Ellipsis (21 page)

Predictably, he made the handshake a contest. I managed to hold my own, which discomfited him. “Marsh Tanner.”

“Take a load off, Tanner.” He gestured toward a two-toned leather chair, the color of pus and the color of mud.

After I sat down I looked him over. He was dressed like an urban cowboy, complete with snaps and boots and jeans and a silver buckle the size of a CD. His beard was more white than black, and his hair was long enough to be braided but wasn't. He fancied himself a tough customer and was so full of himself he was bursting—potbelly, thick lips, huge hands, big head, broad smile. Even his teeth seemed outsize—a row of domino tiles sparkling within a pulpy purse. The term
larger-than-life
was coined for men like Buckley. So was the term
raving asshole
.

Buckley was looking me over, too, of course, and what he saw didn't dent him much. “My girl thought you were a cop when you called,” he said with what seemed like amusement.

“What a shame.”

“If you claimed you were, it would be a felony.”

“If I claimed I was, you're right.”

“But you probably didn't.”

“Probably not.”

“Just played the role and let her jump to conclusions.”

“Show business is my life. Stanislavsky.”

His smile morphed toward a snarl. “I don't like smart-asses.”

I nodded in mock sympathy. “Self-loathing is an insidious thing.”

Flushed and furious, Buckley remained in his chair only with effort. “You've got three minutes.”

“First of all, where were you yesterday at three o'clock?”

He surprised me by answering the question. “Right here.”

“Doing what?”

“Same as always—making money.”

“Witnesses?”

“Probably forty or so if I bothered to check, which I'm not going to do.”

“Anyone in the room with you?”

“My girl, from time to time. And my assistant, from time to time.”

“Your girl is the one who brought me down here?”

“Right.”

“And your assistant is who?”

“Julien Towne. Sharp kid. Prep school back East; lawyer; MBA. I pay him more than he's worth just to listen to him talk.”

“Where is he now?”

“Phoenix.”

“Doing what?”

“Same as usual—making money.”

“When will he be back?”

“When he's made the deal I sent him down there to make.”

“How long will that take?”

“A day. A year. Whatever. If the deal's done right, time doesn't matter.” Buckley looked at me as though he expected a contradiction and was ready to rebut it.

I was happy to disappoint him. I never ask a question about the business world because I never get an answer that makes sense. “Have the Berkeley cops been in to see you yet?”

“If they had, you wouldn't be here.”

“Funny you didn't ask why they might show up.”

He swiveled in his chair and looked out the window, at a view that extended across the bay and over the Berkeley Hills to the bulge of Mt. Diablo rising like a blister out of the warmth of the San Ramon Valley. “I heard what happened to Chandelier over there. It figures they'd want to see me eventually. Hell, everyone in town knows we had a thing for a while.”

“I hear the thing got sour for you at the end.”

When he swiveled back to face me, his complexion had started to mottle. “Bullshit. It didn't work out. We mutually agreed to break it off. The woman I'm seeing now is fantastic. Twenty-four; tits as hard as bowling balls. I'm sure Chandelier has someone new in her life as well.” He shrugged an overly casual disclaimer. “Life goes on. It was fun while it lasted. They always are.”

“Mutual is not precisely the way I heard your breakup described,” I said amiably.

“No?”

“What I heard was, she dumped you and you got ugly about it.”

His flesh seemed hot enough to throw off steam. “My question to you is this, Mr. Peeper—how would anyone but me and Chandelier know what the fuck kind of breakup we had?”

Because he was so proud of it, I decided to ignore his rhetoric. “I heard you were incensed when she told you it was over. I heard you threatened to make her life miserable.”

“Bullshit. All bullshit.”

“Since she's about as miserable as you can get right now, it makes me wonder if you followed through. I mean, you're clearly a can-do guy, Mr. Buckley. I figure you don't make idle threats.”

