“Christ, he was carrying fifty thousand skins.”
“How do you know, Stanley?”
“Jessie told me. I wasn’t planning to pass that on to you. But maybe I’ll be doing you a favor.”
“What happened with him and Jessie?”
“I said last night he made a pass at her. He dropped in the apartment while I was still at the store. Old lady Girston saw him and mentioned it to me. I had to pry the rest of it out of Jessie. Ben wanted her to go away with him. He showed her the loot, he even let her handle it. He said he had fifty grand, in cash, and more coming.”
“The dirty dog! I knew he was double-timing me with that floozie.”
“He made the pitch. But he didn’t make any time–”
“Don’t let her fool you.”
“Jessie doesn’t fool me. She was scared to put in with him, though. I got the whole thing out of her last night. I had to beat it out of her, but I got it. She was afraid it was funny money, that they’d be picked up if they tried to spend it.”
“Counterfeit?”
“No, it’s the real McCoy, but hot.”
“But you said Mrs. Wycherly gave it to him.”
“He didn’t get it for the Nobel Peace Prize.”
“Was she stuck on him? Or what?”
“More like what.”
“Did Ben have something on her?”
“You’re getting warm.”
“He had all that money, and he didn’t tell me. He never even told me.” Her real sorrow was striking dully home. She burst out: “Who got it?”
“I sort of thought maybe you did.”
“You thought I killed him for it?”
“You’ve threatened to often enough.”
“Well, I didn’t. I’m sorry I didn’t.” She let out a laugh which went through my head like a knife. “We make a nice pair, Stanley, a lovely family groupee. The heavenly twins.”
“Listen, sis–”
Her voice overrode his: “Who do you think got it?”
“Whoever it was killed him.”
“Do you have any idea who did it?”
“Not if it wasn’t you.”
“That’s crazy. I thought at first it was old man Mandeville. He’s been making a nuisance of himself. But I guess that’s crazy, too. The cops say it was a gang of kids.”
“Lucky kids,” he said with throbbing sincerity. “Listen, sis, we can maybe pull it out – some of it, anyway. There’s this tape Ben kept in the safe in the office. If you’ll go down and get that for me–”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You don’t have to know. Just get it. I think I can find a customer for it.”
“What kind of a customer?”
“A paying customer. The tape’s worth money, see.”
“Blackmail money?”
“Call it that.”
“I don’t want any part of it,” she said.
“She doesn’t want any part of it. She’s too clean, too sweet, too pure.” His voice was savage: “Come off it, doll. What do you think you’ve been living on the last six months? Manna from heaven?”
“Lay off me. Maybe you can bully Jessie, but you can’t bully me.”
He brought his voice under controclass="underline" “Listen to me. I’m trying to do what’s best for you – best for both of us. You don’t have to know a thing, I don’t want you to. All you have to do is go down to the office and get me the tape in Ben’s safe. It’s in a round paper package – you know what tapes feel like. Just make that little trip for me, and I’ll give you half of what I get for it.”
“And half the rap? I get that, too?”
“There won’t be any rap, sis. Leave it to me.”
“I am,” she said. “I’m leaving it to you. All of it.”
“You won’t co-operate?”
“I’m not going in on any crooked deal.”
“Then give me the office keys and the combination.”
“The cops have the keys to the office. I don’t know the combination.”
“Didn’t Ben have it written down someplace?”
“If he did, he didn’t tell me.”
“So what good are you?”
“More good than you are, nothing man.”
“Don’t call me that!”
“Nothing man. You were going to be a big shot, you and Ben both. The real-estate king and the big movie producer. What did it all add up to? I spent my life trying to make sense out of a couple of cheap hustlers.”
“Hustler is a word you shouldn’t use.”
He slammed out. He was very good at slamming out. The Alfa-Romeo roared away, and I had no chance to follow it.
I went back to Camino Real and stopped at the drive-in across from Merriman’s office. The little building had a lockedup, empty look.
It was dinnertime, and I hadn’t eaten all day. The chill of the winter earth had crept up through the flagstones into my marrow. I ordered hamburger and coffee and sat listening to the younger generation trying to talk like underworld characters and succeeding. Nobody said anything revealing, except that the carhop who brought me my hamburger called me dad.
Stanley didn’t show.
Chapter 18
He wasn’t in his store, either. I went on to the Conquistador Apartments and buzzed Apartment One. A gaunt man in shirtsleeves came to the door. He had a long unhappy face on which a sense of frustration had settled and caked like dust.
“Mr. Girston?”
“Yeah.” His tone was grudging, as if he hated to give anything away, even his identity. “Would you be the gentleman the wife was telling about? Interested in the apartment upstairs?”
“I’m more interested in the occupants of the apartment.”
“There’s nobody in it. It’s been empty for two months.”
“That’s one of the things that interests me.” I told him who I was. “Is there some place we can talk without being disturbed?”
He looked me over suspiciously and said in his grudging whine: “Depends on what you want to talk about.”
“This girl.” I brought out Phoebe’s picture. “She’s missing.”
He peered at the photograph. It was changing under all the eyes I showed it to. Phoebe looked strange and remote and a little worn like a statue that had been standing in the weather.
Girston’s mouth worked softly. “I don’t believe I know her.”
“That’s funny, your wife does. Mrs. Girston said she occupied Apartment Fourteen for some days last November.”
“The old woman runs too free at the mouth.”
“She’s an honest woman. And you’re an honest man, aren’t you?”
“I try to be, when it don’t put my neck in a sling.”
“You recognize the girl, don’t you?”
“I guess so.”
“When did you last see her?”
“Back in November, like you said. She was moving out, and I helped her down with her bags.”
“Where was she going?”
“To Sacramento, to see her mother. I asked, because I happened to notice that they were her mother’s bags. The little girl wasn’t feeling so good, so I helped her down with them.” He looked as if he expected me to thank him.
“What was the matter with her?”
“I dunno, stomach trouble maybe. She was kind of bloated-looking in the face.”
“Can you pinpoint the date?”
“Let’s see, it was the day after the old woman went into the hospital. That was November eleven she went in. She was in for two weeks and three days, came out November twenty-eight. I still haven’t got it all paid for.” His slow mind made a connection: “The girl’s family has money, isn’t that right?”
“Some. How do you know that?”
“The clothes she wore – they were Magnin’s and stuff like that, the old woman said. And look at the way her mother refurnished the flat. You working for the mother, did you say?”