Buried Caesars (22 page)

“You are a lovely man, Arnie. Have any kids?” I asked.

“What’s that got to do with tea in China?” he asked back.

“Nothing,” I admitted. “You have anything running I can rent?”

“See the Chrysler in the corner?” he asked.

“Yeah,” I said.

“Transmission’s a little drunk but it goes. I’m working on it for a doctor. He’s out of town. Maybe it’s fine. Maybe it’s not so fine. Twenty bucks and you can have it till four.”

“Everything’s twenty bucks with you,” I said.

“Used to be everything was fifteen,” he agreed. “But there’s a war on.”

“Twenty,” I agreed.

“In advance,” he said.

“I’ve only got nine in my pocket, and a Luger,” I said.

“I’ll take five, leave you four and you give me thirty-five when you pick up the Crosley,” he said. “You can keep the Luger.”

“Do I have a choice?”

“Who knows?” said Arnie. “All I know is you want the Chrysler, that’s what you pay. Life’s simple like that.”

I gave him the five, promised the rest at four and got in the Chrysler before, he could change his mind. I had the rest of the cash I’d gotten from Major Castle in my front pocket. I knew that I’d get more respect—and my Crosley back on time—if I didn’t give Arnie cash in advance, and Castle’s and MacArthur’s money was running low.

I stopped at a diner on San Vincente, locked the Luger in the glove compartment, went inside and ordered a Pepsi and a grilled cheese with french fries. While the waitress was working on it, I called Castle’s number again. The same voice answered and told me Major Castle wasn’t available. I asked to speak to “the General.” The voice at the other end hesitated and then came back with a firm: “There is no General here.”

“Great,” I said. “If a General shows up, tell him Toby Peters called. Tell him I’ve got some information he should have and that I’ll do my best to get back to where I met him before.”

“There is no General here,” the voice repeated.

“Fine, but if you are surprised and amazed by the sudden appearance of a General, give him my message.”

I hung up, headed for my grilled cheese, fries, and Pepsi and hoped for a miracle. As it turned out, I didn’t have long to wait. When I went back to the doctor’s Chrysler and opened the door, Pintacki stepped out of the doorway of a nearby used-furniture store and aimed a .45 at me.

A woman across the street looked toward us and then hurried away, minding her own business.

He didn’t shoot. I didn’t expect him to. He thought I had something he wanted and I knew he had something I wanted. He lowered the gun and stepped to the car door, motioning for me to get in behind the wheel. I got in and leaned over to let him in. He had the gun trained on me through the window. I could probably have hit the gas and pulled away before he could’ve got off a decent shot, but I didn’t want to.

“I followed you,” Pintacki explained as I drove forward, aware of the pistol in his lap aimed at my stomach. “I followed you from your ex-wife’s house. I was waiting there for you in case Conrad and Wylie missed you and you came. I was inside when you knocked on the door and she tried, in spite of this gun at her neck, to help you get away, but I didn’t want you to get away. I was going to push past her and stop you but that man came, the policeman. I should have shot you both but I controlled my impatience. I followed you to the police station. I heard on the police band of my car that Conrad and Wylie had been killed. What the police don’t know is that you killed them to keep them from getting the MacArthur papers back.”

He was talking quickly, with more than a touch of frenzy in his voice.

“What did you do to Ann?” I asked, trying to keep my voice low and soothing but knowing I was doing a bad job.

“I didn’t have time to do what I should have done,” he said. “I had to follow you. I locked her in a closet. I could have killed her the way you killed Conrad and Wylie.”

“I didn’t kill Conrad and Wylie,” I said, but Pintacki wasn’t listening.

“Doesn’t matter. Doesn’t matter. They’re casualties,” Pintacki said. “Casualties. This is a war, a revolution to save this country. God whispered in my ear. Not much of a whisper, mind you, but a whisper I could feel rather than hear. I need those papers to accomplish my ends. I need them. I had them right in my hand, this hand.” He held up his fist to show me which hand we were talking about. “You know what the trouble with this world is?”

“Nazis and Japs,” I said.

“Loose ends,” Pintacki said, his hand clenching. “No discipline. Not like the movies. Life can learn so much from the movies if life would only watch. Sometimes I think God gave us the movies like a secret message, a message waiting for us to read it and understand.”

