“That’s probably it.” Short nodded. “It sounds like a funny question, but I thought the Beat crowd was against marriage — how come John took the plunge?”
Susan shook her head. “They’re against marriage in the conventional sense. I’m not the kind of woman who’d be a drag and take John away from his creative work. In fact, I wouldn’t want him if he wasn’t what he is. I think good music’s the most important thing in the world.”
“Ever study it yourself?”
“Many years. The piano. I play competently; I began at seven; but I’ve no creative power. John has.”
Understanding came into Short’s pale blue eyes. He smiled and bobbed his head once. “Okay — I want to talk to the clerk now. I’ll meet you at the Sierra Royal in an hour. Just take it easy.”
The desk-clerk was a sallow, horse-faced man of some sixty years. Long-drawn wrinkles, a loose chin, and watery bloodshot blue eyes made him tired and weary looking. He was reading a Los Angelos newspaper and picking at his decayed front teeth with a bent-open paper-clip. Hovering about him was the smell of cheap, strong tobacco and stale wine. A crescent of white showed under his eyes as he peeped upward at Short’s approach.
“Something wrong with the room?” he asked indifferently.
“No. Just the help.” Short pulled the throwing-knife from his belt and tossed it on the desk. “No wonder this joint’s empty — since when do bellhops carry these?”
Looking at the blade, the clerk gave a loose, flabby grin. “That don’t mean nothing. All these Spiks carry knives. Makes ’em feel important.”
“Yeah,” Short said. “Guess I’m just getting touchy.” He leaned over the desk. “What happened to Mrs. McCrory’s husband?”
The clerk kept grinning. “She never had any — not here anyway.” He touched his temple with a yellow-stained forefinger. “It’s all in the mind.”
“You’re telling me she’s crazy?”
“What else? Ha! — ” the clerk cackled — “who’d steal her husband? Why? Ha, ha! Doc Haines says she’s got what they call demon’s cocks. It’s pretty bad.”
Short frowned and thought. “He probably said dementia praecox.”
“Yeah, that’s it. You a doctor too?”
“Come off it, Old Timer — you know I’m a detective. Look, if this dame who hired me is really nuts, why’s everybody acting so cagey?”
The clerk shrugged. “She’s a nuisance. Makes everybody nervous talking about a big bearded bald-headed guy who don’t exist. Saying somebody stole him. We’re quiet folks down here. Sheriff Clymer’ll be satisfied if she just drives back to Chicago. She’s been bugging him every day for a week.”
Short lit a Kent, drew on it hard, and held in a great lungful of smoke. He eyed the clerk thoughtfully as he slowly exhaled. “Sheriff Clymer — is that exactly what he said? — that he’d be satisfied if she just drives back to Chicago?”
“Sure.”
“Those were his very words?”
“Yeah, sure. Clymer’s a sport. He had Doc Haines look her over — no charge. He’ll bill the county. That’s pretty white, I’d say.”
“Yeah, it is,” Short agreed. “Maybe I’ve come down here on a wild goose chase. Maybe,” he considered, smoking, “I’ll run over to the garage, check her car out, and get her home as soon as possible. Maybe I’ll start tonight. Let her folks back in Chicago handle her.”
The clerk nodded emphatically. “You’re talking sense, Mr. Short. That’s where the poor girl belongs — with her folks. And her car’s out back in the parking lot.”
“It wasn’t repaired in the garage? She imagined that too?”
“No. Juan Colum had it that first night. He cleaned the plugs and timed it. She’s run it down to Sonora since then. In fact—” the clerk giggled — “she bought herself a gun.”
“She didn’t get a phone call sending her down there?”
“Not while I was on duty.”
“Who handles the board when you’re not?”
“Nobody,” the clerk grinned. “I just leave the phone here in the lobby plugged for outside.”
“Then she couldn’t get a call in her room when you weren’t on duty?”
“Right. And she didn’t when I was.”
“Are things always so slow in this hotel — just one or two guests, I mean?”
“It’s off-season.”
Short nodded. “Okay, Old Timer.” He ground his cigarette into a tin tray loaded with butts. “Maybe I’d better see Sheriff Clymer before I haul her off. Make it official when I talk to her folks.”
“That makes good sense. He’s most likely in his general store — right down the street, past the Sierra Royal, and on the other side. Can’t miss it.”
“Thanks. See you later—” Short began to move away, then stopped — “oh... one thing — how come you know she bought a gun?”
The clerk gave his cackling laugh. “She asked me where she could buy one. I told her Sonora.”
“Wasn’t that kind of dumb — considering she’s deluded?”
“Maybe,” the clerk admitted. “Guess I just didn’t think.”
“Everybody makes mistakes,” Short told him, waving a generous hand. “See you later.” He left the hotel then, crossed the patio, and looked up and down the main street. He saw the Sierra Royal Restaurant sign, the words formed of unlit neon tube and set within a neon crown; and beyond it, on the other side of the street, a plain black and white printed board that read: M. Clymer. General Merchandise. Walking rapidly up to it, Short saw a large window loaded with everything from shoes to farm implements; and beside the window, separated by a narrow alley but attached to the same building, a screened-in white-painted porch. Through the screens he saw the fat man, Sheriff Martin Clymer, sitting in a wicker rocking-chair, and on a wicker taboret at his elbow was a tall frosty-looking glass containing some beverage. Beside it was a telephone. Short walked up two flat wooden steps and rattled the screen-door by its brass knob.
“Come in, sir,” the fat man nodded, smiling with the words. “Come in, by all means. I’ve been expecting you for the past hour. Just turn the knob; it’s unlocked. I always say that honest, Godfearing folks have little need of bolts, catches, and keys. Those who live behind locks do so because of the larceny in their own souls. Take a chair, sir — you’re most welcome.”
Short sat in a rocker that faced Clymer’s at a distance of four feet. He planted his arms on the wicker rests, laced his fingers across his stomach, studied the fat sheriff, and said nothing.
The fat man smiled again. His lips, lumped round with rings and gullies of pink flesh, were a perfect little cupid’s bow, uptilted at the edges and lost in deep dimples. His nose was a black clotted button, a lump centered on his face, to all appearances lacking bone or bridge. And little black eyes, wide-spaced on each side of it, sparkled with a kind of puckish delight. He still wore white linen, but it was a freshly cleaned and pressed suit. His tie was a blue bow, mostly hidden under the enormous folds of flesh that constituted his chin.
“I’m Martin Clymer, at your service, sir.” The pink lips moved girlishly, and the voice, pitched high with a nasal twang, suggested bubbles of merriment. “Sarah! Come, Sarah!” he called, cranking his neck round and sending his voice into the doorway of the house proper. Almost on the last syllable of her name a tired-looking, gray-haired woman appeared. She was small and birdlike. Dressed in a blue cotton dress, no cosmetics on her face, hair pulled back and tied into a large bun on her thin neck, she glanced once, quickly and nervously, at Oliver Short. Then she lowered her mild gray eyes, saying, “Yes, Martin?”