Dead Letter (Digger) Read online

  "Melinda. That one’s right."

  "Okay. Moving right along, C-S has to be cock-sucker. Technically, it’s not correct, of course, otherwise I wouldn’t have fallen so wildly in love with just the sound of your voice, Marilyn."

  "Melinda."

  "But Arlo always calls me a cock-sucker, so I’ll go with that. Now, R-B could stand for royal breeding, but somehow that doesn’t seem to fit in with what else he said. I mean, you wouldn’t call somebody a cock-sucker and a mother-fucker and then compliment him on his breeding, would you?"

  "I certainly wouldn’t."

  "Neither would I, Monica. So I think R-B has to be something nasty. How about rat-bitch?"

  "No," she said with a sigh. "It was rat-bastard."

  "Wait, that’s not fair," Digger said. "You said it didn’t have anything to do with my parents. That’s misleading. You can’t call that one wrong."

  "Okay, you got it right," she said.

  "That’s three out of three. Are you impressed?"

  "Yes."

  "When will you meet me for a drink?" he asked.

  "I might have some time tomorrow after work," she said.

  "I’ll call you and firm it up. Thanks, Mandie."

  Digger drank the rest of his drink and refilled his glass. The vodka was already thinning so he put it back into the freezer. A nasty message from Arlo. He must have noticed that Digger had broken his hospital appointment again.

  He glanced at his watch. It was early afternoon in Las Vegas and unless Koko was working an early shift at the casino, she should be awake by now. He dialed the number of the condominium they shared. It was answered on the first ring.

  By a man.

  "Happy days," he said, whoever the fuck he was.

  "Who’s this?" Digger asked.

  "This is Digger, right? You lapper, what are you doing sober this late in the day?"

  "Breslin?"

  "That’s right. Memoirs of a Hollywood cop. Come to visit his friend in Las Vegas, but his friend is away doing some bullshit so he is tossed onto the mercies of his friend’s small, but beautiful woman."

  "Is Koko there, you goddam rumdum?" Digger said. "You’re shit-faced."

  "Of course I am. Of course she is. Everybody’s here."

  "Let me talk to Koko," Digger said abruptly.

  "Hang on."

  Koko’s voice answered cheerily. "Hello, Digger."

  "Am I interrupting anything?" he said.

  "Now what’s eating you?" she said. "I’ve got company for tea. How’s your physical?"

  "I didn’t take it yet. I’m working on it," Digger said. He remembered how good-looking Lt. Peter Breslin was.

  "You want to talk, don’t you?" Koko said.

  "I did," he said.

  "Hold on and let me take this in the bedroom."

  "Somehow I got the feeling that’s where you were," Digger said.

  "Don’t start," she warned.

  He heard her set the telephone down. He could imagine her, naked, her body lathered with sweat and love juice and saliva, whispering to Breslin that he should be quiet while she got rid of Digger real fast and then they could get back to what they were doing.

  The bedroom extension was picked up.

  "Okay, Dig," she said. In the background, he could hear squeals of laughter.

  "Listen, if I’m interrupting your orgy, it’s all right," he said.

  "Oh, get off it, you paranoid pain in the ass. Let me go hang up that other phone."

  He heard the phone being put down again. Then he heard a click. Then, ten seconds later, Koko was back on the line.

  "No," she said. "Breslin and Juanita are here."

  "Oh, really," said Digger. And who else, he wanted to say.

  "Yeah, they barged in about a half-hour ago, demanding breakfast. They haven’t been to bed yet. Or at least not to sleep. I think they’ve spent all their time coupling since I introduced them."

  "And what were you doing?" he asked.

  "Jesus Christ, Digger, you’re the most suspicious bastard in the world. I was sleeping. Alone. Horny. Missing you. Alone in our big bed. By myself. Wondering when the only man in my life, the man whose ground he walks on I worship…"

  "That’s not grammatical," he said.

  "…wondering when the man I worship was coming home to fill this aching void in me. That’s what I was doing. You satisfied?"

  "Yes. But not convinced."

  "Go to hell," Koko said.

