Cafe Underground Presents
River Of Lawyers
Book 1 -- Chapters 5
The Detective Andi Wicksham Series, by RL Bell
Copyright © 1997 RL BELL
MENU
....back to WRITING
....author RL Bell
Andi Wicksham's INVESTIGATORY SERVICES
Chapter 5
The boat was a crucial piece of this problem--boats didn't disappear off the face of the earth. It would take a big trailer and a sling to pull a twenty-eight footer from the water. Scuttling it would take a second boat to return to shore. Andi burrowed through her papers for the stolen boat report.
A body tossed into the water from the boat house would be trapped within the maze of floating piers, her second visit to the boat house confirmed it the probability. If Drexler was involved he could have simply returned the boat that evening--unless there was blood on the deck or blood that had dripped into the bilges.
OK... But what happened to the boat? She puzzled a moment, the killer could have punched a little hole and set it cruising toward Japan if he or she had a way to get back to shore. Maybe it could have been junked for parts.
The body could have been dragged or carried from the boat house despite the floating dock's visibility from the Yacht Club--risky maybe, considering the party above and that a dead or unconscious body was an awkward, heavy dead-weight. It would be made a lot easier with two people.
Andi thought another minute--some sort of a cart would work. She made a note to ask what they used there.
She turned to a new page in her notebook, pulled out the phone book and looked up local yacht brokers and marinas--listing docks with facilities for pulling a boat that size.
The boat couldn't go past the falls up the Willamette river. Up the Columbia it could use the locks to pass the dam, but from there where? The further the trip, the more trouble and time and the more likelihood of people taking notice. Down the Columbia to the coast was a similar dead end if one discounted the open ocean. It would take more than a weekend sailor to take a boat out on the Pacific during a winter of stormy weather--and how far would they have to go? All the fishing villages and bays and marinas would be watched.
Her short list of likely suspects were all accounted for during the first days of the past week--they couldn't have taken the boat far themselves. Andi chewed the eraser of her pencil. Bryant's murder wasn't some random act like a robbery gone bad, but there was something that drove the perpetrator to feel it important to hide the body.
What would make the body important enough to go through that trouble? Evidence implicating the murderer? She'd have to ask Ramirez what his guess would be.
She looked up to find Lena staring.
"How late do we work?" Lena bobbed her head like she could go either way.
Andi glanced at her watch. Four thirty. Where had the afternoon gone? "Go another hour?" she asked Lena hopefully. "...or hit it again tomorrow?"
"Your call...I'm pat...this don't care." She gestured dismissively at her computer.
Sonny teased her for working too much. Maybe she and Lena could do dinner. Andi glanced down to her piles and said emphatically, "We're done. Let's clean up..."
Lena stared questioningly.
"Its a thing I do...straighten up before going home." Andi was embarrassed at the admission. "...it's no big deal...waste basket, desk-top piles, coffee cups, general pottering about." She tried to make it sound lighthearted, but heard the defensive edge in her words.
Lena shrugged and smiled and started straightening up her table.
When they finished, Andi stood close enough to feel the warmth of Lena's body--a barely perceptible reverberating purr. Lena lingered an extra moment. She was shorter, Andi smiled down to her face.
Andi asked, "Wanna' get a bite to eat?"
"No..." Lena looked up with a warm, inviting smile. "Wanna' go home'n cook dinner."
"Wha'cha cooking...?" Andi could play the game.
"...curried chicken...JC's favorite."
"Curried chicken...who's JC?" JC? The girlfriend. Andi's voice stayed neutral, but disappointment lifted her heart up to her throat to choke her.
"My boyfriend's...been such a grouch." Lena tossed her head like a tousled ragamuffin and squeezed her eyes shut.
Boyfriend? Andi's heart squeezed tight and crashed through the floor, shrieking she was weird. There was a deafening echo in her mind. Suddenly Lena seemed far away.
"...got a western tattoo...go figure...are you OK Andi?" Lena was close again, standing right beside her. Lena gave a wise-ass grin and Andi fell into her eyes.
She didn't hear the beginning of what Lena finished. "Yeah...just distracted." She smiled back with a swallow. "I want to do a few things here anyway...see-ya eight-thirty tomorrow?"
Lena waved airily and reached for her coat. "Things to do, places to be...I'm gone..." and the door clicked closed behind her.
Andi clenched her teeth, exhaled a long slow breath and sank into her chair. She sat with her elbows on the window stool--chin on hands and forehead on the glass, as if watching cars on the street below.
She picked up the phone. She needed Sonny to talk her down, but had to settle for leaving a message. She grabbed her coat, locked the door and stomped down the stairs to the street.
Sonny caught her later at home and shared an hour-long huddle.
After a bit of cajoling Andi related how cute and free and exuberant Lena was, how her breezy style and look and manner was so appealing. She told of meeting her at Coffee People's, showing the office and the way she'd just slid into the job.
"...she wore the "bi-" button on her coat?" Sonny confirmed, as if it meant something.
"It was just a button...even straight people wear buttons like that...it's hip. It's nothing but fantasy..."
"...never know...never say never." Sonny teased, encouragingly.
