“My father bought his policy through an Italian company. In 1959 it occurred to me that I should claim that life insurance. Not that it was so much money, but why should the company get to keep it? I went through a long rigmarole. But they were adamant that without the death certificate, and without the policy number, they would do nothing for me.” His mouth twisted bitterly. “I hired someone-I was in a position to hire someone-who went back through the company’s records and found the policy number for me, but even so, they never would pay it because I couldn’t present the death certificate. They are incredible thieves, in their glass skyscrapers with their black ties and tails. I make it an absolute policy that the Cellini accepts no money from any insurance companies. The management is livid over it, but I think: it could be my father’s coins wrapped in a scrap of newspaper that they’re using to buy their way onto artistic boards. They won’t sit on mine.”
Max nodded in sympathy; Lotty murmured, “All money has someone’s blood on it, I suppose.”
“Do you think these numbers are insurance sales, then?” I asked, after a respectful pause. “And the crosses, that means the person died? He put a check against those he could confirm, perhaps.” In my bag on the floor my cell phone started to ring. It was Rhonda Fepple, speaking in the drugged, half-dead voice of the newly bereaved. Had there been an arrest? The police didn’t tell her anything.
I took the phone out to the kitchen with me and told her the progress of the investigation, if such it could be called, before asking her if Rick Hoffman had been German.
“German?” she repeated, as if I had asked if he were from Pluto. “I don’t remember. I guess he was foreign, now that you mention it-I remember Mr. Fepple swearing out some legal forms for him when Mr. Hoffman wanted to become a citizen.”
“And his son, was his name Paul?”
“Paul? I think so. That could be right, Paul Hoffman. Yes, that’s right. What? Did Paul come around and kill my boy? Was he jealous because Howie inherited the agency?”
Could Paul Hoffman-Radbuka be a murderer? He was such a confused person, but-murderer? Still, maybe he had thought Howard Fepple was part of some Einsatzgruppen conspiracy-if he knew Fepple had one of Ulrich’s old ledger books, he might be crazy enough to think he had to destroy Fepple. It seemed absurd, but everything involving Paul Radbuka-Hoffman defied reason.
“Wouldn’t your son have mentioned it, if he’d seen Paul Hoffman recently?”
“He might not have, if he had some secret plan in mind,” Rhonda said listlessly. “He liked to keep secrets to himself; they made him feel important.”
That seemed too sad an epitaph. More to brace myself than her, I asked if she had anyone to talk to, to help her through this time-a sister or a minister, perhaps.
“Everything seems so unreal since Howie died, I can’t make myself feel anything. Even getting the house broken into didn’t upset me like you’d think it would.”
“When did that happen?” Her tone was as apathetic as if she were reciting a grocery list, but the information jolted me.
“I think it was the day after-after they found him. Yes, because it wasn’t yesterday. What day would that be?”
“Tuesday. Did they take anything?”
“There’s nothing here to take, really, but they stole my boy’s computer. I guess gangs from the city come out here looking for things to steal to sell for drugs. The police didn’t do anything. Not that I care, really. None of it matters now-I wasn’t ever going to use a home computer, that’s for sure.”
XLII Lotty’s Perfect Storm
I stared out the kitchen window at the dark garden. The same person who shot Paul must have broken into Rhonda Fepple’s house. They-she? Ilse Wölfin?-had killed Fepple. Not because of the Sommers file, but for some altogether different reason-to get the fragment from Ulrich Hoffman’s ledgers I’d found in Fepple’s bag. And then they’d careened around Chicago, looking for the rest of the books.
Howard Fepple, excited over the next big thing that was going to make him rich, had put the bite on a lethal hand. I shook my head. Fepple didn’t know about Hoffman’s journals: he’d gotten roused by something he saw in the Sommers policy file. He’d been excited, he’d told his mother she’d be driving a Mercedes of her own, he’d found out how Rick Hoffman made money from his lousy client list. Not because of the ledgers.
Behind me I heard raised voices, the front door slam, a car start.
Could it be simpler than that? Could Paul Hoffman-Radbuka have murdered Fepple? Maybe he was deluded enough to imagine that Fepple was part of his father’s Einsatzgruppe. But then-who had shot Paul? I couldn’t make sense of any of it. Gerbil on treadmill, going round and round. What had Fepple noticed that I wasn’t getting? Or what paper had he seen that his murderer had taken away? These secret papers of Paul’s which I thought would explain everything had only left me more confused.
I went back to an earlier issue. There had been an Aaron Sommers on the fragment of Ulrich’s journals I’d found in Fepple’s bag. Was that my client’s uncle? Or had there been two Aaron Sommerses-one Jewish, one black?
Connie Ingram had talked to Fepple. That was a point of certainty-even if she’d never gone to see him, she had spoken to him. He had entered her name in his appointment software. Maybe she really had gone to Fepple’s office-under Ralph’s orders? I recoiled from the thought. Under Rossy’s orders? If I showed Connie Ingram a copy of Ulrich’s journals, would she tell me whether she’d seen something like this in Fepple’s copy of the Sommers file?
I went back to the living room. Lotty had left.
“She gets more bizarre every time I see her,” Carl complained. “She looked at that page where your lunatic had written in red that Sofie Radbuka was his mother in heaven, made a melodramatic speech, and took off.”
“To do what?”
“She decided to go visit the therapist, Rhea Wiell,” Max said. “Frankly, I think it’s high time someone talked to the woman. That is, I know you’ve tried to do so, Victoria, but Lotty-she’s in a professional position to confront her.”
“Is Lotty going to try to see Rhea tonight?” I asked. “It’s a little late to pay an office visit, I’d think. Her home address is unlisted.”
“Dr. Herschel was going to go to her own clinic,” Tim said from the corner where he’d been silently watching the rest of us. “She said she had some kind of directory in her office that ought to provide Ms. Wiell’s home address.”
“I guess she knows what she’s doing.” I ignored Carl’s derisive comment. “I must say, I’d like to watch that confrontation: the Princess of Austria versus the Little Flower. My money’s on Rhea-she has that myopia which constitutes a perfect armor… Max, I’ll let you have some privacy. I know it’s been a long, tough week, even though Paul’s misfortune has brought you some breathing room. But I wanted to ask you about the abbreviations in these books. Where are they? I wanted you to see-” I was shuffling through the papers on the coffee table as I spoke.
“Lotty took them with her,” Carl said.
“She didn’t. She couldn’t have. They’re crucial, those ledgers.”
“Talk to her, then.” Carl shrugged with supreme indifference and poured himself another glass of champagne.
“Oh, hell!” I started to get up, intent on running after Lotty, then thought again of a pinball in motion and sat back down. I still had the copies I’d made of the journal pages. Although I’d wanted Max to study the originals, he might figure something out from copies.
He took the pages, Carl leaning over his shoulder. Max shook his head. “ Victoria, you have to remember, we haven’t spoken or read German at all regularly since we were ten years old. These cryptic entries could mean anything.”