Dead Midnight (v5) (epub) Page 16

  I hesitated, unwilling to talk about my own affairs, then decided Eddie could benefit from my experience. “My brother committed suicide. Recently. But I’ve got another brother and two sisters; they’ve all lived through some pretty horrible things, but none of them has ever considered that was a way out. So, you see, it doesn’t have to be an inherited tendency. And you seem a lot more together than Harry or Roger.”

  “I hope so. I’ve gotta be there for my folks. Harry too.”

  “They’re having him committed?”

  “To a private hospital run by a friend of my dad’s.”

  “Well, maybe his story will have a better outcome than Roger’s.”

  He shrugged.

  “There are a few questions I’d like to ask you,” I added.

  “Sure. Go ahead.”

  “You and Roger were closer than you indicated to me?”

  “Yeah. When I was a kid and getting kicked around by Harry, he stood up for me. He was always there to listen when I had a problem. Even after he left home I could call him any time. I only said all that shit about him because I was pissed off at him for killing himself.”

  “And because Roger told you to distance yourself if anybody came around asking about him. For your own safety.”

  “How’d you know that?”

  “His last message to you.”

  His gaze moved toward the bedroom where Roger’s workstation was. “Jody show it to you?”

  I nodded, rather than waste time going into how I’d accessed it. “He also wanted you to look out for Jody in case someone tried to intimidate or hurt her. Show her something you’d taught him. Did you?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And that was how to access the files he’d deleted on his computer?”

  “Right. Look, I don’t know if I should be talking about this with you. I mean, Jody was really scared, and then she left town. And I can’t believe she killed that reporter. Something happened up there, but it isn’t what the press and the cops claim.”

  “That’s what Jody says.”

  “You’ve seen her since?”

  “She called me.”

  “What did she tell you?”

  I recapped my conversation with Houston.

  Eddie asked, “Do you believe her?”

  “There’s a ring of truth to what she says. I wish she’d turn herself in, let the authorities sort it out.”

  “Me too. Even if they put her in jail, at least she’d be safe.”

  “Safe from whom?”

  “She wouldn’t tell me. It’s so complicated. I need to explain from the beginning. But no tape recorder, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Last December Rog called me, said he’d read an article about how you could retrieve deleted files from computers’ hard drives, and asked if I knew how to do it. I did, and I showed him.”

  “And he retrieved files and e-mails from the computers at InSite.”

  “Hundreds of them. Why, I don’t know. Next he asked me about getting hold of the medical records of a couple of the ’zine’s employees who he suspected were victims of poisoning by somebody at the office. I didn’t want to get involved in anything like that, but both people had been patients at U.C. Med Center, so I suggested he ask Harry. Harry didn’t want to do it either, so Rog blackmailed him—threatened to tell our folks about his drug habit.”

  “And Harry cooperated, but was caught and forced to resign.”

  Eddie nodded. “After that he really got into the drugs and the booze. I tried to warn my folks, but by then they were so caught up with grieving for Roger and getting this lawsuit you’re working on going, that they ignored everything else. And, I suppose, they didn’t want to hear what I was saying.”

  “Was Harry the one who told you about having to resign?”

  “No, it was Rog. Harry and I don’t talk, hardly ever. He’s got a mean streak, and it’s gotten worse since he started doing drugs and drinking heavily. I don’t blame Rog for what happened to Harry. He’s smart, and he had the makings of a good surgeon, but he couldn’t handle the pressure. Even if Rog hadn’t put him in a position where he lost his job, he’d’ve crashed and burned sooner or later anyway.”

  “So after Roger died, you kept in touch with Jody?”

  He poured more wine, drank deeply. “Yeah, I called her, said if there was anything I could do for her to let me know. She told me she was okay, but she didn’t sound good, so I started calling once a week, and we’d talk. A couple of weeks ago she admitted that she had a key to his flat and had found and read his personal journal. Trying to make sense of what happened, I guess. In the final entry there was a message for her, she claimed, something about an insurance policy. Now, Rog wasn’t the kind of guy to take out life insurance, so I suspected what he meant. He wanted me to show her how to retrieve his files.”

  “And you did, of course.”

  “Yeah. She was mostly interested in the one labeled ‘Project ’Zine.’ Of course, there was a ton of stuff in the computer’s memory besides that. I didn’t have the time—or the heart—to go through all of it with her, so she had me walk her through the retrieval process a few times, and I guess she accessed the rest later.”

  I’d scanned the rest of the files, and could think of none that might be construed as insurance for Jody.

  I asked, “You talk with her after that?”

  “I called once. She sounded pretty bad—scared—and she cut the conversation short. After that I left messages, but she never got back to me.”

  Interesting. Jody must have been able to read more meaning into Roger’s files than I had—enough to make her flee the city.

  After Eddie left to be with his parents, I stayed in Roger’s flat, going over my interrupted plans for the day. Then I took from my purse the yellow sheet of scratch paper I’d found in J.D.’s raincoat and studied it. The abbreviations and words with question marks after them interested me—two in particular. Econ and TRG. Tessa Remington’s e-mail address was trg: The Remington Group. And the newspaper account of her disappearance gave the name of her husband, Kelby Lincoln, CEO of a firm called Econium Measures.

