Read The Last Private Eye Online
Authors: John Birkett
“No thanks.”
“Go ahead,” Duke Kingston urged. “They Cuban. Got a friend in the Diplomatic Corps keeps me supplied.”
“Thanks, but no thanks.”
Duke Kingston showed Rhineheart a mouthful of even, white teeth. “You a very polite young man. That's good to see. You don't meet folks with a lot of manners anymore.”
“Actually,” Rhineheart said, “my manners aren't all that great.”
Kingston nodded. “Well, to tell you the truth, Mr. Rhineheart, neither are mine. Don't let this place and all these trappings fool you. Behind these expensive clothes, I'm just a rough ol' countryboy with simple tastes. I like simple things and plain talk.”
Why don't you stop bullshitting around then, Rhineheart thought, and get to the point. “What exactly did you want to see me about?” he asked.
“Well,” Kingston said, “for one thing, I'd like to know how your investigation's proceeding.”
“What investigation is that?”
Kingston flashed more teeth. “Mr. Rhineheart, I keep abreast of things. Particularly when they involve either me or projects I'm interested in. I know you're looking for one of my employees, Carl Walsh. I know that Kathleen Sullivan hired you. I even know what she's paying you.”
“You're pretty well informed, huh?”
Kingston nodded.
“Yeah, you could put it like that. The truth is, I'm a majority stockholder in that television station Miss Sullivan works for. Now, I'm not crude enough to suggest that I'm the one paying your salary, but you might could say I have more than a little interest in the matter. Particularly, when you consider that Carl Walsh works for me.”
Rhineheart decided to play along a little. It was possible he might learn something from Kingston. “What is it you want to know?” Rhineheart asked.
“You got any leads yet on where Walsh might be?”
Rhineheart shrugged. “Not really.”
“What's that mean?”
“It means I haven't got any
leads
as you call them. I've just started my investigation,” he said. “I need to look around, check out some things.”
“What sort of things?”
“Things,” Rhineheart said. “Nothing worth talking about. Yet.”
Kingston sniffled. “You not very responsive,” he said. “What's the problem? The station not paying you enough money?” Kingston grimaced, as if the thought of anyone making as little as Rhineheart was too much to bear. “I admit two hundred and fifty a day ain't much. It doesn't take me that long”âhe snapped his fingersâ“to make two fifty, but still and all, it seems like a lot to pay someone and get no real results.”
He wagged a finger at Rhineheart. “You going to have to do better, Mr. Rhineheart, if you want to keep your job. Take it from me, I know this Sullivan woman's reputation and she won't tolerate no half-ass performance. She wants results, and she's a tough woman to please.”
The man, Rhineheart thought, is trying to make me angry. “The way I figure it,” he said pleasantly, “if Ms. Sullivan's not satisfied, she can always fire me.”
Kingston looked glum. He rose from his chair and walked over to a sideboard that held whiskey bottles, decanters, glasses. His back turned, he began to mix a drink. “You like bourbon, Mr. Rhineheart?”
“Love it,” Rhineheart said.
“I thought you looked like a drinking man,” Kingston said. “As a matter of fact, someone told me you liked to drink a little.” He turned and held up a bottle. “Eight-year-old hundred-proof bottled in bond suit you?”
“I'll pass,” Rhineheart said.
“You sure?”
“Positive.”
“What's the matter, Mr. Rhineheart? I thought you said you were a bourbon man.”
“I gave it up for Lent,” Rhineheart said.
Kingston snickered. “I believe you having me on, Mr. Rhineheart. But that's all right. What's life without a little joke, huh?” He returned to the desk with a tall glass in his hand. “You don't mind me having one, do you?”
“Knock yourself out,” Rhineheart said. He jerked a thumb at the goon. “Maybe Mr. Borchek would like one.”
“Mr. Borchek doesn't drink. At any rate, he's on duty.” Kingston sipped his drink, set the glass down on the desk, and cleared his throat. “Let's get down to cases, Mr. Rhineheart. One of my stable hands is missing, disappeared into thin air, and this TV lady decides to hire a private detective to find him. That's fine, but all this occurs in the midst of the most important week of the year. It's only six days to the Derby. You got any conception what winning the Kentucky Derby means to a horseman, mistah?”
