The Classic Car Killer. Richard A. Lupoff
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and studied it. Who had sold the policy? A broker located in Oakland. East Bay Quality Insurance Limited. Huh. He’d dealt with them before, with a stuffy individual named Elmer Mueller. Not much chance they’d be open on Sunday either, but it was worth a phone call. No luck, but at least they had an answering machine and he left his name and a request to call back.
He hadn’t wanted to deal with the Mr. Coffee at International Surety. That would have got Ms. Wilbur all out of joint when she came in Monday morning. So he had stopped and bought a styrofoam cup of coffee and a roll at a fast food stand on his way in.
He spread the wrapper on his desk, took a bite of the roll and a sip of the coffee. It wasn’t good but it was hot, and that was welcome on a gray winter’s morning.
He slipped his pocket organizer out of his jacket and studied the notes he’d made in Oakland the previous night. Mr. and Mrs. van Arndt looked like a pair of lightweights, although they might still be helpful in tracking the stolen Phaeton. But Joe Roberts was the one he needed to talk to first.
There were half a dozen Joseph Roberts in the Oakland directory. Lindsey started the laborious work of phoning them. Three were at home. None of them had ever heard of the New California Smart Set. Two of the numbers rang until he gave up on them. He got one answering machine, left his name and number and asked that Joseph Roberts to call him back.
There was an M. R. Bernstein, Ph.D., in the book. He dialed the number. A man answered. Lindsey asked if Dr. Bernstein was home. The man asked him to hold.
He took another bite of his roll and sipped coffee.
“Dr. Bernstein here.”
Lindsey swallowed coffee and roll. “Martha Bernstein?”
“Yes.”
He told her who he was, asked if Joseph Roberts was at her house.
She said he was. She said she’d summon him, sounding gleeful at the prospect.
Roberts sounded bleary. Probably he was hung over. If the van Arndts’ description was anywhere near accurate, he had good cause to be.
Lindsey said, “I represent the International Surety Corporation, and I’m processing the insurance claim on the Duesenberg Phaeton that was stolen last night. I’d like to come out there and have a chat with you, Mr. Roberts.”
Roberts didn’t reply for a while, but Lindsey waited patiently. Finally, “I don’t know—Mr.—what did you say your name was?”
“Lindsey. Hobart Lindsey. International Surety.”
“Yeah. Got it.”
“Well, may I?”
“May you what?”
“Come and see you about the theft of the Duesenberg.”
Another lengthy pause. Lindsey could hear an off-phone conversation, but he couldn’t make out what was said. Then he heard Roberts clear his throat. “Ah, I don’t think that would be such a good idea, Mr. Lindsey.”
“You want to collect on this claim, don’t you?”
“It’s not my claim. It wasn’t my car.”
“You’re a member of the New California Smart Set, aren’t you?”
“Yes.”
“Then it’s your car. It’s registered in the name of the society.”
“Then I guess it is mine. Look, I don’t know who took the damned car. I told that cop everything I saw. I think. Actually I don’t remember too much about last night. I got kind of stinkeroonie. If you know what I mean.”
“Yes.”
Another silence.
Then, “So why don’t you just get the police report?”
“I intend to, Mr. Roberts. But I’d still like to talk with you. You might have seen something, maybe something useful.”
“Wait a minute. You’re not a cop, are you?”
“I’m an insurance adjuster.”
“Then do your job. Get out of my face. I’m hung over, pal, my head feels like a hot air balloon. Bug off.”
Lindsey heard the phone slam down.
Roberts was probably right. It was unlikely he had seen anything useful, or if he had, it would be in the police report, and Lindsey should have that in another twenty-four hours. But Lindsey hadn’t been kidding about some little detail. People sometimes saw more than they realized. The first report of an incident was usually the most complete and accurate; the human memory started losing track of information within minutes of the event. But there was an odd, opposite effect, as well. People spotted details and tucked them away in some obscure memory bank. And they re-emerged to astonish everyone, anywhere from days to decades later.
Lindsey wanted to question Roberts, as well as all the other members of the society, for another reason. Most car thefts were stranger crimes. The criminal and victim didn’t know each other. The car thief might be anyone from a thrill-seeking delinquent hitting a target of opportunity with nothing more in mind than a joy ride, to an operative of a thoroughly professional ring, stealing cars to order for chop shops or for customers who wouldn’t mind buying merchandise of dubious origin for the sake of a bargain price.
But not all such thefts were committed by strangers. Not all. And the theft of the Duesenberg might be an inside job. Some member of the Smart Set who coveted the club’s collective property for his personal use. Or who thought he might be able to sell the Dusie for a sweet price.
Or maybe the theft had been engineered for the specific purpose of collecting on the insurance claim. What would happen to the $425,000 if and when International Surety paid off? Would the club use it to buy another classic car? Or would it go into the general fund? Or would an officer of the club find a way to convert the payment for his personal use?
Lindsey jotted a note to pursue that line. Was there a member of the club in financial hot water? The New California Smart Set had all the earmarks of a cozy bunch of millionaires, but there might be a scattering of ordinary citizens in the club as well.
For instance: was Dr. Bernstein independently wealthy, or did she have to work for a living? The van Arndts had said that she was on the faculty at the University of California. If she was sitting on a nice fat trust fund, she might be teaching just because she liked it. But if that was not the case, if she had to live on a professor’s salary, well, Lindsey knew that academics nowadays earned a living wage, but they were hardly up there with movie stars or professional athletes. Dr. Bernstein might be happy to get her mitts on almost half a million simoleons. Who wouldn’t?
And Lindsey didn’t know what Joe Roberts did for a living. And as for the van Arndts, they might reek of dollars, but there was many an old fortune that had shrunk with the years. They might be keeping up a facade of wealth and leisure and behind it be teetering on the edge of bankruptcy.
Wait a minute! Van Arndt had said that the club was forced to take in members it didn’t really want, because the Kleiner Mansion was a public facility. Ollie had spoken of moving the society to a clubhouse of its own, so it could become the kind of snooty, exclusive outfit he apparently preferred. They could buy a very nice clubhouse for just under half a million smackers!
What to do? Wait for the police report? That wasn’t the way Hobart Lindsey conducted himself!
Joseph Roberts’ voice on the phone from Dr. Bernstein’s house had sounded husky and his pronunciation had been slurred, but it sounded a lot like the voice on the message tape at one of the Joseph Roberts’ homes. Lindsey found a map of Oakland, searched for Roberts’ street in the index, and found it near the Oakland Estuary. He made up his mind.
He dialed home. Joanie Schorr assured him that Mother was all right and that she was willing to stay for the rest of the day. She handed the receiver to Mother and Lindsey assured her that he had not deserted