Cold Blood (56 page)

Juda said, as she poured a glass of root beer.

“But now I am asking you to help me.”

“You want me to help you?”

he said with a smile.

“Yes, sir. I’ve just lost my life’s savingsmy nephew stole it and I have come back here as penniless as I left over twenty years ago.”

Here it comes, he thought, wondering how much she wanted.

LYMDA LA PLAIMTE

“I want to stay on here, Mr. Caley. I don’t want to go back to LA, I don’t belong there, this is my home.”

He looked at the stained wallpaper. This is going to cost, he thought to himself, but he would not show that he had any indication. He’d just act innocent.

“I can’t take care of your wife no more, Mr. Caley. She drain s me, she uses up everything I have, but I care fo T her and I don’t want to let her down. I feel guilty. I feel that she is my responsibility, and that has been the rope that has hung around my neck
I used to feel that in some way I was to blame, but I no longer believe th^at.”

“Are you asking for money, Mrs. Sali-na?”

“No, sir, not money, I don’t want yoLrar money. I want you to get someone else for Mrs. Caley because I am t:ťred out and I want to stay here, move back in with my sister. I want tc^> sell my apartment on Doheny Drive. I don’t want to go back there, Mr Caley.”

He coughed and ran his finger arou:Ťnd his collar.

“I’m still not sure I follow what you are asking from me, Mrs. Salina.”

“No, maybe you don’t, because you r^iever took much interest, but you should know a lot from what Miss Elizab^-eth does. The way she behaves is because she can’t help it.”

“I’m sure she can’t,”

he said brusqi_^iely, irritated by Juda, and then leaned across the table.

“My wife takes drugs and alcohol like it’s going out of fashion, she has an addictive perscrmality.”

“No, sir, she has a fear inside her th^Ť-t shay trying to get rid of. Now, you may not believe it, and you have tha* riglp but she needs someone to control her demons. If she does not get hmelp she will go out of her mind.”

He smirked.

“So you are saying that ^he isn’t right now?”

Juda turned on him.

“I am saying th at you refuse to understand that your wife needs help, not from your clinics but from”

“People like you?”

She pushed her face closer.

“Just wh^at do you think I am, Mr. Robert fucking Caley?”

He didn’t back off but leaned closer.” ‘You blackmail my wife and hold her in some kind of terror, that’s all I do 3cnow.”

“You are wrong. I am forced into tryii ig to control the terror, and what I am saying to you is that I can’t do it no nmore. I am old and I am tired out. She is your wife, you fleece her more thr^an I never even begun to know how, but that is not my business. Mine is to help her, because unlike you, Mr. Caley, I love her.”

“Do you?” “Yes, sir, I do, but like I said, I am too old, so I am asking you to go back to her. I’ll find someone she can hold on to to help her in the way she needs helping.”

“You mean someone who’ll feed her drugs?”

Juda sat back, shaking her head.

“No, sir, I mean help her spiritually, that’s the only help I have ever given your wife.”

“I am never going back to my wife, Mrs. Salina.”

Jude stared at him and she felt cold, icy cold. The chill moved from her big, bloated feet up through her body.

“Then why did you come here? To tell me that?”

He shrugged. He had come to see Ruby; all this was irritating and now all he wanted was to leave.

Juda stared at his handsome face; she saw his weakness and smiled.

“You will never have the woman you want, Mr. Caley. Your heart is frozen over by greed. I think you should leave, I don’t want anything more to do with you.”

He eased back in his chair, about to stand up, when Ruby walked in. She gave him a nonchalant look, crossing to the fridge to take out a root beer for herself.

“Why, if it isn’t Mr. Robert Caley,”

she said as she banged open a drawer for the bottle opener.

“You know each other!”

Juda said, surprised.

“Sure, we do, this is Anna Louise’s daddy. Am I right?”

Juda looked from Caley and back to Ruby, who opened her bottle and drank it down thirstily.

“I used to work for Tilda Brown, Aunt Juda, you fotgettin’? She was Mr. Caley’s daughter’s closest friend. Isn’t that right, Mr. Caley?”

“Yes, that’s right,”

he said, staring at Ruby, unable to fathom what was going on and how much Juda knew. From irritation he had slid into fear.

“Mr. Caley is opening up a big casino, Aunty Juda, gonna be a rich, rich man.”

