The Hanging

Chapter 23

“This is where you live?”

Thornbury seemed uncomfortable as his eyes scanned the floodlit mountainside down to the house, as if something wasn’t sitting quite right with him.

“Anything wrong with that, Detective?” I asked.

“No.” He shook his head, seemed to shake off something else, too. “It’s great up here. Those your horses out front?”

“Two of them.”

“It’s just…” He looked back up toward the mountain. “I never knew this was here. This area, I mean.”

“That isn’t what you started to say, is it?”

“No.” He flashed a quick, self-deprecating smile. “It’s what we were talking about before, jumping to conclusions too soon. When I thought you were just a temp worker, if I ever thought about where you lived, I thought maybe a little apartment in the Valley. Then when I found out you were in television and lived up here and you were hanging out with some foreign diplomat, I expected iron gates and swimming pools and gold-plated crappers.”

“Sorry to disappoint you; it’s just a house in a canyon.”

“No, I’m the sorry one.”

“Where do you live, Detective?”

“I live in a canyon, too. The stucco canyons out east in Diamond Bar.”

“Quite a commute,” I said.

“It is that.” He didn’t sound happy about it.

Two hours earlier, Roger had hooked up Frankie and taken him down the freeway to the Sheriff’s substation in Lost Hills for safekeeping until Thornbury and Weber had a chance to talk to him. After that, the young man would be transported to LA County’s Central Jail south of downtown where he would wait for arraignment. We were just waiting for the scientific team to finish up inside.

Thornbury kept his eyes on the mountain, but turned his chin a few degrees my way.

“The kid says he’s going to charge you and your friends with kidnapping, unlawful detainer, and assault.”

“I wish him luck with that,” I said. “The laundry list of charges against him starts with attempted murder and moves on to felony assholery and impersonating an artist, just for starters.”

Thornbury dropped his head and chuckled in spite of himself. After a moment, he asked, “Can you see the kid for killing Holloway?”

“I don’t know enough about him to answer that.”

Jean-Paul came outside with my overnight bag slung over his shoulder. Weber followed.

“Maggie, are you ready?” Jean-Paul asked, slipping his arm through mine. “Everyone is gone and the front is all locked up.”

“Detective,” I said to Thornbury. “Any reason for us to stick around?”

He glanced at Weber, got a head shake as response.

“No. Go ahead-we know where to reach you. We’ll follow you down.”

Before we got into Jean-Paul’s Mercedes we gave Duke and company some carrots and scratched their forelocks. They seemed awfully proud of themselves, but for what I had no clue.

Jean-Paul lived in the French consul general’s official residence, an early-twentieth-century Tudoresque house in the middle of a block of similarly gracious, large old houses in the Hancock Park neighborhood west of downtown Los Angeles. The English consul lived down the street.

A young Mexican couple, Yolanda and her husband Teo, lived in an apartment over the garage and took care of the yard, the house, and Jean-Paul. The young man, from time to time, doubled as Jean-Paul’s driver, and his wife prepared his meals when he ate at home, unless there was an official event. For those occasions, a private chef and serving staff were brought in. Yolanda and Teo were pleasant, efficient and unobtrusive.

The arrangement had worked very well for Jean-Paul until December when his son, Dominic, went back to France to study for his college exams. I knew he felt lonely living alone, another reason to be cautious about getting involved with him too quickly.

“Hello, Miss MacGowen.” Yolanda opened the door for us; she had heard the car. “How nice to see you again.”

Teo said a quiet “Good evening,” as he took my bag from Jean-Paul and waited for instructions.

“To my room, please, Teo.”

I caught a faint blush coloring Yolanda’s cheeks, though the cheerful expression on her face did not change, as Teo headed up to the master bedroom.

“I have a soufflé in the oven, Mr. Bernard.” We never got back to our dinner. “It will be ready for you in about ten minutes. Would you prefer the dining room or the small parlor?”

“The kitchen, please,” he said. “If we won’t be in your way.”

His answer surprised her, but still smiling, she said, “Not at all.”

When we were alone, I whispered, “I think we have scandalized the help.”

“And isn’t it about time?” He seemed very pleased with himself, so I kissed him, right there in the middle of the foyer.

Guido was the first to call in the morning. He had finished with the task I had set for him the night before, and was on his way with a crew to film the bullet holes in my kitchen windows before the glazier showed up to replace the broken panes.

The second call came from Mom, just as I had wrapped a towel around my head after a shower. It was a little past seven o’clock and Jean-Paul was still in the shower, a tidbit I did not divulge.

“I’m not snooping, Margot,” Mom said. “But I need you to tell me you’re fine.”

“I’m fine.”

“Every time Roger goes out on a police call he announces where he’s going. Another drunk wrapped around a tree, or college pranksters making too much noise-you know the sort of thing. But last night he said nothing. His face was red when he came back from his call, and then he gave Kate a look that made her turn white, so I knew immediately that whatever it was had to concern you.”

