Full Circle (3 page)

Bernhardt nodded, then decided to shift his attention to Archer, seated directly across the table. Archer’s expression was unreadable, but, at the corners, his mouth stirred with some faint suggestion of fellowship. Or was this the FBI’s pallid version of the good cop? Or, more probably, was Archer suppressing a smirk at the thought of what was about to follow?

“The name,” Haigh was saying, “is Raymond DuBois.” He pronounced the words with exquisite precision, timed to perfection.

Raymond DuBois …

Instantly the searing images flared in Bernhardt’s consciousness: he and Betty Giles in the darkened cabin, no phone, no protection. No hope. Never had time moved so slowly, yet also raced inexorably ahead, bringing with it the certainty of death. He could still feel the sawed-off in his hands, slick with sweat. He could still feel the hammering of his heart, and the weakness of his legs, and the incredible dryness of his mouth and throat.

“I take it,” Haigh was saying, “that you know the name.”

Bernhardt cleared his throat, delivered the only line that came to him: “DuBois. Sure. One of the—” His throat closed momentarily. Then: “One of the world’s richest men.”

As if he were encouraging a slow student, Haigh nodded as he said, “What else do you know about Raymond DuBois, Mr. Bernhardt?”

Bernhardt shrugged, raised one hand, let it fall, a disclaimer. The gesture had come easily. He was getting into the part; the lines were there as the game came clear: both of them were probing, trying to discover what the other man knew—and didn’t know.

“I know what everyone else knows, I suppose. DuBois is old. He’s a recluse. In failing health, I think.”

“And that’s all you know?”

Projecting a casual indifference, Bernhardt nodded, but said nothing. It was a gambit. If another microphone were hidden under the table, Haigh would want him to say something, not simply nod.

Gambit declined.

“Have you ever had any direct contact with Raymond DuBois?” Haigh asked.

The question required a frown that projected puzzled innocence. “I’m afraid I don’t understand the purpose of the question.”

Now Archer spoke, the junior partner, taking his turn, sharply shifting ground. “How about Betty Giles?” Like Haigh, he spoke easily, conversationally. But his eyes were watchful. “Are you acquainted with Betty Giles?”

Once more the images flashed: in the darkened cabin, Betty, crouching between the bed and the wall as Bernhardt heard the sound of the bathroom screen being cut. With the sawed-off raised, he’d advanced until he stood in the open bathroom door. When the gun fired, as if by its own volition, flame filled the high window over the bathtub.

Then the screams had begun.

Then the figure engulfed in flames, running blindly in the darkness. Finally falling to his knees.

Dying.

Was his puzzled frown still in place? Yes, incredibly, yes. Permitting him to look from one FBI agent to the other before he said, “I think I’m entitled to know what this is all about.”

“Just answer the question. Do you know Betty Giles?”

“The answer,” Bernhardt said, “is yes, I know Betty Giles. But I’m not going to elaborate until I know where this is going.”

“When we want you to know where it’s going,” Haigh said, “we’ll tell you.”

“Am I being treated as a suspect? Are we on the same side, or what?”

“Do you know Betty Giles’s present whereabouts?” Haigh asked.

Bernhardt sat up straighter in the leather armchair, folded his arms, met Haigh’s gaze squarely—and said nothing.

“Listen, Bernhardt …” Haigh’s voice dropped ominously. His fingers were spread wide on the rosewood conference table, as if he were restraining himself from gouging the wood with his fingernails. The fingernails, Bernhardt noticed, might be manicured.

“You’re a very small cog in this investigation,” Haigh said. “The only reason you’re here is that we’re looking for Betty Giles. So if you feel like cooperating—telling us where to find her—” Haigh’s bureaucratic mask contrived an ingratiating smile as he gestured down the long conference table to the door. “Then you’re free to go—with the Bureau’s thanks.”

“The problem is,” Bernhardt replied, “that I’ve promised not to reveal her current whereabouts.”

Haigh’s response came quickly, smoothly. “Who’d you promise? Betty Giles? Or Raymond DuBois?”

Bernhardt made no reply.

“
Why’d
you promise?” Archer asked. “Was it personal? Or professional?”

“The problem with this discussion,” Bernhardt said, “is that it isn’t a discussion.”

“Oh.” Haigh’s voice was heavy with sarcasm. Repeating: “Oh. You don’t feel we’re being candid. Is that it?”

