“Go on.”
“Lennox was in and out of the building a lot, yesterday, last night, after the party, but before Lionel Hutchison was murdered, according to the times I got from the ME. Lennox’s daughter was with him. I saw them on a tape,” said Virgil. “Made it look nice, him with his pretty teenage daughter.”
“You think he’d use her that way?”
“Why not? He was first on the scene after you found Hutchison, right? Made it look like he was distraught. How did he know to show up?”
“I don’t know.”
“Also, he has a good motive, better than good. He wants those apartments.”
Something struck me. “You were here last night?”
“I was working the other homicides, like I said, but I stopped by, just to see who I could see while most everyone was over at the club. People in the building, especially the help, feel more like talking when Lennox isn’t around. I thought I might hear something about Simonova.”
“Diaz?”
“Him. Others.”
“You want to pick him up?” I said. “It’s your case.”
“Not yet,” Virgil said, putting his notebook away. “I want it solid, Artie. I don’t want any fancy lawyers finding a nice little well-greased legal loophole. I want to get Lennox in a place where we have the goods to lock him up for life. I know it’s him. He has access to pretty much all of the building, the roof, the basement, all of it. I think he even fucking killed the dog.”
“What for?”
“Maybe he did it to make Marie Louise look guilty. Everybody knew how scared she was of that dog.”
“You want to take a look in his place?”
“Without a warrant?”
“You on for that?”
“It so happens that he’s out with his daughter at this very time,” said Virgil. “Nice, right?”
“You know that?”
“Not for nothing that I’m a detective,” said Virgil. “I managed to have a pleasant conversation with Lennox about life and the holidays and children. I believe he thinks I’m up to his standard, thinks because he went to fucking Princeton and they let him join one of their eating clubs, he’s somebody. But deep down he thinks I come from class while he only learned it. What an ass,” Virgil said. “Snobs are such easy prey.”
In spite of myself, I liked Virgil more and more. I liked working with him. He was smart. Sharp. He was a detective with balls, who didn’t wait around for the bureaucrats to give him permission, and he had a brain and a sense of humor. I would like him even more if I got Lily away from him. Anyway, for now it looked like she didn’t want either one of us.
Virgil had told her what had happened with Marie Louise, or most of it-I wasn’t sure he’d told her about his pal in Homeland Security-and Lily was furious with both of us. I’d already had a couple of angry messages, her voice icy and unyielding. I’d called back. She didn’t pick up.
“You must have loved hearing Lionel’s stories about people who lived up here, all those jazz musicians, right?” said Virgil as we got to the Armstrong’s front door.
“Sure. Not your music, though, is it?”
“Not really. More my father’s thing.” He held the front door open for me.
“I should tell you I sent some pills I found in Huchison’s apartment to an old pal. Same type of meds as I found in Simonova’s.”
“What kind of pal?”
“A good friend in forensics. She knows people who can take a look at what’s in them fast. It’s just a hunch, OK? But I figured, what the hell. OK with you?”
“Your friend has a name?”
“Gloria Lopez.”
“That’s good for me, Artie. I know Gloria,” he said, as we went into the lobby. “How long will she take to see if there’s anything that shouldn’t be there? I don’t really make Carver Lennox for a guy who offs people with bad meds. You?”
“Gloria said by tomorrow. She can put the nicest kind of pressure on her contacts.”
“Good. Listen, Artie, could you believe Carver beat you up in the basement?”
“No. If it went back to him, it must have been somebody he hired. I think I heard somebody speak Russian, or maybe he wanted me to think he was a fucking Russki.”
“Or a Cuban who spoke some Russian? Carver could find himself a Cuban, right?” said Virgil, just as Diaz opened the inside door for us. Tipped his hat at Virgil. Looked at him nervously. Wished him Feliz Navidad.
CHAPTER 48
You any good at picking locks?” I said to Virgil as he looked at Carver Lennox’s apartment door.
“You mean because of my bad black childhood in the mean streets of Cambridge, and Greenwich Village?” He smiled. “Actually, I am pretty fucking fine at it.” He got down and inspected the lock. From his jacket he took a Leatherman, one of those little tool kits.
The doors on the floor were all shut, but you could feel the people inside, feel them waiting, alert, listening. People had heard the sirens this morning. Some had gone downstairs to see what had happened, had seen the cops, and the body on the ground. They would have seen the seal on the Hutchisons’ door. The news about Lionel Hutchison, and about Celestina’s dog, would have traveled through the building. Everyone on this floor would know by now.
Behind those doors, people were talking, making calls, angry at the intrusions into their lives, sorry about the deaths, scared for their own safety. There had been two deaths on this floor, not to mention the dog. The little fortress high above the city had been invaded.
I held my breath. I didn’t want anyone to see us, least of all Lily.
“Virgil?”
“Just don’t talk for a minute; I have to concentrate,” he said, working at the lock. A few seconds later, the door snapped open, and we were in.
From Lennox’s terrace came a noise, like somebody tapping on glass. Instinctively, both of us reached for our guns. What we were doing was illegal and probably dangerous. If Lennox had hired somebody to kill Hutchison and trash a dog, he probably had a thug on his payroll who would be happy to work over a couple of detectives like us.
“I’ll go,” I said.
Turned out the noise was only a piece of glass blowing around. But I saw how easy it would be to get from Lennox’s terrace to the Hutchisons. The terraces were adjacent. Three in a row I thought: Simonova, Hutchison, Lennox.
“Anything?” I said to Virgil who was combing the apartment.
It was a rich man’s apartment: the old oak floors, wide deep planks, covered with antique kilims; the furniture was 1950s; pictures on the wall so famous you had to blink, including an Andy Warhol silk screen of Mohammad Ali. The kind of place you see in a magazine.
As Virgil worked, he talked, softly, in a low voice, with plenty of irony. “The New Harlem, they call it.” He snorted. “New and for rich people,” Virgil said. “Who might not have any taste but sure know how to hire a decorator who has some. You know how old this prick Carver is?”
“Forty?”
“He’s thirty-six, Artie, two years younger than me,” said Virgil. “You know why I think he wants this building? I think he wants it for the history. He doesn’t have any. He’s the kind of guy who invents himself. I mean, I looked him up, it wasn’t hard, he’s been written up, young, black, hedge-fund guy, Goldman Sachs.” Virgil took some art books from a shelf. “He’s also a liar, even about his own past. He didn’t come up from the streets like he tells
