Come Die with Me (9 page)

“Not completely, or the house would be full of cops right now.”

She looked at me candidly. “You might have had a motive for that, too.”

I sat on the davenport and smiled up at her. “Relax, lady. Skinny girls just don’t interest me.”

“You’re a liar,” she said. “Drink?”

“No thanks.” I rubbed my neck. “I have had a busy and disturbing day.” I told her of my adventures since leaving there.

When I had finished, she uttered one word. “Giovanni.”

I nodded. “Giovanni. He doesn’t scare you any more than he does me, I’m sure. He scares the hell out of me.”

She sat down and stared into space. “I’ve seen him a couple of times at places I worked. Grotesque man, isn’t he? Those enormous shoulders and those silly little legs.”

I said nothing.

She looked at me. “I’m frightened. Are you sure those men who were at the gambler’s house worked for Giovanni?”

I nodded.

Beyond her I could see the meadow. The mare and her colt now stood in the shade of some eucalyptus trees. The Cad I’d seen on the way up was rounding a curve far below.

She asked, “Does he think I killed Tip? How could he think that?”

“He might not think you killed Tip, but he could think you know who did. And the investigative techniques of his stooges are a lot cruder than mine.”

She stared at me. “You seem to be deliberately trying to frighten me. Why?”

“Believe me,” I said earnestly, “I’m not trying to frighten you. As a matter of fact, I warned Mr. Giovanni to keep his stooges away from here.”

Her stare widened. “
You
warned Frank Giovanni?”

“Right. You got any Einlicher around?”

She shook her head. “I’ve got Miller’s High Life.”

“That the next best. Could I have some?”

She nodded and stood up, staring past me, out at her view. Then she turned and asked, “Could you stay for dinner? I’m scared silly.”

“I never turn down a free meal,” I said.

She went to get the beer.

A lady like that, playing all those ritzy night spots to sophisticated audiences … A poised and lacquered lovely, adult and unsentimental, cultured, with her emotions under control and her future carefully charted—who would ever imagine that she’d try to seduce me?

And succeed.

I
T STARTED INNOCENTLY ENOUGH
. I sat out on her sundeck with the High Life, watching the eastern slope of the hills turn dark with shadow as the sun moved toward the west. For some reason I was thinking of the ties that bind, loyalty and love, blood, hate and lust, man against man and man for woman.

It was the thought of Giovanni and his niece that prompted this hillside philosophy, probably. But it brought me around to wondering why I was protecting Miss Stone. She wasn’t related to me. And it couldn’t be a very active lust; I was still tranquil from last night.

Perhaps it was because I admire specialists, people who take a smattering of semitalents and weld them into something unique, something saleable only at the highest level and under certain conditions. They are precariously vulnerable, because they appeal only to a limited and easily bored audience and their vogue can die quickly. They are, in a sense, lambs, and lambs are my special province.

A great tenderness for Selina Stone began to grow in me as I looked at the dark shadows on the green hills. I’m sure it wasn’t the beer.

She came out with a martini on the rocks and sat on a plastic and magnesium stool next to me. “Peaceful, isn’t it?” she asked.

“It certainly is. A retreat, I suppose? You’re too young to need a retreat.”

Her narrow face showed nothing as she said, “I’m old in the ways of the world. I’ve been on my own since I was fifteen.”

“No family?” I asked.

“None I care to talk about. How about you, Mr. Callahan?”

“I’ve a younger brother. And a doting aunt down in La Jolla. My parents are dead.”

A silence, and then she asked, “Weren’t you a baseball player or something?”

“Football,” I said.

“Now I remember,” she said. “You’re a friend of Jan Bonnet’s.”

“That’s right. Jan a friend of yours?”

She shook her head. “I wanted her to do this house for me, but she was much too expensive. She has expensive tastes, hasn’t she?”

“Not really. But she specializes in clients with expensive tastes. So do you, don’t you?”

“I suppose,” she said. “Would you like some more beer? I’m marinating those steaks and it might delay the meal a bit.”

I told her I could get my own and I did. Her kitchen was a Betty Furness dream, everything built in, glossy porcelain and moulded formica in a rich brown. But she was doing the steaks outside, on the greasy, weather beaten griddle. California logic.

