J. Jance - Payment in kind

Two of the houses were a faded gray, but 1352 showed every evidence of having been recently and lovingly repainted, although it must have been a killer of a job. The wooden shingles gleamed like the surrounding snow. The trim was a deep green. Two stately but snowshrouded holly trees stood guard on either side of the old-fashioned front porch, while the wide front door itself was decorated by a huge redbowed Christmas wreath. The place looked as though it might have been lifted from some old-time, gilt-lined greeting card.

The whole effect would have been picture-perfect if it hadn’t been for the overweight man with an open, flapping coat who was clutching the handrail and gingerly working his way back down the steep steps toward the sidewalk. Seeing him confirmed my worst suspicions-mine and Doc Baker’s as well. The media had indeed beaten us to the punch. The man picking his way down the stairs was none other than my old nemesis, crime columnist Maxwell Cole himself.

I scrambled out of the car, intent on stopping Cole before he managed to slip away. We needed to find out exactly how much damage he’d done. He blundered off the steps and was heading back down Crockett toward his car when I stopped him.

“Hold it right there, Max. We want to talk to you.”

At the sound of my voice, Max froze, standing knee-deep in the snow. Slowly he turned back toward me while an expression of profound dismay washed over the reporter’s face. He looked like the kid caught with his hand in the proverbial cookie jar.

I didn’t waste time on polite formalities. “What are you doing here, Max?”

He glanced anxiously from me to Kramer and back again. Max was out of shape and puffing from exertion just from walking back down to the street. “I stopped by to see Pete,” he man-aged.

“Pete who?” I demanded.

“Pete Kelsey,” he replied.

“Why?” I asked.

Max took a deep breath and tried to regain a little of his dignity. “He’s a friend of mine,” he replied, squaring his shoulders. “A very good friend.”

That didn’t sound likely, not coming from the Maxwell Cole I knew.

“Is he now,” I responded. “And how is it that you just happened to stop by to see him today of all days?”

“I did, that’s all,” Max insisted petulantly, his voice lapsing into its characteristic whine. “You can believe that or not.”

“I choose not, Max. I know you too damn well. Your stopping by here wouldn’t have anything to do with Pete Kelsey’s wife, now would it?”

He eyed me warily. “What if it did?”

“This is a police matter, Max. Don’t screw around with us.”

Shrugging, Maxwell Cole caved in. “I heard about Marcia as soon as I got to work,” he said. “You know how these things get around. I stopped by to see if Pete needed anything. That’s all.”

“Am I to understand that you know these people? As in friend of the family?”

He nodded.

“So tell me the truth, Max. Was this really a Good Samaritan call, or are you really out here chasing after a scoop, an exclusive interview maybe?”

Maxwell Cole’s eyes narrowed in anger. Although there was no hint of a breeze, the drooping tips of his handlebar mustache trembled with suppressed rage. “I’m telling you, J.P., these people are friends of mine. I thought I might be able to help. Besides, Pete wasn’t home. Nobody’s there.”

“Any idea where we’d find him?”

Cole glanced surreptitiously at his watch and then shook his head. “I can’t think of any place at all,” he said. “Now, let me go before I freeze to death.”

I nodded. “Go on.”

Without hesitation, Cole clambered on down the street toward Thirteenth, leaving a dented trail of steps in the snow.

As soon as Max was out of earshot, Paul Kramer wheeled on me. “Wait just a goddamned minute here, Beaumont. How come you’re letting him go? You saw the way he looked at his watch. That guy knows something, and he’s not telling.”

“Right,” I said. “And all we have to do is follow him to find out what it is.”

Kramer looked at me speculatively for only a moment, then he nodded and got back into the car. “We’ll just see about that,” he said curtly.

It turned out I was right.

Although Crockett wasn’t posted as a one-way street, most of the residents seemed to treat it that way, entering on Thirteenth and exiting by way of Everett Avenue. When we got back to Boston, Maxwell Cole’s laboring Volvo was disappearing over the crest of the hill. Both Max and Kramer had their hands full negotiating their vehicles through the hazardous streets. I rode shotgun and had no trouble keeping the Volvo well in sight.

Cole led us back down off Capitol Hill, through the bungled I-5 interchange known locally as the Mercer Mess, then north to the Fremont Bridge. Max turned off onto Phinney North and stopped on the street next to the Trolleyman Pub, a factory outlet store for one of the city’s better-known microbreweries where they make Red Hook Ale. By then we were little more than a block behind him, but Max was oblivious to our presence. Without bothering to pause and look around, Max hurried inside.

The Trolleyman is a little too trendy for my taste. From the unexpected NO SMOKING sign on the front door to the brightly lit interior decorated with all-too-modern art, it’s hardly the kind of tavern where any self-respecting serious drinker would choose to hand out. Due to the weather, the white-formica-topped tables with their oak chairs were mostly deserted. A single couple was cuddled cozily on an old-fashioned sofa in front of the roaring corner fireplace.

Kramer and I entered the room just as Maxwell Cole was sidling confidentially up to the bartender, a craggy-faced man in his midforties, a junior Willie Nelson type whose shoulder-length, graying hair was drawn back in a scrawny, rubber-band-held ponytail.

As he caught sight of us, Maxwell Cole’s mouth dropped open in dumb amazement. Whatever words he had planned to say died on his lips.

I took the bull by the horns. “Pete Kelsey?” I asked.

The bartender looked at me appraisingly, his head cocked to one side while he absently polished the already gleaming surface of the bar.

“That’s right,” he said. “What can I do for you?”

Pulling out my ID, I tossed it to him. He caught it in midair, looked at it, and tossed it back without comment.

“We’re police officers,” I explained. “I’m Detective Beaumont and this is Detective Kramer. We’d like to have a word with you. In private, if you don’t mind.”

Kelsey glanced around the almost deserted room and grinned engagingly. “It’s already pretty private in here today. I have a feeling most of the regular lunch crowd didn’t bother to come to work, and neither did my helper, so this will have to do. Besides, Max here is an old friend of mine. What do you want to talk about?”

“This is confidential, Mr. Kelsey,” I insisted. “Really, I…”

Kelsey shrugged impatiently. “I already told you. Max is a friend of mine. Whatever you have to say, you can say in front of him.”

“It’s about your wife.”

The friendly, easygoing look on his face disappeared. In its place a hardened mask slipped over his otherwise handsome features. “What about her?”

“Two people were found dead at the school district office early this morning, Mr. Kelsey. I’m sorry to say that one of them may very well be your wife.”

Pete seemed to stagger under the weight of the news, leaning against the bar for support. For confirmation, he glanced briefly at Maxwell Cole, who nodded wordlessly and ducked his head.

My heart went out to Pete Kelsey. My guess was that this would prove to be one of those cases where the death itself would be only the tip of the iceberg. If he wasn’t already aware of it, by the time we finished uncovering all the sordid details surrounding the deaths of the two nearly naked people in the closet, I imagined Pete Kelsey would have a whole lot more to grieve about than a simple, unexpected death. He’d have to learn to live with betrayal as well.