A Is for Alibi

  I thought he was coughing but I knew what I heard were sobs. He might have been nine years old, looking squeezed up and frail and small.

  “I gave her a tranq,” he said with anguish. “She asked for one and I found this bottle in the medicine cabinet and gave it to her. God, I even gave her a glass of water. I loved her so much.”

  The first rush subsided and he dashed at the tears on his face with a grubby hand, leaving streaks of dirt. He hugged himself, rocking back and forth in misery, tears streaming down his bony cheeks again.

  “Go on,” I said.

  “I left after that but I felt bad and I went back later and that’s when I found her dead on the bathroom floor. I was afraid they’d find my fingerprints and think I’d done something to her so I wiped the whole place down.”

  “And you took the tranquilizers with you when you left?”

  He nodded, pressing his fingers into his eye sockets as though he could force the tears back. “I flushed ’em down the toilet when I got home. I smashed up the bottle and threw it away.”

  “How’d you know that’s what it was?”

  “I don’t know. I just knew. I remembered that guy, the one up north and I knew he’d died that way. She might not have taken the goddamn thing if it weren’t for me, but we had that screaming fight and she was so mad, she shook. I didn’t even know she had any tranqs till she asked for one and I didn’t see anything wrong with that. I went back to apologize.” The worst of it seemed to be over with and he sighed deeply, his voice almost normal again.

  “What else?”

  “I don’t know. The phone was unplugged. I plugged it back in and wiped that down too,” he said woodenly. “I didn’t mean any harm. I just had to protect myself. I wouldn’t poison her. I wouldn’t have done that to her, I swear to God. I didn’t have anything to do with that or anything else except I cleaned the place. In case there were fingerprints. I didn’t want anything pointing to me. And I took the bottle the pills were in. I did that.”

  “But you didn’t break into the storage bin,” I said.

  He shook his head.

  I lowered the gun. I’d half known but I had to be sure.

  “Are you going to turn me in?”

  “No. Not you.”

  I went back to the car and sat blankly, wondering in some vague irrational way if I really would have used the gun. I didn’t think so. Tough. I’m tough, scaring the shit out of some dumb kid. I shook my head, feeling tears of my own. I started the car and put it into gear, heading back over the hill toward West L.A. I had one more stop and then I could drive back to Santa Teresa and clean it up. I thought I knew now who it was.

  26

  I caught sight of my reflection in one of the mirrored walls across from the entrance to Haycraft and McNiece. I looked like I was ready for the last round-up: seedy, disheveled, mouth grim. Even Allison, in her buckskin shirt with the fringes on the sleeves, seemed alarmed by the sight of me, and her prerehearsed receptionist’s smile dropped from sixty watts to twenty-five.

  “I have to talk to Garry Steinberg,” I said, my tone apparently indicating that I wouldn’t take much shit.

  “He’s back in his office,” she said timidly. “Do you know which one it is?”

  I nodded and pushed through the swinging doors. I caught sight of Garry walking down the narrow interior corridor toward his office, slapping a batch of unopened mail against his thigh.

  “Garry?”

  He turned, his face lighting up at the sight of me and then turning hesitant. “Where’d you come from? You look exhausted.”

  “I drove down last night. Can we talk?”

  “Sure. Come on in.”

  He turned left into his office, gathering up a stack of files on the chair in front of his desk. “You want some coffee? Can I get you anything?” He tossed the mail on the file cabinet.

  “No, I’m fine but I need to check out a hunch.”

  “Fire away,” he said, sitting down.

  “Didn’t you tell me once upon a time—”

  “Last week,” he inserted.

  “Yeah, I guess it was. You mentioned that Fife’s accounts were being put on computer.”

  “Sure, we were converting everything. Makes it a hell of a lot easier on us and it’s better for the client too. Especially at tax time.”

  “Well what if the books had been fiddled with?”

  “You mean embezzlement?”

  “In a word,” I said with irony. “Wouldn’t that have shown up pretty quickly?”

  “Absolutely. You think Fife was milking his own accounts?”

