“I see. And what did you say to this?”
“I’m… I’m ashamed to tell you.”
“Please.”
“… I asked him if he’d done it.”
“Done it?”
“If he’d killed that girl.”
“And what did he say?”
“He said, ‘Of course not, honey. Whatever made you think I did?’ ”
I searched for sarcasm in her tone but couldn’t find any. “And what did you say to that?”
She looked at me; it was like staring into the glass eyes of a doll. “Do I have to answer?”
“Of course not.”
Now her gaze returned to her coffee; her lips were trembling, just a little. “I said… because of your nervous trouble.”
“What nervous trouble was that?”
“Bob… Bob was discharged from the Army. What you call a ‘Section Eight.’ ”
I knew what that was, all right.
“Was he in combat?” Fowley asked, looking up from his notepad. “Did he have battlefield trauma-”
She was shaking her head. “No, not exactly. He was near combat, when he was overseas, on USO tours.”
Frowning, I asked, “USO tours?”
“Bob’s a musician-he was in the Army Air Corps band. Saxophone.”
“Really. Does he still work as a musician?”
“Sometimes. He’s in the union. He gets a call for a weekend job now and then: bars and nightclubs.”
So this guy was a traveling salesman and a weekend musician who played in bars. That a guy in those twin trades might pick up a little poontang here and there might come as no shock-unless you were, as I was, seated across from the striking beauty he was married to.
I asked, “What did your husband say when he called you from San Francisco?”
The full lips twitched in a nonsmile. “He said he figured the police would be around, sooner or later, and he didn’t want me hearing about this from anybody but him. I suggested he go talk to the authorities himself. I figured that would… look better.”
“You’re right,” I said. “What did your husband say to that?”
“He said he didn’t want to go looking for trouble. He had accounts to call on, and he was with his boss, and it would just be too embarrassing… He represents a pipe and clamp company, you know.”
Another easy joke to be found, had I been in the mood.
I asked, “How long have you and Bob been married?”
“Fifteen months. Robert, Jr., is four months old.”
Robert, Sr., was a hell of a guy.
“The day your husband drove back from San Diego with his passenger,” I said, tactfully, “that was last Thursday, just a week ago. Would you happen to remember what time he got home that night?”
She was already nodding. “He made it home for supper-probably six-thirty. We had some friends over, for bridge that evening-neighbors. I can give your their names.”
“Please,” Fowley said.
“Mr. and Mrs. Don Holmes,” she said, rather formally, and gave the particulars as the reporter scribbled.
Then I asked, “What about the next several days?”
“Bob was at home every day, working, calling buyers on the phone, until he left for San Francisco with Mr. Palmer-that was on Monday.”
If that were true, Manley had been out of town when the murder was most likely committed.
The phone’s shrill ring jolted all three of us. Harriet Manley was up like a shot, probably to make sure the thing didn’t jangle again and wake her baby.
“Hello,” she said.
Then her eyes tightened, and immediately softened.
“Hello, baby,” she said.
Fowley and I looked at each other: her other baby.
Covering the mouthpiece, eyes huge, the pretty housewife whispered, “It’s Bob… Do you want to talk to him?”
Shaking his head, Fowley patted the air, whispered back, “Better not tell him we’re here.”
Though her voice remained calm, her eyes danced; she obviously was torn, wondering whether to warn him.
“No, I’m fine… I love you, too… I believe you… I believe you… I believe you… I know you do… I know you do… I do, too… I miss you too… ’Bye.”
Hanging up the phone, she said, “He was calling from a pay phone, at a diner. He said he should be home by ten or eleven tonight… He has to stop at his boss’ place first. That’s where he left our car, before he and Mr. Palmer drove up to San Francisco.”
I asked, “Where does Mr. Palmer live?”
She was leaning against the counter, near the baby bottles. “Eagle Rock. I can give you the address, if you’d rather… rather pick him up there. Instead of here.”
“Would you like that, Mrs. Manley?”
“I think so.”
“Did Bob say anything else?”
“Yes. He said he loved me more than any man ever loved a wife.”
Her lip was quivering and I thought she might break down; but she did not. I believe she had made a decision that she would maintain her dignity in front of us.
Rising from the little plastic-and-chrome table, Fowley asked, “Would you happen to have any recent photos of your husband that we could borrow? For identification purposes?”
And publication purposes.
“We just had some taken,” she said, “by a professional photographer… If you’ll wait here…”
She exited the kitchen and returned moments later with a triple frame, from which she removed a grinning photo of her husband, a young, handsome if jug-eared fellow. “Do you want these, as well?” She indicated the other two photos-one of herself and Robert, beaming at each other, and another of the family with Robert, Jr., in his mother’s arms, mom and dad looking adoringly at junior.
Fowley said, “If you don’t mind.”
“Take them.”
I took them from her. Harriet Manley looked radiant in the photos, which were beautifully shot.
“We would appreciate it,” Fowley said, as we headed out through the living room, “if you didn’t talk to anyone else about this, especially if newspaper reporters should start coming around.”
“Oh, I won’t talk to any reporters,” she said.
Fowley, having no shame, stayed at it. “And if your husband calls back-”
“I won’t say anything. I know he has to… face up to this.”
“If he’s innocent-”
“He didn’t kill that girl, Detective Fowley. But he’s not ‘innocent,’ is he?”
“Are you going to stand by him?”
We were at the door, now.
“I’ll have to think about that. We have a son, after all, and I do love my husband very much. Bob has his flaws, his problems, but I never thought he was… stepping out on me. I never imagined-”
I said, “You don’t have to go on.”
Harriet Manley swallowed, her big blue eyes hooded. “Terrible… terrible.”
“Yes.”
“What happened to that poor girl, I mean.”
“Right.”
“She was… very pretty, wasn’t she?”
“Elizabeth Short? Yes. But if you don’t mind my saying so, not compared to you. Not nearly as beautiful.”
She managed a slight smile. “You’re kind, Mr. Heller.”
“Hardly. It’s the truth. Your husband’s a damn fool.”
“I know… I know. But I still love him, anyway.”
On the way down the cobblestone walk, “Detective” Fowley said, “Jesus Christ, she’s gonna forgive the bastard! What a woman… Where do I go to find a dame like that?”
I glanced back-it was after dark now, and the beautiful mother of Robert Manley’s son was watching us go, haloed in the doorway of the precious little bungalow on Mountain View Avenue. Red Manley had everything any man could ever hope for, and-whether a murderer or not-had risked it all for a piece of tail.
Then she disappeared, and I could hear the muffled sound of crying-Robert, Jr.’s. I had a hunch he wouldn’t be crying alone.
With Manley due back in town around ten tonight, we took time to grab burgers at a greasy spoon on Colorado Boulevard.
“Well, even if Red Manley isn’t our murderer,” Fowley said, dragging a french fry through a river of ketchup, “he’s how Elizabeth Short got from San Diego to L.A.”
“ Six days before her body was found,” I reminded the reporter, across from him in a booth.