“I’ve a lot of time.”
“That’s what I can’t figure out, Tom. I’ve been here an hour. I’ve pried and spied. You subscribe to a dozen newspapers all over the country, New York, Cleveland, Denver — Minneapolis. But why?”
“You said you’ve spied?”
“Yes. You said you weren’t a lawyer yet — there are letters from lawyers. They mention heirs, wills.”
“I find missing heirs.”
“I don’t understand. Why would you do that?”
“It’s a living. People die intestate. Sometimes they leave wills, but the next of kin can’t be located. Lawyers advertise for them. They want to settle the estates and get their fees. I find the heirs. For a fee.”
She looked at him narrowly. “I don’t know whether I like the sound of that, Tom. It... it’s somewhat like being a... a ghoul — living off the dead.”
“It’s a legitimate business. Nobody refuses an inheritance, especially an inheritance they hadn’t counted on. A lot of people have distant relatives with whom they’ve lost touch. I come along, out of a clear sky, tell them they’ve inherited five thousand dollars, ten thousand. Sometimes more. The heirs almost always forget to weep for their poor departed relatives. Cousin Minnie, Great Uncle Heber. They scarcely knew them, perhaps never even saw them. But they like the money they receive. They like it fine and they don’t even mind paying my fee. Well, they try to cut it down sometimes, but that’s about the worst of it.”
“You like that sort of thing?”
“Why not?”
“When I looked you up in the directory I saw the Brentwood address and it pleased me. You were successful. The house — it measured up to the expectation. But — I don’t know, Tom, I expected more.”
“You always did, Linda.”
She drew her right foot out from under the other, put it on the floor. “You think I... I wrote the Dear John letter because I wanted a husband who could give me more than a law student could?”
“You’re saying it, Linda. Not me.”
“You’re wrong, Tom, dreadfully wrong.”
She got to her feet, drawing herself up, somewhat like a model displaying an expensive evening gown. “I’m a good piece of merchandise, Tom. Harris Toomey has five million if he has a dollar. I’m not going to marry him. There’s only one man I ever loved. I think you know who that man is.”
“No, I don’t know.”
She got to her feet and came toward him. For one instant he thought of moving away from her. But he didn’t. She put her arms around him, raised herself up on her: toes. She kissed him, a soft, warm, lingering kiss. There was no passion in it, only caressing affection. His arms went about her.
“Hold me tight,” she said.
He tightened his hold. But not tightly enough.
“Damn you, Tom!”
“I remember the letter.”
She crushed her lips to his and the affectionate kiss became a carnal one. Her mouth was open, her tongue seared him. He was conscious of her breasts, her body. She strained against him. Then suddenly she pushed away from him.
“What do you want from me?” she cried poignantly.
“It’s been a long time, Linda.”
“Too long. But we can make up for the years.”
“Can we, Linda? Can you forget that you chose another man?”
“I didn’t love him!”
“You married him.”
“He was here and you were away. You were away so long. I was only nineteen.”
“Twenty-one.”
“You won’t even give me that, will you? I was afraid of you. You were too strong. You would have submerged me. I would have become a housewife, a drab little woman, fenced in by a kitchen and a nursery. I would have been making up laundry and grocery lists.”
“Has it been so good, the life you’ve had?”
She backed away from him. “I’ve lived, Tom!”
“Then why are you here now?”
“I don’t know. When I saw you I knew that what I wouldn’t admit even in the darkest moments was true. There was never anyone but you. There never will be.”
She came toward him again.
Chapter 5
It was three o’clock when she left and then he could not sleep. He turned on the bedroom lights and going to his coat, took out the picture of Leroy Dane. He studied it for a moment, then returned it to his coat. Slipping out the folded, mimeographed fan bulletin he returned to bed.
There were twelve pages of news and tidbits about Leroy Dane. It was sheer drivel. Much of it was culled from fan letters, the views and opinions of teenagers, all females, suggestions as to the types of pictures and roles they wanted him to do.
Scattered throughout were items, apparently written by the editor of the fan magazine, the late Julia Joliet. These were chiefly anecdotes about Leroy Dane. Some pertained to his background, his life before he became an actor.
Alder read these carefully. Dane’s war record was touched upon, his life on the West Texas ranch, his athletic prowess in college. The college was not named, however. His age was given — thirty-four. His marriages were glossed over. “They did not work out,” was the way Julia Joliet dismissed them.
The facts of Dane’s life, when Alder summed them up, were copious enough. Yet astonishingly meager. Trivialities were embellished, vital statistics glossed over or ignored.
His age — thirty-four. That would have made him nineteen in 1945. Yet he had come out of the war a first lieutenant. It had taken Alder two years to reach that rank. Dane could have been in the ROTC at college and entered the army as a second lieutenant. No, he would have had to be a senior in college, a junior at the very least. And if he were commanding tanks in the Battle of the Bulge... no, not at eighteen.
Dane was cheating about his age. Either that, or he had been a child prodigy, had entered college at the age of thirteen or fourteen, been graduated at seventeen or eighteen, and then turned out also to be a military genius.
Leroy Dane had not impressed Alder as being either a child prodigy or a military genius. Neither. Alder did have the impression that Dane was a pompous blowhard, an inveterate liar.
Alder looked at his bedside clock. It was 3:40, twenty minutes to seven in the East. He picked up the phone and dialed 110.
“I want to put in a call to Chevy Chase, Maryland,” he told the operator. “That’s a suburb of Washington. Charles C. Mattock...”
Inside of two minutes a voice exclaimed, “For the love of Patrick Henry, it’s the middle of the night!”
“It is here,” said Alder. “Where you are, it’s morning. Time to get up and go to work. Chuck, listen, I need the service record of Leroy Dane. Yep, the movie star. The delight of American womanhood. I want to know when he entered the army, the date of his discharge. His age, home address when he was inducted, occupation, everything there is on him.”
“That’s all you want?” Charles Mattock asked sarcastically. “Sure you don’t want to know what he eats for breakfast, what color pajamas he wears?”
“He eats steak for breakfast,” replied Alder. “It says so in his fan club magazine. And he never wears pajama tops.”
“It’s important, Tom?”
“Yes. Phone me when you get it. Collect.”
Alder talked a moment more, then hung up. He switched off the bedside lamp and fell asleep almost immediately.
The ringing of the phone awakened him. It was daylight in the room and Alder noted that it was five minutes after seven.
Charles Mattock was on the phone.
“What army, Tom?” he said.
“He didn’t serve?”
“Lots of Danes, a number of Leroys, but no Leroy Dane served in the American army. Or marines — or navy. You want me to try the coast guard or merchant marine?”