The Frumious Bandersnatch

14

IT WASeighty-forty-five on the squadroom clock.

“The address is 64 Beachside,” Carella told the detective in the South Beach Police Department. “There may be a kidnap victim there, so proceed with extreme caution.”

Out there in Russell County, they used more paramilitary rank designations than they did here in the big bad city. Detective-Sergeant James Cody asked if there was likely to be anyone armed and dangerous in that house.

Carella said, “Yes, that’s likely.”

“We’ll be careful then,” Cody said.

There was no need.

The only person in that house was a dead girl chained to a radiator.

Everyone else had driven off five minutes ago.

MISS COLEwas getting used to phone calls from Detective Stephen Louis Carella.

“Yes, Detective?” she said almost cheerfully.

“Miss Cole, I’m sorry to bother you again…”

“Oh, it’s no bother at all,” she said.

“On this list of calls made from those two addresses I gave you…”

“Yes, Detective?”

Almost cooing the words.

“There were almost daily calls listed to an unpublished number. Now, I know it’s telephone company policy not to reveal…”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. “This is a kidnapping. Just give me a minute.”

She came back in three.

“All those calls were made to the same party,” she said.

“And who was that, Miss Cole?”

“A man named Barney Loomis,” she said. “At 583 South Thompson. Is that helpful to you, Detective?”

“THEY HANDED USa beaut,” Detective-Sergeant James Cody told the County Medical Examiner.

It was five minutes past nine that Tuesday night and the house at 64 Beachside was swarming with men wearing blue windbreakers, the word “POLICE” lettered in yellow across their backs. The dead girl was in one of the bedrooms. Her wrist was still handcuffed to the radiator.

“Christ, look what they did to her,” the ME said.

Cody nodded. “Can’t find the key anyplace,” he said. “We were waiting for you to get here, see do you want us to saw through the cuffs or what. I figure they got out of here in one hell of a hurry. Left her behind all chained up that way.”

There were three spent cartridge cases on the floor, presumably spewed from the murder weapon.

“Shot her in the face at close range,” Cody said.

“Looks like,” the ME said.

The equivalent of South Beach’s Crime Scene Unit was busy dusting for prints and vacuuming for fibers and hair. One of the technicians glanced toward the dead girl and muttered, “Fuckin animals.”

In one of the other bedrooms, they found three masks. Saddam Hussein, Yasir Arafat, and George W. Bush.

“Three of the world’s great leaders,” Cody said dryly.

Just about then, Detectives Carella and Hawes were knocking on the door to Apartment 22C at 583 South Thompson.

AT NINE-FORTY-FIVEthat night, just as Air France’s flight #23 for Paris was about to take off, Ollie and Patricia came out of the movie theater into a fairly decent rain. He took off his jacket, and over her protests draped it over her shoulders.

“You’ll get allwet! ” she told him.

“Tut tut,” he said. “Would you care to go for some pizza?”

Patricia said she wasn’t hungry, but she’d be happy to join him.

Over his third slice, he told her he had learned a lot from that movie.

“Like what?” she asked.

“Like it ain’t only about a ticking clock,” Ollie said.

CARELLA DID NOTlearn that Tamar Valparaiso was dead until he and Hawes got back to the squadroom with Barney Loomis in tow. It was now ten o’clock. Flight #23 for Charles de Gaulle airport had been in the air for ten minutes already, and Avery Hanes was waiting in British Air’s lounge to board flight #82 to London’s Heathrow. Sergeant Murchison behind the muster desk told them that Mr. Loomis’ attorney was waiting in the lieutenant’s office.

“Also, you got a call from a Detective Cody out at South Beach,” he said, and handed Carella a folded message.

Carella glanced at it briefly.

“Want to take Mr. Loomis to his lawyer?” he asked Hawes, and then went to his own desk and immediately called the Joint Task Force, grateful when they put him through to Endicott rather than Corcoran.

“Stan,” he said, “the girl is dead. I just heard from the South Beach Police, she was being held in a house out there. All three of the perps are gone. I’ve got full names for two of them, and a given name for the third. They made calls to Air Jamaica, British Air, Air France, American, Virgin Atlantic, and Delta. You’ve got better ties to Homeland Security than we do, maybe you can flash their names on the airport computers here and across the river. I’ve got Barney Loomis in custody, I think he was an accomplice…”

“Wait a minute,wait a minute! BarneyLoomis? ”

“One of the perps called his home number every day in March.”

