“That’s one of the things been bugging me. I read all the testimony, and I don’t see this opportunity stuff at all. The news-break intermission was only ten minutes all told, and some of that was taken up by Tutter’s leaving Studio A and going to his dressing room — of course, it’s only a few steps, but even a few steps take time — and then having to cross the hall to dressing room 1 and all... What I mean, except for Mr. Stander I myself didn’t see a soul, and I was out there in the hall must have been a good four minutes.”
“You were in the hall four minutes?” Layton asked. “You must be mistaken, Wayne.”
“No,” Wayne protested.
“But you told Sergeant Trimble that you and Nora went to Tutter’s dressing room, looked in, he wasn’t there, and then you returned to the studio. That couldn’t have taken four minutes.”
“Well, of course, not that part of it,” the boy said. “What took up most of the time was I had to wait for Nora.” He glanced philosophically at the girl, who glared back at him. “You know girls when they have to go to the john. It’s a wonder I’m not standing there yet.”
“Wayne Mission,” the girl hissed, her face flaming, “you’re impossible! Isn’t anything sacred?”
“Well, I had to explain, didn’t I?”
“Just a moment,” Layton said. “Which john are you talking about, Wayne?”
“The ladies’ room right outside Studio A. You know, Mr. Layton. It’s the only one in that corridor.”
“I don’t know why we have to discuss things like that,” Nora Perkins said. “I’m sure there must be more acceptable subjects for conversation.”
“No, wait, Nora,” Layton said. “Why didn’t you mention this to Sergeant Trimble?”
“That I had to visit the ladies’ room?” The girl eyed him coldly.
“It’s all my fault.” Wayne said disgustedly. “I shouldn’t have brought it up. I’ll never hear the end of it.”
“You certainly won’t!”
“But that might have been important, Nora,” Layton said.
“Oh, for heaven’s sake,” the girl said petulantly. “It was no such thing, Mr. Layton. The only person either Wayne or I laid eyes on from the time we left Studio A until we went back in was that Mr. Stander down at the end of the hall, going to the control room of Studio B and C. And we told the detective that. Now can we talk about something else?”
18
Layton dropped the two teenagers at their homes, drove off carefully, and stopped carefully at the first tavern he saw.
He carefully downed four shots of bourbon, neat, in rapid succession, sat musing for a while, then ordered two more.
When he returned to his car he drove, still more carefully, to the Freeway. He took the slow lane because his head felt large, light, and tippy.
He parked downtown and began shuffling through the streets, hands plunged in his trouser pockets and his shoulders up near his ears, as if he were cold.
An hour or so later he went into another bar.
He reached his apartment at a quarter to four the next morning, long after the official closing time of Los Angeles bistros. He reached it on his hands and knees. He had little recollection of events past midnight. He had been rolled somewhere, and survival instinct had kept him from attempting to drive home. There was the vaguest memory of a cab-driver to whom he had given his wrist watch in payment for depositing him at his door. That had been ages before, because he had had to creep across the sidewalk and into the building and up the stairs, a time-consuming procedure.
Now he found himself safely ensconced in his nest, surrounded by a horrible odor. Something died in here, he said to himself with great amusement, and I guess it’s you. You stink, old boy, all over. Inside as well as out.
He forced his eyes to stay open by pure cussedness and took a floor’s-eye view of himself. It was pitiful. He felt so sad at what he saw that he began to cry.
He stopped crying long enough to be sick again, this time over his own floor, and then he cried some more.
The next thing he knew, he was dialing the Bulletin. Or trying to. He tried six times, but each time something went wrong. Finally he dialed the operator and made a desperate effort.
“Look, sweetheart, I can’t seem to get my number, wouzhyou get it for me?” He articulated the number. “Liferdeath.”
He heard a ladylike sniff and then after a while Layton woke up with a voice saying in his ear, “Come on! Who is this?”
“Watshon?” That was funny. He didn’t remember asking for the night desk. “Wonnerful age the age velectronics, Watshon.”
“Say,” the voice said, “This couldn’t be Jim Layton, could it?”
“Well, whonell dyathink it izh?”
“Where are you, Jim?”
“Home,” Layton said indignantly.
“Then you must have just got there. Dracula’s out for your blood, Jimmie boy. Where’ve you been all day?”
“Watshon, lish... shen.” Layton swallowed. “Listen. Msick. Mdamsick. Can’t come ininamoming. Tella Cheese.”
“You may never have to come in,” Watson said. “Not if I read the signs and portents correctly. What’s happened, Jim? I’ve never known you to be drunk before.”
“Whosh drunk?” Layton wept.
“Jim” — Watson sounded concerned now — “how about my sending one of the boys over? You sound like you need help.”
Layton said, spacing it out, “Not — ‘like you need’ — Watshon. A zif.”
“You’re okay.” Watson laughed. “Go to bed, Jim.” He hung up.
When Layton opened his eyes his first thought was that the Russians had dropped the big one and his whole apartment had been picked up by the scruff of its neck, shaken, and dropped back helter-skelter. The telephone table was lying on its top like an overturned turtle, the phone was off its cradle and buzzing feebly for help, some animal had left a mess on the rug, the couch was in the wrong place, a picture had been knocked off the wall and its glass shattered, and there was a zigzag trail of crumpled, smeared, noisome clothing leading from the mess on the rug to the fallen telephone and back across the room to the bathroom. At this point Layton closed his eyes. The one glimpse he had had of his bathroom was just too, too much.
When he opened his eyes again he crawled off the divan and began the work of rehabilitation. He was not surprised to find himself naked, although he never slept naked; rather, he was grateful. The vision of himself falling asleep in the befouled wreckage of his clothing was too sickening to contemplate for more than a moment.
It was not until he was scalding his hide under the shower, with the apartment reasonably restored and most of the stench gone, that he remembered. The shock that followed the memory struck him with concussive force. In one soundless stroke it crushed out his hangover, vaporized the mush on his brain... cleansed him to the bone so that he cowered, inwardly naked as well, before the unveiled granite face of truth.
Layton emptied a six-cup pot of coffee. Three cups he drank black, the rest he took with cream and sugar. He made no toast. Although he had not swallowed a morsel of solid food for almost twenty-four hours, the mere thought churned his stomach.
He had to retrace his erratic route of the night before to reclaim his car.
It was almost 3 P.M. when he swung into the driveway. The doors of the double garage were open. The white Jaguar was there, the station wagon was not.
Nevertheless, Layton thumbed the doorbell. He thumbed it several times without result.
He returned to his car, backed out of the driveway, and parked on the street. Then he trudged over to the swimming pool, lowered himself into an aluminum-slatted chair, and waited.