The Emerald Cat Killer (2 page)

She looked around inside the car. Maybe there was something here worth ripping off. They said you could get some nice money for a good car stereo but she didn't know how to get one out of a car, and if she did, how would she get it back to Bobby's room in the old Van Buren Hotel down on Acton Street? No, that wouldn't work.

She punched open the glove compartment and pulled out a fat wad of papers. Maps, owner's manuals, insurance certificates, registration papers. Christ, this guy must never throw anything away. She pawed around the dashboard until she found a knob that she recognized as a cigar lighter. Imagine, everybody used to have these things in their cars. She punched it, waited till it popped back out, pulled it out of its little hole and stared at the glowing bull's-eye of red-hot wires. She held it up to her face so she could feel the warmth. It was really great. She decided to warm herself, pushed it against her cheek, screamed when she felt the burning, searing heat on her skin.

She dropped the lighter. It bounced off something hard lying on the floor. She reached down to see what it was. Something black, almost like an attaché case only not an attaché case, more like— She almost had it, she'd get it in a minute … but somebody in the house must have heard her scream. She saw a light come on in the house, heard a little yippy dog sending up an alarm.

Somebody was going to come and grab her, she knew it. If she could get out of the car fast enough and get away she'd be all right. Or maybe she should lock the car door. She should have done that in the first place but she didn't think of it, she was too occupied thinking about getting warm and dry and swallowing jelly beans. She started to get out of the car, then realized what the black thing was, realized that she'd hit pay dirt after all.

Her heart beat wildly, her blood sang in her veins. This was something she could sell for real money. Or she could bring it to Bobby and he could sell it and they'd share the money. He'd let her stay with him in his room on Acton Street. She wouldn't even need any of the money. He could have it all. She'd take out her share in jolts.

She started to sing a happy song.

Some ancient guy wearing pajamas and a bathrobe must have come out of the house because he was pulling at the car door. He got it open and reached for her but she didn't wait for him to grab her. She could have scrambled out the other side of the car but this was too exciting. She screamed at the guy and jumped out of the car, straight at him.

He was startled. He hadn't expected that, the sucker hadn't. She'd never seen anybody look so surprised. He actually backed away from her. There was a brick thingamabob behind him, a plinth or a pilaster or whatever the hell they called them in art history class. She laughed at him. She went for him; the black thing in her hands was a laptop computer and those things were worth real money, worth even more than car radios or cell phones.

The sucker saw her coming at him and he threw up his hands. She hit him smack on with everything she had, smashed him in the face with the laptop computer.

There were more lights on in the house and the little yippy dog was going absolutely bonkers nuts.

The guy she'd hit lurched backward, his head jerking backward against the brick thingamabob, and then the front door of the house opened and the little yippy dog came swarming at her followed by a dumpy old broad waving her arms. Red split; she turned around and she ran, ran back to the bigger street, turned, and ran, and ran, and ran, the laptop computer hugged to her chest, her feet soaked with icy rainwater that came up through the holes in her sneakers and she was screaming, “Bobby, Bobby, open up, Bobby, let me in, Bobby, Bobby, I've got something for you, Bobby, for us, Bobby, something wonderful. Oh, love me, Bobby, love me, Bobby, love me, Bobby.”

TWO

One year later:

“Lindsey?”

It only took one word to make the old synapses kick back in. If he'd been a retired soldier he'd have wanted to jump out of bed and stand at attention. If he'd been a retired fire horse he'd have snorted once, shaken himself, and been ready to pull the wagon to the conflagration.

Hobart Lindsey grunted, “Yes, Mr. Richelieu.”

He pressed the phone to his ear, swung himself around, and planted his feet in his fleece slippers. How long had he been retired? He'd put in enough years at International Surety to qualify for his pension. He wasn't eligible for Social Security yet and the monthly checks from I.S. weren't exactly lavish, but he'd been able to keep the little house in Walnut Creek after his mother remarried and moved to Oceanside Villas, a gated retirement community in Carlsbad.

He waited to hear what Desmond Richelieu, his old chief at International Surety, top executive at Special Projects Unit / Detached Service, would be calling him about at this hour of the morning. In fact … Lindsey frowned, peered at the glowing readout on his bedside clock, and waited for Richelieu to say what he had to say.

