The McCone Files Read online

  He merely grunted and motioned for me to proceed up the wide concrete steps. They led uphill from the entrance to a promenade whose arms curved out in opposite directions around the edge of the amphitheater. As I recalled from the night before, from the promenade the lawn sloped gently down to the starkly modernistic concert shell. Its stage was wide—roughly ninety degrees of the circle—with wings and dressing rooms built back in the hill behind it. The concrete roof, held aloft by two giant pillars, was a curving slab shaped like a warped arrowhead, its tip pointing to the northeast, slightly off center. Formal seating was limited to a few dozen rows in a semi-circle in front of the stage; the pavilion had been designed mainly for the casual type of concert-goer who prefers to lounge on a blanket on the lawn.

  I reached the top of the steps and crossed the promenade to the edge of the bowl, then stopped in surprise.

  The formerly pristine lawn was now mounded with trash. Paper bags, cups and plates, beer cans and wine bottles, wrappers and crumpled programs and other indefinable debris were scattered in a crazy-quilt pattern. Trash receptacles placed at strategic intervals along the promenade had overflowed, their contents cascading to the ground. On the low wall between the formal seating and the lawn stood a monumental pyramid of Budweiser cans. In some places the debris was only thinly scattered, but in others it lay deep, like dirty drifted snow.

  Canfield came up behind me, breathing heavily from the climb. “A mess, isn’t it?” he said.

  “Yes. Is it always like this after a performance?”

  “Depends. Shows like last night, where you get a lot of young people, families, picnickers, it gets pretty bad. A symphony concert, that’s different.”

  “And your maintenance crew doesn’t come on until morning?” I tried not to sound disapproving, but allowing such debris to lie there all night was faintly scandalous to a person like me, who had been raised to believe that not washing the supper dishes before going to bed might just constitute a cardinal sin.

  “Cheaper that way—we’d have to pay overtime otherwise. And the job’s easier when it’s light anyhow.”

  As if in response to Canfield’s words, daylight—more gold than pink now—spilled over the hills in the distance, slightly to the left of the stage. It disturbed the shadows on the lawn below us, making them assume distorted forms. Black became gray, gray became white; short shapes elongated, others were truncated; fuzzy lines came into sharp focus. And with the light a cold wind came gusting across the promenade.

  I pulled my jacket closer, shivering. The wind rattled the fall-dry leaves of the young poplar trees—little more than saplings—planted along the edge of the promenade. It stirred the trash heaped around the receptacles, then swept down the lawn, scattering debris in its wake. Plastic bags and wads of paper rose in an eerie dance, settling again as the breeze passed. I watched the undulation—a paper wave upon a paper sea—as it rolled toward the windbreak of cypress trees to the east.

  Somewhere in the roiling refuse down by the barrier between the lawn and the formal setting I spotted a splash of yellow. I leaned forward, peering toward it. Again I saw the yellow, then a blur of blue and than a flicker of white. The colors were there, then gone as the trash settled.

  Had my eyes been playing tricks on me in the half-light? I didn’t think so, because while I couldn’t be sure of the colors, I was distinctly aware of a shape that the wind’s passage had uncovered—long, angular, solid-looking. The debris had fallen in a way that didn’t completely obscure it.

  The dread that I had held in check all night spread through me. After a frozen moment, I began to scramble down the slope toward the spot I’d been staring at. Behind me, Canfield called out, but I ignored him.

  The trash was deep down by the barrier, almost to my knees. I waded through the bottles, cans, and papers, pushing their insubstantial mass aside, shoveling with my hands to clear a path. Shoveled until my fingers encountered something more solid….

  I dropped to my knees and scooped up the last few layers of debris, hurling it over my shoulder.

  He lay on his back, wrapped in his bright yellow cape, his baggy blue plaid pants and black patent leather shoes sticking out from underneath it. His black beret was pulled halfway down over his white clown’s face, hiding his eyes. I couldn’t see the red vest that made up the rest of the costume because the cape covered it, but there were faint red stains on the iridescent fabric that draped across his chest.