Andi rolled over, tangling the cord 'round arm and pillow--she rolled back to straighten out. "I'm a fool, OK? ...I was flirting, not offering a job. Now I don't know how to face her. I go ga-ga when...God, I don't understand how a person could be bi. It's sick..." She was surprised by the vehemence in her voice.
"...she doing a good job?" interceded Sonny.
"And how." answered Andi disconsolately. "Fun too....doing a great job. It's me not her...like junior high."
"You could thank her, pay her off and let her go." Sonny said evenly.
Andi's had a sinking feeling. "No, it's no big deal...I like her. I'm just vulnerable...Lena's fine. She didn't do anything wrong, I'm just a basket case." Andi felt like a moth drawn to a flame.
"Watch out for sexual harassment." Sonny added casually.
"What!" responded Andi, insulted. "I'm not some groper...Sonny...what you mean?"
"What? You don't read newspapers? Anything beyond work can be harassment, asking her to coffee or lunch...even touching her hand...”
"I can read her, she enjoy's it." Andi mumbled defensively, but could hear the uncertainty and felt a sinking feeling in her stomach.
Sonny met her gaze straight-faced, lips pursed resolutely.
"Thanks...I'll give it thought." Andi uncomfortably played back the innuendos they’d bantered.
"We could do breakfast..." Sonny offered, breaking the silence.
"Your usual noon-o'clock?" Andi gratefully fell back to their chummy intimacy.
"You got it. Same time, same station?"
"Mañana, Amiga..." Andi switched off the phone, lay back on the pillows, trying to remember what she had in the refrigerator to make a salad and trying to keep Lena to a back corner of her mind.
By the next morning she'd recovered. It had been a silly crush, like her puppy love infatuation with Sandra Washington in 10th grade--that ended painfully too...you'd think she might have learned.
She arrived at eight-thirty just as Lena strode up the drying sidewalk--overalls and a sunflower yellow tee shirt under her unbuttoned coat. The latest rain brought warmer air--Portland weather was kookie.
They exchanged chit-chat on the stairs and set to work as they walked in.
Lena was as irreverent and impetuous as before, arriving spouting an idea for a bookkeeping/tracking system and questions on the jobs Andi wanted and how she marketed the firm.
Andi was vague and defensive, resistant to organizing the office into some sort of McDonald's. Except for the cheapest phone book listing and business cards, she'd done no advertising in five years in business.
Might explain the dry spells, but she kept the thought to herself.
Lena drew up sample invoices and past-due notices with addresses, names and numbers inserting automatically from her spreadsheets. "Through the magic of electronics..." She stepped aside like a magician's assistant, flourished a finger to the keyboard and Andi's printer clicked and hummed to life.
Out came a bill as slick and professional as anybody in town.
"Wow...OK..." Andi allowed a suitably impressed expression though she was satisfied with the ones she did herself.
"Of course bookkeeping hasn't caught up, but by this afternoon I'll have kicked your list of old checks." Lena stood, one knee on the seat of her chair, with a hip thrust out and her finger poised beside pursed lips. "We could zip off letters to all the lawyers in town letting them know you're around...or a brochure..."
"Whoa...slow down...just what extra time of mine are you trying to book solid?"
Lena wasn't phased. "Yeah, yeah...all in good time...so what are you working on? ...want coffee?" She grabbed the empty pot and veered off to fill it with water.
Andi shook her head and called after her. "Missing person, mysterious circumstances, possible murder...it's a mess..."
"Isn't that a cop thing?" Lena asked wide-eyed as she returned poured water into the coffee maker and fumble for a paper filter.
"Our client..." How easy it was to say "our." "...is a law firm and the missing guy a partner. They want to know what happened."
Lena nodded, set out coffee cups and leaned against the wall like a colorful James Dean. "But you got suspicions regarding their motive...?" She picked at her teeth with a fingernail.
"Seems the guy Bryant and his secretary might have been up to their eyebrows...extorting clients with lot of folks feeling reason to knock him off." Andi shrugged nonchalantly. She indulged herself in the role of hardened-professional.
"So who's Ramirez?"
"A friend...a cop I've known since he was a pot-head friend. I wore a tux as an usher at his wedding...he's a chum...best straight friend I got."
"Not culturally straight, I assume?" Lena asked in a dead-pan that came across as funny as her smirky smile.
Andi dismissed her with a wave and flopped down in her chair.
"So...what's going to happen?"
Andi ticked points off on her fingers. "...they'll stop paying with an arrest--unless the suspect is one of them...or stop if I tell 'em that I've learned too many compromising things--which I haven't...or if they decide there isn't enough risk to justify the expense."
"These good guys or bad?"
Andi reached for her files. "...weird. They do pro-bono environmental work on one hand, with a great reputation while on the other they might be blackmailing their clients. It's bizarre." Andi made a face as she opened a file and turned on her computer. It was time to go to work.
Lena still leaned against the wall waiting for the coffee. "So where are the cops?"
Andi paged through her notes as she talked. "No body, no weapon--no murder case...a little blood at the crime scene...missing boat...a Yacht Club full of suspects, they got jack...less than me for motivations...I think. I haven't opened all the way up to Ramirez yet."
The coffee started its final spluttering and Lena hovered, nervously fiddling with a spoon, then the jar of sugar, then the buttons on her overalls.
