Shell Game – Chapter 43 – The Truth

As soon as the door latch clicked closed, Evan rushed to the telephone. His fingers quickly and deftly circled the rotary until all the numbers were dialed. At the same time, he saw Claire trying to make a quick escape from the apartment.

Evan grabbed her by the elbow and held on tight. He looked hard into her confused eyes and said, “Where are you going?” And then, into the phone, “Evan Gold for Lt. Abrams.” It was not long before he said, “Yeah, Steve, it’s me. I got some leads for you, but you’ve got to make hay. There’s a woman just left my apartment. A dead ringer for Lauren Bacall. She’s the one killed Charles and the train conductor. She worked for this guy… Ha! You know what, I never got his name. Anyway, he’s dressed all in black. Has a silver eye patch over his right eye. You’ll need to watch out for him. He’s slippery, to say the least. The man’s also traveling with our Mr. Huber. That’s right. The three of them plan to blow town, so you’ll have to move fast. They all just left my place. The woman’s supposed to be good with a gun, so be careful. She’s loaded down with several of them… Sure.”

He hung up the phone and let go of Claire. “Have a seat. You and me are not out of the woods by a long shot.” He guided her to the chair the man in black had been sitting in. Claire looked at the chair and then, with confusion on her face, slumped wearily into it.

“We don’t have much time. The police will likely be here soon, and I need to get my wife to a doctor,” Evan said.

She waved him off, “She’ll be alright. I’ve seen him when he gets angry and vindictive. Believe me, if he’d wanted her dead, she’d be dead.”

Evan looked over at Katherine, who had fallen asleep, “You can appreciate that I’m going to get a second opinion,” he said and sat on the sofa opposite her. “Regardless, we need a story to tell the police when they get here. I’ve given them a patsy for the conductor and Charles, but there’s still one murder that I need to get clean of. They’re going to ask a library of questions, and they aren’t going to stand for the same run around we gave them the last time. What’s worse, and I think you know this, there’s a lot we can’t say, or they’ll put us in the paddy wagon.” Evan stood up and started to pace the room, “I’m still confused how you got attached to these characters. Eye Patch and Huber hired you to go to Colorado and get the pearl from Plumb, is that it?”

Claire moaned in her chair, “It’s all over now, Evan. Can’t you see that? I just want to sleep.”

Evan grabbed Claire by the shoulders and shook her. She cried out in pain. A look of surprise and confusion covered her face as she looked at him. “Listen, precious. We’re still in the thick of it. Your future and mine are tied together right now. Don’t go soft on me. We need to work together on this.”

“Yes. Fine. No,” Claire said as she wrestled her shoulders out of his grip, “they didn’t send me to Colorado. I was in Colorado already. Jason knew Harold. Harold offered me the job. High risk, high reward.”

“So, wait, you worked on Plumb together?”

Claire looked again at Evan, “Yes, well, no. Can’t we stop? My head is throbbing.”

“You’re going to tell me the truth this time, Claire. Which is it? ‘Yes, we were,’ or ‘No, we weren’t?’”

Claire sighed and rubbed the skin near her hairline, “Harold was looking to do a double-cross. Unnerving how I found out. It was clumsy. Smash and grab, then run away. Like no one had thought of that already. You must believe me; I had no idea the pearl was… What was that?” She looked to the spot where moments before, Lillian had stood in radiant glory. “So much light.” She tried to squeeze the memory of the past few minutes from her eyes. “All we knew was it was a priceless pearl. Nothing more. Nothing alive. You have to believe me.” She looked at the upturned coffee table and the pearl dust scattered over the carpet. “All for nothing.”

“Come on, Claire. Go on,” Evan pressed.

“I found out about the double-cross. I started to see that I was about to get cut out of everything.”

“So that’s when you involved Charles to keep things honest?” Evan asked. Claire nodded. “So, Charles was, what, accountability? An insurance policy to make sure everything’s on the up and up? Honor among thieves and all that?”
“No, we figured if Harold was going to double-cross us, we should double-cross him. We made sure we kept his grubby hands full with something else.”

“Something else?”

