To Catch a Cook: An Angie Amalfi Mystery (15 page)

Angie was glad to stay in the city today. Last night, as she gave Paavo a shortened version of her visit north with cousin Richie, she had visions of him wanting to drive up to Gideon immediately. Luckily, he was too busy with an autopsy and a deposition at the Hall of Justice, plus he’d set up a meeting with a couple of specialists at San Francisco General to discuss Aulis’s treatment.

Shortly after he left for work, Angie received a phone call from Irene Billot, the customer the grocer had mentioned. Angie asked if they could meet to discuss Cecily, and she agreed.

Irene lived on a ground-floor apartment on Diamond Street, several blocks away from Liberty. She appeared to be in her sixties, with large, green eyes and beautifully coiffed coppery brown hair, and wore a pants outfit that looked like a Chanel. And she was in a wheelchair.

“The grocer assured me you seemed like a nice—and safe—person to talk to,” Mrs. Billot said after they’d introduced themselves. “Can’t be too careful anymore! But you’re too young to have known Cecily.”

“I didn’t,” Angie said. “I’m a friend of Aulis Kokkonen’s. I hope you remember him.”

“Mr. Kokkonen? Of course I remember him. He was a quiet man, and so very nice.” The woman continued to look quizzically at Angie. “Please come inside.”

Angie followed her into a living room filled with photos of children and grandchildren. She had set out cookies and a pitcher of iced tea, and poured them each some.

Angie sat on a yellow armchair facing the woman. “Mr. Kokkonen is the reason I was asking questions in the neighborhood. Cecily’s son, you see, is a close friend of mine. Almost a fiancé—once he gets around to asking me.” Angie smiled, and to her thanks, the woman did as well. “His name is Paavo. You might remember him?”

“Paavo? Little Paavo? He’s all grown up now? Oh, of course he is! My, it was long ago, wasn’t it?” Irene smiled from her memories. “Such a cute little boy. He had curly brown hair, so soft and springy I’d love to run my fingers through it, and huge blue eyes. He was always talking and laughing. I used to tell Cecily she was going to have to beat the women off with a stick from that boy.”

“Well…he’s still as handsome as ever,” Angie admitted. “Although his hair isn’t curly anymore. But I still love running my fingers through it.” Then her spirits fell. “He doesn’t laugh much, though, and he isn’t a very talkative person either.”

The woman studied her face. “Please tell me what’s wrong.”

Angie proceeded to tell her a little about Aulis and Paavo. “So I’m trying to find out something about Cecily from someone who knew her. There’s even a question as to whether she’s alive or dead. Do you think she might still be alive?”

Irene dropped her gaze and quietly said, “No. At first I had hoped she’d managed to get away, but when she never came back, when she abandoned her children, I realized she must have died.”

“What was she like, Mrs. Billot?” Angie asked. “What happened to her? Do you know?”

“Well, Cecily and I were as close as…as sisters back then, but in hindsight, I realize there was a side of her that was different from the goody-goody loving wife strangers might have seen her as. She had her secrets.”

Angie sat straighter in her chair. “What do you mean?”

“Cecily’s first marriage wasn’t a happy one.”

“Oh?” Angie’s voice rose. “I’ve never heard anything at all about it.”

Irene took a sip of her tea. “Well, I’m just guessing here, from a few things she said. It seemed her first husband was a lot older. She, like Mika, had lost both her parents, although she had lost hers to illnesses. Her first husband, if you ask me, was the father she had grieved for. She loved him in a quiet way, and he was good to her, and protective. But then he died from a stroke or something. She had a lot of tragedy in her life. A lot of tragedy. Some people, trouble seems to stalk them, no matter what they do. Cecily was one of those people.”

“That’s terrible,” Angie cried, her heart going out to the woman, despite her vow to never forgive Cecily for her treatment of Paavo and his sister.

“She left D.C. with her young daughter and eventually moved to the apartment on Liberty Street. I lived next door back then. Since we both had daughters, we got along. I was a manager at PG & E, and Cecily was a researcher at a law library.”

Angie nodded, remembering that was apparently the story Cecily had used as a cover.

“I didn’t know it was a lie at first,” Irene said pointedly, to Angie’s amazement.

“She told you it was a lie?” she asked.

Irene nodded. “I was the only one she confided in. She worked for the FBI and moved into the building to watch a group of Finns mixed up in anti-Soviet activities, and—”

“Wait,” Angie interrupted. “I thought she was a research clerk.”

“That was the job she began with, but they quickly moved her into surveillance—undercover work.”

Angie was too stunned to say a word.