“Could have been anybody, Mom.”

“Kate and Marisol were on either side of me at the table, his parents were both there and he had just spoken not an hour earlier with his grown children. That leaves you, my dear daughter.”

“Nothing to worry about, Mom. Someone shot out a couple of my kitchen windows last night, that’s all.”

“Where were you when it happened?”

“At dinner with Jean-Paul.”

There was just the slightest pause before she asked, “What did you cook last night, dear?”

“The kid was a lousy shot, Mom. Don’t give it another thought.”

“Hah!”

“Have you persuaded Gracie you aren’t in the clutches of a cult?”

“If it’s a cult, she likes everyone in it very much. Here she is.”

Gracie Nussbaum was on the phone. “What was all that about last night?”

“Business as usual, Gracie,” I said. “So, has Mom said anything more to you about moving down here?”

“I think she’s made her decision, honey. She talked with your former housemate Lyle last night about the logistics. He suggested that she keep the house furnished, except for the things she’ll want in her apartment, and turn that big heap over to the university housing office to rent out to graduate students and visiting faculty. The arrangement will give her a nice tax break and she’ll be able to go up and stay there whenever there’s a vacancy.”

“I knew Lyle would know what to do.”

“That boy is a treasure.”

Gracie told me that she wasn’t ready to move out of her own house yet, but she planned to come down for regular visits. And of course, Mom would be up in Berkeley from time to time.

She handed the phone back to Mom who had one more thing to say.

“Lyle will want to borrow Mike’s pickup when I get around to the actual move.”

Of course he would. I hung up and couldn’t help laughing. Was I ready for Mom as a neighbor? Ready or not, I had brought this on myself.

Hiram Chin, sweating although the living room of Mme Olivier’s Broad Beach mansion was chilly, paced between the massive front windows and the table where his empty apéritif glass rested on a coaster, as if maybe hoping that after each short trip the glass had magically refilled itself.

Mme Olivier, Lisette, to give Hiram and me some privacy after a rather stiff attempt at brunch-no one seemed interested in food-was giving Jean-Paul a tour of the house. The first floor had an open floor plan so wherever they were he could keep an eye on Hiram and me by doing no more than leaning around a pillar or massive sculpture. The living room was two stories high. In order to catch the light and the ocean view, all of the rooms upstairs opened onto a walkway that overlooked the living room below. When the two of them made it upstairs, I spotted Jean-Paul checking on us regularly.

“Ethics,” Chin was saying. “Now there’s a term with variable meanings. Actions that in my mother country might be considered smart business practice might be considered unethical, even illegal, in yours. The reverse is as true. Can you not see the genius involved in creating a perfect replica?”

“I can appreciate craftsmanship in an imitation. But genius? No.”

“You see? That is where we differ.”

“I am less concerned about the ethics of what happened than I am about the events themselves,” I said.

“Why?” he said with enough heat that Jean-Paul’s face quickly appeared over a walkway railing. “It’s over, done with. We were ruined a long time ago. What does it matter now?”

“Park Holloway was murdered only a few days ago. How can you say it’s over?”

He looked at his empty glass with such a desperate longing that I handed him my full one. As he closed his eyes and savored the first sip, I glanced around the room, not knowing where each tiny camera lens had been secreted by Guido early that morning. Because we did not know where Hiram might sit, or not sit, the entire room was covered by cameras. Each camera was fixed in place, so as he paced Hiram moved constantly from the field of vision of one camera into the field of another. The final edited sequence of this conversation in the finished film would have to be a cut-and-splice mosaic with tiny lacunae-gaps in coverage-interrupting the images in the same way that grout interrupts the pattern of a tile floor.

“Hiram, what was Park’s role in the art-for-arms deal?”

“Veneer,” he said. “He made the deal look pretty, and that’s all.”

“Are you protecting Park?”

“Dear God, woman,” he said, glancing at me with disdain. “Don’t you understand that Park Holloway was an empty suit? He was a hick with some book-larnin’ from a fancy Ivy League school who later got pushed to the top of the local manure heap by the boosters from some small cowtown by the mere fact that he didn’t get his degree from the local state college. He did nothing in Congress except warm a chair until I came along; when he was supposed to be studying bills before the House, he was studying Mandarin.”

“I thought he was your friend.”

“He was my front. My American credentials.”

“Why are you being so forthcoming now?”

He beat his fist against his chest. “What have I got to lose?”

“Your freedom?”

“I can arrange to be out of this country before anyone who can stop me could stop me.”

“I have some vague idea what you got out of the art scam. But what did Park get?”

“His life.”

“What does that mean?”

He drained the potent liquid from the tiny glass and took a deep breath, but instead of answering, he turned toward the window and watched the ebbing tide.

