The Man Who Loved Women to Death (28 page)

After Francie’s body was found, the bidding for the book skyrocketed to $5 million instantly. If nothing else, the answer man knew how to run an auction. And we’re still not even talking movie sale. What about the new-and-improved Son of Sam law, you’re wondering? What about the question of whether this killer should or should not be allowed to profit from his crimes? None of the houses seemed too worried. Certainly not on ethical grounds—publishers have no ethics anymore. As for the law, hey, that’s why they have lawyers.

One house even went so far as to hint that a contract for my own novel might be included as part of the deal. I was not, repeat not, the one who suggested this, as so many critics later claimed. That wasn’t what I wanted out of this. I didn’t want anything out of this, actually. I didn’t even want to be in it. But no one believed that. A few editors and agents around town even started whispering that I was he—that I, Stewart Hoag, had fabricated this poison-pen pal of mine. That I was killing these women myself and mailing myself these chapters so as to revive my own, semicomatose literary career. A theory that was not, I should point out, totally dismissed by the New York City Police Department. In response to a question on
Larry King Live
about whether I was considered a suspect, Inspector Dante Feldman would say only that his task force was “considering everyone.”

I did not consider this a ringing personal endorsement.

Cassandra Dee, in case you’re wondering, did indeed go on the air with her appeal for the answer man to turn himself in to her, live and in stereo. “Call me, fax me, E-mail me, I’m yours” was what she said. It was very emotional, the way she said it. Also very nasal. She repeated it several times during the broadcast, only it didn’t work. The answer man didn’t turn himself in to Cassandra on the air. I guess he was too busy writing Chapter Four for me.

I sat there on that bench with my hands in my pockets staring out at the river for the longest time. Eventually, after they had taken the body away, Very made his way over to me and sat there staring out at it, too. He wore a hooded sweatshirt under his leather spy coat. His nose was red from the cold. He hadn’t shaved in a couple of days. Or slept, by the look of him.

“Inspector Feldman was right, Lieutenant.”

“How so, dude?”

“Serials do change their methods.”

Very considered this a moment, nodding to himself. “Could be this was just him taking care of business.”

I glanced at him. “Business? What business?”

“Check it out, he says he and Francie swapped some spit, am I right?”

“Right …?”

“So maybe that freaked him out. Like he thought maybe we could score some of his DNA from her tongue or her lips. No telling what scientists can do now. Maybe he figured he better be careful and take the head with him.”

“Could they actually do that, Lieutenant? Identify him from traces of his saliva left behind in her mouth?”

“That’s hard to say, dude.”

“How come?”

“We got no head, remember?”

“I assure you that didn’t slip my mind. What about her hands?”

“Could be this one put up a fight. Scratched him some before he did her. She’d have his skin under her fingernails. A trace of his blood, even. Same story, him being careful. He’s always being careful, that’s for damned sure.” Very swiped at his red nose with the back of his hand. “Something you want to get off your chest, dude?”

“I’m not the answer man, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

“It’s not,” he said, scowling at me. “And don’t you front me no more, because I ain’t hearing that.”

I studied him curiously. “Meaning?”

“Meaning give it up, will ya!” he pleaded, his voice abruptly cracking with emotion. “Whatever it is,
whoever
it is! Give it up, damn it!” Very was shaken. He was freaked. It was the horror of it, the pressure. Everyone has their limit. Very had reached his. He sat there in silence a moment, trying to calm himself. “You can’t sit on it no more, dude,” he said quietly. “You just can’t.”

I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. I reached into the inside pocket of my jacket and removed the slender, folded page of a letter that Tuttle Cash had sent me from Ghana twenty years ago. I didn’t feel good about this. In fact, I felt real bad about it. But he was right—I had to do it. You see, I had reached my limit, too. I handed it to him and said, “See if this was typed on the same machine that the answer man’s using. If it was, then I’ll give him up.”

Very stared at it, stunned, not making a move to take it. “Dude, how could you do this on me?”

“I had my reasons.”

“Well, I hope they were
damned
good ones.”

“They were. They are.”

He pocketed the page, seething. “His name. C’mon, c’mon. What’s his name?”

“I can’t. Not yet.”

“Fuck this shit!” Very grabbed me by the lapels of my coat. “What are you doing on me? I thought we was
friends!”