Andi was momentarily reminded of the crazy suspicion that Lena might be Morse's plant, then was angry with herself for the uncharitable thought. As penance she pulled the files on the boat and marinas.
A moment later, as she dialed the first marina on her list, Lena set her blue cup before her--she got it right without asking; double cream, no sugar.
No marina or yacht dealer admitted to pulling out the boat. The locks on the Columbia had no record--but everybody knew the boat was missing. Three different people mentioned a ploy of taking the registration numbers of something similar that was junk and repainting the name. The Coast Guard knew nothing, Oregon marine board, and everybody she could think of, even less. It had taken most of the morning and she'd come up with a big fat zero.
Andi called the Yacht Club manager to casually asked about carrying luggage the boats, did they have wheelbarrows?
"No wheelbarrows," Stredlow responded politely, "There are handcarts on each dock for members." He'd obviously given the lines as part of a membership spiel.
Andi smiled as she thanked him and hung up to enter the comments in her notebook. So there was a way to get the body to the boat--throw a tarp or box on top and nobody casually watching from up in the Yacht Club would ever be the wiser.
She straightened the papers and replaced the file.
Lena kept working.
Andi glanced to Lena and bit her lip to keep from giving in to purely social talk. She liked the tingle when their eyes met and they shared a smile, but was saved from questionable yearning by the sudden ringing of the phone.
"Andi Wicksham please." A male voice, round, low and businesslike.
"Speaking..." Andi used a down-to-business voice for people using both first and last names.
"Ramone Bodega of Northwest Bio...returning your call." He was to the point, slightly impatient--a person with a lot before him more vital than returning calls to strangers.
Andi figured she could be more than simply civil. "Yes sir, thank you...I'm a private investigator in the service of Templeton, Morse and Bryant..." she assumed that as an environmental professional he'd know them--she hoped it wouldn't hurt.
"I'm gathering information on companies that might have less than positive environmental records." She took a breath and admired Lena's slightly frizzy hair as it spilled from its elastic tie down on her shoulders.
"I know Lionel Morse." Bodega stated flatly. "You say you're working for him?" There was a slight pause. "He already has extensive files..." He wasn't calling her a liar, but the implication was there.
Careful now, thought Andi. "Templeton, Morse and Bryant are my client and Mr. Morse my official contact. There may be confidentiality reasons to establish an independent file." She was shooting from the hip, hoping it didn't sound too hokey. "You can confirm with Mr. Morse and we can talk later if you want." she reached for her notebook.
"Sounds reasonable." Ramone Bodega said affably. "What sort of information are you after?"
"Sensitive information...reason enough to commit a serious crime. Whatever you can tell about people involved...not environmental science. I'm looking for motivations for blackmail or murder. May I give you some of the names we're looking at?" She fumbled for the list.
The phone lay silent, Bodega waited.
Andi took a breath and continued. "OK...let's see...All American Industries, Brian-Core Inc., and Noris-SDI..." she read off another five or six names.
Ramone Bodega "humm"ed and took notes as she listed them. He was carefully pleasant and neutral--guardedly exchanged trivial comments and said goodby.
Andi logged the call in her notes and tapped the eraser on the edge of the desk. Maybe she this industrial angle will crack after all. If she could only figure a way into Bryant's personal life she might wrap it up with a ribbon.
The phone rang. It was the executive assistant of Mr. Drexler of Brian-Core giving excuses why Mr. Drexler hadn't returned her call--would she like to discuss the matter with him and have it relayed. Mr. Drexler was very busy and might not be available for some time to come.
Andi silently cursed and snickered at the bold-facedness of the story, but replied politely that she needed to speak to Mr. Drexler himself. A business associate had disappeared and she was looking into the matter. She took the nebbish's name, left her own and number and made a note in her calendar to phone again.
She wondered if Lena could be that obsequious while running interference--and bet herself a nickel that she could.
Andi chewed her knuckle and stared out her window lost in thought, unconsciously taking a glance at her watch. Twelve-fifteen...damn...she was late for her date with Sonny. She looked over at Lena, but Lena was already staring at her.
"Lunchtime..." Andi announced.
"I'm buying if you want..." Lena offered. "Sandwich at the Cup And Saucer?"
"...got a lunch date...maybe tomorrow?" Andi smiled and felt a touch of power in turning down lunch.
Sonny and Andi ate sandwiches at Bower's Bakery, head to head at the little table by the front window. Sonny seemed grateful not to reprise her counselor role.
Returning from lunch, there was a message from Chang-Turner asking her to call. Andi groaned inwardly but logged it and called her back.
Businesslike to a fault, Chang-Turner cut to the issue. "I found a note from Mr. Bryant among my pending files..."
Andi waited, unsure of what response she expected. "A note? How recent?"
"...instructions for handling work...but there are some things you should see..."
Andi noted that she'd avoided how recent. "Should I come get a copy?" She rolled her eyes, mugging silent ridicule for Lena who glance up, smiled and turned back to her typing.
"It might be best...are you free now?"
"It'll take me half and hour..." Andi assumed Chang-Turner meant Morse thought it best.
"I'll tell the receptionist you're coming." she rang off.