When I came out to the deck again with a new can of beer, soft music was coming from speakers built into the wide eaves overhead.

I said, “For a small house, you spent a lot of money.”

She nodded. “I never lived in a decent house until I built this place. I wish I could retire and just stay right here, night and day.”

So there’s a sample of our dialogue and you can see how innocuous it was, giving no hint of the later savagery of her attack.

It was pleasant. It was peaceful and meaningless and the sun went down with a fine show of red and orange, and we ate the steaks and gabbed and listened to the music and then she said she had to make a long distance call to New York. So after we did the dishes, she put through the call and I flopped on the enormous square couch in one corner of the living room, just to relax my muscles.

And I dozed, my guard down.

And dreamed of her, of the thin loveliness of her body and the music of her voice. Half awake, I realized it hadn’t been a dream. She was next to me on the square couch and my arms were around her.

And I mumbled something I don’t remember now and she said hoarsely, “Hold me. Don’t let me go. Hold me tight. I’m frightened.”

And there it is, the complete story of how she forced me to submit to her carnal desire.

She murmured, “You’re so gentle. Why are big men so gentle?”

“They get tired from hauling all that avoirdupois around. Tired people are gentle people.”

“No, they aren’t. Do you love Jan Bonnet?”

“Now that’s a hell of a question to ask.”

“I wasn’t being feminine. I was thinking a man or a woman has to love
somebody.
What are we without love?”

“Free.”

“Don’t be cynical. You’re not, naturally. You force it.”

I didn’t argue with her.

From the highway far below, the thin sound of a siren drifted up and from some yard in the neighborhood a dog began to bark.

“I love the dark,” she said. “I love nights. Don’t you?”

“Some. Did you ever meet Mrs. Malone?”

I could almost feel her stiffen next to me. A pause. “What prompted that question?”

“I don’t know. Tip’s funeral is tomorrow. Are you going?”

She sat up. In the moonlight I could see her glare at me.

“What’s come over you? Of course I’m not going to the funeral. It would be in horrible taste, wouldn’t it, my going to
his
funeral?”

The odor of her perfume was stronger. The moon seemed to be grinning. Beneath me, the sheet was like silk and I wanted to fall asleep, but some perversity drove me.

“Nobody but his wife seems to be mourning him,” I said, “and I’m not even sure she is. This afternoon I thought that maybe Harry Adler was, but that would be unlikely I’ve now decided.”

“I think you had better leave,” she said. “You’re not a man. You’re a—a hunter, a bloodhound.”

“I’m a man, a not-completely-cynical man. The cynic is you. And you’re hiding something that shields the murderer.”

She scrambled from the bed and went to get a robe. She came back, white and ghostly in the moonlight, and said hoarsely, “Get out of here!”

“Yes’m,” I said, and swung my feet out of the smooth warm bed. “I’m going. Don’t start screaming.”

She stared for a few seconds and then went to the bathroom. I heard her lock the door, and not another sound.

No diplomacy, Callahan,
I scolded myself.
No touch, no flair. In a sugared world, you’re made of vinegar.

My mouth tasted bitter and there was some tremble in my knees. Was it guilt that had made me destroy the moment’s mood? Was it the thought of Jan?

Or maybe the thought of Tip Malone, cold and mute? My bad knee ached as I bent to pick up a shoe. Again from below came the far sound of a siren and again the dog began to bark.

High on her hill, remote from the world, protected by her agent, slowly building her reputation. A murder could make her less remote and her future more uncertain.

Outside, the night was cold. There were a number of cars parked around a house farther up the road; except for that one, the scattered places that dotted the hills here were dark.

The flivver groaned, coughed and began to murmur. I went down the long, winding road slowly, thinking back to that bed and that thin and spirited girl and wondering why she reminded me of someone. Who, who, who …?

My mind was as fatigued as my body. It had been a full day, but what had I learned? I had learned Tip Malone had been lucky in his choice of women and that Frank Giovanni would go to great lengths to protect the reputation of his niece. I had learned I was not insatiable, and that wrestlers were pigeons in street fights, but I had already known that.

