“And by the time they land — They crashed through a store roof, didn’t they?”
“A Seven-Eleven.”
“So by then,” I said, “the car’s so mangled, there’s nothing to show what happened to it up on the highway.”
Ken drank some of the San Pellegrino. “Very pleasant,” he said.
“Refreshing.”
“Yes.” He was distracted. Putting the half-full glass on the table, he said, “It’s time to go see Ross Ferguson. You’ll come along, won’t you?”
34
They let me lead the way in my own car, for which I was grateful. I’m always uncomfortable in the backseat of a patrol car, where I was a few times when PACKARD did location shooting. Maybe it’s the drop in status, I don’t know. The people in the front seat of a patrol car own it, they are native to that world, they have assurance and authority, whereas the people in the backseat are civilians, they’re witnesses or victims or whatever, who don’t really belong. Having at one time been one of the people in front, I just don’t like being the guy in back.
I was in the station wagon again, and this time I’d brought the dogs along, which made them very very happy. Max, ladylike, sat smiling on the front seat, looking at me sometimes and otherwise studying the world beyond the windshield, while Sugar Ray stood in the cargo area staring out the rear window to be sure the deputies didn’t get lost. Once we left Sunset Boulevard and started curving up through the twisty streets of Beverly Hills, Sugar Ray could no longer keep his balance and had to drop onto his stomach, but he still kept an eye on the police car behind us.
“You guys wait here,” I said as I parked next to Ross’s streetside stone wall. The dogs were used to that command, and made no effort to follow me. Both stood now, and watched through the window.
The first thing I noticed, when I got to Ross’s gate, was that the pool-company van was gone. Or it could merely be out of sight, tucked away in the garage.
Ken and Chuck, having parked behind me, walked over and also looked through the gate. “Big house for a writer,” Chuck said.
“Producer-writer,” I told him. “Ross has a piece of a couple of series.”
“Well, that’s not bad.”
Ken said, “We got more information on the way over. The reason Sheridan and Olsztyn were together in Sheridan’s car, they’d been hired for some sort of job.”
“Oh, yes?”
“Not regular movie or TV work,” he went on, “not according to Mrs. Sheridan. It was some private job, almost like home movies. She didn’t know much about it. But the interesting thing is, Mrs. Sheridan says her husband told her it was the same people he and Olsztyn did some work for last fall.”
I said, “Does Mrs. Sheridan know who the employer was?”
“No. Last fall they were paid in cash, so they wouldn’t have to pay taxes or union dues.”
“And so there’d be no record of the employer,” I said.
Ken gestured at the house. “Let’s talk to your friend.”
“We can try, anyway.”
I went to the side of the gate, opened the callbox door, picked up the phone, and pushed the button. I didn’t really expect an answer, and was just turning to suggest to the deputies that we try some other method of getting in when there was a click in my ear and Ross’s voice said, “Hello?”
“Ross,” I said. “It’s Sam. Let me in.”
“Goddammit, Sam, now what are you up to? After Doreen some more?”
“I want to talk to you, Ross.”
“We’ve talked. We made a deal. For Christ’s sake, won’t you just sit tight until—”
“We have to talk again,” I told him. “I have a couple of policemen with me.”
There was a quick little intake of breath, and then a brief silence. I could imagine Ross looking like Orson Welles in The Third Man when Joseph Cotten told him he’d gone to the police. What was it Welles had said? “Unwise, Holly, unwise.”
What Ross said was, “I’ll be right down.” And there was another click.
I hung up, shut the door, and said, “He’s coming down here.”
Chuck looked irritated. “He won’t let us in,” he said.
“Let’s wait and see,” Ken said.
“I can smell it,” Chuck insisted.
So could I. You never entirely forget what it feels like to be a police officer entering someone else’s home, where your power and authority are at the most tenuous they ever get. People who want to be mulish and make difficulties can do so there, on their own ground. And why wouldn’t Ross want to be mulish and make difficulties?
“Is this him?” Ken asked.
I looked, and it was. Ross never made any attempt to look as though he belonged with that big fake English house, so when he came down the steep driveway in thonged sandals and white jogging shorts and an open Hawaiian shirt of many colors and large dark sunglasses and his usual chains, he didn’t look as though he could possibly live in that great Tudor mansion up there behind him. He mostly looked like a remittance man, the owner’s raffish cousin, here for a not entirely welcome visit.
He was smiling, but edgily. “Sam,” he said as he reached the gate, “what have you done now?”
I said, “Ross Ferguson, these are Deputy Donaldson and Deputy Nulty.”
Ken said, “Mr. Ferguson, could we come in for a moment?”
Ross turned the edgy smile his way, saying, “What for? I’m trying to get some work done here.”
“We hope you could help us,” Ken said.
“With what?”
Chuck said, “Mr. Ferguson, wouldn’t it be more civilized to talk without this gate in our faces?”
“Not necessarily,” Ross said. “Officers, I have the greatest respect for the law, but I have to tell you, I don’t want to take time away from my work — I’ve got a deadline coming up here — I don’t want to take time away for a lot of nonsense.”
Ken said, “Why do you assume it’s nonsense?”
“Because you’re here with Sam.” Ross turned to me, strain lines on his neck, eyes invisible behind his dark glasses. He said, “This is Doreen again, isn’t it?”
“You know what it is, Ross.”
He turned back to Ken. “Do you know about the collision Sam had the other day?”
“As a matter of fact, we do,” Ken told him.
“Well, I think,” Ross said, “I’m no shrink, but if you want my opinion, it shook him up. Sudden reminders of mortality, all that. He’s mixed the whole thing up with a little spat my lady friend and I had, and his theories were getting so wild that when he went away to New York, Doreen came back to me rather than put up with it anymore.”
It was difficult to keep silent, but I managed. Ken and Chuck were the pros here. It was Chuck who said, “This lady friend — Doreen? — you say she came back to you.”
“She spent two nights at Sam’s house. Didn’t he tell you that?”
Ken said, “Where had she been spending her time before then?”
“With me,” Ross said.
Chuck nodded at the house up the slope. “Here?”
“For a few months. Then we had a very stupid quarrel and she moved for a while down to my other place in Malibu. That’s where Sam found her. Some National Enquirer people were hanging around, and he got all upset, saw conspiracies everywhere, and got Doreen so spooked, she went to his place. I ask no questions about how they spent the night, Doreen is over twenty-one, but by this morning she was beginning to think maybe he’d flipped, maybe after all this time he thinks he really is Packard, the great private eye, and he’s off to solve mysteries where there aren’t any.”
“You’re going too far, Ross,” I said.