Beating the Babushka (3 page)

Chapter Five

The zoo was in an uproar.

Every time the panther roared, the antelope jumped, kicking and snorting, clueless about the fences separating them from the great cat. One or two invariably ran headlong into the metal fencing, which made a metallic sound that scared the shit out of the birds in the surrounding trees, causing them to fly in panicked circles. The squawking of the birds sounded like human screams.

The panther roared again.

It paced hungrily beneath the man tied to the rope, a guttural sound replacing the roar as it licked its lips. It was a primal sound, heavy with bass that hit you deep in the gut, telling you to run, get the hell out of there. Death was coming to dinner.

But there was nowhere for the man to run. With one leg tied to a rope secured with enough duct tape to fix the economy, all he could do was scramble around the cage, hoping to stay out of reach of the enormous black cat.

“The problem with the zoo is that most of your big jungle animals are nocturnal.”

Frank Alessi spoke slowly from outside the protective bars of the panther’s cell, careful to make every word heard over the animal buzz all around him. “Nocturnal means they wake up at night, by the way. So when busloads of kids pour through the gates to see the ferocious lions, tigers, and bears, all they see are big piles of fur, asleep in the corner.”

Frank took the chewed cigar from his mouth and pointed at the man dangling above the panther.

“If you ask me, it’s all a big scam.”

The man on the rope said something in Chinese and spat, twisting his body to aim at Frank. He’d managed to climb one of the tall boulders the zoo designers had placed inside the supposedly natural habitat, but his perch was precarious, so his options for a dignified response were limited.

Frank leaned forward solicitously. “Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that.” He turned toward two men standing by the fence, gesturing once again with his cigar. They yanked the rope, dragging the man to the edge of the boulder. The panther growled and suddenly vanished, then reappeared as it moved in and out of shadow. The man twisted frantically but only succeeded in swinging wildly back and forth.

“I asked you a question,” said Frank, his belly pressing against the iron fence that separated the general public from the African veldt during normal visiting hours. Beyond the fence was a cement ditch twenty feet deep and maybe ten feet wide, too far for the panther to jump, and too smooth for the man to climb. Trees stood on both sides of the fence, their branches intertwining to form a latticework of leaves overhead. The boughs were thick enough to support the strain on the rope as it pulled back and forth, held fast by the two goons.

The man closest to Frank was maybe six feet tall but wide as a refrigerator. The guy to his right was tall and lean with a beak for a nose, so hooked it made him look like a hawk with a sinus infection. They watched impassively as Frank continued his lecture.

“My good friend Otto the butcher got himself killed.” He strolled casually away from his captive, running his hand along the fence, then turned back and switched hands. “Now it looks as though Otto might have been socking away some product for a rainy day, maybe cutting his own deals on the side. It’s not like we ever asked him to stuff his sausages. But be that as it may, none of my guys would have done something so—” Frank paused, looking over his shoulder at the two men.

“Rash,” said the hawk-nosed thug.

“Right,” said Frank, smiling. “My guys would never do something so rash. And neither would any of our business associates, not without telling me first.”

The man on the rope twisted around like a spent yo-yo, then spun in the opposite direction without saying anything.

Frank shrugged. “To kill Otto like that was, well, it’s…” His voice trailed off.

“Imprudent,” whispered the hawk.

Frank shook his head, annoyed.

“Unwise?”

Frank smiled.

“It was unwise,” he said.

The man on the rope said nothing. His eyes darted frantically around the cage, but he’d already run around its perimeter looking for a hiding place. Anytime he moved out of sight, the rope was pulled violently, dragging him to the ground. His face was covered in cuts and bruises and his nails had torn off trying to break through the tape, but only a serrated knife could cut that rope.

And now the great cat was not only awake but pissed. It was tired of the chase. The panther had stopped pacing and was sitting in a crouch, its paws moving excitedly, a big cat waiting for the catnip mouse to come within reach.

Frank cleared his throat. “Which brings me to the logical deduction that you and your Chinese pals had a little disagreement with Otto about his cut, so you decided…”

“To cut Otto out of the picture.”

“Exactly.” Frank nodded. “You wanted a bigger cut, so you cut him out. I like that.”

The hawk man looked at his partner and raised his eyebrows, a smug look on his face. The refrigerator just shook his head.

The man didn’t answer. He’d managed to scuttle back from the edge of the boulder but his legs were wobbling, the surface too narrow for him. He’d gained a few inches but was still only three feet from the swinging paws.

“Why go and do a thing like that?” demanded Frank. “Otto’s deli was the perfect drop site—not your turf, and not mine. Why would you stupid tong bastards ruin something so sweet, unless you decided you didn’t need Otto anymore?”

The man on the rope caught the tone in Frank’s voice and spun around, tearing his eyes away from the shifting ground in front of him.

“And if you don’t need Otto, then maybe you don’t need Frank either.”

