Fool's Flight (Digger) Read online

  And what is Batchelor doing? First going to see the doctor, then Mrs. Donnelly, pumping, pumping. He goddamit knows something but I don’t know what it is. He’s a sleaze with his yacht caps and little blue blazers and Clark Gable mustache. I just don’t trust him, he’s up to no good. He looks like a smuggler to me. Who else gives away cocaine at parties?

  I hope Koko gets back soon.

  Expenses: breakfast, Mrs. Donnelly and me, twenty-one dollars, the woman’s a big eater. Lunch, Koko, thirty dollars. I round all these numbers off to the next lower dollar. I hope you appreciate this, Kwash. Dr. Riesner, who analyzed Donnelly’s records for me, will send a bill to B.S.L.I. Room and car by credit card. Total, fifty-one dollars. Another cheap day.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  "Well, that was an experience," Koko said. She was wearing blue jeans, a white blouse and white high-heeled shoes, her generation’s idea of Saturday night go-to-meeting best.

  "What’d you think of His Holiness?" Digger asked.

  "Charisma, but he’s a nut-case." She walked back and forth along the shabby rug, imitating better than Digger ever could Wardell’s speech rhythms, punctuated by the footsteps along the stage. "‘Prosperity is just around the corner. Good health is just around the corner. Happiness is just around the corner.’ Digger, this guy’s the king of around the corner."

  "You think he’s a phony?"

  "That’s the problem. I don’t. I think he’s on the level and it annoys me. I wanted to be able to come back and tell you, Digger, go get him, it’s him, but I can’t."

  "Me, neither. I don’t picture him as the kind of guy to bring down a plane of forty people," Digger said. "I think he’s a manipulative power-junkie, but I don’t make him a killer."

  "Did you hear from the doctor?" Koko asked.

  "Yes. Donnelly had cancer. Maybe only days to live."

  "All right," she said. "Pilot error. Or maybe pilot incapacitation. Maybe he had a cancer attack. Do people get cancer attacks? Like migraines and menstrual cramps?"

  "I think so," Digger said. He got up from the bed and Koko flopped down on the other side of it.

  "Well, that’s a possibility, then," she said. "It’s a lot more possible than your idea that somebody brought the plane down."

  "Except," Digger said sourly, as he started to pace the floor of the room.

  "Except what?"

  "Except for that damned insurance," Digger said. He kicked the closed drawer of the plastic-veneered dresser.

  "Easy on the furniture," Koko said. "Unless you got ten dollars to replace it all."

  But Digger wasn’t listening. He was walking the floor, talking as much to himself as to her.

  "Except for that damned insurance," he said again. "Forty passengers on that plane, all with insurance made out to one man, the man who’s sending them on the trip. And then the pilot who is terminal turns out to have insurance made out the same way."

  Digger kicked the dresser drawer again. The cheap mirror on the dresser rattled against the wall.

  "And why does the pilot take off without his crew when the co-pilot conveniently gets sick?" he asked aloud. "And the co-pilot has the look of a hustler or smuggler or something and now he’s nosing around, trying to find things out, and I think he’d down every commercial aircraft in the country to get money to buy a bigger Porsche."

  Digger gulped the dregs of vodka from his glass. "And then we’ve got Timothy Baker," he said. "In deep money trouble and that plane going down might just be the best thing that ever happened to him. And the pilot’s wife sleeps around, and when she was talking about suing over the insurance, Mrs. Wardell talked her out of it. Why? And how? And the whole plane was a planeful of losers. No family, no friends, no future. If ever a plane was meant to go down, it was this one."

  He looked at Koko imploringly. "Except this, except that, except everything. There are too many damn excepts in this case."

  She kicked off her shoes and stretched her hands above her head as Digger kicked the dresser one more time.

  "This is an awful job you have," she said. "Nothing’s ever simple and nothing’s ever what it seems to be."

  "That’s the fun of it," Digger said.

  "I know. I like puzzles, too. But just once in a while, don’t you wish something was slambang, whammo?"

