City of Secrets (37 page)

Miranda counted to ten. Braced herself against the desk, wishing she'd taken some aspirin.

The receptionist walked out again, face red.

“Dr. Parkinson will see you now.”

*   *   *

Brown paneling, burled wood. Hunting lodge in the city flavor, decorated with sports trophies and blue-and-gold pennants boasting allegiance to the California Bears.

Her first surprise. She'd figured him for a Stanford man.

Her second was when he turned around to face her, cigar between his lips.

Her age. Not a fat, soft, middle-aged lecher getting his kicks from sticking his fingers in women's mouths. Not a bigmouthed braggart with a loud tie and country club connections. Not a distinguished gray-haired businessman, calculating, canny, careful.

Maybe his father. But not Hugh R. Parkinson.

Daddy's little boy. Wouldn't want to endanger Daddy's little boy, would we, Dr. Gosney?

Parkinson was good-looking in that slightly chubby, vacuous way all fraternity boys are, especially after they hit thirty. But the eyes were hard. And very, very cold.

Tried to smile, waved her to a seat. Stubbed out the cigar. Sat back in the brown leather chair, which cost twice as much as the one she'd spent a fee on.

“Now then, Miss Corbie—what can I do for you?”

He bent forward, telegraphing helpfulness, all the goodwill of a fucking Boy Scout.

She lifted the veil. “Mind if I smoke?”

He hesitated. “Smoking is very bad for the teeth.”

She shook out a Chesterfield, lit it with the Ronson on the first try. Studied him over the glowing tip, watching him flinch from the curling smoke.

“I'm not here for my teeth.”

He sighed, and a muscle inside his jaw moved in and out. First sign.

“Then why exactly are you here, Miss Corbie?”

“I wanted to see you for myself. The puppeteer.” She shook her head, said it regretfully. “But I was wrong. I found the puppet instead.”

His brow wrinkled, eyes frozen over. “I don't understand.”

She inhaled, blowing smoke in the direction of his left ear. “Now that I've met you, I don't either, not entirely. I assume Daddy still has something to do with the county or state or with political campaigns of certain people or still sits on the boards of certain corporations. Or, possibly, hospitals. Yeah. Hospitals make a lot of sense. Is he a doctor? Is that why you chose dentistry?”

Red flush, eyes seemed to get closer together. Second sign.

“My father has nothing to do with any reason you may or may not have come to see me.”

She nodded, crossed her legs with effort. “Sure, Junior. He's got nothing to do with a Fascist group of Jew-hating bullies called the Musketeers … founded by you. Nothing to do with some heavy strings pulled on the San Francisco Police Department to cover up certain facts about certain murders, encouraging them to railroad a former cop, and do it before anybody else got wise. And nothing at all to do with bombs on Treasure Island, planted around the Federal Building, and your pet surgeon's private eugenics lab at the Napa State Hospital.”

She inhaled the Chesterfield, watching him. Glanced down at his hands, fingertips pressed tight across his desk.

“Where's your special decoder ring with the M on it? Didn't you collect enough box tops?”

He jumped up, fists clenched, jerked an arm in the air toward her, then stopped himself. Ran a hand through his slickly oiled hair. Started to pace.

Bingo.

She looked up at him calmly.

“You're an accomplice to attempted murder. Mine. And unless you're willing to go through with it, Parkinson, I swear I'll nail you and Gosney to the wall, however long it takes. You, Gosney … and dear old Dad. Because that's who he was talking to when I overheard his phone call.”

He glared down at her, contemptuous, features sharper, more well-defined.

“Trash like you wouldn't understand. We're making America a better place. Keeping her out of the Jew war, fighting overseas for a bunch of grocers and garbagemen. Here and in New York … all over the country.”

She leaned back in the chair. Made an O with her lips and blew a smoke ring. Watched it sail over some framed photographs taken at the St. Francis Yacht Club. Parkinson watched her, unable to look away. Legs and mouth, legs and mouth. He was sweating.

“I thought they were all international bankers, Parkinson. Or are they Reds? Or can't you Hitler-loving assholes make up your little minds?”

He turned white, then red again, rubbing more jelly out of his scalp. Breathing hard, breathing fast.