The man’s eyes were wide, the fear visible even in the dark.

“Not—not us,” he said in halting English. “Not Chinese.”

Frank screwed up his face and scratched his cheek, looking about as contemplative as an angry hippo.

“I didn’t ask if you did it,” said Frank. “I asked why.”

Before his captive could answer, Frank walked away from the fence, past his two men.

“Pull the rope,” he muttered. “I’m going home to get some sleep.”

The two thugs obliged, putting their backs into the effort.

The panther roared and the zoo exploded with sound. The antelope ran, scaring the birds, which screamed just loudly enough to drown out the sounds of a man being eaten alive.

Chapter Six

Cape heard a growl and realized it was coming from his stomach.

Golden Gate Park is a good spot for a picnic. It’s roughly three miles long and half a mile wide where it runs into the Pacific Ocean on the western edge of San Francisco, so even on the weekends there’s plenty of room to spread out. A free patch of grass for residents of a city where housing is too expensive for anyone to afford a backyard.

Cape considered it the perfect rendezvous point for meeting his friend from the newspaper. Though Linda Katz lived and worked in the city, she spent all her free time away from office buildings, restaurants, and most public transportation. She wasn’t claustrophobic, nor did she dislike people. What she hated was electricity.

While everyone else in town worried about earthquakes, Linda was convinced electromagnetic radiation would be the end of her. One conversation on a cell phone and tumors would blossom in her brain like dandelions. A ride on one of those electric buses hooked to the power lines above the streets and all her hair would fall out.

This last concern was considerable, since Linda’s hair practically had its own zip code. Never tamed by a hair dryer or electric shears, her hair moved seemingly of its own accord, expressing Linda’s feelings more clearly than anything she ever said or did. Right now it was shifting unsteadily in the breeze, moving suspiciously back and forth as Linda looked at the picnic spread before her.

“You’re feeding me. How big is this favor you’re asking?”

Cape looked up from the cheese and crackers with a wounded expression.

“Isn’t this nice?” He swept his arm toward the field around them. “No antennas, no high-tension wires.”

Linda shrugged. “We’re still in a nexus,” she said, reaching into the basket for a bottle of water.

“A what?”

“A nexus,” she repeated. “An electromagnetic vortex caused by the surrounding transmission towers for cell phones, the nearby power generator for the park lights, not to mention the radiation from the cars passing by.”

“You seem awfully calm for someone sitting in a nexus.”

Linda shrugged again. “I’m not a Luddite, you know. I just try to limit unnecessary exposure. Compared to someone who makes a living trying to get people to shoot at him, I consider myself quite balanced.”

“I usually don’t ask them to shoot at me—it just happens.”

“I even agreed to use an electric typewriter at work.”

“Not a computer?”

“Don’t push it.” Linda’s hair assumed a menacing posture. Cape decided to change the subject.

“How are things at
The Examiner
?”

“It pays the rent,” she said. “And every once in a while, it feels like you’re making a difference.”

“You’ve always been an optimist.” Cape first met Linda when they were both working as investigative reporters at
The San Francisco Chronicle
. Linda was already a veteran when Cape arrived. He was a transplant from New York with a knack for finding people who didn’t want to be found. He also had a talent for pissing off his editor. Linda took him under her wing, taught him some manners, and had mothered him ever since. He smiled briefly at the memory. “By the way, sorry that vegetarian paper you were editing on the side had to fold.”

“That was the problem—it wouldn’t fold.” Linda snorted in disgust. “The paper was made from corn husks, more environmentally friendly than recycled paper, which rarely gets recycled anyway. So the publishers found someone who made this vegetable papyrus for the paper stock. But you couldn’t fold it, the pages would stick together, and the ink would run. It was a paper you could boil and eat, but you couldn’t read it. Even I thought the publishers went too far.”

“Sounds very San Francisco,” said Cape.

“Very stupid,” said Linda as she grabbed a carrot stick. “The experience proved that being a vegetarian does wonders for your body, but unfortunately very little for your IQ—so I kept my diet and quit the job.”

“You seem happy with your day job.”

“
The Examiner’
s a kick,” replied Linda. “Since they changed to a tabloid format they’ve been willing to take risks. The city desk editor is willing to push the boundaries.”

“Then you’ll love this story.”

Linda took a sip from her water. “You said it had something to do with the bridge jumper?”

Cape outlined his meeting with Grace, smiling to himself as Linda’s eyes grew wide and her hair stood on end. She was hooked.

“So the suicide’s a murder?”

Cape shrugged. “That’s what my client says.”

“And you believe him?”

“Her,” said Cape. “My client’s a she.”

Linda frowned, a worried crease appearing between her eyes.

“Uh-oh.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” said Cape indignantly.

Linda looked at the blanket while her hair shrugged noncommittally.

“Nothing. It’s just that you have a tendency to…well, you know…”

“What?”