“I don’t have the papers,” I said.

“You’re lying,” said Pintacki. “I left them in the castle, in my desk.”

“They weren’t in your desk, but I know where they are,” I said, pulling into Laurel Canyon and heading across the hills. “I’ll make a deal with you. I’ll tell you where they are and you tell me about the murders of Hower and Lansing.”

Pintacki grimaced and reached over quickly to touch his shoulder. A spot of blood seeped through his shirt from the bullet wound he’d suffered on Mrs. Plaut’s porch and had, apparently, bandaged without -complete success. “I didn’t kill them. Conrad and Wylie didn’t kill them,” he said. “We save our bullets for those who deserve them.”

“Like me?” I asked.

“Just like you,” he said with a maniacal grin as we ground up the hill toward Mulholland Drive.

There were no cars behind me. As we approached the top, I threw the Chrysler into neutral and let it drop backward with a jerk. Pintacki’s neck snapped back, his wounded shoulder slamming against the door. He let out a scream and dropped the gun. I threw an elbow in his face and checked the rearview mirror. We were picking up speed and about to bit a curve. I stomped the brake hard and Pintacki shot forward, hitting his head on the windshield with a dull thud. A car came around the curve as the Chrysler stopped, and the driver almost shot over the edge into nowhere. He held on though, and took the turn on two wheels going past us. I put the Chrysler’s parking brake on, grabbed Pintacki’s pistol, threw it in the back seat, threw the Chrysler into first, released the brake and started up the hill again.

Pintacki seemed to be out cold, slumped on the floor in a not very neat bundle.

I had as much as I could probably get from him. It would have to be enough. When I dropped down the other side of the hill and eased around Ventura Boulevard in the San Fernando Valley, I left Pintacki and checked the trunk of the Chrysler. I found some insulated wire, used it to tie his hands and feet, dumped him in the back seat, and hoped he wouldn’t bleed all over the doctor’s upholstery.

I drove a few blocks farther to a hot dog stand and tried to reach Ann. There was no answer. I called the Wilshire Station and asked for Phil. He was out. Seidman was in. I asked him to get someone to Ann’s apartment fast, that she was probably locked in a closet and that I’d explain later. He didn’t ask any questions. I hung up and tried the number Major Oren Castle had given me. This time no one answered.

I got back in the car and headed toward Pasadena. Pintacki groaned once or twice in the back seat. I turned on the Chrysler’s radio and picked up the second chorus of Helen Forrest singing “I’ve Heard That Song Before,” with Harry James providing trumpet fills. I hummed along nervously to drown out Pintacki’s groans.

“Bleeding to death,” moaned Pintacki when I hit the outskirts of Pasadena and headed east on California Boulevard. I looked over the seat at him. The spot of blood was larger, but not much.

“You’ll live,” I said. “What’s a little wound to a hero like you? If God wants you saved, he’ll save you.”

“It hurts like hell,” he groaned. “Get me a doctor.”

“You disappoint me,” I said. “Would Victor McLaglen whine and whimper like this? Ronald Colman? Chester Morris? Hoot Gibson? This is life. Learn something from the movies.”

“I’ll get you, Peters,” he whispered. “I’ll get you. As the Lord is my witness.”

“Pintacki,” I said with a sigh, “you’re giving me bad lines from B movies. Why don’t you quiet down, work on your dialogue and come back when you’ve got something worth pitching.”

I turned the radio louder. Helen and Harry were doing “He’s My Guy.” I thought about Ann in the closet and took a sharper than necessary right onto Fair Oaks Avenue into San Marino. Pintacki rolled against the front seat and said something forbidden in the movies. I made a left on Monterey Road and pulled in front of the gate to the estate where I’d met MacArthur. It didn’t open. I got out of the car and walked to the gate. There was a little phone in a metal box. I opened the box and picked up the phone.

“Yes?” came a flat male voice.

“My name’s Peters. I’m here to see the General.”

“There’s no Gen …”

“Tell him I have some answers for him,” I said. “Tell him there may not be much time.”

The phone went dead and I stood looking at the broad green leaves of the tropical trees that blocked a view of the house beyond the iron gates and fence. I jangled the change in my pocket, touched the Luger in my belt and wondered what Helen Forrest was singing now.

