4

Driving home, top down on my Cad convertible, the thought kept coming back: I wonder what she meant by that?

I was also wondering why her name had to be Mrs. Spork. Spork was bad enough, but the Mrs. ruined it entirely.

I was wondering about a number of other things, too. From brief talks with some of the Halsteads’ guests and a chat with Lieutenant France, I had a few other facts. George Halstead’s skull had been bashed in with a smooth, heavy rock—there were small boulders all over the place, lining paths, in decorative clumps, and scattered in and among the plantings—which had been found in a clump of dichondra about ten yards from the body, near an outside phone apparently used by swimmers around the pool. So either Halstead had been clobbered where he fell and the stone tossed away, or he’d been struck and then dragged to where I’d found him. The police hadn’t come to a decision on that when I left.

Halstead was worth a couple of million dollars, perhaps more. All the guests present were, at least, well-to-do. Or “Jaybirds of a feather” as Lieutenant France had said. He’d also said he doubted that anyone present had banged Halstead in the brains, and if that’s what he thought, I was inclined to go along with him. Which left the disappearing Smiths, whom the police were now checking on, and the others Hugh Pryer had mentioned: the Whists and Rileys, Kents and Nelsons. Plus, of course, any one of perhaps two or three million other people.

Even so, it was possible that by the time the police finished their investigation tonight there’d be no further investigating to do. Often it happens that way, and a case is closed shortly after it opens. But until and unless that happened, I was interested in talking to a few people myself, particularly the Whists and Rileys.

I was remembering Hugh Pryer’s mention of them and the not-so-sly dig in the ribs from his wife. It has been my experience that when a husband says something apparently innocuous and his wife instantly gets him a good one in the ribs, the comment may well be considered nocuous. So, while driving to Hollywood Boulevard I checked the addresses I’d jotted down as Mrs. Halstead gave them to me.

The Rileys lived in Pasadena, farther then I felt like driving at this hour—it was after midnight. But the Whists were living at the Norvue, which was in Hollywood and only a few blocks out of my way. So when I hit Hollywood Boulevard, instead of turning at Vine and continuing on to North Rossmore and home, I kept going to Highland Avenue and swung left toward the Norvue, three blocks ahead.

It was a new building, twelve stories of swank apartments and suites built around an enclosed pool-and-patio area and outdoor dining room and expensive as hell. I’d never been inside the place. The Whists were in 12-C, which I presumed would be one of the four penthouse suites on the Norvue’s top floor.

As I turned to park in the curving drive before the lobby entrance, I noticed something mildly disturbing. Or, rather, noticed it again.

Checking traffic and keeping a casual eye on my rear-view mirror has become a habit with me, so before pulling into the Norvue’s drive I glanced at the mirror, fingering up the turn indicator to signal for a right turn. The only car behind me was half a block back, but the left headlight was a little cock-eyed and tilted up slightly, so that its beam glared more than the right one. It wouldn’t have been important, except that I’d noticed that same cock-eyed light behind me a few minutes earlier.

By the time I’d pulled into the drive and started slowing to a stop, the car had gone on by, and I didn’t get a good look at its make or color. It was a dark sedan, but that was all I knew.

I turned off the ignition, left the Cad where it was, and went into the lobby.

It probably wouldn’t have looked more expensive if they’d built the furniture out of new money. The carpet was off-white, thick, spongy, probably fifty bucks a yard—and there were a lot of yards. The furniture, divans and chairs and even “love seats,” was a little spindly for my taste, but it looked as rich and as modern as Mars flights. A bank of elevators was on the right; and on my left behind arcs and planes of black steel bands and rich red woods the shade of vitamin-enriched blood stood, at alert attention, a thin man with a kindly face.

He was dressed in a black suit, an unobtrusively patterned white shirt, and a white silk tie, and he stood there beaming kindness at me.

I waded to the desk and said, “Good evening.”

“Good evening, sir. May I aid you?”

They didn’t just help you here. They aided you. That was probably good. “I’d like to see the Whists. Ed and Marcelle.”

Mrs. Halstead had told me their first names, so I tossed them in, probably thinking that my casual familiarity with penthouse dwellers might make up for the lack of class of my chops. But that was a pretty sneaky thing to do, I immediately realized, so I added, “Actually, I don’t know them. Not intimately. Not even personally, that is.”

“No matter.”

“What?”

“No matter, sir. They are not here.”

“Oh? They’re out for the evening?”

“I know not,” he said.

“You know not? Don’t you work here?”

“Yes, sir,” he said. “But Mr. and Mrs. Whist have not been in residence for nearly a month.”

“They moved? Checked out?”

“No.”

“Then where are they?”

“I know not.”

It may be that I am not the most patient chap in the whole wide world. I flipped out my wallet, flapped it open to my private detective’s card and dangled it before the desk man’s eyes; then I leaned on the counter, maybe even a foot over the counter, and said, “Look, friend, maybe you’ve got nothing else to do, but I should like enormously either to see the Whists or determine before the dawn where the hell they have got to. So will you give it to me all in one gob?”

