Tad arranged for Kate to drive a studio car home, since Bonnie and Aurelio had to work late. Only a plain black Buick, but more powerful than her little roadster back in San Francisco. She made a wrong turn in Pasadena and had to pull over to look at a map, but still managed to park at the curb in front of Ollie’s house before daylight was gone.
Kate never drove in the dark unless she had someone with her.
No reporters tonight, but as she walked around the hood of the car, Detective Bassett emerged from the house, wearing his rumpled brown suit and hat. He saw her and lifted his notebook. “Miss Hildebrand! I was hoping to catch you tonight! I have a few questions, if you don’t mind.”
She thought of the sword in her trunk and hoped she wouldn’t have to lie outright—and if Ollie were in the room, she’d be lying to him too. “Do you mind if we speak out here? I don’t want to distress my grandfather any more than necessary.”
Detective Bassett’s attention seemed to sharpen at that, but he kept his tone easy as he approached. “Sure, if that’s what you want.” A woman walked by with a dog on a leash, craning her neck to get a better look at Kitty Hildebrand. “Why don’t we sit in your car for some privacy.”
“All right.” Kate went around to the driver’s seat, while the detective settled himself on the passenger side. He shut the door, and a stale aroma filled the car. Kate rolled down her window.
“Not as hot today,” the detective observed, keeping his own window closed. “I never like the Santa Anas. All that wind and static makes me jumpy.”
“You said you have more questions?”
“A few.” He flipped pages in his notebook, his lips pursed. “Can’t read my own writing half the time.”
Kate tapped a finger on the steering wheel.
“Let’s see, here it is. I was hoping you could tell me more about that first night you arrived, when Mr. Berman played that prank on you, pretending to be dead on the floor.”
“I told you—it wasn’t a prank. They were rehearsing for Hugo’s play.”
“Sure … but still, must have made you angry after a long day of traveling.”
She forced a smile. “I didn’t kill him over it, if that’s what you mean.”
He chuckled. “No, no, nothing like that. I’m just trying to understand your relationship with Mr. Berman.”
“I didn’t have one. I met him once. Twice, I guess, if you include breakfast.”
Detective Bassett looked up. “You had breakfast with him?”
“No. He walked into the kitchen briefly.” Telling him that Lemmy had been on his way to visit a gangster in prison would help point suspicion somewhere besides Ollie and his boarders, but it also might bring closer scrutiny on Reuben and his fake name, and the fact that both Hugo and Aurelio used to work at the shady nightclub.
The detective wrote in his notebook, the pencil scratching. His ear was round and fleshy, a shade lighter than his ruddy face.
“Is that all?” she asked.
He rubbed the ear, as if feeling her stare. “Maybe you could tell me a bit more about what brought you to Pasadena. You were living with your aunt, I think, but she had some financial difficulties and couldn’t pay your private school, so you came here to live with your grandfather. That right?”
Kate struggled to hide her irritation. “You’ve been reading the newspapers, I see. Nice of them to do your job for you. Only, they didn’t get it quite right. My aunt got married, and I wanted to get to know my grandfather better. That’s why I came here.”
“Oh, sure, that makes sense. Still, I imagine it came as a shock when you showed up to live with your movie star grandfather and realized he wasn’t—well, he’s not exactly rolling in it anymore, is he? That must have been disappointing.”
“Not at all. I was aware of my grandfather’s financial situation.” A lie. She hadn’t known the extent of it. Certainly hadn’t known he was in debt to a gangster.
“Well, that’s good. He doesn’t go out much these days, from what I gather.”
She remained quiet.
“Sure has a lot of old stuff in his house. Looks like junk to me, but I imagine some collector would pay good money for it.”
“I wouldn’t know.”
“Wouldn’t you?” Detective Bassett turned on the seat to look at her. “Now that’s interesting, because he just told me you talked about his things on your first morning here. How he said they were valuable, and you asked if he planned to sell any of it, and he told you no.”
Kate frowned, trying to avoid whatever trap he was setting. “We spoke briefly about it. I hardly remember.”
“And yet, an hour later, you got everyone out of the house—quite forcefully, I’m told. Even your grandfather, who doesn’t go out much. You wanted everyone out of the house pretty bad, Miss Hildebrand. But then Mr. Berman came home, so the house wasn’t as empty as you expected.”
Her temper flickered. He was taking Ollie’s innocent ramblings and twisting them. “You think I wanted my grandfather out of the house so I could rob him? And Lemmy caught me, so I killed him? You should be writing for Hollywood.”
Detective Bassett spread his hands. “I’ve been doing this job a long time, and if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that truth is stranger than fiction. You’d be surprised what people are capable of, Miss Hildebrand.” He paused. “Or maybe you wouldn’t be. I guess you learned that yourself a few years ago.”
Her anger turned to ice. She stared forward, her jaw tight, not wanting to give him the satisfaction of seeing how accurately he’d stabbed. The orange sunset had disappeared, the sky now purple. “You’re trying to aggravate me on purpose, hoping I’ll lose my temper and confess. The only problem is—I didn’t do it. I didn’t steal anything, and I didn’t kill anyone. I was at Falcon Pictures all day.”
“See, now, that’s interesting too.” Detective Bassett flipped a page in his notebook. “From what the men tell me, there was about an hour and a half, maybe two hours, when nobody knew where you were. I looked at some maps, and that movie studio is about twenty-five minutes away—fifty minutes round trip—which gave you plenty of time to ride here in a taxi and get back with no one the wiser.”
It gave her smug satisfaction that he didn’t know about the yellow car being moved. “So,” she said coolly. “My getaway car was a taxi? And I hid the loot where—my purse?” She lifted the handbag on her lap, barely big enough for a compact and handkerchief.
He scratched his fleshy earlobe. “Maybe you planned to hide things under your bed and sell them later. Or in your empty luggage.”
Kate’s heart jumped into a panicky beat, but she forced her face to remain neutral. Hopefully, Hugo had put the luggage in the attic today. “That’s absurd.”
“You’ve grown up with nice things, Miss Hildebrand. It isn’t easy coming down in the world like you have. And he’s your grandfather, so it probably didn’t feel like stealing. All in the family, as they say.”
She hid her fear behind outrage. “I didn’t steal anything—and I didn’t kill Lemmy. I was the one who found him—and it was horrible—and I would never steal from anyone, let alone my own grandfather! You think you know me because you’ve seen my picture a hundred times and read a bunch of made-up stories. Well, you don’t know a thing, because that girl isn’t me!” She stopped, grabbing the bottom of the steering wheel.
Detective Bassett watched her closely, unruffled.
She took a moment, then said with forced calm, “I don’t think you’re stupid enough to think I did it. You’re trying to unnerve me. And it worked. But that doesn’t change the fact that I didn’t do it and the real killer is still out there.”
“Not out there, Miss Hildebrand—in there.” Detective Bassett lifted a hand and tapped the car window with its view of Ollie’s house. “I think one of you killed him, that’s for sure, and I’m going to figure it out.”
Her fury collapsed, because a small part of her feared the same thing.
Detective Bassett stepped out of the car, then leaned back to say through the open door, “He was stabbed with something long and sharp, like that sword in the painting on your grandfather’s wall. I don’t suppose you’ve seen something like that around the house?”
“No, I haven’t,” Kate said, and it was the easiest lie she’d ever told.