“You manipulated the college trustees to get Park hired as president at Anacapa College,” I said. “Why? What can you possibly get out of a cash-strapped community college?”

He stared out the window. “I thought you would have that figured out by now.”

“I’m still working on it.”

Jean-Paul had made his way slowly back downstairs. I glanced out the window and saw Detectives Thornbury and Weber on the beach near the edge of Mme Olivier’s deck, barefoot, baseball caps pulled low over their eyes as camouflage, wearing shorts and sweatshirts, half-heartedly chucking a football back and forth.

I walked over to the wet bar in the corner, picked up a highball glass and held it up to Chin.

“Scotch, light ice, fifty-fifty water,” he said.

It is unethical, in American journalism, to get a subject drunk during questioning. My goal was to keep him mellow; he seemed ready to jump out of his skin. Barring that, more strong drink might render him to some degree impaired in case he intended to do something stupid.

“Tell me about Francis Weidermeyer,” I said, putting the glass in his hand. “Where does he come in?”

As he took the glass from me, he gripped the wrist of the hand that offered it.

“You have slender wrists,” he said, holding on tight.

I pulled myself free of his grasp.

“You were going to tell me about Francis Weidermeyer.”

He looked up at me over the top of his glass. “I wasn’t.”

“Park solicited money to buy a really ugly sculpture that I believe was the work of your friend Weidermeyer’s son by his mistress, Clarice Snow.”

“The kid.” His tone was rife with derision. “Little Frankie.”

Again he looked out at the ocean, drawn by it, seemingly lost in its endless surge and retreat.

“The kid,” I said. “What about him?”

“Park did a lot of favors for Weidermeyer when he was in Congress,” he said. “Greased the skids for export licenses, government contracts, made introductions-that sort of thing. In return, Weidermeyer did a big favor for Park, probably saved his political career.”

“What was that?”

“Father, father, who’s got the father?” he said in a singsong tone, still fixated on the scene outside. It occurred to me that he was probably half in the bag before he came over for croissants that morning. “Isn’t that the game the children play? Father, father?”

“Father, button, whatever,” I said. “At the moment, Frankie Weidermeyer is in jail waiting arraignment. Will his father help him?”

“Can’t. He’s dead.”

He seemed to relax a bit-or at least to lose some starch-leaned a shoulder against the cold window and faced me, finally.

“His mother called me this morning,” he said.

“Did she ask you to help her son?”

“No. She asked me to help her. The FBI came calling last night. They have closed down her gallery.”

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Jean-Paul edging closer. We were both nervous about Hiram; something about him was very off.

“What did Clarice want from you?” I asked.

“A ticket out of the country, a new name and a new passport; the Feebs took hers.”

“What about her son?”

“She can’t help him if she’s in jail, can she?”

I walked across the room and stood next to Hiram at the windows.

Looking at the side of his face, I asked, “What did you mean, ‘Father, father, who’s got the father?’”

He smiled, almost. “What do you know about the art of political mistresses?”

“Not much.”

“Here’s a clue.” He turned and leaned his back against the glass, hands in pockets. “What do Strom Thurmond, Thomas Jefferson, John Edwards and Arnold Schwarzenegger have in common?”

“They were all politicians who had children with mistresses,” I said.

“Bingo,” he said. He pulled his right hand out of his pocket. I saw Jean-Paul lunge for him at the same time I heard the blast of gunfire. Deafened by the explosion at such close proximity, all I knew about what had happened was the rain of fine strawberry mist that rose up out of the top of Hiram’s head and showered down on me. Hiram, his descent lubricated by his own blood, slid down the glass wall behind him until he was seated on the now pink-dappled white carpet. A single eye, fixed and dilated, stared at me with reproach: what should I have known before I cornered him that morning?

My ears rang. People were talking to me, but I had no idea what they were saying, there was so much noise. I saw Thornbury and Weber run into the house, saw that they left sandy footprints on the white carpet. Jean-Paul’s arm was around me, walking me because I seemed to have lost communication with my legs, following Mme Olivier’s elegant straight back in a rush out of the room.

In a marbled bathroom, Jean-Paul and Mme Olivier stripped off my spattered clothes, washed me, wrapped me in a thick terry robe, the sort you find hanging in the closet at some hotels with a tag warning that if you take it you will be billed some extravagant amount of money. That’s what I focused on: if I wore the robe home, was there enough in my checking account to cover the cost of the robe?

When I became somewhat sentient again, I was sitting on the bathroom floor between Jean-Paul’s outstretched legs, his arms around my middle, sipping very strong coffee with the encouragement of Mme Olivier.

I looked at her and said, “What a mess. I am so sorry.”

She laughed, a great, deep laugh full of both relief and compassion. “My dear.” She reached down and stroked my cheek. “My dear.”

Jean-Paul kissed the top of my head. I turned to look at him and saw that his eyes were so full they threatened to spill over.

