The Christmas Mystery Read online

  We arrive at 535 Park Avenue at 8:00 a.m. There is still a “modified police presence”—one NYPD officer at the corner of Park and 61st Street, a second officer in the small mailroom, a plainclothesman in the lobby. It’s the usual set-up for a post-homicide scene.

  Burke and I bring with us two big evidence cases marked “NYPD.” These will be used to carry the forged Lichtenstein and Hockney. When the elevator opens at the Dunlop apartment we exchange hellos with Ralph Ortiz, a smart up-and-coming rookie who’s stuck guarding the crime scene.

  “Allons-y,” I say. “Let’s go.”

  “I know what allons means, Moncrief,” she says. “I’ve only told you a few thousand times. You do not have to translate for me. I know French. That’s one of the reasons they teamed us up.”

  “Ah, oui,” I say. Then I say, “That means ‘yes.’”

  Burke ignores me as we walk toward the hallway.

  And then…son of a bitch! The paintings are missing.

  Softly Burke says, “Goddamnit.”

  I turn quickly and rush down the hallway to Officer Ortiz.

  “How long have you been on duty?”

  “Since midnight,” he says. Ortiz senses that something’s not right. He immediately answers the question I would have asked.

  “Nobody’s been in or out. Nobody. Not a soul,” he says. And then, because he’s as sharp as any kid I know in the NYPD, he says, “And I never heard anyone. I never saw anyone. I checked on the master bedroom and the other rooms every hour. I know…”

  “Okay, okay,” I say. “I’m sure nothing got by you.”

  “Only something did get by him,” Burke says. “A bunch of officers and detectives on surveillance and two paintings disappear.”

  “Listen, these things happen. These things…” But she cuts me off.

  “Goddamnit,” says Burke. “I should never have listened to you. We should have gotten the info to Elliott and then together the three of us could proceed. But you. You have your own ways. The goddamn instinct.”

  My anger about the paintings, along with Burke’s rant, now makes me explode.

  “Yes. And my ways are good ways, smart ways. History proves it. My ways usually work!”

  Burke shakes her head and talks in a calm, normal voice.

  “The operative word here is ‘usually.’ I’m going back to the precinct house.”

  “I’ll join you shortly,” I say. We are quiet.

  I know this brief two-sentence conversation is as close as Burke and I will come to signing a peace treaty.

  As soon as K. Burke leaves, Ortiz and I check the apartment, walking the rooms for any detail that might stand out. Nothing. Pantry. Maid’s rooms. Butler’s pantry. Service hall. Nothing. Silver closet. China closet. Powder rooms. Nothing. Dressing rooms. Kitchen (and impressive wine collection). Office. Dining room. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.

  I rush back to the hallway wall where the Lichtenstein and Hockney once hung. I study the two empty spaces of the wall—as if the paintings might magically have reappeared, as if I could magically “wish” them back to the wall.

  Finally, I say to Ortiz, “I cannot stay in this apartment any longer. If I do, I will explode like a human bomb.”

  Chapter 10

  It is barely eleven in the morning when I leave Baby D’s apartment. The day is cold and crisp, and to the happy person…Christmas is in the air. The sadness that I’ve come to know so well begins to descend. As the doctors say, “Rate your pain on a scale of one to ten, ten being the most painful.” I would call it a six or seven.

  I walk down Park Avenue and turn left on 59th Street. I am at a store I enjoy enormously, Argosy, the home of rare maps and prints, antiquarian books. Perhaps a $30,000 volume of hand-colored Audubon birds will lift my spirits. Perhaps a letter addressed to John Adams and signed by Benjamin Franklin will cheer me up. I touch the soft leather on the binding of a first-edition Madame Bovary. I study a fifteenth-century map of my native land—a survey of France so misshapen and inaccurate, it might as well be a picture of a dead fish. But I buy nothing.

  The same happens to me in Pesca, a swimsuit shop, where Dalia once bought a pale-yellow bikini for five hundred dollars, where I could buy an old-fashioned pair of trunks with a bronze buckle in front for $550 and look just like mon grand-père on the beach in Deauville. I move on to other shops.

