Motive (9 page)

An elderly Asian man answered the bell ring. Barely above five feet, he wore a spotless white shirt, cream linen slacks, and blue velvet slippers with lions embroidered at the toes. One thin-boned hand held a rolled-up copy of
Forbes
.

“Yes, please?” Soft voice, oddly boyish.

“Lieutenant Sturgis, Los Angeles police.”

The man’s eyelids quivered. “Did something happen at the store?”

“No, sir. We’re looking for Phyllis Tranh.”

“That’s my daughter. She’s out of the country. May I ask what’s going on?”

“Could we come in, Mr.…”

“Albert Tranh. May I see that badge again, please—yes, of course, come in.”

A thirty-by-twenty living room was furnished completely in American Colonial, much of it actually from the period. Albert Tranh rang a small pewter bell with a gold handle and a blue-uniformed maid appeared.

“My coffee please, Irma. And for you gentlemen …?”

“Nothing, thanks,” said Milo.

“Bring some sweets, Irma,” said Albert Tranh. His English was barely accented. Precise elocution said he’d worked hard to achieve that.

As the maid left, Albert Tranh pointed to a silk brocade sofa the color of bruised plums and waited for us to take our places before settling in a yellow silk Chippendale side chair. Dominating the room was the single break in the Colonial motif: a lithograph above the mantel, Jasper Johns flag.

The rest of the wall art consisted of framed samplers, landscapes portraying bygone Hudson River edens, and stiff-looking portraits of
puritanically garbed people with severe faces. Deputy D.A. John Nguyen had once told me that his family and their community of Vietnamese emigrants loved America enough to make a DAR lady blush.

Milo informed Albert Tranh of Ursula Corey’s murder. The old man’s free hand wafted like a dry leaf before settling on his chest. The copy of
Forbes
bent as fragile-looking fingers squeezed. “That’s horrible. What happened?”

“You knew Ms. Corey well?”

“Oh, yes, very, we did business together. A lot of business. You can’t tell me what happened?”

“She was shot to death, sir.”

“Good grief. Where?”

“Century City.”

“Century City? In the mall?”

“In a parking lot.”

“A parking lot,” said Tranh. “A robbery? A carjacking?”

“Doesn’t appear to be either, sir.”

“Yes, of course,” said Albert Tranh. “Why would you be here if it was a robbery?” He frowned. “May I ask why Phyllis is relevant?”

“Ursula’s ex-husband told us about her friendship with Ursula.”

“Richard said that,” said Tranh. “Really.”

“You find that surprising.”

“Did Richard also inform you he and Phyllis had a relationship?”

“A romantic relationship?” said Milo, evading seamlessly.

“I wouldn’t go that far, Lieutenant. Richard and Phyllis dated briefly. Nothing underhanded, this was well after Richard and Ursula’s divorce. Nevertheless, I didn’t approve, mixing business with personal. But Phyllis is a strong-willed girl. Would you excuse me one second?”

He was back in five seconds, carrying a framed photo that he handed to Milo. His “girl” was a beautiful woman in her forties, with upswept ebony hair, wide eyes ripe with amusement, and a pointy dimpled chin.

“My only child.” Tranh frowned. “She is married, but only technically. Her husband has been living in Cambodia for seventeen years and has at least two other wives that are confirmed, quite possibly more.”

“Sounds like a peach.”

“Norbert Lam is a lowlife.”

I said, “Phyllis has only been married once?”

“Yes. Big wedding.” Albert Tranh’s expression said a repeat of the experience would be unwelcome. “Ursula murdered, this is unbelievable. So you’re here to learn more about her through Phyllis?”

“Why did Phyllis and Richard stop dating?”

“That.” Tranh sighed. “Perhaps I’ll regret mentioning it in the first place.”

“We appreciate anything you can offer, Mr. Tranh.”

“Hmm … why did they stop? From the little Phyllis told me, she decided that Richard held on to feelings for Ursula and that caused her to—I believe the expression is, she bailed?”

Milo smiled. “Yes, sir.”

“I taught English and American history in Saigon, spent time as a graduate student at the University of Illinois in Urbana. The key, obviously, is to learn idioms. But keeping up is difficult.”

I said, “Could you tell us about your business relationship with Ursula?”

“With Ursula
and
Richard. They continued working together even after their divorce. Are you familiar with their company?”

