City of Ghosts (A Miranda Corbie Mystery) (44 page)

Her legs were trembling by now, as she looked at her hands and sank slowly on the mattress.

She was holding a jade necklace.

*   *   *

Miranda stood by the window and smoked. The jade looked enough like Mrs. Hart’s to be Mrs. Hart’s. Cold, implacable, a brilliant green.

Miranda clicked the beads together,
click-clack
,
click-clack,
only sound in the small, stuffy apartment except for her breathing. She’d searched the rest of the shoes, the hatbands, and the pockets of Fingers’s clothes. She’d discovered a jade bracelet in a fedora hatband and a pair of earrings in some socks.

Click-clack, click-clack, click-clack …

Not much paperwork, no trail in ink for Fingers. Camels and Lucky Strikes in the almost full milk-glass ashtray, no lipstick on the stubs. Maps of San Francisco and Oakland in his nightstand drawer and a Catholic Bible. No postcards, no letters, no photos. He’d hoarded matchbooks, penny saved was a penny dipped, and there was a small pile on a scarred coffee table in front of the two-seat couch.

She poked a finger through the pile, found one for Finnegan’s and the Koffee Kup and Pig n’ Whistle, Topsy’s out by the beach. There was one from Los Angeles—a donut shop—and a new book on top from United Airlines.

Click-clack, click-clack, click-clack …

She picked it up and held it to the light. The small print under the logo read: “Hubbard Field—closest air transport to Reno, Nevada. All flights daily.”

Her fingers closed around the matchbook, and she drew down on the Chesterfield, expelling the smoke through her nose and mouth, watching it cloud the already cloudy room.

Miranda thought of Baltimore and Pinkerton and the State Department, the price of art and the price of fakes and the price of information, a whole fucking world at war, with no one to look over your shoulder. Jade and art, movable feasts, stable assets when currency becomes obsolete. She thought of means and opportunity and the motive in front of them all, the motive behind everything.

Greed.

Behind the first stone thrown, behind the first sin sinned, behind the blown-up bodies and bleeding children, behind the jackboots and the yellow stars, refugees trudging down dusty French roads, bombs falling like rain on Warsaw and Guernica, drops red, so very red …

A woman with money. Mrs. Lois Hart, millionaire’s wife, politician’s mistress, hophead’s mother. Lois and her improbable friendship with Edmund, her insistence on paying off and paying quietly, her attachment to a priceless jade parure, gift of her husband.

Lois Hart, whose whispered word could buy her mink but not a pretty death. And then Lois fell and the dance continued, marathon and never ending, and they danced until they all fell down, after the jade, the art, the secrets.

Before Lois, Grant Tompkins. A man with a wife and children, the man who held her job. Grant Tompkins, the State Department agent who opened the door to possibility, and Lois Hart, who made it all come true.

First Grant and Lois—then Edmund—then Jasper and Wardon and Cheney. Dominoes and ducks, all in a row.

And now, Fingers.

Miranda pinched the end of the stick, watching it until the embers were extinguished, and dropped the stub in the pack.

Fingers had gone the way of Cheney, she was sure. In the Bay, over the highway by Devil’s Slide, somewhere they wouldn’t be found by humankind, only by the buzzards or the fish and always the insects, picked and eaten until their bones were as clean as their newly scrubbed souls.

She picked up the jade from where she’d laid it on the bed, wrapped in a handkerchief, and placed it carefully in her purse. Looked around the small apartment once more, face lined and weary, chest and limbs heavy and tired.

Miranda took a breath. Her voice was quiet and bitter.

“Hell is empty and all the devils are here.”

*   *   *

She dreamed of ghosts that night.

Ghosts of yesterday—her mother, desperate to protect her,
I’d rock my own sweet child to rest,
until she was ripped from her mother’s arms and tossed in a prison, lines on Hatchett’s face made by knife tips, lines on her father’s forming rivulets of Scotch, flowing, always flowing.

Mills College days, a year or so to be happy, to think happiness was a bottle of bootleg gin and oblivion and a quick, unfeeling encounter in the rumble seat of a sedan, forget your past, forget your future, forget who you are and who you might become, dance, girl, dance the Charleston, life’s a bowl of fucking cherries and we don’t need blackbirds, bye-bye …

Dust bowl refugees and children with ancient eyes, stomachs swollen from not enough food, and she learned and her own eyes opened.