“I think it’s called a paladin complex,” said Linda. “Every woman is a damsel in distress, and you’re the knight in shining armor—you feel a moral obligation to help them. It probably has something to do with your mother.”

“Oh, Christ.”

“Good point,” said Linda, nodding, “You probably have a Christ complex, too. You want to save everybody and you’re willing to sacrifice yourself to do it. So maybe you’d be just as obsessive if she were a man.”

Cape sighed.

“You have to admit,” pressed Linda, “that every time we go to lunch or dinner, you fall in love with the waitress.”

“I have a healthy appetite.”

“Forget I said anything.”

“Can I get off the couch now?”

Linda kept her mouth shut but her hair laughed silently.

Cape blew out his cheeks. “As I was saying, my client worked with the guy who jumped. They worked together for almost ten years and co-produced four movies.”

“Co-produced?”

“The way she described it, Tom typically handled shooting at the studios, on the big sound stages in Hollywood.”

“Okay.”

“Grace handled scouting and location shooting. And Tom handled most of the budgeting.”

“Most?”

“Grace manages her segments of the movie, but Tom managed the overall budget, making sure everyone’s segment added up to the same bottom line for the studio.”

“Which studio do they work for?”

“Empire Films.”

Linda sat up straighter. “Didn’t they make that gay astronaut movie?”

Cape nodded. “That’s one of theirs.”

“I loved that film.”

“So did everyone else,” said Cape. “The last American male archetype, shattered.”

“That’s what they said about the gay cowboy movie.”

“Yeah, but when you’re gay in space, there’s no one to hear you scream.”

Linda’s brow furrowed. “Wasn’t that the line from
Alien
?”

“Not exactly.”

Linda’s politically correct instincts kicked in and she frowned disapprovingly. Cape thought her hair liked the joke, but he couldn’t be sure.

“It was a great movie,” said Linda.

Cape nodded. “Yeah, it was. And Grace tells me it made a fortune for the studio. The big actors treated it like an art film, so they all cut their salaries.”

“So the box office receipts went to the bottom line.”

“Yeah. And they bought the script for next to nothing, because all the studios in Hollywood had already passed on it.”

“That’s right, Empire is based in New York, aren’t they? I read an article in the Times—it referred to them as Hollywood outsiders.”

Cape nodded. “Two brothers—Harry and Adam Berman.”

“I saw their picture, standing on their yacht in New York Harbor,” said Linda. “Is Harry the fat one or the tall one?”

“I’m not sure,” replied Cape. “For all I know, he might be the tall, fat one.”

“Do they know you’re working on this?”

“Not yet.”

“Have you talked to anyone from the studio besides your client?”

“No,” said Cape. “Before she went to the police station, Grace called the head of operations at Empire—a guy named Angelo—and told him what she was doing.”

Linda raised her eyebrows. “How did that go over?”

“I guess he was pissed—Grace said he’s kind of a control freak.”

“Your favorite.”

“Well,” said Cape, “I can understand his reaction. They are in the middle of a movie, and they’re down one producer.”

“Who might have been murdered.”

“I have a feeling we’re the only ones who believe that.”

“We?” said Linda, her eyebrows once again heading north.

“I meant Grace and me—but I’m glad you’re on our side already.”

Linda smiled, knowing exactly what he meant.

“So what do you want me to do?” she asked cautiously. “I may work for a budding tabloid, but I do have standards.”

Cape tried to look vulnerable but gave up. No one could bullshit Linda, and he didn’t have it in him anyway.

“The studio is screwed if Grace walks from this picture, so they have to indulge her murder theory, at least for now.”

“Okay.”

“But they don’t know me from a key grip on one of their sets.”

“I always wondered what a key grip does,” mused Linda. “You think the studio may not be entirely forthcoming.”

“The studio doesn’t want to risk too much publicity, let alone an investigation.”

“What if there really was a murder?”

“To hear Grace describe it, there could be ten murders a day and the studio wouldn’t launch an investigation if they thought it would interfere with production. That’s apparently Angelo’s real job—keep things running, no matter the cost.”

“Sounds like his idea of an investigation and yours might be a little different,” said Linda, her hair bouncing in anticipation.

“But my approach is to stir things up as much as possible, since you never know who might be hiding something.”

Linda nodded. “You’re a pain in the ass.”

“That’s what they’re afraid of,” said Cape. “Grace wants me to proceed with the investigation but somehow stay off Angelo’s radar.”

“How are you supposed to do that?”

“I think it comes down to two things.”

“The first?”

“Don’t do anything that interferes with the production of this movie.”

“And the second?” asked Linda.

“Keep the investigation as low-profile as possible,” replied Cape.

“Not likely.”

“That’s the hard part,” said Cape. “My guess is Angelo won’t like it if I do anything to embarrass him.”

“So what do you want me to do?”

“Embarrass him for me,” replied Cape.

Linda smiled.

“Do you think you can do that?” asked Cape.

“You bet.”