Murder by Candlelight (39 page)

Followed by the metallic slam of the car
door.

Steps.

A squeak .... A sound Z hoped he'd hear: the
lid of the mailbox being lifted.

After that, came the scrape of the dean's
key slotting into the lock, followed by the opening and closing of
the door.

As the swallows returned to Capistrano, as
spawning salmon swam up stream, Z's pigeon had come home to
roost!

Z saw a rectangle of light appear on the
lawn; the living room light switched on, shining through the front
window.

No sign, as yet, that the dean knew anything
was wrong inside.

After all, it was unlikely that Ashlock
would go into the bedrooms when first coming home.

What Z was counting on was that, before
doing anything else, Ashlock would spend some time in the bathroom.
Who, upon arriving at home after eating and drinking, didn't?

A car drove by.

Another car.

Another car coming: this time featuring the
sound of Jamie's mini-truck.

Z huddled behind the tree again, his black
outfit a perfect blend with the oak's night-black trunk.

Yes.

Headlights. Jamie, slowing to park at the
curb across the street.

As he'd explained to her, to pass herself
off as a Johnny D. hooker she must both look and act the part, a
task for which -- privately -- Z thought she was perfectly suited.
He'd also cautioned her to wait for Johnny's girls to arrive --
should be any moment -- John's "ponies" the last piece of the
puzzle to be snapped in place.

The night had become cooler; the breeze
freshening. The air smelled ... damp. Though the "dead" of winter
was still months away, its skeletal footsteps were already stalking
all things green.

No ... girls.

Z was worried. He certainly didn't want
Jamie going up to the house alone; had strictly forbidden her to do
that. Still, as bold as Jamie was ....

Ah! Another car coming. If only ....

Yes. It, too, was slowing to a crunch of
gravel along the curb. The car parking out front.

In quick succession, four doors opened ...
then slammed like the ragged volley of a drunken firing squad, the
high chatter of women's voices drifting with the wind. Also the
smell of hot perfume.

Cautiously peeking out, Z
saw
Jamie's
car
door crack open; glimpsed the dome light flash on, then off as she
swung the door shut.

Next, came a momentary confrontation between
Jamie and the other women as they met on the sidewalk in front of
the house.

Some girl talk. A little laughter. The flash
of a cigarette lighter. A flounce of red and black.

Apparently satisfied with Jamie's
explanation of her presence -- that she was new to the life -- the
women, impossible to count in the dark, wiggled up the walk to
Ashlock's front door.

One of the women rang the bell.

A pause.

Followed by the opening of the door, the
women noisily pushing their way inside.

And the trap was sprung!

The rest was easy. All Z had to do was
circle the house, pausing to take "candid" shots of the inside
action through the slashes he'd made in the bedroom blinds, a task
he set about after an "indecent" interval, Z beginning his
photographic foray by peeking through the first slit he came to,
seeing into the bedroom where he'd stashed Scherer. To find that
the captain, now buck naked and awake, had been securely tied to
the bedposts, a colorful silk scarf gagging his mouth. And ...
something Z hadn't planned!

What Z had failed to
consider was that the hookers would find the package of drugs Z had
mailed to Ashlock's home, the package Ashlock had found in his
mailbox and taken inside the house. Z's plan was to have the dope
there to be "discovered" by a later police search, Z taking a
childish delight in boomeranging the coke to Scherer, Scherer's
"boy" trying to stick
Z
with the snow. Special delivery. Return to
sender.

But the B-girls had found the flake. Already
using it liberally themselves, they were "sharing" by dusting
Scherer's nose, Scherer plainly beginning to get a rise out of the
drug. (Also a "rise" out of the girls' more professional
ministrations.)

A couple of fast-film snapshots -- Scherer
prominently featured -- and Z was around the house to another
bedroom to take photos of similar scenes of Ashlock.

Ditto, for D.J. Jewell.

When it came right down to
it, few things were as enjoyable -- either to participate in or to
watch -- as men and women sporting in the altogether, though few
wished to
share
the photos that were taken of themselves in these zestful
moments.

As for Jamie, she was going from room to
room, enthusiastically clicking the flash camera, Jamie seeming to
be enjoying her first brush with detective work. (To be truthful,
she was now "getting into the spirit" of things even more than the
job required.) For his part, Z was careful to take a few snaps of
Jamie -- in positions a psychologist like Calder might describe as
"parallel play."

Finished photographing at last, Z crossed
the backyard to limp back down the alley to 7-Eleven where he
cranked up the Cavalier and drove back to Gladstone.

Nearing home, he stopped at the busy, 72nd
street QuikTrip's pay phone to rattle in his first quarter.

"Gladstone Public Safety," whined the girl
"manning" the phone, Gladstone Public Safety the local euphemism
for the cops.

"Detective Tabor."

"Who should I say is calling?"

"Me."

"Me ... who?"

"Got a tip."

"One moment."

A moment.

"Detective Tabor, here."

"Your boss is in trouble."

"Who's speaking?"

"Your boss is in trouble."

"I don't know what you mean."

"He's at 1256 White in Liberty. Girls.
Dope."

"But ...."

Z hung up. If he knew Tabor, the rotund
little toady would hop out of the police station, eager to do
Scherer a favor by rescuing his captain from these alleged vices.
Which was OK with Z, Z having had something of a change of plans
since the party had gotten underway. Z's afterthought was that he
wanted Scherer slowed down, not ruined. The captain could be dealt
with, after all. His replacement, on the other hand ....

Another call.

"Who's this, honey?" asked a boozy
voice.

"Cops coming."

"What you mean?"

