Death in North Beach (27 page)

‘I'm not going to play with you, Lang. I don't like you. I don't care what happens to you. I have no investment in you whatsoever. So, go away.'

‘How's your license?'

‘What do you mean?'

‘I'm working with Inspector Gratelli on this. They want Mickey too. You know, I tell him about your working relationship with him and how you stopped by to see Angel and, well, you find yourself . . . Oh, well. I hadn't really thought about it. But you're hired muscle. Maybe you killed Angel.'

‘Nah, Lang. If I did I'd have done you for free while I was at it.'

‘You might wish you did,' Lang said, smiling.

‘Lang!' Markham called as Lang exited into the hallway.

‘What is it?' Lang asked, peeking back in.

‘Mickey hangs out with an old broad, Marlene Berensen.'

‘I know.'

‘So I gave you something.'

‘The way this game is played is that you give me something I don't already have. So don't tell me he drives her Jag and stays at her place sometimes. Don't tell me that the car was abandoned at Ocean Beach and Mickey left Marlene in a drunken funk. Don't tell me he's involved in massage parlors. Don't tell me he's not in his dad's will. These are things I have. So what do you have?'

Lang didn't mind revealing what he knew.

‘He's not in his dad's will?' Markham asked.

‘No.' Lang smiled. ‘He stiffed you. Wow.'

Markham looked away, maybe so Lang wouldn't see the anger he couldn't conceal.

‘How much?'

‘None of your business,' Markham said, trying to put a look of terminal disinterest on his face.

‘Who else does he owe?' Lang asked.

‘I'm not his accountant.'

‘You have any clients in common?'

Markham didn't answer. Lang wasn't going to get anything more.

‘Such a sensitive guy. Anyway, thanks for the present, Scotty. You came through.'

Markham did come through, unwillingly and unwittingly. Maybe Lang could have put the pieces together himself – staying on with an older woman in order to have a place to stay and a car to drive – young Warfield was having serious money trouble.

Outside, Lang called Thanh's cellphone. No answer. He called the office. Carly was back already. Lang asked for Thanh.

‘Not here,' Carly said.

‘What about Brinkman?'

‘Brinkman's here.'

‘Let me talk with him.'

Brinkman pulled up in his '86 Buick, a cigar between his lips, a sarcastic smile on his face. He double-parked on Polk, just outside the entrance to Markham's building.

Lang got into the car and asked Brinkman to pull up a little.

‘I need you to tail a guy.'

‘So far so good,' Brinkman said.

‘Name is Scotty Markham . . .'

‘The guy who came in to roust you?'

‘The same. The one you scared to death.'

‘Be right back,' Brinkman said.

Brinkman clicked on the car's caution blinkers, got out, went to his trunk and came back with a baseball cap to cover his flat-topped head and a pair of non-prescription, horn-rimmed eyeglasses.

‘Great disguise,' Lang said. ‘You're like a completely different guy with that hat.'

‘Don't get smart,' Brinkman said. ‘No one pays attention to old codgers like me. Believe me, a hat and a pair of nerdy glasses are enough. Where do you think he's gonna go?'

‘I have no idea.'

‘Maybe he'll just go home,' Brinkman said.

‘Maybe he will.'

‘What if he drives to Chicago?' Brinkman asked.

‘You have something better to do?'

‘You have a point,' Brinkman said, glancing up in his rear-view mirror. ‘He's coming out. Coming this way.'

‘Crap,' Lang said. He slipped down on the floor, cursing fate for sending Markham this way and thanking fate for Brinkman having a big, old, roomy Buick. ‘Tell me when he's gone by.'

After a few moments of silence and Lang sucking in the cigar smoke air Brinkman gave him the all-clear.

‘Call me if he comes back to his office in the next thirty minutes. Right now, he's going to the parking garage at the end of the block. Only one exit. Bye,' Lang said, getting out of the car. He patted the Buick on the trunk as it accelerated up Polk Street.