“Lindsey, I need you back on board.”

“I'm retired, Mr. Richelieu.” He couldn't bring himself to call his old chief Ducky, the name that everyone used when Richelieu was out of earshot.

“I know that. You get a fat check every month for not working.”

“Mr. Richelieu, I earned it.”

“All right, look … wait a minute, where the hell are you, Lindsey?”

“Don't you know? You called me. I'm at home.”

“Yeah, yeah, vegetating. I'm still working, why aren't you?”

Lindsey didn't even try to answer that, didn't bother to remind Richelieu that he'd been downsized out of his job and forced into early retirement. “Look, Chief, I'm sure you called me for a reason. You realize it's an hour earlier here in California than it is there in Denver. Did you just want to wake me up, or is there some ulterior motive?”

“You're getting feisty in your old age, Lindsey.”

“Yep.” He stretched, stood up, started toward the kitchen. Thanks be given for cordless telephones!

“You were always the go-to guy on wacko cases. I've got your file right here on my monitor. Comic books, that Duesenberg with the solid platinum engine, Julius Caesar's toy chariot. You were always the oddball. Maybe that's why you were so good at the loony cases.”

“Thanks, Chief. You should have said that at my retirement banquet when they gave me the gold wristwatch and the fond farewell. Oh, wait a minute, I didn't get a retirement banquet, gold wristwatch, or fond farewell. I got a fond
Don't-let-the-door-hit-you-on-the-way-out.
Look, I am longing for a cup of coffee and a plate of scrambled eggs, and since there's nobody here to make them, I need to get off the phone and do it myself. Unless there's something you want.”

“You know about the consulting fee account.”

“Right.”

“I can offer you some nice bucks for a few hours of easy work.”

“Right. And there's a really nice bridge you'd like to sell me.”

“No, I mean it.”

“Okay, hold on.” He laid the phone on the counter, turned on the coffeemaker, got a couple of eggs out of the fridge and set them where he could keep a watchful eye on them, and plopped himself in a chromium-rimmed kitchen chair.

Desmond Richelieu's voice came squirming out of the telephone. “Are you there? Are you there? Damn you, Lindsey, where the hell did you go?”

Lindsey picked up the phone. “Sorry 'bout that, Chief. Now, what were you saying?”

“You ever hear of Gordon Simmons, Lindsey?”

Lindsey frowned. “I don't think so.” The coffeemaker was grunting and chugging like a happy little steam locomotive.

“You don't keep up with things, do you?”

“Chief, please. He's not related to Flash Gordon on the Planet Mongo, is he? I've always had a fondness for old Buster Crabbe.”

“Don't joke, you. Listen, don't take it for granted that your pension is guaranteed, Lindsey. Don't get me peeved.”

“Chief, it
is
guaranteed. Who is Gordon Simmons?”

“Not is. Was. He died a year ago. Murdered.”

“Sorry, Chief. Deponent knoweth not. You want to tell me more, or let me scramble my eggs. I'm hungry this morning.” He looked out the kitchen window. Beyond gauzy, pale blue curtains the sky was a vivid shade, almost cobalt, and the sun was bright. “Did we cover the decedent? Is there a problem with the claim? Why is this a case for SPUDS? I'm sorry Mr. Simmons was murdered but why are you calling me about it? Especially a year after his death.”

“It's not about the death claim. We paid that off. No problem.”

Lindsey sighed. “Can I call you back after I've had my scrambled eggs? I think I'm going to have an English muffin and orange marmalade with them.”

“No, damn it, no! I don't give a damn about your breakfast. Now listen. The guy lived in Berkeley. Simmons. He had a policy with us. Beneficiary was his wife. Walnut Creek office handled the claim. They paid the claim and we closed the case. This is a new case.”

“You'll have to enlighten me, Chief.” Lindsey clutched the telephone between his jawbone and his shoulder, pulled apart the English muffin, and dropped the pieces into the chrome-plated retro toaster on the counter. Except that the toaster wasn't retro; it was original stock. It had stood on that counter for as long as Hobart Lindsey could remember.

“We've got a potential lawsuit on our hands. Mrs. Simmons is threatening to sue a publisher called Gordian House. It's a plagiarism suit. She has a co-plaintiff, a publisher called Marston and Morse. Gordian House has kicked it over to us. If the case gets to court and they lose we have to pony up. And the Widder Simmons and M-and-M want big bucks. Big bucks, Lindsey.”