Eyes level, mouth firm, Bernhardt made no response. For a long, hostile moment the two men eyed each other. Then Haigh spoke softly, in a cold, precise voice: “If you’ve got any smarts at all, you’ve figured out that this”—he tapped the microphone—“could be just a blind. You probably figured there might be a microphone under the desk that’s picking up everything we say. There could even be a hidden camera.”

Bernhardt decided to affect a world-weary smile, followed by a world-weary nod.

“Well,” Haigh said, “to demonstrate that there’s no concealed microphone, I’m going to favor you with a rundown of what I’m thinking about you and your future.” His pale, prissy face registered a wintry pleasure, a latent sadism. “Would you appreciate that?”

“Oh, yes.” In the words, Bernhardt tried to distill the essence of irony.

“First of all,” Haigh said, “you’re a gnat. You’re of no significance whatever. The Bureau chews up people like you every day. Every hour, maybe—that’s how powerful we are. Are you with me so far?”

“Oh, yes. I’m with you.” And, in silent counterpoint, his secret self was kicking in:
I’m with you, you pampered, pompous asshole, you puffed-up, slicked-down jerk.

“We know all about Betty Giles,” Haigh said. “We know she and her boyfriend were blackmailing Raymond Dubois. After the boyfriend was killed in Santa Rosa, probably after you fingered him, we know that Betty Giles tried to hide out down in Borrego Springs, in the desert. You followed her. Then, surprise, a professional hit man showed up. He decided to toss a Molotov cocktail in Betty’s window. He’d burn her out, then kill her—that was obviously the plan. Instead, though, his Molotov cocktail exploded as it went through the window, and the hit man—his name was Willis Dodge—got turned into an instant human torch. Are you with me so far?”

“I’m with you.” Bernhardt was satisfied with his own response. His eyes, he could feel, were clear and alert, revealing no fear.

“When the sheriff arrived on the scene, he found you and Betty Giles. He also found a sawed-off shotgun that had been fired. You admitted that the shotgun was yours. You told the sheriff that you fired in self-defense when you saw the Molotov cocktail coming through the window. Correct?”

“It was a reflex. Someone was outside, cutting the screen in the bathroom window. It was dark. When I saw the bottle framed in the window—the wick, flaming—I pulled the trigger automatically. From fifteen feet the shot pattern was probably twelve inches across. I couldn’t miss.”

“How’d you feel, watching Willis Dodge burn to death?” It was a casual question, a matter of academic interest, nothing more.

“I have nightmares.” As again, his inner voice kicked in:
Not that it’s any concern of yours, you bloated bureaucrat.

“Hmmm—yes.” It was a perfunctory expression of bogus sympathy followed by a short, speculative silence. This, Bernhardt suspected, was the carefully calculated pause that preceded the final thrust.

“So,” Haigh said, speaking with an air of finality, as if he were about to finish the business between them, “what you’ve got here is a pretty clear choice, Mr. Bernhardt. You can either tell us where to find Betty Giles, in which case you’re off the hook, or else you can elect to stonewall us. If you decide to stonewall, in the belief that you’re protecting Betty Giles, then I have no choice but to contact the United States Attorney. I’ll ask him to prepare two charges against you—one for illegal possession of an outlawed firearm, and one for conspiracy to commit murder. The latter charge would include the murder of Nick Ames and the attempted murder of Betty Giles.”

“You’re joking.”

“Oh, no. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that, Mr. Bernhardt. I promise you that you’ll be indicted. Whether or not we have a winnable case, that’s a matter of conjecture. The point is, though, that you’ll go bankrupt long before the trial starts. We took the liberty of running a credit check on you. And it looks like you have a total net worth of about forty thousand dollars. Meaning that, even if the case is thrown out of court, you’ll have long since gone broke.”

“You must want Betty Giles very badly.”

Haigh nodded. “Very.”

“S
O WHAT’D YOU
SAY
?
” Paula demanded. “What’d you
do
?”

“I stalled. I told them I’d need time to talk to my lawyer. They bought it. I’ve got until tomorrow. At least.”