“You’ve been busy,” Endicott said dryly.

“Can you cover the airports?”

“What are those names you’ve got?” Endicott said.

BARNEY LOOMIS’ attorney was a man named Roger Halliday. He’d been watchingThe West Wing on television when Loomis called from his apartment. Balding and a trifle portly, he’d come to the squadroom in a dark blue business suit and tie, looking more like a banker than any criminal lawyer the detectives knew. Actually, he was a skilled corporate attorney, and it never occurred to him that he might be out of his league here.

“Is my client being charged with something?” he asked.

“Not yet, Mr. Halliday,” Hawes said. “We’d just like to ask him some questions.”

“He doesn’t have to answer any questions, you know that.”

“Yes, we know that.”

“Has he been read his rights? The man’s under arrest here, have you yet…?”

“We read them to him in his apartment,” Carella said.

“Read them to him again now,” Halliday said.

Carella read Loomis his rights again.

Halliday looked bored.

“So what do you want to do?” he asked Loomis. “You don’t have to answer any questions if you don’t want to. My advice is you ask them either to charge you or let you go. Even if they charge you, you don’t have to answer any questions. This is America, don’t forget.”

“Charge me with what?” Loomis asked. “I haven’t done anything.”

“Why don’t you just satisfy our curiosity, Mr. Loomis?” Carella said. “Answer a few questions for us, okay?”

“No, I don’t think so,” Loomis said.

TWO HOMELAND SECURITYagents boarded British Air’s flight #82 ten minutes before it was scheduled to take off for London. They found Avery Hanes in the first-class section, where he was already enjoying a scotch and soda, and they asked him if he would mind accompanying them off the aircraft. Since they were both armed, he said he wouldn’t mind at all.

Fifteen minutes later, he ratted out Barney Loomis, and told them they could find Calvin Wilkins in American Airline’s first-class lounge. He also told them that his girlfriend Kellie Morgan would be landing in Paris at eleven-fifteen tomorrow morning.

Wilkins’ flight to Jamaica was not scheduled to leave until sevenA.M. tomorrow morning. He was curled up asleep on one of the lounge’s sofas when they shook him awake. Looking up into what appeared to be nine-millimeter weapons, he said, “Oh shit.”

WHEN NELLIE BRANDgot to the squadroom at close to eleven, she was still wearing the long green gown and green satin slippers she’d worn to the annual May Cotillion at the River Dix Yacht Club, to which she and her husband belonged. She was also wearing a mink stole, and a jade necklace her husband had given her this past Christmas, and she looked less like a District Attorney answering a rotation call than a stockbroker’s wife who’d been drinking champagne not an hour and a half ago, which she was and which she had been.

Carella took her aside and told her what he had.

“That’s purely circumstantial,” she said. “Is that why you dragged me all the way up here?”

“I think it’ll wash.”

“I don’t. Guy could’ve called him for any one of a thousand reasons besides criminal chicanery.”

“How’d he happen to know him? How’d he get his home number?”

“How do I know? Having a person’s home number doesn’t add up to kidnapping.”

“The girl’s dead, Nellie. This is now a death penalty case.”

“Where are these people with whom he allegedly conspired?”

“Flew the coop.”

“That’s nice. And you say they left a dead girl behind?”

“Yes.”

“This singer I’ve been seeing all over television?”

“That’s the one.”

“Very high profile, Steve. You’d better be right.”

“What can we lose?” Carella said. “Let’s give it a shot.”

“I must be out of my mind,” Nellie said.

THE Q ANDA started at a quarter past eleven.

It had been a long Tuesday for everyone in that room. Well, everyone except maybe the police stenographer, who took down every word as Loomis was read his rights for the third time, and then advised that he did not have to answer any questions if he chose not to…

“I choose not to,” he said.

“In which case,” Nellie said, “we’ll be charging you with Conspiracy to Commit Kidnapping…”

“That’s ridiculous,” Halliday said.

“…and Kidnapping itself, which is an A-1 Felony…”

“You truly can’t be serious, young lady.”

“Oh but I am, Counselor. Under the laws of this state, your client acted in concert, and it doesn’t matter whether he was a principal or an accomplice…”

“A Grand Jury will kick this out in five minutes!”

