#012: Time Factor

The suspected "weapon" turns out to be a rock weighing about ten pounds, roughly the size and shape of a football. Theory has it that Karen could easily heft such a stone in both hands, raise it overhead, and smash it against a human skull with sufficient force to crush same.

Another theory has Karen alone and terrified in the night, mistaking Powell for an attacker and thus putting his lights out.

This without benefit of any input whatever from Karen, herself. She is seated in my car, staring blankly at nothing, while a guy introducing himself as Macllliney or MacAllaney, the staff lawyer, holds her hand in silence. He is no more than thirty years old and very ill at ease in the situation.

There are other people all over the damned place. There are also floodlights, helicopters, ambulances, many police units, couple of television crews with minicams getting no cooperation whatever from the officials.

Some of Kalinsky's people are quietly discussing fine points of the law with some plainclothes cops.

Kalinsky himself is pacing nervously about, obviously awaiting the arrival of something or someone else, shooting me an occasional murderous glance and muttering under his breath.

I am leaning against the front fender of the Maserati, arms crossed, feeling almost like a casual spectator until a uniformed cop approaches with a clipboard and asks me to sign my statement. I scan it and sign it, hand the clipboard back, the cop thanks me politely and walks away.

The night wears on.

The cops seem bent on an interview with Karen over the continued objections of Kalinsky's people. There seems to be a standoff of sorts.

Finally, Kalinsky's "someone" arrives in a chauffered limousine. Kalinsky runs over and climbs inside; I get a glimpse of a silver-haired man wearing a business suit.

It is midnight, now.

The cops have completed "securing the scene." The corpse has been transported. There has been a huddle around an open door of the limousine. Kalinsky emerges from the huddle, goes to my car, takes Karen and the lawyer to the limousine. I follow, because I am the curious type.

I hear a plainclothes cop refer to the man in the limousine as "your honor." Another guy in the huddle is apparently representing the DA's office. There is some give and take, there, outside the limousine, before Karen is allowed to enter. Fine points of law again. Or, maybe, fine points of bending the law. I overhear phrases such as "medical affidavits" and "conservator's certification" and I begin to get the drift.

A "conservator" is someone appointed by a court to manage the affairs of a mental incompetent.

Through all of this, Karen stands woodenly with head bowed. As she is being helped into the limousine, though, she swivels her head to stare directly at me. Our eyes clash for maybe a tenth of a second and then she is inside and the car is moving. I am left with an electric jolt racing through my nerve tissue and I know that she knows what is happening to her.

One of Kalinsky's men comes over to me, a guy I now know as Herbert, to give me an edge on the flow.

"She will be booked on a preliminary charge of simple manslaughter and immediately released to Mr. Kalinsky's custody."

 "That's nice."

"Mr. Kalinsky will be wanting a conversation with you immediately upon his return from the police station."

"That's fine."

"You are to make no further statements to the police or to the press unless Mr. Kalinsky is present."

"That's right."

But as soon as Herbert spun on a military toe and marched away, I ambled over to the DA's man and told him, "She didn't do it, you know."

He smiled at me and said, "You are... ?"

I smiled back as I replied, "I are the one who

found them out here, your principal material witness."

"Miss Springsteen."

"That's right. And apparently I found them too quick. There is a time problem. It was a cute trick, but not quite cute enough. Do you know what is at stake here?"

The guy went right on smiling as he told me, "Yes, I do, Miss Springsteen. I would say that my entire political career is at stake here."

I said, "Too bad," and left the guy staring at my back as I went on to the Maserati and got the hell away from there.

I made a beeline to the Highland estate while jotting down distance traveled for every compass heading and trying to maintain a steady 30 mph pace. It took me just under three minutes to hit the front gate, which figures about a mile and a half of distance traveled via the most direct roadways.

The gate guard had nothing to tell me about traffic through there before midnight since his shift had begun at that time.

I put the Maserati in the same parking space as before, but she was now the only vehicle in the area. Obviously the party was over. I retrieved the Walther and tucked it inside the waistband of my shorts, then went on toward the pool.

The service force was busily restoring order to the patio-lounge area. The bartender who helped me with Marcia was cleaning the island bar outside; he looked up at my approach and recognized me with a smile so I steered that way and went over to thank him for the assist, then I asked him in a casual way when he had last seen Miss Highland.

He replied that she had come into the lounge at "a bit" past nine o'clock, apparently while the dinner guests were dawdling over desserts, to check on the musicians and to make sure that all was in readiness there.

"You haven't seen her since then?" I asked.

He dropped his chin and leaned a bit closer in the response. "No ma'am, not since then, but something very strange has been going on around here the past couple of hours. I think maybe Miss Highland had another one of her spells or something. I mean, the whole executive staff is very uptight and they sent the guests home early."

I thanked him and started away, then checked myself and leaned back to inquire, very casually, "Mister Kalinsky get back yet?"

The guy gave me a blank look and replied, "I wondered where he was, I mean I figured he was with Mrs. Kalinsky. Haven't seen him since, uh, since I guess right after Miss Highland."

"You mean since right after dinner."

"Yes ma'am, it—well, I guess more like about nine-thirty. He was looking for her—Miss Highland—asked me if she'd come through. Because by then the party had moved out here, you know, here on the patio and in the game room. Because people were dancing and—about nine-thirty, yes ma'am."

"He was in a dither," I suggested.

"Sure was."

"See Doc Powell around that same time?"

The guy was beginning to wonder about all these questions. He was getting an edge to the eyes and the body language was definitely one of withdrawal. "Not since we pulled Mrs. Kalinsky out of the pool, no ma'am."

I thanked him again and went on inside.

There was no sign of life whatever in the executive wing. The operations center was shut down and darkened except for a small nightlight at the back wall. I expected the executive office to be locked, as well, but the doors were not even closed, not even the one to the inner sanctum.

My unsigned contract still lay on the desk. There was evidence, also, that Kalinsky had quit the place in a hurry: an open cigarette humidor, a dead butt with an inch-long ash still attached in the ashtray, a doodle pad with several used sheets filled with hieroglyphics and detached, but not discarded; more importantly, a lighted LED on the telephone console indicating "Record Pause."

I studied the console for a moment, doped it, rewound the tape through three brief conversations, and hit the playback.

My own voice came through the speaker, bearing the message of my grisly find out Stone Canyon.

Then Kalinsky cussing in a husky voice to himself, then a dial-out followed by a brief and cryptic conversation:

"Yeah."

Kalinsky: "Okay, it's hit. Meet me out front in two minutes. Better bring the squad."

"Are we ready for this?"

"We better be. Where's Herb?"

"He's mobile."

"Okay, we'll catch him on the way. Better bring Mac."

"He's been partying. May not be ready."

Kalinsky: "Fuck that, just bring 'im."

A hang-up, another dial-out, but already I was beginning to sort the players. "Herb" was no doubt Herbert, one of the security honchos; "Mac" was Macllliney or MacAllaney, the lawyer who had hand-held Karen during the ordeal in my car.

The second call-out was much more cryptic and even more brief:

"Yes, hello."

"This is TK. I need that package. Can you get started?"

The other voice was cultured, mature, maybe even silvery-haired. "You mean, right now? Do you know what time it is?"

"We both better know what time it is. Get started. I'll contact you on the mobile."

That was it. I removed the cassette and put it in my pocket, replaced it with a blank, then gathered up the doodles and took them, also, and got the hell out of there.

I wanted a moment with Marcia before Kalinsky and his goons returned to the palace.

And maybe, time allowing, a shot at Doc Powell's doodles.

Time allowing ...

The time factor had become all-important. As important, probably, as life and death.