Madman's Thirst (29 page)

“Arachne was a lunatic,” Sobok
said. “I would never have taken on the assignment had I known what he had done
on Staten Island. Initially I thought he was merely punishing some thugs for
overstepping their assignments. I could live with that. Even killing you made
sense.”

“A lot of people would agree,”
Scarne said.

“But then Bimm, in his final
moments, told me the whole story. It was he and Arachne all along.”

Scarne could imagine what Bimm’s
‘final moments’ were like.

“Arachne was becoming increasingly
erratic,” Sobok continued. “The Three Stooges could have worked up a better
plan than the one upstairs.” They had reached the street. “Now, let’s act
inebriated and silly. All the activity is in the front of the building. With
luck, nobody will connect three drunks around the corner with a dead body.”

“Who died?” Emma was slurring her
words. She’d easily pass for a drunk. “Anyone I know.”

“Osama bin Laden,” Scarne said.

Sobok liked that. When they got to
the street there was a cab idling. The driver was wearing a turban. Once inside
the taxi, Scarne acted the drunk by singing “The Patriot’s Game,” the Irish
lament that Dudley Mack had tortured him with for years. Sobok looked over at
him.

“I’m beginning to regret not
shooting you.”

Emma tapped the glass partition.
The driver turned.

“Yes, miss?

“Osama bin Laden is dead,” she
told the cabbie. “The bastard.”

“I’m Sikh,” the man replied,
nettled.

“I’m feeling a bit woozy myself,”
Emma replied, lurching back.

The driver looked back quickly.

“Do not throw up in my cab!”

Sobok leaned forward.

“Just drive.”

He rattled off the address of Scarne’s
apartment. Scarne looked at him. “Research,” Sobok said, shrugging. “Better not
take her home until she gets her story straight. Now, while we have a moment,
tell me how you tracked down Banaszak.”

Scarne gave him the short version.

“Priceless,” Sobok said. “A
priest. So that is why you mentioned the sanctity of the confessional in the hospital
parking lot. I wondered about that. But you still had virtually nothing to go
on. I am impressed. It is what your Edgar Allen Poe would say is a wonderful
example of deductive ratiocination.”

“You were always one step ahead of
me.”

“Yes, but I had a crib.”

“Where are my Fuck Me’s?”

It was Emma again. Sobok glanced
at Scarne, perplexed.

“Her shoes,” Scarne said, struggling
to put one of them on a foot she now playfully waved in his face. “That’s what women
call them.”

“Americans,” Sobok said, shaking
his head. “Give me the other one.” He grabbed her other foot, which she wiggled.
“Now, behave yourself Ms. Shields.”

“Oh, suck farts,” she said, but
then was mercifully silent for the rest of the ride, as the cab swept through
Manhattan’s mostly silent streets, mowing down the spectral steam rising from
dozens of manholes on their way to Greenwich Village. Scarne thought of  the
famous scene in
Taxi Driver
, with Robert DeNiro’s crazed Travis Bickle
behind the wheel of a different cab. Bickle would appear sane beside some of
the characters in our drama, he thought, rubbing the back of his neck, which
was throbbing.

“Put some ice on it when you get
the chance,” Sobok said.

“Why knock me out when you were going
to kill Arachne?”

“Habit. Besides, you were on the
verge of doing something rash. By the way, here’s your gun. I prefer the
Beretta myself.”

“You’re making a habit of cold-cocking
me,” Scarne said, pocketing his weapon.

“It does save ammunition.”

They both laughed.

“What’s so damn funny?”

It was Emma. She had regained
enough of her faculties to look questioningly at the two men. As the cab pulled
up to his apartment Scarne put his fingers to his lips and she took the hint.
Sobok helped Scarne get her out of the cab. The doorman came over and Scarne
was preparing a lie when a hearse pulled up and two men jumped out. Sobok’s
hand went inside his jacket and Scarne quickly said, “It’s OK. I know them.”

“We’ve got it pal,” Dudley Mack
said and the doorman immediately went back to his post as Bobo Sambuca put his
massive arms around Emma.

“You a good guy or a bad guy,”
Emma said happily.

“It depends, miss,” Bobo laughed.
“But tonight I’m being good.”

“Take her upstairs and put on a
pot of coffee, will you Bobo,” Scarne said, handing him keys. “I’ll be up
shortly.” He wasn’t worried about what the doorman or concierge might think. It
was New York.

The three men watched the huge man
gently pick up Emma and carry her into the building. She was singing “The Patriots
Game.” Then Scarne made the introductions and gave Mack a brief rundown of the
evening’s events.

When he finished Mack said,
“Roddenberry?”

“Actually, it’s Sobok.”

“Sure it is,” Mack said.

“You come prepared, Mr. Mack,”
Sobok said, gesturing toward the hearse.

