The major emotional change in her telling had come when she mentioned Mrs. Olson, so I pushed that after getting down another graham cracker. I wanted to dip it in my coffee but kept myself from doing so.
“Anne Olson,” I said.
“Mrs. Olson’s name is Laura,” Jane Poslik answered, looking up at me from her imaginary drawing.
Anne or Laura Olson had had a few belts when I met her so she might have been playing non-sober name games with me. I let the puzzle pass for the moment and went on.
“Was she, is she, part of the business with the dog?”
She shrugged. “It’s possible, but I’m a prejudiced source. I didn’t like Laura Olson. She was on a free ride. While Olson was not my favorite human, he was a troubled man who needed support. She gave him quite the reverse.”
“Was she fooling around with Bass?” I tried.
“Possibly, but I doubt if you could call anything Bass does fooling. More coffee?”
“No thanks. Go on.”
“I once walked in on her nose to nose with a man who had brought in a sick cat for treatment. She didn’t take long.”
That I could confirm from my own experience.
“That’s it?” I said.
“That’s it,” she agreed, standing up. “That’s what I wrote in my letters after the FBI came asking questions last month and I started to put things together as I told you. I know it isn’t courtroom evidence, but it was enough to make me think it was worth reporting. I don’t know how, but I thought it might have something to do with the war. Mr. Peters, my parents are both dead. There’s just me and my brother. Charlie’s in the navy somewhere in the Pacific. Am I making sense?”
“You’re making a lot of sense,” I said, heading for the front door. “And I like that dress on Lucille Ball.”
“Thanks,” she said, offering me her hand. “Let me know if-”
Whatever it was she wanted to know remained unsaid. There was an insistent knock at the door a few feet away from us.
“Yes,” she said.
“Police,” came a voice I recognized.
She looked at me, took a few steps, and opened the door to John Cawelti, who didn’t look in the least surprised to see me. He gave both of us a knowing smirk and stepped in.
“Listening at the door, John?” I said with a smile.
“Call me John again and I ram you through the wall.” He grinned back.
“John and I are old friends,” I said to Jane Poslik, spreading my legs slightly in case he decided to pay off his threat. He took a mean step toward me and she stepped between us, facing him.
“This is my home,” she said softly. “And you’ll touch no one in it. What do you want?”
“I’m investigating the murder last night of a Dr. Roy Olson,” Cawelti said, looking at me and not her. “You used to work for him, and I understand you didn’t get along, that you quit a few weeks back. You want to tell me about it and let me know what you told my friend Peters?”
“Miss Poslik and I were just leaving,” I said, showing my most false smile.
“No, Mr. Peters,” she said, “you go ahead. I’ll talk to Officer-”
“Sergeant Cawelti,” he said.
“Suit yourself,” I said, brushing by Cawelti. “I’ll be seeing you, John. You won’t be able to miss me. I’ll be the guy a step ahead.”
I stepped quickly past the door of the as yet unseen Molly Garnett and headed for my car parked across the street. It was early in the afternoon. The sun was shining, and a couple of small birds swooped by playing tag as the black Chevy that screeched away from the curb rushed out to kiss the side of my Ford. I would have been caught in the middle of the kiss if I had not heard an unexpected but familiar voice call out, “Toby.”
I managed to sense the Chevy, rolled forward on the hood of my car with my feet in the air, and tumbled over on the sidewalk to the sound of metal scraping metal. When I looked up, the Chevy was weaving down the street wasting precious rubber.
“Toby,” came Gunther’s voice.
I looked back to see his small form hurrying toward me.
“I’m okay, Gunther,” I said. “Was that …?”
“Bass,” he finished, coming to help me up. Gunther was strong for his size. He had done some circus work back when he had to, but he wasn’t quite what I needed. It was extra work getting up and pretending that he was helping me, but I managed it.
“I followed him as you said,” Gunther explained. “He came here, started to get out from the car, saw you, got back into the car, and then tried to compress you. Shall I pursue him?”
“Not now,” I said. “You saved my life again, Gunther.”
“I was fortunate to be in vicinity,” he answered, embarrassed. “I’ll continue my pursuit tomorrow then?”
“Tomorrow will be fine.”
We shook hands after agreeing to meet back at the boarding house that night, and I inspected the side of my car. The paint was streaked with metal showing through as if some massive bird had scratched its claws along it. The door was dented slightly, but there seemed to be nothing else wrong other than that I couldn’t open the passenger door. I’d worry about that later.
I got in and drove downtown.
Jeremy was seated in his room on the second floor of the Farraday when I got there. I had once referred to Jeremy’s room as an office, but he had politely corrected me. “It is the room in which I often work, but I work in other rooms, other spaces, while I walk, sleep, dream,” he had explained. There was no desk in the room and no name on the door. If you didn’t know he was in 212, you’d never find him. The room itself contained an oversized leather chair near the window and a couch of matching black leather. A low table in the middle of the room was surrounded by four stools. On the table were neat stacks of lined paper, some with poems and notes written in Jeremy’s even hand. Others were blank. The walls were lined with books from floor to ceiling. There wasn’t a speck of bare wall in view. I knew that beyond another door in the corner was a room I had never seen, in which I guessed Jeremy slept.
When I entered the office, Jeremy was seated in the leather chair. The two reading lamps in the room were off and he was backlit at the window with a book in his lap.
“Jeremy,” I said, “I’m sorry to bother you but I need some help.”
He was looking at me without expression, the book held open in front of him. I went on. “A woman named Jane Poslik in Burbank may be getting a visit from Bass. I don’t think he plans to be friendly when he visits. I’m going to try to put a penny in his fuse, but for a day or two someone should keep an eye on her. I know you have your book to-”
“The address, Toby,” he said, finding a bookmark and placing it carefully in the page he was holding open with his huge thumb. “The day is clear. I can sit in my car and meditate. Look for the secret moment of the day.
“There is a Moment in each Day that Satan cannot find
Nor can his Watch Fiends find it, but the Industrious find
This Moment and it multiply and when it once is found
It renovates every Moment of the Day if rightly placed.”
“Byron,” I guessed, going with one of Jeremy’s favorites.
“Blake,” he corrected, getting up. “The last victory went to Bass in the American Legion Stadium before four thousand. It would be interesting to meet him with only a passing bird, the bending grass, and the sun upon our heads.”
“Sounds fine to me,” I agreed.
“Do I have time to do a quick cleaning of the lobby?” he said, putting the book neatly back in a space on the shelf near him.
“I don’t know, Jeremy.”
Leaving Jeremy’s office, I knew there had been another choice. I could have gone back to Jane Poslik, tried to talk her into moving out of her apartment till I got the whole thing settled, but that would have meant giving her a hell of a scare, which she didn’t need. Besides, she might have turned me down. No, my best bet was to track down Bass, try to find the dog, locate the guy Jane had mentioned-the guy named Martin-and hope for the best.