The Emerald Cat Killer (11 page)

“It's about a laptop computer. One that you got from your cousin Carlos.”

“Oh, no.” She put her head in her hands. Was the gesture one of real grief, or was she mocking herself? What a terrific person! “Was it stolen? Computers seem to be the favorite target for thieves these days, more than cell phones or even guitars. Carlos has had some scrapes with the law, I'm afraid. He's always been my favorite
primo
but I worry about him.”

Lindsey shook his head. “Well, yes and no.”

She tilted her head like Edison's dog on the RCA Victor logo. “I don't understand. Either the laptop was clean or it was stolen goods. How could it be both yes and no?”

Lindsey said, “I believe your cousin got the computer from a pawnshop out in Fruitvale.”

“Okay.” She looked dubious.

“They got it … the, what do you call it,
prestamista,
a woman called Crista—she got it from a man named Rigoberto Chocron. How he got it … well, there seems to be a long, tangled trail of owners behind this thing. And, yes, I'm afraid that it was stolen at one point. But you needn't worry about that, Jade. I'm sure that your hands are clean. And your cousin Carlos—no, I don't think he has anything to worry about.”

“Well, then?”

Lindsey hesitated.

Jade Montoya glanced at an oversized wall clock, the hours indicated by musical instruments instead of numbers. At the moment it was double bass past piano. She said, “The owner will be here in a few minutes and I have to scamper up to the campus for Counterpoint and Composition Two-Oh-Nine.”

“There was a file on the laptop. We're quite certain that it was there at the time that the computer was stolen. There's likely to be a civil suit over it, an intellectual property suit. One party claims that the contents of that file—it was a novel—were published for the enrichment of a party other than the author.”

“And he's suing? Sounds reasonable enough to me.”

“Well, in fact he's deceased.”
That
again, Lindsey thought. “But his wife is involved. And there's more. The book was contracted to a publisher and they're threatening to sue the company that actually published the book.”

Jade Montoya's features drew back into an impish grin. Clearly she had grasped the situation and found it amusing. “And your role in this drama, Mr. Lindsey? Your card says you're not a police officer, you work for an insurance company.”

“International Surety needs to know whether to fight the lawsuit or to pay up.”

“Ha. Very neat.” She rubbed her slim jaw between thumb and forefinger. “And the computer itself is missing, is that it?”

“Precisely.”

A heavyset man emerged from the back of the store. Beyond the newcomer, Lindsey could see a workshop. Disassembled instruments of various sorts were strewn across a massive workbench. The heavyset man was taller than Lindsey. He had close-cropped gray hair and wore wire-rimmed spectacles.

He was carrying a tuba.

“Everything all right, Jade?” He pronounced her name in the Spanish manner.

Jade turned and handed Lindsey's card to the heavyset man. “Remember that computer my cousin gave me a while ago? Mr. Lindsey is looking for it, for an insurance case he's working on.”

“Hardly seems worth the trouble. That thing was pretty battered. Wasn't that why you dumped it?” He didn't wait for an answer. “Let me know when you leave so I can run the store.” He tossed a casual nod to Lindsey, turned around, and strolled back to his workshop. Lindsey heard a few tuba-notes after that.

“Well, I have to go to my class,” Jade said. She drew a felt-lined instrument case from beneath the counter and placed her trumpet in it. She folded her sheet music and slipped it into a slim portfolio.

“I still need to find that laptop,” Lindsey said.

“It crashed,” Jade Montoya said. “For once in my life I did the sensible thing, I actually backed up my work on a flash drive. When the laptop crashed I took it to a computer store I'd heard about in Oakland to get it fixed.”

She came around the counter and headed toward the street door.

Lindsey offered her a ride to the university campus and she accepted. Once in Lindsey's rented Avenger he pressed the issue.

“Congratulations on saving your data. You only saved your own files, though—not old files that were left by others?”

“I'm afraid so.”

In that case the missing file might still be found. “Miss Montoya—Jade—what did you do with the laptop when you got it back from the computer store?”

They had reached Durant Avenue and turned up toward the University of California complex.