The toaster popped. Lindsey clutched the phone again between jawbone and shoulder. He spread some marmalade on one half of the English muffin, butter on the other half, and closed it up. He opened the fridge and put away the eggs.

“Lindsey, here's what I want you to do. The case file is on the SPUDS server. Get into the Walnut Creek office and read through it. Nobody there has enough brains to pour piss out of a boot with the instructions on the heel. Just read the file and call me back and tell me you'll handle this one.”

Lindsey poured himself a cup of coffee, added some half-and-half, took a generous bite of English muffin, and washed it down with coffee. He didn't say anything.

There was a lengthy silence. He could hear Richelieu breathing, knew he was waiting for Lindsey to say he'd take the case. Lindsey was determined to outwait his onetime boss. After all, it was the company's dime, not Lindsey's.

Finally, Desmond Richelieu said, “Please.”

It was the first time Lindsey had ever heard him say that word. True, Lindsey could tell, even from the distance of a thousand miles, that Richelieu said it through clenched teeth and very nearly with tears in his eyes. Still, he said it.

To Lindsey, that constituted an offer he couldn't refuse.

*   *   *

The Walnut Creek office of International Surety occupied a suite in a modern high-rise building across North Main Street from City Hall. Lindsey left his Dodge Avenger in the parking garage beneath the office building. He liked everything about the car, especially its safety features, except for the name. Why name a car after a World War II torpedo bomber?

He rode up in an elevator full of hard-strivers half his age.

The receptionist at International Surety looked up from her monitor screen and stared at him as if she feared that he would die on the spot of superannuation. He said, “I'm from SPUDS. Need to talk with the branch manager about the Simmons case.”

The woman hit a buzzer on her desk and Elmer Mueller emerged from somewhere. He'd gained weight and lost hair since Lindsey had seen him last. And how long had that been? Lindsey wondered.

Elmer Mueller offered a reluctant handshake and ushered Lindsey into his private office. Behind Mueller's desk and across North Main, City Hall gleamed in the March sunlight. Mueller gestured Lindsey to a chair.

The décor was modern. Elmer Mueller's desktop was clear except for a keyboard and monitor. That seemed to be the standard of the day. But the portraits on Mueller's wall were of President Richard Nixon and Governor Pat Brown. Lindsey wondered if Mueller's intention was ironic.

“Richelieu e-mailed me about you, Lindsey.” Elmer Mueller leaned back in an overstuffed leather chair. He swiveled, nodded permission to City Hall to stay where it was, then swung back toward Lindsey. “We've had to cut back. I can't spare people to hold your hand, and I don't like SPUDS poking its nose into my business.”

“Your business?” Lindsey raised his eyebrows.

“Running this branch. If Ducky has any complaints about the way I run this office he can file a beef with Corporate.” He dropped a fist onto the sheet of gray-tinted glass that topped his desk. “How long since you worked out of this office, Lindsey?”

Lindsey smiled. “Twenty-two years, Elmer.”

“Didn't I see your name in the retirement column of
IntSurNews
a few years ago?”

“Ducky asked me to come back on special assignment.”

Mueller pursed his lips like an exasperated schoolteacher and swung his head slowly from side to side. “I suppose I might as well set you up. There's an empty office in the suite. Remember Mrs. Blomquist?”

Lindsey said that he did.

“Dropped dead. Had her retirement papers in, bought a condo down in La Jolla, had her furniture shipped ahead. Moved into a motel for her last few days in Walnut Creek. Came in to clean out her desk and say good-bye, and dropped dead. You can use her computer.”

Lindsey thanked him. The receptionist showed him to the vacant office and handed him a printout of file access codes. She closed the door behind her. Lindsey got to work.

The computer file on the Simmons case was sparse. Policy date and number, premium payment records, date of death, cause of death, coroner's and police reports, claim forms, and record of payment to beneficiary. Everything looked normal. Lindsey felt sorry for Simmons's widow, Angela. He wondered if there were any children. If so, they weren't listed on the policy. But it had been in effect for a long time. Maybe Simmons took it when the couple were newlyweds and never added bennies when the tykes came along. Bad work by the agent, if that was so.