Andi looked across at Lena.
"Something to do?" Lena glanced over her shoulder without her fingers skipping a beat, then she paused and turned over a page in the ledger. "Knock 'em dead slugger..."
"Yeah..." Andi grabbed her coat. "Our client calls and we respond..." She gave a super-hero wave and swung the door closed behind her.
Andi cut north on SE 20th and zipped down Morrison so she could turn south on Third once across the river. Remembering Morse's expense account she treated herself to a parking garage instead of spending the fifteen minutes it usually took to find a downtown weekday parking spot.
There seemed to be no added efficiency having the receptionist forewarned. Chang-Turner retrieved her from the waiting room and led without comment to her desk.
"There were a number of notes among this bundle..." she casually avoided greetings, handed Andi a slim pile of papers and launched into comments as if they were in the middle of a conversation. "Those are copies of the ones we thought of interest..." she pointed to a handwritten note at the top of the first sheet containing a thoroughly ordinary task list of clerical chores.
Katherine____.
See that these get into the right hands should I be unable to do it myself.
Thanks,
Robert
It seemed less than an earthshaking communication.
Straight-faced, Andi looked up to Chang-Turner. "...and..?" she let the question hang.
Bryant's secretary reached over and turned over the top page. The second page was less than half a page, typewritten, single spaced, without letterhead, heading or signature.
I believe I may be in danger. I've received numerous threats over the past few weeks and feel those responsible may move to silence me. Please find attached, a few notes that may be of crucial importance.
I'm unclear which of the following people are involved. I'm leaving this material for whoever will be looking into this.
Please be aware that only one of those mentioned is threatening me; the others may be guilty of minor transgressions, but I have no desire to bring them to grief...
Katherine Chang-Turner put her hand on the paper and caught Andi's eye. Concern showed in the wrinkles on her brow and around pursed lips as she seemed to be make a silent plea for help.
In the brief moment of silence Andi saw that her lipstick exactly matched her nail polish and noted the expert tracing of eyeliner on her upper lid. Chang-Turner's look was practiced manipulation. She appealed as a woman to an assumed ally in a male world, but her eyes were hard, not seeking, and she glanced away a bit too soon.
"It was felt that you should see these first, but we'll want to pass them on to the police if we can...probably tomorrow or the day after..."
It was felt...we'll want...meant Lionel Morse. Andi nodded understanding and returned to reading. There was a page on Sandra Ibbe and two on Noris-SDI, another on Drexler and Brian-Core, Inc., others on Houston Light and All American Industries and Northwest Solids and another three or four firms. All of the companies had been Bryant's clients and each person on the Yacht Club's guest list.
Andi quickly scanned the material. Much of it was technical, with occasional references to apparently illegal maneuverings and questionable business practices. If true, they were exposes a journalist would die for, if not it was slander, vicious and uncompromising.
"Mr. Morse is concerned for client confidentiality and is retaining council on the issue of turning these over to the police." Chang-Turner seemed genuinely distressed at the prospect. "...there's an issue of obstructing justice...but these are Mr. Bryant's clients, so attorney-client privilege is in effect. With Mr. Bryant absent the issue is complicated..."
Andi sat back in her chair--it certainly seemed that there was reason for concern. People and dates and materials were connected to illegal toxic dumping and land-scams. There was conspiracy and cover-up on the face of it, plus the underlying illegality.
Andi asked to see the original documents. Chang-Turner reached into a drawer and handed them over without expression. They were pristine, no dog-eared pages, no erased pencil marks, no obvious deletions. Andi looked at the first page with its handwritten note and paged through the rest trying to find the page that had been beneath it when the note was written in ballpoint pen.
"Where's the page that was beneath this one...?" She set the papers before Chang-Turner with a questioning look. "It would have been embossed by the pressure of the pen."
Chang-Turner looked almost embarrassed. "There were some papers that addressed unrelated issues...Mr. Morse decided they were irrelevant to your work..." She suddenly stood and strode to glance down the hallway.
When she returned she leaned close and whispered, "There was a page I didn't show Mr. Morse...I've made a copy for you...don't ever let anyone know where you got it..." her eyes flashed with unexpected intensity as she pulled out an original and copy and lay them on the desk.
Dragon Lady Andi thought. She took the copy gingerly and quickly read. There were three typewritten paragraphs--almost personal-journal style telling of Morse's demands for greater percentages of Bryant's profits, of arguments they'd had, of threats and accusations that Morse was syphoning from client trust funds and bitter differences of opinion boiling over in their professional lives.
Andi glanced up--Chang-Turner was sitting back in her chair pale and almost passive. Andi compared the original with the cover sheet, it was as un-marked the rest. She shuffled the copy to the bottom of her stack.
"I'll file it separately and not refer to it in reports..." she promised.
"I felt you should have it..." was all the prim Chang Turner said. "If I'd passed it on to Mr. Morse after I found it...you wouldn't have it now...this was the only way."
Their meeting was obviously over. Chang-Turner didn't even bother to rise.
Andi turned back before stepping into the hall. "Oh...has a woman named Maureen worked here in the last year or so?"
Chang-Turner stared back blankly, "Maureen...no. There's nobody in the firm by that name."