  But nothing is for me. Not the art deco silver ashtrays, not the leather iPad cases that cost more than the iPads that they hold.

  No. Not for me. But also not for me are the street corner Santa Clauses, the exquisite twinkling white lights in the windows of the townhouses, the impromptu Christmas tree lots on Third Avenue.

  In the season of buying I have, for once, bought nothing.

  Chapter 11

  I really do intend to return to Midtown East and meet with K. Burke. Really. But then other instincts take over. I decide to return to 535 Park Avenue. I must make a dent in this case. I must redeem myself.

  I walk back toward Baby D’s building. This morning I interviewed the super, a handsome middle-aged guy named Ed Petrillo. Like most Park Avenue supers Petrillo wears a suit, has an office, and thinks he’s running a business like General Motors or Microsoft. He says he was at his weekend house (the super has a weekend house!) for Thanksgiving.

  I also spoke with the first-shift doorman, Jing-Ho. He was not aware of anything unusual. He suggested that I talk to George, the doorman who came on after him. I let other detectives speak to George, but now I need to stick my own fingers into this pie.

  I arrive at the building and exchange a few words with the police guard at the corner of Park and 61st. “Nothing suspicious, nothing extraordinary.” He’s seen a bunch of limos outside the Regency Hotel across the street. He’s seen a celebrity—either Taylor Swift or Carrie Underwood. He’s not sure. (Hell, even I would know the difference.)

  George the Doorman has the full name of George Brooks. The dark-blue uniform with gold braid fits him well. He wears black leather gloves.

  “In winter we wear leather gloves. Other times of the year it’s strictly white gloves. White gloves are what separates the ‘good’ buildings from the ‘cheesy’ buildings.”

  He is a polite guy, maybe thirty-five.

  “Listen, Detective, not to be uncooperative or anything, but two other detectives have already asked me a bunch of questions—all I can do is tell you what I told them. I really don’t know much. I mean, Mrs. Dunlop didn’t have many guests. Just the usual deliveries through the service entrance—groceries, flowers, Amazon, liquor.”

  “Just tell me anything unusual about the day she died,” I say. “Even if you think it’s not important, just tell me.”

  “Nothing. Really nothing. She had come back Thursday night from the country. Her regular driver dropped her off.” He pauses for a moment. “I didn’t like the driver, but who the hell cares about what I think.”

  “I care quite a bit about what you think. Why didn’t you like him?”

  “He wasn’t here long, but he thought he was better than the building staff. Because he drove a rich lady around in a car. A big black Caddy, an Escalade. Who gives a shit? Here’s a good example: drivers are not supposed to wait in the lobby. That’s the rule. They either stay in the car or go downstairs to the locker room. The driver was always standing outside smoking or sitting on the bench right here by the intercom phone. So I tell Mr. Petrillo about it…”

  “The super,” I say.

  “The super, yeah. So Mr. P. tells him he can’t do it anymore, and Simon says that that’s bullshit. He says he’s going to tell Mrs. Dunlop. Mr. Petrillo says go right ahead. Well, I guess Mrs. Dunlop agrees with the rules of the building. So the next thing you know—bam!—Mrs. Dunlop is getting a new driver.”

  I’ve read all this previously, in the interviews taken down by the other detectives, but I do notice a small trace of triumph in George Brooks’s face when he arrives at the climax of his story.

  I also know
that the driver, whose full name is the very impressive moniker “Preston Parker Simon,” did not say he was fired. According to his manager, he’d quit. K. Burke had checked Simon out with Domestic Bliss, an employment agency that places maids, laundresses, chauffeurs, and the occasional butler. Simon hadn’t answered her calls, but a manager at Domestic Bliss, Miss Devida Pickering, told Burke that Simon was honest and dependable. But, she said, Mrs. Dunlop only used him part-time, and Simon wanted to be a full-time chauffeur. So that was that. But as that is never really that, we would need to track him down. He was the last person to see Baby D alive. I thank George. He offers me his hand to shake. I, of course, shake it.

  I tell him thank you.

  He says, “It’s been great talking with you, absolutely great.”

