“WHY DID WE COME SO early?” Kevin asked him. They stood by the full-length picture of Shasta Lynn. The gaping bullet hole in her midriff had not been touched.
“I wanted to take a look at the audience this time,” Walter James explained. “I don’t want to miss the good doctor again tonight.” His eyes roved restlessly over the few late comers queued at the box office. Kevin brushed a small length of thread from the skirt of her chocolate-brown suit.
“Do you think he’ll be here tonight?” Her voice held an undercurrent of excitement. Walter James looked at her bent coppery head with its ridiculously small cloche of brown felt.
“I hope so.” He stroked his head gently. “The stitches come out in another five days.” The puckered scars showed vividly under the ruthless bulbs of the marquee.
Kevin raised her head. “What did you say, Walter?”
“Never mind,” he said. “Here comes Clapp.”
The big man came striding up Market Street. He shook hands with Walter James. Clapp’s eyes sparkled with excitement. The weariness of the night before seemed to have been shrugged off like a coat.
“Let’s go,” he said.
“You by yourself?”
Clapp showed his teeth in a grin. “Don’t you believe it. This whole block’s covered. We’re locking the barn door ahead of time tonight.”
Walter James said, “Make sure somebody doesn’t steal the barn.”
Kevin frowned at them both. “Isn’t everybody jumping to conclusions? I mean, all that we got was a note from Shasta Lynn. It might not have anything to do with Dr. Boone.”
“Miss Gilbert,” Clapp said seriously, “when you don’t have anything else to go on, then you start jumping at conclusions.”
“And don’t forget,” pointed out Walter James, “Shasta Lynn has been more or less of a question mark since the beginning.”
Kevin took both their arms. “Well, I hope you’re not too disappointed if nothing happens. I’ll keep my fingers crossed.”
“Do that,” Walter James advised her solemnly.
Greissinger was standing in back of the burly ticket taker as the three went into the theater. His eyes widened at the sight of the big detective.
“Evening, Greissinger,” Clapp said as he surrendered his ticket.
“Uh — good evening, Lieutenant,” Greissinger said. He brushed the ticket taker aside and put a pudgy hand on Clapp’s arm. “Lieutenant, there isn’t nothing wrong, is there?”
Clapp’s face was bland. “Wrong?”
Greissinger looked around hurriedly and lowered his voice. “I mean, you’re not going to raid us or anything, are you? We’ve been co-operating, Lieutenant, just like you asked — ”
“Don’t worry,” Clapp cut him short. “I’m not going to run you in. I just love the theater, Greissinger. You should feel complimented.” He retrieved his arm and followed Walter James and Kevin into the house, leaving the fat manager staring after him.
They brushed past John Brownlee as they entered the aisle. The thin man was carrying a wooden tray, a quarter filled with boxes of crackerjack and bags of popcorn. Brownlee gave the trio a startled glance and hurried past them into the lobby.
Clapp grinned. “Everybody is so glad to see us,” he murmured to Walter James.
As they sat down, Kevin whispered, “I’m glad they didn’t have another Filipino taking tickets out there. I almost expected to see — him.”
A voice behind her said in a soft whisper, “Laura — “. She turned slowly in the hard seat. The puzzled frown between her eyes vanished when she saw Bob Newcomb watching her from dark, pained eyes.
Kevin said fiercely, “Bob, why don’t you — ”
“Don’t bawl me out again, Laura.” Walter James snapped his head around with a quick movement; the younger man met his gaze with no embarrassment. “I just want to see that you’re all right.”
A cutting phrase trembled on the girl’s lips, then she put her mouth into a firm line and turned her face toward the stage. Walter James squeezed her hand reassuringly.
On the stage, the twelve-girl chorus was alternately hulaing and jitter bugging to pseudo-Congo music. They wore bright strips of cloth as skirts and danced with their legs apart, knees slightly bent. All of them showed complete lack of interest in the routine; two girls were giggling at a third who was stomping determinedly with drunken concentration.