  "The only thing I want to slambang whammo is you," Digger said.

  "Fat chance."

  Later, they lay in bed with the lights out, Digger smoking his last cigarette of the night, even though smoking in the dark was totally unsatisfying. If you couldn’t see the smoke you could barely taste it. That was true of all cigarettes but especially of Digger’s low-tar, low-nicotine brand, about which he complained that he had to suck so hard for smoke, his teeth were coming loose.

  "Digger," Koko said.

  "You know I don’t like to talk during my last cigarette. Now I’m going to have to light another one. This is my quiet-thinking cigarette of the day."

  "I’m sorry."

  "Well, as long as you started, what is it?"

  "This probably doesn’t mean anything, but you know how Wardell’s tent is kind of hooked up to his rectory building or parsonage or whatever they call it."

  "Yeah."

  "When Wardell was preaching, someone came up the ramp and slipped his wife a note. She got up and left the stage. She went down that ramp. It struck me as odd, her going like that. Anyway, he was preaching and I had heard enough, so when she left, I nipped out the back of the tent and ran around the side to see what she was up to."

  "You see anything?"

  "She walked into the parsonage. I thought, hell, maybe she had to go to the bathroom. But then I thought of that note that she got. So I waited awhile, and in a couple of minutes, somebody else came out of the house."

  "Who was it?"

  "Some woman. She had black hair and big knockers. Sunglasses, too. She got into a car and drove out of the lot."

  "What kind of a car?"

  "Don’t interrupt. I had my car parked in the front of the lot and so I got in my car and tried to follow her."

  "How’d you make out?"

  "I followed her for about a mile to that big fork in the road, you know that six-way intersection with the gas stations and the motels and some cars got between us and I lost her."

  "What kind of a car?"

  "I drove around the block a few times but I couldn’t see her. Then I went back to the tent and the show was just letting out so I drove right home here."

  "What kind of a car?" Digger asked.

  "Dark color."

  "Oh, that helps. That’s good. A dark car."

  "I don’t know what kind of a car. You want me to tell you it was a 1951 Malibu coupe with double-barrel carbs and California headers and mouse-fuzz upholstery and a million-liter engine, you got it. Go look for it. I don’t know from cars."

  "Women never learn the important things in life like what kind of car somebody is driving."

  "It was black, that’s all I know. Do you think this is important?" Koko asked.

  "I don’t know. Why didn’t you tell me before?"

  "I didn’t know whether to or not. I thought you might get all twisted because I was gumshoeing around and when I thought about it, it all seemed kind of trivial and pointless. Maybe Mrs. Wardell was sending somebody out to get orange juice for breakfast."

  "Maybe," said Digger. "And maybe not." He was thinking of Melanie Fox, dark-haired and big-chested.

  "All right," Koko said.

  "Koko. You did good."

  "Thank you. Good night."

  He smoked another cigarette before falling asleep.

  When he fought his way back to consciousness, it seemed as if he’d been sleeping only for five minutes. But the sun was up, streaming into the room through the threadbare curtains. Why did he wake up? The telephone. The telephone was ringing.

  "Hello," Digger said. He glanced at Koko. She slept on blissfully, unaware of telephones or the world waiting o
utside to annoy him. How a woman could sleep like that knowing that Cora and the two kids were even now steaming toward Fort Lauderdale was beyond him.

  "Is this Burroughs?" a male voice demanded.

  "Yeah."

  "This is Lieutenant Mannion at headquarters. I’ll have a car there for you in five minutes. I want to talk to you."

  "This early? I’m warning you. I’m not charming this early."

  "I don’t want charm, I want information. Five minutes, the car’ll be in front."

  "Make it ten so I can brush my teeth."

  "Ten."

  "What’s this all about?" Digger asked.

  "Ten minutes," Mannion said. "Be ready."

  Lieutenant Marvin Mannion looked as if he had been up all night. There were deep bags under his eyes, and a faint stubble was showing around his jowls.

  "Sit down there," he growled as Digger entered his office. "Do you know a Randy Batchelor?"