  Chapter 12

  A minute later, I am in the basement of the building. My interviewee is fifty-four years old and is wearing khaki pants with a matching shirt. The shirt has the words “535 Park” emblazoned in red thread on the pocket.

  The man’s name is Angel Corrido, and Angel stands in the doorway of the service elevator. As we talk he removes clear plastic bags of very classy recycling. Along with the newspapers and Q-tips boxes are empty bottles of excellent Bordeaux and Johnnie Walker Black Label, empty take-out containers from Café Boulud.

  I’ve already been briefed on his initial interviews on the scene, so my first question is the old standby: “Could you tell me anything I might not know about Mrs. Dunlop?”

  He shrugs, then speaks. “No, nothing. Mrs. Dunlop never sees Angel Corrido.”

  “Never?”

  “Eh, maybe sometimes.” He removes a bundled stack of magazines.

  “When I see her…Mrs. Dunlop…she is nice. She says, ‘Hello, Angel. How are the wife and the children?’”

  Angel laughs and says, “I have stopped telling her that I don’t have a wife and I don’t have children. She don’t remember. She is nice, but a man who runs the back elevator blends in with the other men who run back elevators and shovel snow and take out garbage.”

  Angel does not sound angry at this. He actually seems to think it’s amusing.

  “Were you working here on Thanksgiving?” I ask.

  “No, I come to work early the next morning. No back elevator on Thanksgiving.”

  He takes the last bag of recycling from the elevator. Then he throws a glance at the stairs leading down from the lobby above.

  “But Angel can tell you something you do not know. But it is not about Mrs. Dunlop. It is about someone else.”

  “Yeah?”

  He says nothing.

  “So what is it?”

  Still silence.

  Then I do what no NYPD detective is ever supposed to do. I take a fifty-dollar bill from my pocket and hand it to him.

  “So?”

  “So maybe you should know something about that big-shot el cabrón who holds the door open for people, George Brooks,” says Angel.

  “Go on,” I say.

  “You know the way you just tipped me?”

  “Yeah.”

  “That is the way the chofer for Mrs. Dunlop used to tip George every week. One hundred dollars when he delivers Mrs. Dunlop the big packages from the art gallery.”

  “The Namanworth Gallery?” I ask.

  Angel speaks.

  “Yes, maybe that is the name. I am not always good when I try to remember names. You know, when you are not born in this country—it is sometimes hard.”

  “Yes,” I say. “It is sometimes very hard.”

  I thank him. I run up the stairs.

  I text K. Burke: Need more info on driver P Simon. Let’s find him.

  Chapter 13

  Burke telephones Domestic Bliss again. They have no current address for Preston Parker Simon, but she finds out that he is now driving for the CEO of a large and very successful comedy video website.

  Making up for their failure to maintain addresses for their employees, Domestic Bliss does have the capability to track their drivers while they’re driving clients. In a few minutes Burke finds out that the Escalade, presumably with Preston Parker Simon in the driver’s seat, is parked outside the Four Seasons Hotel.

  All roads in this case seem to lead to 57th Street. The Four Seasons is neatly bookended with Brioni, the men’s fashion hot spot, on one side and Zilli, the French luxury brand, on the other side.

  Burke and I meet up outside the hotel. A parade of limos, SUVs, and two Bentleys are waiting there. Their engines are running, poised to whisk away some business tycoon or rap star or foreign princess.

  Burke punches some buttons on her phone, and soon we’re asking Simon to step out of the Escalade.

  He turns out to be a good-looking blond guy, certainly no older than thirty. He’s charming, cooperative, and he has a fancy British accent that fits perfectly with his fancy British name.

  Burke tells him that we’re investigating the murder of Mrs. Ramona Dunlop. As soon as we do, a look of horror crosses his face.

  “I heard. I saw it on the telly yesterday. Quite horrid. You know, I worked briefly for Mrs. Dunlop.”

  “Up until yesterday, you were her chauffeur,” Burke says.

  “Lovely woman. Remarkably spry for her age,” Simon says.

  He pulls out a tortoiseshell cigarette case from his jacket and offers us a cigarette.

  “Have a fag?” he asks. Then he adds, “I love saying that to Americans. Always good for a laugh.”