Mack laughed.

“We were in a hurry. Got to
Arachne’s building and saw the commotion out front. Thought it might be you
lying there, Jake. Once I found out whose body it was I figured you wouldn’t
stick around. We were getting some stares, what with the Johnny-on-the-spot
hearse and all, so we headed here.”

“Bimm is dead, too,” Scarne said.

Mack looked at Sobok, who merely
smiled.

“You must be racking up frequent
flyer miles,” Mack said.

“Anyone know a good screenwriter,”
Scarne said. “This has HBO movie written all over it.”

“You were on a list of people
Arachne gave me, Mr. Mack.” Sobok said. “He said you might have to be dealt
with. Considering your  refrigerator of a bodyguard, I’m glad I don’t have to
go up against you.”

“Sallie Mae Lacuna wasn’t much of
a problem for you.”

Sobok smiled.

“He was not cautious. You don’t
have the look of a man who is easily taken unawares.”

“Who else was on that list,” Scarne
said.

“Half of New York,” Sobok said.
“That’s when I decided to end this farce and see if Mr. Arachne could fly.”

“Why did you do it,” Mack asked.

“Arachne is – was – a pig and a
fool. He threatened me. And he was thinking irrationally. The police would have
found chloral hydrate in the woman’s blood. His story would have fallen apart.
Once caught, he would probably implicate me. I am hard to find, to be sure, but
with him alive, it would not be an impossibility. I have one strict rule. I
never let a man who has endangered my livelihood continue breathing.”

“And I’m not a threat,” Scarne
interjected.

“Not anymore, at least to me.”

“Why didn’t you kill me in
Florida?”

“As I said, I didn’t know about
you then. You were merely an annoyance. If I killed everyone that aggravated
me, I’d never get any serious work done.”

Scarne and Mack looked at each
other. The logic was inescapable.  

 “You tried to kill me on the
racetrack.”

Sobok smiled.

“By then you had graduated into
being a threat. You’ve since been demoted back to annoyance, and as it turned
out, a helpful one. I’m not sure I could have handled Miss Shields alone
tonight.”

“You might have killed the race
driver.”

“Please, Mr. Scarne. I didn’t say
I was a saint. There is occasionally some breakage in my business.” He looked
at Mack, who nodded. “But I had no part in murdering that poor girl on Staten
Island. Nor would I do something like that. You are on the verge of being
ungrateful.”

“I suppose you think I should
thank you.”

“It might be nice. I don’t get a
lot of that.”

All three laughed as an elderly
couple walked by and glanced at the hearse.

“Probably Mrs. Rosenbaum in 10H,”
the woman said as they entered the lobby. “I wonder what her kids will do with
the apartment. You should call your cousin.”

“Well, on that note,” Sobok said,
“I think I will be going.”

“Need a lift,” Scarne said.

“No, thank you. I will take the subway.
It’s become a real pleasure. Not like years ago.”

With that, Sobok nodded at the
other men and simply walked away.

CHAPTER 36 – OFFICIAL STORY

One week later, Scarne met Emma
for another lunch at the Gotham. She was drinking Perrier. There would be no
afternoon delight, Scarne assumed as he sipped his beer. He detested Perrier.
Given her recent experience, Emma was probably off men (and vice versa, he
thought rudely) for the time being.

Arachne’s death had caused a
predictable sensation. It is not every day that a billionaire does a
half-gainer from a 34
^th
floor penthouse balcony. In a tuxedo, no
less. The tabloids had a field day, especially with the discovery of a dead
chauffeur with ties to a Vietnamese gang. But there was no mention that someone
else had been in the apartment.

 Then hints of Arachne’s financial
woes began to appear, first in some of the Shields publications, and then in other
print and electronic media. Bloggers soon swarmed, with some suggesting that other
billionaires should do society a favor and follow Arachne’s example.

“The press is evenly divided
between suicide and a mob killing.” Scarne said after they ordered. “Nice job.”

Emma smiled. But it was bitter.

“I only started the ball rolling
on the financial news side. It was common knowledge that Ari and I were an
‘item.’ There was even speculation in the gossips that I was to be the next Mrs.
Arachne. So it would have been natural of him to confide in me, to a point. I
just mentioned to one of our editors that perhaps his companies were on shakier
ground than we first reported. He took it from there. I’m sure he thinks I’m a
heartless bitch.”

“Not a bad rep to have when
running a media conglomerate, although I know you’re a sweetheart.”

“My father still runs the
company.”

Not for long, Scarne thought.

“Did you tell him what really
happened?”

“No. I’ll let sleeping dogs lie.
I’ll let Dad be the company’s sex object.”

Emma reached across and put her
hand over Scarne’s. 

“You saved my life.”

“I can’t take all the credit. The
scary fellow did much of the heavy lifting.”