  "Don’t let them do coitus in our bed," he said.

  "I won’t. I’m going to make them eggs and get them the hell out of here so they can go fuck each other into senselessness and I can get working on our goddam income tax. It’s due next week."

  "Well, don’t let it be late," Digger said.

  "I won’t. But as long as we’re on the subject," she said, "let me tell you that it annoys me that you’re an accountant and I have to do the income tax."

  "Yeah, but I was a lousy accountant. You’re a mathematical genius. As well as the sexiest twenty-one dealer in Las Vegas."

  "Okay, now that you’re over your attack of jealousy, what do you want?" she asked.

  "I don’t know," he said. "I’m just weary. I’m hanging onto this thing by my fingernails and I think my nails are coming loose. And now Allie has had an abortion. If Frank had sent Adolf Eichmann here to look after Allie, he couldn’t have done a worse job than I’m doing."

  "You didn’t get her pregnant, did you?" she asked.

  "No. I wasn’t here long enough."

  "Then the abortion’s her decision. She’d have it whether you were there or not. Her father know about it?"

  "No, Christ, no. He thinks she’s the Maid of Orleans."

  "If she’s going to tell him, she’ll tell him. And if she won’t, she won’t. It’s none of your concern. Make believe you never heard about it. Is there really a killer up there?"

  "Yes."

  "Tell me about it," she said, and Digger did. He told her about the stolen car and the second letter. About Allison having been Henry Hatcher’s mistress. How Hatcher’s ex-wife was on the death list but didn’t seem to be frightened. He told her about Rampler and Rolan watching the shrink’s apartment. He told her about his inability to find out who was writing the letters, but he was going to try again in Langston’s office that night. He told her how Danny had wanted Allison to have the baby and marry him. How Danny thought Hatcher was after Allison’s money. How Hatcher had reason to hate Redwing. How Redwing was gay and Rampler a cocaine junkie, free-basing his brains into mush.

  He told her everything, except about the woman from the college he had slept with the night before, and said, "I’m not getting anywhere."

  "Keep trying for the letter, Dig," she said. "And I don’t know about that stolen car."

  "Why not?"

  "You’re right. It wasn’t just a normal car theft, because nobody does that and then, just by accident, comes back to kill somebody near where it was stolen. No prints, you say?"

  "None at all."

  "I’ve got to think about that some," Koko said. "It’s not sounding right, but I don’t know why."

  "Should I tell Frank what’s going on?"

  "Can you afford to wait an extra day?"

  "I think so," Digger said.

  "Then wait. All you do by telling him now is get him pissed at you for not telling him sooner. If you hand him a package with a ribbon around it, he’ll be so happy with the package he won’t look at the postmark."

  "Well put," he said.

  "And accurate," she said. "Stop sounding grim. You’ll figure it out. Especially now that I’m helping."

  "Okay. About our income tax," Digger said.

  "What?"

  "Don’t forget to cheat," Digger said.

  "I won’t," she said.

  Behind him, Digger heard a sound at the door. "I think I’d better get off the phone now. Arlo’s home."

  "Give him my love," she said. "How is he?"

 
"Maudlin." He whispered. "About Evvie and all."

  He heard a roar from Buehler.

  "Who are you talking to?" he demanded. He was more than a little drunk. Digger could tell because his tie had missed his collar and was tied around his neck and his shirt flaps were out.

  "Koko," Digger said.

  "Let me talk to her," Buehler ordered. He stomped heavily across the room and pulled the phone from Digger’s hand.

  "Koko?" he said. "This is Arlo. I just want you to know that the bastard you’re living with is the worst irresponsible Shpos I ever met. Shpos. That’s right. Shpos. It means sub-human piece of shit. It’s hospital talk. Julian wouldn’t know that because he never goes to the hospital. He keeps breaking appointments. I don’t know how you put up with him. If you want to dump him, let me know. I’ve always been hot for your body. Thank you. Good-bye." He hung up the phone.

  "What’d she say?" Digger asked.

