“You sound almost as though you envied him.”
“I almost do.”
“It may be a two-way envy, Dr. Damis. Is your middle name Burke, by any chance?”
“It is. My father was an admirer of Edmund Burke.”
“Did you know that Campion’s been using part of your name as an alias? He’s been calling himself Burke Damis.”
He flushed with displeasure. “Blast him, I wish he’d leave me and my things alone.”
“Has he been at your things?”
“I mean this place. He left it like a pigsty when he moved out last fall. I had to spend most of the last week cleaning it up. Frankly, I’ve had enough of Bruce and his messy life and his outré relationships.”
“Are you thinking of his relationships with women?”
“I was, yes. We won’t go into them. I’ve long since given up trying to purge those Augean stables.”
“I wish you would go into them.”
“I prefer not to. They’re excessively boring to me. They invariably follow the same sadomasochistic pattern. Bruce has always regarded women as his legitimate prey.”
“Prey is quite a dramatic word. It reminds me of your hawk.”
He nodded, as though I’d paid them both a subtle compliment. The hawk sat still as a figurine on his hand. It occurred to me that this Damis might be attached to Campion and the hawk in similar ways, watching through rimless spectacles as the two predators vaulted into space and took their pleasure.
“It brings up the fact,” I went on, “that Campion’s wife was strangled two months ago. Campion is wanted for the murder. Did you know that, Dr. Damis?”
“I most assuredly did not. I just flew in from Italy last week, and I came directly here.” He was pale as bone now, and almost chattering. “I’ve been utterly out of touch with everyone and everything.”
“But you’ve been in touch with Campion.”
“How do you know that?”
“Call it intuition. You’d talk about him differently if you hadn’t seen him for a year. Now when and where did you see him?”
“This morning,” he said with his eyes on the floor. “Bruce came here this morning. He’d walked halfway around the lake during the night, and he looked perfectly ghastly.”
“What did he come to you for?”
“Refuge, I suppose. He admitted that he was in trouble, but he didn’t say what kind, and I swear he said nothing about his wife. He wanted to stay here with me. I didn’t see that it was possible, or that I owed it to him. He’s always been the taker and I’ve been the giver, as it is. Besides, I’ve reached a crucial stage in training my hawk.” He smoothed the long feathers of its tail.
“When did he leave here?”
“Around noon. I gave him lunch. Naturally I had no idea that I was harboring a fugitive from justice.”
“How did he leave?”
“He took my car,” Damis said miserably.
“By force?”
“I wouldn’t say that. He is bigger than I am, and more – forceful.” He had dropped his pride, and he looked very young without it. “Bruce has an ascendancy over me. I suppose you’re quite right, I’ve secretly envied his life, his success with women–”
“You can stop doing that now. Will you please describe your car – make and model?”
“It’s a 1959 Chevrolet convertible, red, with a checkered red and black top. California license number TKU 37964.” As I was making a note of the number, he added: “Bruce promised I’d have it back within twenty-four hours. He knows I’m stuck out here without transportation.”
“I imagine he couldn’t care less. I’ll see what I can do about getting it back for you. Do you want me to report it as a theft?”
“It wasn’t a theft. I was a fool to do it, but I lent it to him voluntarily.”
“Did he explain why he wanted the car, or where he was going with it?”
“No.” He hesitated. “On second thought, he did give some indication of where he intended to go. He originally proposed that when he was finished with the convertible, he should leave it in Berkeley, in my garage. It certainly suggests that he was headed in that direction.”
“And he was alone when he came here and when he left?”
“Oh yes, definitely.”
“Did Campion say anything about the girl he’d been with?”
“He didn’t mention a girl. As a matter of fact, he did very little talking. Who is she?”
“She is, or was, a tall blonde girl named Harriet Blackwell.”
“I never heard of her, I’m afraid. Has something happened to her?”
“The indications are that she’s in the lake.”
He was shocked, and his feeling communicated itself to the bird on his fist. The hawk spread its wings. Damis calmed it with his hand before he spoke.
“You can’t mean that Bruce drowned her?”
“Something like that. When he came here this morning, were there any signs that he’d been in a struggle? Scratch marks on his face, for instance?”
“Yes, his face was scratched. His clothes were in bad shape, too.”
“Were they wet?”
“They looked as though they had been wet. He looked generally as though he’d had a rough night.”
“He’s in for rougher ones,” I said. “Just in case he does come back this way, we’ll want to station a man here. Is it all right with you?”
“I’d welcome it. I’m no more of a physical coward than the next person, but–” His apprehensive look completed the sentence.
“It’s unlikely that he will come back,” I told him reassuringly. “Assuming he doesn’t, I’d like to have your ideas on where to look for him. Also, I want your Berkeley address, in case he follows through on his original plan.”
“Couldn’t we skip the Berkeley address? My mother lives there with me, and I don’t wish her to be alarmed unnecessarily. I’m sure that she’s in no danger from him.”
“Does she know Campion?”
“Very slightly. Minimally. We had him to dinner, once, a couple of years ago. Mother didn’t like him at all – she said he had a dark aura. At that time, though Mother didn’t know it, he was living with some black-stockinged tramp in Sausalito. He’d previously lived in Carmel, Santa Barbara, San Diego, Los Angeles, and probably a number of other places. I wouldn’t know where to start looking for him. Unless,” he added after some thought, “he’s gone to his sister.”
“Campion has a sister?”
“He has, but it’s far from likely that he’s with her. She’s a very stuffy Peninsula type, he told me. They don’t get along.”
“Where does she live on the Peninsula, and what’s her name?”
“I’d have to look it up. I’ve never met the woman. I only happen to have her address because Campion used it as a mailing address when he was moving around.”
Carrying the hawk with him, Damis went to a table in the corner of the room. He opened a drawer and got out a shabby brown leather address book. I stood beside him as he flipped the pages to the C’s.
Bruce Campion was the first name on the page. Scribbled under and around it were addresses in the various cities Damis had mentioned. They were all scratched out except for a Menlo Park address – c/o Mrs. Thor Jurgensen, 401 Schoolhouse Road – which I made a note of.
“I used to think we were good friends,” Damis was saying. His eyes were fixed on the hawk, as though it was feeding him his lines by mental telepathy. “But over the years I caught on to the pattern of our relationship. I heard from Bruce only when he wanted something – a loan or a recommendation or the use of something I owned. I’m heartily sick of the man. I hope I never see him again.”
I made no comment. He said to the hawk: “Are you hungry, Angelo? How about another sparrow wing?”