Juda watched her niece, then Caley. She was confused as to what the undercurrent was about, but she could sense it, and see the hold Ruby seemed to have over him.

Ruby sidled up to Caley and flicked her hips^at him. He moved away.

“Mr. Caley is a very sexy man and he likes them young and fresh, ‘bout my age, is that not so, Mr. Caley?”

He got up, moving as far away from Ruby as he could in the small kitchen. Juda could smell his fear, and she caught hold of Ruby as she passed her.

“Mr. Caley, would you wait in the hallway for a few moments if you please? I can see you want to talk to my niece.”

Caley eased past Juda and went into the hall. The kitchen do. slammed shut behind him as Juda kicked it closed.

“What’s going on, Ruby?”

Ruby sat on the edge of the table, sipping her root beer and enjoyi^ outlining what she had found in Tilda Brown’s diary about Robert Cal^ She gasped when the punch knocked her to the floor. Her soda bott)’ broke into fragments and she hunched up, terrified, as Juda picked up tl-, damp dishcloth and began to swipe her with it so hard it made her ey, water. She covered her head, screeching, but then came the kicks and tl^ slaps. It was as if Juda had gone crazy, and she kept up the onslaught un\1 she had to sit down, exhausted. Her breath came in short, sharp rasps.

“You made that doll for Anna Louise Caley, didn’t you?”

Ruby began crying, scared of her aunt.

“You shouldn’t have done that, Ruby, you did a terrible thing, VQ. raised up evil.”

“He’s evil, he was fucking that girl Tilda Brown.”

Juda kicked her so hard she crunched into a tight ball. She then ra, the cold water and filled a tumbler full to the brim. Ruby didn’t see h^ swallow, all she saw was this massive looming figure leaning over her ar. spitting out a jet-spray of water. She tried to inch away, but Juda grabb^ her hair and then pressed her hands tightly around the girl’s skull.

“You got evil in you, girl, an’ I got to get it out.”

ť

Caley stood in the dank hall, waiting. He cftdn’t help hearing Ruby screams and sobs, and the strange high but dffp voice of Juda Salina ca)| ing out words that he couldn’t make out. Eventually Ruby appeared, h^ hair wet and clinging to her face, and she was weeping.

“Mr. Caley, please don’t go.”

She knelt before him and clasped h^ hands together.

“I am sorry I came and asked you for money, I meant nt, harm, I have never meant any harm. I will never ask you for anythirL again, I give you my word. Please, don’t you say anything about what I dirt just as I won’t ever repeat what was in that poor girl’s diary.”

Caley was nonplussed as Juda walked out from the kitchen.

“You go away from this house now, Mr. Caley, Ruby will never both^ you againshe has more important things to do with her life. We want nr) money from you, we don’t want anything from you.”

“Is this true, Ruby?”

Ruby remained on her knees, nodding her head, and after a momeru he left. Juda stood behind her.

“You never do anything that’ll cause such pain again, Ruby, you he^f me?”

ft “Yes, Aunt Juda,”

she whispered.

“You take in evil and it will possess you, do you understand? You got power, child, and it must not be used for the darkness, or darkness will seep into your soul and you will become its slave. You hear me?”

Ruby nodded, and then watched as her aunt eased her bulk onto her knees beside her.

“You ask forgiveness now, Ruby.”

Ruby clasped her hands together.

“What if we could get so much money, Aunt Juda, that’d help so many?”

“We don’t ever want devil’s money because he’s sly and he always wants to be repaid. You must never be in debt to the devil. I’ve seen a woman who owes him, I don’t ever want that to happen to you. You got a future ahead of you, but you have to obey the spirits and take care of our own, just like Queen Marie.”

Ruby clasped her hands tighter, and whispered to Juda that she was afraid.

“We all are, honey, every living soul is frightened at some point in their lives, but you can help guide people through that fear. You got to respect that power, never abuse it; love it and it will do good. Mr. Caley will pay his own dues, you care only about your own, Ruby.”

Errol was rubbing his head, his bellboy’s hat in his hands.

“I love Ruby Corbello, I have loved her since high school, but she don’t seem to know I exist. Sometimes she walks past me on her way to Fryer Jones’s bar, swishing her hips, smiling that smile. I know she’s out of my league, I know that, but it won’t stop my heart from fluttering like I was having some kind of attack. That is what she can do to me, make my heart beat faster than it should.”

