“You know your way around dead bodies, Doc.”
“You do your residency at County General in Chicago, you see a lot of violent injuries in the ER,” Schwartz said. “Couldn’t help learning a few things from the questions cops asked.”
“Thanks, Captain, you’ve been a big help. Okay to move him out.” I arranged Chang’s hands on his chest, closed his eyes, and drew the sheet up over his face as Schwartz loosened the wires holding Chang’s leg in traction. I left, wishing Sam Chang a quick trip to the next life and hopes that it’d be a peaceful one.
As for Jack, my mind wasn’t made up. I knew he had a temper, and it wasn’t impossible to think of him taking a whack at a guy in a rage; I could see him killing Daniel in an unguarded moment. But could he throttle a man to death? It wouldn’t have been his style in Boston, but in the South Pacific, surrounded by blood, decay, and death, who knew?
I didn’t.
Chapter Fifteen
“Jack?” I said, announcing myself as I entered his hut. The place was empty, his bed unmade and clothes heaped in piles on the floor. Neatness was never a big consideration for Jack, as far as I remembered. I sat at the table, strewn with yellowed newspapers, a couple of old Life magazines, and some correspondence in progress. I sat to wait and flipped through Life, reading about the army training women pilots in Texas to ferry aircraft overseas from the States. Not a bad idea. Another article was about General Charles de Gaulle, which wasn’t even a close second in the not-a-bad-idea department. I tossed the magazine aside and let my gaze wander over to Jack’s letters.
One envelope had a return address from Charlotte McDonnell. The letter next to it was in Jack’s handwriting, with a note from Charlotte scrawled across the top in large letters: Can’t keep all the girls straight? Jack’s letter to Dearest Darlyne had gone in the wrong envelope and was obviously not appreciated. Especially the part about looking forward to a return engagement, not of the matrimonial kind.
No, Charlotte, I thought, Jack can’t keep all the girls straight.
I craned my neck to spy on the letter Jack was obviously in the midst of writing. Dear Lem, it began. Lem Billings, Jack’s best friend from his private school days. I’d met Lem-it was hard to know Jack and not meet Lem-and liked him. A decent guy. We’d stayed in touch off and on, mostly through Christmas cards and the occasional postcard from distant lands. He had bad eyes and couldn’t get into the service, but had volunteered for the American Ambulance Field Service, and probably saw more action in North Africa than a lot of guys in the army.
Jack’s letter started off by informing Lem he was about to be discharged from the hospital, and was well enough to have sampled the delights of the Orient, if you know what I mean. Last night was my first excursion into the Far East, and I did my nation proud. And so on. Now I’m no prude, but something in Jack’s bragging about his conquests didn’t sit well with me. It seemed like he needed to announce his every escapade, and I wondered if the telling was more important for Jack than the act itself. I’d heard plenty of rumors about his old man stepping out with the ladies, so maybe he was trying to live up to his father’s reputation.
I walked outside, putting some distance between me and evidence of my snooping. Just in time, too. Jack approached, wearing shorts and tennis shoes, a towel slung around his neck.
“Billy, what’s new? Did you have a good time last night?”
“It was okay,” I said as I followed him into the hut. “How about you?”
“Terrific. Rui took me home to Chinatown,” Jack said, grinning as he flopped into a chair and tossed the towel on the floor. “Did you meet her?”
“Yeah, a little while ago,” I said. Jack sounded like he hadn’t heard about Sam. “As I was checking her brother’s body for evidence.”
“What?” Jack said, his eyes wide with surprise, or a reasonable imitation.
“Sam Chang was murdered early this morning,” I said. “A few hours after you were seen in his room.”
“Oh Jesus, that’s all I need,” Jack said.
“Yeah, I imagine he felt the same way when he was being strangled,” I said, pulling up a chair next to Jack and leaning in close. “Tell me why you were there.”
“Rui asked me to drop off a bamboo plant,” he said. “It’s for luck.”
“Yeah, all of it bad. What time was that?”
“I’m not sure, around two o’clock, I think,” Jack said. “I went in and put the plant on the table; Rui told me which bed Sam was in. He was asleep, and so was everyone else in the room.”
“Did you see anyone else?”
“A few people in the corridor, maybe a doctor and a few orderlies,” he said. “I really wasn’t paying attention, I just wanted to hit the sack. Strangled, huh? Poor bastard.”
“Did Rui talk about her brother? Did she mention anyone who had a beef with him?”
“Other than her? No,” Jack said, and began shuffling through the letters on the table. He looked at the returned letter from Charlotte and laughed as he ran it under his nose. “I can smell her perfume, but I don’t think I’ll ever get close to it again.”
“Wait,” I interrupted, amazed by the nonchalance with which Jack dropped that tidbit of news. “Rui Chang and her brother Sam had problems? What was that all about?”
“Money,” Jack shrugged, indifferent to a commodity he found so readily available. “The Chang family runs a lot of business ventures, but the two sisters are based here on Tulagi and Sam up on Vella Lavella. Or at least he was. Rui said he borrowed from them to expand his stores and his shipping right before the war broke out. Bad timing.”
“So he owed his sisters money?”
“Apparently,” Jack said. “I got the impression the bamboo plant was a bit of a joke. Like saying he’d need good luck to get out of the mess he found himself in. It actually reminded me of my own brother. Joe would pull a prank like that.”
“Would your family commit murder over money?” I asked, knowing that some of Joe Senior’s more questionable associates might.
“You don’t think Rui had him killed?” Jack asked. “It’s her brother for Chrissake. And how would she ever collect what he owed?”
“Inheritance?”
“Her timing would be off for that,” Jack said. “She mentioned a lot of planters had been running a tab with Sam when the war began. He’d have to collect on that first. Like I said, his timing was terrible. Anyway, I don’t believe she had anything to do with it. I got the impression it’s a hard-nosed family when it comes to business, but murder is a different story.”
“Probably so,” I said. “Now tell me why you said ‘that’s all I need’ when I told you about Sam’s death.”
“Listen, Billy, I need you to keep quiet about Sam and my late-night visit. Al Cluster is coming by later today. He’s my commanding officer and he’s the one who can send me home or give me another boat. I don’t want him to start thinking I’m a problem child he’d be better off without.”
“How are your injuries?” I asked. “Bad enough for a ticket home?”
“No, my feet are healing up fine,” he said. “There’s a navy tradition that says a captain who’s had his boat sunk gets sent stateside. If Al wants me gone, he can use that. If he doesn’t, he’ll ignore it. So do me a favor, Billy, and forget about this Chang thing.”
“How’s your back?” I asked, without commenting on the favor. There’d been a few too many favors done between the Kennedys and the Boyles, and I didn’t want to start another round. “You must’ve gotten banged up pretty bad when that destroyer hit you.”
“It’s the same,” he said. Which meant not so great. “Here’s the deal, Billy. I can’t go home now. I haven’t really done anything worthwhile out here. The truth is, these PT boats are next to worthless. Our torpedoes are a joke. Half the boats don’t have radar, and the brass thinks we’re a bunch of Ivy League pansy yachtsmen who don’t give a damn about the real navy.”