“More good reason to use a lighter plane.”
“Hey, the Lockheed Electra, either model, can fly high and fast, even without special modifications, like bigger engines. The plane I saw was a long-range reconnaissance aircraft with all the latest gadgets and goodies. With that customized bird, Amelia could climb higher and faster than the first Electra, zip off her official course and return on route without anybody the wiser; she can cruise at speeds up to, hell, two hundred and twenty miles per hour.”
“As compared to what?”
He shrugged, rocked in the wicker chair. “One hundred and forty.”
Alarmed, I said, “Then this elaborate sea search that’s under way, all the rescue projections are based on the wrong aircraft specifications!”
He shrugged again. “Maybe not. After all, the military knows the real specs. But look, this finally makes the west-east flight plan change make sense.”
“How so?”
A shaggy eyebrow rose. “By flying west to east, from Lae to Howland Island, where American military personnel are waiting, the film could be retrieved, the camera equipment removed, and she could head home, to American Hawaii, in a non-spy ship, for a grand welcome.”
I could think of another reason for the west to east change: that Coast Guard cutter, the Itasca, so involved right now in searching for Amelia Earhart, would have been posted (and waiting) at Howland Island, tracking Amelia’s progress. Had she taken off from Howland Island, flying east-west, she would have been moving away from the ship, instead of toward it, as she undertook her mission.
Then she would have landed at Lae, a foreign territory, with her plane’s belly filled with film from a spy mission; should something have gone wrong, and the local government confiscated that film, the international repercussions would have been devastating.
“The change of direction does make perfect sense,” I said, “for a clandestine military operation.”
“Polly’s not a fool!” the parrot in the courtyard said.
“I’ve told you everything I know,” he said. “And what the hell you think you can do with it…” He threw his hands up. “…is beyond me.
“Who else can I talk to?”
His eyes and nostrils flared. “Not my friend at Lockheed!”
I patted the air reassuringly. “I know, I know…I gave you my word. Who else was close to Amelia, and knows something…and thinks what Putnam did to his wife stinks?”
“Maybe you ought to talk to the secretary.
“What secretary?”
“Margot DeCarrie.” He smiled, as if the mental image of her were a pleasant one. “Nice young kid, idolizes Miss Earhart, and Miss Earhart thought the world of her.”
He was getting his present and past tense mixed up, where Amy was concerned; I knew the feeling.
“How come I never met the girl?”
“She only started with the Putnams when they got the new house, in Toluca Lake, just this year. She’s live-in help. I’m friendly with her. You want me to pave the way?”
“You think she’d cooperate?”
“Living in that house, she coulda seen a lot. I know she’s broke up about Miss Earhart’s disappearance. She’s a wreck. Take it easy on her…don’t scare her…and I think she’ll open up like a flower.”
“I appreciate the help.”
“I’ll make a call…but I should warn ya—that guy Miller may still be there.”
“Who?”
He gestured with an open hand. “I don’t know his first name. It was always just ‘Mr. Miller’…he’s some kind of consultant. My guess is he’s some sort of government intelligence guy. He’s one cold fish. Him and Putnam was thick as thieves.”
“What’s he look like?”
“Tall, six foot one, maybe. Probably forty. Pale, like all the blood got drained out of him. Slim but not skinny—what they call it, lanky, like the actor, Jimmy Stewart?”
“Ever have a run-in with him?”
He shifted in the chair; these wicker things weren’t all that comfortable. “He shooed me out of the hangar, once in a while, if him and Putnam and some of these others, military people, more guys in dark suits, was havin’ a conference or somethin’. He smiles but he never shows his teeth, and his tone is always, ‘fuck you,’ no matter how polite the words…. I got a feeling he’s a serious bad apple.”
“I’ll take that under advisement.”
“Okay. I’ll call Miss DeCarrie. They got a public phone out front.” He pushed the wicker chair back, stood. “Should I set something up for tonight?”
“My dance card is free.”
He ambled off, almost bumping into the waitress, who then hip-swayed over in true Polynesian style, though my guess was she was Jewish. She collected my long tall empty glass and, her voice high-pitched, melodic, asked me, “Another Zombie, sir?”
“You’re a fool!” the parrot said.
11
On Valley Spring Lane in Toluca Lake, a few blocks down from where Paul and Myrtle Mantz used to live, stood a similar Spanish-style bungalow, this one with a red tile roof rather than green, and stucco that was off-white rather than yellow, though at dusk the difference was negligible. A wing had been added to this cozy bungalow, however, giving it a one-story sprawl that overflowed onto the adjacent lot, making for a spacious lawn as immaculate as the greens of the golf course nearby. Palm trees provided shade and an oasis atmosphere, enhanced by the occasional cactus and even a century plant. Well-tended but thorny shrubs hugged the house and made me glad that this time I wasn’t heading for the bushes with my Speed Graphic.
It was a little after eight when I rang the bell; a wooden slab of a door opened about a third of the way, enough to give me a good look at an Oriental houseman in Charlie Chan’s white suit and black tie. He might have been thirty, he might have been fifty; whatever his age, he wasn’t terribly impressed by my presence.
“I’m here to see Miss DeCarrie,” I said, then told him my name. “I believe she’s expecting me.”
He nodded, closed the door, and when it opened again, just seconds later, it was like a magic trick: the deadpan Oriental replaced by a beaming young woman.
She was in her early twenties, as tall as Amy only more shapely, in the same sort of casual cowboyish clothes: a plaid shirt, tan cotton slacks, and boots. She had a similar short hairdo, though unlike Amy’s, hers was marcelled and dark brunette; she had a clear-complected, lightly made-up, heart-shaped face and wasn’t as cute as Betty Boop, but damn near.
“Oh, Mr. Heller!” she burbled, as if we were old friends finally reunited, her eyes bright and brown and wide, “how wonderful it is to see you!”
She flung the door open and allowed me to move through the shallow, terra cotta-tiled entryway into a living room, casually tasteful in its modern furnishings, dominated by a fireplace of massive gray stone over which a mirror created an illusion of spaciousness, next to which French doors looked out onto a patio where the shapes of more palm trees and a garden were ghostly through sheer curtains. The stucco walls were fairly bare, though one side wall was taken up by a lovely oil portrait of Amy, in flying jacket, hand on hip, a breeze catching her scarf.
“I guess you’ve guessed I’m Margot,” she said, her voice chirpy, her bee-stung lips forming a big smile; her eyes, however, were laced with red. “I feel like I already know you…. A. E. has told me so much about you….”
“Thank you for seeing me,” I said. “Are you sure there’s no problem with your employer?”
“My employer is A. E.,” she said, sticking her chin out proudly. “As for Mr. Putnam, he’s at the San Francisco Coast Guard Station, with Mr. Miller, and isn’t expected till tomorrow afternoon at the earliest.”
She hooked her arm through mine and led me across the living room’s Oriental carpet through an archway into the dining room, off of which a hallway led into the addition to the house. She had a clean fresh smell about her, soap not perfume, I’d bet.