“Yes,” she said. “Where did he
come from?”

“I don’t know.”

“How did Ari find such a man?”

“Men like Arachne can always find
them. All it takes is money.”

“Where did he go?”

“Not a clue.”

“Doesn’t that bother you?”

“Gift horse and all that.”

“He killed Bimm, didn’t he?”

“Gift horse and all that.”

“Jesus,” she said, and visibly
shivered. “And you’re not worried about him anymore?”

“No. He was only a danger to us
when he working for Arachne. When he stopped, we ceased being his problem.”

“But aren’t you a threat to him?
Could you find him, if you wanted to? You found Banaszak. That would give him
pause.”

“Perhaps, but he knows I won’t
try.”

“How the hell does he know that?”

“He just knows.”

“Because you’re in his debt?”

“Partly. But also because he
respects me and knows I respect his code.”

“Code? What code? He’s an
assassin, for God’s sake. He kills for money.”

“And only for money. Or to
eliminate danger to himself. Arachne was a danger. He was unraveling and
threatened him.”

Emma shook her head.

“Men. I’ll never understand them.
I’m not sure I want to.”

Scarne was silent.

“Yes, I know,” she said. “I just
proved it with Ari. I was so gullible.”

“Don’t be too hard on yourself. I’m
not exactly the poster boy for common sense in matters of the heart. Ari was a
charmer. And a hell of a dancer.”

 “He was also rumored to have an
enormous penis,” Emma said. Scarne choked on his beer. “At least that’s what
some of my girlfriends told me. You saved me from finding out. Were you jealous
of him, Jake?”

“Not for that reason,” Scarne
said, dabbing some beer from his shirt. “I just thought you deserved better
than a thrice-married Trump wannabe.”

 “Why did he go off the rails. He
was brilliant.”

“Yes. To give him his due, the
tunnel idea had merit. May still have. Arachne had vision. But a lot of men of
vision eventually come to believe they
are
the vision. The rest of us
become inconsequential to them. And if we get in their way, well, history is
replete with examples of what lengths they will go to protect the image of
themselves they have created. The thirst for power and prestige can be
overwhelming.”

“What will happen to those
projects on Staten Island. The race track and the waterfront thing?”

“Dudley says the track was always
dead. As for the Home Port, he says the latest deal looks to be falling apart.
Some Chinese investors pulled out suddenly, probably because of the publicity.”
Scarne was about to take another sip of his beer but put the glass down sharply
on the table. “Jesus!”

“What?”

“It might be nothing. But I always
suspected that Arachne had some big backers for his tunnel plan.”

“The Chinese?”

“Might just be a coincidence,”
Scarne said. “But it probably wouldn’t hurt if some of your reporters looked
into it.”

“You’d make a hell of a
journalist, Jake. That’s a great idea.”

“Snoops under the skin.”

“Come to think of it. There were
several Chinese at Ari’s funeral. And they looked important.”

“You went to the funeral?”

“How could I not? Even the Donald
was there. Comforting the grieving widow. You wanted me to keep up appearances,
didn’t you?”

“Speaking of which, I presume it
was a closed casket. I understand he landed face down.”

“Yuck. What about the murder of
Elizabeth Pearsall? Will the police be able to trace it back to Ari?”

“Maybe. Dudley gave Scullen and
Crider, the two cops who helped us, just enough information to implicate Bimm
and the Lacuna crime family. They’re heroes now. And I told Dick Condon about Banaszak’s
involvement without blowing the priest’s cover. It will make lurid copy, but
with everyone basically dead, no one will dig much farther. In a few years, if
somebody unravels all the real estate deals, the truth may come out, especially
if you come up with a Chinese connection. But by that time there will be other
scandals and crimes. Arachne will be old news.”

“What about our involvement?”

 “Nothing that happens should
affect us. Hell, we were never in Arachne’s apartment, remember.”

“Do you think the Chinese knew
about the girl’s murder? I mean, if they really were in bed with Ari.”

“I doubt it. Moral considerations
aside, that’s not the kind of risk they’d want to run.”

Emma grew pensive.

 “What would
you have done if you had found Ari raping me?”

“The end result for him would have
been the same.”

  She stared at Scarne a long
moment and then signaled their waiter.

“Please bring me a very dry Beefeater
martini, straight up, one olive,” she said. “And the wine list.” When the man
walked off she turned to Scarne. “Since I can’t thank the scary man, I hope you
don’t have anything important to do this afternoon.”

“I’ll clear my calendar.”

“Kindly wipe that goddamn smile
off your face.”

After finishing lunch they walked
up the street toward Scarne’s apartment arm in arm.

“Just for the record,” Scarne
teased, “how would you have thanked the scary man?”

“Suck farts,” Emma Shields said,
leaning up to kiss him.