Lang went back, up the stairs and into the hall toward Markham's office. Markham had locked the door, but it wouldn't take much for Lang to get in. Somehow, it didn't seem like a bad thing to break into Scotty Markham's place. More like poetic justice. He looked around. He saw no one. Heard nothing. It was quiet on the second floor.

It took five minutes to get in. Longer than he thought, but not bad really. If Lang had to explain what he had learned that was of the most value in his profession, he would have to say patience.

Markham didn't take his laptop and it was left on. All the files were closed, but it wouldn't take much for Lang to look around and leave the screen as he found it. For a guy specializing in security, Markham paid little attention to it for himself. A little browsing, opening files, checking the Excel spreadsheet showed Lang the guy was barely making it. He checked the history. There were indications that Markham visited porn sites regularly. He had played more than 25,000 games of Solitaire online.

There were a few people searches, but no one he recognized. He clicked on to the Google Search and went through the alphabet one letter at a time, letting the little opening reveal where Markham had gone. Again, nothing that seemed to connect to Warfield or to anyone Lang recognized.

Boring work. He pressed the voicemail. Markham hadn't cleaned that up either, so there were thirty-three messages, the voice said. Lang played them back. There were many hang-ups. There was a guy wanting his money. There was Mickey Warfield's voice asking Markham to call him back. That was the day before Markham and his skinny friend visited Lang. A couple of calls telling him this was Markham's last chance to sign up for a warranty on his car. Lots of crap.

There was only one call that meant anything and if Lang was the kind of guy to feel cold chills he would have felt them as he heard Angel's voice. ‘I'm afraid, Scotty. You have to help me.'

‘Jesus.'

Lang opened the voicemail case, noticed the tiny cassette. Thank the Great Whatever for Markham's dinosaur ways when it came to technology. Lang put the cassette in his pocket. He searched Markham's desk, found another, replaced the tape he'd taken.

Lang looked around, gave the filing cabinet a cursory search, found nothing. He checked the computer screen. OK. He wiped his prints off everything he touched and left, remembering that Markham may have had more brain cells and more skills than Lang originally thought. He'd have to be careful. The man was dangerous.

Twenty-Seven

Brinkman was on the other end of the line, on the cellphone Lang had given him.

‘Markham stopped at some real estate office on Geary,' Brinkman said.

‘Where is he now?'

‘Inside.'

‘Where are you?'

‘On the sidewalk, half a block away near some old folks' home or something. Some big old nurse tried to herd me on a bus to goddamn somewhere.'

‘Might have been a fun trip,' Lang said.

‘I don't like old people,' Brinkman replied bitterly.

‘But you are an old people, Brinkman.'

‘The irony is your problem. What do you want me to do when he comes out?'

‘Continue to follow him until he goes home or back to his office.'

‘Got it,' Brinkman said and disconnected.

Lang wouldn't have made that connection – Markham and Chiu. If Chiu was part of a criminal Tong, it was unlikely he would hire non-Asian muscle. But it was clear there were ties between Warfield and Chiu and Markham and Marlene Berensen and the dead woman. This new observation, coupled with the otherwise irrelevant fact that Chiu and the dead woman were both Chinese and connected somehow to Markham, expanded the speculation. But how would a missing photograph, if one were missing, play into this set of circumstances? He was pretty sure Carly was on the wrong track.

He shook his head. At some point investigations were supposed to narrow. The point was to eliminate suspects on the list – not add them. In the beginning, Lang would have to admit, the case was a kind of amusing adventure. It became more intense because of the attack on Carly and the cloud that hung over his own suspected self. Then, there was the mounting body count. Would there be another?

‘You were right,' Gratelli told her on the phone. ‘There was a missing photograph, but it's been returned. Probably sent out to be reframed. Sorry I doubted you.'

Carly hadn't realized just how much investment she'd made in the idea the murder could be solved by locating the photograph. Gratelli's comments, while confirming her original observation skills, didn't do much for her theory. It felt like a punch to the solar plexus.