“We made it look like he’d robbed a store. The police occupied him while we made our move.” Claire smiled at the thought of it, and then her brows shifted from a memory of something. She looked back at the table of dust with sadness. “Jason and I had talked about making a fake. We’d seen the pearl once, and Jason said he knew a guy who could do it on the quick. The idea was to keep the real pearl for ourselves and give the fake to Harold. We decided in the end not to do that plan. I can’t remember why. But I guess Jason went with the plan anyway to double-cross me.”

“Then?” Evan asked.

Claire wiped away a tear. “It was my job to lift the pearl from Plumb. He gave it to me easily enough. People can be so gullible sometimes. I showed it to Jason. In the morning, I guess he made the switch while I slept. The next day, I met up with the railroad man. I worked out a deal with him to bring it here on a certain run on a certain day. I knew I couldn’t trust Harold, and I thought I could trust Jason, but you can never be too careful. However, I knew I could trust myself. Always look out for yourself. That’s the number one rule, right? This seemed like the best plan. I thought I had seen every play.”

“So, what, you and Charles take different trains here to throw off the scent?”

Claire nodded, “Didn’t want to be seen together, and we wanted to be hard to follow, so we took different routes. He arrived a few days before me, the conductor a few days after that. By the time I left, our boss was in town, breathing all kinds of threats to Harold and me. I didn’t want to risk more than necessary, so I escaped a little ahead of schedule.”

“Ol’ Eye Patch scared you, did he?”

She gave a small, cynical laugh, “I knew if he found out what we…” her voice trailed off, unable to finish the words.

“When I arrived in Athens, I knew all I had to do was lay low, bide my time till the train arrived. I also needed to find where Jason was in case our boss was able to get to Charles and cut me out of the deal altogether.” She looked at Evan, “That’s why I asked you to follow Jason that night.”

Evan, his face like granite, said, “Don’t lie to me, sister. You had Charles wrapped around your little finger the same as you’ve had men tied up your whole life. Trust me; I know men. Once a sucker, always a sucker. You wanted Charles out of the way before the train arrived. Simple as that. Why should you share the profits with the likes of him?”

“It wasn’t like that,” she said.

“But I’m not far off.”

Clare sighed, “I knew Jason was in trouble with a previous employer. I figured if he felt like he had a tail on him, he would get spooked and split town before the train arrived.”

“So you pointed out Gabe to him,” Evan said. Claire looked at him with tears beginning to fill the rims of her eyes.

“Don’t play my emotions. Gabe Silver was no saint, but he was a good detective. He certainly was good enough to avoid being noticed by the likes of you two. Someone had to give him up.”

She sniffed and nodded. “Yes. I told. I pointed him out to Jason as we walked. Oh, Evan, oh Evan, my stomach has been in knots this whole time. Ever since it happened. Please forgive me. You must forgive me, Evan. I didn’t think it would go that way. I had no idea Jason would kill a man.” Claire sobbed and buried her face into her hands.

Evan placed his forefinger under her chin to lift her face. With a wry smile, he said, “Well, if you thought he wouldn’t, you’d be right.”

Claire looked confused.

“Charles didn’t kill Gabe,” Evan said.

“What are you saying?” asked Claire, “The police said…”

“Listen, as I said, my partner was no saint, no matter what public opinion is. He was no saint, but he was smart enough to have his guard up on the first night. He certainly wouldn’t have been so dumb as to stand in the open in a deserted bridge with his gun in his holster and his coat buttoned over it.”

“I don’t understand,” Claire said. “What are you saying?”

“You were the one who came into our office all dolled up telling us Charles was a dangerous and immoral man. If that was his impression of Charles, then there’s no chance he follows or chases Charles onto Memorial Bridge, and there’s no chance Charles could get the jump on Gabe.

However, Gabe Silver was a man. And almost every man is just foolish enough to let his guard down around a pretty face. Especially if that pretty face tells him he’s her hero. Especially if she’s the one who hired him in the first place. I mean, why should you have your guard up around your client? Around you?” Claire’s eyes suddenly went wide, and Evan laughed bitterly, “Yes, precious, Gabe was just foolish enough to step into that trap. You could’ve gotten as close as you wanted before putting a bullet in his gut. A bullet from the gun you that stole from Charles’ room earlier that day.”