Andi walked to the elevator thinking about that uncharacteristic betrayal of her employer's confidence. Did accepting Chang-Turner's terms make her an ally? Would keeping silent on the matter make her an unwitting conspirator? She drove slowly back to her office.
The pages almost pulsed as they lay beside her. Suspicion clamored like an alarm...it was too convenient--impersonal generic pages, only a cover sheet truly tied to Bryant--the whole thing looked too pat.
Did Morse plant it for Chang-Turner or she for him, or was it their's together? Would Morse really give the papers to the cops? On a practical level, it would mean releasing them publicly. If forged, it would be obstruction of justice and probably some sort of libel and fraud. Just what were the stakes of the game they played?
Up until this, the firm's style had been seamless--this called attention to itself showing up after a week and a half, with missing pages and that strange extra page on Morse. Could Chang-Turner really have an box of pending files that languished for weeks or was it found a week ago and only recently cleared for her out-of-firm eyes? It was all a bit too bizarre.
Andi needed to sit down and study her copies, but the Hawthorne bridge was up again and she waited, caught in traffic, tapping her hand restlessly on the wheel.
Lena had found the little radio and was dancing to blaring rock oldies as she typed and fussed at her computer. The printer was cranking out page after page.
Lena sprang from her chair as Andi entered, prancing across the floor singing "Yeeeow...I feel good...da da, da da, da da, da...you know that I should now...So good..da, da..So good..da da...I got you."
Andi waved her hands trying to keep a straight face. "Enough already...OK...I got something important...let's turn it down a minute OK?"
Lena sprang to the radio then scrambled to the printer--pushed a button and the room went silent.
"If you got a moment I'd like your help." Andi announced as she dropped into her chair and tossed the papers on her desk.
She looked over at Lena, weighing responsibilities in her mind. "The official rap on confidentiality is that as an employee you're bound as well as I am and working in the service of Templeton et al, we're probably bound by their relationship to their clients. I don't know exactly what this stuff is, but consider yourself bound to silence..."
Lena held up her right hand and spouted, "I Doctor Watson swear an oath of silence to Sherlock Holmes..." Then she flopped in her chair and pulled it to the edge of the desk.
"Read these before I tell you anything...then give me your impressions..." Andi passed a page to Lena and sat back with another. They spent the next fifteen minutes in silence.
"So..." Andi asked. She raised a questioning Vulcan eyebrow.
"Are they for real?" demanded Lena.
"Statements, not questions, Watson..."
"OK...the writer's trying to get these folks in trouble... real stinky mud's being thrown...mostly anecdote and innuendo dressed up with dates and names and some science stuff...nasty, nasty, nasty...we're working for this person?
"...for...? I'm not sure. Is this a forgery by our client, you mean? I don't know. You want a break from billing? I'd like you to make lists of all the folks and places to see if there's anything funny."
"Funny...?"
"Details...on made up things dates and stuff are easily screwed up...does Saturday fall on the 12th? Do the same names or places occur on more than one page? Whatever..." Andi already had her note pad before her and a pencil in her hand.
Lena nodded, but said "By the way you had two phone calls while you were gone. A Janice Thompson wanting you to track down a witness and some woman wanting to talk about child support." She pointed to the notes laying on the corner of her desk.
"Just what I needed...." Andi grumbled.
"Hey, it's work..." Lena burbled. "I can do the phone calls if you point the way. I told them you'd call back this afternoon." She smiled her helpful smile before turning away with her pile of pages.
Andi shot a sharp look, but Lena'd already turned her back. Andi reached for the phone--maybe Lena could do the calls that the witness skip search would take.
She called Thompson and agreed to take the case. Thompson said she'd fax over details--it would be a telephone search after all, the guy was an engineer, probably stable, probably hadn't moved to thirty places or taken a dozen different jobs.
The other call about child support took a while, the woman wanted to know how much it would cost to track down her ex and was near tears when she found out. Andi suggested the usual support services and suggested going on welfare for a month if for nothing else than to turn the state's resources onto tracking him down. She had the same conversation a number of times each month and knew none of the options was satisfactory.
She and Lena were still at it when Andi looked at her watch and saw that it was twenty minutes to six. "Look at the time... you didn't get JC's dinner."
Lena made a face and turned back to reading. "Who gives a fig? I'll finish this page before we call it..." she waved her hand as if she didn't care at all.
Andi bit her tongue both to keep from asking and to keep from smiling. She finished the page she was reading and pushed it away, studiously looking straight ahead. She wasn't going to extend a single tendril fantasy in Lena's direction--whether Lena cooked for or fought with JC it was all the same to her.
On a sudden impulse she picked up the phone and dialed Noris-SDI. Just as Ibbe said there was no receptionist after five; a mechanical voice answered.
"You have reached the offices of Noris-SDI after normal business hours. If you know the extension of your party please enter it now--if not wait for the beep and leave a message."
Andi punched in a random four numbers. There was a click or two and the phone rang three times, then clicked again and the voice mail message of a Greg McCall kicked in. Andi slowly lowered the phone. If Bryant knew an extension he could have phoned in after business hours.
Sandra Ibbe had lied.
But if he punched an extension number would the redial button work on his phone?