“Jesus, the FBI—our tax dollars at work.” She lifted her glass of white wine, drank, returned the empty glass to the table. Sitting across from her, Bernhardt smiled. Only when she was agitated did Paula gulp her wine. Otherwise, she sipped. He caught the waiter’s eye, signaled for a second glass for each of them, red for him, white for her. At seven-fifteen they’d gotten the last table at Bernardo’s, their favorite spot for Italian food. The pasta was made fresh daily, the house wine came from gallon jugs, and the prices came from another era. The waiters at Bernardo’s wasted no time in pleasantries, a nostalgic evocation of Bernhardt’s past life in New York.

“I think,” Paula said, “that it’s time you told me the whole story.”

The waiter set the fresh glasses of wine before them. Then, frowning, he stood with pencil poised over a pad, ready to take their orders. As she talked to the waiter, discussing the scampi, Paula’s face was in profile. It was a multifaceted profile, one of the most compelling Bernhardt had ever seen. It was all there in her face: humor, intelligence, curiosity, even a certain restlessness that could turn reckless. God, had it only been four months since they’d met? He’d been conducting a read-through for
The Buried Child
, at the Howell. Because it was the first read-through, a get-acquainted session, he’d sat on the edge of the stage, legs dangling, facing the dozen-odd hopefuls sitting in the first two rows. He’d talked about himself, described what he’d done in the theater—and what he hadn’t done. Since one of the things he hadn’t done was support himself by acting, or directing, or playwriting in little theater, he’d admitted that, yes, he moonlighted. It was part of his standard spiel, illustrating the axiom that most actors shouldn’t give up their day jobs. Ever.

All during the spiel, intrigued, he’d watched Paula, who was avidly watching him. When the meeting broke up, he’d maneuvered adroitly enough to leave the two of them alone in the darkened theater, after the others had gone. He’d asked her out for beer and pastrami sandwiches. Immediately she’d pointed to the pager clipped to his belt. “Do you moonlight as a brain surgeon?” she’d asked. When he’d told her what he did, told her that he was a duly licensed private investigator, her whole face had come alive. A few weeks later, pillow-talking, she’d announced that she wanted to be a private investigator. She was sure she’d be good at the job—and she was right. A month into the job, she’d faced down a murderer and saved a young woman’s life. Afterwards—hours later—in his arms, her whole body shook with the inevitable delayed reaction. But the next day she was back on the job, no problem.

A month ago, when he’d ordered stationery, her name was on the letterhead.

“So?” she prompted.

“You know most of it. A high roller from Los Angeles hired Herbert Dancer to find Betty Giles. I got the job. All I was told was that she was involved in industrial espionage. I was told to find her, then call Dancer, who’d contact the client. I got lucky, and found her at a cheap motel in Santa Rosa. She was with a guy named Nick Ames. I called Dancer, who ordered me to keep them under surveillance until he got back to me, probably in twenty-four hours. The following evening, Giles and Ames had a fight. Nick slammed out of the motel room, got in their car—Betty’s car—and drove to a bar. He had a few drinks, then left the bar. He was starting the car when a well-dressed black man walked up and shot him through the glass. The weapon was a twenty-two-caliber automatic pistol firing high-speed hollow points. Which, as it happens, is a favorite weapon of the professional hit man.”

“Why?”

“There’re three types of twenty-two automatics that can be very effectively silenced. That’s because the barrel isn’t surrounded by a slide. The Colt Woodsman with a six-inch barrel is a special favorite. The combination of a long barrel and the small powder charge makes a silencer very effective, and the high-speed hollow-point bullet at close range is devastating. Plus, the bullet breaks up when it strikes something, so there’s no ballistics. From the hit man’s viewpoint, it’s the ideal weapon, especially since the gun’ll hold ten cartridges. In the Nick Ames homicide, the victim was shot five times, all in the head. That’s a typical professional hit.”

“Did you see the actual murder?”

“No. My orders were to tail Betty, so I was at the motel when Ames died. I didn’t know about the murder until the next morning. By that time, Betty was with the police, answering questions and identifying the body. I decided to get the hell out of there, drive back to San Francisco. About an hour down the road, I figured out that I’d been set up.” He sipped his wine, watching her over his raised glass. It was inevitable, he realized, that this moment would come—inevitable that he put his glass down, look into her eyes—

—and tell her the rest of it.

“Ostensibly,” he began, “Betty Giles worked for an outfit called Powers Associates in Los Angeles. Actually, it’s a front for Raymond DuBois.”

“The zillionaire financier.”

“Right.”

“Based in Los Angeles.”