  Digger sat down.

  "What’s this all about?"

  "I’ll ask the questions," Mannion said.

  "Good. You answer them, too."

  "I can arrest you, you know."

  "And I can get sprung in three minutes and you can hold your hand on your ass waiting for answers. What do you think insurance companies do, anyway, with all the money we steal from fender repair swindles? We hire smart lawyers. I’ll be out of here in a flash, so listen, I haven’t had any coffee and I haven’t had much sleep and spending my morning with you isn’t high on my list of must-dos, so why don’t we be civil and you tell me what this is all about and I’ll tell you anything I know."

  Mannion sipped some coffee from a Styrofoam container as he thought the offer over, then pushed the coffee over toward Digger.

  "Here. You can have some of my coffee. All right, Batchelor’s dead. You know, you’re a brazen bastard."

  "Not another plane crash," Digger said.

  "Different kind of crash. A bullet crashed into his head."

  "Shit," Digger said.

  "Where were you last night?"

  "In my room at the motel."

  "Can you prove it?"

  "I had a witness from all day up until about eight o’clock. And then from about eleven o’clock on."

  "From eight to eleven, you’ve got no witness," Mannion said.

  "At eight-thirty, I got a phone call in my room. That puts me there then. Then I was playing tapes and making a tape recording. No proof of that. When was Batchelor killed?"

  "We don’t have a report yet. Sometime between last night and early this morning. You had an argument with him yesterday?"

  "An argument?"

  "Burroughs, maybe you’re dumb but you’re not deaf. An argument."

  "Oh. It wasn’t really an argument. I was out at Interworld Airways, nosing around about this accident. He was there. He came out to talk to me in the parking lot."

  "What’d you talk about? Witnesses said it looked like you were arguing."

  "Hell hath no fury," Digger said. "The girl who told you that, Jane, was wrong. She’s just pissed at me because my girlfriend is prettier than she is. We weren’t arguing. I was trying to find out why that plane went down. I told him that I thought he might be involved. He denied it. I thought he might know something but I couldn’t get him to talk."

  "Why’d you think he might know something?"

  "He seemed ready to say something," Digger said. "That and the way he conveniently got sick and got off the plane just before it took off. His little mustache. I didn’t like his looks. I think he pushed dope."

  "You didn’t like his looks so you suspected him?"

  "Yeah. That’s the way it generally works," Digger said.

  "Why’d you think he pushed dope?"

  "I was at a party. He was handing out coke like jelly beans."

  "Where was the party?"

  "I don’t know," Digger said. "Some big old house. Melanie Fox would know. She’s the stewardess that flew with him a lot."

  "I know who she is," Mannion said. "You didn’t kill him?"

  "No. I was just thinking, Lieutenant. I was making a tape recording last night in my room and I had the TV on. It was a ballgame. The background noise on the tape would be the game. That’d fix the time I was in the room."

  Mannion nodded briefly. He seemed unhappy about Digger having an alibi.

  "Do you have any idea who might want to kill him?"

  "I don’t know," Digger said. "If he was doing drugs, who knows? If there was something phony about the plane crash, well, then, that’s something different. Maybe somebody who had something to do with that, might have had something to do with Batchelor’s death."

  "What about the plane crash?" Mannion asked, his voice hardening with suspicion. "You haven’t turned up anything yet, have you?"

  "Nothing yet but I’m still looking. Where was he killed?"

  "At the Oedipus Motel."

  "Maybe some chickie shot him ’cause he couldn’t get it up."

  Mannion shrugged. "If that’s a reason, my wife would go for my lungs twice a week," he said.

  "Who rented the room at the motel?" Digger asked.

  "Some woman. Mary Grissom. Dark hair, sun-glasses. You know her?"

  "No."

  "She paid cash. She gave an out-of-state license plate but we checked and it’s a phony. Goddamit, Burroughs, why the hell aren’t you the murderer so I could close this up and get a night’s sleep?"

  "Sorry, Lieutenant, I do my best to please but that’s above and beyond. How’d you find me, anyway?"

