The Case of the Russian Diplomat: A Masao Masuto Mystery (Book Three) (2 page)

“Who discovered the body?” Masuto asked.

Detective Beckman came in at that moment with the day desk clerk, whom Gellman introduced as Ira Jessam. Jessam was forty or so, thin, dark, intense, and very much disturbed by the sight of the dead body.

“Take a good look at him, Mr. Jessam,” Wainwright told him, “and tell us whether you ever saw him before.”

It was obviously painful for Mr. Jessam to stare at the corpse, more, Masuto suspected, because the man was naked than because he was dead.

Jessam shook his head.

“You never saw him before?”

“He didn't register. That's all I can say. I can't possibly keep track of who goes in and out of the hotel, and anyway there's more than one entrance. But he didn't register while I was on duty.”

“All right, Jessam,” Gellman said. “Go home and get some sleep. I'll see you tomorrow, or today.”

“Not much use in going home now. I think I'll just lie down in the office—if I may.”

“Be my guest.”

“I'd still like to know who discovered the body,” Masuto said.

“Tell him, Beckman,” said Wainwright.

“It's the goddamndest thing. According to the night operator, the call came from room three-twenty-two. The room is registered to a guy by the name of Jack Stillman, out of Vegas. He's a booking agent. The call came at exactly two forty-nine, and the operator switched it to the front desk. Now that room overlooks the pool, and the caller tells Frome—he's the night clerk—that there's a body floating in the pool. Frome calls Freddie here”—indicating the security chief—“whose room is on the ground floor off the pool area, and Freddie goes in in his pajamas and drags the fat man out—”

“Which is by no means easy,” Comstock observed.

“For God's sake, Freddie,” Gellman said, “find a sheet or some towels or something and cover him up.” And to Wainwright, “Where the devil's that ambulance? I want him out of here before any of the guests wake up.”

“It's coming.”

“But now,” Beckman said, “we come to the cute part. Both the night operator and the night clerk swear that the call was made by a woman.”

“Oh?” Masuto was intrigued.

“Not hysterical. Very cool, very calm. Speaking softly. She talks to the operator first. Then to the front desk.”

“What did she say?”

Beckman got out his notebook. “Says to the operator, There's a body floating in the pool. Where, asks the operator? In the swimming pool. The operator says, My God, I'll give you the front desk.”

“The operator's a good girl,” Gellman said. “Very steady.”

“This woman. What did she say to the night clerk?”

“Same thing. Exactly.”

“Did he ask who she was?”

“She hung up.”

“And room three-twenty-two?”

“I just got down from there when you arrived, Masao. This Stillman guy claims he was asleep. Alone. That's what makes it cute.”

“Now look,” said Gellman, “this isn't as crazy as it sounds. I know Stillman. He always stays here when he's in L.A. Last month he married Binnie Vance, the dancer. It's his third marriage. All she has to do is find out that he's shacked up with a dame and the shit hits the fan.”

“Did you look through his room, bathroom, closets?” Masuto asked.

“What am I, an amateur?”

“Could she slip out of the hotel without being seen?” Masuto asked Gellman.

“I suppose so. Service entrance in the basement. It's bolted on the inside.”

He looked at Beckman. “Did you check the bolt?”

“I just got down from the room when you arrived.”

“Do it now.”

Beckman left. “If she came in her own car,” Masuto said, “she wouldn't know where the jockey parked it. If she came with Stillman, she's on foot.”

“Where's the phone?” Wainwright demanded.

Gellman pointed to the pool office. A moment later, they heard Wainwright telling the central office to put out a call for any woman on foot. “Give it to L.A.P.D. too,” he told them. “She may be a fast walker.” He came back as Beckman reappeared.

“The bolt was open,” Beckman said.

“I'm going home and get some sleep,” said Wainwright. “You take it from here, Masao. And for Christ's sake, if he drowned, he drowned.”

“Of course, Captain.” Masuto was opening the lockers. “Take that row, Sy,” he said to Beckman.

“What the hell are you doing, Masao?”

“He hid his clothes, his glasses and his wristwatch, and then he decided to drown.”

“You know what he's after,” Gellman sputtered. “He's determined to make something of this. God almighty, a man drowns, he drowns.”

“Maybe. Every locker, Sy,” Masao said to Beckman.

Gellman turned desperately to Wainwright. “Masao's the boss. It's his case now. I'm going to sleep. Anyway, we won't know how he died until Doc Baxter does the autopsy. Why don't you get some sleep yourself, Al? Good night, gentlemen.”

Gellman followed Wainwright out of the dressing room. Masuto and Beckman went through the lockers. The lockers were there for the convenience of the hotel guests, and none of them were locked. The search turned up a number of bathing suits, male, some sunglasses and a wristwatch, all of which Fred Comstock took into his custody. They tried the ladies' dressing room next, and the results were equally uninspiring.

“It's five
A.M.,”
Comstock announced. “I lost a night's sleep, and I don't get overtime, and I'm on duty at eight. How about I sack down for a few hours? You guys don't need me.”

“I'll want to talk with Stillman,” Masuto said.

“Go ahead. But be gentle. At a hundred dollars a day, they're entitled.”

“I'm always gentle.”

“The way I figure it,” Beckman said, once they were in the elevator, “she made the call while he was sleeping and then skipped.”

“You're sure he was asleep?”

“Either that or he was a good actor.”

They rang the bell at room 322, and then waited. A second time. Then a third time. Then Jack Stillman opened the door, in his pajamas.