“Urrick, Ltd.”

“We are among their customers.”

“What do you buy?”

“There’s no simple answer for that,” said Tranh. “We sell deeply discounted merchandise, mostly domestic overstock and budget imports from Asia. It’s a fluctuating inventory, based on educated guesses about customer demand.”

Irma the maid brought a silver tray holding a coffeepot, bone china
cups, and a plate of wafer cookies. She poured for Tranh first, offered us the opportunity to change our minds.

I said, “No thanks.”

Milo said, “Just half a cup.”

Hard to imagine his digestive system had any room to spare, but maybe taking two cookies was exhibiting good manners in service of rapport and I was the rube. I watched him chew energetically and reach for a third cookie.

When Albert Tranh placed his cup on a coaster, I said, “That type of purchasing sounds risky.”

“Risky but exciting, we’re always having to figure things out,” said Tranh. “And we’ve had our disasters.” He smiled. “Would you by any chance be interested in ten thousand, five hundred and thirty-six tiny stuffed red crocodiles that disintegrate when water touches them and end up smelling like week-old pot roast?”

Milo said, “Hmm, let me talk to my people about that.”

Tranh’s smile widened then dropped off his face. “The key is to win many more bets than we lose and for the most part we’ve been able to do that. And I must say Ursula and Richard have helped.”

“How so, sir?”

“Ursula has a terrific nose for product. Years ago, she and Phyllis traveled together on buying trips. The marketplaces in most Asian capitals are vast, I’m talking about thousands of stalls covering miles. Phyllis said Ursula’s energy outstripped hers and that she noticed things Phyllis walked right past. So in a sense, Ursula became more than just a wholesaler, she was almost an unpaid purchasing agent for us.”

“You don’t do your own buying because—”

“We’re retailers and we stick with what we know.”

“What about Richard? How has he helped you?”

Brief pause. “Richard is honest and efficient, delivers what he promises in good condition and on time. With him you get none of the attitude we experience with other wholesalers because we’re not Kmart.” He sat forward. “If not a robber, what?”

“We don’t know, sir,” said Milo. “Is there anything you’d like to say about their personalities?”

“Ursula was lovely,” said Tranh. “A charming, refined, lovely person.”

“And Richard?”

“You’re asking about him because …”

“Because when we begin an investigation we ask lots of questions, Mr. Tranh, and hope some of them bear fruit. Kind of like you, sir, when you invest in merchandise.”

“Fair enough, Lieutenant. What can I say about Richard … he’s always been honest and dependable but he is not … engaging.”

“More of a loner?”

“How shall I put this,” said Albert Tranh. “Hmm … all right: He’ll make conversation but one can’t help feel he’s not enjoying it. I suppose he just wasn’t blessed with a huge dose of gregariousness.”

“Ursula was,” I said.

“Ursula.” He sighed. “Ursula had natural warmth. It served her well in Vietnam, we’re a friendly bunch.” His voice caught on the last two words. “Phyllis will be so sad—oh, no, the daughters, Ursula has two, do they know?”

“Yes, sir.”

“How are they doing?”

“As well as can be expected, Mr. Tranh. Do you know the girls personally?”

“I’ve met them once,” said Tranh. “Family barbecue, before the divorce. Nice children. Mostly they were riding their horses.”

Milo said, “How long has your daughter been out of the country?”

“Six weeks.”

“When’s she due to return?”

“Not sure—if you’d like, I could try to reach her now.”

“That would be great, sir.”

Shooting a cuff, Tranh bared a gold Rolex, checked the date.
“Today I believe she’s still in Bangkok, with the time difference it would be … she’s probably up.”

He rang his little bell, Irma appeared and hurried to fetch him a cordless land-model. “Phil? It’s Pops. I’m afraid I have terrible news for you … no, no, I’m fine … unfortunately, Ursula has been murdered.”

Milo and I sat there as Tranh did a lot of listening interspersed with brief words of comfort. After a long interlude of the former, he said, “All right, dear, please draw yourself together so I can give you to a detective.”

Milo took the phone. Did a lot of listening and not much else.

When he was through, he handed it back to Tranh, who said, “All right, darling, I’m so sorry—yes, do that, you need your rest. Bye.”

Albert Tranh said, “She says she wants to go back to sleep but I’m pretty sure she’ll be calling me soon. For parenting.”

