
finished the legal research to see whether it was possible to sustain that
count if I was lucky enough to get Dulles to testify honestly about the events of
the day and evening. The medical evidence and DNA results proved that sexual
intercourse had occurred. Maybe Dulles could establish the fact that there had
been threats. I knew the chances looked pretty bleak. I didn't answer.

"Suppose
I move to dismiss the rape count of the indictment," Robelon said, Hoyt
sitting patiently by his side. "I'm not asking
you
to do that. I'll make the motion-oppose it if you want.
You'll be clean on the record, if that makes you feel any better about it, and
Moffett will rule on it. My way."

"Guess
you've already had that conversation with him. Ex parte." I was certain
that out of my presence the judge had given Robelon the go-ahead on his plan.

"You're
too emotional about this, Alex. Moffett's got no choice," Robelon said.

"You
don't either, if we're talking realistically."

"And
the assault charge on Dulles Tripping? Andrew will plead to that?"

"Graham
and I think that if we work on him together, we can get you that plea. The
misdemeanor-assault in the third degree."

"Jail
time?" Just the abuse of his son should have earned him the better part of
a year behind bars.

Robelon
pursed his lips and stalled for a minute. "We're just starting that part
of the discussion. When you were talking rape, he knew he was facing state
prison. That was out of the question. This is just city jail. I think we can
bend him."