Masuto rang the bell. Beckman opened the door for him. “Thank God you’re here, Masao. You’re five minutes late.”
“You’re counting?”
“You’re damn right I am. These dames are driving me nuts.” He spoke in a whisper.
“How’s that?”
“They been drinking. I tried to lean on them and make them hold back, but they just don’t listen.”
“Are they drunk?”
“Not so you can notice, but they put down the stuff like it was going out of style.”
“Where are they?”
“In what she calls the library.”
“Let’s go in.”
He followed Beckman into the room. The four women sat facing each other, two on easy chairs, two on the couch. Each had a glass in her hand.
“Welcome, Oriental sleuth,” Mrs. Crombie said. “Has the stalwart Beckman been telling you we are drunk? We are not-only nicely, warmly lit. Do you want a drink?”
“No, I don’t want a drink.”
“He’s very handsome but severe. So severe. So straight,” a pretty red-headed woman said. She was the youngest of the four, and Masuto guessed that this was Mitzie Fuller.
“Fuzz,” a slender blonde said, shrugging. Alice Greene, Masuto decided.
The fourth, Nancy Legett, just stared at him. Her eyes were full of fear. She was small and dark. She was in one of the big easy chairs, not just sitting in it but giving the impression of being trapped there, trapped and doomed and afraid.
Masuto reacted to her. Her fragile, empty world of wealth and possession had come tumbling down around her head. As for the others, they could put on masks. She had no masks. He scarcely heard Laura Crombie introducing the women. For one long moment, he was in a state reached sometimes in his meditation, when he knew things that he did not otherwise know.
“The whole thing,” said Alice Greene, “is a crock. A well-filled crock. I’m here because Laura pleaded with me to stay. Otherwise, I’d tell you to take your fantasy and stuff it. How dare you do this to us! This is Beverly Hills, not the South Bronx. As for this business of being in danger, another crock! That chocolate was not meant for me. It was delivered to the wrong house.”
“Alice, for Christ’s sake, shut up,” Laura Crombie said.
“Give me another drink.”
“No!”
“Then I’ll get it myself.”
“Like hell you will! This is my house!”
“Great. I’m glad you told me. Now I’m going to get the hell out of here!”
Both women were on their feet, and Laura said, “No-no, I’m sorry. Please. Please stay.”
“Not on your life.”
“Alice, I’m begging you.”
“Peddle it somewhere else.”
Laura turned to Masuto. “Stop her. Make her stay here.”
Facing him, Alice Greene said, “Just try it, buster. Just lay one hand on me.”
“I’m not going to lay a hand on you,” Masuto said gently. “You are in danger, great danger. Believe me.”
“I’ll handle it. I’ve handled it for thirty-six years, mister. I’m all grown up. You might not think so to look at me, but I’m all grown up. Now get out of my way.”
She pushed past him, and Laura pleaded, “Can’t you stop her?”
“I have no right to stop her.”
She ran after Alice Greene. Masuto and Beckman followed. Alice was fumbling with the locks on the door.
“How do you open this stupid thing?”
Laura Crombie stood back and whispered to Masuto, “She’s in no condition to drive. Can’t you arrest her for drunken driving?”
“Only if she commits a violation while driving,” Beckman said.
Alice Greene finally opened the door and walked to her car with long steps. She got into the Mercedes and with the light on from the open car door, the two men and the woman in the doorway could see her fumbling in her purse for the car keys.
“Sy,” Masuto said to Beckman, “get into your car and follow her. Anything-even a rolling stop at a stop sign-anything. The moment she steps out of line, pull her in for drunk driving.”
At that moment, just as Beckman took off for his car, Alice slammed her car door, switched on her lights, and turned the ignition key. The explosion rocked the house and the burst of flame lit up the driveway. Laura screamed. Masuto and Beckman rushed toward the car and then were physically repelled by the curtain of heat.
“Call the fire department!” Masuto shouted at Laura Crombie.
He and Beckman circled the car, looking for some opening, and then Beckman pulled Masuto back. “Your eyebrows are singed, Masao. It’s no use. She’s dead.”
“Why didn’t I stop her? Why?”
“Because you didn’t know.”
People were beginning to come out of their houses, to stand watching. A prowl car pulled up, then a second one. In the distance the siren of a fire engine sounded.
“Get inside with the women,” Masuto told Beckman. “Keep them in the house and keep the door closed. They’ll be hysterical by now, so quiet them down.”
People were crowding onto the driveway, and one of the uniformed policemen was ordering them back. The fire truck screamed its way into the street, and a moment later a fire hose opened up on the burning car.
“Twenty-seven grand for that heap,” Masuto heard someone in the crowd say. Evidently no price was put on the human life. The uniformed officer who had come in the second prowl car said, “For Christ’s sake, Sarge, what in hell goes on here?”
“Get on your radio and patch it through to downtown. I want the L.A. bomb squad up here, and tell them to bring their truck.”
“Okay.”
“Are you in charge here?” a fireman asked Masuto. “We’d like to move those two cars,” pointing to the Seville and the Porsche. “You got the keys?”
“Don’t touch them. They may be wired. Can you get the woman out?”
The fire was out now, the car a blackened, smoking heap.
“We’ll try. The ambulance will be here any minute. But she’s dead. No question about that. That heat would kill her in ten seconds if the blast didn’t.”
Another police car with two more officers pulled up. “I want those people back in their houses,” Masuto said to them. “There’s nothing they can do and there’s nothing for them to see.”
“Who’s in the car, Sarge?”
“A woman,” Masuto said shortly. “Does the captain know about this?”
“They called him from the station. He’ll be here any minute.”
“Well, get those people back into their homes. If they ask, tell them it was an accident and that’s all you know.”
“That is all we know,” one of the cops said.
The firemen had pried open the door of the smoking car, and Masuto walked over and forced himself to look at the charred figure that a few moments ago had been a vital, living woman. The metal of the Mercedes was still hot and the firemen were wetting it down with a soft stream of water. At that moment, the rescue ambulance arrived, and a moment later, Wainwright in his shirtsleeves.
“My God,” one of the rescue men said, “that poor woman.”
“Where shall we take her, Sarge?”
“Take her to the morgue at All Saints,” Masuto said. “We don’t need an autopsy. Tell them to hold the body until we inform the family.”
Wainwright stood there in silence, his face glum and unhappy. From somewhere inside the house, Beckman remembered to switch on the driveway lights. The sudden blaze of illumination made the scene even more grotesque.
“It’s over now,” the fire captain told Masuto. “Do you want us to call the tow truck?”
“No, just leave it there. I’ve called the L.A. bomb squad.”
The rescue people wrapped Alice Greene’s body in a rubber sheet, put it on a stretcher and into the ambulance. The firemen climbed into their truck and drove off. By now, most of the curious had been ushered back into their houses or on their way. The uniformed cops stood around uncertainly, and Beckman came out of the house.
Still, Wainwright had not said a word.