"I-I can't imagine!"
"You had an enemy here, Howard. That must be how it went down."
"Yes! Yes! Raoul! That sneaky bastard. I'll fix him. He hates me. Because I-because of a money thing. Years ago. We had a dispute. He said I owed him two hundred thousand dollars. We lost that money fair and square. It was a joint venture, a tax thing, and Claudia told me Raoul had forgotten all about it. But now I see he's just been biding his time. Eric, you have to do something!"
"How long ago was this? The money thing?" Vince asked.
"Ten, twelve years ago."
"You and Claudia and Raoul were tight, huh?"
And out it came. "Tight? We were business partners, that's all. Claudia worked at this health place I went to and we got to talking, and she told Raoul about this film I was producing. I had Kevin Costner practically attached, this was before the water flick and the futuristic Pony Express one. Raoul and Claudia had some money from somewhere and they were looking for an investment."
Vince nodded sagely. "Hollywood," he said.
"The project tanked, they tank sometimes, but they took it personally. And about the same time the deal soured, Raoul got this idea that Claudia was sleeping with me. He was madly in love with her. He was insecure and jealous. So anyway I was damn surprised when she called and invited me to come, but I really needed to get away, and when she told me Lauren Sullivan was here and looking for a project, it was perfect, and Claudia said-God, she said-" He stopped and a horrified expression came over his face.
"Well, what'd she say?"
"She said I deserved the full treatment."
"And had she started giving it to you by last night?" Vince asked.
"He thinks I'm lying," Howard said to his lawyer. "You check it out, Detective. It was her husband. He killed her. I don't know why he killed her, but he got me here to frame me."
"But she was the one who said you deserved the full treatment," Vince said.
"He got her to invite me," Howard said, less assurance in his voice. "He's a subtle one, he is."
Vince said, nodding again, "I hate subtle people. All those hidden agendas."
"So are you going to do something about him? Arrest him?"
"We'll check for his prints on the bottle."
"He'll have wiped them off," Eric Derrick said.
"You sure you didn't take a midnight stroll last night?" Vince asked. "I get lit, I do funny things sometimes. Decide I need some air."
"I'm quite sure I never left my room," Howard said.
"Is there anything else?" said the lawyer, leaning forward.
"Well, I have to ask, you understand. Whether you did sleep with her way back when in the Kevin Costner days. Since it might have inflamed the husband."
"I never laid a hand on her."
"Oh, come on, how could you resist? You were all going to get rich together, you were at this relaxing place together, hot tubbing and all that, she was a fine-lookin' lady. And it would explain a lot better why the husband would go after you."
Howard said, "Well just the one time."
"One time only. Sure."
"Once or twice. She really wanted me. I was damn attractive in those days." He smoothed back his neat, thinning hair, as if remembering thicker, more unruly days.
"I bet."
"Come on, Howard," Eric Derrick said. "Are we finished?"
"For now," Vince said.
"Who's next?" Mike said, sticking his head in. Behind him was a talking head, irate.
"The husband."
Raoul de Vries came bounding in like he was aching to beat some butt on the tennis court. His tan and good health made Vince feel vaguely pissed off. He must be the stiff-upper-lip type, or else he didn't give a flyin' fart that his wife was dead, whatever he might have felt about her before, because there was no sign of red eyes or sadness. The second lawyer was just like the first: tall, balding, portly, and young. Vince waved them to seats and took the card. "H. David Derrick," it read.
"Your brother out there, H.?" Vince asked the lawyer.
"Yes. It's a small town. We aren't in the same firm."
"You guys could be twins."
"We are."
"What's the H stand for?"
"Herrick. Can we move on?" He was even more humorless than his brother.
"I bet you're the older one. By ten, fifteen minutes," Vince said. The devil made him do it.
"I am the younger. Is this relevant?"
"I guess not," Vince said. "But I don't know what else we're gonna talk about. Because your client told me this morning that he wouldn't talk to me on advice of counsel."
"I said without advice of counsel," de Vries interposed. "Let me explain. A long time ago a lawyer told me to say that if I ever found myself in a police situation. It's not that I don't want to cooperate. My wife is dead. My heart is broken. I'm at your service."
"I'm happy to hear that. Really. Because it looked bad," Vince said. "So what was this police situation you were in?"
"I didn't say I was in a police situation. I said if I was in a police situation."
"You ever done time, Mr. de Vries?"
De Vries gave him an incredulous look and turned to Derrick Herrick or whatever the Mother Goose hell his name was.
"I fail to see the relevance," the lawyer said.
This parrot talk didn't go over very well with Vince. He ignored the lawyer and picked up the rap sheet in front of him and said, "You went to Soledad Prison fourteen years ago. For attempted murder. You tried to kill your then-girlfriend. Not Claudia." He turned to Derrick. "Relevant enough for you?"
"Go ahead."
He was ordering Vince around, the twerp, but Vince did want to go ahead, so he contented himself with a scowl and went on. "You served only two years, what with good behavior, good lawyering, and good connections. It's cryin' out for reform, our penal system."
"Is there a question pending?" asked Derrick.
"I didn't do it," de Vries said flatly.
"Yeah? You told the California parole board you did it. You gave plenty of details and said you were sorry. You said you were, let's see, in a rage due to her infidelities and didn't know what you were doing. You beat her up pretty bad."
"If I hadn't told them I did it, I'd still be rotting in jail," de Vries said. He had crossed his leg and was bouncing his foot up and down. He was counting the seconds until he could get out of there.
"Did you already know Claudia by then?"
"Yes. We were married two months after my parole. Which has expired, by the way."
"Where's she now? The girlfriend, I mean."
De Vries jumped up. "Why are we crashing around in this ancient history? My wife is dead! You should be finding her killer, finding out how Hilda Finch ends up getting everything we worked for, everything we own. You should ask me where I was last night, when I went to bed, how we got along! Yes, I went to bed with her! No, we had no quarrel at all! Yes, she must have got up in the middle of the night and gone to check something or maybe meet someone, I don't know!" He covered his face with his hands and started to sob.
Bored, Vince sat back and waited for the curtain to fall. He didn't believe de Vries's performance. Vince was getting the idea that de Vries was a jealous, weak man with a definite place in his scheme of things for women as objects of desire and sources of financial security, who had learned a few things in prison.
Derrick put his arm around his client's shoulder and offered him the paisley handkerchief out of the chest pocket of his jacket. Next he'd be saying de Vries was too distraught to continue.