Too Many Murders(145)

“Stravinsky broke the bitch’s arms and legs one bone at a time, but she gave nothing away except the names of her Party friends in Moscow. Had she had anything more to confess, she would have. Stravinsky especially enjoyed it. We agreed that it would have to be the hired assassin Manfred Mueller—as good a name as any—who got rid of her body. I wanted it put on Delmonico’s property, Stravinsky thought that a mistake. Of course I won the argument, so Mueller took the body there. My luck that the gigantic wife appeared. Not that it made much difference. Mueller got away cleanly. So, unfortunately, did the wife. A grotesque.”

The entry on the sniper in the copper beech was extremely interesting; Smith was very rattled.

“I have lost my luck,” he wrote. “The great Julius Caesar believed implicitly in luck, and who am I to contradict him? But the trouble with luck is not that it runs out—it doesn’t. Rather, it encounters another man’s luck that is stronger, and fails. As mine has. I have encountered Delmonico’s luck. Now all I can do is send him in a thousand different directions at once. Manfred Mueller is willing to kill as many of Holloman’s illustrious citizens as he can, and lay down his own life in the process. His price? Ten million dollars in a Swiss bank account in his wife’s name. I have done it. But Stravinsky says it will not answer, and I very much fear that Stravinsky is right.”

Interesting, thought Carmine. He said something like that to my face. About losing his luck because mine is stronger.

That was the last entry in the fifth book. Tired and sick, Carmine gathered his evidence together and put it in an old box he marked ODDMENTS—1967. Then he took it to the cage and saw it put among a dozen other equally grimy boxes. Even if the faithful Stravinsky donned the uniform of a Holloman cop and came asking, he would not get it.

Stravinsky… A code name, it had to be a code name. The exercise books had given absolutely no hint as to who Stravinsky was. The music? No, surely not! Any bets Stravinsky is Stravinsky because Stravinsky picked the name? Or the KGB bosses? He’s like Smith, KGB. And here I thought Desdemona had seen him when Erica’s body was dumped. Now I learn that the sniper dumped the body. Smith always spoke of Stravinsky as an almost-equal, as someone whose opinion he respected. Stravinsky was treasured, valued too much to confide his identity to the pages of these diaries of murder.

“I always feel let down at the end of a difficult case,” Carmine said to Desdemona that evening. “As usual, the end of it depends on the courts—anticlimactic, not high drama. Smith can’t escape conviction, but I strongly suspect Pauline Denbigh will, and as for Stravinsky, he won’t even be identified.”

“You don’t think he might be Purvey or Collins?” she asked.

“No, that feels wrong. This is master and apprentice, not a hierarchy.”

“What will happen to Cornucopia?”

“There’s only one hand strong enough to take the helm, and it belongs to Wal Grierson, who won’t like it one little bit. His heart’s at Dormus with the turbines, not spread across thirty different companies.” Carmine shrugged. “Still, he’ll do his duty—pray note that I do not include the word ‘patriotic’ in that! Meaningless cant, when it’s trotted out endlessly.”

“Your mama will come out of her conniption fit the moment she hears the villains have been caught. Though what will she hear, Carmine? How much of it will make the news?”

“Precious little. Smith will be written off as a maniac found fit to stand trial. The information in the exercise books will never be used. He’ll go down on physical evidence—the razor for Dee-Dee and the killing kit for Skeps. His motive? Control of Cornucopia,” said Carmine without regret.

“How can that be stretched to encompass Dee-Dee?”

“The DA will allege that she tried to blackmail him as one of her customers.”

“He’ll hate that! He’s a shocking Puritan.”

“Then let him produce a better reason for killing her. One thing for sure, he won’t admit to treason. He’s convinced he won’t stand trial for treason.”

“Do you think he will?” Desdemona asked curiously.

“I have no idea,” Carmine said.

“He must be a very vain man.”

“Vain in every way,” Carmine said with feeling, “from his custom-made clothes to his custom-made house.”

“Not to mention his custom-made sports cars.” She unwound her legs. “Dinner.”

“What is it tonight?”

“Saltimbocca alla Romana.”

“Wow!” Carmine slipped an arm about her waist and walked with her to the kitchen.