Free The Hanged Man by Walter Satterthwait

lawsuit.”
    â€œI’m not a reporter,” I said. “Nothing you tell me is going to end up in the New York Times . And I won’t be giving out names.”
    He nodded. “All right. Leonard Quarry. Another dilettante. Worse than Bouvier, in fact, because at least Bouvier believed the bullshit he was spouting. I don’t think that Quarry believes in anything except Mammon.” He sipped at his beer. “That’s money.”
    â€œRight,” I said. “Thanks.”
    Once again, he hadn’t heard the irony. Maybe he never did. “He lives out in Agua Caliente,” he said, “near the hot springs, with his wife, a frail little number who calls herself Sierra. She’s a psychic, allegedly. Quarry’s a dealer—in esoterica, primarily, but when push comes to shove, he’ll move anything that’ll turn him a buck. He likes to pass himself off as an expert on the occult. He’s anything but. He talks the talk, but he can’t walk the walk.”
    I said, “You knew that he wanted to get that Tarot card from Eliza Remington?”
    â€œSure. And I know he was pissed off that he didn’t get it. But look, Quarry didn’t kill Bouvier. Quarry weighs in at about four hundred pounds, and on top of that he’s got emphysema. He has a hard time lifting his gin and tonic. He’d never be able to lift Quentin Bouvier.”
    â€œHow did you know that Quarry wanted the card?”
    â€œWhat?” Wincing slightly. We were back to the routine with the fingers at the temple.
    â€œHow did you know that Quarry wanted the card?”
    â€œI don’t know. Someone mentioned it at dinner that night.”
    â€œOkay,” I said. And then, one by one, as I had with Justine Bouvier, I went through the names of the other people who’d been at the house in La Cienega last Saturday night. Hadley’s responses, although he didn’t know it, were nearly identical to Bouvier’s, and as glibly dismissive.
    Peter Jones: “He’s into a kind of alchemical meditation. Transmuting base elements into spiritual. And he’s got plenty of base elements to work with. You know he’s been having an affair with Justine Bouvier for over a year?”
    Brad Freefall and Sylvia Morningstar: “Sylvia’s a crystal maven, Brad’s into drums. They’re both relics. Debris left over from the sixties.”
    Carol Masters: “The poor man’s Shirley MacLaine. She’s into reincarnation and she’s a channeler, channels a celestial being named Araxys. Funny, but a lot of what he has to say is lifted straight from the dialogue of Carol’s old movies.”
    Carl Buffalo: “Chief Thunderthud, I call him. One of the local gurus of the men’s movement. A muscle-bound clod.”
    Eliza Remington: “A fraud. But a sharpy, no question. You make an appointment, Little Liza takes your name and your birthdate and your place of birth. She uses those to get your social security number—she’s got a computer, and she’s hooked up to a database—and then she can find your medical history, your employment record, credit standing, pretty much anything she wants.” He grinned. “Well, shit, you’re a private eye, right? You know how that works.”
    â€œYeah.” But only because Rita had told me.
    â€œAnd then, when you show up, she dazzles you with how accurate she is. She’s a sharpy, all right.” He grinned and shook his head, almost in admiration.
    I asked him, “How did she get the Tarot card?”
    â€œBeen in her family for years, apparently. She only sold it now because she needed the cash. That’s the story, anyway.”
    â€œAnd what about Veronica Chang?”
    As it had earlier today, when I was speaking with Justine Bouvier, Veronica Chang’s name abruptly changed the texture of the conversation. Hadley frowned, and started once again to do his