The gate clicked like a shotgun, cracked open for loading. I gave it a push and watched it swing inward with hardly a sound. Back in the car, I closed the door and looked over at Pintacki, whose eyes were closed. He was breathing evenly so I didn’t worry. I drove through and started up the driveway. In the rearview mirror I watched the gate swing shut and through the open window I heard it close with a metallic shudder.

On the steps in front of the door to the house stood Major Oren Castle—bleak, trim, hair tight and short like a golf course lawn. He was in uniform, complete with tie and medals, and he stood at ease, hands behind his back.

“I’ve been calling you,” I said.

“I’ve been unable to return your calls,” he said. “The military situation has changed in New Guinea. The General will have to head back to Australia this afternoon.”

“I need ten minutes of his time,” I said, stepping up on the porch next to Castle and looking out at the broad lawn and trees swaying in a prestorm breeze.

Castle rocked on his heels twice and nodded his head. He turned, opened the door and stepped back so I could go inside. I didn’t say anything about Pintacki in the back seat.

We walked silently through the house, me in the lead, Castle behind. We paused in front of the same door to the same room where I’d first met the General. Castle knocked and MacArthur called, “Come in.”

Castle opened the door and in I went, with him behind. MacArthur was dressed in a neatly ironed pair of khaki trousers and a matching short-sleeve shirt. It was faintly military, but not quite. His hands were behind his back, his corncob pipe clenched between his teeth. The room was just as hot as it had been before.

“Major Castle, you may wait outside,” MacArthur said.

“I’d like Major Castle to hear this,” I said.

MacArthur bit his pipe stem a little harder. He wasn’t used to people questioning his decisions and it was clear that he didn’t like it. I could see that he was considering a less than polite answer, but he held it in and said, “Very well. Major Castle will remain. I see nothing in your possession which might be the missing money or the papers you were seeking.”

“Right, General,” I said, feeling that first trickle of sweat on my brow. I sat wearily, with Castle behind me and MacArthur in front. “I guess Major Castle briefed you on what happened in Angel Springs.”

“He did,” MacArthur said. “I know that Andrew Lansing is dead and that this man Pintacki killed him. I gather you have not found this man Pintacki and his henchmen.”

“I found them,” I said. “His two men are dead. Pintacki’s in the back seat of the car in your driveway. He doesn’t know where the papers are. He and his men came after me, thinking I had them. And, General, Pintacki and his men didn’t kill anyone.”

MacArthur was pacing and thinking, trying to get a step ahead of me, to take back center stage.

“The property just beyond this to the right, over there,” he said, pointing out the window with his pipe. “That belongs to the Patton family, as does a good deal of the land around here. General Patton is a wealthy man, a fierce, headstrong man who may emerge as a political factor following this war. George Patton would be a mistake.”

By this time, I knew that according to MacArthur anyone would be a mistake except Douglas MacArthur. I didn’t say anything and he went on.

“Over there, to the left, just beyond that row of hedges, is the Huntington estate, library and gardens. Do you know what artifacts of Western civilization stand in the gallery and library over there?”

“Gainsborough’s
Blue Boy
,” I said. “And Lawrence’s
Pinkie
. Did you know Pinkie was Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s aunt? Her father’s sister? Let’s see. There’s a Gutenberg Bible and …”

“That’ll do,” said MacArthur, less than pleased to be upstaged again.

I’d been to the Huntington at least twenty times when I was a kid. Glendale was just down the road. I even remember seeing old man Huntington himself back in 1910 or 1911 when I was in high school. He was a big guy with a white mustache walking alone down one of the garden paths he had built for the public. The teacher we were with, Miss Herbert, pointed him out to us. He didn’t look like one of the richest men in the world. He looked like a sad old man with a lot on his mind. Old Man Huntington had put together the Pacific Electric Streetcar System, the big red cars and the yellow cars, the trackless trollies with the overhead electric cables that you could ride through the canyons for a dime. “The world’s wonderland lines,” he called it, and at its peak Huntington’s Pacific Electric carried more passengers every day than the transit systems of the five biggest cities combined. MacArthur had picked the wrong hick to impress with California history.

“What do you have to tell me, Mr. Peters?” MacArthur said as he started to pace, hands behind his back. “And remember, brevity is essential. I have to leave at fifteen-thirty hours.”