“That bitch.”
“—and his daughter. Why is Mrs. Hunter a bitch?”
“She made his life miserable.”
“How did she do that?”
“Every way. Every damn way.”
“Is that what he told you?”
“He didn’t have to tell me. I have eyes. Cold-hearted bitch — someday I’ll tell her what I think of her. In no uncertain terms.”
“Why don’t you tell me what you think of her?”
“I just did,” she said. “Besides, I have to go home now.”
“You’re going to have to talk to me, Mrs. Cooney. Not now, but when your head is clear.”
“I am not drunk.”
I produced one of my business cards, tucked it into her purse. “Will you remember where you got this?”
“Of course I’ll remember. I told you, I’m not drunk.”
“Then call me. As soon as possible.”
“And if I don’t?”
“I’ll call you. Or slop by and see you.”
“Frank,” she said. “You wouldn’t tell my husband about Jack?”
“I’m not out to do you any harm. All I want are the answers to a few questions about Jack Hunter and his wife. After that, you’ll never hear from me again.”
“I don’t seem to have a choice, do I? All right. But now I have to go home.”
“Not just yet. Let me have your keys.”
“Oh, no. You can’t drive me home, not in my car.”
“That isn’t my intention. I’ll give the keys to the man at the security desk and he can call a taxi for you.”
“Oh, no,” she said again. A crafty look came into the bleary gray eyes. “Do you want me to scream? I will if you don’t go away and let me drive home.”
“I don’t think you will. You wouldn’t want to make a spectacle of yourself.”
We locked gazes, but it was not much of a stalemate. The liquor was catching up to her now, making her even more fuzzy-headed and a little shaky on her pins, and she had enough sense to realize it. Her eyes slid away from mine; she fumbled in her purse again, came out with a set of keys, and laid them in my outstretched palm almost gently. On her dignity again.
I said, “Do you want to wait inside?”
“No, thank you. I’ll sit here in the car.”
She opened the door, put herself under the wheel with great care, and sat looking straight ahead, hands clasped in her lap, spine rigid.
“Tell them to hurry,” she said. “I really need to get home before Frank does.”
That was part of the reason, I thought as I left her, but not all of it. The sooner she got home, the sooner she could have another drink.
Joan and Patty were gone when I returned to the pro shop. The lone occupant now, separating the day’s receipts into piles of cash and chits, was a muscular, sun-browned guy dressed in tan chamois slacks and an Emerald Hills polo shirt. He was about forty, with one of those handsome chiseled profiles that were assurances of box-office success among male film stars a generation ago. A thick mat of curly hair the color of pale ale topped him off to masculine perfection. Women like Joan and Patty would want to take lessons from him, all right, off the golf course as well as on it. He was the type of physical speciman who could have a different bed partner every night of the year if he wanted it that way. The question was whether or not he was that type.
He had a polite smile for me as I came up to the counter. The neutral variety, without any of the disdain of the guy on the security desk. Point in his favor.
“Help you, sir?”
“You can if you’re Trevor Smith.”
“Guilty. Don’t believe I’ve seen you here before.” Friendly, cheerful, no signs of either arrogance or conceit. Another point in his favor.
“I’ve never been here before,” I said. When he’d had a look at the card I handed him, I added. “I represent Intercoastal Insurance—”
That was as far as I got. His smile vanished, his face set hard and tight, and he said with a kind of simmering anger, “So you’re the one. Who told you to come sucking around here?”
“Could be the same person who told you about me.”
“No way. Whoever it was, I don’t care what they said. Sheila Hunter and I are friends, that’s all.”
“Then maybe you have some idea why she’s so dead set against capitalizing on her husband’s insurance policy.”
“If I did, I wouldn’t tell you. It’s her business.”
“And her daughter’s.”
“Not yours or the insurance company’s, that’s the point. Why don’t you leave her alone? Her husband’s been dead less than two weeks, for Christ’s sake.”
“I’m sorry about her loss,” I said. “But it doesn’t explain why she’s so afraid.”
“Afraid? What’re you talking about?”
“I think you know what I’m talking about, Mr. Smith. If you’ve seen her lately you couldn’t help but know.”
He knew, all right, and it was bothering him; I could see it in his eyes. More between Sheila Hunter and him than a casual friendship, a casual affair?
“She doesn’t want her past investigated,” I said. “Why? What’s she afraid I’ll find out?”
“That’s bull,” Smith said. “You can’t make me believe she’s hiding anything about her past.”
“I won’t try. But I believe she is. She’s been living a lie the past ten years, she and her husband both.”
“What does that mean, a lie?”
“She ever say anything to you about her life before they came to Greenwood? Where they lived, what they did?”
No answer. But his silence was eloquent.
“Does the word crazybone mean anything to you?”
“Crazy— Now what the hell?”
“It means something to her, something bad. Ask her about it. Ask her about her past.”
“Why should I? Listen—”
“I might be able to help her. I already know some of the truth and if I keep digging I’ll find out the rest. It’s going to come out one way or another.”
He leaned forward across the counter so that his face was close to mine. I let him do it without giving ground. “Blackmail?” he said. “Is that your damn game?”
“No, and don’t use that word to me again. I don’t like it.”
“I don’t like you or what you’re doing to Sheila.”
“Your prerogative. But all I’m trying to do, all I’m going to do, is my job. And all I want out of it is the fee I’m being paid by Intercoastal Insurance. The truth is my game. Smith. The only other thing I’m interested in is Emily Hunter’s welfare.”
“Now you’re saying Sheila is an unfit mother, is that it?”
“No. I’m saying whatever she’s hiding, whatever she and her husband were mixed up in before they came to Greenwood, may be putting the child’s future in jeopardy. I don’t want to see that happen. Do you?”
Smith’s eyes held on mine a few seconds longer. Then the anger went out of him and he backed off. Worry and dismay were what I was looking at then.
“She won’t talk to me,” he said. “I’ve tried... she just walls herself off.”
“It might be different when you tell her what I’ve told you.”
“I don’t know. If it’s bad enough, the thing she’s so scared of...”
“It may not be as bad as she thinks it is. Even if it’s a police matter, it may not be.”
A muscle jumped on Smith’s cheek; it pulled one side of his mouth up in a puckery rictus. “Christ,” he said.
“Will you try to get her to talk to me?”
“I don’t know...”
“At her house, some public place, whatever. You can be there, too, if she wants it that way.”
Long pause. Then, “All right, I’ll try. But you better be on the level about helping her. If you’re not—”
“I can give you a dozen references.”
His eyes probed mine, for ten seconds or so this time. Then he shook his head: a gesture of silent acceptance.