Defense for the Devil (7 page)

“I can’t stop you,” Barbara said. “Promise me this, though. If you make such a decision, you’ll tell me first.”

“I’ll tell you first,” Maggie said, and hurried out.

As soon as she was gone, Barbara went to the phone and hit the redial button. Bailey answered. “It’s me,” she said, and he said he thought it might be.

“Right. Maggie hired you to do some work for her, and you bill her directly, not through me. Got that?” He said sure. She told him what little she knew, and then said, “Find out what you can about it. And while you’re with the Arno clan, keep your eyes and ears open. Okay?” He asked if she wanted to teach him how to tie his shoes. Ignoring that, she said, “I’ll be at Dad’s tonight, and you’re welcome to drop in for dessert and coffee, if you’d like. And if you have anything for me.”

He laughed. “You’re hitting a new low. In my books that’s bribery. See you around.”

She drove home deep in thought, and only when she entered the apartment and John emerged from his office, still with a distant, hurt expression, did she remember that she had promised to tell him what was happening.

“I made some tuna fish,” he said. “I’ll fix you a sandwich while you get the boots off and wash up. You look hot.”

He wasn’t going to ask anything, demand anything, she understood, yet this would be between them, her silence, her abrupt departures, staying out past office hours with no explanation, and it would fester and grow.

The card table was in the kitchen with the two folding chairs in place. She sat down and started to unlace her boot. Not looking at him, she said, “If I talk with my clients about legal matters, no power on earth can make them or me reveal what was said, but that doesn’t apply to you. If you know anything about a case and you’re put under oath, you would have to testify, or possibly be held in contempt of court, possibly even go to jail. There’s no protection, not even spousal protection in our case.”

She finished with the boots and wriggled her toes; her feet were hot and sweaty, she thought with disgust.

He had stopped moving at the tiny counter by the sink. “You think I’d reveal a confidence,” he said flatly.

“No, I don’t. It’s just that you could be at risk.” She pulled off her socks. “I want to spare you any possible problem.”

“Is a problem going to come up? Spousal protection. You mean one spouse can’t be forced to give evidence that might be incriminating to the other, don’t you? Are you involved in something that’s going to cause you trouble?”

“There could be trouble down the road. Sometimes things that start very simply turn complicated. A pretty simple case just went postal.”

He finished making the sandwich and put it down in front of her. “Wash your hands at the sink here and then tell me about it. And eat something first.”

She ate first and then told him about it.

He was silent a moment when she was done, then he asked, “Can I comment?”

“Sure.”

“She can’t collect from a dead man, and the bum’s dead, apparently. Why not hand the stuff over to the cops and let them deal with Trassi, get to the bottom of it?”

“She has a child who wants to go to medical school,” Barbara said. “She’ll come out with a hundred-thousand-dollar-plus debt to pay back. That’s for openers. But worse, suppose the police come up with a different story. Mitch arrived and told her about the money, maybe showed it to her. She killed him and hid his body and called Ray for help. Or Ray killed him for a share of the money. I have to stall for now, until we know more about Mitch Arno’s death.”

“Barbara,” John said thoughtfully, “granted that you like Maggie Folsum, but has it occurred to you that maybe she hasn’t told the entire truth?”

“It’s always a possibility that a client’s been lying. They often do. But let’s drop it now. I’m so sticky and stinky, I can’t stand myself a minute longer. I have to have a shower.”

It did not surprise her at all when he joined her beneath the spray a few minutes later.

Frank’s dinner was mainly garden vegetables, all crisp and tender and brightly colored, done to perfection in a way that Barbara decided could only be magic. His halibut was moist and flaky, with a luscious lemon-and-garlic sauce. Her salmon had been tough and dry; she had forgotten to set a timer. She had told him when he admitted her and John that Bailey might join them for dessert. He had raised his eyebrows. “Always plenty.”