Andi suddenly felt tired and began cleaning off her desk, making piles, leaning over to sharpen pencils and setting the files in place. She rose and put the old coffee filter in the wastebasket and took it and the coffee cups to the rest room.
When she returned, Lena was wiping down the coffee tray, her computer screen already dark and her coat folded across the end of the table. She looked across at Andi as if to say something, but then thought better of it. She picked up her coat, raised her hand in a half-wave that matched her worried half-smile and silently slipped through the door.
Andi stopped at the supermarket for a salmon steak and some spinach. At home in her mail box was an envelope with her name, but no stamp--recipes from Daniel, who lived downstairs with his wheelchair, crafting jewelry. She set the envelope aside and put on basmati rice, slid the fish under the broiler and sauteed the spinach with sesame oil and chili peppers.
She took her plate into the living room and sank exhausted on the couch. She'd lie there and watch TV if anything decent was on; vegging in front of Mystery was about as energetic as she wanted to get. She clicked the set on, but turned the sound way down--then turned it off and got up to turn on the radio, spinning the dial to KMHD. She sat back down and ate and thought.
Extraordinary as "Bryant's" late-found papers appeared, Andi didn't expect much meat in them. As probable forgeries, they were tainted and compromised beyond interpretation--their only value would be in betraying their author.
She carried her plate to the kitchen, turned the TV back on and the radio off. That they were the work of Bryant's own hand was a romantic thought. She channel-surfed through networks' commercials before Mystery came on. It could be someone maneuvering for position, taking advantage of the confusion, but she'd put money on the author being Bryant's murderer.
If Morse drafted them, would he have added the page exposing himself? It would be his style, a flourish incriminating himself to draw attention from a greater crime. Withholding pages could be a baroque detail or ad-libbing by Chang-Turner.
She was probably capable of as much deceit as any corporate player. She could have been embezzling--perhaps Bryant discovered her. She could have blackmailed the blackmailers--that would be a twist worthy of Morse.
Then again, there could be a third player, perhaps with Chang-Turner's assistance. There were many in that crowd of business fat-cats with money and power enough to lure her. It might just be an opportunistic attack on a competitor in hopes that the papers would be leaked.
Andi remembered a PD James' line, "Love, Lust, Loathing, and Lucre, the four L's of murder...And the greatest of these is Lucre." She smiled and glanced at her watch--almost eight o'clock.
She clicked up the volume and pushed away thoughts related to work. She sank back into the cushions. Tomorrow would come soon enough.
When she unlocked the office just after eight the next morning there were already phone messages waiting. One from Morse, another from Chang-Turner, the third from Lon Lively and the last, a long one, was left by the landlord telling of plans to paint the stairs and hallways and asking Andi to call him at his girlfriend's.
Her landlord and his girlfriend wouldn't welcome a call until ten o'clock or eleven. She looked at her watch and decided it might be safe to call Morse or Chang-Turner.
"Katherine Chang-Turner please." she asked the perky voice on the other end of the line.
"Certainly...one moment."
"Robert Bryant's office..." Chang-Turner's voice announced.
"Hi, this is Andi Wicksham...I was wondering if I could have a moment of your time...I could come there..."
Silence reigned. Chang-Turner didn't answer.
"If it were more convenient we could meet for a coffee or lunch..." Andi wanted to give her plenty of room to let her let down her hair should she feel so inclined.
It took another moment for Chang-Turner to weigh that option. "That might be fine...let me check my calendar. Would ten o'clock be too early? I think coffee would be good." Her voice was as calm and un-flustered as ever.
"Fine...you want to choose where?" Andi hoped that meeting out of the office meant there was something Chang-Turner wanted to reveal.
Chang-Turner named a cafe near the Portland State campus--a student dive a significant walk from her office, significantly out of the way of corporate suits.
Andi said goodbye, dutifully reaffirmed "Ten o'clock" and entered it in her calendar.
She'd just dialed the number a second time when Lena came in--glowering.
Andi put down the telephone. "You look cheerful..." She opted for the playfully-compassionate option and hoped for the best.
"Damn, damn, damn, damn, DAMN." cursed Lena, appealing to the heavens with outstretched arms, but then mugging an unhappy smile for Andi. "It's the frigging pits..."
"What's the problem Babe?" She knew enough to give up jokes after that opening gambit flopped. "JC...?"
"...who else? The band was all booked to play around the Northwest through Spring, but now they're going to cancel all those gigs and go off on tour..." She held her fists on either side of her head. "...and Martha Vee, their singer, is just waiting to get in his pants again. I know it..." She looked up mournfully. "This does not look good..."
"...again?" Asked Andi, taking Lena's coat and pulling up a chair.
"They used to be an item..." Lena wailed. "She's wild and weird and flashy."
Andi looked at her levelly, "Like you're not weird and flashy..." She couldn't keep herself from smirking.
Lena looked back in open-eyed shock. "I'm not the same league...and I'm not a musician...and I'm not going on tour with him." she pouted.
"Maybe he'll show admirable self restraint. What's your agreement?" Andi tried the reasonable approach.
