“Just a moment, please,” Olivia called, and then shot Rothstein a warning glance and went into the entrance alcove and opened the door. The man standing there was perhaps thirty-seven, thirty-eight years old, Olivia guessed, with red hair and blue eyes. His complexion looked ruddy from the cold outside. He smiled pleasantly.
“Miss Kidd?” he asked.
“Yes?” she said.
A shield pinned to a leather fob appeared in his right hand.
“Detective Reardon, Fifth P.D.U. All right if I...?”
“Ah. yes,” Olivia said. “My sister phoned earlier, said you’d been to see her. How can I help you?”
“May I come in?”
“Certainly. What’s the problem. Detective Reardon?”
“No problem. Just a few things I wanted to ask you. I hope I’m not interrupting anything.”
“Please,” Olivia said.
He followed her through the open arch that led to the living room. Lowell Rothstein was sitting on a sofa near the windows. The drapes were open and the sky over Central Park was littered with stars.
“Hey, hello, Mr. Rothstein,” Reardon said pleasantly.
“Hello, how are you?” Rothstein said. “What a surprise.”
“Do you know each other?” Olivia asked.
“Only casually,” Reardon said. He smiled at Rothstein and said, “I didn’t expect to find you here.”
“I... uh... was shopping at F.A.O.’s,” Rothstein said.
“Just around the corner,” Reardon said, and smiled.
“Lowell and I are old friends,” Oh via said.
“Too bad Phelps couldn’t join you, huh?” Reardon said, still smiling. “But he’s down at the Fifth Precinct. I guess your sister told you, huh?”
“You found him?” Rothstein said. “Good!”
Smooth as glass, Reardon thought. But there was apprehension in his eyes.
“We picked him up at Kennedy, buying a ticket to Rio,” he said, and smiled. “Why do they always go to Rio? His briefcase was full of U.S. Treasury bonds. Three million, four hundred and eighty thousand dollars. Lots of money,” he said, and whistled softly. “In bearer bonds. That’s the same as cash. I guess you know that, Mr. Rothstein, being in the brokerage business and all.”
“Yes. The bonds belong to a woman named Phyllis Katzman. I discovered them missing at a little after eleven this morning. I don’t know what possessed Joe. I really...”
“But you didn’t call the police, huh?” Reardon said.
“I beg your pardon?”
“When you discovered the theft. You didn’t call the police, did you? My partner checked with the First Precinct down there. No record of anyone reporting the theft.”
“Well, no. I...”
“You went shopping at F.A.O.’s instead.”
“Actually, I... uh... didn’t know what to do. I was hoping Joe might have had some reason to...”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Instructions from Mrs. Katzman to return the bonds to her? Some reasonable explanation for what he did.”
“He had a good reason for running, if that’s what you mean,” Reardon said.
“Well, I guess they all have reasons, don’t they?” Rothstein said, and smiled. “Thieves, I mean. In any case, thank you for coming here to inform us. And thank you, too, for what I’m sure was splendid police work.”
“Only thing our guys did was hang around outside his apartment and follow him to Kennedy,” Reardon said, and shrugged.
“Whatever they did, you’ve got him,” Olivia said “Forgive me, can I order a drink for you?”
“Well, thank you. but this isn’t a social call. I mean, I didn’t just stop by to tell you we got Phelps and the bonds.” He looked at Rothstein, turned to Olivia again, and then said, “I came here to talk about silver.”
“The Lone Ranger’s horse?” Olivia said, smiling.
“No, but that’s very good. Miss Kidd. I mean silver silver.”
“And what is that supposed to mean, Mr. Reardon?”
“Well... according to what Phelps told my partner, your family’s been buying silver contracts, Miss Kidd, lots of silver con...”
“There is nothing illegal about buying silver contracts. We’ve done nothing that wasn’t entirely legal and aboveboard.”
“How about murder?” Reardon asked. “Is that legal and aboveboard?”
“Oh? Has someone been murdered?”
“Two someones. Three if we count the Arab, but you can’t be blamed for what some fanatics did, can you?”
“I have no idea what you’re...”
“One of the victims came to see you on the fifteenth, Mr. Rothstein. Remember? I asked you about him this morning, and you said you didn’t know him.”
“I... who do you mean?” Rothstein said.
“A man named Peter Dodge.”
“I still don’t know him.”
“Let me help you,” Reardon said. “He bought quite a few silver contracts. Bought them long, in fact. Which is what someone would do if he knew the price was going up.” He looked at Olivia. “If he’d seen the timetable, right, Miss Kidd?”
“Mr. Reardon, the legal buying and selling of silver...”
“Oh, sure,” Reardon said, and turned to Rothstein again. “Stop me if you’ve heard this one,” he said. “Here’s what Phelps says happened. At least, this is what you told Phelps happened, after which he ran to clean out Mrs. Katzman’s lock box.”
“If you’re ready to believe a thief...”
“Yeah, I’m ready to believe him,” Reardon said. “According to Phelps, this is what you told him. Dodge came to you that afternoon and showed you a piece of paper with a lot of dates on it. Dales for buying silver contracts. All spelled out. A textbook for making a fortune. And he also showed you...”
“No, he didn’t show me anything,” Rothstein said.
“Ah, you remember him now.”
“Vaguely.”
“Then why’d you tell me you hadn’t seen him?”
“Because...”
“Because you knew he’d been killed and you knew why he’d been killed!”
“No, I...”
“Yes. Which is why Phelps ran, by the way. The minute he knew you were involved in murder...”
“I had nothing to do with Dodge’s murder!”
“But he did come to see you, huh?”
“Yes.”
“Lowell,” Olivia warned.
“He’s accusing me of murder, damn it!” He turned to Reardon again. “He came to see me, yes. And, yes, he showed me the purchasing schedule.”
“You just told me he didn’t show you anything.”
“He showed it to me.”
“How’d he get it?”
“From a little Italian who owns a restaurant on Mulberry Street.”
“Ralph D’Annunzio?”
“Dodge didn’t tell me his name.”
“It was D’Annunzio. Who’d been sitting next to an Arab named Amin Abbas...”
Olivia looked at him sharply.
“... on the shuttle from Washington, D.C. Go on, Mr. Rothstein.”
“Are you charging Lowell with something?” Olivia asked. “Because if you are, I feel an attorney...”
“Sit tight, Miss Kidd,” Reardon said. “You’ll have plenty of time for attorneys. Let me hear it, Mr. Rothstein.”
“Apparently, they struck up a conversation on the plane. Abbas and the Italian. Abbas left his briefcase behind...”
“I know all this,” Reardon said, “I have it from D’Annunzio’s son. What did Dodge tell you when he came to see you?”
“He said a client of his had come into possession of a briefcase and was afraid to go to the police with it because its owner was the victim of a shooting at La Guardia. That’s exactly what he told me.”