  I went to Roger’s workstation, took the city directory from its drawer, and looked up both the firm and Lincoln. No listings. Next I called information, asked for listings in the Greater Bay Area. Again, none for Econium Measures, but there was a Kelby Lincoln in Atherton, on the Peninsula. I dialed the number, and the man who answered warily confirmed he was Remington’s husband. But when I explained I would like to talk with him about his wife’s disappearance, his tone hardened.

  “I’m not interested, Ms. McCone.”

  “Please hear me out. I’m working for Glenn Solomon, the criminal-defense attorney, on an investigation of InSite magazine, one of the firms your wife’s company has invested in—”

  “And I suppose they want their funds and are claiming I’ve misappropriated them. Well, the hell with them.”

  “I’m not representing the people at the magazine. Quite the opposite, in fact. I’ve discovered some irregularities there, and wonder if they might have a bearing on Ms. Remington’s disappearance.”

  A pause. “You say you’re working for Glenn Solomon?”

  “Yes. His office will verify—”

  “That’s not necessary. I take it you’d like to meet with me in person.”

  “If possible.”

  “I tell you what: I have a dinner appointment in Marin this evening. I could meet you for drinks in the city—say, around five-thirty.”

  “Good. Where?”

  “Do you know the Beach Chalet?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s on my route to the bridge. I’ll meet you in the bar.”

  The Beach Chalet at the western end of Golden Gate Park, facing the Great Highway and the Pacific, is a San Francisco institution that has seen both good times and bad. Designed by noted local architect Willis Polk, and completed in 1925, it was originally conceived of as an elegant waterin
g hole for day-trippers to what was then still the countryside. During the Great Depression, a WPA artist was commissioned to augment the grandeur by decorating the terra-cotta tiled ground floor with murals depicting vivid city scenes. The Chalet, however, never quite became the favored destination the city fathers had hoped it would, and by the time I first began visiting San Francisco, it was not a place where any sane woman would have ventured without a weapon or a strong male escort.

  Upstairs, the Veterans of Foreign Wars, who had managed the building since World War II, held infrequent meetings. Downstairs was a dark, smoky bar where men in bikers’ garb swilled drinks, played pool, and often laid one another out with their cues. The murals were coated with grime, the tiles sticky with miscellaneous vile substances. On one occasion my friends from Berkeley and I were forced to flee the patrons’ wrath because one of our party was black. Finally even the bar closed, and the building stood fenced off and vacant; occasionally a rumor would circulate that a restaurant was negotiating a lease with the city, but it wasn’t until the late 1990s that the Chalet reopened. Now it—and the murals—are restored to their former splendor, with a Parks and Recreation Department visitors’ center on the ground floor and a restaurant with sweeping ocean views on the second. Today it’s a favored spot for locals, tourists, beach walkers, and anyone else who enjoys a good meal on the edge of the Pacific.

  Kelby Lincoln had described himself to me—tall, blond, tanned, with gold-rimmed glasses—and when I entered the bar area I spotted him on a stool at one of the high tables that take advantage of the view over the diners’ heads. He stood as I approached, nodding gravely; his handshake was weak, as if he feared contamination from another person’s touch.

  I slipped onto the opposite stool. Lincoln asked me what I wanted to drink and went to the bar. He was slender and fit looking, and his deep tan appeared to be of the saltwater variety. When he returned he squinted in the glare of the sunpath on the water and replaced his clear lenses with dark glasses.

  “Have you found out anything about my wife’s disappearance?” he asked.

  “So far, nothing conclusive. But it appears to be linked to the other events I’m investigating, and I was hoping you might be able to shed some light on them.”

  “I’ll be glad to help, if you think you can turn up something that may lead to Tessa. But the police and the detectives I hired”—he named a highly respected local firm— “had no success. The police investigation is on hold, and I terminated the detectives’ employment last month. Since then I’ve been more or less waiting for the other shoe to drop.”

  “Meaning?”

  “Well, whatever word I finally have of Tessa won’t be good.”

  “Let’s talk about the day your wife disappeared. You last saw her …”

  “At breakfast. She planned to spend the day at her office, then attend a five-thirty meeting of the Committee for Wireless Privacy and come straight home.”

  “This committee—it’s a nonprofit?”

  “One of Tessa’s causes. She feels strongly about abuse of the new technology. That night we were to meet friends for dinner at our club at eight, so when she wasn’t home by seven-thirty I contacted the committee chairman. She said Tessa never arrived for the meeting. I called around to a number of her friends and associates, but none had seen or heard from her. In the morning I notified the police.”

  “Were any of her possessions missing?”

  “None that I could tell. The police made me look through them thoroughly.”

  “I’m sure you’ve been asked this before, but was there trouble in the marriage?”

  “… Well, it was … a marriage. It had its ups and downs, but what marriage hasn’t?”

  “And you had no reason to suspect she might be seeing someone else?”

  “… No.”

  Interesting hesitations there. “Did anyone report anything unusual happening to Ms. Remington before she disappeared? Annoying phone calls, or someone following her, perhaps?”

  “Nothing like that.”