He glowered down at me from his throne as though he'd majored in monarchy in college. “You got that right for a change. But like I said, I didn't threaten the bitch. I just found another filly.”

“What happened? You have problems in the sack? Or maybe you don't like women who make more money than you do.”

“The day she makes more money than I do will be the day they serve shit to the sultan.” He stood up and stepped off his cloud of chromium and loomed over me like an overaged bouncer. “Get the fuck out of here. Now.”

I stayed put. “You build lots of buildings, Mr. Buckley. You must have plenty of guys on the payroll who know their way around explosives. Like the ones that blew the hell out of Chandelier's Lincoln and killed her chauffeur.”

“Stop trying to dump that on me.”

“But you're such a nice receptacle.”

He grabbed my arm at the biceps and squeezed. “No one talks to me that way, goddammit. I'm going to kick your ass all the way to the elevator if you don't get moving.”

I yanked his hand off my arm and stood up. “I also figure you're such a blowhard, there's someone around here who heard you hatch the plot. When they realize somebody died and Chandelier got badly hurt, sooner or later they'll crack.”

He made a fist with his meaty hand and squeezed with the power of pneumatics. I expected to see drops of blood. “I can break you in half with one hand.”

I smiled. “Only if the hand held an ax. Have a nice day.”

“Fuck you.”

When we were through playing rooster and I was back in my office, I called Lark McLaren's cell phone number, hoping that if she'd gone home to sleep she'd had the fortitude to turn off the phone.

She answered after the first ring.

“Hi. This is Marsh Tanner.”

“Oh. Good. I was afraid you were another reporter.”

“It's swarming season, I take it.”

“Like flies on … well, like flies. Have you learned anything helpful?”

“I learned Thurston Buckley is a jerk.”

She laughed feebly. “I could have told you that. So could Chandelier.”

“And I don't think Lucy Dunston Bardwell had anything to do with it.”

“Who's she? I forget.”

“The woman at Steinway Books who accused Chandelier of stealing her work.”

“Oh. Her. She seemed so … sincere. And so pathetic. What is she, some kind of nut?”

“Actually, she's a very committed writer, almost to the point of monasticism. And not at all pathetic.”

“Well, Chandelier wouldn't do a thing like that. Never.”

“No?”

“No. People send her ideas all the time. Out of the blue. More than she could possibly use. She has no need to steal one.”

“I'll take your word for it,” I said, while I wondered if she was protesting too much, then wondered if it mattered. “I think Allen Goodhew is off the list as well.”

“You're sure? He's such a monster. At least in print.”

“Off print, too. But he's a talker, not a doer. Plus, if Chandelier didn't exist, he'd have to invent her. Beating up on bestsellers makes him feel like a man.”

“So you don't have a suspect yet?”

“I can't cross Buckley off the list, but I don't have anything that says he did it, either.”

“He was very upset with Chandelier.”

“And now he's very upset with me. But that's not anything you can take to a grand jury. Have the retired FBI boys been in touch with you yet by any chance?”

“I …”

“They talked to me so I'm sure they talked to you. And told you not to mention it.”

“You're right. They just left.”

“They tell you anything you didn't know?”

“No.”

“Not even about Filson?”

“They asked lots of questions but they didn't offer much in return.”

“That's been federal policy for the last hundred years. You tell them anything you haven't told me?”

“Of course not.”

“Good.” I took several seconds to gather my thoughts. When a few had been gathered, I asked, “Does Chandelier pay her sources?”

“I don't think so.”

“Never?”

She considered it. “I suppose she might if it was …”

“Juicy enough?”

“Yes.”

“Is there any way you can find out for sure?”

“I'd have to talk to her accountant, probably.”

“Put that on your to-do list, okay?”

“But why?”

“I'm not sure. But what I think we need to do at this point is find out if Chandelier was doing any research for her new book.”

“I don't know if she was or not.”

“Can't you dig up her notes?”