Then she met John Hayes, and his smile blinded her and his eyes shot out beams of light, and she was helpless, held captive, enveloped in arms once again, arms that wouldn’t leave her, couldn’t leave her, someone to watch over her …

But the ghost became a ghost, bombed and bloody and broken, hull of a man, no soul left, no soul on earth, no earth. Just an empty shell, a functional place to breathe and eat and defecate, not hell on earth because earth was hell, no hope, no love, no Johnny, and death swallowed them all.

Miranda spun around and around and around …

More ghosts. Rick, with his smile, eyes desperate, how she wished he didn’t love her so much. Gonzales and his body, the smell of his skin, and she thought about giving herself over, as she’d done in the dark days, the days of black on the calendar when she’d fallen, fallen, fallen, and reached the bottom and found Dianne.

Rick held out a hand and she started to climb, her nails broken and bloody and full of earth. She passed Sally and laughed, watching the girls twirl lariats at the Fair, and in another room Burnett was drinking tea with Dianne, until he fell over, too many bullets in his chest.

Miranda pointed a finger, mouth open, “
J’accuse! J’accuse! J’accuse!
” And James walked in, charming James, James wouldn’t lie to her, wouldn’t use her, he admired her for more than her breasts and thighs and what was between them, and he gave her a gilt-edged proclamation and a bow and a wink. Said he’d be back.

The ghosts flocked around her … Betty Chow and Phyllis Winters and Martini and the blood on the bathroom walls, and Dr. Gosney and the patient in number 114 and Joe Merello and Edwina Breckinridge and Annie Learner and Pandora Blake and Mickey Cohen and Allen and Gladys. Bente rose above them all, orchestrating a strike with Eddie Takahashi in the front, holding a sign. She tried to talk to him, but he could only smile and nod and thank her for saving his sister.

And then other ghosts floated in and Ozzie Mandelbaum performed a high dive at the Aquacade while Meyer tried to pull her away from Duggan, who was holding out handcuffs. And in a long line, solemn procession, a gray parade formed at the Tower of the Sun, light streaming through them, first Grant Tompkins, hat in his hands, face downcast, then Lois Hart wearing her jade, and Huntington Jasper and Hugo Wardon, each carrying the same painting. Cheney ran after them, laughing and hearty, and Fingers trailed, furtive and shy.

At the rear of the procession was Death, not so tall and not dressed in a robe, wearing a three-piece suit and wide-brimmed fedora. A certificate was pinned to his chest and his face was featureless, entirely blank, and he held her Baby Browning in his right hand and a piece of piano wire in his left.

He slowly turned to face her.

Miranda screamed and sat upright, sweating. The clock on the nightstand read 3:15
A.M.

She blinked a few times, still trembling, and reached a hand to turn on the light.

She didn’t sleep for the rest of the night.

*   *   *

Miranda spent the morning on the phone. Left another message for James, no response, no sign the State Department knew who she was.

She ate another bite of buttered toast and moved on.

Called Meyer to get the name of a reliable jeweler, someone who could appraise. Phoned Chinatown jewelers, too, I’d like an appointment for an appraisal, yes, jade, thank you very much. Kwok she’d have to visit in person, she’d make the rounds for lunch.

Miranda made notes and smoked half a pack, fuck the Life Savers. Called Southern Pacific and asked for Railroad Hal, called United Airlines and called Fisher, reported Fingers missing. Thought about calling Rick but pulled her hand away from the phone at the last second. Tried to reach Allen, left a message instead. Spent ten minutes waiting for the operator to put a call through to Baltimore but finally found someone at Pinkerton who said he’d get back to her.

Fuck. No confirmation, she’d have to go on her gut.

You’re a good soldier, Randy, a good soldier …

By mid-afternoon she was ready, hot shower and Elizabeth Arden for her neck and legs, dressed in a red-and-white summer frock with wide hat and Red Dice lipstick.

Roy looked up with a hesitant smile.

“You goin’ out, Miss Corbie?”

“Yeah—be back later.”

“Have a good day, Miss Corbie.”

“You too, Roy.”

She was halfway up the hill toward Bush, panting a little, when she heard her name. She looked up, holding her hat down with one hand in a sudden gust of wind.

Scott.