This time he had not been sleeping. The pajamas were heavy black silk, and they had not been slept in. His hair was combed. Stillman was a large, fleshy man, over six feet, with a lot of muscle gone to fat. He had the heavy neck of a football player, cold blue eyes, and brown hair. Behind him, past the small foyer, Masuto saw the unmade bed, an open notebook next to the telephone, and then a window, probably the one that overlooked the pool. The room was overdecorated in the gold and ivory that was a signature for the Beverly Glen Hotel.

“What the hell is this?” Stillman asked unpleasantly.

“I'm Detective Sergeant Masuto, Beverly Hills police. This is Detective Beckman. Are you Stillman?”

“Yes, but it's five o'clock in the morning.”

“I'm sorry,” Masuto said. “Things happen at inconvenient hours. May we come in?”

“What for?”

“Simply to ask you a few questions.”

“He asked questions,” indicating Beckman. “I answered them.”

“I have some questions of my own.”

“Look,” said Stillman, “whatever happened here happened when I was asleep. I know nothing, and I don't intend to be pushed around by a couple of small-town cops—not at this hour of the morning.”

He started to close the door. Masuto put his shoulder in the way and replied mildly, “Beverly Hills is hardly a small town. We have a population of over thirty thousand, and if you will not talk to us here, Mr. Stillman, we will be happy to wait until you are dressed and then take you downtown, where you can talk to us at the police station.”

The cold blue eyes stared at Masuto, and then, unexpectedly, he said, “What are you, Chinese?”

“I am a Nisei, which means that my parents were born in Japan. Now may we come in?”

Beckman recognized the slight hardening in Masuto's voice, very subtle, an indication of closely controlled but increasing anger. Masuto was almost as tall as Stillman, but narrower, leaner, no extra flesh.

Stillman nodded, closing the door behind them. The bedroom was large, with a couch and two brocade armchairs facing the bed, and two windows. The drapes were drawn. Before he sat down, Masuto parted the drapes and looked down at the pool. The first glimmerings of dawn now.

“Sit down,” he said to Stillman. Beckman remained standing. Masuto took one chair, Stillman the other.

“The call that informed us that there was the body of a man in the pool came from your room, as Detective Beckman told you earlier,” Masuto said.

“It was a mistake. I was asleep from about midnight until he woke me.”

“It was not a mistake. A woman made the call. Mr. Stillman, a woman used the telephone in this room. I want to know who she was.”

“I told you—”

“Would it be easier,” Masuto interrupted, “if I gave the story to the Los Angeles
Times
, specifying that a nameless woman who shared this room with you discovered a body in the swimming pool in the middle of the night?”

“Who the hell-”

Again Masuto interrupted. “Suppose you just tell us what happened and stop the indignation.”

“What then? Do you still give it to the papers?”

“Only if I must. Possibly not. I'm not a reporter, I'm a policeman.”

“All right. Look, understand me. I don't give a damn about my reputation. I live in Vegas, and nobody's going to fault me for wanting my bed warm. But I was just married to Binnie Vance, and she'll cut my heart out if she hears about this. I picked up this dame in the Rugby Room, and I bought her a drink, and then I bought her dinner. She was a pro. I paid fifty bucks for last night, but like I said, she was a pro, and she didn't rip off my wallet when she left. I respect that. I respect integrity in any line of work. That's the whole story. If she made the call, she made it without waking me. I was asleep. I didn't lie about that.”

“I'm glad you have principles,” Masuto said.

“What the hell does that mean?”

“What was her name?”

“Judy.”

“Judy what?”

“I don't know.”

“You went to bed with a woman and you don't know her last name?”

“Jesus Christ, I didn't marry the broad. She tells me her name was Judy. I didn't ask for her birth certificate.”

“What does she look like?”

“Not like a hooker.” Stillman was trying to be helpful. “You get a classy kind of broad in the Rugby Room, five seven, stacked, blond hair, blue eyes—a good-looking kid.”

Beckman was taking it down in his pad. “What was she wearing?”

“Let's see—silk shirt, tan suede pants, same color, or almost, boots—”

“Boots?”

“Boots.”

“What kind of jacket?”

“Same thing as the pants, suede. Four gold chains around her neck.”

Out in the hall, Beckman said to Masuto, “Where does it get us? So she saw fatso in the pool and reported it. Another dame would have kept her mouth shut.”

“That makes Judy a little special, doesn't it?”

“For a hooker.”

“For a person.”

“What now?”

“Take a look around the basement before you leave, Sy—laundry bins, that kind of thing. See if you can dig up his clothes.”

“And you?”

“I'll phone in the description, and then I'm going home for a hot bath.”

“And what about me?”

“What about you?”

“Do I get to sleep?”

“Tonight.”

“It is tonight,” Beckman said.

“Not anymore. It's tomorrow.”

2

THE
SHOT
MAN

Masuto lay steaming luxuriously in water as hot as he could bear. Kati, having just seen the children into their school bus, entered the bathroom with an enormous white towel and settled herself on the stool to await her husband's completion of his bath. To Masuto, a hot bath was not simply a hot bath; it was the continuation of an ancient ritual without which life would have been considerably less tolerable.

He had already told her about the incidents of the night, and now she said, rather plaintively, “You know that I have never been to the Beverly Glen Hotel. Wouldn't it be pleasant if we could have dinner there some night and I could see that famous Rugby Room? My mother would be happy to stay with the children.”

“No.”

“But she would.”

“I was not referring to your excellent mother, but to the Beverly Glen Hotel.”

“But why?”

“Kati, darling, I dislike being judgmental about the City of Beverly Hills, since they pay me my wages. The hotel is another matter. It makes my skin crawl.”

“But why?”

Masuto sighed and shook his head. “How can I explain why? Perhaps another time. Hand me the towel, please.”