As I turned off onto the highway at the base of the hill, a Cad turned into the road I had deserted. But it was not the stooges; a peroxide blonde was driving and she was alone.

And I had the uncomfortable hunch, though it was bad for my ego, that Selina Stone had used what she had to keep me on her side.

I would hate to think she would buy the Giovanni stooges the same way. I had kept her out of my report; continuing to keep her out was going to be rougher on my conscience. Now I had an ulterior reason. I hadn’t, until this evening. At home, I was asleep five minutes after I went to bed.

The morning
Times
informed me that yesterday had been the hottest April 9th in twenty-eight years and that the police were nowhere in their investigation of Tip Malone’s death.

The editorial page blamed it all on the recent rise in illegal bookmaking in the city but didn’t carry the thought to its obvious premise. Without the two local and profitable tracks, the illegal gambling would be cut to nothing. But in this town not even the ministers have the courage to attack horse racing.

The sun was already up and working; it looked as if we were due for another scorcher. I drove over to the office to finish my report of yesterday.

I had promised Miss Ronico that I would be discreet about revealing Selina Stone, but Miss Ronico had already told her uncle about the girl. How much of my promise was still valid?

I didn’t mention her in the report. One more day won’t hurt, I told myself, lying.

I was separating the carbons from the originals when Pete Petroff came in, looking like a smug Cheshire cat. “I’ve got something for you,” he purred.

“On Giovanni, no doubt,” I said, “or you wouldn’t look so happy.”

“Who else? You know, the police didn’t question him, not yet. They asked that niece of his where he was night before last and she told them he was in Las Vegas. And she told them the name of the man he was supposed to be seeing, a guy named Alan Chalmers.”

“I’ve heard of him. Big man.”

“Right. Got a show place, northwest of the Strip. Giovanni was supposed to be staying with Chalmers there. The law checked with Chalmers and Chalmers said it was all true. And the housekeeper said it was true. And so did the chauffeur.”

“So …?”

“So I happened to know the chauffeur. I’m still holding a chit for four grand he owes me. And I got the word from him—Giovanni was never there.”

I looked at Pete levelly. “For four grand some men will say
anything
.”

“What the hell do you mean by that?”

“I mean you hate Giovanni enough to frame him. I’ll bet that chauffeur doesn’t even owe you four grand any more.”

He stared at me. “Man, you’re absolutely nuts. You think, because Dave got slapped around a little, I’d want to frame Giovanni?”

I shook my head. “I think it goes back further than that, though I don’t know to what. But why would you be so anxious to involve Giovanni’s niece with Tip Malone? Why did you and Dave come here that afternoon to make sure I got the picture?”

“We came here,” he said quietly, “and asked you
not
to mention Gina Ronico’s name to Mrs. Malone.”

“Sure you did. Knowing that I don’t relish taking advice from men on your side of the law. And hoping you had made it clear that she and Tip were involved and that maybe that would hurt Giovanni where he can be hurt.”

He continued to stare. He said nothing.

“What’s your beef with Giovanni?” I asked.

“What damned difference does it make?” he said. “I’m bringing you
facts, facts, facts!
Don’t you want them?”

“They aren’t facts yet. Would this chauffeur stand up in court and swear that Giovanni wasn’t a house guest of Chalmers?”

“Of course not. You couldn’t expect him to. I’m not giving you a court case; I’m trying to give you some leads that will bring the case to court eventually.”

“Okay,” I said. “Okay.”

“What the hell are you hot about?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I thought you were giving me a sour lead. And this case is hopeless enough already. Look, if Giovanni wasn’t in Vegas, where was he?”

“One guess is all you should need for that.”

I shook my head. “He’s too big. He can hire all the killers he wants. He wouldn’t take the chance.”

“Wouldn’t he? This one was
personal.
You should know the way he feels about his niece. It’s like a religion.”

“I know,” I said. “I talked with him yesterday.”

There was wonder in his eyes. “You did?”

I nodded. “He phoned me. He warned me he would go to some length to protect his niece’s reputation.”

“He’s already gone to murder. What did you tell him?”

“I told him I was working with the L.A.P.D. and would not be diverted. Frankly, I was very brave.”