Lena bobbed a crossed leg, tapped her cheek with a finger, rolled her eyes and made a face. "She hates me and would jump his bones just to spite me... Christ...he's a jock...what can you expect from a drummer anyway?"
"Hey..wait a minute," Andi complained defensively. "...I'm a drummer and I don't screw around..." Andi pulled up short of adding not that I get a Chance to.
"I didn't know that...who do you play with?" Lena seemed more than willing to let the subject slip.
"Friends. It's no big thing...be-bop and some poetry jam stuff...we just have a good time." Andi admitted with a touch of embarrassment.
"Better that than a bunch of egos with fantasies of the big time. I'm glad I have a job to come to." She didn't look glad at all.
"How about an early coffee break?" Andi looked over to Lena and jerked her thumb toward the door. "...hit the Underground for a mocha? My treat...OK?" She was willing to put off Morse and Lively.
They settled into one of the Underground Cafe's overstuffed couches and turned to face each other. Andi perched anxiously, her knees drawn up before her.
They sat through an awkward minute with neither saying a word.
Finally, Andi felt obliged to revealed her affair with Traci and getting dumped. She didn't mention that they'd met on Traci's rebound and that Traci'd gone back to her ex.
Lena listened attentively, took it in stride and smiled at the mango fantasy. She shook her head at Tracy's farewell, but responded with "JC and I've done a year and a half, but I'm living out of an emotional suitcase instead of having home and garden." Her eyes were damp with unshed tears. "And I wanted it to go right this time."
Andi felt awkward consoling friends--felt she had little grace and patience. But she listened and murmured condolences and bought Lena a semi-sweet brownie to salve the emotional wound.
When they returned there was call from Ramone Bodega suggesting they meet for lunch. Andi looked at her watch--only a half hour or so before she had to leave to meet Chang-Turner.
Lena returned to her computer. Andi dialed Morse's number and waded through the chirpy receptionist.
"Morse here...Ms. Wicksham, I've been looking forward to speaking with you."
I'll bet Andi thought sullenly. What she said was, "Oh good...I have another item you might help with. I need an introduction to someone who knew Mr. Bryant outside the office. I haven't had any luck with his personal life...not a storekeeper or waiter, no friends or social contacts, not a cleaning lady, nothing."
"I'm..not..sure..." Morse slowly deliberated. "I'll see what I can do." He finished bruskly as if he'd made some decision right then and there.
The phone hung quiet. Andi wondered if he was going to ask what she thought of the papers passed on by Chang-Turner.
She waited another moment. "I expect to talk to Ramone Bodega about Mr. Bryant's clients...did he call you?" She wasn't going to tell him about her upcoming meeting with Chang-Turner, but she wondered if he didn't already know. Was he expecting her to confide that to him as kind of loyalty test?
"I expect you will be able to find the information you need, Ms. Wicksham." Morse said obscurely. "I'm expected in a meeting in a few minutes...is there anything else?"
Andi said "No." and the phone went dead. She paused a moment as she considered how much she should trust Lena's skills. "Lena..."
Lena looked over questioningly.
"Janice Thompson's witness lived here up until two years ago. Here's the file..." Andi pushed the folder with the faxes with her finger. "What you do is phone the old employer--and everybody you can think of--asking for leads. Start locally and go from one to another to another. Get parents and siblings and friends names and numbers from as many sources as you can--you never know who's out of date or lying--document everything anybody tells you, everything..."
She looked up, Lena was already taking notes--she'd do fine.
"After that, phone Phoenix information and trace things there--his job, contact and residence...Chances are it'll be easy. Don't tell him who you are. When you find him pretend you're a phone solicitor...let Thompson make the overtures in case there's something fishy--he's her's to land. And remember we bill by the size of the files we generate so document every little thing that's said."
"Got it Sherlock..." Lena winked. "...this is so exciting..." She poked her cheek with an outstretched finger and bobbed her head back and forth.
Andi rolled her eyes and groaned at the act. Her next call was to Ramone Bodega--she dialed and he answered on the first ring. "Mr. Bodega..." Andi began, "This is Andi Wicksham returning your call. So, is it possible to get together..?" No use beating around the bush.
"Ms. Wicksham...Andi? Do I call you Andi, or..." Bodega's voice sounded in consciously slow, with paced phrases that hung full-voiced and resonant.
"Andi's fine." She reassured, chummily. Bodega's manner almost made you like him--she reminded herself that she was being paid to pump him for what he knew.
"I'd like to meet in person, but not at either of our offices...I'm free now..." he extended carefully.
"Not good." Andi reached for her calendar, "I've got a ten o'clock."
"Eleven?" Bodega offered. Andi visualized him looking at a calendar identical to her own.
"...I couldn't get anywhere until eleven-thirty...how 'bout lunch?" Andi asked--she'd be hungry anyway; the day was filling up.
"If not eleven how about half-past noon...somewhere outside and take-out if we're going to talk."
"Done! ...where?" Andi made a notation in her calendar and scribbled a note in her notebook with a mental image of the two of them in their second floor offices in different parts of the city sharing the synchronized ritual task--both bending over their desks at that identical moment making notes to coordinate their lives. "I can bring a couple Honkin Huge burritos..."
"Fine, fine...it's been rather dry today.." Bodega said absently. He was probably glancing out to the street from where he sat at his cluttered desk.
