Fallen Angels (22 page)

“Oh.” I guessed having to endure such a
frightful day might exhaust a man.

“Yeah.”

“But I found out who’d been sending Mrs.
Chalmers those nasty letters, by gum!”

“You did?” He perked up slightly

“I did.” I was feeling quite proud of myself
by that time.

“Well?” he demanded. “Who the hell was
it?”

Some of my exultation slipped a bit.
“Honestly, Ernie Templeton. You can be the most aggravating—”

“Dammit, Mercy, will you just tell me who
sent the damned letters?”

I huffed, but gave in. “Mr. Gaylord
Pinkney.”

“I’ll be damned.”

“Of that I have no doubt,” I said
bitterly.

“Huh.”

“Well, you’re going to tell Phil, aren’t
you?”

“Of course, I am”

“And then they’ll investigate him?”

“Sure they will.”

We were both silent for a moment. Then Ernie
said, “I don’t suppose you managed to get your hands on one of
those letters, did you?”

My pride kicked in again. “As a matter of
fact, I did.”

Ernie actually smiled at me. “Good work,
Mercy. Can I see it?”

Without overtly correcting his grammar, I
said, “Yes, you may. Mrs. Pinkney gave me the one she found in his
desk drawer. I guess he didn’t send it because he killed her before
he got around to it.”

He lifted an eyebrow. “You’ve pegged him as
the killer, eh?”

“It makes sense.” I fished in my handbag and
withdrew the letter. “Here.” I held it out to him.

Ernie read it and wrinkled his nose. “Ugly.
He really hated her, didn’t he?”

“Looks like it to me.”

“Yeah, well, you never know. Maybe he was
just peeved. Anyhow, I’ll give this to Phil, and the police will
check on his location at the time of the murder.”

“You don’t sound very encouraged by this new
discovery,” I said, feeling slightly miffed.

With a shrug, Ernie rose from his chair and
took his hat from the rack beside his desk. “Come on, kiddo, let’s
beat this joint. You gotta get home for dinner or anything?”

“Well, I generally dine with Chloe and
Harvey, but I don’t have to. What did you have in mind?”

“Call your sister and tell her
you’re
dining
in Chinatown
with me this evening.”

So I did, thrilled with the possibility that
Ernie was actually going to discuss the case with me and ask for my
input.

Chapter Thirteen

I ought to have known better.

“Mercy, I don’t want to talk about the damned
case,” he told me flatly as we drove the few blocks to Chinatown in
his battered Studebaker. And all I’d done is ask if he considered
Mr. Pinkney a viable suspect. “All I want to do is get some Chinese
grub at Hop Luey’s, then go home and go to sleep. I’m bushed.”

Hmph. So much for that. Feeling put out, I
said, “Very well.”

After Ernie parked his car on Hill Street, we
walked to Hop Luey’s, climbed upstairs to the restaurant, and were
seated by a dignified Chinese waiter. Hop Luey’s interior was dim
and lovely, with Chinese hangings on the walls and little Chinese
candle holders on the tables. Holding candles, I’m sure I need not
add. Although I just did. Oh, never mind.

“I’m sure I can help you with this case
if you’ll only let me,” I pressed him after we’d been handed menus
and the waiter had gone off to get our tea. “In fact, I
already
have
helped you with
it. You have to admit that’s so, Ernie.”

“I don’t want to talk about the damned case.”
Ernie’s words were measured, as if he were deliberately putting
large spaces in between them so I’d get the message.

Irked, I said, “Well, we have to talk about
something, don’t we?”

Lowering his menu so he could squint at me
from across the table, Ernie said, “Yeah. How’s your mother?”

“Darn you, Ernest Templeton. I don’t
want to talk about my overbearing mother! And you certainly don’t
need
me
to eat Chinese food
with you if you don’t want to talk about anything
pertinent.”

He carefully set his menu on the table, and I
took a good look at him. He appeared exhausted and defeated, and I
felt a little guilty.

“Can’t we just have a nice little dinner and
chat like friends?” he said at last. “I’m sick and tired of the
case, crime, the L.A.P.D. and everything else that’s happened
lately. Give me a break, can’t you?”

Chastened, I said, “I’m sorry, Ernie. I know
you’ve had a hard time these past few days.”