“We’ll see, I guess,” Nellie said. “You think they’ll also kick out Felony Murder?”

“Murder?” Loomis said.

“Murder during a kidnapping,” Nellie said. “The same thing as Murder One.”

“What do you meanmurder? ” Loomis asked. “Did theykill Tamar? Are you saying theykilled her?”

“She was shot in the face at close range with a high-powered rifle,” Carella said.

“That wasn’t thedeal! ” Loomis shouted, and suddenly he was sobbing into his hands.

I LOVED THAT GIRLas if she was my own daughter, he told them. The deal was they’d hold her till the ransom was paid, and then they’d let her go. They weren’t supposed to hurt her, they certainly weren’t supposed to…to…

And here he buried his face in his hands and began sobbing again.

Halliday took this opportunity to remind him that he was not compelled to say anything.

Loomis kept sobbing into his hands.

“Mr. Loomis?” Nellie said.

He just kept sobbing.

“Would you like to tell us what happened?” she said softly.

She was skilled at such things.

Loomis nodded into his hands.

Halliday shook his head.

I MAKE A HABITof stopping in record stores, checking on how our product is displayed, what kind of space we’re getting, all that. I normally introduce myself to the manager, sometimes to the floor personnel, tell them I’m the CEO of Bison Records, explain how much this or that CD or album means to me, ask them to keep a personal eye on it. I love every record we put out. Every one of them. I love this business. I love music.

I knew Tamar was going to be a big star the minute I heard her for the first time. She could bang out a song like Cher, or hoot and holler like Steven Tyler. She could bend notes like the best blues and country singers, or break and yodel like Alanis Morissette. And sweet! Oh Jesus, what asweet wonderful voice! She could break your heart with the simplest ballad. Like an angel. She sang like an angel.

Every store I went into, I told them to watch out for Tamar Valparaiso.

I told them Tamar Valparaiso was going to be the next big singing sensation.

THIS KID WORKEDin the shop just around the corner from our office. I used to stop in there after lunch almost every day. Just before I went back upstairs. Lorelei Records. I checked out the product, the displays, told this kid what was hot for us this week…

Avery Hanes.

That’s his name.

Told him what was coming down the pike, what he should be on the lookout for. Tamar Valparaiso, I told him. Coming in May. The album is calledBandersnatch. That’s the title song, “Bandersnatch.” Watch for it. We’ll be doing a terrific video. Watch for it. Tamar Valparaiso.

One day…

Q: Is Avery Hanes the person who made the ransom calls?

A: Yes.

Q: Is Avery Hanes the person who actually kidnapped Tamar Valparaiso?

A: Well, not alone. He wasn’t working alone. I gave him all the information about the launch, and he told me he thought he could do it with just three people. Himself and two other people.

Q: Who were these two other people?

A: I have no idea.

Q: Do the names…excuse me. Steve, what were those names again?

A: (from Detective Carella) Calvin Wilkins and Kellie Something, we don’t have a last name for her.

Q: Do those names mean anything to you, Mr. Loomis?

A: Nothing at all.

Q: So the only person you dealt with was Avery Hanes.

A: Yes.

Q: Was the kidnapping his idea?

A: Well, it sort of evolved.

Q: How do you mean?

A: From talks we had. We discussed all sorts of approaches, he’s really a quite brilliant young man. Primarily, I was concerned with how to make the debut album a success. I had such faith in Tamar, I wanted so much for her to make it in a big way…

Avery didn’t care how he spent my money, of course, well, you know how young people are, nothing’s impossible to them. All these big ideas about massive in-store promos, and TV ads, and subway posters, and ads on the sides of busses, ten cities, twenty cities, a hundred cities! He was talking about millions in advertising and promotion alone, a prohibitive approach, really, on top of everything else we’d be doing.

At first, we met in my office. He’d come up on his lunch hour, and we’d discuss his ideas. I like to encourage young people, I’m very good with young people. And he was so…enthusiastic,do you know? One day, he said something about five minutes of fame, fifteen minutes of fame, whatever it was, Andy Warhol’s famous saying. He said if only we could do something that could give Tamar just those fifteen minutes of fame, was what it was, then the rest would follow. Like if she broke her leg onstage during a concert…

“But she won’t be doing any concerts till after the album release,” I told him.