  "She sent me her love. She said I ought to come out to Las Vegas so the two of us can figure out a way to kill you and make it look like an accident. So where were you this time? Maybe I should build a hospital just for you. We can keep a room vacant for you at all times, like Howard Hughes’s hotels."

  "I was busy. Catching killers isn’t a nine-to-five job."

  "Oh, fuck you and your killer," Buehler said. He walked to the liquor cabinet and poured himself Scotch, neat, into a water glass. "All I know about that alleged killer is he keeps making you miss appointments."

  "I’m sorry, Arlo," Digger said. Quietly he pressed the record button on his small tape machine.

  When Arlo sat down in the living room, Digger said, "You’re bent and I’m sorry. Listen to me. Are you still in love with Evvie?"

  "Of course I’m in love with Evvie. She always showed up at the hospital when she was supposed to, not like some people I know. Of course I love her. I always loved her, from the first day I stole her away from you."

  "Nobody else?" Digger said.

  "Never. Nobody."

  "You want her back?" Digger asked.

  "Julian, I don’t want to live without her," Buehler said. "Evvie’s my whole life and the longer she’s away, the more I know it. I’m very tired, Julian, and I have to lie down." He drained his glass of Scotch.

  "You’re drinking too much," Digger said.

  "What else is there?" Buehler said, clapping the empty glass on the table and lurching off toward the bedroom.

  Beautiful, Digger thought as he turned off the tape recorder. Just beautiful.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Digger was in the cocktail lounge of the Copley Arms Hotel, a pleasant old woodsy kind of room, with girls in Maid Marian costumes, crested shields on the walls, and, inexplicably, Tiffany lamps. He felt like Robin Hood in Sherwood Forest with a Gimbel’s on the corner.

  The telephone under the bar rang and after the bartender answered it, he brought it over to Digger.

  "For you, Mister Burroughs."

  "Thanks. Hello."

  "This is Terlizzi."

  "How’d it go?"

  "Wait for me. I’ll be right there," the officer said. He hulked into the bar fifteen minutes later, saw Digger, and pulled up a stool next to him. He ordered Scotch and soda.

  "Well?" Digger said.

  "Okay. I still don’t know why I’m doing this."

  "So far you haven’t done anything but complain," Digger said.

  "There are no burglar alarms anywhere in the building," Terlizzi said. "There are…" He stopped talking while the bartender put his drink in front of him and Digger motioned for the charge to be added to his check.

  "There are just three keys. Front door. Main office door. Private office door." He handed Digger a single chain with three keys on it. As Digger put it in his pocket, he said, "The silver one is the outside door."

  "How’d you get them?" Digger asked.

  "I stopped in to see her and drive her home. I made it a point to lock up for her so I could check the locks and all and I told her she ought to get a burglar alarm. When we got to her apartment, I went upstairs so I could see about that peeping tom again and when she went in the can, I took the keys from her pocketbook."

  "If she misses them?"

  "I’ll tell her she must have dropped them in my car and I left them home on my dresser. You just better get them back to me before then," Terlizzi said.

  "I will. Where are you eating dinner?"

  "I’ve got to pick her up at 8 o’clock. A place down near the harbor. Muggsy’s. Ever hear of it?"

  "I know where it is," Digger said. "Don’t eat the scrod."

  "If you get done early, you can pop in there and figure out a way to get them back to me. Call me to the phone or something. If I don’t see you at Muggsy’s, I’ll bring her back here. And I’ll wait for you as late as it takes, but dammit, try to be early ’cause I want this chick in my house tonight before midnight."

  "What are you planning on turning into?" Digger said.

  "Just turning in, if I’m lucky," Terlizzi said. "I hope this isn’t a wild-goose chase."

  "I do, too. I just want to get the hell out of this town. I hate Boston."

  He was sure no one had seen him enter the building that housed Doctor Langston’s offices. The building was dark and after a few moments of standing silently, but hearing nothing, he walked to the back of the building, and let himself into the psychologist’s office. He carefully double-bolted the door behind him and pulled the drapes tightly closed over the two windows in the room, before he switched on the small gooseneck lamp on the desk.