Too late to retrieve Milo’s car from the lot in Century City so I headed for the station.

He said, “In answer to your yet-unasked question about Phyllis, mostly she cried. I’m talking geyser.”

“Over the top?”

He shrugged. “Sounded real to me but without nonverbal cues, who knows? She also volunteered the fact that she’d dated Richard briefly and that Ursula had been ‘unbelievably gracious’ about it but that she’d broken up with Richard because her friendship with Ursula was more important than ‘any guy.’ So unless I’ve wandered into the Actors Workshop, things are not looking up in the romantic rival department.”

“Maybe it was over as far as Phyllis is concerned,” I said. “But what if Richard blamed Ursula for the breakup? Not only does Ursula leave him, she gets her friend to do the same.”

He thought about that. “Good point. So back to Mr. Charmless. You like him seriously, huh?”

“He’s the best you’ve got.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

“I like him plenty,” I said. “The financial motive alone would keep me on him. What’s planned for tomorrow?”

“Heart-stopping drama, amigo, as I honor Richard’s permission to crawl through his phone records and his finances—but I’ll still need subpoenas and a victim’s warrant on Ursula’s house to look for date-books or computer logs of her social life. Thanks for all your time, I’ll see if I can put in a reimbursement request that actually gets you paid something.”

Not-so-subtle way of easing me off the case because when a woman gets executed the husband’s always the initial suspect, usually for good reason.

Allowing himself to start believing this one would turn out
not
to be different?

I had no problem with that.

Ten days later, Milo phoned. “What’s the opposite of a progress report, a regress report?”

“No luck on Ursula.”

“The security tapes from the building zeroed out and so did Richard’s financial records. I brought in a D.A.’s investigator with forensic accounting training. No suspicious payments to anyone. Pawing through Ursula’s house turned up a couple of vibrators in her undies drawer and a date-book. She was a popular bachelorette, dated twenty-three swains since the divorce, listed their names and numbers. A few she found on an online dating service for attractive, affluent middle-aged singles. Most she met at upscale cocktail lounges or restaurants.”

“Your basic casual pickup.”

“Just add Martini. I talked to every one of them and they back up Richard’s take on her as a lusty gal. But a classy one—several guys used the word. The only objection was she cut everyone off after three dates but did it diplomatically. Nothing personal, she needed to travel for a long time. Still, no one had a bad word to say about her, Alex.”

I said, “Gracious or not, injured male pride’s a great motive.”

“Hell, yeah, wars have been started over it. Too bad every single one of these jokers has been ruled out with solid alibis.”

“Twenty-three solid alibis?”

“Not as unlikely as it sounds because most of them are from out of town and can prove being in another city at the time of the shooting.”

“She picked up travelers.”

“The picture I got was she allowed
herself
to be picked up,” he said. “Of the six locals she met online, three were also traveling. The last three work alone—screenwriter, freelance financial advisor, sculptor—but they, too, had eyewitnesses placing them at home.”

I said, “She list any dates during her own Asian travels?”

“Nope.”

“Maybe she cut off the wrong guy overseas.”

“And he flew halfway around the world to express his displeasure? That would be nifty, lad, but during her travel periods, the date-book’s crammed with business appointments. I’m talking dawn-to-dusk, visiting marketplaces, shipping agents, manufacturers, even farmers for stuff like bamboo. There really doesn’t seem to be any allowance for partying and that was backed up by Phyllis Tranh who I talked to again, yesterday at her hotel in Hong Kong. She never observed Ursula do anything
but
business on business trips, we’re talking one focused woman.”

“Twenty-three men,” I said. “Ashley and Marissa claimed not to know about any of them.”

“I had a couple more sit-downs with Ashley and Marissa and their not knowing doesn’t surprise me. Like that, they live in their own pad, mostly come by to play with their horses. Ursula would sometimes be there, working in her home office, but more often she wasn’t.”

“Do the girls work?”

“Apart from on their tans? Negative. Yeah, they’re a couple of indulged rich kids but that’s not a crime yet.”

“Any boyfriends in the picture?”

“Nope, just a group from high school they still hang out with. The closest thing to criminal is that girl, Laura Smith, the one who played Le Mans with Daddy’s Bentley and has had two weed busts over the last three years. Daddy is Imago Smith, this big-time hip-hop producer, and he’s got a rep as a heavy partier so I suppose she comes by it honestly.”