“I never got it back,” Jade Montoya said. “They opened it up and told me what it would cost to get the thing up and running again and I just about
plotzed.
”

“You what?”

“Is that the word?
Plotzed?
Like almost fell down, I was so
farshimmelt?
”

Lindsey shook his head. “I guess so.”

“So I asked them if they had a good used laptop I could buy instead and they made me an offer I couldn't refuse. So now I have a good machine. Uploaded my files and everybody goes to the seashore on Sunday.”

That one, at least, she got right. And good for her. One more important question. “What was the name of the store?”

“Generic Services Corporation.”

“Are you serious?”

“Not really. But it might as well have been. Universal Data Services Inc. Nice guy runs it, a Mr. White.”

“And what became of the old computer?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “No idea. Maybe they junked it. Maybe they salvaged it for parts. Look, here's my stop. Thanks for the ride. Give my regards to Mrs. Columbo. Come by the store if you ever need some music.”

They were stopped at Dana Street and Lindsey intended to turn anyway. As Jade Montoya disappeared into the pedestrian traffic, Lindsey called after her, “Try ‘And the Angels Sing.'” He couldn't tell whether she'd heard him or not.

He cut over to Channing, then down to Oxford, and headed for Northside.

Too early for his appointment with Eric Coffman, he found a parking spot and spent an hour happily browsing through a neighborhood bookstore. There was a pretty good section of detective novels, including a string of Tony Clydesdale pulpers by Wallace Thompson. And there was
The Emerald Cat,
by Steve Damon. There was no question that the Marston and Morse titles were more attractively designed and manufactured than the Gordian House book, but a casual browser might well have taken the Damon novel for part of the Thompson series.

There was a section of used paperbacks and it included a shelf and a half of old Perry Masons. Lindsey looked over a few of them, thinking more of the old Raymond Burr television series than the Gardner novels. Burr reminded him of his old friend Eric Coffman. Or the other way around. Burr was a vigorous, good-looking, athletic man in the earliest episodes. As the years went by he'd grown heavier and more ponderous, moved more slowly, but always confident, always in charge, always successful.

And in the later color revivals he'd expanded to massive proportions, grown a beard, become nearly a parody of himself. But he was still Raymond Burr, still Perry Mason, still … Lindsey found himself thinking, still Eric Coffman.

The mental Rolodex popped into action. Raymond Burr. Born … Raymond Burr. There, at least, was a man unafraid to be who he was.

He checked the time, flipped open his cell phone, and called Eric Coffman's office.

“Bart? Where are you?”

Lindsey told him.

“For heaven's sake, you're right around the corner from here. Listen, you haven't had lunch yet, have you?”

“Matter of fact,” Lindsey said, “I haven't really had breakfast today. I had an early appointment and I just climbed into my skivvies and headed out the door.”

“Good. Make it your breakfast, my lunch, whatever. I hope you're paying.”

Lindsey laughed.

“Look, you're at Black Oak. Meet me at Saul's. You're practically there already. Give me a minute to put my dignity back on and I'll be right over.”

EIGHT

“What's so funny, Lindsey?” Eric Coffman tried very hard to make his question sound like a resentful snarl but there was no way he was going to bring that off.

Before Lindsey could get an answer out he was engulfed in Eric Coffman's bear hug. He felt himself lifted off the ground and swung in a circle before the lawyer set him back on his feet. Coffman's big hands closed around Lindsey's shoulders. Lindsey felt himself tilted back. Coffman said, “Okay, okay,
mein hower,
tell me how you are and what you've been up to since the age of the terrible thunder lizards. No, never mind, we need first to wrap ourselves around some good
yiddisch schpeis,
what, you're an American and you don't speak Yiddish? You need some nourishment, first we fill the belly, and then we can talk, come.”

Bearded now, and sporting a spade-shaped Vandyke streaked with gray, comfortable in a suit and vest that did nothing to conceal his corpulence, Coffman was either patterning himself on the latter-day Raymond Burr, or Lindsey had fallen into a TV movie.
Eric Coffman and the Case of the Carboniferous Collaborator.
Coffman piloted Lindsey into Saul's Delicatessen and to a table. He'd never been in the establishment before, but the sights and odors were eerily familiar. After a couple of minutes Lindsey remembered similar establishments from the one and only case that had taken him to New York, a decade and a half before.