  “No,” I said slowly, “I think Charlie Scorsoni was. That’s part of what I need to ask you about. Could he have skimmed money out of the estates he was representing back then?”

  “Sure. It can be done and it’s not that hard,” Garry said appreciatively, “but it might be a bitch to track. It really depends on how he did it.” He thought for a moment, apparently warming to the idea. He shrugged. “For instance, he could have set up some kind of special account or an escrow account for all his estates— maybe two or three phony accounts within this overall account. A large dividend check comes in, he diverts a percentage of the check from the estate it’s supposed to be credited to, and he credits it to a phony account instead.”

  “Could Libby have realized something was wrong?”

  “She might have. She had a head for that kind of thing. She’d have had to trace the dividends through Moody’s Dividend Book, which gives the amount of each dividend by company. Then if there was some kind of discrepancy, she might have asked for records or documentation—bank statements, canceled checks, stuff like that.”

  “Yeah, well Lyle told me last week that there were lots of phone calls back and forth, some attorney driving down for dinner. It finally occurred to me that Charlie might have engineered an affair with her in the hopes that she’d cover for him . . .”

  “Or maybe he offered her a cut,” Garry said.

  “Oh God, would she have done that?”

  Garry shrugged. “Hey, who knows? Would he?”

  I stared down at his desk top. “Yeah, I think so,” I said. “You know, everybody kept saying that she was involved with some Santa Teresa attorney and we all assumed it was Fife because both died the same way. But if I’m right about this embezzlement business then I need proof. Are the files still at your place?”

  “No, I’ve got ’em right here as a matter of fact. I thought I’d take a look at ’em during my lunch hour. I’ve been having cottage cheese but I don’t think that counts as food so I thought I’d do without. I brought ’em in yesterday and then I got tied up. Now that you mention it, I do think she was working on that account when she died, because the cops found her briefcase at her place,” he said. He gave me a curious look. “How’d you fix on him?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t know. It just popped into my brain and it fit. Charlie told me that Fife made a trip to Los Angeles sometime in the week before he died, but I don’t think that’s true. I think probably Charlie made the trip himself and it would have been within a day or two after Laurence died. Libby had a bottle of tranqs and I think he doctored some—who knows, maybe all of ’em. We’ll never know about that.”

  “Jesus. He killed Fife too?”

  I shook my head. “No, I know who killed Fife. My guess is that Charlie saw a way to bail himself out. Maybe Libby wouldn’t play ball with him or maybe she’d threatened to turn him in. Not that I’ve got any evidence one way or the other.”

  “Hey, it’ll come,” he said soothingly. “If it’s there, we’ll find it. I’ll start on the files this afternoon.”

  “Good,” I said, “I’d like that.”

  “Take care.”

  We shook hands across the desk.

  I drove back to Santa Teresa, resolutely refusing to think of Gwen. Thinking about Charlie Scorsoni was depressing enough. I would have to check his whereabouts at the time Sharon died, but he could easily have
checked out of the hotel in Denver and flown straight to Las Vegas, picking up my location from the answering service, finding my motel, and then following me to the Fremont. I thought about Sharon—that moment in the coffee shop when I thought she’d seen someone she knew. She’d said it was the pit boss signaling the end of her break, but I was sure she was lying. Charlie may have put in an appearance then, pulling back when he spotted me. Maybe she thought he had shown up to pay her off. I was relatively certain she’d been leaning on him for bucks, but then again, I’d have to pin that down. Sharon must have known that Fife was never involved with Libby Glass sexually. It was Charlie who’d been making the trips down to Los Angeles to discuss the accounts. Sharon must have kept her mouth shut during the trial, watching the whole tale unfold, biding her time, eventually cashing in on whatever information she had. It was also possible that Charlie Scorsoni hadn’t known where she was—that I’d led him straight down the path to her door. I was aware, as I went over the sequence of events, that much of it sounded like a lot of fancy guesswork, but I felt I was headed in the right direction and I could probe now for corroborating evidence.