“At first the Finns did amateur stuff like what everyone was doing,” Irene said. “At times Sam or Mika or sometimes one of the others would go off on nightly errands. The last time I saw her, in fact, it was evening. Mika got a call from Sam and left quickly. The next day, he was killed.”

“Oh, my!”

“Sometimes Cecily would go off, too, by herself. She’d ask me to look after Paavo and Jessica. She’d be back in less than half an hour, looking stormy and angry.”

“Did you ask Cecily where she went or what upset her?”

“I asked. She was having a difficult time with her boss. In fact, she was having problems going through with her work because of Mika. She kept it from him.”

Angie wasn’t sure she’d heard right. “He didn’t know she worked for the FBI?”

“How could she admit to spying on him for the government, even though they were both on the same anti-Soviet side? What she was doing bothered her a lot. Deep down, she knew she should have quit her job and told Mika everything. But she
didn’t. Her boss apparently talked her into staying. She never went near the FBI office, but used to meet him every few weeks. He convinced her she could actually watch over Mika and the others by staying with the Bureau—that the whole U.S. government would be looking out for them as they got in deeper and deeper with the Russian Mafia.”

“And she believed them?”

“To her eternal regret, I’m sure.”

Angie could scarcely believe it. “Was she an activist?”

“Not at all. Cecily wasn’t a bohemian, a rebel, or even a government critic. Maybe it was because her parents died early and she had to look after herself. She was a survivor; there was an inner toughness to her that not even Mika saw. Oh, that didn’t mean she wasn’t nice or that she wasn’t innocent in some ways. Back then we were all so innocent, believing we could change the world, believing in the good of man. Trusting and naïve—that was all of us, including Cecily.”

Irene’s cynicism was startling.

“I apologize,” Irene said. “But sometimes I get cranky here in this chair. I know you want to ask—it’s muscular dystrophy.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t bother.” Irene reached for more tea, and so did Angie.

After a while, Angie drew in her breath, and then said, “I hope you don’t mind my saying, but it sounds like you were more than a little exasperated with Cecily.”

Irene nodded solemnly. “As I said, all this is in hindsight. She was my truest friend, but I see now that she was too ambitious; she wanted to succeed in the Bureau. She saw a chance to get ahead—there was lots of pressure to recruit women agents. Cecily
might have been one of the first. She had the mind, talent, and ambition for it, or so she believed. So did I. On the other hand, she also had a family and a good man. Then, in the end, she had nothing.”

“My God,” Angie cried, finally realizing the enormity of Cecily’s deception. “The minute she married Mika, she should have been pulled from the assignment. How could the Bureau have left her in it? How could she have remained? You don’t spy on your own husband!”

“That’s right. We talked about it at length. Her boss wanted her to stay on, and her ambitious part agreed with him.”

“That’s madness. Why would her boss have done that?”

“She gave him information about the Russian smugglers—organized crime, in other words, their activities. The Finns were nothing to them, but an insight to what became the Russian Mafia was important. She didn’t understand that back then. She believed in God and country. Had she lived, I’m sure she would have spent the last thirty years asking herself how she had been such a fool. She misread the signs, and kept her secret from Mika, and her ambitions drove her to trust the wrong man.”

“Her boss?”

Irene’s eyes turned hard as steel. “That’s right. She always said he was the one.”

“My God!” Angie’s stomach churned, and tears of frustration and anger on Paavo’s behalf came to her eyes. “It’s so hard to believe. What about her children, her responsibility as a parent, if not as a wife? What was the woman thinking?”

“I warned her.” Irene’s tone was cold, almost clinical. “Cecily believed they were all protected. She was close to delusional, playing her games with all
their lives, thinking she was beating the system. She beat no one.”

Perversely, Angie felt the need to defend Paavo’s mother. “Maybe you don’t know the whole story. Sometimes there are circumstances beyond anyone’s control. You can’t control everyone. You can only be responsible for yourself, and hope you take the right step.”

Irene gazed at her a long moment. “You’re a good person, Miss Amalfi. Paavo’s very lucky to have found you,” she said, leaving Angie flustered. “But how can you excuse Cecily for leaving her children? That was the result, no matter how you paint it.”

“I don’t excuse her at all.” Angie tried to explain her complex feelings. “Or Aulis. Or even Jessica for perpetuating the lie. I can’t forgive any of them for that, but I would like to think she really did love her children and did what she believed was best. I don’t know for sure. Just as I don’t know if she would have been a great mother. Those are ‘what ifs’ and ‘might have beens.’ I’m not here to judge her. I just want the truth. And I don’t want Paavo to be hurt anymore.”