Waiting for a waitperson to approach, Coffman repeated his question.

“Oh.” Lindsey tried to come into focus. “I was just browsing in this bookstore, what, Oak Tree Books, something like that—”

“Black Oak. I know the place,” Coffman grinned.

“I was looking at some Erle Stanley Gardner novels and remembering the old TV series—”

“And up shows Perry Mason in the flesh. Plenty of flesh at that, hey?” Coffman tapped a thumb against his rounded belly. “I get a lot of that. I play into it. In my business, you need every advantage. Besides, he was a great lawyer.”

“Mason?”

“Mason? No such guy. Fictitious creation. No. Erle Stanley Gardner. Gardner himself. I'm glad I never had to go up against him in front of a judge. So—”

A young woman in T-shirt and jeans approached and asked if they'd had time to look at the menus prominently present on their table, or if they'd like a little more time.

“Thank you, darling—”

“Oh, it's you, Mr. Coffman. Nice to see you.”

“Give us a minute. Don't go too far; come right back; we'll order.”

She backed away.

“That's the trouble,” Coffman said, “these waitresses. Too young, too pretty, too good-natured. She should look like your Aunt Sadie and act like your Uncle Heshie. Wrong atmosphere. But they're sweet. Very pleasant to the eye, too. You ready to order or you want me to recommend something?”

Lindsey studied the menu.

The waitress came back, pencil and pad in hand.

Lindsey said, “I'll have, ah, I'll just have, oh, a green salad. Salad and a cup of tea.”

The waitress said, “Green, glass tea. What else?”

Lindsey frowned.

Eric Coffman shook his head mournfully. “Lindsey, Lindsey, at least learn, it's
a glass tea,
no
of.
And have something fit for a human being to eat, you're not a cow in a pasture. At least”—to the waitress—“make my friend's salad a tuna. And bring a few slices Russian rye. And for me, Alexandra—you're Alexandra, right, all you gorgeous goddesses, I can't tell you apart—yes, Alexandra, for me the usual.”

“Chicken in pot, glass red wine.”

“Yes, darling. And some rolls to go with.”

She scurried away.

To Lindsey: “Have a pickle.”

Lindsey ignored the invitation.

“So, Hobart, such a long time. It's good to see you again. You're coming tonight; you'll see our new digs.”

“You still have your little harem? I spoke with Miriam and one of the girls. They're all grown up, aren't they?”

“Alas, they try their wings and then they fly away. Sarah is married, she lives in Seattle getting rich writing software. Rebecca at least is nearby, she's teaching. And you and I, Lindsey, we're turning into a pair of
alter kockers
. Well, it beats the alternative, does it not, old friend?”

“Rebecca's teaching in Oakland?” Lindsey raised his eyes questioningly. “Isn't that dangerous?”

Coffman tilted his head this way, that way, as clearly as if he'd said,
maybe yes, maybe no.
“In Oakland. Jingletown. Interesting neighborhood, interesting history. Some good kids in her school, some gangsters. Miriam worries.” After a pause, “I also worry. What can a father do?”

The food arrived. Lindsey looked at it and realized that he was hungry after all. He pitched in.

Coffman's meal included chicken, matzo balls, broth, carrots, pickles, rolls. He drank his wine and signaled for a refill. Lindsey was glad that he had more than a cow's lunch.

“So, Hobart.” Coffman took a noisy spoonful of soup. “Officer Plum will be with you? A remarkable woman. Surprising. Impressive.”

“I don't think so.”

“No? You two were quite an item at one time. What happened? Are you totally finished?”

“I saw her a couple of days ago. She's doing well. We're friends.”

“I thought more than that. I'm disappointed, Hobart. A fine woman. The clock is ticking, you know. You never married? Never found the right girl, or is it something else? All the years we've known each other. Is it polite to ask, even?”

That diffident Perry Mason smile, but you knew there were shark's teeth behind those smiling lips.