“Cooking shows are nice,” he said. “If you must continue in television.”

“But I’m not a good cook.”

“A game show, then?”

“I’ll think about it.”

“Please do. I rarely see people hosting game shows face much danger.”

There was a knock on the door. Mme Olivier, who I realized had been sitting atop the toilet lid, reached over and opened the door a crack.

Thornbury’s face appeared.

“We okay in here?”

“I’m so-so,” I said. “But they seem to be a bit rattled.”

Both Jean-Paul and Mme Olivier had the grace to laugh; nerves.

“How are you?” I asked the detective.

“I’ve been on the job for almost twenty years, and I never saw anything like that.” He squeezed in and sat on the edge of the tub. “Man, I can go the rest of my life without seeing it again.”

I offered him what was left in my coffee mug, and he took it.

“I did not see that coming,” he said. He drained the mug and set it on the floor. “It happened so fast, I’m not even sure what I saw.”

“Everything was captured in HD-digital format,” I said.

He looked at me as if maybe he thought I was loopy, and probably I still was.

“There are ten cameras covering that entire room,” I said.

“You filmed it?”

“Yes. I thought I would probably only get one chance at Hiram, so I wanted a record of everything he said. But I had no idea…”

“Did he confess?”

“To killing Park Holloway?” I shook my head. “No.”

“You were talking to him for quite a while,” Thornbury said. “What was that all about?”

“Let me ask you something first,” I said.

“What’s that?”

“I suggested the other day that you might track down a man named Francis Weidermeyer. Did you?”

He nodded. “Yeah.”

“Is he dead?”

“He wasn’t yesterday when I spoke with him. What’s the deal?”

“Do you remember when John Edwards was running for president, and his cookie-on-the-side gave birth to his baby? A friend covered for him, claimed to be the father.”

“I remember. But what does that have to do…?”

“Hiram was talking in riddles. But when I asked him where Frankie Weidermeyer’s father was, he said he was dead. I think that Park Holloway was the kid’s father, and I suspect that Weidermeyer took credit to cover for him.”

“Of course, yes,” Jean-Paul said. “That explains the ridiculous price Holloway paid for that very large and very ugly pile of bronze.”

“Does, doesn’t it?” I said.

I asked Thornbury, “Where did you find Mr. Weidermeyer?”

“In Vegas. He now manages a big construction project.”

“Does he?” I said.

I asked him the name of the company. When he told me, I dropped my face into my hands, didn’t know if I should laugh or cry, because there it was, the missing piece.

“You okay, Maggie?” Thornbury asked, solicitous.

Jean-Paul tightened his grip around me. I looked up at him.

“My foot is asleep,” I said.

He let out a deep breath, smiled, and helped me to my feet. One foot, anyway.

Mme Olivier rose and opened the door.

“Maggie?” Thornbury was still perched on the edge of the tub. “I’ll need that film.”

“I know.”

“Chérie,” Mme Olivier said. “Let’s find you some clothes.”

“Maggie has a bag in the car,” Jean-Paul told her.

She sent her houseman out to retrieve the bag, and led me upstairs to a guest room to change.

When we came back down, paramedics had arrived and determined that there was nothing they could do for Dr. Hiram Chin. Thornbury and Weber, who looked absolutely green around the gills, had cordoned off the far side of the room where Hiram still sat, slouched, with his back against the smeared window. Once again, the detectives, working a case on the far northern edge of Los Angeles County, had to protect the crime scene until the coroner and a team from the Scientific Services Bureau could find their way all the way from downtown.

Guido came to retrieve his film equipment but couldn’t get past the deputies at the gate until Thornbury went out and vouched for him.

“Damn, Maggie,” Guido said as he walked in and caught a glimpse of the scene. “Can’t let you out of my sight, can I?”

“Not for a minute.” I patted his cheek. “The police want all of the original footage, but we need to keep a copy.”

“Everybody will have to settle for a copy,” he said. “It’s digital. There is no ‘original’ footage unless they want the computer’s motherboard, and that won’t do them much good. All of the cameras fed live images into a system I set up in the garage that recorded and sent a simultaneous backup to a cloud file. I can go out to the garage now and make a copy, but the original file exists.”

“Would you please make the detectives a copy to take with them?”

We made plans to meet at the studio later, and excused by Thornbury, Jean-Paul and I left.

In the car, Jean-Paul put a hand on my knee.

“Why did you react so strongly when the detective told you where Weidermeyer works?”

“Until I heard that, I could not understand what two big-time operators like Chin and Holloway were doing at Anacapa College. Chin especially. The man lives large, right?”

“If he owns a house in this neighborhood, I have to say yes.”

“The college system is flat broke,” I said. “Except for one pocket.”

He stole a glance at me. “Yes?”

“Think Taj Ma’Holloway.”