He said something as he neared us, but the words were lost in the roar of an airplane passing overhead: one of the Navy patrol planes that were constantly taking off and landing at the North Island Naval Air Station nearby. He looked up in annoyance, waited for the noise to fade, and then said, “What’s the idea of parking your car in the middle of the lane? If you don’t move it instantly, I’ll call the police.”
“I’ll move it,” Valdene said. “We were just trying to—”
“I don’t care what you were trying to do. There’s no excuse for blocking the lane this way.”
“Look, mister, we maybe just saved your life.”
The rich type blinked at him. “What was that?”
“The guy in this Ford is drunk, drunk as hell. We hadn’t come along and spotted him and my friend here took his keys away, he might’ve woken up and started driving. He might’ve run right up your fat tailpipe.”
A sputtering sound came out of the rich guy; he didn’t know what to say. For about five seconds, anyway. Then he said, “Move your car,” huffily, and stalked off to the Cadillac.
“Asshole,” Valdene said.
“Lots of them around these days, Charley.”
“That kind’s one of the worst. Damn politician.”
“You know him?”
“Seen him on television. His name’s Henry Nyland. Used to be in the Navy. Now he’s running in a special election for the San Diego City Council. One of those Let’s-Nuke-the-Commies nuts, big on religion and all hot for censorship. That type sets my teeth on edge, you know?”
“Yeah,” I said, “I know.”
We walked back to the coupe, not hurrying, and Valdene drove around to the hotel entrance. I gathered up my pulps, we shook hands, he told me again how great it was to meet me and not to forget Sunday afternoon and Sleepers West, and we said good night.
The plush lobby was empty when I entered. But as I started across to the desk, to get my key and to turn over Jim Lauterbach’s car keys for safekeeping, the doors to one of the elevators whispered open and Elaine Picard came out. She passed within ten feet of me, and I said hello, but she either didn’t hear or chose to ignore me. She looked tired, preoccupied; the skin across her forehead was drawn so tight it had a waxy look.
I watched her walk out through the front doors. Odd lady, I thought. Not as odd as that guy Rich who’d been bothering her this afternoon, but odd enough. Maybe it came with the job. I had yet to meet a female P.I. of any variety who wasn’t strange in some way, and that included McCone.
Not to be sexist, though. Women didn’t have a corner on the oddball P.I. market; this convention was proof positive of that. Look at Jim Lauterbach. Look at the guys who held earnest discussions about worblegang veeblefetzers.
Hell, look at me.
7: McCone
When I arrived at ten the next morning, the Casa del Rey’s lobby was much less crowded than it had been the afternoon before. Guests sat around on the heavy Victorian furniture; a few of them wore convention badges; some of them looked hung over. A Japanese family with two little girls in fluffy pink dresses posed for a photograph in front of — strangely enough — the rental-car counter. Otherwise all was quiet.
I stopped a bellboy and asked the way to the hotel offices. He indicated a door marked PRIVATE to the left of the registration desk. I crossed the lobby and went through it, finding that all luxury stopped just over the sill.
The carpet was gray and institutional, the walls devoid of pictures. The only furnishings were a bank of steel file cabinets and a secretary’s desk. An unkempt young woman sat hunched over a typewriter, dabbing white correction fluid onto the paper. When I asked for Elaine, she motioned wordlessly at one of the doors in the opposite wall. I went over and knocked, and Elaine’s voice called for me to come in.
She and two other women were seated at a cloth-covered table from room service, the remains of breakfast in front of them. Elaine immediately got up and fetched me a chair. She told the others who I was, then said, “Sharon, these are fellow members of the Professional Women’s Forum executive committee — Karyn Sugarman and June Paxton.”
Karyn Sugarman, a willowy, long-haired blonde, nodded at me. She lounged in her chair with a fashion model’s grace, her black sleeveless dress reinforcing her stylish appearance. The dress completely eclipsed my crisp white pants and blue silk blouse that had seemed very sophisticated when I’d put them on at home. If I’d been alone in the room with her, I’d probably have felt like a teenybopper, but as it was, June Paxton neutralized Sugarman’s effect.
Paxton was probably in her mid-fifties — at least fifteen years older than Sugarman, I guessed — and everything about her was round. She had a plump little face, china-saucer eyes, and a roly-poly body. Her hair was nondescript brown, done up in tight little curls, and she wore bright turquoise polyester that must have come straight off the rack in a bargain basement. When she smiled, though, it was with genuine friendliness, and her blue eyes sparkled.
“Sit down,” Elaine directed me. “Can I get you something to eat?”
“No, thanks. I’ll take some coffee, though, if you have any.”
She poured coffee from a silver pot, and I watched her closely. Although she was as immaculately groomed as ever — wearing pale pink today — there still were dark circles under her eyes that spoke of a bad night, and her hand shook as she passed me the cup. I frowned, wondering what was wrong in my friend’s life; if I could get her to talk about it, maybe I could help.
“Are you sure you don’t want something to eat?” June Paxton asked in a motherly way. “I think there’s a croissant left over.”
“Really, no. I’m visiting my family, and my mother forced a big breakfast down me.”
“It’s just as well,” Karyn Sugarman said. “The croissants were tough. How on earth can this hotel make a croissant the consistency of shoe leather, Elaine?”
Elaine merely shrugged — wearily, I thought.
“Probably made them with margarine instead of butter,” Paxton said, reaching for the object under discussion. “If no one else wants it?”
We all shook our heads.
I said to the table in general, “So what has your executive committee been deciding?”
“Nothing earthshaking,” Sugarman said. “We just went over the program for next week’s dinner meeting. It’s to be held here at the hotel.”
“How often do you meet?”
“Once a month for dinner, although we have occasional breakfasts with speakers,” Elaine said.
“What kinds of speakers?”
“Oh, anyone whose talk might be beneficial to the membership. Time-management people, financial planners, small-business consultants...”
Sugarman took up the conversation. “Once we even had a color consultant come in — one of those people who charge you a couple of hundred dollars to tell you what color clothes to wear.”
“When you could figure that out for free by holding the clothes up to your face,” Paxton said. “If you turn green, it’s no go. Otherwise—”
“Well, June, some people like to be told.” The way Sugarman looked at Paxton’s bright polyester dress clearly said she thought she could benefit from such a consultation. “Anyway, the speakers aren’t the real purpose of the Forum. It’s more social, in a business sense, of course.”
“How do you mean?”
“Networking.” When I looked blank, she went on. “The men in this country have always had old-boy networks — from the Jaycees on the small-town level, right up to the President’s buddies who get the Cabinet positions or the fat defense contracts. Now that women are moving into the professions and going into business for themselves, we need that kind of thing too. The Forum helps us establish the necessary connections.”