Twenty-four
“Giselle, give us those four dates,” said Dan Kearny.
Ballard looked up from his coffee quickly. “Which four dates?”
It was Tuesday noon. Kearny had spent the morning with the reports again, then had called the four of them into his basement cubbyhole.
“The four times Wendy used her sister’s house to rendezvous with some mysterious man.” Giselle was flipping pages in her steno pad. “The sister called this morning. She said they’re firm dates, she checked them against her household calendar.”
Ballard tried to keep his voice casual. “She... leave a message?”
“For you? No. Wednesday, May ninth. Sunday, May twentieth. Sunday, June seventeenth. And Sunday, July twenty-second.”
“All Sundays except the first one,” mused Kearny. “And the last one the same night Padilla went off Devil’s Slide.”
“All of the Sundays were the next-to-last of the month,” said Heslip.
“Why would the first one be on a Wednesday, though?”
“That was two days after Fazzino filed for divorce, Larry.” Kearny suddenly frowned. “Giselle, did you get the date that Nucci bought that Jaguar?”
She checked her file. “May eleventh.”
“May seventh, Fazzino files for divorce. May ninth, Wendy has her first shack-up at her sister’s place. May eleventh, Nucci buys a Jaguar that he pays for but that Wendy drives. Interesting, huh?”
“Wendy doing what Fazzino wants — setting up Padilla — after he’d started divorce proceedings as she demanded? Then Fazzino forcing Nucci to buy her a car... If were right, one sweet little chick.”
“Why hasn’t Fazzino married her, then, Giselle, if that’s what she wants?” asked Ballard.
“His six months for the divorce to become final aren’t up yet,” said Heslip. “What bugs me is that third-Sunday-of-the-month jazz...”
Kearny gave a heavy bark of laughter and started reading. “‘Sunday, October twenty-first, two-thirty P.M. Subject drove to San Francisco International Airport...’” He looked up. “Your report, Bart.”
“Caught a flight to L.A.! Sure, I remember. Third Sunday, too, isn’t it? But hell, Dan, I never read the L.A. agency report—”
“He goes down there to play chess,” said Kearny. “The club meets at the International Hotel on the next-to-last Sunday of each month. About fifty members. Fazzino’s a Master, remember. Has a room booked at the hotel on a standing basis, catches a Monday morning shuttle back.”
“Wendy shacking up while he’s gone,” said Ballard. “It could even have been a legitimate affair.”
“Or an elaborate setup worked out by him and Wendy. What we have to do is find some way to establish Padilla as the man she was meeting on those nights.”
“Was Fazzino in L.A. on July twenty-second, Dan?” demanded Heslip.
“He reserved the room,” said Kearny. “He used it. But no attendance records are kept by the chess club — only who played who, who won or lost. The hotel is five minutes from L.A. International, flights take only an hour. Larry, how far is it from Padilla’s house to the Shapiro house?”
“Fifteen miles. Five miles from Bridget’s to Devil’s Slide.”
“Bridget, huh?” said Heslip.
Ballard made a rude gesture.
Heslip got serious. “Easy enough for Fazzino to fly up from L.A. while she’s doping Padilla’s drink. They drive him to Devil’s Slide, send him and the car over the edge, she drives Fazzino to the airport and he flies back. Three hours maximum away from the chess club.”
“And we have absolutely no way to prove any of it,” said Kearny. “Let’s see if we can do any better on Chandra, starting with Mallory Rickerts’ mysterious passenger.” He made points with a finger on the glass-topped desk. “Dr. Immanuel Sanderson went to Santa Barbara on the right day — Monday, October twenty-ninth. He returned on the right day — Tuesday, October thirtieth. He chartered Bestway’s Cessna 182 by phone, made his initial deposit with an untraceable cashier’s check, used a phony address and phone number, and had his pilot rent a car for him in Santa Barbara so he didn’t have to show any ID.”
“He’s also white-haired, stooped, limps, has cancer of the larynx and is over fifty years old,” said Ballard sourly. “And besides, I was tailing Fazzino in a Jaguar somewhere south of Soledad when Chandra was killed. Remember?”
“Were you?” asked Kearny.
Three heads came up in unison. They knew that tone of voice: it meant they were going to have their noses rubbed in something shortly.
“Let’s forget that Larry was tailing the Jaguar and that Fazzino was in it. Let’s just look at the Tuesday Chandra died. According to the logbook Rickerts gave Larry a look at, the Cessna left Santa Barbara carrying the man calling himself Dr. Immanuel Sanderson at a little before three o’clock. Set down in San Carlos, actually, at four thirty-seven. Give him forty-five minutes to settle up with Bestway and drive up to San Francisco, and—”
“And you put him into Edith Alley at five-thirty, easily!” exclaimed Giselle.
“Wait a minute!” Heslip was suddenly on his feet. “White hair, middle-aged, smoked glasses, slight limp, cane... Hell, that’s the description of the old man that girl saw coming out of Edith Alley at five forty-five!”
“Chandra was beaten to death with a cane,” said Kearny. “All of the old man’s characteristics are easy to fake. A limp. A whispery voice. A shock of white hair. Dark glasses. And his girl friend is an actress, remember, she’d know about make-up...”
“But dammit, Dan—”
“We’re ignoring the fact that you were tailing him, Larry. I know. Later you can make your objections. What started me thinking is the fact that this guy’s a chess player. They like complex problems, and they’ve all got damned big egos, the really good ones.”
They were all watching him intently now, waiting impatiently while he lit a cigarette.
“So I put myself in Fazzino’s place. I’m young, ambitious, and I’ve just been ordered to take out my immediate superior in the Northern California organized-crime setup. Method unspecified, but the boys back East don’t want any waves. What about an accident? Do it very cute, so the hierarchy is impressed. For this I need a girl who can set Padilla up. I remember a girl named Wendy Austin from some hardcore porn films. She’s greedy, gutsy, ruthless, willing to do anything for what she wants...”
Giselle was nodding. “And what she wants is a boutique, to become your wife, to have a fancy car and clothes...”
“That’s it. The Jag. Funky Threads. Fazzino filing for divorce. Reading between the lines, the wife Constanza probably knows she’s married to a very ruthless boy. Divorce is better than a weekend in the bedroom with a goon squad from Vegas. She gives him his divorce. Wendy sets up Padilla by never giving him very much — just once a month at her sister’s place when Flip is down in L.A. playing chess. It keeps Padilla panting for more, you follow me? So on July twenty-second he’s ripe for his fatal accident.”
“Only Chandra has overheard part of it,” said Heslip. “She asks for dough. So Flip and Wendy have to start all over with another elaborate scheme to get rid of Chandra.”
“And at this point DKA blunders in,” said Kearny. “Larry knocks off the car before Chandra can get the money Fazzino left for her to pay for it. Fazzino tries to scare us off with a threat and a beating set up through his tame bank VP. But they rough up the wrong man, and worse, one of them gets arrested and identified. Making waves, just what the big boys back East don’t want...”
“So he keeps trying to run us off, but—”