  "Coley out there. Don’t look shocked. I knew he was doing some work for you. He told me about it. I thought it was all right if you were going to find out something we didn’t know about that plane crash."

  "So far all I’ve done is eat up my boss’s money."

  "I guessed as much. Okay, you can get out of here, but don’t leave town without checking with me."

  "I will." Digger got up from the hardbacked chair. "Anybody see this Mary Grissom’s car?"

  "No. She described it on the application as a white Ford."

  Digger walked to the door.

  "One last thing, Burroughs."

  "Yes."

  "A woman was in here yesterday with some lunatic story about Interpol and the Bermuda Triangle. Said some guy from Interpol came and took a letter from her and put a guard on her house. She wanted to know if it was safe to go out. The letter had something to do with one of the crash victims."

  Digger laughed. "You really get the half-decks in your business, Lieutenant. I didn’t look. Was it a full moon yesterday?"

  "It’s a full moon everyday in this business. Don’t leave town."

  "No, sir. I couldn’t. My ex-wife and children are coming to visit."

  Digger took a cab to Melanie Fox’s apartment but she did not answer the bell. When Digger insisted on the doorbell, the upstairs resident of the two-family house finally came to the front door.

  "You really know how to ring a bell, don’t you?" the woman said. She had a long straight nose, framed by two bulbous cheeks. Her face was blotched red and her hair looked as if it had almost rusted away.

  "Sorry to disturb you. I’m looking for Melanie."

  "Who are you?"

  "A friend of hers. Elmo Lincoln. I was checking out some insurance matters for her."

  "Well, you’ll have to wait. She went away. Said she had to visit her folks."

  "When’d she leave?"

  "Yesterday afternoon. She said she’d be a couple of days. Asked me to watch the apartment."

  She stopped as if suddenly realizing that Digger might be the advance man for a gang of burglars who specialized in cheap furniture. "I’ve got my Doberman running around down there every night," she warned.

  "I’ll be sure to wait until she gets home," Digger said. "Thank you very much." He turned to go, then stopped.

  "By the way, she asked me to look into car insurance for her. Do you know what kind of car she has?"

>   "A Buick, ’79 or ’80."

  "What color is it?"

  "Black."

  "Thank you."

  Digger had kept the cabdriver waiting and he next directed him to Trini Donnelly’s house.

  He told the cab to wait again and walked to the house. The two sociopaths were nowhere in sight, but Trini was standing behind the screen door, looking at him as he came up the steps.

  "What do you want?"

  "I’ve got a question," he said.

  "Send it to Dear Abby. My answers are all used up."

  "Trini, it’s important."

  She had seemed ready to slam the inside door but she hesitated briefly.

  "Why didn’t you tell me your husband was sick?"

  "I told you, he stopped drinking," she said.

  "I’m not talking about drinking."

  "Then I don’t know what you’re talking about," she said.

  "Cancer. Terminal cancer."

  "Oh, my god."

  "You didn’t know?" Digger asked.

  "Go away. Please go away."

  Digger said, "Will you be all right?"

  "Just go," she said. She closed the door. Diggerstood there for a moment. From inside, he heard sobbing.

  Koko was in the room, playing the tapes Digger had left in the dresser drawer. She took the ear plug out of her ear.

  "Where’d you get the tape player?" he asked.

  "I went out and bought it. It’s a cheapo but I didn’t know how late you’d be and I thought maybe listening would help some."

  "Did it?"

  "I don’t know. Where were you?"

  "Police headquarters, by special request. They found Batchelor murdered this morning. They don’t know who did it."

  "What’d they call you in for? You’re not a suspect, are you?" Koko asked.

  "No, I don’t think so. The lieutenant just doesn’t like me and he dragged me in on general principles."

  "How was he killed?"

  "Bullet in the head while he was lying on the bed, fully clothed in Room 17 of the Oedipus Motel. That’s some motherless name for a motel."

  "Digger, that’s where I lost that cowlet last night in the black car. At that intersection. I remember thinking what a stupid name for a motel."