  Burke and I decline the cigarette. We also decline to laugh.

  “How long did you work for Mrs. Dunlop?” Burke asks.

  “Not more than a month. She had a home in East Hampton. So a few times I took her out there. But she only really needed me for an occasional trip to the Colony Club for lunch, sometimes the opera, once or twice to her son’s house in Bedford. It was not working out financially for me. I sought other clients.”

  “You drove her up to her son’s house Thanksgiving Day, correct?” I ask.

  “Quite correct.”

  “Though you had already given your notice?”

  “Yes. She had hired a new driver, but we agreed I’d work through the holiday.”

  “How long were you and Mrs. Dunlop up there?” I ask.

  “About four hours. We left for the city around six o’clock. I think I had her back on her doorstep by seven fifteen, maybe seven thirty.”

  Burke says, “Did you help her into the building with her things?”

  “Things?” Simon asks, confused.

  “Yeah,” says Burke. “Things. Luggage. Packages. Leftover stuffing.”

  “Oh, no, no, no. There was a doorman. Very posh place. Lovely mansion,” says Simon.

  “535 Park Avenue is an apartment building, a co-op,” says Burke.

  I speak. “In England an apartment building sometimes is called ‘a mansion.’”

  “Live and learn, I guess,” says Burke.

  When did he officially resign from his job with Mrs. Dunlop? Yesterday.

  Has he had reason to return to 535 Park since her death? No.

  Who’s he working for now?

  “Danny Abosch, a dot-com prince,” he says. “Lovely young chap.”

  As if on cue, a guy who looks like a college student who’s late for class exits the hotel.

  “Mr. Abosch is approaching,” says Simon. “I really have to dash.”

  K. Burke responds to a crackle from her radio. I tell Simon that we may want to talk to him again. He says, “Surely,” but his attention is on his boss, the young man in a blue Shetland sweater and a red ski parka walking toward us.

  As Preston Parker Simon moves to open the car door he hands me a “calling card”—name, number, email. Engraved. Beige paper. Garamond type.

  A chauffeur with his own calling card.

  And they say I’m fancy.

  Chapter 14

  K. Burke and I begin walking from the Four Seasons Hotel down Fifth Avenue. We’re headed back to police headquarters on Ea
st 51st Street.

  A few minutes pass in silence. Then I speak.

  “Preston Parker Simon is not an Englishman,” I say.

  “He sure does a good imitation of one,” K. Burke says.

  “Precisely,” I answer. “His accent is purely theatrical. It is not authentic. In England someone from Yorkshire sounds distinctly different from someone from Cornwall. Monsieur le chauffeur has an all-purpose stage accent, the kind Gwyneth Paltrow uses in the cinema.”

  “You’re good, Moncrief,” Burke says. “Very good.”

  “Merci,” I say.

  “But you aren’t telling me anything I don’t already know.”

  “You could detect it also?” I ask.

  “No. Simon might as well have been Prince Charles as far as I could tell.”

  We stop to look at the Christmas display in the windows of Bergdorf Goodman. It is sparkly and sexy and crazy. Neptune and half-dressed female statues and the Baby Jesus. Toward the back of all this opulence is a crystal Eiffel Tower—homage to the horror of the hideous Paris terrorist attacks. I turn away.

  “So, go on,” I say to Burke. She speaks.

  “While we were finishing up with Simon I received a ‘birth and background’ file from downtown. They found out that Preston Parker Simon’s real name is Rudy Brunetti. He’s from Morristown, New Jersey. He was born and raised there, and then…”

  “And then he became an actor,” I venture.

  “Don’t try to speed ahead of me, Moncrief.”

  “Forgive my enthusiasm,” I say.

  “Then Simon went to Lincoln Technical Institute. That’s in Edison, New Jersey. Then he became a karate instructor. Then he became an actor.”

  “And after that he became a chauffeur,” I say.

  “What did I tell you about speeding ahead of me? No.”

  She takes out her iPad and consults it for the rest of Simon’s bio.

  “Then he signed up with Domestic Bliss. He got a job as a personal assistant to one of Ralph Lauren’s designers. Then for a year he was a butler at the French consulate.…”