He heaved a big sigh and picked up his menu.
“I think I’ll have number two, with the egg-flower soup. What about
you?”

“That sounds good to me.” In truth, it was
too much food, but I supposed I could always take the leftovers
home and bring them with me for luncheon on the morrow. That’s what
other working girls did. At least, I think that’s what they
did.

I tried to think of something to talk about
that wasn’t connected with the case. My mind floundered. Then I
thought about Chloe and Harvey selling their house and moving, so I
told Ernie about that. “It’s because the studio’s going to move to
Culver City,” I said.

He tilted his head to one side. “They’re
moving to Beverly Hills? That’s where all the flicker folks are
moving to these days.”

“So I hear. Harvey wants to build a house
there. He might get started on the building part, but they aren’t
going to move into the new house until after the baby’s born.”

Was it indiscrete for a single lady to
discuss people having babies with a single gentleman? There
was
so
much I still didn’t
know about real life! It got downright discouraging
sometimes.

“Are you going to move with them?” Ernie
asked, surprising me out of dismal thoughts about my
inadequacies.

Aiming for a lightness I didn’t feel, I said,
“No. I want to stay around here and keep my job. You can’t get rid
of me that easily, Ernest Templeton.”

He chuckled. “I don’t want to get rid of you,
Mercy. Most of the time.”

The waiter returned and took our menus and
our orders.

“I’m so hungry, I could eat a horse and
follow it up with a moose,” Ernie said.

“Didn’t they feed you at the police station?
Gee, they came and took you away right about lunchtime, didn’t
they?” I was counting up grudges against the L.A.P.D., and the
stack was getting awfully high.

“Phil had them bring me a sandwich and
coffee, but they were both so bad, I didn’t eat much. Besides, I
didn’t feel like eating at the time. I was too busy being
grilled.”

There was that word again. Grilled. The
waiter placed soup before the two of us, and I fiddled with my bone
spoon. Ernie dipped his spoon into his soup and dug right in. He
glanced at me. “What’s the matter? Don’t like your soup?”

I took a sip. “It’s delicious.” Then, because
I couldn’t seem to help myself, I said, “Ernie, I know you don’t
want to talk about the case, but I really want to know what they
did to you at the station. I don’t want you to be hurt.”

Another sigh rippled the soup in Ernie’s
bowl. “They didn’t hurt me. They asked me questions for hours and
hours. It seemed like the same questions over and over. Phil was
there, so nothing got out of hand. I think they’re frustrated
because they can’t find any other likely suspects, so they’ve fixed
their attention on me.”

“Well, now they’ve got Mr. Gaylord Pinkney.
Even his wife wants it to be him.”

Ernie’s eyebrows lifted and he grinned at me.
“Yeah?”

“That’s what it sounded like to me. He’s dead
set against her involvement in the Angelica Gospel Hall, and that’s
about the only thing she’s interested in now that her best friend
is deceased.”

“Sounds like a pathetic life to me.” Ernie
grimaced into his soup.

“Well . . .” I let out a smallish sigh. “It
does to me, too.”

“Can’t she join the library guild or a garden
club or something?”

“I guess she has a religious bent.”

“Huh.” Ernie sipped more soup.

“What about the son?” I asked, feeling a
trifle frustrated.

“Clean as a whistle.”

“You’re sure?”

“Phil’s sure. And I trust Phil.”

“I’m not so sure I do anymore,” I said,
thinking black thoughts about Phil Bigelow, even if he was Ernie’s
best friend. Glumly, I sipped more of my own soup. It really was
good. “Well, I don’t think her husband did her in, either,” I said,
laying my spoon on the plate, surprised that I’d managed to finish
all the soup that had been in it. Maybe I was hungrier than I’d
thought I was.

“Phil’s opinion, too. And mine,” said Ernie,
leaning back so the waiter could pick up our soup plates. “Poor
man’s been a total blubbering mess ever since you found the
body.”

He would have to bring my discovering the
body into the conversation, the mere remembrance of which made me
shudder, wouldn’t he? “Of course, he could be faking his grief,” I
said, not believing it.

“I suppose so, but I don’t think so. Neither
does Phil.”

Well, that was just great. We were
eliminating suspects right and left. I decided to lead the
conversation in another direction on my own, even without Ernie’s
prodding.