“Go ahead and call Daddy if you want. And by the way—how is Dr. Gosney today?”

“He's recuperating at home, thanks to you. You almost killed him.”

She shrugged. Leaned forward, grinding the cigarette out on the polished mahogany.

“Consider it a warning. I don't like threats, especially from Nazi toadies.”

He slammed a fist down on the wood surface, yelling, “We are not Nazis! We're Americans, and—and—you'll see—we're forming a committee, our own party, and our goal—our only goal—is to keep the United States out of this war.”

He calmed down, breathing hard and staring at the desk, as if reciting something by memory. “It's a noble enterprise, true to our heritage, to our history. We've been betrayed from both sides, and we're going to make sure American boys don't die in another European war for a pack of Jews.”

Her voice was dry, withering. “No. You'll just make sure Jewish girls die in America for a pack of anti-Semites.” She stood up, sharp stabs through the ankle, but held her face in place.

“Form whatever committee you want to, Parkinson. Try to take down FDR, hide your fifth column behind the Founding Fathers and the Boston Tea Party and pretty speeches about the U.S. Constitution. But the Musketeers are over—finished. No more bombs. No more recruitment. No more free sterilizations.”

His face was canny. “Or abortions?”

Her eyes narrowed. “There are other doctors. You and Gosney are out of business.”

“Or you'll what?”

Boyish bravado, eyes on her legs again. She glanced up at the shelf with the golfing trophy from Harding Park. Locked on the weak blue eyes darting over her breasts. She leaned forward, fuck the ankle.

“I'll ruin you. Or I'll kill you. Either way.” He shrank under the tone, blinded by the white-hot steel. “The war's already here, Parkinson. And you're the enemy.”

He froze, staring at her, while she limped out of the office, banging the door shut behind her.

*   *   *

She couldn't remember the ride to the office. Remembered the receptionist's horrified face, glaring at her, the woman who made Dr. Parkinson scream.

Only patients screamed in a dental office, didn't she know better?

Shaking all the way downstairs. Didn't want to think about whether she was bluffing, didn't want to think about anything except her office and her own chair, and the bottle of Old Taylor in the right drawer.

Hailed a taxi on Sutter.

Gladys not on duty behind the counter, jukebox playing “Glad to Be Unhappy,” Lee Wiley sultry and smooth and full of knowing pain.

Look at yourself. If you had a sense of humor, you would laugh to beat the band …

No fucking sense of humor. Maybe that was her problem. Maybe she belonged in number 114, men in dirty white smocks coming to feed her Cream of Wheat, watching it dribble down her chin.

Watching her scratch her eyes out,
drip-drop, drip-drop,
red swirls like cotton candy, around and around, wheel of fortune, folks, and where she stops, nobody knows.

Except Miranda. Miranda knew.

It stopped in a coffin, flies and maggots and beetles eating whatever you left behind.

She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, stepping out on the fourth floor.

*   *   *

Gummy brown sediment at the bottom of the Castagnola glass, but she poured anyway, tossing the bourbon back until it bit her throat and made her cough. Not the day to call dear old Dad. Not ever the day, but now she had something to say, something to ask him, something to the point.

“Why didn't you tell me she was alive, that she'd left and gone to England? Why didn't you tell me, you sodden piece of shit?”

Oh, Miranda. Must respect our elders, mustn't we, especially our parents. We owe them our lives, after all.

She stared into the glass, swirled the whiskey until tiny drops clung to the edges. If she squinted hard enough, she could see Johnny's face in every one.

Life. Such as it is. Why wasn't she blown up, fallen on the same soil, buried in the same grave, dead, dead, food for the same goddamn worms, ghost floating over a Spanish olive grove …

Drained the glass, set it down with a thump.

Too late.

Funny thing about life, mister, it just keeps going and takes you along, like a hitchhiker or somethin'. Yeah. A hitchhiker. And she owed something to her mother, owed something to Johnny. Anything she owed her father she paid off a long, long time ago.

She reached for the phone. Dialed the answering service.

*   *   *

First message: from Lucinda. “About Pandora. Something funny. Call me.”

Miranda puffed on the Chesterfield, wrote it down in the Big Chief pad, fresh sheet. Lucinda tried to phone her before Calistoga. Time to pay more attention to Henry Kaiser.

