Kam answered his phone. It was attorney Finegold asking that he come to the office, no explanation given. Kam said sure, and left. I went out and picked up a copy of the paper that contained my article. Howie was there when I got back; he had also picked up the paper. “How in thunderation kin you git away with makin’ up shee-it like that?”
“Easy. English is such an incredible language for making nothing sound like the obvious.”
Twenty after two, Polly and Leon came driving up.
After two hours of questions and answers, and becomingcomfortable with Leon and Polly, I felt assured Leon was innocent. Leon seemed sincere in his grief and guilt. He thought if he had been more attentive he could have prevented the murder. Gerald had taken great pains to keep his secret from the whole world, and as good as Gerald was, why could I not believe he could keep it a secret from his assistant? An assistant who played by the rules, and always did as he was told. A bright guy, Leon: He just had no street smarts. Howie concurred.
My sister Angelica reached me on Kam’s house phone.
“Peter darling, someone has called and asked for a way to get in touch with Mister Nucase. He left a cryptic message that he said you would understand… ‘Tell Mister Nucase someone wants to talk with him about the underworld, and that the word underworld should be written in capital letters.’ Whatever does that mean?”
“Bingo. Jackpot. Blackjack. We’ve got a shark on the line. Give him my Nucase cell phone number, and tell him to call at anytime. Oh, and Sis, I owe you big time.”
“Haven’t I heard this before? Well, good, I’ll collect big time. Be careful, you nutcase. Underworld in capital letters doesn’t sound like a fun game.”
Kam arrived in a new Hummer 2 with a footlocker-sized crate in the back. “This, my fellow Americans,” he said, presenting the crate like a prize on The Price Is Right, “and what’s in here,” pointing to his head, “will lead directly to our culprit.”
“Hey Pete, I’d be willin’ ta bet ya any amount you kin count, and give twenty-to-one odds, that both them there containers he jest pointed to are empty.”
“Funny, sonny. You guys help me in with this thing.”
It was heavy. When we set it down in the music room, and opened it, Kam started performing again.
“Lady and Gentlepersons, we have before us Dandy Randy Nimoy’s entry into the Estate Contest. Does it seem strange to you that it was completed only two days after the reading of the will? Okay, it did to me too. This dandy little stunt was stolen from the labyrinth, and we can prove it. How, you ask?” He reached into his briefcase and pulled out a set of plans. “These plans, for this trick, were taken by me from the labyrinth. The tricks for all of the other plans I found were still down there. Only this trick was missing.”
Leon chimed in, “I recognize some of the parts! I ordered them for Mr. Tannon.”
“And, Lady and Gentlepersons, as far as the contents of this other empty container…” Kam went on to say that after he realized what he had, he’d gone over to Randy’s house. No one was home, so-o-o he did what the police can’t, or shouldn’t do: He made himself a guest. Inside, he found the notes and drawings that were used to pull the stunts on Howie.
“Where is Randy appearing tonight?” I asked Howie.
“Back at Rita’s. This should oughta be fun.”
Kam was swaggering, “Let’s celebrate first. Dinner on me at Lombardi’s.”
We agreed to meet at Lombardi’s at nine.
The call came through halfway through dessert.
“Meet me at Mount Charleston Lodge in forty-five minutes,” the unfamiliar voice said. “Drive out 95, take a left on 156, then drive the loop to 158 and 157. Be alone, no cops, and no ridealongs. I’ll be watching and signal you. I have info on what’s going down, Mr. Nucase. If you want it, don’t betray me.”
“How do we handle this one, Pete? You’re not going up there by yourself,” Kam said.
“I can handle this creep. Whoever he is, he believes he’s dealing with a reporter. So I’m going to finish dessert, take a little mountain drive, and catch me a two-legged varmint. You and Howie go on out to Rita’s to check if our caller is Randy.”
“Could be a accomplice,” Howie added. “It don’t have to be Randy hisself. Possible six million dollars, a feller might go lookin’ fer some help.”
Mount Charleston and the Lodge are right around the corner from Vegas. Mostly locals go there. It’s rustic and wooded, and at almost 12,000 feet the peak is above the snow line. In the old days, it was the only source of timbers for the mines in the area. Now it’s the Toiyabe National Forest. Beautiful place to catch a murderer.
We were all so busy plotting and planning no one saw Leon leave the table. Damn boy, he had hot-wired my Jag and took off for the rendezvous alone.
“He’s got a good fifteen-minute jump on us. Get in,” Kam ordered, as he started the engine of his new tricked-out Hummer 2. It was the first time I saw Polly lose her composure.
Fifteen minutes was too big a jump to make up, especially against my XKE, but we were pushing it. Coming around a sharp bend on 158, the only thing that saved us was Kam’s extraordinary driving skill. He saw car headlights heading straight for us on our side of the road, and the white stripes veering sharply to the right. He yelled “Damn,” and cut the wheel sharply to the left, head-on into the oncoming car. We braced for the crash and nothing happened, other than we heard the tinkle of broken glass. We got out of the car and realized someone had rigged a clever stunt. A large mirror had been propped up across the narrow highway to make it look as if a car was heading straight at us as we rounded the curve. Black roofing paper covered the center stripes and shoulder markers. Additional paper had been painted to show the lane heading straight over the embankment. “How the hell did you figure that?” I asked Kam. He answered, “I saw my own license plate number reversed in the mirror, and went for it.”
About fifty feet down we spotted the headlights of my car. Leon had not been so skillful.
“Oh my God, no!” Polly moaned and started over the side.
Howie stopped her, and held her. Kam and I made the climb down.
I cupped my hands and shouted to Polly and Howie, “He’s alive, but hurt real bad.” The seatbelt and roll bar saved his ass.
Kam told Howie to lower the winch. We rigged a stretcher of sorts using the canvas and struts from the convertible top. Secured it and the unconscious Leon to it with duct tape from the boot of my wrecked car. We made sure his neck and spine were immobilized. Kam on one side, me on the other, we let the winch pull us up as we kept the stretcher and Leon from hitting the rocks.
After getting Leon to the emergency room at Mountain View Hospital, I sent Kam and Howie to roust out Dandy Randy and see what he’d been up to. No more pussyfooting around-hurtthe sonofabitch if you have to. Polly and I would do the pacing and keep them apprised of Leon’s condition.
Two hours later, Leon was brought out of surgery, with a positive report. Several broken bones, all reset, and in casts. Concussion, severe enough to cause a major headache that would last for days, but no permanent damage. Internal hemorrhaging, in check. He was in critical but stable condition. Sedated though he was, Polly relaxed a little after being let in to see him.
Kam called me first, and I gave him the good news. He gave me news as well. He and Howie had snatched Randy from Rita’s parking lot, restrained him, and brought him to Kam’s. He was not the one on the mountain. There were plenty of witnesses to attest he had performed that night. His story was, Yes, he had pulled those pranks on Howie. But someone, a stranger, told him about the tunnel complex and Gerald’s changing of his will. He broke into Finegold’s office to check the will for himself, and also visited the labyrinth. He did not kill Gerald. However, after the murder, he took the opportunity of stealing the trick. Randy felt he was set up to be a fall guy. I said he’s full of crap, has an accomplice, and did it all. I told Kam to keep him there for me, I would be home as soon as Leon wakes up from his anesthesia.