Mister Jinnah Mysteries 3-Book Bundle. Donald J. Hauka
Читать онлайн книгу.
you deny Sam Schuster was kidnapped and you deny there is a police report to that effect in your records?” Jinnah asked, looking carefully at Graham’s face.
The Sergeant flushed red.
“That’s not what I said! I said her story that Sam Schuster was murdered for that venture capital is bullshit!”
“So you admit Sam Schuster was kidnapped two weeks before his death and the two men involved threatened to burn him alive unless he handed the funds over, hmm?”
Graham closed his eyes and exercised, in his opinion, considerable restraint in not having Jinnah taken down to the cells for trespassing.
“There is a report to that effect in our records, yes,” he admitted. “But what I am also telling you, Hakeem, is that we have good reason to believe that there is no connection between the two incidents. Sam Schuster committed suicide: full stop.”
Jinnah found himself getting increasingly agitated.
“You know, Sergeant Graham, I’m getting a little tired of the line of bullshit you’ve been feeding me. First you lie to me about Chan seeing someone at the scene —”
“We didn’t lie,” Graham had protested. “We merely obfusticated!”
“— then you let me track down and interview a known axe-murderer —”
“He hasn’t murdered anyone — as far as we know.”
“— then you feed Grant this shit about the insurance policy and even set him up with your main man in Commercial Crime!”
“If you’d listened to me, maybe I would have given you the tip instead, Jinnah!”
The two men glared at each other.
“You’ve lied to me too many times!” Jinnah said after a tense silence.
“Jinnah, please,” Graham pleaded, standing up and placing his hands on his desk. “Please — trust me on this one. If I could tell you what’s up, I would. But it’s too sensitive right now. If you publish this information, it wouldn’t —”
“Be helpful?” Jinnah had said, leaping to his feet. “Jesus Christ, Sarge! Give me a real reason. Just one!”
Graham had sat back down, eyes glistening, moustache moist and trembling.
“Trust me, that’s all I can say.”
“Not good enough,” Jinnah said, turning to leave.
“Remember what the Duke of Wellington said to his mistress when she threatened to name him in her memoirs, Jinnah.”
Jinnah paused at the door.
“What was that?” he asked, not bothering to turn around.
“Publish and be damned.”
“Ye shall know the truth, Sergeant Graham and it shall set you free,” Jinnah replied and left for the relative safety of the satellite-guided Love Machine.
So it was that Jinnah found himself driving along the streets of Vancouver, smoking and cursing, listening to the radio for any news about the killing or Sam Schuster or, for that matter, the Orient Love Express. He heard nothing of interest. Finally, he took out his cell-phone and called Sanderson in the newsroom.
“Ronald, I want you to do me a favour —”
“Not now, Hakeem!” Sanderson cried, sounding harried. “You won’t believe what that bastard Blacklock wants me to do now —”
“If you need to borrow a set of knee-pads, ask Grant — although his are probably nearly worn out.”
“Don’t be disgusting! I have to go out on a rescue operation!”
As it happened, Jinnah was driving along Cornwall Street, past the south side of English Bay, looking at the deserted lifeguard towers. The beaches themselves were crowded for it was warm despite the heavy clouds overhead.
“It’s a bit late in the year for missing snowboarders, isn’t it? Or has another fishing boat disappeared?”
“Be serious! I have to go out to a motel in Surrey with this mother —”
“I don’t want to hear about your sordid sex life —”
“— and help her rescue her daughter from a notorious pimp!”
“So what?” Jinnah grunted. “You’ll have a photographer with you. You’ll be perfectly safe.”
“Hakeem, I’ve never done this sort of thing before in my life!”
“There’s always a first time, Ronald. Now, my friend: what time are you setting out on this Herculean task?”
“Eight o’clock. Are you offering to come with me?”
“No,” Jinnah admitted. “But since you’re not leaving until eight, you can do two things for me: first, find out where Blacklock is going tonight —”
“Hakeem!”
“— launching, shall we call it, Operation Lard Ass —”
“Jinnah!”
“— and second, what is the line story?”
“Jinnah, are you totally, completely and utterly self-centred? You refuse to help me in my hour of need and then you have the gall to command me to — the line story?”
“Yes, Ronald, the line story.”
There was a pause. For a moment, Jinnah thought perhaps Sanderson had fainted.
“Ronald, are you there?” he asked, worried.
“Just reading the list, Hakeem,” Sanderson’s voice sounded tired and defeated. “The line story was supposed to be something about Schuster’s business dealings in Indonesia. It has Grant’s name beside it.”
“Son of a bitch!” swore Jinnah, swerving to miss a pedestrian. “I’m sorry, Ronald. You said supposed to be?”
“Now there is some doubt, apparently, as to whether Grant can get the story.”
The doubt had been planted in Grant’s mind by the securities investigator handling the Schuster file. Richard Kurster was a small, compact man with thin, grey hair and tiny, grey eyes who wore Dick Tracy trenchcoats and sported a fedora. He liked to think he projected the image of a veteran G-Man, but in truth, he was often mistaken for a car salesman. This impression was cemented by the scent of Old Spice aftershave and too much mousse holding his bad comb-over in place. Kurster was Grant’s rough equivalent to Jinnah’s Sergeant Graham: the seasoned investigator who tried to manage and manipulate the media to his advantage while the reporter tried to outguess and outmanoeuvre him at his own game. But Grant had not known Kurster nearly as long as Jinnah had known Graham and he was unsure if the securities man was bullshitting him about the sudden “complications” regarding Schuster’s death as they sat in the offices of the Vancouver Securities Commission.
“You’re telling me your story has changed,” said Grant, ever-aggressive, vaguely abusive, bordering on rude.
“I wouldn’t use the word ‘changed’ here,” Kurster said patiently. “Rather, I would describe the picture as becoming somewhat more clear — and more complicated.”
“You’re quibbling over semantics,” growled Grant. “First you tell me Schuster made off with about ten million of the money he raised to buy IIP, then toasted himself for the insurance after you guys got wind of the scam.”
Kurster leaned back in his chair, putting his hands on his head, covering his growing bald spot, but mindful not to squash his carefully constructed hair.
“Early evidence suggested that indeed might be the case,” he agreed. “But certain information has come to our attention that puts a slightly