*   *   *

The agent was standing on the corner of Bush looking down the hill at her, and she could see his smile half a block away. She grinned back at him, walking slowly up the hill, still holding the hat against accidents.

Brown eyes crinkled at her and he smelled like bay rum. Goddamn it, he reminded her so much of Rick …

No cocksure tone today, no arrogance. His voice was polite, almost deferential, with more than a hint of flirtation.

“Miss Corbie. I heard you were better. Thought I’d pay you a visit before I get sent back home … should be any day now. This is for you.”

He held out a small package of See’s candy, neatly wrapped in yellow and blue stripes, face blushing, athletic body seeming smaller and more hesitant. She took the candy with raised eyebrows, looked up and gave him smile.

“Thank you. But please—call me Miranda. We’re far past the formalities, don’t you think?”

He grinned and nodded his head, falling into step beside her as they proceeded past the Cottage Market and down Bush toward California and Chinatown.

“So … Miranda. It was, uh, quite an experience working with you. I never worked with a female op before.”

She paused to light a stick. He extended a gold-plated Ronson and she held his hand briefly to steady the flame while she inhaled. Her eyes flickered upward.

“Not many of us around—not even at Pinkerton. So is this a social call, Scott?”

“You could call it that. My car’s around the corner at the garage. I thought maybe you’d like to go to lunch somewhere—on me. Crab salad, like I promised? Look, I know Jimmy owes you, but I figure the government in general does, too.”

She shook her head regretfully, blowing smoke out the side of her mouth. “I’m sorry. I’m actually chasing a lead. It’s funny you showing up—I was going to call you later this afternoon, after I confirm a few things. I may need some help.”

The agent grabbed her arm and drew her toward a slanted angle of shade under the Hotel Grant awning. His voice was low, urgent, concerned.

“You draw a bead on Cheney?”

She made a motion with her head for them to keep walking, and when they moved farther away from the hotel she said: “No. Not exactly. But I’ve got to tell Old Man Hart that the jade set I found for his wife—the one she died for—was a phony.”

Scott whistled under his breath. “Christ, Miranda, that’s a kettle of fish. If what the Hart dame had was fake, where’s the real stuff?”

Miranda paused at the corner of Powell and Grant, dropped the stick and ground it under her navy blue pump. She raised her face to his.

Scott Petrie was a good-looking man, the arrogance he normally wore like aftershave making him seem more so. Eyes too close together were his only real flaw and she could feel him standing next to her, strong and tense and alert, almost too alert, like a quivering watchdog. “That’s what I was going to call you about,” she said slowly. “I’ve got a lead at a pawnshop. Yick Lung. I could use a little muscle, and the friend I normally count on is out of town. You doing anything tonight?”

“Nothing more important,” he said promptly. “Where and when?”

She glanced at her wristwatch. “It’s one-thirty now. Let’s say seven tonight at Yick Lung. Washington and Spofford Alley.”

The agent smiled and drew his arm through Miranda’s. “It’s a date.”

She removed her arm, eyes on his. “It’s an appointment. And bring your gun.”

Thirty-eight

Miranda’s stomach growled at the smell of rice drifting through the open casements. No food, no cigarette, no time.

She crouched on the rough and unvarnished wooden floor, no red-and-white summer frock. She’d prepared, wearing wool trousers and a cotton shirt, thick auburn hair up and covered in a bandanna.

Not exactly Club Moderne material.

Different kind of trap.

The July sun smiled over the City, still high over Playland at the Beach, but shadows kept falling in Chinatown, over the men in scuffed pants throwing dice against the green door, wide-mouth lion looking over the game, or the grandmothers raking in dollar bills, playing mah-jongg in underground rooms.

She checked the Spanish pistol again. Temples throbbed in time to her heart, and she drank in the dank air, almost tasting the rice and bok choy.

Footsteps.

Miranda tensed, stood up. Held the pistol in her right hand, waiting. Not heavy, light and fast.

A young boy about ten or eleven rounded the corner. He met her eyes and nodded.

The signal.

She nodded and he ran, swiftly and softly, back up through the warren. Now if she could just manage to remember her goddamn way out …

The peeling walls gave off an acrid stink, tempering the smell of rice and cooking vegetables and cigarette smoke and cinnabar incense, mingling in the middle, where she was, from the gambling room below and whatever was upstairs. She walked quickly, the sound of her footsteps making a soft echo.