  I yanked the cape aside and touched the vest. It felt sticky, and when I pulled my hand away it was red too. I stared at it, wiped it off on a scrap of newspaper. Then I felt for a pulse in his carotid artery, knowing all the time what a futile exercise it was.

  “Oh, Jesus!” I said. For a moment my vision blurred and there was a faint buzzing in my ears.

  Roy Canfield came thrashing up behind me, puffing with exertion. “What… Oh my God!”

  I continued staring down at the clown; he looked broken, an object that had been used up and tossed on a trash heap. After a moment, I touched my thumb to his cold cheek, brushed at the white makeup. I pushed the beret back, looked at the theatrically blackened eyes. Then I tugged off the flaxen wig. Finally I pulled the fake bulbous nose away.

  “Gary Fitzgerald?” Canfield asked.

  I looked up at him. His moonlike face creased in concern. Apparently the shock and bewilderment I was experiencing showed.

  “Mr. Canfield,” I said, “this man is wearing Gary’s costume, but it’s not him. I’ve never seen him before in my life.”

  The man I was looking for was half of an internationally famous clown act, Fitzgerald and Tilby. The world of clowning, like any other artistic realm, has its various levels—from the lowly rodeo clown whose chief function is to keep bull riders from being stomped on, to circus clowns such as Emmett Kelly and universally acclaimed mimes like Marcel Marceau. Fitzgerald and Tilby were not far below Kelly and Marceau in the hierarchy and gaining on them every day. Instead of merely employing the mute body language of the typical clown, the two Britishers combined it with a subtle and sophisticated verbal comedy routine. Their fame had spread beyond aficionados of clowning in the late seventies when they had made a series of artful and entertaining television commercials for one of the Japanese auto makers, and subsequent ads for, among others, a major U.S. airline, one of the big insurance companies, and a computer firm had assured them of a place in the hearts of humor-loving Americans.

  My involvement with Fitzgerald and Tilby came about when they agreed to perform at the Diablo Valley Clown Festival, a charity benefit co-sponsored by the Contra Costa County Chamber of Commerce and KSUN, the radio station where my friend Don Del Boccio works as a disc jockey. The team’s manager, Wayne Kabalka, had stipulated only two conditions to their performing for free; that they be given star billing, and that they be provided with a bodyguard. Since Don was to be emcee of the show, he was in on all the planning, and when he heard of Kabalka’s second stipulation, he suggested me for the job.

  As had been the case ever since I’d bought a house near the Glen Park district the spring before, I was short of money at the time. And All Souls Legal Cooperative, where I am staff investigator, had no qualms about me moonlighting, provided it didn’t interfere with any of the co-op’s cases. Since things had been slack at All Souls during September, I felt free to accept. Bodyguarding isn’t my idea of challenging work, but it intrigued me. Besides, I’d be part of the festival and get paid for my time, rather than attending on the free pass Don had promised me.

  So on that hot Friday afternoon in late September, I met with Wayne Kabalka in the lounge of KSUN’s San Francisco studios. As radio stations go, KSUN is a casual operation, and the lounge gives full expression to this orientation. It is full of mismatched Salvation Army reject furniture, the posters on the wall are torn and tattered, and the big coffee table is always littered with rumpled newspapers, empty Coke cans and coffee cups, and overflowing ashtrays. On this particular occasion, it was also
graced with someone’s half-eaten Big Mac.

  When Don and I came in, Wayne Kabalka was seated on the very edge of one of the lumpy chairs, looking as if he were afraid it might have fleas. He saw us and jumped as if one had just bitten him. His orientation was anything but casual; in spite of the heat he wore a tan three-piece suit that almost matched his mane of tawny hair, and a brown striped tie peeked over the V of his vest. Kabalka and his clients might be based in L.A., but he sported none of the usual Hollywoodish accoutrements—gold chains, diamond rings, or Adidas running shoes. Perhaps his very correct appearance was designed to be in keeping with his clients, Englishmen with rumored connections to the aristocracy.