"Dosso said, get out."

"Oh ... OK."

Z owed John too much to get John's girls in
trouble.

The sequence of events as Z saw it was that
John's joy girls -- plus Jamie -- would now make tracks. A quarter
of an hour later, Tabor would arrive and free the three men; at
about the same time, Jamie, coming the opposite direction, would
reach Z's house to deposit her camera as he'd instructed her to do.
Maybe.

Except ... that, even
after an hour, Jamie hadn't stopped by the apartment with the film
-- not
altogether
a surprise.

What "playful" purposes
Jamie thought she might have for the dirty pictures
she'd
taken, Z couldn't
imagine -- the best of reasons he'd "forgotten" to put film in
Jamie's camera.

On the other hand, in
addition to sending the naughty pictures
Z
had taken to the men who'd starred
in them, he'd be sure that Jamie got some of the "arty" photos he'd
shot of
her
. It
had been Z's experience that women (even more than men) disliked
the idea of having revealing pictures of themselves ... out there
... somewhere, to say nothing of Jamie needing to at least
appear
circumspect since
she made her living by teaching at a Catholic girls school. Jamie
would give
him
trouble, would she? Not with
that
kind of can tied to her
tail!

Finished "settled
everybody's hash" (as his sainted Mother used to say,) Z could now
go to bed in the hope, at long last, of enjoying the "sleep of the
righteous" -- another saying of good old Mom. When it came right
down to it, there was nothing more satisfying than to be in a
position to help
good
triumph over
evil
!

* * * * *

Chapter 22

It was on the following Tuesday that Z got a
skip-trace job from "Freedom Now," a Kansas City, Missouri bonding
agency, the man on the run rumored to be hiding out with an uncle
North-of-the-River. An unsuccessful enterprise, as it turned out,
the relative long since moved away, Z having nowhere else to
look.

Failing to produce the felon, Z mailed back
half the small advance, keeping the rest -- a fair deal,
considering he'd spent the whole day looking for the runaway.

A day later, Z had just entered his office
at 9:00, when he got an angry call from Jamie Stewart.

"What are you up to, you
son-of-a-bitch!?" Not the kind of question
anyone
wants to hear after picking
up his "secretary's" phone.

"What?"

"You know what I mean. There wasn't any film
in the camera!"

"That right?" Z settled himself on the front
desk.

"You know damn well that's right!"

"Is that why you didn't bring the camera by
after the job like you were supposed to?"

A pause for thought. "I decided to get the
film developed first."

For all her experience as
a liar, Jamie couldn't make
that
fib ring true.

"Yeah."

"If there was no film in
the camera, what was
I
doing there? Just to give the
impression
that pictures were being
taken?"

"Yeah."

"But why not
actually
take
pictures?"

"Wouldn't be nice."

"I always
thought
you were a
wimp," Jamie grumped.

"Yeah."

"But you can't
shuck
me
. You
took out the film because you didn't trust me!"

"Since you failed to bring me the film like
you promised ...."

"Think you're pretty smart, don't you?"
Jamie cut in, her voice thick with threat. "OK. You win this time.
But I wouldn't count on winning round two!" Slam!

Though Jamie didn't know
it, Z planned on picking up the prints of the shots
he'd
taken this very
afternoon, in time to mail them to their respective subjects by
Five o'clock. Round
two
would begin when Jamie received the
pictures
Z
had
snapped of
her
sexual activities at the party, making Z the winner of
that
one,
too.

A prediction that came
true, days passing after Z sent his pictures to their respective
"stars" with no response from Jamie, the girl realizing her best
strategy was not to make him angry. What she could
not
know -- nor could
the others who received equally intriguing photos of themselves in
action -- was that they were in possession of the only prints made;
Z had just the one copy made before burning the negatives. While
the Zapolksa code was flexible enough to allow the
hint
of blackmail, it
positively forbade the
use
of blackmail.

Visiting the other side of the "love front,"
Z's relationship with Susan was the best it had been in quite
awhile, Susan's sunny mood providing that happy circumstance, her
pleasant disposition a reflection of the smug self-satisfaction of
her bosses at the insurance company. The tricky bastards beating
back the government's attempt to reduce the cost of health
insurance, the company's higher-ups now anticipated even greater
ripoffs of the American public -- in Z's case, proving the truth of
the old saying, "It's an ill wind that bloweth no man good." While
America's people might be the losers for the collapse of government
health care, Z's personal life was benefited, Susan better in bed
than she'd been for some time.

On the fifteenth of September, after a
delightfully sweaty night of lovemaking at Susan's apartment, Z got
a second indication that the Ashlock-Jewell-Scherer "party" was
bearing fruit.

Both Z and Susan still in
the state of nature, covers thrown back, Z was about to drift off,
this, in
spite
of
the nausea Z always felt after having made love on Susan's
waterbed. Susan, on the other hand, energized by sex (instead of
falling sensibly asleep like God intended,) was rattling on about
her week; had already "shared" the "hot" news that her immediate
superior had gotten a fat bonus with which he planned to expand his
already Olympic-sized swimming pool. Susan was now bringing Z
up-to-date on the file clerk who'd quit and the "inexperienced
child" who'd been hired to replace her. As one of the firm's "old
girls," Susan took delight in bitching about the impossibility of
hiring competent help. The obvious solution, of course, was for the
insurance company to pay higher than starvation wages to attract
quality employees, an option with little appeal to the firm's
bosses, particularly when they had swimming pools that "needed" to
be enlarged.

Almost asleep, curled comfortably around
Susan's fetal flanks, Z heard, "... and I don't ... what to do ...
Margaret."