“If there are any, they're all in her computer and I don't have the password.”

“Do you know much about computers?”

“Some. Not a lot.”

“Play around with hers and see if you can crack the code. Or get her to tell you, either one.”

“She never talks about what she's working on. Ever. She thinks it's bad luck.”

“Then you need to become a hacker. Or hire one.”

She hesitated. “Mr. Tanner?”

“What?”

“I've been thinking, you know? About who might have done this.”

“Good.”

“There's this guy. Most of Chandelier's fans are women, but this one guy—he may be gay, I don't know—but he shows up at lots of readings dressed like one of Chandelier's characters. And quotes lines from her books. And brings her candy and cheap jewelry.”

“Sounds creepy.”

“It is creepy. But I didn't see him at Jimbo's, and that's even creepier. I was thinking he might be mad at her for some reason.”

“Why?”

“I don't know. There's been some tiff about her fan club newsletter, I know. I think he was involved with that, somehow.”

“What's this guy's name?”

“Randolph Scott.”

“For real?”

“Probably not.”

“Where does he live?”

“Somewhere in the Castro. He brings Chandelier this wonderful pastry from a Mexican bakery called Charro's.”

“I'll check him out,” I said reluctantly. “But it doesn't sound like fun.”

“And I'll play around with the computer. That doesn't sound like fun, either.”

Chapter 22

I went for an early dinner at MacArthur Park. When I got back to the office, the phone was ringing—Ruthie Spring was reporting in.

“So what's going on?” I said after she'd asked if I had time to chat.

“Nothing out of the ordinary,” she answered. “Chandelier's still in intensive care; the docs are doing their thing, the entourage is hovering, and the flowers are piling up like tumbleweeds in a Texas sou'wester. This woman is more than a writer, Marsh; she's some kind of love goddess or earth mother or something. Her fans are flooding the place with everything from Holy Bibles to echinacea, to say nothing of the flock that's gathered in the lobby sniffing and sobbing and carrying on like the Baby Jesus just stubbed His toe. I haven't seen anything like it since Elvis tumbled off the toilet.”

“Have you checked the lobby out?”

“The assembled multitude? Sure.”

“Any kooks?”

“They're all kooks. Why the hell else would they be here?”

“Any of them look capable of building a car bomb?”

“Most of them don't look capable of boiling water, if you ask me. But I can't say any of them look evil.”

“How's Chandelier?”

“The good news is she's going to live. The bad news is, she's not going to want to for a while. Lots of pain; lots of grafts coming up; lots of scarring; and lots of scary pictures looking back from the bathroom mirror.”

“But she's out of danger?”

“So they say.”

“Can she talk?”

“Barely. The McLaren woman was in there for quite a while, but she didn't get much done, is what she said. When she came out, she was crying.”

“Is Lark still around?”

“Home sleeping. Said she'd be back by six. Nice girl,” she added cryptically.

“Yeah.”

“If you weren't so dazzled by the assistant DA, I'd do a little matchmaking.”

“I'm twenty years too old for Lark McLaren, Ruthie.”

“Men are never too old, Marsh. And women are never too rich.”

I laughed even though she'd said it a hundred times. “Anything else I should know?”

“Not really. Some of the Wells crew could use some manners,” she added as an afterthought.

“Such as?”

“The Adams woman is a pain in the ass.”

“She's an agent. She's supposed to be a pain in the ass.”

“The McLaren girl said something interesting about her.”

“What?”

“That Chandelier had gotten so big in the business, she was the Adams woman's only client.”

“So?”

“So Chandelier is thinking about making a change.”

I perked up. “She's getting a new agent?”

“Thinking about it. That's what Lark told me.”

“Why?”

“Something about the last contract. Not enough front money; not enough promotional commitment; not enough share of some kind of royalty; and not enough something I didn't understand.”

“Given what ten percent of Chandelier's take must amount to, that makes a nice motive.”