Читать книгу After the Horses - Jeffrey Round - Страница 11

Rich Men

He was back in the sports pub with Charles and Lionel. Lionel was pensive, making him seem even more appealing, while Charles simply looked out of place in his grey striped suit and wide pink necktie. (Though a lawyer would probably call it coral, Dan noted sourly.)

“He had dark, curly hair. Young. Early twenties, maybe even a teenager. Pale face. He wore a long, grey, trench coat and a newsboy cap.”

Lionel was listening carefully. He had been startled when Dan told him about the intruder he’d seen leaving Yuri Malevski’s Parkdale mansion.

“Sounds like Ziggy,” he said at last. “He was one of Yuri’s hangers-on. Just a kid, really, though I think Yuri said he was a drug dealer. Maybe even a heroin addict. Do you remember, Charles?”

Dan glanced at Charles, whose gaze seemed anchored to a potted plant on the windowsill. His face was expressionless.

“Not particularly,” he said at last.

“Any idea what he might be doing there?” Dan asked.

Lionel shrugged. “I have no idea. None at all. I don’t know why anyone would be there. He was sort of a sad kid, a lost boy. I used to see him at the Saddle, even in the daytime. It was like he had nowhere else to go.”

“How would he have gotten inside the house?”

Lionel looked bewildered. “He must have the code. You can’t get in without it.”

“Wasn’t it changed after the murder?” Dan asked.

“No.” He looked sheepish. “Once the police finished the investigation, I reset it to the original code. Just an accounting thing.” Lionel turned to Charles. “You don’t remember Ziggy? Sort of a Goth look?”

Charles shook his head. “Not specifically, no. Yuri’s place was a zoo, with all kinds of people hanging around.” He turned to Dan. “Is it possible you left the door open and he followed you in?”

Dan shook his head. “I was careful to latch the door behind me when I arrived. I didn’t want anyone to know I was on the premises, apart from a nosy neighbour who didn’t seem to care for Yuri.”

Lionel shrugged. “Then there’s no question: he has the code.”

“How would he have got it?” Dan asked.

“Yuri must have given it to him. There were always a few people who knew it. If it became a problem, he just reprogrammed it for a while. That happened a couple times a year, but he always set it back to the same code afterwards. His birth date. Easier for him to remember.”

“Who else had the code that you know about?”

Lionel considered. “Off the top of my head, I can think of a few people. Santiago always had it. Probably one or two of the kids who hung out here.”

“And presumably they could have given it to others?”

Lionel nodded. “I suppose.”

Charles snapped his fingers. “What about that trannie?” He looked over at Dan. “There was one in particular I took a strong dislike to. I think he — she — it — whatever the correct term for a transgendered person is —”

“I believe the correct pronoun is ‘ze,’” Dan said.

“Okay, then ze was probably a transsexual, but I never had my suspicions confirmed.”

“Do you recall a name?”

“It was one of those neutral names.” Charles looked at Lionel. “Wasn’t it Jan?”

Lionel nodded. “Yes, that’s it. Jan used to work there from time to time.”

“Doing what?” Dan asked.

Lionel looked perplexed. “I couldn’t really say. I got the idea Yuri hired Jan as some sort of party warden.”

“A drug enforcer,” Dan offered.

“Maybe. All the kids were in awe of Jan, though I never understood why. It was as if Jan had some hold over them. Whatever it was, I never learned.”

“Can you give me a description?”

“Besides scary?” Charles smirked. “Well, at first glance you’d probably say woman. Spiked hair, shaggy eyebrows, lots of piercings and make-up, but if you looked long enough you’d start to second-guess yourself. Big shoulders, muscular arms. That’s what I recall. There were enough qualities of both sexes to make things confusing. As often as I ran into Jan, I could never say for sure what sex I was looking at.”

“How did Jan and Yuri get along? Any bad blood there?”

Lionel thought this over before answering. “Nothing I could put my finger on, but I once overheard an argument they were having. Yuri said, ‘If you can’t do this for me then you can find another donor to bleed dry.’ That was the phrase he used.”

“Do you have any idea what wasn’t being done to Yuri’s satisfaction?”

Lionel shook his head. “None at all, though I remember I was instructed not to pay Jan that month. Jan must have known not to expect anything, because I was never asked for anything.”

Dan considered. “It might be interesting to find out what it was.”

“I can try, but Jan pretty much stopped coming around after that. As I said, there were a lot of people Yuri might stop speaking to for a period of time, then resume just as suddenly for no apparent reason.”

“What about this policeman you mentioned, the one you saw when you and Charles had the accident? Did he have the entry code?”

Lionel frowned in concentration. “Not that I know of, but I couldn’t say for sure. And by the way, I looked him up, as I said I would. I was right. His name was Trposki.”

“Was he one of the cops taking bribes?”

“I’m sure he was.”

“And then Yuri stopped paying him. So, if anyone were to get hot under the collar about it, it might be this Trposki.”

Lionel nodded. “It makes sense.”

“So there were a number of people, some of them at odds with Yuri, who had access to the house. Besides Ziggy and other occasional partygoers, there was an ex-boyfriend, a transsexual who was hired and then fired, and a corrupt cop taking bribes. It’s not a very exclusive list, even if you consider that Yuri changed the code from time to time.”