Then, at the dining room table, he began to talk about Sylvia Fenton. “You know who Joe Fenton is, don’t you? The jewelry store owner?” Barbara nodded. “Yes, well this started back, oh, thirty or thirty-five years ago, when this rich bachelor was on a jewelry-buying trip to New York. Can’t say he was handsome, he never would have won a beauty contest, but he was rich and eligible. Every gal in the county was after him. Anyway, he was in New York and someone took him to an off-Broadway show, and he saw Sylvia. She was a bit player, did character roles—the Irish waif, the saucy French maid, tough honky-tonk dancer. You know what I mean. But something hit Joe hard that night. He came home with a bride.”

He was grinning. He helped Barbara to another serving of spinach salad with feta cheese, talking all the while.

“Well, Joe’s mother tried to have a heart attack, and his father threatened to disinherit him. But a funny thing happened. In just a couple of months the mother-in-law was Sylvia’s champion; she took her everywhere and introduced her as ‘my daughter.’ And the father-in-law began talking about doing it right, a real wedding with no expense spared. Joe was the happiest man in the county. She has a way, that Sylvia.” Frank looked at John then. “Now, I know a few things about folks around here. Barbara knows more, I’m sure. Bailey knows just about everything. And Sylvia knows more than Bailey.

“She fit in, kept busy, volunteer work, stuff like that, but it wasn’t quite enough. Then one day she came to see me and brought a maid in with her, and the maid’s story was that a nursing home had killed her mother through neglect, wrong medication or something. Sylvia believed her, but there wasn’t a shred of evidence. Inspectors never found a thing out of line. Bailey said he might be able to get a ringer, someone to send in undercover, and Sylvia said she’d do it herself. Right before my eyes she changed from queen of high society to a barely literate, ignorant drudge. So she went in and got a job emptying bedpans and scrubbing; she took a camera with her, and she nailed them. The usual thing, sugar pills instead of prescription drugs, and pocket the money, a lot of things like that.”

He laughed. “Thing is, Sylvia loved doing it, and Joe was so proud, you’d have thought she just invented heaven. Sylvia told Bailey she’d be available if something else came along. And, by God, every now and then something does come along.” Very softly he added, “Everybody loves Sylvia, and no one more than Joe. He’s still the happiest man in the county.”

They all cleared the table, and Frank brought out a raspberry torte and a carafe of coffee. As if on cue, Bailey arrived at that moment.

Finally even the dessert was gone, and Bailey put sugar in his third cup of coffee and said, “You tell him anything yet?”

“I told John about it, but not Dad.” She told Frank then about Maggie’s visit, Mitch’s death. “What did you find out?” she asked Bailey afterward.

Frank’s face had been jovial, a look of fond reminiscence had softened his features; now he was grim-looking.

With a reproachful look Bailey said, “You sent me straight into bedlam. Three sons—Ray, James, and David—two wives, a thousand kids, Maggie, the old man and old lady all talking at once. Nobody listens, everyone talks.”

She shook her head impatiently, and he continued.

“Okay, okay. Problem is, you ask Ray a question and while he answers it, so does everyone else, a chorus of answers, and no one seems to notice. I fingerprinted the whole crew, even little kids wanted their fingerprints made, so I did them, too.”

John looked bewildered. “Why?”

“Elimination. Match up what I can, and anything left over goes to the FBI lab for identification,” Bailey said. “So, no point in doing that house, not with people swarming everywhere like they were. Maggie, Ray, James, and the old man, we all went to Ray’s house and I did that one. Got a nice footprint in the bathroom, and another one on a hassock in the living room. Looked like someone had put his foot against it and shoved it across the room.”

No one moved as he talked. “Okay, out at his house, I asked Ray to show me around the property, alone. And I got to ask him some questions without the Greek chorus helping out. Ray says that the old man showed up at seven or a little later on Friday, hauling Mitch in with him. The old man took off in his truck, and Ray told Mitch about the party at Maggie’s place and warned him if he showed up, they’d make the last beating look like practice. Then he took off, collected his brother James, and they went to the coast.

“On Monday when Ray got home, the living room looked like Mitch had gone wild. Two broken lamps, a can of beer spilled on the floor. Mitch had shaved with Lorinne’s razor, and he had eaten and left dishes on the table. He had showered in the big bathroom and left a footprint. He had put on a pair of Ray’s jeans and a shirt with the shop logo on the pocket. Mitch was gone and so were his own clothes. That’s all Ray knows about that.