“We are friends, Lieutenant. And I’m sorry. But it has to be this way. Because if there’s one chance in a million that I’m wrong, well, I don’t want to be wrong.”

“Even if it costs another girl her life?”

“I have that under control.”

“Oh yeah?” he snarled.
“How?!”
When I didn’t respond, he released me. Shook his head at me, disgusted. “What is it—somebody you’re tight with?”

“Something like that.”

“Loyalty goes out the window when shit like this goes down.”

“Correction, this is precisely when loyalty does not go out the window.”

He tried a different approach. “How about we keep it between us two? You can trust me. I can keep his name under wraps.”

“No, you can’t.”

“What are you saying, I’m a fuck-up?”

“I’m not accusing you of being a fuck-up.”

He peered at me. “I see. So he’s a celeb, huh? Somebody famous. Fuck me, this is getting wiggier by the day.”

“And the night,” I added. “Don’t forget the night.”

Very got up and strode over to the railing and gazed out at the water. Then he turned back to me, his head nodding to its own rock ‘n’ roll beat. This one was speed metal. “I can take you in for withholding evidence, you know. I can throw you in a holding cell with the worst kind of vermin on earth.”

Lulu moaned at my feet, horrified.

“You can, but I still won’t tell you his name.”

“I’m hip to that,” he admitted, puffing out his cheeks. “I go back with you long enough to believe it. Damn, you are one mondo pain in the ass, you know that?”

“It has been brought to my attention before, yes.”

Romaine Very glowered at me. “It’ll take me two hours, tops. Don’t disappear.”

“I’ll try not to, Lieutenant.”

IT WAS TWO IN
the afternoon by the time I made it over to East Sixty-fifth Street. I did not take a direct route, figuring Very would put a tail on me. I took a cab from Riverside Park to Columbus Circle, then rode the A train downtown, watching the people’s faces across from me just as He watched their faces …
What do we have for our winners, Johnny? …
Most of those faces were buried inside that morning’s edition of the
New York Post,
which boasted an exclusive jailhouse interview with David Berkowitz. Son of Sam’s take on the answer man was blasted across page one: SAM SEZ HE WANTS TO BE A STAR. At Fourteenth Street I caught a cab back uptown to Grand Central, where I picked up the No. 6 train. That took me to East Sixty-eighth. I walked the rest of the way. No one was on my tail. I was sure of it. Well, I wasn’t but Lulu was. She knows about these things.

Vic was on duty behind the wheel of the Land Rover halfway down the block from Tuttle’s building. He’d been on duty since 8
A.M.,
when he took over for me. I had spent my own night staked out across the street from King Tut’s, waiting for The King. Tuttle had come staggering out of there at 3:29
A.M.,
drunk and alone, and had limped home in the cold. He had arrived there a few minutes before four. The lights went on. The lights stayed on. The lights were still on.

One thing Vic had managed to do over the past forty-eight hours was follow Malachi Medvedev to his little Coochie roost, which was on the corner of Second Avenue and East Fifty-eighth Street. According to the doorman, Malachi stopped by there several evenings a week to visit Miss Ochoa. Had his own key. Vic couldn’t get any more details out of the doorman. Maybe Malachi had shmeared the guy plenty not to give out anything more. Maybe there
was
nothing more. Maybe Malachi Medvedev slept over with his Coochie-coo like he’d said. Maybe he didn’t.

“Malachi stopped by this morning at 8:35 with the newspapers and pastry,” Vic reported to me through the Rover’s open window. “He stayed one hour. Otherwise, all’s quiet.”

“It’s all over, Vic,” I announced to him in a low voice.

“What’s all over, Hoag?”

“I’ve given Lieutenant Very a letter that will verify within the next couple of hours that Tuttle Cash is the answer man.”

Vic’s eyes widened a bit, but not much. Clearly, he had suspected what my interest in Tuttle was all about. But he hadn’t said anything. And he didn’t say anything now. Just sat there, grim-faced.

“I want to thank you for your help, Vic. I suppose I just needed time to accept this.”

“Sure thing,” he said gently. “You needed some time.”

“But if I shield him any longer, I might cost another woman her life. And I couldn’t live with that.”

“Of course not, Hoag,” he agreed. “Want me to stay here with you until you get the word?”