  If Charlie had killed Gwen in that hit-and-run accident, there were bound to be ways to trace it back to him: hair and fibers on the fender of his car, which probably sustained some damage that would have to be repaired; paint flakes and glass fragments on Gwen’s clothes. Maybe even a witness somewhere. It would have been much wiser if Charlie’d never made a move—just held tight and kept his mouth shut, lying low. It probably would have been impossible to put a case together against him after all these years. There was an arrogance in his behavior, a hint that he considered himself too smart and too slick to get caught. No one was that good. Especially at the rate he’d been operating these days. He had to be making mistakes.

  And why not just go down for the count on the original embezzlement? He must have been desperately trying to cover for himself in Laurence Fife’s eyes. But even if he’d been exposed, even if he’d been caught, I didn’t believe Laurence would have turned him in. As sleazy as Fife had been in his personal life, I knew he was scrupulously honest in business matters. Still, Charlie was his best friend and the two went a long way back together. He might have warned Charlie off or smacked his hand—perhaps even dissolved the partnership. But I didn’t think Charlie would have gone to jail or been disbarred from the practice of law. His life probably wouldn’t have been ruined and he probably wouldn’t have lost what he’d worked so hard to achieve. He would have lost Laurence Fife’s good opinion and his trust perhaps, but he must have known that when he first put his hand in the cookie jar. The ludicrous fact of the matter is that in this day and age, a white-collar criminal can become a celebrity, a hero, can go on talk shows and write bestselling books. So what was there to sweat? Society will forgive just about anything except homicide. It was hard to shrug that one off, hard to rationalize that one away and whereas before, Charlie might have come out somewhat tarnished but intact, he was in big trouble now and things just seemed to be getting worse.

  I didn’t even address myself to the matter of his relationship to me. He’d played me for a sucker, just as he’d done with Libby Glass, and she, in her innocence, at least had a better excuse for the tumble than I did. It had been too long since I’d cared about anyone, too long since I’d taken that risk and I’d already invested too much. I just had to slam the gate shut emotionally and move on, but it didn’t sit well with me.

  When I reached Santa Teresa, I went straight to the office, taking with me the sheaf of bills from Sharon Napier’s apartment. For the first time, I was beginning to think those might be significant. I went through them with an abstract curiosity that felt ghoulish nevertheless. She was dead and it seemed obscene now to note that she’d bought lingerie that had gone unpaid for, cosmetics, shoes. Her utilities were a month behind, with dunning notices from several small businesses including her tax man, a chiropractor, and a health spa membership renewal. Visa and Mastercharge had gotten churlish and American Express wanted its card back in no uncertain terms, but it was her telephone bill that interested me. In the area code that included Santa Teresa, there were three calls in the month of March, not an excessive number but telling. Two of the calls were to Charlie Scorsoni’s office—both on the same day, ten minutes apart. The third number she’d called I didn’t immediately recognize but the Santa Teresa exchange was the same. I picked up my Cross-Reference Directory. The number was for John Powers’s house at the beach.

  I dialed Ruth, not allowing myself to hesitate. Surely Charlie hadn’t told her I’d broken with him. I couldn’t picture him confiding his personal affairs to anyone. If he was there, I’d have to think fast and I wasn’t sure what I intended to say. The information I needed was from her.

  “Scorsoni and Powers,” she sang.

  “Oh hi, Ruth. This is Kinsey Millhone,” I said, heart in my throat. “Is Charlie there?”

  “Oh hi, Kinsey. No he’s not,” she said with a hint of regret in my behalf. “He’s in court up in Santa Maria for the next two days.”

  Thank God for that, I thought, and took a deep breath. “Well maybe you can help me instead,” I said. “I was just going over some bills for a client and it looks like she was in touch with him. Do you happen to remember someone calling him a couple of times maybe six, eight weeks ago? Her name was Sharon Napier. Long-distance.”

  “Oh, the one who used to work for him. Yes, I remember that. What did you need to know?”