  Don introduced us and we all sat down, Kabalka again doing his balancing act on the edge of his chair. Ignoring me, he said to Don, “I didn’t realize the bodyguard you promised would be female.”

  Don shot me a look, his shaggy eyebrows raised a fraction of an inch.

  I said, “Please don’t let gender worry you, Mr. Kabalka. I’ve been a private investigator for nine years, and before that I worked for a security firm. I’m fully equipped for the job.”

  To Don he said, “But has she done this kind of work before?”

  Again Don looked at me.

  I said, “Bodyguarding is only one of any number of types of assignments I’ve carried out. And one of the most routine.”

  Kabalka put out a hand as if to stay his departure, but Don stood. “I’ll be in the editing room if you need me.”

  I watched him walk down the hall, his gait surprisingly graceful for such a tall, stocky man. Then I turned back to Kabalka. “To answer your question, sir, yes, I’m firearms qualified.”

  He made a sound halfway between clearing his throat and a grunt. “Uh… then you have no objection to carrying a gun on this assignment?”

  “Not if it’s necessary. But before I can agree to that, I’ll have to know why you feel your clients require an armed bodyguard.”

  “I’m sorry?”

  “Is there some threat to them that indicates the guard should be armed.”

  “Threat. Oh…no.”

  “Extraordinary circumstance, then?”

  “Extraordinary circumstances. Well, they’re quite famous, you know. The TV commercial—you’ve seen them?”

  I nodded.

  “Then you know what a gold mine we have here. We’re due to sign for three more within the month. Bank of America, no less. General Foods is getting into the act. Mobil Oil is hedging, but they’ll sign. Fitzgerald and Tilby are important properties; they must be protected.”

  Properties, I thought, not people. “That still doesn’t tell me what I need to know.”

  Kabalka laced his well-manicured fingers together, flexing them rhythmically. Beads of perspiration stood out on his high forehead; no wonder, wearing that suit in this heat. Finally he said, “In the past couple of years we’ve experienced difficulty with fans when the boys have been on tour. In a few instances, the crowds got a little too rough.”

  “The boys were opposed to that. In spite of their aristocratic connections, they’re men of the people. They don’t want to put any more distance between them and their public than necessary.”

  The words rang false. I suspected the truth of the matter was that Kabalka was too cheap to hire a permanent guard. “In a place like the Diablo Valley Pavilion, the security is excellent, and I’m sure that’s been explained to you. It hardly seems necessary to hire an armed guard when the pavilion personnel—”

  I was silent, watching him. He shifted his gaze from mine, looking around with disproportionate interest at the tattered wall posters. Finally I said, “Mr. Kabalka, I don’t feel you’re being frank with me. And I’m afraid I can’t take on this assignment unless you are.”

  He looked back at me. His eyes were a pale blue, washed out—and worried, “The people here at the station speak highly of you.” He said after a moment.

  “I hope so. They–especially Mr. Del Boccio—know me well.” Especially Don; we’d been lovers for more than six months now.

  “When they told me they had a bodyguard lined up, all they said was that you were a first-rate investigator. If I was rude earlier because I was surprised by your being a woman, I apologize.”

  “Apology accepted.”

  “I assume by first-rate, one of the things they mean is that you are discreet.”

  “I don’t talk about my cases, if that’s what you want to know.”

  He nodded. “All right, I’m going to entrust you with some information. It’s not common knowledge, and you’re not to pass it on, gossip about it your friends—”

  Kabalka was beginning to annoy me. “Get on with it, Mr. Kabalka. Or find yourself another bodyguard.” Not easy to do, when the performers needed to arrive at the pavilion in about three hours.

  His face reddened, and he started to retort, but bit back the words. He looked at his fingers, still laced together and pressing against one another in a feverish rhythm. “All right, Once again I apologize. In my profession you get used to dealing with such scumbags that you lose perspective—”

  “You were about to tell me…?”

  He looked up, squared his shoulders as if he were about to deliver a state secret to an enemy agent. “All right. There is reason why my clients require special security precautions at the Diablo Valley Pavilion. They—Gary Fitzgerald and John Tilby—are originally from Contra Costa County.”

