Heslip was on his feet, draining the last coffee from his cup.
“So she found him.”
“She found him. I went with her when she went to see him. Was a mean, ugly dude in a fancy house. Told us to leave.”
“Maybe we’ll do better with him,” said Heslip.
Down in the street, he unlocked his rental car, then stopped to drum thoughtful fingers on the roof as Fleur got in. He was sure he’d left it unlocked, because that way kids wouldn’t break a window to get in and boost it. Would a kid relock it afterwards?
To hell with it. Fleur directed him to Magazine Street and then over to Jackson Ave which eventually put them on the I-10 expressway. Heslip listened to her chatter, as bright and pleasant as rain on the roof, and wondered what Corinne was doing just then at the travel agency under the Sutter-Stockton Garage.
Corinne was getting a breather on the phone. The heavy voice said, “Fleur. The broad’s name is Fleur.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“The one in New Orleans. The topless dancer.”
Corinne held the receiver away as if expecting it to squirt water at her like the fake boutonnières that used to be advertised in comic books. She returned it to her face. “This is a travel agency,” she said, “not a massage parlor.”
“Heslip. He slept with her last night,” said the husky, half-whispering voice. The breathing got heavier. “Lemme tell you what he did to her. First he...”
She was so astounded that she actually listened for several seconds before slamming down the phone.
“What’s the matter, Corinne?” asked Toni, the other girl in the office. “You sick or something?”
Corinne waved a hand rather weakly. “Just... a weird call.”
“An obscene call?”
“Uh... something like that.” Then she added very quickly, “Just a breather.” Toni was an ardent libber and very behind self-defense: thirty-seven ways to geld a man with bare hands, feet, or sarcasm. “I hung up on him, he won’t call back.”
She put the incident from her mind, only it wouldn’t stay put. Bart was in New Orleans, after all. Looking for a hooker. And a lot of hookers hung around topless bars. Fleur. The caller had used a specific name. Would he do that if it was just a crank call?
But it was silly to think that way. What she would do, she would call Giselle at DKA and tell her about it. The call probably had something to do with the license thing. Only when she called, Giselle wasn’t there. Nor were Kearny, Larry, or O’B. Probably all over at those licensing hearings...
At which Hec Tranquillini was putting Simson on the grill at last, starting gently, hoping to pry him open by careful manipulation. Because that was the only way in the world he was going to be able to keep excluding that damned letter.
“For the record once again, please, what is your name?”
“Jeffrey L. Simson.”
“Have you gone by any other names?”
“Yes, sir.” Simson obviously had been well-briefed. “Jackson J. Jacoby, that’s J-A-C-O-B-Y, and Jeffrey J. Jacuzzi, that’s J-A-C-U-Z-Z-I.”
“What a lot of names. How old are you, Mr. Simson-Jacoby-Jacuzzi?”
“Objection. Those were professional pseudonyms, not—”
“I withdraw the question in that form. Your age, Mr. Simson?”
“Twenty-five.”
“Where do you live?”
“One-four-seven-two Fort Point, Los Angeles.”
“How long have you lived there?”
“For I guess a month or something like that?” Tranquillini saw his opening, but did nothing to show he was going through it. “And before that?”
“Avenue Fifty in Eagle Rock. Near Occidental College.”
“What number on Avenue Fifty?”
“Um... Gee, I’m not sure...”
“How long were you at number um Avenue Fifty?”
Delaney was on his feet. “Your Honor, counsel’s sarcasm is neither witty nor necessary. The witness is responding as best—”
“I apologize to the witness,” said Tranquillini meekly. “How long were you at the Avenue Fifty address?”
“Well, I guess it must have been... maybe four or five months.”
“And before that?”
“In San Francisco for two years.”
Tranquillini took a chance. “Most of that at a single address, I believe?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Could you give us that address, please?”
Delaney had another objection. As Tranquillini had hoped, he obviously was trying to keep Simson’s homosexuality out because he thought that was what Tranquillini was trying to get in. “I fail to see the relevance of this line of questioning.”
“Is that an objection?” asked the Hearing Officer.
“Yes, Your Honor.”
“Overruled.”
“Do you remember the address, Mr. Simson?”
“Not the street number — thirty-three-hundred something. It was just a block off Mission Street.”
“You had a roommate there, did you not, who—”
Delaney was up. “Objection.”
“I withdraw the question. Do you remember which street it was, Mr. Simson?”
“Ah... Sure! It was Twenty-fourth Street.” He smiled in relief. “Thirty-three, uh... Yes: Thirty-three ninety-six.”
“Thank you very much, Mr. Simson,” said Tranquillini in a suddenly significant voice. He looked up from his papers. “When did you work for Kearny Associates?”
“From some time last year until—”
“What was the specific date you started working for them?”
“I believe it was... ah... September? October?”
Delaney was on his feet again. “Does counsel plan to take this man through the last year of his life minute-by-minute?”
“This does seem rather extended, Mr. Tranquillini.”
Tranquillini avoided saying what he was doing: establishing
I the witness’s obvious difficulty in remembering detail. Instead, he said, “I request the utmost latitude with this witness because his is the only direct evidence against my client which the State has yet produced. Therefore I feel—”
“Counsel is stalling, Your Honor.” Delaney was advancing on the bench. “He has no direct evidence of his own...”
“If the State would quit interposing objections, I could proceed with my interrogation. But since we are discussing motions, Your Honor, I am still waiting for a ruling on mine of Monday afternoon concerning a subpoena for Mr. Pivarski...”
Delaney was shouting. Tranquillini covertly checked his watch. Oh yes. Old time was yet afleeting. Every minute spent this way gave Bart Heslip extra time to look for Verna Rounds.
Twenty-Two
If Zebulon Rounds had been white, he’d have been a good ole boy. But he was black, and what investigative ploy was going to work with a 250-pound black redneck?
Fleur hadn’t had the street address out in Kenner where he lived, near the airport, which was upper-crust black and had obviously been white a few years earlier. But she was able to recognize the house, where Rounds’ wife was out in halter and shorts trimming an honest-to-God magnolia tree. Also wearing a mouse under one eye and a swollen jaw, neither of which had come from an afternoon bridge game with the girls.
Posing as an insurance salesman, complete with clipboard and clear-glass horn-rims and a fruity manner, Heslip had been led out West End Boulevard to Bucktown and a dazzling white, crushed-shell parking lot near Lake Pontchartrain. It seemed that the uncharitable Mr. Rounds had, like Heslip, been a professional boxer. His career had led him, not to manhunting, but to part ownership of a rather fancy bar-restaurant catering to the tourist trade, which was built out over the water on concrete pilings. When Heslip pounded on the closed front door, it opened on a thin, white, dispirited face with a cigarette dangling from a lower corner of it.