“This morning at seven two cops come to the house and seem a little surprised to find Ray. They might have thought he was the dead man. Anyway, they split up—one goes in with him to identify the body, and the other one tags along behind. They’re being helpful, they’ll help him with parking, show him the right place to go, and generally be of assistance. He’s grateful, and after he identifies Mitch, he tells them everything he knows.”

Barbara groaned and he nodded. “Right. I doubt it would have occurred to him to clam up, get some advice, not his style. They ask questions, he answers, and they send a couple of detectives back to the house with him. They send someone out to talk to the old man, and the questions are getting tougher with Ray. The way he sees
it, they’re doing their job and he’ll help any way he can. Simple.”

“What do the police have?”

“Last night they got a tip about a body up at a cabin around Blue River. The caller said it was behind a place that’s for sale. He was hiking with friends, and they spotted a foot sticking out of the ground and did their duty and called. And hung up. The cops went out last night and found him, buried, except for one foot. The cabin had been broken into, and he had been beaten and probably killed inside. And they found the name
Arno
in blood on the floor, so tracking Ray down was easy enough, that and the shirt.”

“Jesus Christ!” Frank muttered in a low, savage voice. Barbara asked, “Anything else?”

“They’ve been up there today poking and prying. No time of death yet, no direct cause of death. Hell, the autopsy hasn’t been done yet, more than likely. But the police will be all over Folsum asking questions, and if they don’t already consider Ray their prime suspect, they will soon. Who else?”

John was watching her so closely, she felt almost as if rays were being emitted from his eyes, burning her. “Are you going to take him on if he asks? Get involved in another murder case this soon?”

“Even if I wanted to, and I don’t, I couldn’t,” she said. “Conflict of interest.” She stood up. “Excuse me. Right back.” Outside the dining room door she paused, listening to her father’s voice.

“See, John, she already has a client, and it’s her duty to protect that client, to fulfill her obligation to her, and not bring harm to her.”

“Wouldn’t that be a criminal offense, to withhold information in a murder investigation?”

“Now you see
the problem.”

She hurried to the bathroom, where she gazed at herself in the mirror. “Oh my, yes,” she whispered. “Certainly a criminal offense.”

7

Sunday was going
to be another hot, bright day; at ten in the morning it was already too hot to be carrying the camping gear from their apartment down a flight of stairs that collected heat and stored it. By the time all the equipment was beside the van, sweat was running down her back, down her legs. John was unbearably cheerful; she suspected he had been more oppressed by the cluttered apartment than he had admitted, and now they were doing something about it. He regarded with satisfaction the piles of bedding, the stove, refrigerator…. There was so much, it seemed impossible that it would all fit into the van.

“Go on and cool off,” he said. “This will take a couple of hours.” Thank God for air-conditioning, she thought as she returned to the apartment. And thank God for silence, she added. She felt desperate for time without distraction.

She took her briefcase to her newly cleared office and sat down to think. Already dates and times were slipping away; she had not made sufficient notes to set them in her mind.

John came back; she heard him moving boxes in the living room, and she put down her pen. In a moment there was a very soft tap on her door, as if a low noise would be less intrusive than a real knock. John pushed the door open and asked, “Have you seen a box about like so? Tools in it.” He held out his hands to indicate size; she shook her head, and he withdrew.

It took a long time for her to remember something she had started to jot down. She finally got it back and wrote:
What if Mitch had not recovered his car, and instead some kids had hotwired it and taken it joyriding? Had it turned up wrecked anywhere? If so, what was found in it?
Bailey work.

If there was any way she could keep Maggie out of the murder investigation, she would do it, she had decided; something in the car might drag her in anyway.

The phone rang and she went to the kitchen to listen. “Ms. Holloway, I have to talk to you. It’s imperative that I talk to you today.”

She picked up the phone. “Barbara Holloway,” she said.

The caller let out an audible sigh. “Thank God,” he said. “My name is Brad Waters, in San Francisco. I’m catching the first flight I can get, and I’ll go to the Valley River Inn. Can you talk to me this afternoon? At four? It’s about Mitch Arno and what he was carrying?”