‘We found it at Wiley's studio, at the top of the steps, leaning against the door.'

‘Who sent it?' she asked.

‘No return address.'

‘Who delivered it? What delivery service?'

‘Apparently none. Probably just the framer. Brown paper wrapper, that was it?'

‘And the photograph?' she asked. ‘Who was the subject?'

‘A naked figure. Nobody I know. We'll try to find out if you think it's important. Is it?'

‘I don't know,' she said, sorry that she allowed her disappointment to slip into her voice. ‘You mind if I come down and take a look?'

There was a long pause.

‘No. Come on down. I'll be here for another hour.'

She had already called Blue Monkey Press, the company that had the contract to print the book, and planned to go to San Mateo to talk with them and look at what they had. The problem was they didn't have final images . . . just the text, but that was sent out for typesetting in New York. They expected the proofs back soon. They'd call.

Gratelli seemed a little embarrassed as he brought the photograph, recovered in the brown paper, into one of the interview rooms. He set it on the table, nodded, and stepped out. Carly thought it amusing that a man who had no doubt frequently seen far worse found this moment distasteful.

Carly unwrapped the frame. The photograph was a black-and-white of Marshall Hawkes, a young Marshall Hawkes, naked. He was photographed from behind, looking back over his shoulder. His face was clearly visible and it was clearly Hawkes. The lighting, background and texture of the photograph were in keeping with the others. But there was something – and she wasn't sure what that was – troubling about the image. She took out her cellphone and photographed it.

Gratelli glanced in through the glass partition and when he saw her rewrap the photograph, he came back inside.

‘Marshall Hawkes,' Carly told him.

‘You look disappointed,' Gratelli said.

‘I am.'

‘So what do all these photographs tell you?'

‘They were all young and may have regrets now.'

‘Motive?' Gratelli asked.

‘One of his subjects might not want his or her photograph on exhibit or in a book. That's still a possible motive. But my theory that finding the missing photograph would identify the killer just lost credibility.'

Carly said it because it seemed obvious and to think otherwise would be foolish. She knew she was foolish. She didn't fully believe what she said.

Carly called Nadia to say that her theory of the missing photograph was kaput. But Nadia wasn't to be deterred. She wanted to do the show. She would talk to Wiley's kin or whomever. She would put on the show – ‘Murderer's Row'.

‘You said Wiley was unimportant, an archivist. So did the people at Reed Fine Arts. So what's the big deal?'

‘The hook. The media won't be able to resist. You know,' she said, catching the greed that crept into her voice, ‘this will give Wiley the stature he no doubt wanted and help the people he left behind.'

‘You're a saint, Nadia. Anybody tell you that?'

‘Only people who think sarcasm is cute . . . or want something.'

‘How about coming with me tomorrow? You can break away for a short trip to San Mateo, can't you?'

‘You bet. I need to talk with the publishers . . . set this whole thing in motion.'

When Lang learned from Carly that she planned a morning trip to San Mateo he asked her to stop by the local police station. He wanted to verify that Mickey Warfield spent the whole night in their custody the night of Wiley's death. Just as the appearance of the photograph was the kink in the chain of Carly's theory, so too was Warfield's DUI the obstacle in Lang's argument.

On the other hand, there was this seeming coincidence that the publisher of the ‘lost' manuscript was located in San Mateo and that Warfield the Younger had made a recent trip there. There are lots of reasons to go to San Mateo, but there were a lot of other places to go to. Mickey's San Mateo trip was worth looking into.

‘There's a great Chinese restaurant in San Mateo – Little Sichuan. Check it out for lunch. And there is the king of all gourmet supermarkets across the street. Draeger's. Nothing like it in San Francisco.'

‘Food, food, food. I gain five pounds just talking to you.'

‘It's all I think about that I can speak of in polite company,' Lang said.

‘I'm polite?' Carly seemed genuinely surprised at the adjective.