  When Digger tried the drawers of the three filing cabinets, side by side next to her desk, they were all locked.

  He opened the center desk drawer and found a key on a little hook, hanging next to the compartment for paper clips. The one key opened all three cabinets. Of course, he mumbled to himself. Women always locked things and then left the keys right next to the locked object. It must have been a woman who first left the key to the front door under the welcome mat. He was glad that, even though a shrink, Doctor Langston was also a woman and he hoped that Terlizzi would get half a chance to prove out that theory.

  "Matchmaker, matchmaker, make me a match," he sang softly under his breath as he began to root through the files. The first cabinet contained administrative work, budgetary requests, and personnel action forms, and the second was given over mainly to correspondence.

  The third cabinet was filled with row upon row of manila folders, all with names neatly labeled in the left-hand corner in red magic marker.

  He went through them in alphabetical order. He found Danny Gilligan, John Paul Rampler, Allison Stevens. There was no folder for Mark Rolan. Maybe you needed a brain to have psychological problems. Nor were there any folders for Otis Redwing and Henry Hatcher. If Doctor Langston did any work with faculty, she kept the records somewhere else.

  Allison Stevens’s file was the thickest and, out of curiosity, he opened it first as he lit a cigarette and sat at Doctor Langston’s desk.

  The opening page was a brief biography of Allie. Name, age, address, parents’ names, schools attended, childhood illnesses. Under "previous psychological treatment" was marked "none."

  The first entries after that were written on yellow legal pages in Jayne Langston’s pinched-tight handwriting. They dated from three-and-a-half years before. Each page represented a separate visit and there were fifteen of them over a two-month span. The gist of her notes, bless her for her neatness even if she wrote like an anal retentive, was that Allie was homesick. Big deal. Student had led a sheltered life, Doctor Langston had figured out, and did not really know how to cope with her first taste of freedom. A note in red said "Usual. Cures itself when student comes to realize all in same boat."

  Another entry said "student is a virgin." Digger knew that was ancient history. "Very attractive, sensual, sexually explorative."

  Doctor Langston had written, "That too will cure itself with help of man."

  Digger s
tarted to flip through all the rest of the pages, and then saw something in the harsh light of the gooseneck lamp that sent a chill down his back and raised the hairs of his arms.

  There was a stack of white papers, smaller than the yellow note sheets. Each contained a poem, neatly typewritten, and signed by A.S. They were dated last summer, and the first poem he saw was entitled "The Betrayer." It was the time that Allie had split with Henry Hatcher and was feeling guilty about possibly breaking up his marriage to Doctor Langston.

  But that wasn’t what put chills on Digger’s arms. It wasn’t the message. It was the typing. The typing was neat and accurate, but every O was dropped below the rest of the line of typing.

  Just like the typing in the chain letters.

  Digger skimmed through the rest of the poems. They were all the same, all neat, all signed A.S., and all of them showing the same typewriter defect.

  He pushed his chair back away from the desk and looked over the lamp into the dark of the office. There was no ashtray and he took out the wastebasket under the desk and flicked his ashes into it.

  Allison Stevens was writing the death letters herself. The conclusion was inescapable. And that was why Jayne Langston had not seemed concerned about the notes Allie had received. She had recognized the typing and she knew Allie was sending herself the letters.

  But why?

  Why pure, sweet, lovable, always-smiling Allie? Why would she try to make it look as if someone were terrorizing her?

  His mind nibbled around the edges because he knew he was afraid to face the real questions. And then it jumped into his mind with all the teeth of a full-grown idea that demanded attention.

  If Allie had written the notes, had she also killed Redwing?

  Why?

  Why?

  It make no sense. No sense at all.

  Digger pulled the chair back in to the desk and using Doctor Langston’s private line, dialed the Copley Arms and asked for Room 309.

  Allison’s voice answered. She sounded a lot brighter than she had that afternoon.

  "Hello."

  "This is Digger. How are you feeling?" He spoke softly in case a cleaning woman should be working nearby.

  "Oh, like a million dollars now," she said.