“That won’t be necessary. You go ahead and catch a cab home.”

Vic climbed out of the Rover slowly, groaning from the stiffness in his heavy limbs. Lulu hopped right in, anxious to claim dibs on his nice, preheated seat. I claimed it for myself. I’m the boss, and don’t you let anyone tell you otherwise.

Vic lingered there by the open window. “Something, uh, I’ve been meaning to talk to you about, Hoag. Unless now isn’t a good time …”

“No, no. Now’s fine, Vic. What is it?”

“I, uh …” He cleared his throat uncomfortably. “I wondered if you’d be my best man. At the wedding, I mean.”

“Why, Vic. You’re getting married?”

“I am,” he admitted, ducking his big, meaty head.

Lulu started thumping her tail. She loves weddings, although she has been known to sob uncontrollably at them. I had to carry her out of the Baldwin-Basinger nuptials because she was stealing the show.

“When is the happy occasion?” I asked.

“As soon as possible.”

I raised an eyebrow at him. “You mean …?”

“Shoot, no. It’s nothing like that, Hoag. We’re just anxious, that’s all.” He kicked at the pavement with his brogan. “We were thinking maybe over Christmas, if that’s okay.”

“Do I know the lucky girl?”

“Yes, you do.”

“Well, don’t keep me in suspense, Vic. Who is she?”

“Pam,” he replied. A blissful smile softened his plain features. “And she’s not the lucky one—I am.”

“Pam who?”

“Pam,
Hoag.”

“Wait …
our
Pam?”

“We’re in love.”

Lulu started whooping now. I think she sensed flower girl honors.

“Since when, Vic?”

“The passion has been overtaking us for some time,” he said dully.

“Vic, how can I put this delicately—Pam’s old enough to be your grandmother.”

“That’s not so at all,” he responded, flaring. “She’s barely seventy.”

“And you’re barely forty.”

“And she’s intelligent and warm and we get along great. I’ve waited all my life to meet a woman like her.”

“That shouldn’t have been so hard. The nursing homes are full of them.”

I felt a withering glare from the seat next to me.

Vic was glaring at me, too. “I’m really disappointed by your reaction, Hoag. I didn’t expect you to be so close-minded. You of all people.”

“You’re absolutely right, Vic. I was totally out of line. I apologize.”

“Merilee was delighted when Pam told her. Delighted.”

“I said I was sorry, didn’t I?” I stuck my hand out to him through the window. “Congratulations. I’m happy for both of you. And I’ll be honored to be your best man.”

We shook on it, then he went lumbering off to catch a cab home, beaming happily. Me, I sat there drumming the steering wheel with my fingers, thinking once again about just how little I knew about people.

And then Malachi Medvedev came hurrying up the street in a trenchcoat with a worried look on his face. When he got to Tuttle’s building he stopped on the sidewalk out front, squinting up at the big second-floor study windows, craning his neck for a better look inside. He waddled across the street and climbed the stoop to the brownstone opposite Tuttle’s so as to get an even better look. Then, clucking to himself, he crossed back to Tuttle’s building and went inside. Me, I waited all of three seconds before I got out of the Rover with Lulu and went in after him.

The apartment door was open, the keys still in the lock. Malachi stood there in the living room with his hands on his hips and his lower lip stuck out.

“What’s up, Mal?” I asked him from the doorway.

“Man didn’t show for work today, that’s what’s up,” Malachi replied distractedly, running his hand over his face. “Ain’t answering his phone neither. Help me look around, will you?”

We both helped him. Lulu checked out the bathrooms. Malachi took the bedroom. I checked out the study. There was no sign of Tuttle in there. Just an empty bottle of Courvoisier and a dirty glass on the desk. A wrinkled necktie was slung over the desk lamp.

Moving swiftly, I tore open the old leather suitcase, dug out that horrid X-rated photo album and tucked it inside my coat under my arm. If the police were going to get involved, I did not want them to find it, to paw through it, to smack their big fat lips over it and maybe, just maybe, pocket the odd picture and sell it to the likes of Cassandra. This much I could do for Tansy. It was the right thing to do. I knew this. But I still felt like some sleazy little man who cleaned up after people, some bagman, some fixer. I didn’t feel like
me.
Or the me I liked to believe I was.