Rhineheart nodded. It was, he knew, the stuff that dreams were made of.
“I'm going to be brutally honest with you, Mr. Rhineheart. The Derby means more to me than just about anything. My lifelong ambition is to win it. I'd do just about anything to accomplish that goal. Maybe Jessica's already told you that. There's people say I'm something of a fanatic when it comes to the Derby. They may be right. I've entered horses in it that didn't have a prayer or a blind hope. All 'cause I wanted to win it so bad. Now, for the first time in years, I think I got a decent shot at it with Royal Dancer. I know the so-called experts don't think much of his chances, but he's the best horse I ever owned, a genuine stakes winner, and I want him to have his chance. I don't want any kind of disruption. That's why I'm prepared to double whatever salary this woman's paying you and offer you an additional ten-thousand-dollar bonus if you can find Carl Walsh before Thursday.”
“Why Thursday?” Rhineheart asked.
“Thursday,” Kingston said, “is the day they draw for post for the race. It's also the day of Jessica's big Derby party. I want everything smooth from then on out.”
Rhineheart wanted to get it straight. “You asked me out here to offer me this?”
Kingston nodded. “Ten thousand dollars is a hell of a lot of money.”
Rhineheart nodded. “Yeah,” he said, “it is, isn't it.”
Kingston smiled. “I thought you might think so.” He took a cigar out of the box and rolled it between his fingers. “And here's the thing, Mr. Rhineheart . . . I don't see any need to inform Mizz Sullivan about this. Or Jessica. It can be a little arrangement between us. A confidential matter.” He paused. “What do you say?”
It was, Rhineheart knew, way too early in the game to be laying down any cards. “I'll give it some thought,” he said.
“Fair enough,” Kingston said. He stood up. “Get back to me on this, Mr. Rhineheart, and we'll work something out.” He gestured to Borchek, who walked over and opened the door and stood there holding it open.
It looked as if the interview or meeting or whatever the hell it had been was over. Rhineheart stood up and walked over to the door. He had to look up to meet Borchek's eye. The goon was three inches taller and thirty pounds heavier, and standing next to him, Rhineheart could feel the man's brutality emanating from the man, like body odor.
“Tell me something,” Rhineheart spoke to Kingston.
Kingston waved the cigar expansively. “Anythin'.”
“What do
you
think happened to Carl Walsh?”
“I got no idea, Mr. Rhineheart.”
“You think Howard Taggert might know?”
Kingston looked surprised. “Howard Taggert?”
“You know who Howard Taggert is, don't you?”
“Sho. As a matter of fact, Howard and I are old friends.”
“You happen to know if Carl Walsh ever worked for him?”
Kingston shook his head. “Why don't you go and see Howard and ask him your ownself?”
“I might just do that,” Rhineheart said. He started to leave, then stopped. “One more thing.”
“What's that?”
“You don't mind if I talk to your stable help, do you?”
“Not at all,” Kingston said. “Talk to anyone you please, Mr. Rhineheart.”
Rhineheart stepped out into the hallway. The library door swung shut. The maid appeared at the end of the hallway and as he followed her back through the house, Rhineheart remembered the photograph of the Kingstons he had seen on Walsh's wall. They said pictures never lied, but he couldn't see much resemblance between the handsome smiling couple in the photo and the two people he had met this afternoon.
On the drive back to Louisville Rhineheart thought about the case, trying to form some picture of it in his mind. What it reminded him of was the design of a crazy quilt he had once seen, a mixture of elements and ingredients that didn't seem to fit, yet appeared to be somehow related.
The disappearance of a stable hand and his wife. A dead man in a motel room. A story that would “blow the town wide open.” Duke and Jessica Kingston. Howard Taggert. A pair of Derby horses. A bookie's telephone number. A locker key. A syringe. What the hell did it all mean?
Rhineheart didn't know. He was the first to admit that he wasn't hitting on much when it came to solving puzzles. His talent was for hanging in there, plodding along, poking around, and uncovering things. It occurred to him that he was going to need some help on this one. Farnsworth, Rhineheart thought. If there was anyone who could help him find the answers in this case, it was old Farnsworth. Everything Rhineheart knew about detecting had been taught to him by Farnsworth.
