Ed McBain - The House That Jack Built

“Find her where ?”

“In New York, I would guess.”

“Matthew, this was nineteen years ago.”

“I know. But give it a shot.”

“What if I do find her?”

“You may be flying up there.”

“Oh, goody. New York in February. Anything else?”

“Yes. Please don’t call me for the next ten minutes,” Matthew said, and hung up.

“Braggart,” Irene said.

At ten minutes past eight that morning, the garage door to the house on Peony Drive swung up, and Frank Summerville backed a brown Mercedes Benz into the driveway. From where she sat parked diagonally across the street. Toots Kiley saw him reach up to the sun visor above his head. A remote control unit; the garage door swung down again. She started her car and drove off up the street. Five minutes later, she had circled the block and was parked again, in a different spot this time, near an undeveloped lot some five houses up from the Summerville house.

At eight-thirty sharp, Leona Summerville’s green Jaguar appeared at the mouth of the driveway. Leona looked left and right, and then made a right turn onto Peony and an immediate left onto Hibiscus Way. Toots did not follow her.

Instead, she got out of her car and walked toward the Summerville house. She was wearing a smart brown business suit over a white blouse. Low-heeled walking shoes. Taupe pantyhose. She looked like a real-estate agent.

There were no cars in the driveway of the Summerville house.

Toots walked directly to the front door and rang the bell.

She kept ringing the bell.

She was studying the lock.

No one answered the door.

She didn’t think anyone would.

The lock was a Mickey Mouse spring-bolt lock. A credit card was palmed in her right hand. It took her two minutes to loid the door. Her back was to the street. She rang the bell again, and then, as if shouting to someone inside, said, “It’s Martha Holloway!” and turned the doorknob and went in.

She locked the door from the inside.

She stood just inside the door, listening.

Not a sound.

This is known as Trespass, she thought. Chapter 810.08. Whoever, without being authorized, licensed, or invited, willfully enters or remains in any structure or conveyance. A misdemeanor of the second degree. Punishable by a term of imprisonment not exceeding sixty days.

I do not want to get caught inside here, she thought.

And immediately got to work.

There were three telephones in the house.

Toots planted a bug near each of the telephones.

One under the kitchen cabinet near the wall phone. Another behind the night table near the bedside phone. The third under the desk top near the study phone. The bugs she planted had nothing to do with the telephones. This was not a true wiretap that would record both ends of a phone conversation; she did not want to mess with taking the carbon mikes out of the phones and replacing them with her own mikes. Her bugs were small FM transmitters hooked into a voice-activated recording machine. If Leona made a phone call, they would pick up only her end of the conversation. They would also pick up any conversations that took place anywhere in the room. The battery-powered mikes had to be replaced every twenty-four hours. Which meant Toots had to risk coming in here again tomorrow morning. Which she’d have to do anyway. To listen to the tape and to decide whether she needed to record for another twenty-four hours. If there was anything useful on the tape, she’d simply pack her equipment and haul ass.

At five minutes to nine, while she was hiding her recorder on the top shelf of the bedroom closet, she heard a car in the driveway.

A rush of adrenaline, he’s back!

Or she is!

One of them forgot something!

Captain Hook’s Marina had a big billboard out front depicting a pirate who had a black patch instead of a right eye, and an iron hook instead of a right hand. Matthew’s grandmother used to tell him that when she was a kid growing up in Chicago she went to the movies every Saturday and one of the silent serials they showed was something called The Iron Claw . The piano player would accompany the kids in a little vamp before each chapter began, and the kids would chant over and over again, “Dah-dah-dah-dah- daht , the I-Yun Claw! Dah-dah-dah-dah- daht , the I-Yun Claw!” Matthew could remember his grandmother saying, “Oh, Matthew, it was soooo scary.” His kid sister Gloria thought it was disgusting, a person with an iron claw for a hand. Matthew thought it might be sort of neat; you could roast marshmallows on it. Gloria, who was in her pain-in-the-ass stage at the time, told Matthew that he was disgusting, too.

The marina billboard was visible as you came off the bridge from the mainland. This huge pirate with his iron hook. The lettering over his three-cornered hat. Captain Hook’s Marina. You drove off the bridge and past a shopping mall that was built like a Cape Cod village transplanted to Florida — whoever had dreamed up that one — and then doubled back on a mostly dirt road that ran past the mall, paralleling the bridge, past the back side of the billboard, and then dead-ended at the marina.

Boats stacked under a shed with a tin roof. Boats in the water. Most of them powerboats. A sign pointing to the marina office. Rickety docks with gasoline pumps on them. A ramshackle building with a smaller wooden sign that was a replica of the billboard announcing the marina. Beyond the main office the sky was gray with the promise of more rain. The water looked choppy. Matthew opened a screen door and stepped into a large cluttered room.

Boat keys hanging on a plywood board to his right. Little plastic float attached to each key. The float came apart; you kept your boat registration inside it. Virgin white line wound on spools. Unopened cartons containing portable toilets. Anchors of various sizes and shapes. Life preservers and throw rings. Cans of motor oil. Brass polish. Bottles of teak oil. Tools. Peaked caps, some blue, some white, some labeled “Captain,” others labeled “First Mate.” Flares. Charts. Boating shoes. A metal desk covered with papers, a wooden chair behind it. A calendar on the wall showed a blonde in cutoff jeans and nothing else, hanging to a sailboat’s rigging. A big Evinrude engine was on the floor across the room, its parts scattered everywhere around it.

A young man in a grease-stained tank-top undershirt and blue jeans was squatting over the engine, a screwdriver in his hands. He looked up when Matthew came in.

“Help you?” he said.

“I’m looking for Anthony Holden,” Matthew said.

The young man studied him suspiciously. Matthew — seersucker suit, white shirt, blue tie, black shoes, blue socks — looked out of place in a marina.

“In reference to?” he said.

Extremely tanned despite all the rain these past several weeks. Flinty blue eyes. Muscular arms and chest bulging in the tank-top shirt. Toothpick in his mouth.

“In reference to a lawsuit,” Matthew said. “Where can I find him?”

“Somebody suing Tony?”

“No, this was a long time ago,” Matthew said. He took a card out of his wallet. “Here’s my card,” he said. “You might want to give it to Mr. Holden, if you know where he is.”

The young man took the card in his greasy right hand. He studied it. He turned it over to see if there was anything on the back of it.

“Hope, huh?” he said.

“Hope.”

“Matthew, huh?”

“Matthew Hope.”

“Are you famous or something?”

“Hardly.”

“The name sounds familiar.”

“It’s a common name.”

“I’ll tell him you’re here,” the young man said, and went to a closed door at the far end of the large room.