“Pretty bad,” sighed Clapp. He hunched down in his seat. Kevin looked around at Walter James. The slender detective was sitting very erect, his head turning slowly from side to side. He was watching the audience instead of the performers. After a moment, he felt her eyes on him and turned to her.
“What is it, Walter?” she whispered.
His eyes were gleaming and the corners of his mouth were quirked in a half-smile. “Just checking on our little flock,” he whispered back.
“Did you see — ” she began, but he put a finger to his lips and turned his attention to the stage. After a moment of puzzled frowning, Kevin did the same.
Silently, they sat through an hour and a half of grimy blackouts, featuring Danny Host in a half-dozen characterizations, stepping sisters, an obese stripper who failed to tease, and an enthusiastic xylophonist. Kevin jumped when the tin voice began the familiar cajole: “And now — what every man in San Diego has been dreaming of — the Grand Theater’s own — lovely Shasta Lynn!”
The house lights dimmed out. “Walter!” Kevin whispered and put out her hand to him. He was gone.
Walter James bumped into the man just outside the stage door. His hand snapped to the .38 weighting down his right coat pocket.
The shadow spoke with the voice of Danny Host, “Why don’tcha watch where you’re going?”
Walter James let his hand move away from the gun. “That’s a bad habit you’ve got, Host — smoking out here in back.”
Host leaned forward and peered at him closely in the glow of his cigarette. He let out his breath noisily. “Oh, it’s you, huh? What are you doing snooping around here?”
Walter James went around him and jerked open the iron door. The white light fell across the lanky comedian’s face. He was staring at the shorter man with narrowed eyes. “Collecting autographs,” Walter James told him pleasantly. “I’ll get yours on the way out.”
A couple of girls glanced at him speculatively when he came up the cement steps to the stage. Several of them were trying to persuade the drunken member of the jungle routine to for God’s sake get up off the floor. Dixie Lake, attired in a whisper of a silver dancing costume, threw him a look of recognition and opened her mouth as if to speak. Walter James ignored her.
Madeline Harms, her back toward him, was standing in the wings looking out onto the stage. Over her shoulder he could see Shasta Lynn, cool and blue-gowned, facing the curtain, waiting for it to go up.
Her dressing room door was ajar. Walter James slipped in and shut it behind him. Nothing had been changed since his previous visit except that a folding chair had been added. He looked at the unfinished plywood walls speculatively. Then he began to work purposefully, deftly. From his trousers pocket he produced a squat derringer with a short, ornately carved butt. The carving contrasted with the simple modernity of the twin inset .22 barrels. The gun had two triggers inside the guard, one slightly forward of the other.
Walter James cocked his ear to the music, carefully analyzing the heavy rhythm of the drumbeats. In a moment, Shasta Lynn would begin to sing. He turned the gun mouth toward himself, pointed it slightly upwards and peered at his aim in the mirror. Loud applause and whistles broke in from out front; that meant that the curtain had gone up. On the crest of a drumbeat, he pressed the forward trigger.
Drowned by music and uproar, the explosion of the .22 was little more than a loud pop. The slug buried itself high in the plywood wall of the dressing room. The thin cut in Walter James’s left coat sleeve began to seep crimson.
Hastily, he sat before the dressing table and wiped the refit derringer clean with a make-up rag. He opened the table drawer and, holding the gun in the rag smeared its metal in the loose powder that was scattered there. The slight man regarded the dirtied weapon painfully. His arm was beginning to throb now. He closed the drawer and laid the derringer on the dressing table top, tossing the rag over it. He spread his fingers and looked at his slender hands. Steady as a rock.
He heard footsteps coming toward the door and a smile worked its way quickly across his face. He brought the .38 out of his coat pocket and held it loosely in his hand. Outside, he could hear Shasta Lynn’s cool voice singing, “I cried for you — now it’s your turn to cry over me …”
The knock sounded loud on the thin door. Walter James got up, holding the pistol in his right hand. With his left arm, throbbing from the bullet wound, he threw the plywood door open.
“Won’t you come in, Dr. Boone?” he asked.
The startled face of Major Rockwell looked at him.