Andi looked at out the window--he was obviously from the Northwest...there'd only been a single short rain earlier in the morning, but the streets had been constantly damp from a misty drizzle...who else but a local would call it "dry."
"Ever been to the Japanese Gardens?" He asked. "Meet there...tennis court parking lot? We can walk around if it's not too wet..."
"Fine...twelve-thirty at the Gardens..." Andi stared across at Lena's back--her hair, today in yellow bounded pony-tails bounded off from either side of her head. She wanted to say something conversational to Bodega but nothing came to her tongue so she lowered the phone to her desk.
She looked again at her watch--maybe ten-twelve minutes before she had to leave. She still had to call Lively and her landlord, nine-thirty was going to be have to be soon enough.
She paged through her opened files, found Lively's number and punched it in with off-hand professionalism. The phone rang four, five times. Andi had just decided to hang up when a breathless voice growled "Yeah...what do 'ya want?"
"Andy Wicksham for Lon Lively." Andi responded.
"OK...Lon here...I got stuff I think you want, and some gossip you want to hear...but for more money, OK?"
"Depends on what it is Mr. Lively." Andi shook her head and shut her eyes a moment.
"OK...but at least seventy though, OK?"
"Sixty..." Andi uttered bluntly. "Where you want to talk."
"...Waterfront Park, south side of Hawthorne bridge at lunch time" It was a statement, not a question.
"Can't do twelve, how 'bout two." Andi tried to guess the time to get to her car and from the Japanese Gardens to the Hawthorne bridge--fifteen minutes, add five for noon-time traffic, another ten for parking. If she left Bodega as late as one-thirty she should make it easy.
Damn...she'd have to re-visit the cash machine. She scribbled a reminder in her book.
"OK...see 'ya then." He hung up and Andi snuck another glance at her watch.
The note with the landlord's girlfriend's number had disappeared. Andi cursed and reached toward the piles littering that corner of her desk. Papers leapt of their own accord and danced in the air to the floor.
"Shit..." Andi cursed, leaping to her feet and rummaging through the pile for the note.
She dialed the number not even bothering to sit down. "Bobby please..?" she asked the sleepy female voice that answered. How could people have such laid back lives when the world moved at such a maddening clip.
"Yeah..." Bobby "Soxx" Magnolia, her landlord and rock and roll guitar extraordinaire came grumpily to the phone.
"Andi here Bobby...you said to call..."
"God...do you have any idea what time it is?" he demanded with exasperation.
"Best I could do...I only got a moment, what do you want?." Andi looked down, her foot was tapping in impatience.
"You got to approve the color for the hallway...I got the color chip's and can bring them by..."
"You're the landlord...you decide...your decision will be fine..."
"Noooo, nooo...you guys will whine for months no matter what color the walls get painted so you have to approve before the thing gets done...you think I haven't dealt with you all before?"
"I don't have time Bobby." Andi appealed. "Look I got to run...I should be back in the office for last half of the day...maybe then huh?
She said "Yes" a couple more times and finally set the receiver down.
"Busy day..." she reported rhetorically to Lena.
Lena swung around. "Make some time to glance at these..." she waved to piles of papers on the table beside her. "Letters and invoices for the unpaid balances. The letters are stamped--give 'em a glance and sign the letter...I'll fold, stuff and pop 'em off.
"Already..?" Andi looked over at the table in surprise. "That's going to take me an hour." she complained, waving at the piles with a smile. "How can you do this to me?"
"That's me...fem on the streets...butch on the spreadsheets. It's none of my business if you don't want to get paid...the beauty of the work itself sustains me. Here, take this stack of letters and do your mark before you run, I'll get em in the mail at noon." She dropped a pile of paper before her.
Andy looked at her crossways and made a face, but leaned down and scribbled her name at the bottom of each without bothering to read. "I'm glad we've had this little talk...I'm going out now and I'll be gone much of the day..." Andi gave her an exaggerated wide-berth as she edged toward the door.
"But, colleague of mine...I have no key." Lena reached imploringly like Mediterranean diva in a nineteen-thirties movie.
"Damn..." Andi stepped across to her desk and pulled out the spare. She could make a duplicate tomorrow--if she had time.
"I'll get a copy made at lunch." Lena slipped the key into a pocked in her levi's and patted it. "Don't forget your 'broily..."
"What?" Andi demanded as she struggled into her coat.
"Your umbrella dear..." Lena pantomimed opening one that then pulled her, open eyed, out of her chair and across the floor. "Bye..." she waved like Mary Poppins.
"...I knew that." Andi mumbled darkly.
"Shall I answer the phone or let the machine get it?" Asked Little Miss Helpful Lena.
"Goodbye...answer the phone...fine...goodbye." staccatoed Andi as she closed the door with a firm and definitive bang. She again thanked her iron resolve not to succumb to the lure of a cellular phone. If she had one she'd never get a moment of peace.
Go on to Chapter 6
Go back to Chapter 4
Go back to Andi Wicksham Series page
Copyright © 1997 RL BELL.
Last Updated 5/22/97
For more information, contact Webmaven Lena Kovid, at:
geekgirl@cafeunderground.com