“Or got hit by a bus…” he said.

“Oh sure, hit by a bus.”

“Do you remember when this writer Ira Levin wrote a book calledA Kiss Before Dying, where the last chapter is this girl gets pushed off the roof? Well, right after the book was published this girl in real life fell off a roof someplace in New York, and she had a copy of the goddamnbook in her pocket! Something like that, you know?”

“Sure, we’ll push Tamar off the roof.”

“Come on, Barney…”

He was calling me Barney by then.

“…I’m talking about something spectacular. Something that will make headlines.”

“Like what?”

“Like she gets smacked around by some goon in a disco…”

“No, no.”

“…or somebody’s stalking her…”

“That won’t make headlines.”

“…or she gets kidnapped or something,” Avery said, and we both looked at each other.

There’s that moment, you know?

There’s that moment when you realize this is it.

Avery suggested fifty thousand dollars as the ransom, but I said we’d never find anyone to do it for that kind of money, so he said, “Okay a hundred, how does that sound?” and I said that still sounded too low, one minute he’s talking about spending ten million dollars in as many cities, and now he’s down to a hundred grand! I told him that would sound phony as hell, and besides, no one would risk a kidnapping for a lousy hundred thousand dollars! So we batted it back and forth until we hit on two-fifty, which was, after all, a quarter of a million dollars, a not unreasonable asking price for someone who was not yet a star.

I don’t think he was playing me, do you think he was playing me? I mean, I don’t think he knew all along that he was the one who’d be doing the actual kidnapping, I don’t think he was bargaining for a higher fee. There was an innocence about Avery…well, he double-crossed me later on. But at the time, I think he genuinely was just so enthusiastic about the idea, justinto it, you know, working with me to find what would sound like a reasonable ransom demand, not too low, not too high, two hundred and fifty thousand dollars had just the rightring to it, the way the whole idea seemed absolutelyright.

But then we faced the reality.

Never mind the fifteen minutes of fame. Who were we going to find who’d risk getting caught doing something as serious as a kidnapping? And who could we trust to keep quietif they got caught? Who could we trust not to say that Barney Loomis of Bison Records had engineered the kidnapping of his own young recording artist?

“You could trustme, ” Avery said.

I looked at him.

“I’d do it,” he said.

Q: When did you hatch this brilliant scheme?

Little touch of sarcasm there, Carella thought. Be careful, Nellie. He’ll spook and tell you to go to hell, no more questions.

Q: Mr. Loomis? When did you and Mr. Hanes decide that he would be the one to carry out the kidnapping scheme?

A: It must have been in March sometime. We set everything in motion in March. That was when he found the house at the beach…

Q: The house at the beach?

A: South Beach. He rented a house there. To take Tamar to. He had his team together by then, he told me they were both experienced people, it should go off without a hitch. As a matter of fact, it did. Though I have to tell you I could havekilled whoever that was with him on the night of the launch, when he slapped Tamar…

Q: The name Calvin Wilkins still doesn’t mean anything to you, is that correct?

A: I never heard of him.

Q: And the first name Kellie?

A: No. Whoever it was, the deal was nobody lays a finger on her, Avery knew that. Keep her for forty-eight hours, collect the ransom—which was really his fee for his role in all this—and then let her go safe and sound. That was the deal. He knew all the details of the launch party, I’d provided him with those, he even had a floor plan of theRiver Princess. It was frightening as hell when they came down those stairs, wasn’t it? Did you see the Channel Four tape? It looked real as hell, didn’t it?

Q: Itwas real, Mr. Loomis.

A: Well, certainly. To the observer, itlooked real, especially when that idiot hit Tamar’s partner with the rifle and then slapped her, I could’ve killed him. But it was allfake, you see, it was all a hoax, you see. We kept reminding ourselves of that all the time we were planning it. It’s a hoax, stupid, it’s a hoax.

Q: Yes, but it was real.

A: It only became real when he double-crossed me. Asked for a million instead of the two-fifty we’d agreed upon. Well, sure, he saw what was happening, I’m sure he was glued to that television screen day and night. Tamar had her fifteen minutes of fame, all right, in spades. It worked, you see! She was a diva overnight!

“A dead one,” Nellie said.

And Loomis buried his face in his hands and began sobbing again.