4

We were on the last lap of our drive to Big Sur when out of the corner of my eye I saw Millie’s head turn gently to look behind her.

“He’s still there,” I said.

“Oh! You know?”

“He’s been with us since we left Los Angeles. Black Buick. I’ve been watching him in the mirror.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I don’t know.” I shrugged. “I don’t feel I mind it as much as I might. I’m used to him. I thought of trying to run away—this Caddy will float at a hundred miles an hour—but I’m not sure I want to.”

She nodded. “I’m with you on that.”

It was late afternoon when we reached Big Sur, and at the gas station where I filled my tank, I watched the black Buick sitting half a mile back alongside the road. I asked the attendant how to get to the Hunting and Fishing Club.

“Turn right at Coyote Drive—that’s a mile or two up—and then just keep going up into the mountains until you reach it. It can’t be more than three or four miles.”

It was a beautiful drive. Coyote was a dirt road, hardly wide enough for two cars to pass each other, and we turned and twisted until presently the land fell away and we could look down onto the golden Pacific, the sun dropping into it like a ball of red fire, the air clean and sweet and cool.

Then, suddenly, we were at the lodge—with no sign of the black Buick behind us. It was a fine, rambling building of redwood logs, gabled, with a slate roof. There was parking space on either side of the entrance for about two dozen cars, but only four cars and a pickup truck were parked there now.

I glanced at Millie, and she said, “Drive in, Al, and park over there next to the pickup truck. Play it very cool. Darling, I love you, really—very much. Cool, remember.”

I parked next to the pickup truck. Dusk was gathering, and lights were going on in the windows of the lodge.

“Front door?” I said to Millie.

“Of course.”

We got out of the car and walked to the entrance. It was the kind of lodge they built in California in the twenties, and it had been kept up, the logs glistening with fresh varnish, the brasswork on the door spanking bright. As we moved toward the door, the outside lamps went on, and the door was opened by a servant in green livery, who smiled and held the door aside for us to enter. We walked into a magnificent foyer-living room, a great eight-foot-wide fireplace facing us, a box so large it dwarfed the three enormous logs burning in it. The overstuffed chairs and couches in the room were old-fashioned, but proper for the place, and a huge Oriental rug covered the floor in front of the fire.

“We have been expecting you, Mr. Brody, and you, Miss Cooper,” the man in the green livery said. “Won’t you make yourselves comfortable? The washrooms are over there”—he pointed—“if you care to refresh yourselves. I’ll take your orders for drinks now. Dinner will be at seven.” He waited, his hands clasped, his brass buttons shining.

“Well,” said Millie, “this is very nice indeed. I’ll have a tall Scotch and soda.”

“The same, but a double,” I said.

He moved silently away, and Millie said, “Well, partner, I think we ought to refresh ourselves, as the man said. Don’t you?”

I nodded, having absolutely nothing to say, and entered the room marked with a silhouette of a man, while Millie went into the other. Like the living room, the washroom was of another time, the toilets framed in marble, the sinks cut out of solid marble, gold-plated fixtures, chain boxes above the toilets, but everything clean, shining, the pile of towels soft and inviting. Here, as in the big living room, there was an air of propriety, of calm, moneyed assurance, as if the people who kept up the place were totally and unshakably content with their post-Victorian splendor, untouched by the fripperies of our times. The same held true of the log walls of the living room, hung with elk heads and moose heads, with Remingtons and Bierstadts.

I went back into the large room and selected a couch facing the fire on an angle, sank into the soft luxury of it and stretched out my legs gratefully. Somehow my nervousness had been reduced to a minimum. I found myself thinking that whatever came up, Millie would handle it properly and competently. I was provoked at myself for the thought—and then Millie appeared, looking as bright and fresh in her white sweater blouse and plaid skirt as if she had just stepped out of her morning bath, and dressed precisely as one would dress for an evening at a hunting lodge at Big Sur.

I rose, forgetting the whole thing for a moment and smiling with delight at her appearance and at her fine good looks.

“Sit down, Al,” she said, dropping onto the couch alongside me. “Isn’t this something, this grand old couch and this great fire? Where would you find the like of it today? They don’t make them like this anymore, do they, not furniture, not rugs, not fireplaces, not buildings. Everything now is shoddy and fake, plastic junk—we live in a world of things that fall apart before you can cart them to the dump. But this is real.”

“I don’t feel very real,” I said. “Nothing that has been happening to us is very real. For thirty seconds or so, when I saw you come out of the washroom, I forgot about it. Now I am remembering again. God, you looked so beautiful when you walked across the room.”

“Did it go away, or am I still a bit attractive?”

