It came unexpectedly. The front doorbell chimed, and as the maid passed the living room Linda Norman Hathaway called, “You find out who it is, Alice, before you open that door. Mind?” and Alice said, “Yes, ma’am,” and Layton heard the door open and Alice call out — was there the merest touch of malice in her voice — “Oh, it’s only Mr. Gerald, Miss Linda. Come in, Mr. Gerald,” and before the old woman could get to her feet a young man bounded into the room.
He could not have been more than twenty. Layton had seen scores of him around the Pacific beaches — the deeply tanned, broad-shouldered, hipless blond athletic boys, handsome Nordic counterparts of their darker brothers of the Hawaiian beaches — emotionless, alien to the youth Layton remembered, without conscience or direction, superb male flesh catering to the starved appetites of well-heeled women. This specimen wore the most expensive-looking sports jacket Layton had ever seen.
The boy stopped short at the sight of Layton. He glanced curiously at the old woman in the bikini and said, “Why all the bare skin, baby? It ain’t that hot today.”
Hathaway’s wife was glaring at her maid. Alice vanished.
“Why didn’t you phone, Gerald?” the old woman said, sugar-voiced. “I want you to meet Mr. Clayton. Tim, this is Gerald Jacnewski, a friend of my husband and me.”
The young man laughed. “Especially of her husband.” Before Layton could stir he was across the room and crushing Layton’s hand. “That’s for nothing,” he said. “Now do something.”
“Gerald!” the woman said in a furious voice.
Gerald grinned at her and made for the bar.
“Well, Linda, I’ve got to be going,” Layton said. “And thanks.”
“Thank you, Tim. Here, I’ll see you out.”
Layton lingered outside, blowing gently on his numb hand. Through the open living-room windows he could hear the woman shrilling, “Did you have to show up without warning, you idiot? That man’s a reporter!”
“So? It’s no bark off my ash,” the young man’s voice said. “Say, Hot Pants, I got a real cool date tonight and I need some dinero. Gimme a hundred.”
“Damn you!” Layton heard her cry.
Still blowing on his hand, Layton got into his heap and drove away.
10
Layton glanced at his watch. It was a few minutes past five. He debated with himself whether to phone Linda Hathaway for the information he wanted and had forgotten. He decided against it.
Instead, he stopped in at a drugstore on Santa Monica Boulevard and phoned KZZX, asking for Hazel Grant. To his relief, she was in. Apparently she worked on Saturday afternoons, too.
“Jim Layton,” he said. “Hazel, what’s Hathaway’s new home address?”
“You again,” she said. “What did I want to be nice to you for? Mr. Layton, I can’t give out confidential information like that!”
“Sure you can, honey,” Layton said. “Because I can always get it from Mrs. Hathaway. I have a hunch she wouldn’t mind telling me anything I want to know about your boss-man.”
The phone was silent. Then Hazel Grant said in a venomous undertone, “If you tell him I’m the one who gave it to you, I’ll kick you right where it will do you the most good. I mean it. He’s in the San Granados Apartments on South McCarty Drive.” She hung up so viciously that Layton’s ear rang.
The Beverly Hills address was less than a mile from the Carmelita Avenue mansion. It was a tasteless “better-class” apartment hotel with a tiny lobby. A fat young desk clerk sat behind the desk, within reach of a switchboard, reading a comic book.
“Where will I find Mr. George Hathaway?” Layton asked him.
The clerk barely bothered to look up. “In back. Across the court.”
“Is he in?”
“Dunno. He usually sneaks in and out through the back way.” He set his comic book down resentfully. “I’ll ring him. I’m supposed to do that, anyway.”
Layton slid a dollar bill across the desk and it fluttered into the fat young man’s lap. “Look at all the comic books you can buy if you didn’t see me blow by you. How do I get there?”
The bill vanished. “For a buck’s worth of comic books I’ll give it my personal attention.” The clerk grinned. He got up and indicated a short hall leading to the fear of the lobby. Layton followed him.
The hall led to a central court. Across the court an archway opened into a rear alley. On each side of the archway there was a door into the rear building. The clerk indicated the door on the right.
“Through there and up the stairs. You’ll find his name plate on apartment 23-E — second door to your left from the top of the stairs. How’s that for service?”
“Perfect,” Layton said; and he crossed the court, went through the right-hand door, and climbed the fake-Spanish black iron-and-tile stairway. Just as he reached the landing, George Hathaway came out of the second doorway on the left.
“Well, hello, Mr. Hathaway,” Layton said. “This is my lucky day.”
The KZZX manager peered; the hall was darkish. “Layton?” He seemed disagreeably surprised. “If you’re looking for me, I was just going out to dinner.”
“This is important, Mr. Hathaway.”
Hathaway hesitated. Then he said, “All right,” and stepped aside.
Layton found himself in a typical “exclusive” Los Angeles furnished bachelor apartment, consisting of a big flashy room with a wall bed, a recessed kitchenette masked by a mauve plastic fold-back screen, and a tiny bathroom. The furniture was what Layton called “Grand Rapids Swedish Moderne”; there was a television set; there was a small portable bar; a single mass-produced abstract “painting,” all blots and doodles, was self-consciously off-centered on one long, otherwise blank wall. The San Granados Apartments, Layton knew, contained scores of almost identical “adventures in living.”
“Sit down,” Hathaway said ungraciously. Layton sat down in a back-breaking contour chair; the station manager remained standing. “How did you know where to find me?”
“There are no secrets from the Press,” Layton smiled. “Now that that’s behind us—”
“Of course, this is only temporary,” the handsome old man said. “I had to, ah, move rather suddenly. I wish you wouldn’t publicize where I’m living, Layton. You see—”
“Why not?”
“Well, it’s only a hundred and eighty a month — with maid service, mind you — but it was all I could get in such short notice—”
“It would bankrupt me.”
Hathaway seem mollified. “Can I fix you a drink?”
“No, thanks,” Layton said. “I don’t drink a man’s whisky when I’m going to clobber him.”
Hathaway’s ruddy cheeks became noticeably less so. “What do you mean?”
“I just came from a long talk with your wife.”
The ruddiness dwindled to a milky pink. “I knew you were bad news the minute I laid eyes on you! Well, if you expect a statement from me about my marital affairs, Layton, you’re a fool. And I don’t think you’re a fool. What do you want?”
“Exhibit A.” Layton produced from his inside breast pocket a sheet of stationery. He unfolded it and held it up. “I hold here the original of a letter from one Reinhard K. Ault, Director of Public Relations of the Best-Play Recording Company, addressed to Mr. George Hathaway at his former home—”
“She gave that to you,” Hathaway said in a choked voice. “She dug that up and gave it to you.” He towered over the contour chair with his manicured hands clenched and raised, as if he meant to use Layton’s head as a drum. “Give me that letter.”
Layton folded it and slipped it back into his pocket in one fluid motion.