“Sadly, no. He even gave it out to delivery men and such. There was always a shipment of something coming around. Alcohol, food, flowers. Exotic plants were Yuri’s passion. He didn’t want them left outside, so he gave the florists the code and told them to leave the goods inside the door.”

“I saw his greenhouse. It must have been impressive when it was in bloom.”

Lionel nodded. “Yuri spent a lot of money on plants. Orchids in particular, especially rare ones. He could talk about them forever, when the mood hit him. I think he preferred plants to humans, to tell the truth.”

“The passions of the rich,” Dan concluded.

Lionel smiled. “He had a few of those. They weren’t all bad.”

“Maybe not, but one of them might have got him killed,” Dan said. “When you have a moment, I’d like the names of people who definitely had the code. I’d also like to know who was given discreet payments for the running of the club or anything to do with his house.”

Lionel gave him a questioning look. “You want a list?”

“It doesn’t have to have your name on it. Nothing official, just names and addresses if you have them. If anyone asks, I’ll say I got them from the bar’s files on my own.”

“Okay.”

“So then you’re taking the case?” Charles asked, just as his cell rang.

Dan smiled. “It would appear so.”

Charles nodded and reached for his phone. “Good. Excuse me a moment.”

He stepped out of the room.

Dan looked across at Lionel. “I assume you still want me to take the case?”

“Sure, it’s just that … well, we didn’t think you would.”

“You have to bear in mind that even if I do find this Santiago Suárez, he has no reason to talk to me, especially if he’s an illegal on the run from the police. He’s going to be very wary of any contact that would get him in trouble or thrown out of the country. I don’t know what the official policy is for Cuban illegals, but I’m pretty sure he won’t want to be sent back.”

Lionel gave a short laugh. “I can confirm that. The last thing Santiago wanted was to get sent back there. He hated his homeland. He said it was as homophobic as it got.”

“He probably hasn’t been to a Muslim country,” Dan said. “Were he and Yuri a real couple?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean was there anything more between them than sex? I just wonder why Yuri didn’t marry him to grant him full citizenship status.”

“I know there was talk of it. My guess is they just never got around to it, or else Yuri was making sure the boy was really in love with him and not just after his wealth. Santiago is very attractive, so he might have wandered off once he got citizenship. I think Yuri knew that. Also, there was a huge age gap between them. At least twenty-five years. It doesn’t mean they didn’t love one another.”

“You think he was the killer?”

Lionel shook his head. “No. I don’t have any reason to suspect him. More than Jan or the police, I mean.” He hesitated. “I guess you can’t work on assumptions, but if you do find him, please be careful.”

“I will. If only because finding missing people is sometimes like cornering wild animals. You can’t predict what they’ll do or what they’re capable of. If they don’t want to be found, anything can happen.”

“I can believe it,” Lionel said.

“What about this kid, Ziggy?” Dan asked.

“I don’t really know much about him, to tell you the truth. I thought Charles did, but apparently not.”

Dan thought this over. “Maybe it’ll come to him. Do you know if Ziggy and Santiago hung out together? They were close in age, by the sounds of it.”

Lionel laughed. “I doubt they had much in common, but you never know.”

“If anything comes to you, let me know.”

“I will.” Lionel gave him an assessing look. “It must be exciting. What you do, I mean.”

Dan smiled. “It’s mostly dull and repetitious. Anyway, I do it because I’m good at it, not because I’m an excitement junkie.”

“Good to know.”

Lionel had dressed in track pants and runners again, as though it was his habitual uniform.

“You’re a runner?” Dan asked.

“Yes, though I stopped being obsessive about it. I was up to ten k a day for a while. I’ve tapered back. I was neglecting Charles. Well, according to Charles, at least.”

“We should go running together sometime,” Dan said, hoping he wasn’t sounding flirtatious.

Lionel gave him an encouraging nod, as though to disarm the thought. “I’d like that.”

Charles came back into the room and glanced at the two of them.

“All good here?”

“Yes,” Lionel told him. “Dan’s going to take the case.”

Charles looked at Dan. “That’s great. Thank you.”

“I’ll do what I can,” Dan said.

They shook hands.

“We have to go,” Charles said. “Please keep us updated. You’ve got our numbers. Anything else you need to know, just ask.”

“I will,” Dan said. “Oh, one other thing. “I’ll need your permission to mention your names if I speak with the police.”

Charles looked alert. “What will that entail?”

“Simply that I’m talking to you. I won’t divulge anything sensitive.” Dan looked at the two faces staring at him. “In strictest confidence, of course, especially given the nature of the situation.”

“No, I can’t authorize that,” Charles said.

Dan waited. “Okay. But seeing how I’ll be working for you, I have to make sure I don’t step on anybody’s toes at headquarters. They don’t take kindly to outside investigations, as you can probably imagine.”

“I never really thought about it,” Lionel told him.

“Occupational hazard,” Dan said.

Charles shook his head. “Please keep our names out of it.”

“All right.” Dan nodded. “You have my promise. I won’t say or do anything to jeopardize either of you.”