“Of course. Nothing. When I left, Kann had bagged the bodies and was off to the morgue. Photographers left about a half hour ago. Uniforms have cordoned off the area, but we’ll probably take down the ribbons in a day or two. Our search was disappointing because of the rains…except for the key.”

Decker said, “Have you found a bank to match it?”

“I’m one step ahead of you,” Marge gloated. “Orit gave me the name of Yalom’s accountant. From him, I found out that Yalom has accounts at six banks. I called all six institutions. Yalom has safe-deposit boxes at three of the six banks. Davidson’s pulling the papers for inspection. Trouble is, once he announces the Yaloms as dead, the IRS will step in and freeze the boxes. It’s quite a paper chase for Old Tug, but I gotta hand it to him. He’s actually acting like a cop. A racist, sexist cop, but I’d rather have that instead of a bureaucrat. I think the corpses lit a fire under his butt.”

“When will the papers be ready?”

“Hopefully in an hour, maybe a little longer.” Marge looked around. “What’s the story here?”

“Doesn’t appear to be a burglary. They left behind valuables, including money. Maybe they were looking for specific items like the jewels and diamonds that were stored in Yalom’s vault at the LA diamond center.”

“They were looking for this.” Marge held up the safe-deposit-box key.

“Possibly,” Decker said. “Or possibly they were looking for the Yaloms’ passports.”

Marge looked surprised. “Who would toss the place like this just to steal dead people’s passports?”

“Someone who didn’t want it known that Arik traveled to strange places,” Decker said. “If Arik had been working for some covert organization, his passport would have been a concise record of his assignments.”

“Good point. Guy certainly went to some weird places.” Marge paused. “Didn’t you say he was in the Israeli army for six years? Or was that the partner, Gold?”

“It was Gold. Speaking of which, we should talk to Shaul immediately…let him know what happened to his partner.”

“If he doesn’t know already.”

“Yeah, you’re right about that. He’s a prime suspect until we know otherwise.”

“He and the boys are prime suspects.”

“The boys…” Decker thought a moment. “No, I haven’t given up on the boys. I’ll ask Davidson to assign a couple of men to follow up on the airlines. Also, someone should check out cabs and bus schedules. But first things first. Since we can’t follow up on the safe-deposit-box key until we’ve got our papers, let’s pay Gold a visit and see what he has to say about his partner’s murder.”

“What do we do with the house?”

“Seal it off and hope nobody trespasses,” Decker said. “You coming with me?”

“I’m coming with you.”

18