Irene looked shocked. “That’s all this means to you, Paavo’s feelings?”

“Yes! Of course my concern is for him, his feelings and his safety. My God, someone tried to kill him! All the rest is in the past. Mistakes were made, and nothing can be done about them. I want to be sure they aren’t perpetuated. I can’t imagine what it was like for Paavo to grow up without his parents, but he’s a fine man because of what his life experience made him, and what he is inside. Now these past secrets are hurting him, and the danger is much, much too close. I’ve got to stop it. That’s
what’s important, Irene. That’s the only thing that’s important.”

Irene slowly nodded. “You’re right. The past sometimes seems more real to me than the present. Maybe for a reason.” She patted her useless legs. “I wish you luck, Miss Amalfi. You and Paavo. I hope you both find what you’re seeking.”

“I appreciate that,” Angie said. After some small talk, Angie made her good-byes and left the apartment.

When all was quiet once more, the woman rose from the wheelchair, folded it, and placed it by the front door. She popped the bug from the telephone receiver, dropped it in her pocket, and, after waiting a few minutes, walked out the door, carrying the chair with her.

“Inspector Smith, Homicide,” Paavo said, showing his badge as he stood at the front door of the home of Craig Weston, the onetime owner of Omega Computing. “I’d like to speak to Mr. Weston.”

“Homicide?” The man cocked his head, peering hard at the ID. His skin was dark olive, his head completely bald. Rounded shoulders caused a stooped posture, and the skin around his eyes and mouth hung in loose, rubbery folds. “I’m Craig Weston.” His voice was gruff. “What’s the problem?”

“There’s no problem. I’m investigating a murder case in San Francisco,” Paavo said, “the murder of a Russian jeweler. In the course of the investigation something came up that happened many years ago. It doesn’t involve you, but I did have questions about some of your former employees.”

The man visibly relaxed. The way people became uptight when first contacted by police never ceased to surprise Paavo. They could be perfectly innocent, but you wouldn’t know it from the way they looked.

“Come on in,” Weston said. The house was a sim
ple ranch style, the type that carried an affordable, middle-class price tag almost anywhere but in Palo Alto, the home of Stanford University and many Silicon Valley executives and managers. Weston walked straight through it to the backyard. Across a concrete patio was a clapboard workshop. “We can talk in here so the wife won’t be listening and butting in every two seconds.”

The workshop looked like a junkyard for old computer parts. A couple of complete systems were up and running, but most of the room was filled with miscellaneous pieces, soldering irons, tools, and electrical equipment. “I’m working on a new invention. Soon it’ll be ready to market.”

Paavo nodded. Weston removed a crumb-filled plate, utensils, and an empty coffee cup from a chair near the work area, and motioned for Paavo to sit there.

“What do you want to know?” Weston asked, easing his bulk into the chair in front of one of the computers.

“About the Omega Corporation.”

“Omega?” Weston leaned back in the chair. “That was years ago.”

“You had some Finns working for you there.”

“Yep. Three of my programmers. They’d get to talking Finnish, I didn’t have a clue. They were good, though. Smart boys. They stayed with the company after I sold it. I heard a couple of them died or were killed not too long after that. I suppose that’s why you’re asking. I didn’t know anything about it, though. I was long gone by then, thanks to Partridge.”

“Partridge bought Omega, I understand.”

“Right.” He bent forward, suddenly steely eyed. “Partridge forced me out. To this day, I’m not sure how he did it, but he decided he wanted Omega,
and went head to head with us, contacting my customers and undercutting my deals even if he was losing money on them. The customers didn’t care as long as they got a better bottom line. After a while I couldn’t afford to make my payroll. Guess who showed up to offer to help.”

“Partridge.”

“You’re damned right.” Weston reached for a pack of Marlboros and matches on the worktable, shook out some smokes, and offered one to Paavo. Paavo declined. Weston lifted the pack to his mouth and wrapped his lips around one cigarette, pulling it free from the others. “I had no choice, so I borrowed from him. He was a smooth bastard, offering help, saying he understood. What he understood was how to run me out of my own company. Before long, I owed him more than my share of the business.”

Weston paused long enough to light the cigarette bobbing up and down between his lips. “He became the owner, and booted me out the door. Made me an offer—not nearly what the place was worth. Back then, the computer industry hadn’t yet taken off. We were young, we knew the future, but few of us had the business sense to jump from here to there. Look at Altair or Osborne or Commodore computers—they owned the early days. Where are they now? It was the same with a lot of us. Me included.”

