“I’m looking for a woman.”
“What a lucky coincidence. I’m looking for a man. It’s just a leetle early for me. I’m still a teensy bit drunky from last night.”
Yawning, she cocked one fist and stretched the other arm straight up over her head. Her breath was a blend of gin and fermenting womanhood. Her bare feet were dirty white.
“Come on in, I won’t bite you.”
I stepped up into the office. She held herself in the doorway so that I brushed against her from shoulder to knee. She wasn’t really interested, just keeping in practice. The room was dirty and disordered, with a couple of lipsticky glasses on the registration desk, confession magazines scattered on the floor.
“Big night last night?” I said.
“Oh, sure. Big night. Drink cocktails until four and wake up at six and you can’t get back to sleep. This divorce kick – well, it isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”
I braced myself for another life-story. Something about my face, maybe a gullible look, invited them. But she spared me: “Okay, Joe, we won’t beat around the bush. You want the girlie in the red dress.”
“You catch on very quick.”
“Yeah. Well, she isn’t here. I don’t know where she is. You a mobster or what?”
“That’s a funny question.”
“Yeah, sure, uproarious. You got a hand gun in your armpit, and you’re not Davy Crockett.”
“You shatter my illusions.”
She gave me a hard and murky look. Her eyes resembled mineral specimens, malachite or copper sulphate, which had been gathering dust on somebody’s back shelf. “Come on, now, what’s it all about? The kid said there was mobsters after her. You’re no mobster, are you?”
“I’m a private dick. Her husband hired me to find her.” I realized suddenly that I was back where I’d started, twenty-eight hours later and in another state. It felt more like twenty-eight days.
The woman was saying: “You find her for him, what’s he plan to do with her? Beat her up?”
“Look after her. She needs it.”
“That could be. Was it all malarkey about the mobsters? I mean, was she stringing me?”
“I don’t think so. Did she mention any names?”
She nodded. “One. Carl Stern.”
“You know that name?”
“Yeah. The Sun dug into his record and spread it on the front page last fall when he put in for a gambling license. He wouldn’t be her husband?”
“Her husband’s a nice boy from Toronto. George Wall. Some of Stem’s friends put him in the hospital. I want to get to his wife before they do it to her.”
“No kidding?”
“I mean it.”
“What did she do to Stem?”
“It’s a question I want to ask her. Where is she now?”
She gave me the mineral look again. “Let’s see your license. Not that a license means much. The guy that got me my divorce was a licensed private detective, and he was a prime stinker if I ever saw one.”
“I’m not,” I said with the necessary smile, and showed her my photostat.
She looked up sharply. “Your name is Archer?”
“Yes.”
“Is this a funny coincidence or what? She tried to phone you last night, person to person. Knocked on the door along towards two o’clock, looking pretty white and shaky, and asked to use my phone. I asked her what the trouble was. She broke down and told me that there were mobsters after her, or there soon would be. She wanted to call the airport, catch a plane out right away quick. I put in a call for her, but I couldn’t get her on a flight till morning. So then she tried to call you.”
“What for?”
“She didn’t tell me. If you’re a friend of hers, why didn’t you say so? Are you a friend of Rina Campbell’s?”
“Who?” I said.
“Rina Campbell. The girl we’re talking about.”
I made a not very smooth recovery. “I think I am. Is she still here?”
“I gave her a nembutal and put her to bed myself. I haven’t heard a peep out of her. She’s probably still sleeping, poor dearie.”
“I want to see her.”
“Yeah, you made that clear. Only, this is a free country, and if she don’t want to see you there’s no way you can make her.”
“I’m not planning to push her around.”
“You better not, brother. Try anything with the kid, and I’ll shoot you personally.”
“You like her, do you?”
“Why not? She’s a real good girl, as good as they come. I don’t care what she’s done.”
“You’re doing all right yourself.”
“Am I? That I doubt. I had it once, when I was Rina’s age. I tried to save a little of it for an emergency. If you can’t pass on a little loving-kindness in this world, you might as well be a gopher in a hole.”
“What did you say your name was?”
“I didn’t say. My name is Carol, Mrs. Carol Busch.” She offered me a red, unlovely hand. “Remember, if she changed her mind about wanting to see you, you amscray.”
She opened an inner door, and shut it firmly behind her. I went outside where I could watch the exits. Charles Meyer was waiting in his cab.
“Hiyah. Any luck?”
“No luck. I’m quitting. How much do I owe you?”
He leaned sideways to look at the meter. “Three seventy-five. Don’t you want a ride downtown? I’ll let you have it for half-price.”
“I’ll walk. I need the exercise.”
His look was sad and canine. He knew that I was lying, and he knew the reason: I didn’t trust him. Mrs. Carol Busch called me from the doorway of the unit adjoining the office. “Okay, she’s up, she wants to talk to you.”
Chapter 27
MRS. BUSCH stayed outside and let me go in alone. The room was dim and cool. Blackout blinds and heavy drapes kept the sunlight out. A shaded bedside lamp was the only source of light. The girl sat on the foot of the unmade Hollywood bed with her face turned away from the lamp.
I saw the reason for this when she forgot her pose and looked up at me. Nembutal or tears had swollen her eyelids. Her bright hair was carelessly groomed. She wore her red wool dress as if it were burlap. Overnight, she seemed to have lost her assurance that her beauty would look after her. Her voice was small and high: “Hello.”
“Hello, Rina.”
“You know who I am,” she said dully.
“I do now. I should have guessed it was a sister act. Where is your sister, Rina?”
“Hester’s in trouble. She had to leave the country.”
“You’re sure about that?”
“I’m not sure about anything since I found out Lance is dead.”
“How did you find out? You didn’t believe me when I told you last night.”
“I have to believe you now. I picked up a Los Angeles paper at the hotel, and there was a headline about him – about his murder.” Her eyelids lifted heavily. Her dark-blue eyes had changed subtly in thirteen hours: they saw more and liked it less. “Did my sister – did Hester kill him?”
“She may have, but I doubt it. Which way did they say she went – Mexico or Canada or Hawaii?”
“They didn’t say. Carl Stern said it would be better if I didn’t know.”
“What are you supposed to be doing here? Giving her an alibi?”
“I guess so. That was the idea.” She looked up again. “Please don’t stand over me. I’m willing to tell you what I know, but please don’t cross-question me. I’ve had a terrible night.”
Her fingers dabbed at her forehead and came away wet. There was a box of Kleenex on the bedside table. I handed her a leaf of it, which she used to wipe her forehead and blow her nose. She said surprisingly, in a voice as thin as a flute: “Are you a good man?”