He grinned, and seemed to stand at ease. “Why didn’t you say so?”

I grinned back at him. “I know not.”

“They took a six-month lease on their penthouse,” he said. “It expired night before last, but—” He broke off, flipped through some cards, then went on, “Last night they were here was four weeks ago.”

“They didn’t check out? Didn’t give up the suite, I mean?”

“No.”

“Skip out on the bill?”

“No, nothing like that. They paid the six months in advance. I recall asking the bell captain about them a few days ago. He said that when the Whists’ luggage was taken to their car, Mr. Whist, after presenting him with a handsome gratuity for his aid, indicated they were going on a short vacation.”

“I don’t suppose they said where.”

“No.”

“Well, if their lease has expired, what about the stuff still left in the suite?”

“Nothing is left. They took everything with them.”

“All? Clothing, the works?”

“All. Which, I presume, is why Mr. Whist presented the bell captain with such a handsome gratuity.”

“I heard you—” I smiled—“the first time.”

He smiled. “Splendid. The night they left, that was the night of the fire in their bedroom.”

“The night of … in the bedroom?”

He nodded.

“What the hell were they doing?” I paused, held up a hand. “I know—you know not. What kind of a fire? Huge conflagration? Sheets of flame leaping and crack—”

“No, no. The bed burned, that is all.”

“That’s all, huh? Did it discomfit the Whists?”

“They were not in the room, not even in the suite. According to Mr. Whist, when he and his wife returned from dinner in the Tongolele Room, here in the Norvue, they discovered the fire. Apparently it began in a nearby wastebasket, into which he had emptied an ash tray before leaving the suite. It would seem there was still a cigarette smouldering in the ash tray.”

“Only the bed was damaged?”

“The mattress and bedclothes were ruined and the bed frame was charred. One wall was scorched considerably. That was all, other than a little smoke damage. Members of the staff were able to prevent the blaze from spreading.” He paused. “Mr. Whist was very apologetic. Of course, he paid handsome—paid for all the damage.”

“Good for him. And then they left, huh? On this—vacation?”

“Yes, later that same night.”

“Maybe they wanted to sleep in a bed that hadn’t burned up.”

He agreed that was possible.

“You haven’t seen them since?” I asked.

“No.”

“And you’ve no idea where they are now?”

“No,” he repeated.

I shrugged. That was enough for the moment—especially since I was probably wasting my time to begin with. So I thanked the desk man and left. Left—after, of course, presenting him with a handsome gratuity.

I tooled the Cadillac back down to Vine, took a right and followed Vine into North Rossmore. The Spartan was only a block ahead on my left when I noticed that cock-eyed light again. At least I thought I did.

A small Corvair was directly behind me, but a block or so back one car had pulled out to pass another and then pulled in behind the small job. It was the second car back now, but when the driver had pulled into the left lane the headlights bounced on my rear-view mirror, and the left light was high, glaring.

I felt that queer, cool-nettle prickling beneath the surface of my back, as if the temperature of my spinal column had dropped a degree or two; I reached under my coat and rested my thumb on the butt of the Colt Special, handy in its clamshell holster there.

Then I slowed down, let the Corvair creep up on me, creep up and pass. I went on past the Spartan to Beverly Boulevard, pulled up at a stop sign there. The other car idled behind me, but I wasn’t able to see who was at the wheel. I didn’t delay overlong at the stop, just sat there a few seconds and then swung left into Beverly, as if heading back toward L.A.

The other car—it was a dark sedan, a late-model Dodge Polara—turned right, away from me. That wasn’t what I’d expected. I drove on slowly, watching the Dodge as long as I could. It kept going straight up Beverly. Then I turned, headed back to the Spartan.

So, maybe I was nuts. Maybe it was a coincidence. Or even a different car with a cock-eyed headlight.

And maybe not.

Home is apartment 212, three rooms and bath complete with two tropical fish tanks, Amelia—jazzy nude in bold oils—on the wall, yellow-gold carpet with thick shag nap on the living room floor; and on the carpet a low, chocolate-brown divan, two leather hassocks, the much-scarred coffee-and-booze table, and in the air—faint but still detectable by an expectant nostril—the scent of soft, and sweet, and spicy, and slinky perfumes and sprays and lotions.

Or maybe I imagined it. Lots of memories in that room. In all the rooms.

In the kitchenette I mixed a short bourbon-and-water nightcap, then showered, wrapped a towel around my middle and went back into the front room. For ten minutes I sat before the two aquariums, watching the little devils dart after the threadlike tubifex worms I fed them, and thinking about the three or four hours just past, the murder, nudity, people, motive, means, opportunity, Sybil, Mrs. Halstead, a car with a cock-eyed light.

After ten minutes of watching and thinking, I’d come to one firm conclusion. I was going to have to hospitalize the inch-long Microglanis parahybae bouncing himself on sand at the bottom of the community tank. Apparently he’d picked up some Ichthyophthirius.