Second message: from Bente. “Got message. Went anyway. Tonypandy bad people.”

She was sure “bad people” was a message-service euphemism for something else, an operator's delicate, shell-like ear turned pink by Bente's vehemence.

Third message: “Confidential matter. Please call.” Exbrook exchange. Nob Hill and lower elevations. Probably a nervous client. She craned her head to check the calendar on the wall, verified that it was still Thursday, Memorial Day, time for graves and flowers and prayers and tears. No dynamite, Dr. Gosney, not today. She made a note to return the call next week.

Fourth message: “Walter Lodges. Friend at the Hotel Potter. Owe me a ten-spot. Name was Flamm.”

She sat back in the large leather chair.

She owed the little man with the rheumy eyes ten dollars and a new pack of Fatimas.

Name of Pandora's boyfriend, he said, rhymed with somebody “gettin' out of town.” Taking it on the lam.

Harry Flamm. Lothario, gambler, and the man who was riding Temple Sherith Israel around the track at Tanforan.

Miranda jumped up, ignoring the needles in her ankle, and opened the safe.

Cigarettes with the Black Cat matchbook.

Sat down, opened the flap, read the words again: “Mickey wants to see you.”

Stared into space. Reached for the phone, dialed the number. Gruff voice answered.

“Black Cat Café.”

She drew in a breath, plunging ahead. “Tell Mickey I want to see him. I know about Harry Flamm and Pandora Blake.”

Silence on the other end, except for someone ordering a hamburger, medium rare, hold the onions, and the sound of dishes clanking in the kitchen.

“Who is this?”

“Miranda Corbie.”

Silence again. Handset dropped on the receiver.

 

Thirty-two

Rick wasn't in at the
San Francisco News
office. One of the other reporters, fat cigar clenched in his teeth, mumbled something about Sanders going home to get some rest, pointed tone, your fault, lady, always a goddamn dame in the way of news.…

She tried the Hotel Empire, spoke to a politely precise clerk with a Romanian accent. Left a message, Western Union style: “Flamm Pandora's man. Call me. Miranda.”

Dug out her
Chadwick's Street Guide,
flipped to the back. Lucinda lived at the La Salle Apartments, 650 Post, fleabag with no phone.

She phoned the central exchange for the Fair, left a message with one of the impersonal clerks that never saw the Magic of the Magic City, one of the thousands of people employed by Golden Gate International Exposition, Inc.: “Set a time, call me, Miranda Corbie.”

Miranda hung up, frustrated. Not much hope of reaching Lucinda. She'd have to go in person, try to catch her after the act.

Flipped through the Kardex, found the Oceanic Hotel, dialed direct. Waited for ten rings before somebody answered it, mouth full of mush. No, Gallagher ain't here. Yeah, I'll give her the goddamn message. Hang up.

She bit her lip. Needed to let Bente know about the bombs, about Parkinson, afraid the redhead would put herself in danger. Even if she scared them into shutting down Gosney, Miranda knew the Musketeers would be around in one form or another, swallowed up by the Bund or the Silver Shirts or another hate group.

They'd paint swastikas on buildings, stick posters on buses, break up labor meetings and beat up Jews. She tapped her fingers on the desk. Probably no more bombs. At least in San Francisco.

Didn't check the papers but figured no explosion, no story. Not with the Fair corporation and all those concessions and the Northern California Chambers of Commerce and the whole fucking Golden State, not to mention the West, trying to eke out a solvent year in 1940, '39 floating belly-up. She smiled grimly to herself, thinking of O'Meara and the firing squad.

Her stomach growled. Goddamn it. Needed to clear her head.

Miranda grabbed her purse, locked up the office. Walked by Pinkertons, Allen's door open a crack. He was leaning forward, offering a lemon drop to a weeping woman in widow's weeds, who probably wasn't really weeping, much less a widow, judging from her red sling-back pumps. She grinned. Allen could take care of himself.

Miranda hurried into the elevator and out into the City, limping on her swollen ankle. She hailed a taxi for Chinatown.

*   *   *

“And the Angels Sing” was still playing on the Fong Fong juke, but no sharp kid from Filipino Charlie's, no gang of girls ogling the bad boys.