“But your gum found out about this? How?”
“Alan Omony is a real film noir buff, and he bid on a lot of Neva Maxton’s effects at an auction in Pasadena five years ago,” she replied. “He has all kinds of detective movie artifacts, including one of the fedoras Dick Powell wore in Murder, My Sweet. The thing is, he knew that the secret to the location of maybe a million dollars in jewels was in Neva’s locket. But up until I went and blabbed what poor Dick Barnson had confided in me, nobody on the face of the earth had any idea what had become of her or the locket.”
“Okay, what’s been going on since you told Omony?”
“I haven’t got any real proof that he’s responsible, but he has to be the one behind all this.”
“All what?”
“Well, somebody has kidnapped Dick Barnson,” she said forlornly. “That has to be because they want him to take them to the spot where Neva’s remains are. Soon as I came home and realized what’d happened, I departed for elsewhere. That was yesterday and—”
“Where’ve you been staying since?”
“At another mansion, this one in Beverly Hills,” she answered. “A realtor friend of mine let me use a place they haven’t been able to unload for months. Oh, and he’s gay as a three dollar bill, so you don’t have to be jealous of him either.”
“But somebody found you there?”
“Two goons with knives broke in early this morning,” she said. “I was able to jump out the window and, in spite of really bunging up my damn ankle, get away in my Mercedes. I hadn’t even dragged my luggage into the new place, so that’s still all in my possession.”
Wes left the sofa, walked over to the windows to look out at the dark ocean. “What about Barnson? Shouldn’t you go to the police about what you suspect?”
“I don’t have proof of anything,” she said. “It looked to me like somebody broke into his mansion and carried him off after a struggle. But the cops could say he got drunk, smashed a few things, and wandered off on a binge.”
“Nobody followed you here?”
“Of course not,” she said. “I took a very circumspect route from the walk-in clinic in Santa Monica.” She gestured at the crutches. “Did you know you have to leave a fifty dollar deposit on those things?”
“If any of what you’ve told me is true, Casey, then I figure you’re working on some way of using me to go up to Lake Tahoe and find the remains of this long-gone actress. After a little grave robbing, I’ll probably end up helping you hunt for the jewels. Isn’t that so?”
“No, damn you.” She stood up, wobbling, and glared at him. “That’s not the scenario at all. I don’t want any further part of this mess. I hope they don’t hurt Dick Barnson too badly, but I don’t intend to do anything to stop that. The million dollars in loot can stay hidden for all I care.” She took a few limping steps in his direction. “I really have reformed, and what I’d like to do is stay here with you and work on the next issue of my independent comic book, Bertha the Biker. That is, if you’ll let me move back in, Wes.”
After a few silent seconds he nodded. “Sure, you can stay,” he said. “But for now, use the guest room.”
It was raining in Studio City. A warm, wind-tossed rain that spattered the windows of Wes’s middle-sized office at the Sparey Arts Animation Studios.
Not quite right, he thought, shaking his head and pushing back from his drawing board.
He was supposed to be designing a pair of tapdancing elephants for an upcoming thirty-second cartoon spot advertising the new Ginkgo Bar — The Candy That Helps You Remember!! But he concluded that his elephants didn’t have any grace and, worse, they didn’t look as though they possessed exceptional memories.
Nobody who wears a straw hat ever looks all that bright, he decided, picking up an eraser.
He dropped it, left his chair, and wandered to the window to stare out at the rainy afternoon. His brooding about Casey was probably affecting his creativity.
Normally he should’ve been able to turn out a pair of dancing elephants in a couple of hours. And both of them would have ended up looking as graceful as Fred Astaire.
Casey had been back living with him for four days now. In all that time he hadn’t detected any fantastic yams from her, not even a single small fib. She hadn’t tried to con him in any way, nor had she mentioned his helping to unearth that long-missing actress so they could locate the lost gems. It was very unsettling.
Could she really have reformed?
Heavy, trotting footfalls suddenly sounded out in the corridor. Then Mike Filchock, dripping rain and shaking his furled polka dot umbrella, popped into the office. “Have you seen the paper?” the redhaired screenwriter inquired as he shed a dramatic-looking black trenchcoat. “I rushed right over from my office at the Wheelan Studios when I spotted this.”
“Is it something about Casey?” Wes left the window to approach his friend. “Don’t drip on those storyboards, huh?”
“This transcends storyboards.” From inside his aggressively plaid sportscoat Filchock tugged out a folded newspaper. “Take a look at page three.”
“Paper’s soggy.” Gingerly, Wes managed to get the wet paper unfurled and opened to the page.
The entire lower half was given over to the story and photos. The headline said: RICHARD BARNSON, TOUGH GUY ACTOR OF THE PAST, FOUND DEAD. The subhead explained: FORMER STAR, 83, TORTURED AND KILLED TWO DAYS AGO.
“Casey didn’t do this,” said Wes. “She’s been with me ever since—”
“That’s not my point, dear chum,” Filchock told him. “After that recent dizzy spell, during which you were temporarily insane enough to allow the Bride of Frankenstein to move back in with you, you told me about the latest spin she’d put on reality. Her tall tale, as I recall, was woven around this now defunct actor chap.”
“But this proves she’s been telling me the truth for a change.” Wes shook the limp, wet newspaper.
“What it proves, dimwit, is that once again Casey McLeod is involved in some complex criminal venture,” countered his friend. “This latest incident, by the way, won’t look good in ads wherein she tries to get more work as a ghost autobiographer. ‘Due to the murder of my latest client, I am now able to take on a new assignment from—’ ”
“Wait now,” said Wes. “It says here in the story that Barnson’s body was found by a couple of hikers in a patch of wilderness near Lake Tahoe. That indicates that whoever grabbed the guy took him up there to persuade him to show them where what’s-her-name’s body is buried. All of that confirms Casey’s story to me, Mike.”
“Nope, it only proves that she probably knew they were going to knock off the poor old coot,” said Filchock. “Casey needed a place to lie low and establish an alibi. That was, as so many times in the past, your humble hacienda.” He shrugged. “If you’re lucky, her fellow felons have divided the loot they stole from Barnson and scattered to the four winds. Soon as she gets her share, hopefully shell vanish again.”
Wes shook his head and tapped the soggy news story. “There’s something else that’s bothering me.”
“Were I you, I’d start calculating how many years I was likely to serve in the pokey for being an accessory after the—”
“If they killed Barnson after he told them everything, they probably have found the jewels by now,” Wes said slowly. “But if he died before giving them the secret, they could come after Casey to see what she knows.”