Paavo nodded. Weston was simply stating the facts and there was no recrimination or resentment. Even his dislike of Partridge was coldly clinical…like a computer.

“What I’ll never understand was how Partridge was able to match the technological side of what I was doing. I had programmers, but I also had engineers. In the old days we did everything. Hardware
and software. It was all connected in our minds—computers. Period. Anyway, we were working on light-emitting diodes—LED displays. They’re what made little calculators possible. And then”—Weston’s face grew taut, his breathing quickened—“before we could get ours on the market, Partridge suddenly had them in use, in his company! It pulled the rug right out from under us.” For the first time in the interview, Weston’s analytical demeanor vanished in rage at a betrayal that still ate at him.

Paavo prompted, “How did that happen?”

“Partridge had to have had some outside help—I mean, outside-the-country help! The Finns that you mentioned, they were suspicious of that, too. I remember having a conversation with one of them—Sam, I think his name was.”

“Sam Vanse?”

“Uh, I guess.” Weston seemed startled by the question, as if he meant this to be a monologue. “Yeah, Sam. That’s right.” He flicked cigarette ash into a used plate by his monitor. “Anyway, Sam said that he had been back home, and he’d heard that Soviet scientists were working on different digital display methods for computers and other things, probably for their space program. The Soviet scientists had the necessary theoretical knowledge, the math and the science, but they didn’t have any industry. The complete thrust of their technology was aimed at satellites—the space program—but they developed the LED display, and suddenly so did Partridge.”

Weston stopped talking and fixated on the tip of his cigarette as if watching Partridge burning there.

“So you agreed with the Finns that Partridge had Soviet sources?” Paavo asked.

Before continuing, Weston filled his lungs with
smoke. “At first I didn’t believe it, even though that was always Sam’s idea. Mike and Oscar agreed.”

“You mean Mika and Okko?”

“If you say so—they were Mike and Oscar to me. Anyway, that was their explanation for the way Partridge jumped ahead of the competition the way he did. Then, after he bought Omega, he made it sound as if the LED display technology had originated with us. That was when I really began to get suspicious of his sources. The bastard couldn’t tell the difference between computer parts and those of a toaster.” Weston gazed at the far wall and shook his head. “The worst part is, I still don’t see how he did it. He had to have had the cooperation of the Soviet government…or our government. But why? He was just a nerdy computer builder in California. I don’t get it.”

“Neither do I,” Paavo admitted. “But it’s a good question. One that bears looking into.”

“Good luck, fella. I used to try to wise up folks in the industry—hell, anybody who’d listen—about Harold-The-Shit Partridge. All it got me was a rep as a bitter loser. Everybody loved Harold—and if you didn’t, you faced his lawyers or got blackballed in the Valley or both.” Weston’s face darkened. “I’ve been watching him…waiting. He’s going to get his comeuppance. Soon, too.”

As if realizing what he’d just said to a cop, he added, “If you think I’m worried telling you this, I’m not. When I act, no one will be able to pin it on me. I was one of the founders of this Valley. Most of what Partridge has is rightly mine. I just need to remind him of that fact, and someday soon, I will.”

“Paavo, I’m at the Au Claire restaurant, Union and Grant.” Angie spoke quietly into her cell phone.
“Why don’t you meet me here? I’ve got lots of information for you.”

“Okay. I’ll drop my things off at the house and walk down. I should be there in fifteen, twenty minutes or so.”

“Great. Love you!”

“You, too.”

She listened to the receiver disconnect, and couldn’t help but smile. He still wasn’t one to get mushy on the phone. Or ask questions. Cops—they always act as if their phone is being tapped.

She put her phone in her tote bag and took out her camcorder. She wouldn’t use this restaurant as one of her review subjects since it was near the house she and Paavo were sharing and she might want to come here fairly often. Still, she couldn’t pass up the chance to take a few shots.

As she panned the room, she became aware of someone standing behind her. She stopped filming and glanced over her shoulder. The older man who had been seated at the next table now stood frowning at her. “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s just that it’s a lovely restaurant.”

To her surprise, his frown changed to a smile. He was a big man, in his late sixties or so, with broad shoulders and a thick chest, waist, and hips. His hair was the color of steel, receded quite far at the temples, with a slicked-back center tuft. His eyebrows were gray, and his lashes so pale she could scarcely see them. His brown eyes were thin slits in a fleshy face, almost Boris Yeltsin-like, or maybe she just had Russians on the brain after all Paavo’s stories.

