New York Dead by Stuart Woods Page B

telephone?” he asked the doorman.
    “Sure,” the man said, placing a phone on the desk.
    “An interesting connection, wouldn’t you say?” he asked Dino. He checked his notebook and dialed the number of the network.

Chapter
13

    A woman answered Harkness’s phone, a voice Stone didn’t recognize.
    “Barron Harkness, please. My name is Barrington; he knows me.”
    “I’m sorry, Mr. Barrington, Mr. Harkness is in a meeting. May I have him return the call?”
    “Let me speak with Cary Hilliard, please.”
    “Ms. Hilliard is in the same meeting.”
    Stone tried not to sound annoyed. “Please take a note to Mr. Harkness. Tell him Detective Stone Barrington would like to speak with him at once, and that it’s important.”
    “I’m sorry, but—”
    “Please do it now. This is police business.”
    The woman hesitated. “All right,” she said finally. “What is your number?”
    “I’ll hold.”
    An irritating minute passed, then: “Barron Harkness.”
    “Mr. Harkness, this is Stone Barrington. I’m at your apartment building, and I want your permission to enter Sasha Nijinsky’s apartment. The doorman insists on speaking with you before allowing entry.” “But why?” Harkness asked. “Sasha never moved into the apartment; there’s nothing there. Legally, she didn’t even own the apartment; she was supposed to have closed on it the morning after she…” “It appears that a moving company followed instructions she gave before her disappearance and moved her belongings into the apartment. The doorman let them in.”
    Harkness hesitated, then spoke. “I’ll be right over there,” he said, and hung up before Stone could speak further.
    Stone replaced the receiver and turned to Dino. “Harkness is coming over here.”
    “Why?” Dino asked.
    “Who knows? Maybe he’s being protective of his building’s reputation.”
    The doorman spoke up. “That sounds like Mr. Harkness,” he said. “He and the board are very picky about what goes on here. That’s why I wouldn’t let you in. It woudda been my job, y’know.”
    Stone nodded, then joined Dino on a sofa in the lobby to wait for Harkness.
    They didn’t have to wait long. A black Lincoln Town Car pulled up at the curb, and Harkness strode into the building. He shook hands with Stone and was introduced to Dino. “All right,” he said, “let’s get this over with. I’ve got to get back to the office.” “We don’t really need you for this,” Stone said, “if you’d like to go back now.”
    Harkness fished a letter from an inside pocket and handed it to Stone. It was from a midtown law firm.
    “You’re her executor?” Stone asked. “But we don’t even know that she’s dead.”
    “I got the letter this morning; it was the first I’d heard of it.” He shrugged. “I guess I’m representing Sasha in this,” he said, “so, unless you want to get a search warrant, I’m going to have to go into that apartment with you.” “All right,” Stone said.
    “Eddie,” Harkness said to the doorman, “I’ll use my passkey. We won’t need you.”
    On the elevator, Stone turned to Harkness. “You say you didn’t know that Ms. Nijinsky had appointed you executor of her will?”
    “Didn’t have a clue,” Harkness replied. “I was astonished, to tell you the truth.”
    “Mr. Harkness, did you and Sasha Nijinsky ever have a romantic relationship?”
    Harkness looked him in the eye. “Stone, I haven’t the slightest intention of answering that.”
    The elevator door opened, and they stepped into a vestibule; only two apartments opened onto it, 10-J and 10-K. Harkness opened the door to 10-J and led the way in. There was an entrance hall, then a large living room. Furniture had been dumped here and there, as if the moving men had no instructions, and the boxes Stone had seen at Sasha’s old apartment were piled in the middle of the floor. Every one of them had been opened, and the woman’s belongings were strewn across the