Heartbreak Hotel

Chapter 30

I drove home and worked the computer, searching for any kind of familial link to Fred Drancy. No success in his birth state of Massachusetts, same with New York and California. The people I talked to in a few neighboring states were baffled. My last call was to a man in Berlin, New Hampshire, who said, “Are you from that magazine outfit with the big check?”

“Sorry, no.”

“Who cares, I don’t read, anyway.”

I was trying to figure out a next step when Robin came in, hair tied back, T-shirt flecked with sawdust. Behind her bounced Blanche wearing a frosting of wood shavings.

Robin ran her fingers through my hair, trailed them down to my neck, kneaded.

“No progress, huh?”

“My neck tells you that?”

“All of you tells me that.”

“We’ve got a good idea about motive and a couple of dead suspects. The problem is finding the live ones.”

I told her about DeGraw.

She said, “Another one? These people are relentless and greedy. You think they got away with a huge amount of Thalia’s cash?”

“That’s what it looks like.”

“Okay,” she said, adding pressure to her fingertips.

“You don’t think so?”

“I’m on the outside, honey, but why would someone in her situation keep substantial cash around?”

“Milo found three thousand.”

“That, I can see,” she said. “Tips, gifts, shopping. But you said she’d stopped going out and her basic needs were taken care of by the hotel. You didn’t describe her as a hoarder or any other kind of eccentric. She’d been investing successfully for years, wasn’t one of those under-the-mattress types.”

The value of a fresh eye.

I said, “It’s a good point.”

She pushed down harder. Muscles I hadn’t realized were tight began to slacken.

“The other thing, Alex, is once upon a time she had a boyfriend who stole jewels. What if he left her a souvenir or two? Something really valuable but small, that a thief could stick in a pocket and walk out with?”

I said, “Unbelievable.”

“Doesn’t make sense?”

“It makes total sense. You’re unbelievable.”

“Did you find any jewelry in her room?”

“A couple of decent pieces. An amethyst ring.”

She said, “Semi-precious — that’s what some women do. Leave the cheaper stuff out, hide the good stuff. If there was major-league bling, that’s what I’d go for.”

I turned. She smiled. “If I was criminally inclined, that is. Were the jewels from the Beverly Hills robbery ever recovered?”

“There’s no record of recovery. But we suspect they were cashed and the money was taken by the IRS with a possible share going to the department.”

I told her about the Demarest report.

She said, “Even with that, Hoke could’ve left his babe a bauble or two as tokens of his affection.” Wider smile. “You were a hood and I was a moll, I’d expect it.”

“You’re brilliant.” I got up and kissed her.

She said, “That was my commission for being smart?”

“A down payment.” I found my notes on the case, came upon what I was looking for. Read and sat back down.

“Oh,” I said. “You’re a genius!”

No reply. I swiveled again.

Just me in the office.

From the kitchen came the singsong Robin glides into when discussing topics of substance with Blanche.

Return yip. The rattle of kibble on the porcelain of a dog-bowl.

I went in, waving a piece of paper. “Look at what you’ve wrought, Einsteinia.”

She resealed the food bag and grinned. “Appreciate the sentiment, but it’s been a bad-hair day, maybe you can come up with a girlier analogy?”

“How about Ada Lovelace?”

“Sounds like a porn actress.”

“She was Lord Byron’s daughter, a math genius and probably the first computer programmer.”

“Now we’re talking — how do you know these things?”

“Malignant curiosity.”

“Ha. Okay, what have I wrought?”

I showed her the Beverly Hills Monitor puff piece on Count Frederick LaPlante, pointed to the last two lines.

She said, “Wine of the Nile? The pyramids?”

“A big ruby’s one helluva motive.”

“Sure, but why’re you focusing on this one and not the others?”

“Because of a pencil notation on the back of that LAPD report. ‘Win. Ni. 57.’ ”

“Wine, Nile,” she said. “You think she got to keep the ruby?”

I pointed.

“Ah,” she said. “Fifty-seven carats, that’s some boulder.”

“What if Demarest made a note because it was never recovered?”

“The one that got away? Because Thalia kept it all these years?”

“Diversified investment,” I said. “Let’s see if we can find a picture of this trinket.”

Easier than I’d expected. The ruby was listed in the holdings of an Egyptian banker named Adel Fawzi Sayed, whose collection had been loaned to the British Museum for a 1929 exhibit titled Treasures of the Pharaohs.

The tit-for-tat: Sayed’s knighthood a month before the show opened. Soon after it closed, Sir Fawzi sold much of his cache and used the proceeds to buy a mansion in Belgravia.

Fuzzy black-and-white photos included a shot of “a 57 carat, oval, pigeon-blood ruby said to have been unearthed in one of the Pyramids of Giza. However, the Burmese origin of the gem and the nineteenth century style of cutting casts doubt on that assertion. Nevertheless, it is a jewel of uncommon size, beauty, and rarity.”

“Nice,” said Robin. “I’m thinking brooch. Something falling right above the cleavage.”

She demonstrated.

“Now you’re distracting me.”

“Me? Never.”

I stayed distracted all the way to the bedroom. Achieved focus without trying.

Afterward, lying on the bed, as Robin showered, I replayed my time with Thalia. Had trouble conjuring images. Then they came to me, as if a mental drainpipe had been snaked.

So did a snip of conversation.

The lapidary reference that had escaped me.

Thalia asking me about criminal tendencies, then expressing dismay.

I was hoping for better. Would still like to think of our planet as an evolutionary gem.

And again, moments later, describing images taken by the Hubble telescope.

I was cheered. The universe seemed... jewel-like.

Playing games? Or rehearsing a story she planned to tell me later.

There hadn’t been a later.

Robin began humming as she dried off. Warren Zevon’s “Carmelita.”

I returned to that first time in the bungalow. Nearly snagged an image but lost it — one of those tip-of-the-mind frustrations.

I gave up. Sat up. It came to me, clear as a digital photo.

Robin walked in, wrapped in a towel. “Hi, babe... are you waiting for something? Love the passion, but if you don’t mind—”

“Honey, I think I saw it.”

“Saw what?”

“The ruby.” I told her where.

“Crafty,” she said. “Now, that could be a motive.”

I got dressed and phoned Milo. “You’re not going to believe this.”

“At this point I’m open to all kinds of beliefs, including ecologically justified cannibalism. What religion do you want me to convert to?”

“The Church of Cautious Optimism.” I filled him in.

He said, “Win. Ni.”

“Fifty-seven carats, that’s got to be it.”

“You just came up with this?”

“Robin led me to it.” I repeated her logic.

“That’s some smart girl you’ve got.”

“Lord Byron would be proud.”

“What?”

“Never mind. Why don’t you call the crime lab and find out?”

“No call, something like this, the evidence chain needs to be solid, I’ll check it out personally. Can you meet me in front of the station, say immediately?”

“I’ll be there sooner.”