On the Other Hand, Death - Stevenson Richard - Страница 40

dot: Yes, I do.

voice: Wait by that phone. And no Alice Blue this time, missus!

Click.

The voice again. I knew it. I'd heard it. Somewhere. And now I knew something else. "Alice Blue." A nickname for cops used only, so far as I knew, by a distinctive subgroup of a certain larger social group. The kidnapper himself was gay.

Bowman had not failed to research the terminology. "One of my boys tells me he's heard this 'Alice Blue' shit, Strachey. Sounds like this creep is one of your people. So sorry to hear it. My condolences."

"Thank you. Where did the call originate?"

"Another pay phone. Colonie Center this time. He was gone by the time we got a car out there. And nobody around there had seen whoever’d used the phone. A royal pain."

"So, what's your plan?"

"She's going. Mrs. Fisher's one tough cookie, she is. We'll follow, discreetly."

"She knows you'll be along?"

"Yes. She wants these punks as much as I do. And she knows what savages they are."

"Is she taking the money?"

He nodded, a little guiltily.

In the heat, I felt cold. I said, "Where did she get it?"

"It's not here yet," he said, looking around for something to distract him. "The cash'll be here any minute now."

"Uh-huh. And who's bringing it?"

"Your employer," he said, not looking at me. "Mr. Crane Trefusis."

"No. She didn't."

"She did. Well, she did in a manner of speaking. What I mean is, it's an option on the property cancelable by the seller up to twenty-four hours after signing. After that it's binding, no matter what. Mrs. Fisher's lawyer got on the horn with Trefusis and okayed the language."

"Twenty-four hours. Crap. That may not be enough time."

"It's more than enough if these nuts show up for the drop."

"Yeah, if. But they're unpredictable, aren't they, Ned? They often seem to have the audacity not to follow to the letter the plan tucked away inside your head."

He snorted. "So, what do you suggest, bright boy? What have you come up with that's worked out any better? Unless you've got a niftier idea, maybe you'd just better keep your fat yap shut for a while, huh?"

I kept my fat yap shut for a while.

Dot had been upstairs with Edith, and now she appeared in grass-stained old jeans, sneakers, and a sweatshirt with words across the front that read: "My grandmother visited Hawaii and all she sent me was this dumb sweatshirt."

A cop came in and called Bowman to the radio car, and he went out puffing into the night.

I said to Dot, "I understand why you did it, but we could have come up with the cash some other way. It's an awful risk you're taking, Dot."

"Oh, it doesn't matter all that much. I'm just worn to a frazzle. Enough is enough. And Edith does hate the winters here so awfully much. Do you think I'm too old to take up surfing?"

"Probably not in Laguna Beach."

"I'll bet there's an Old Biddies' Down-the-Tubes Association out there, wouldn't you think?"

"I would. But you haven't lost it yet, Dot. Not at all. There's time."

"Yes. I hope so. Though, really, I'm not at all optimistic about getting Fenton back here safely. Are you? Not after what they did to Peter. But we have to try, don't we?"

"Yes."

A wicker picnic basket lay atop the kitchen table. Dot went over to it. "This basket was a present from Edith on my fiftieth birthday. It was full of cheeses from all over the world, and a card that said, 'You're the big cheese in my life.' Wasn't that a dumb, funny, lovely thing?" She perched on the edge of a chair and gazed out the window at the orchard and the moonlit pond.

The door opened and Bowman came in, followed by Crane Trefusis, who saw me first and came toward me with a glad hand out.

"That was a superb piece of detection, Strachey, the way you zeroed right in on that Deem boy. Congratulations."

"Congratulations? That's all?"

"The check is in the mail," Trefusis said brightly. "Oh—Mrs. Fisher, it's nice to see you again."

"I'm sure it is," Dot said, not smiling.

"I want to tell you how sorry I am—"

"Yes, yes, thank you, Mr. Trefusis, but let's just get this over with."

Trefusis looked a little hurt and peeved that his condolence speech had been cut short, though if the alternative was doing business, his nimble mind was prepared to accept that. He produced from his jacket pocket a sheaf of documents and a gold-plated pen.

"I'll just be a moment," Dot said, accepting the papers but not the pen. At the kitchen table she shoved a pair of reading glasses onto her nose and laid out the documents to compare them to the agreement her lawyer had dictated over the telephone.

Trefusis said to Bowman, "Lieutenant, I wish you all the luck in the world in getting hold of the maniacs responsible for this malicious crime. What are the odds that you'll make an arrest in the near future?"

"Excellent," Bowman said.

Trefusis ceased breathing for a second or two, but his expression didn't change. "Glad to hear it," he said with too much enthusiasm. I didn't doubt that he wanted the matter tidied up, though if it happened twenty-five hours from then, that would have been preferable.

Dot came back with the binding option agreement signed. In essence, it stated that unless the $100,000 was returned to Millpond Plaza Associates within twenty-four hours, Dot was obligated to sell her house and acreage to Millpond for $350,000 within a week's time.

"I need a witness to my signature, Don. Would you mind?"

I minded, but I signed. Then Trefusis signed and Bowman signed as his witness. The ritual was repeated

over a second copy of the agreement, which Dot kept.

Handing over a canvas sack full of money, Trefusis said, "Included is a list of the bills' serial numbers as per Lieutenant Bowman's request. You know, Mrs. Fisher, I'm so sorry this had to happen under these sad circumstances, but in a sense you are actually quite fortunate that Millpond was available to—"

"Take your papers and go, Mr. Trefusis. Please. Before I . . . give you a piece of my mind!" Her color was rising, and Trefusis swiftly backed off and fled out into the night, the option agreement clutched in his fist.

I said, "Sweet guy."

"We all have our loyalties," Bowman piped up.

"Ned, that's the fifteenth or sixteenth most fatuous statement I've ever heard you make."

"I was only just saying, goddamn it, that—"

"Don't squabble," Dot snapped, opening an aspirin bottle. "Please. Not now."

Bowman and I stood there, heads bowed contritely.

To break the silence, I asked Bowman, "Who was on your radio just now. Anything new?"

"Not much. Just that the coroner now thinks the Greco kid had some kind of allergy or something. The asphyxiation was caused by an internal chemical reaction. But they don't know yet what set it off."

I said, "Dot, was Peter allergic to anything that you know of?"

She looked perplexed. "Why, I don't think so. He never mentioned anything like that. Goodness knows, people with hay fever have a devil of a time this season of year. But Peter never seemed bothered by it. Fenton would be the person to ask."

We all looked at each other.

Bowman said, "Hopefully we'll have an opportunity to ask him in an hour or so."