Rhoda Richards’ green convertible drove into the parking lot. The top was down and the afternoon sun struck fire on her dark red hair. Beside her was a tall, very brown man, thin as a steel rod. His grizzled brown hair was clipped short to minimize the amount of gray. His nose was thin and aristocratic, and his mouth a straight line.
“Darling,” Rhoda said nervously, “this is Pete Sheffold. The man I was telling you about.”
“You’re the bouncer here?” Richards’ voice leaped at Sheffold. “What do you know about this man Pantera?”
“He’s a racketeer. A real tough boy.”
Richards’ light blue eyes blinked. “I’m pretty tough myself. Where does he think he gets off, trying to extort money from me!”
“He’s bluffing,” Sheffold said quietly. “He knows Bannerman’s reputation with women and he’s trying to cash in on all this publicity of the kidnapping by threatening to smear your wife. It doesn’t mean anything. It could have been any prominent woman. Because Mrs. Richards drove up to Bannerman’s love-nest, as a favor to me, Pantera is trying to make you believe she’d been there before.”
“I see,” Richards’ voice was still uncompromising. He was the type who had to be convinced. Sheffold could envision him bounding around a tennis court in shorts, skinny, sinewy, bronzed by the sun. He’d play with a grim concentration, not for the satisfaction of the game but to prove that he was a man among men.
Perhaps for the same reason he had married a young woman and a beautiful one and then must continue to reassure himself that it wasn’t wealth and position that had won her, but his own masculine attraction.
To a man like this, Sheffold thought, there could be no greater or more fatal stab than the possibility of his wife’s infidelity. “Perhaps I can make you a proposition. If you’ll take this pest out of my hair, I’ll pay you—”
“No,” Sheffold said in a low voice. “I don’t hire myself out for strong-man stuff. If you want Pantera worked over, you’ll have to get someone else.”
“I see,” Richards repeated, contempt in his eyes now. It was a losing fight even to compete with ordinary men; the contrast between himself and Sheffold was insurmountable. But giant or not, his gaze said Sheffold was yellow.
He said aloud, “Then I’ll handle him myself. My family has been here since the hacienda days, Mr. Sheffold. It is a question of pride with me. I will pay extortion money to no man on earth.”
Sheffold shrugged, said nothing.
“Of course you won’t, darling,” Rhoda assured him. The look she threw to Sheffold was full of thanks. She made a U-turn and drove back out into the flow of traffic on the Strip.
Sheffold went back into the club. Julian was sitting at a table listening to Laurel Owens sing to the accompaniment of a piano. He motioned Sheffold over.
“She’s your protegé,” he said, in a lack-lustre tone. “Listen to her and let me know what you think. I’ll be upstairs.”
Laurel’s gaze followed Julian as he left the room but finished the song. Sheffold sat and listened, his face utterly blank. When she came over to the table he stood up and held a chair for her.
“Hello,” she said, trying to smile. “My audience seems to have walked out on me. Was I that bad?”
“No,” Sheffold said. “You can sing. I’ll tell him.”
She said eagerly, “Do you think he’ll give me a job?”
“I don’t know — maybe a little later on.”
“Later?” Her eyes were worried. “I need a job now... What do you think I should do?”
He shrugged. “Why ask me?”
“Please,” she said. “You’ve been very kind. If you aren’t my friend, you wouldn’t have helped me this much. I need your advice.”
“All right,” he said harshly. “I’ll tell you. Wash that stuff off your face and let your hair grow in its natural color. Then get on the first train out and go home. Get off the Strip, Laurel, before you’re tainted too.”
Her face seemed to freeze except for the quivering of her chin.
“It’ll get you, sooner or later,” Sheffold said. “It gets everybody. Success is a religion in this town, and its cross is the dollar sign. You can’t be a halfway convert. There’s no such thing as a little success. You can’t take a little and stop because once you stop, somebody else, more ruthless, will club you to death to take what you have.”
He looked away from her but his voice went on. “You give a little here, and a little there. One more compromise every day. It doesn’t hurt much that way. When it’s too late you find out what it was you were trading in — your soul!”
Laurel stood up. “It’s nice of you to worry about me,” she said stiffly. “I appreciate your interest. Now I suppose you’ll tell Julian Mena I can’t sing. Go ahead, rearrange my life for me. You can always tell yourself it was your duty. I’d be more grateful, except it happens to be my life!”
Pete Sheffold said woodenly, “Go on upstairs. First office to the right. Tell Julian I sent you. He’ll give you a job if he can make room.”
She didn’t move; she stood there looking down at his dark head.
“Pete.” She put a hand under his jaw and made him look up at her. “I’m sorry... Why don’t you get away? You think you can’t be hurt because you’re too strong. But you’re wrong. This town is getting you and you don’t know it.” She took her hand away. “I... thanks, Pete. Thanks a lot.”
He sat there looking at nothing until her footsteps faded out, going upstairs. He was still sitting there when Jerry Sims came in, his face pulled tight with emotion.
“Some time tonight,” he whispered. “I didn’t get it all but he’s to drive along the sea road near the big rocks south of Palos Verdes.”
“Do you know where that is?”
Jerry nodded, swallowed, and went on: “There is a bus stop and cafe where the sea road comes into the highway. The rocks are about a mile from the intersection. That’s all I heard. I was busy and missed a little of it. I didn’t get the time. What are you going to do, Pete?”
“Get me a car,” Sheffold told him. “Have it ready in twenty minutes. And keep it under your hat. Understand?”
Jerry gave him the okay sign and slipped away...
Chapter Five
Kidnap Trail
The sea road beyond Palos Verdes was a narrow, forgotten lane with a thin crust of asphalt, the only remaining evidence of some real-estate agent’s dream. It followed the curve of ocean with a swiftly falling bank and a strip of beach on one side, and ugly tenacious weeds creeping in on the other. The asphalt had worn away at the edges and it was full of great holes, so that, secluded as it was, even couples shunned it.
At the all-night cafe situated at the intersection with Palos Verdes Drive, Sheffold had asked directions of the proprietor. There was only one way in, he was told, and the high rocks were over a mile down the road.
Now, driving without lights, Sheffold let the car ease along almost silently. An overcast had rolled in from the ocean, swallowing the moon and, Sheffold reasoned, he could see as easily as he could be seen. At what he estimated was half the distance to the rocks, he stopped the car and went the rest of the way on foot. He moved lightly, on the balls of his feet, the sound effectively muffled by the tired crash of the breakers on the shore.
Only now did it occur to Sheffold that he was not armed, but the thought caused him little concern. His confidence in his great physical strength was such that he didn’t consider it a disadvantage. He had no plan as he approached the rocks, and this did not disturb him either. He would deal with whatever situation arose.
The rocks were fully twenty feet high, vaguely resembling old-fashioned loaves of bread, set on end, and not more than the width of two cars apart. A car had been driven off the asphalt and was parked on the hard-packed ground between the rocks. From where Sheffold crouched twenty feet down the road, there seemed to be no one in the car.