  “What? I thought they were British.”

  “Yes, of course you did. And so does almost everyone else. It’s part of the mystique, the selling power.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “When I discovered the young men in the early seventies, they were performing in a cheap club in San Bernardino, in the valley east of L.A. They were cousins, fresh off the farm—the ranch, in their case. Tilby’s father was a dairy rancher in the Contra Costa hills, near Clayton; he raised both boys—Gary’s parents had died. When old Tilby died, the ranch was sold and the boys ran off to seek fortune and fame. Old story. And they’d found the glitter doesn’t come easy. Another old story. But when I spotted them in that club, I could see they were good. Damned good. So I took them on and made them stars.”

  “The oldest story of all.”

  “Perhaps. But now and then it does come true.”

  “Why the British background?”

  “It was the early seventies. The mystique still surrounded such singing groups as the Rolling Stones and the Beatles. What could be better than a British clown act with aristocratic origins? Besides they were already doing the British bit in their act when I discovered them, and it worked.”

  I nodded, amused by the machinations of show business. “So you’re afraid someone who once knew them might get too close out at the pavilion tonight and recognize them?”

  “Yes.”

  “Don’t you think it’s a long shot—after all these years?”

  “They left here in sixty-nine. People don’t change all that much in sixteen years.”

  That depended, but I wasn’t about to debate the point with him. “But what about makeup? Won’t that disguise them?” Fitzgerald and Tilby wore traditional clown white-face.

  “They can’t apply the makeup until they’re about to go on—in other circumstances, it might be possible to put it on earlier, but not in this heat.”

  I nodded. It all made sense. But why did I feel there was something Kabalka wasn’t telling me about his need for an armed guard? Perhaps it was the way his eyes had once again shifted from mine to the posters on the walls. Perhaps it was the nervous pressing of his laced fingers. Or maybe it was only that sixth sense that sometimes worked for me, what I called a detective’s instinct and others—usually men—labeled woman’s intuition.

  “All right, Mr. Kabalka, “I said, “I’ll take the job.”

  I checked in with Don to find out when I should be back at the studios, then went home to change clothing. We would arrive at the pavil
ion around four; the show—an early one because of its appeal for children—would begin at six. And I was certain that the high temperatures—sure to have topped 100 in the Diablo Valley—would not drop until long after dark. Chambray pants and an abbreviated tank top, with my suede jacket to put on in case of a late evening chill were all I would need. That, and my .38 special, tucked in the outer compartment of my leather shoulder bag.

  By three o’clock I was back at the KSUN studios. Don met me in the lobby and ushered me to the lounge where Kabalka, Gary Fitzgerald, and John Tilby waited.

  The two clowns were about my age—a little over thirty. Their British accents might once have been a put-on, but they sounded as natural now as if they’d been born and raised in London. Gary Fitzgerald was tall and lanky, with some straight dark hair, angular features that stopped just short of being homely, and a direct way of meeting one’s eye. John Tilby was shorter, sandy haired—the type we used to refer to in high school as “cute.” His shy demeanor was in sharp contrast to his cousin’s straightforward greeting and handshake. They didn’t really seem like relatives, but then neither do I in comparison to my four siblings and numerous cousins. All of them resemble one another—typical Scotch-Irish towheads—but I have inherited all the characteristics of our one-eighth Shoshone Indian blood. And none of us are similar in personality or outlook, save for the fact we care a great deal about one another.

  Wayne Kabalka hovered in the background while the introductions were made. The first thing he said to me was, “Did you bring your gun?”

  “Yes, I did. Everything’s under control.”

  Kabalka wrung his hands together as if he only wished it were true. Then he said, “Do you have a car, Ms. McCone?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I suggest we take both yours and mine. I have to swing by the hotel and pick up my wife and John’s girlfriend.”

  “All right. I have room for one passenger in mine. Don, what about you? How are you getting out there?”

  “I’m going in the Wonder Bus.”