  “Well I can’t quite tell from this if she actually got through to him or not. It looks like she called on a Friday—the twenty-first of March. Does that ring a bell?”

  “Oh yes. Absolutely,” Ruth said efficiently. “She called asking for him and he was out at Mr. Powers’s house. She was very insistent that I put her through but I didn’t feel I should give out the number without checking with him, so I told her to call me back and then I checked with him out at the beach and he said it was fine. I hope that’s all right. I hope she hasn’t hired you to pester him or anything.”

  I laughed. “Oh heavens, Ruth, would I do that to him? I did see the number for John Powers and I just thought maybe she talked to him instead.”

  “Oh no. He was out of town that weekend. He’s usually gone around the twenty-first for a couple of days. I have it right here on my calendar. Mr. Scorsoni was taking care of his dogs.”

  “Oh well, that would explain it,” I said casually. “God, that’s been a great help. Now the only other thing I need to check is that trip to Tucson.”

  “Tucson?” she said. Doubt was beginning to creep into her voice, that protective tone secretaries sometimes take when it suddenly occurs to them that someone wants something they’re not supposed to get. “What is this about, Kinsey? Maybe I could be of more help if I understood what this has to do with a client of yours. Mr. Scorsoni’s pretty strict about things like that.”

  “Oh no, that’s something else. And I can check that out myself so don’t worry about it. I can always give Charlie a buzz when he gets back and ask him.”

  “Well, I can give you his motel number in Santa Maria if you want to call him yourself,” she said. She was trying to play it both ways—helpful to me if my questions were legitimate, helpful to Charlie if they weren’t—but in any case, dumping the whole matter in his lap. For an old lady, she was adroit.

  I jotted the number down dutifully, knowing I’d never call him but glad to get a fix on him anyway. I wanted to tell her not to mention my call but I didn’t see how I could do it without tipping my hand. I just had to hope that Charlie wouldn’t check in with her anytime soon. If she told him what I’d been asking about, he would know like a shot that I was on his tail and he wouldn’t like that a bit.

  I put in a call to Dolan at Homicide. He was out but I left a message, “important” underlined, that he should call me back when he got in. I tried Nikki at the beach and got her on the third ring.

  “Hi, Nikki, it’s me,” I sa
id. “Is everything okay?”

  “Oh yeah. We’re fine. I still haven’t quite recovered from the shock of Gwen’s death, but I don’t know what to do about that. I never even knew the woman and it still seems a shame.”

  “Did you get any details from Dolan? I just tried to call him and he’s out.”

  “Not a lot,” she said. “He was awfully rude. Worse than I remember him and he wouldn’t tell me much except the car that hit her was black.”

  “Black?” I said with disbelief. I was picturing Charlie’s pale blue Mercedes and I’d fully expected some detail that would tie that in. “Are you sure?”

  “That’s what he said. I guess the detectives have been checking with the body shops and garages but so far nothing’s turned up.”

  “That’s odd,” I said.

  “Are you coming out for a drink? I’d love to hear what’s going on.”

  “Maybe later. I’m trying to clean up a couple of loose ends. I’ll tell you what else I need. Maybe you can answer this. Remember the letter I showed you that Laurence wrote—”

  “Sure, the one to Libby Glass,” she broke in quickly.

  “Yeah, well I’m almost sure now that the letter was written to Elizabeth Napier instead.”

  “Who?”

  “I’ll fill you in on that later. I suspect that Elizabeth Napier was the one he got involved with when he was married to Gwen. Sharon Napier’s mother.”

  “Oh, the scandal,” she said, light breaking. “Oh sure, it could well be. He never would tell me much about that. Messy business. I know the story because Charlotte Mercer filled me in on that, but I was never really sure of the name. God, that would have been way back in Denver, just after his law-school days.”

  I hesitated. “Can you think who else would have known about that letter? Who could have had access to it? I mean, could Gwen?”

  “I suppose so,” she said. “Certainly Charlie would. He was working as a law clerk in the firm that represented the husband in that divorce and he lifted the letter from what I heard.”