“Lulu’s coming with me to the Angelica Gospel
Hall this coming Sunday.”

Ernie’s eyes bulged. “Lulu? She’s doing
what?”

“She’s coming with me to the Angelica Gospel
Hall.”

Darned if he didn’t lean back and laugh. For
the first time in a long time, his laugh sounded as though he were
truly amused.

I couldn’t help but grin myself. “It’s true.
In fact, she came over to Chloe’s house with me last night, and we
picked out a dull gray suit for her to wear on Sunday. I don’t
think the Angelica Gospel Hall folks would appreciate her usual
attire.”

“Lordy.” Ernie actually had to wipe tears of
amusement from his eyes. “I’d love to see that.”

I shrugged. “You can come, too, if you want
to.”

“No thanks. I don’t like going to church. Had
too much of that when I was a kid.”

Now there was an excellent topic of
conversation, and one that was totally unrelated to the case:
Ernie’s childhood. I didn’t know a thing about Ernie as a child. As
a matter of fact, it was difficult for me to imagine him as a
little boy in knee britches. He seemed to me as if he’d always been
. . . well, Ernie.

Before I could pry, however, the waiter was
back, carrying lots of dishes full of wonderful, delicious-smelling
things, which he placed on a rotating lazy-Susan-type of device on
our table. Ernie twirled the gadget and said, “Dig in.”

So I took a little bit of everything.
Actually, I took two spare ribs and three shrimp. I love Chinese
spare ribs and fried shrimp. Not that my taste in food matters to
the story. I just mention it.

“I suppose you’re going to poke around some
more at the church. That’s why you’re going, right?” I noticed that
Ernie had taken several ribs and lots of shrimp, so I didn’t feel
quite so piggish.

“Right.” At least we’d been provided with
silverware. Since I’d worked for Ernie, I’d been with him to
Chinatown a time or two. He favored a little noodle place on the
other side of Hill, where the only eating implements were bowls and
chopsticks. I wasn’t a chopstick expert at that point in my life,
although using chopsticks was another skill I aimed to master with
more practice.

“I can’t quite feature Lulu in that joint.”
He shook his head and grinned.

“I can’t, either, but she’ll be one more
person to talk to the people there about Mrs. Chalmers. I figured
it can’t hurt to revisit the church and pry a bit.”

Shaking his head, Ernie said, “I don’t know,
Mercy. I think you’re wrong about the church angle. We already know
that Pinkney guy wrote the letters, but he didn’t have anything to
do with the church. It’s his wife who’s the church person. It’s a
long way from being against a church and sending poison-pen letters
to killing the dame.”

The dame? I stared at Ernie over the food
piled in the middle of the table. “I thought you liked Mrs.
Chalmers. Now she’s a dame?” My voice was cold even to my own ears.
But really!

“Sorry. Actually, I didn’t like her much. She
was pretty, but she was . . . loopy.”

“Well, I suspect you’re right about that, but
I still don’t think you should call her a dame. That’s not a nice
thing to call anyone, Ernie, especially one who’s no longer with
us. Didn’t anyone ever teach you not to speak ill of the dead?”

“Yes, Mother,” he said.

I could feel myself blush. “Well, it isn’t a
very nice thing to call anybody.”

“I know. I’m tired and out of sorts. Anyhow,
you know I use bad language all the time, so you ought to be used
to it by this time. Let’s forget the dame thing, okay?”

“Very well.”

“In fact, let’s forget the case. Just for a
little while? Can you at least do me that favor? Please?”

His voice had an honestly pleading quality to
it that surprised me. Gazing at him in the dim light, I once again
noticed how tired and wan he appeared. He looked nowhere near as
awful as he had on that ghastly Thursday when I’d found him tied up
and drugged, but he was clearly worn to a frazzle. And worried. My
boss, the ever-nonchalant Ernie Templeton, was definitely
worried.

“Yes, Ernie. I can do you that favor.”
Unfortunately, I couldn’t think of anything else to talk about. I
sensed his childhood would have to wait.

Fortunately, Ernie took care of the problem
for me. “So what are you going to do when Chloe and Harvey
move?”

Aha! A new topic, and one that interested me
almost as much as the case.

“I’m thinking of buying their house and
having Lulu and maybe another working girl or two live there with
me. You know, as tenants. There are suites of rooms there that
would make great apartments.”