Rosie nodded.

“I know how you feel, I felt that way about someone for a long time. In fact, I never would have believed he would love me, that’s how low my self-esteem was, Errol, but, you know, two nights ago he asked me to marry him.”

“You kidding me? Someone wants to marry you?”

He was wide-eyed with astonishment, not realizing the insult. To his mind, Rosie was so far removed from his beautiful Ruby Corbello it was hard for him to accept that anyone could love the fat woman who sat beside him. It made Rosie laugh.

“I am telling you the truth.”

“Maybe, Miss Rosie, it’s different for you, you maybe don’t understand about desire.”

“Errol, you believe me. Fat, thin, ugly or beautiful, everyone finds their partner, and he or she becomes the most beautiful creature in the whole wide world,”

Rosie said with good humor.

“You don’t understand, do you? You see, Ruby Corbello really is the most perfect woman God created. She’s a goddess.”

“That worked as a maid for Mr. and Mrs. Brown until she was fired for thieving, and now is sweeping up hair off some floor. Some goddess, Errol.”

Rosie paused.

“All I want to know is if you somehow helped Ruby Corbello pass a package to Miss Anna Louise Caley, and if you knew what was in the package. You can be real honest with me because right now there are no police involved.”

Rooney returned to the hotel. He hadn’t been able to contact his cop because he was on patrol duty, but was told to call after lunch when he would be back in the office. Nor had he had any joy with the bellboy, who’d been tight-mouthed, so it had been a pretty fruitless morning so far. There was a message at the desk for him to call Lorraine’s room.

Rosie opened Lorraine’s hotel-room door. She had a smug look on her face, so Rooney guessed she’d found out something, hut she remained silent.

Lorraine came out of the bathroom lookine worn-out.

“Right, I’ll start. My morning so far has been heavy, and etty unproductive. Tilda Brown’s father broke down when he saw the oolland that was the high point. The rest has been downhill, but I’ve still got a few more ‘close’ friends to speak to. I hope they are more forthcoming than her local Bible thumper who said, and I quote, ‘Tilda Brown was an example to every young teenager. She was joyful, enthusiastic and ready to help anyone in need.’ That this joyful bundle tied her own dressing-gown cord to the curtain rail and hanged herself seems to have escaped him. Only one kid, part of the choir that Tilda Brown used to sing in, boy called Eddie Mellor, said she had changed over the past six months. She used to be much more outgoing and friendly, but she had hardly spoken a word to anyone, and seemed to him to be in a very nervous state.”

Rooney coughed.

“You mind if I say something?”

“Sure, go ahead.”

“Well, we’re hired to trace Anna Louise Caley, and you seem to have gotten sidetracked by this Tilda Brown girl.”

“You saying I’m wasting my time, is that it, Bill?” “No, but we seem to be sidetracking, that’s all.”

Rosie told them how she had gone to the hotel and had questioned Errol.

“I did that too,”

Rooney muttered.

“I know, I’d hoped I’d see you there.”

Rosie beamed at him.

“I just got better results than you, because me and Errol had a good long conversation. He admitted that he had passed a note to Mr. Caley, and he said Ruby Corbello had a conversation with Mr. Caley down by the pool. After Caley had gone back to his room Anna Louise saw Errol and Ruby talking in the courtyard; she beckoned to Ruby to come up, and Ruby asked him to smuggle her up the back stairs. This was, he said, around six o’- clock. She was with Anna Louise for only ten minutes, and left the same way she had come in. And he said she was in a mighty hurry. Something we didn’t know before is that Errol saw Ruby Corbello again later that night, the night Anna Louise disappeared, and it’d have been about seventhirty, so she returned to the hotel.”

Lorraine flicked through her old notebook.

“The Caleys said they went down to eat around that time, in the hotel restaurant.”

Rosie nodded.

“Ruby, he said, was ducking and diving around the palm trees in the back of the courtyard. He’s in love with her, and so he gets all angry because he thinks she’s meeting up with one of the other boys working at the hotel. Errol follows her, and she’s looking up at Anna Louise Caley, who is bending over her balcony. Which means she was still in her room at seventhirty.”

“Yes, and?”

asked Lorraine impatiently.

“Well, by the time Errol got to the balcony, or was standing underneath it, there was no sign of either of them, and he was on duty, so he had to get back out front.”

Lorraine sighed.

“That’s it?”