  “Has anyone contacted you concerning her?”

  He sighed wearily. “Oh, yes, people have contacted me. That’s why initially I was reluctant to talk with you. I’d categorize them either as sickos or clairvoyants. The sickos claim they’ve seen her in such locations as a drug den in Seattle, an S and M club in Los Angeles, a lesbian bar in New Orleans. One of them—a cocaine dealer—asked for a million dollars to lead me to her body; I brought in the police and they had me set up a meeting, but he didn’t show. The clairvoyants throw out hints—she’s near water, she’s being held in a cold, dark place—and want to collect a retainer before they’ll reveal more. This experience has taught me a great deal about human nature, Ms. McCone.”

  “I imagine so. What about activity on her credit cards or bank accounts? Anything there?”

  “Nothing at all. Originally that led me to believe she was dead. My wife is not a woman who can do without her creature comforts.”

  “You say ‘originally.’ Has something happened to make you think otherwise?”

  “Yes, just today. Something I don’t want to tell the police about.” He swiveled his head, scanning the room from behind the dark glasses. It was cocktail-time crowded, and no one was paying any attention to us. “I don’t know if I should be telling you this,” he went on. “If Tessa turns up unharmed, it could ruin her professionally.”

  “I can keep a confidence.”

  “Legally?”

  “I don’t have the same status as an attorney when it comes to confidentiality, but if the occasion merits it, I can have an extremely bad memory.”

  He thought about that for a moment, and it seemed to satisfy him. “Nominally I’m head of a corporation called Econium Measures. It’s really Tessa’s company. She uses it to hold and disburse investors’ funds. I’m only a figurehead, don’t know much about its operations, and only sign documents when she tells me to.”

  “Why is your name on it, then?”

  “Legal reasons, she tells me. I’ve always suspected it’s because she’s more comfortable being able to introduce her husband as the CEO of something, rather than as a man who does nothing.”

  “Nothing at all?”

  His face grew melancholy. “Nothing, according to her. I’m a classical pianist, although I’ve long ago lost my passion for performing. But I still compose, and a number of my works have been performed by others, both here and on the East Coast. Unfortunately, I’m not financially successful, so Tessa refers to music as my ‘little hobby.’ You asked earlier if there was trouble in the marriage. There is, and it stems from my lack of appropriate ambition.”

  And his wife’s lack of appreciation for a pursuit that didn’t bring in large sums of money.

  When I didn’t respond immediately, Lincoln knocked back what was left of his drink and took our glasses to the bar—buying time to get himself under control. I waited, looking out at the sea over the heads of early diners. The sun was sinking, orange now, and there wasn’t a wisp of fog on the horizon. It would be beautiful at Touchstone tonight: daffodils and wildflowers blooming in the meadow that sloped to the cliff, the sunset gilding the pines. I hadn’t been up there since early in March, and I was anxious to get back and begin putting the final touches to the new home Hy and I had built… .

  Kelby Lincoln returned with fresh drinks. He’d taken off his dark glasses and without them his eyes looked deeply shadowed and vulnerable. He rubbed them before he replaced the lenses and said, “I’m sorry for unloading on you like that.”

  “No problem. Sometimes it’s easier to confide your problems to a total stranger.”

  “Perhaps. Anyway, I was about to tell you about Econium Measures. It doesn’t actually do anything except act as a clearinghouse for investors’ funds, and its accounts can contain anywhere from a few dollars to eight figures; the amounts fluctuate weekly. Tessa handles every transaction herself, doesn’t even have a staff.”

  “Isn’t t
hat unusual?”

  “I wouldn’t know. As I indicated, I don’t really understand how she operates. But I do feel a certain responsibility to oversee things in her … absence, so a week after she disappeared I checked the account balances; they were huge, a total slightly over twenty-two million dollars. Her administrative assistant at the Remington Group, Steffi Robertson, explained that the week before she vanished Tessa had received a large influx of cash from the limited partners in three of her funds. It was sitting there, and the firms she was funding were waiting for her to disburse it.”

  “And as CEO, you can’t do that?”

  “No. The documents I sign have to be countersigned by my wife.”

  “So the funds’re still in the accounts, and the companies’re still waiting.”

  “The companies are still waiting. InSite magazine is on the verge of bankruptcy. But …”

  “Yes?”

  “The funds are gone. Apparently Steffi Robertson became worried that I might help myself to them. Somehow she obtained Tessa’s passwords, and has been monitoring the balances. This morning she came to my home and accused me of looting the accounts over the weekend.”

  “Twenty-two million dollars, gone? How?”

  “Electronically.”

  “Are you sure this Steffi Robertson isn’t responsible?”

  “I doubt it. She’s one of those people with few aspirations of their own. And she’s been with Tessa since she first formed the Remington Group. Besides, she immediately brought in a technician who so far has been unable to trace the funds, and she wanted to go to the police.”

  “I gather you persuaded her not to.”

  “Yes. Given her extreme loyalty to my wife, it hadn’t occurred to her that Tessa herself may have emptied the accounts. When I mentioned that, she agreed to wait until the technician had exhausted all hope of tracing the funds.”

  “And how long will that take?”