“Not attractive—beautiful. You’re a very beautiful and fascinating woman. But God damn it, Millie, I can’t be romantic now—not if this were the Casbah itself. They were expecting us—do you realize that? Every move that we made, they were on us.”

“Al, we knew they were following us.”

“Then what happens now?”

“We wait and see.”

“You realize we’re apparently the only ones here.”

“There were other cars outside, Al.”

“Then where are they?”

“Al, take it easy. You said you were going to play it cool. You promised me.”

The man in the green livery returned with the drinks and placed them on the coffee table in front of the couch. “Your single, Miss Cooper, and your double, Mr. Brody. Is there anything else I can get you? The waiter will bring you some hors d’oeuvres. If you enjoy cheese, we have some sharp Canadian cheddar that’s very excellent.”

“Well skip the cheese,” Millie said. “Mr. Brody has had his cheese today.” And then she lifted her drink and turned to me. “Cheers.”

“It’s probably poisoned.”

“Don’t be silly, Al. They didn’t bring us here to poison us. They could have done that in L.A.”

“I suppose they could. Well—cheers.”

It was excellent Scotch, and a moment later a waiter—black coat and tie this time—entered with a silver tray, a bowl of beluga caviar, thin toast, chopped onion, chopped egg. He put it down and departed, and Millie spread caviar on toast for me, sprinkled it with egg and onion and said, “Be my guest, Al.”

It was delicious, gray-green beluga. “Eighty-eight dollars a pound,” I informed her.

“Really?” She tasted it. “It is good, isn’t it?”

“Millie,” I said, “before they turn up—whoever they are—there’s something that bugs me. Anne said that when she entered my office with the mail, the urn was already there.”

“That’s right.”

“How did it get there?”

“I don’t know. They do things. I suppose they could get into the office. The cleaning women have passkeys.”

“All right. How did they get into my house?”

“Picked the lock.”

“No. You can’t pick those locks. Break the door, break a window—yes. But you can’t pick the locks.”

“Al, it’s a Beverly Hills house. There’s no second floor, and there are three thousand windows and glass doors. If they wanted in, they could get in.”

“I suppose so. I keep thinking of Evelyn.”

“Al!”

“It’s not that she’s a bitch or vindictive or anything like that. She’s a beautiful woman who never learned anything else. She couldn’t—no.” I put the thought away.

The man in the green livery returned now. “Dinner is ready, sir. If you and Miss Cooper will come to the table, the gentlemen will join you.”

“What gentlemen?”

The green livery smiled, as if I had exercised my wit, and led the way toward the dining room. Millie took my arm and we followed, as I whispered to her, “Lambs to the slaughter.”

“Or tigers to the foal. Think positively, Al.”

“Some tiger,” I muttered.

The dining room lived up to all that the living room had promised. Beamed under a twenty-five-foot ceiling, floored with red Spanish tile, hung with reproductions of medieval banners, it contained a single polished mahogany table about twenty feet long. The table was probably calculated to seat every guest the lodge could hold, but now it was set with only four places at the farther end, two at the end of the table and two flanking it, providing a kind of intimacy in spite of the size of the table. The green livery drew out the chairs at the end of the table for Millie and me, and we sat down to a service of English Spode, Irish glass and antique silver such as I had never seen outside of a museum.

“They do themselves well,” I said to Millie.

“And all things willing,” well soon know who they are.

Almost as if her words were a signal, they entered, two tall, well-set and exceedingly handsome men. The first had gray hair, a fine head of hair that swept down over his brow, gray eyes and clean-cut features. The second had a square jaw, piercing blue eyes and a military bearing. The first man was Senator Ronald Bellman. The second was Richards, the Federal Narcotics agent. They entered from the living room across the dining room, and I had time to whisper to Millie:

“We’re in luck. That’s Richards, the Federal agent.”

Through her teeth she whispered back, “Al, don’t be silly about this. He’s one of them.”

And then they were greeting us, warmly and pleasantly, the senator saying, “Good evening, Al. So glad to see you. Really delighted. And you, Millie. I’ve never seen you look better. And this”—he nodded at Richards—“is my associate, General Holbert Martin—but of course you’ve met Marty, Al, as Mr. Richards. You’ll find him much more engaging as himself.” And then turning to Richards or the general, “And I’m sure you’re equally delighted, General.”

“I am.” And then the general said to Millie, “So very happy to see you, my dear. A week can be a long time.” And he walked over and kissed her.

I stared at the senator, at the general and then at Millie. My heart was hammering at my chest, and I felt sick, woefully, terribly sick.

Millie said, “I’m sorry, Al. Yes, I’m one of them.”