“No need to be sorry. I’m the one who should say that! I had to look at your camera—and I didn’t want you to break it by getting my ugly mug on film! I’m most intrigued by it.” His voice was deep, and his enunciation beautifully precise in a British
or even European manner—not at all like an American accent. “It’s such a tiny thing.”

“It’s the latest model.” Angie handed it to him. “It’s a digital video recorder. I look into the square on the side, and take my videos.”

He slid out the chair across from her and sat. “They haven’t brought my dinner out yet,” he murmured, lost in studying the camera. “This is nice. Quite nice. Can I try it?”

“Sure. Look into the little square, and hold down the button on the side.”

“Ah, I see.” He focused on Angie, taped her for a moment, then panned the restaurant. “I should tell my son about this. He does photography.”

“Then he’s probably aware of it. I’m not sure if serious photographers like these much or not. They seem to use mostly old, heavy stuff.”

“That’s what my son uses. He fills the car with equipment.” He chuckled. “I don’t know why he does it.”

“Is he a professional photographer?”

“Yes. He takes videos at weddings, bar mitzvahs, all that sort of thing. He enjoys it.”

“That’s great.” Angie looked at the small video camera. Maybe she should forget about food-related jobs and become a photographer herself. Making a living going to happy occasions and getting people to smile sounded easy enough. But then she thought of her sister Caterina, and how she tended to scream at photographers for always catching her with the most unflattering expressions. Actually, the photos were quite accurate.

“My name is Nick,” the old man said. “I must say, I don’t understand your country.”

That surprised her. “You don’t? Why not?”

“Because—a beautiful young woman like you should not be sitting alone in a restaurant. Back
home, when I was young, you would have been circled by men like roosters around a hen.”

A hen? How unflattering. “All pecking at me?”

“Not pecking in a bad sense…pecking as in a kiss.”

Her eyebrows rose up, and then she burst out laughing. “You do have a way with words, Nick.”

He chuckled. “That’s what the ladies used to say. Those days were great fun. So, why is someone as beautiful as you alone?”

“I won’t be for long. My boyfriend is going to meet me here.”

“Ah! My bad luck! Well, I won’t keep you. I see they’ve finally brought out my salad. I’d better leave—I wouldn’t want your boyfriend to get the wrong idea.” He held out his hand. “It’s been very nice talking to you, Miss…?”

“Call me Angie.” She reached her hand out to shake his.

“Angie.” He gently revolved her hand, clicked his heels, bowed forward, and kissed the back of it. “My pleasure.” Then he walked away.

Instead of returning to his table, he continued toward the back of the restaurant. Going to the men’s room, she supposed. She had to smile. It had been a long time since she’d met anyone who knew the proper way to kiss a lady’s hand, or, for that matter, knew any of the old-world mannerisms on how to treat a lady. Nick. She liked him. Ah, if he were about thirty years younger, watch out, Paavo.

Since Nick wasn’t there to make her feel self-conscious, she took a few more pictures of the restaurant. It had a warm charm about it.

The waiter brought out the lobster bisque she’d ordered, and soon Nick returned to his table. She returned his smile as he sat and began to eat.

He seemed to forget about her, and she took a few more shots of the restaurant. She had no sooner finished the salad than the waiter brought her crab-stuffed filet of sole. She tried to eat slowly, waiting for Paavo, but he was taking longer than he’d expected. The man seemed to think he had wings, and forgot that annoyances like traffic jams could slow down his progress.

She nibbled at her sole. Had she been able to concentrate on it instead of Paavo’s whereabouts, it would have been delicious. Nick sent a bottle of Chalone Vineyard Reserve Chenin Blanc 1996 to her table.

She had the waiter ask him if he’d like to join her.

Quietly, and smoothly, the waiter moved him to her table, and poured them each a glass of the wine. Nick had ordered
frutti di mare
with white beans—
mare i monte
. “I don’t know where my friend is,” Angie said, as he settled in across from her, “but it seems a shame for both of us to be eating alone.”

“You are very kind to an old man. Most young people don’t give us a second thought these days,” he said.

“You’re very kind to send me this wine. It’s excellent.”

“You seemed to be someone who would know and appreciate a fine vintage.”

They talked about wines, and food, and music, and Angie discovered that Nick liked classical as much as she did, and they launched into a discussion of the San Francisco Symphony and Michael Tilson Thomas’s conducting. Nick had grown up with classical music, and Angie had come to it because of violin lessons as a child. Later, when her family realized that she wouldn’t grow very tall, they had her take ballet lessons. Neither had
worked out at all—her musical talent was nonexistent and her dancing ability was even worse—but she came to appreciate the music.