Pendergast nodded.
'Milbanke and Frederick were at the last dinner party, and the calls were probably about organizing it. We have no idea why he called Bullard. We don't have any evidence that he ever met the guy. Cutforth is also a cipher. He's some kind of record producer, again no indication that he and Grove ever crossed paths. Yet in both cases, Grove had their private numbers.'
'What about all these calls to directory information?' D'Agosta asked. 'He must have called at least a dozen different cities.'
'As far as we can tell, he was trying to track down somebody by the name of Beckmann. Ranier Beckmann. His Internet search activity bears this out, too.'
Pendergast laid down a dirty napkin he had been examining. 'Excellent work, Lieutenant. Do you mind if we interview some of these people as well?'
'Be my guest.'
D'Agosta and Pendergast climbed into the agent's Rolls, idling ostentatiously in front of the police station, the driver in full livery. As the powerful vehicle accelerated away from the station, Pendergast slipped a leather notebook from his pocket, opened it to a fresh page, and began making notations with a gold pen. 'We seem to have an embarrassment of suspects.'
'Yeah. Like about everyone Grove ever knew.'
'With the possible exception of Maurice Vilnius. Even so, I suspect the list will shorten itself rather quickly. Meanwhile, we have our work cut out for us tomorrow.' He handed the list to D'Agosta. 'You speak with Milbanke, Bullard, and Cutforth. I'll take Vilnius, Fosco, and Montcalm. And here are some identification cards from the FBI Southern District of Manhattan Field Office. If anybody objects to the questions, give them one of these.'
'Anything in particular I should be looking for?'
'Strictly routine police work. We've reached the point in the case where we must regrettably put on those old- fashioned gumshoes. Isn't that how they say it in those detective novels you used to write?'
D'Agosta managed a wry smile. 'Not exactly.'
{ 10 }
Nigel Cutforth, sitting in his Bauhaus-style breakfast nook1,052 feet above Fifth Avenue, lowered the latest issue of Billboard and sniffed the air. What was it with the ventilation in his apartment these past few days? This was the third time that sulfurous stink had come up into his apartment. Twice those yahoos from building maintenance had come up, and twice they'd found nothing.
Cutforth slapped down the paper. 'Eliza!'
Eliza was Cutforth's second wife-he'd finally dumped the old bag who had worn herself out bearing him children and found something fresher-and there she stood in the doorway, in her exercise tights, brushing her long blonde hair with her head tilted to one side. Cutforth could hear the crackle of static.
'There's that smell again,' he said.
'I've got a nose, too,' she said, swinging one mass of hair back and pulling another forward.
There was a time not so long before when Cutforth liked watching her mess with her hair. Now it was beginning to get on his nerves. She wasted half an hour a day on it, at least.
As she continued brushing, Cutforth felt his irritation rise. 'I paid five and a half mil for this apartment, and it smells like a goddamn science experiment. Why don't you call maintenance?'
'The phone's right there, next to your elbow.'
Cutforth didn't care for the tone she was taking with him.
She swung the last part of her hair back, shook it out, straightened. 'I've got my spin workout in fifteen minutes. I'm already late.'
With that, she vanished from the doorway. Cutforth could hear her banging the hall closet, getting on her tennis shoes. A moment later there was the hum of the elevator in the hall beyond, and she was gone.
He stared at the closed door, trying to remind himself that he'd wanted something fresher; that he'd gotten something fresher. Too fucking fresh, in fact.
He sniffed again. If anything, the smell was worse. It would be a bitch getting maintenance up here a third time. Building management was useless; they did something only if you yelled loud enough. But there were only two apartments on this floor-the other had been purchased but not yet occupied-and nobody on the other floors had seemed to smell anything. So Cutforth was the only one yelling.
He stood up, feeling a prickle of disquiet. Grove had complained of a bad smell in that bizarre call of his-that, and about a hundred other strange things. He shook his head, trying to clear the clouds of apprehension that were slowly gathering. He was letting that old pillow-biter and his crazy worries get to him.
Was it coming from the vents? He moved around, testing the air. It was stronger in the living room, even stronger in the library. He followed it to the door of the control room, sniffing like a dog. Stronger, ever stronger. He unlocked the door, entered the room, flicked on the light, and looked around. There was his beautiful 64-channel Studer, his RAID-striped hard disk recording system, and his racks of audio processing gear. On the far wall were several glass cases containing his treasured collections. The guitar Mick Jagger had smashed at Altamont: Keith Richards's prized 1950 Telecaster, dating from the first year of mass production, still sporting its original pickups. The scribbled music sheets to 'Imagine,' with the coffee stains and obscene doodles in the margins. His wife said the control room looked like Planet Hollywood. That really pissed him off. This space was one of the greatest collections of rock memorabilia anywhere. The place where he'd discovered the Suburban Lawnmowers from an over-the-transom four-track demo mailed from Cincinnati. This is where he'd first heard the sounds of Rappah Jowly and felt that special creeping sensation go up his spine. Cutforth had an ear. He had a knack of recognizing a big-