Tomorrow, Rhineheart decided, he would go and see the old pro, talk to him about the case, hear what Farnsworth had to say. Just thinking about bringing the old man in on it improved Rhineheart's mood. He switched on the radio and found an FM station that featured old-timey jazz. He drove back to Louisville with the tinny sounds of a 1920 New Orleans jazz band beating against his ears.
It was after five when he got back. He stopped at a gas station near the expressway and telephoned Cresthill's head trainer, John Hughes, but there was no answer.
He ate dinner at a Chinese restaurant in Jeffersontown. Moo Goo Gai Pan, fried rice, and hot tea. Dessert was a scoop of ice cream and a fortune cookie. The paper in the cookie read,
The star of riches will soon shine upon you.
He called McGraw at home. The news on the syringe was negative. Frank Parker couldn't identify whatever substances were in the syringe. He was going to have to run more tests. He wanted Rhineheart to call him.
“You find out anything about Walsh?” Rhineheart asked McGraw.
“You bet your ass I did,” McGraw said. “You were right. Walsh worked for River City Stud for two years. He left there to go to Cresthill. I got all this from a clerk at Thoroughbred Employment. It's on Walsh's job application.”
“Good work,” Rhineheart said. “You going to be at O'Brien's later?”
“I wasn't planning on it, no.”
“I just got back from Cresthill Farms. I'll buy you a beer and tell you about it.”
“I'll see you there about nine.”
The Hideaway Club was a long, narrow shotgun of a room with a bar on one wall, a row of booths on the other, and a dozen tables in between. The decor was early red-neck. Rhineheart slid into one of the empty booths and looked around. Even though it was Sunday the place was packed and noisy. All the tables were taken and the bar was crowded with loud, rowdy cowboy types in jeans and Western hats.
The jukebox was playing a Merle Haggard number. On the wall above the bar, a poster advertised a C&W radio station that played “Lovin', Lyin', Laughin', Cryin', Cheatin', Hurtin', Flirtin”' music.
A slim dark-haired girl with a sweet innocent face approached the booth. She was carrying a tray and holding a bar rag in one hand. She was wearing a denim mini skirt and white knee-high boots.
“Get you somethin'?”
Rhineheart took a gamble. “Hello, Tammy.”
She smiled at him. “Do I know you?”
“I think so, yeah.”
“I don't believe I know you.”
“I'm a friend of Carl's.”
The smile vanished. Her voice turned cold and unfriendly. “What do you want?”
“I'd like to talk to you for a minute.”
She shook her head. “I got no time to talk. I'm busy.”
“I'm trying to get in touch with Carl.”
She laughed, a hollow little laugh. “Join the club, mister. Looks like ever'body's trying to get in touch with Carl. Only Carl ain't here. Carl took off. And
nobody
knows where he is. Not his good-for-nothin' buddies. Not his sweet little thang of a wife. Not even me. His girl friend. His
ex
-girl friend. The dumb-ass who believed all his lies and his bullshit, and believe me, mister, it was
all
bullshit.”
“You got any idea where Carl might be?”
She smiled bitterly. “Ask his wifeâif you can find her. I hear she's split too. It wouldn't surprise me none if they're together someplace. Look,” she said, “it's like I told them other two guys, I don't give a royal shit where Carl Walsh is. He could be dead and it wouldn't make me no matter. And if you find him you can tell him I said that.”
“Tell me about these two guys,” Rhineheart said. “They were looking for Carl?”
Tammy nodded grudgingly. “They said they were cops, but they weren't. I can tell cops.”
“One bald-headed, the other with a beard?”
Tammy nodded. “They offered me money if I'd tell them where Carl was. They acted like they didn't believe me when I said I didn't know.”
“When was the last time you saw Carl?”
She shrugged. “I don't know. Tuesday, I guess. He was supposed to call me Wednesday night, but he never did. The low-life son of a bitch.” She swiped at the table with her bar rag. “Who are you, anywayâsome kind of cop?”
Rhineheart said, “I'm a private investigator.”
“A private investigator? You mean like on TV?”
“Not exactly.”