The Proof is in the Pudding (12 page)

Liddy’s eyes widened with excitement. “If you’re going to break into somebody’s house, I’m not letting you go alone.”

The first thing I did when I got home, after greeting Tuffy and Emma, and assuring Tuffy that we’d go for a walk shortly, was to take off my once-beautiful gown and get a good look at the damage.

It was awful. While I was wearing it, I could tell that it was bad, but studying it on the hanger I knew that it was hopeless. Beyond even the best dry cleaner’s art. The stains on the front of the delicate peach chiffon fabric had hardened, and turned from the vivid red of fresh blood to a dull shade of old rust.

Even though he was a disgusting human being, the fact was that a man had died a violent death tonight; that was far more serious than the loss of a designer gown. I wasn’t sure Phil Logan would see it that way. I dreaded calling him, but I knew that I had to. After putting on a sweater and slacks, I sat down on the edge of my bed and picked up the receiver.

Instead of dialing Phil’s cell phone, which I knew he answered twenty-four hours a day, I did the cowardly thing and punched in his office number, to get his voice mail.

One ring.

“Hello,” Phil said.

Ooops.
“What are you doing at the office so late, Phil?”

“Working. I heard about Ingram’s murder.”

“How did you know? It couldn’t have been on the news yet.”

“There’s no such thing as a secret—if you’ve got friends who are cops,” Phil said. “I’m writing a press release that mentions your name, but doesn’t make it sound as though I’m using somebody’s death for publicity. It’s a delicate balancing act.”

“Must you do that? It makes me uncomfortable.”

“Sometimes effective PR is like making sausages—you shouldn’t see how it’s done,” Phil said.

“I make my own sausages, and there’s nothing to hide.”

“Talking about food is making me hungry. Listen, the story I’m writing says that you ruined a six-thousand-dollar Jorge Allesandro gown trying to save Keith Ingram’s life.”

“Two security men worked on him. You can’t give me credit for—”

“My hotel source said you were the first to try to administer aid. Right or wrong?”

“Well, I tried to stop the bleeding from his wound, but it was just for a second or two until the security men—”

“But you tried. Right? And in thinking about Ingram, your dress was ruined.”

It was useless to try to talk Phil out of doing his job as he saw it. I gave up and moved on to the subject I feared. “You said the dress cost six thousand dollars. Will Mr. Allesandro let me make partial payments over time?”

I heard Phil chuckle. “Are you worried about that? Don’t be. Jorge won’t ask you for money. He’ll get many thousands of dollars of free publicity out of the fact that you were wearing his gown at the scene of a murder. Luckily, my photographer got pictures.”

“When?”

“Tonight. There was so much going on, you probably didn’t notice.”

“No, I didn’t.” A new thought occurred to me; it was about Phil’s boss and mine, Mickey Jordan. “Does Mickey know what happened tonight?”

“No. He and Iva are sailing around the Greek Islands, and Greece is nine hours ahead of us. He makes his daily check in call at six PM his time, which is nine AM ours. I’ll tell him about it then.”

“The trip is their second honeymoon. I hope this won’t make him cut it short.”

“No reason for him to do that. You were just on the scene of a crime—you didn’t commit one.”

“Get some sleep,” Phil said. “You’ve got a live show to do tomorrow night. Actually, you’ll be going on the air about nineteen hours from now.”

I agreed—but with my fingers crossed. Phil told me he would have the dress picked up sometime tomorrow, and we said good night.

My second call was to Nicholas D’Martino’s cell phone. He answered in two rings, but sounded sleepy. When he heard my voice, he said, “Hi, Slugger. How’d the judging go?”

“The contest was interrupted. Somebody threw a smoke bomb, and when everybody could see again we found that Keith Ingram had been stabbed to death.”

“Details.” His tone was brisk, professional. All trace of sleepiness was gone from his voice.

I told Nicholas everything I knew, including the fact that John had hit Ingram close to an hour before the murder. There was no way to keep that a secret to protect John because there had been too many witnesses. Because John was a decorated lieutenant in the LAPD, that detail was sure to be in every report of the crime.

“Do you think O’Hara killed Ingram?”

“No! And I’m not saying that because he’s my friend. John is not a murderer. In fact, he’s never even killed anyone in the line of duty.”

“Okay, okay. Don’t get mad at me. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt, but socking Ingram looks bad. It had something to do with Eileen, didn’t it?”

I didn’t want to lie to Nicholas, but I wasn’t going to betray Eileen. Taking a middle course, I said, “Maybe John heard bad things about Ingram and women. Look, I can’t talk about this anymore right now. I have a live show to do tonight. When are you coming back?”

“Friday morning. I’m going to call the paper now, see who’s on the Ingram story and work with him on follow-ups.”

“See you Friday?”

“Without fail.” His voice took on a caring tone. “Sleep well. I know it won’t be easy.” He added something sweet and we said good night.

It was nearly two o’clock in the morning when Liddy phoned from her car to tell me she was on her way. As we planned, she had waited until Bill was asleep, and then sneaked out.

I grabbed the gym bag in which I’d packed the items I would need: a pencil flashlight, a roll of duct tape, a spray can of WD-40, a hand towel, a fresh pair of the white cotton “beauty gloves” I wore when I went to sleep with my hands covered in cream—and an auto center punch. The final item was something I had taken from the glove compartment of my Jeep shortly after I got home. It was five inches long and half an inch in diameter: about the size of a stubby pencil. With its alloy steel point, it was the most crucial tool of my new trade: burglary.

Even though I had committed to memory every inch of Eileen’s diagram of Ingram’s house, I didn’t want to risk the smallest mistake, so I folded the precious sheet of paper and shoved it into the pocket of my slacks.

After petting Tuffy and Emma, and assuring them that I would be back soon, I slipped outside to wait in the darkness for Liddy. Lucky for me—for what I intended to do—there was only the tiniest sliver of new moon, and clouds obscured the stars.

My neighborhood was quiet. None of the houses I could see from where I stood in the driveway showed the glow of interior lights. The dogs in this canine-friendly area weren’t barking. The only sounds I heard were faint traffic noises in the distance. I knew most of the vehicles carried people who were going to their work, or coming home. Or returning from late night revelry. I wondered if any of the motorists were heading toward commission of a felony. Given the most recent Los Angeles crime statistics, I guessed that there were probably a few villains among the innocent commuters.

A pair of headlights turned onto my street from Montana Avenue, three blocks south. At that distance, I couldn’t tell who might be in the car, so to avoid arousing suspicion by standing outside at this hour I retreated to concealment behind the large weeping willow tree in my front yard.

When the vehicle was half a block away, I recognized Liddy’s ivory Land Rover and hurried down to the sidewalk to wave at her. She stopped next to me, but didn’t cut the engine.

As I climbed into the passenger seat and put the gym bag down next to my feet, she put one index finger to her lips. I nodded agreement to being silent, but when I fastened my seat belt the resulting
click
sounded almost as loud as a car backfiring.

Liddy emitted a barely audible nervous titter. I held my breath. We scanned the nearest houses for any sudden turning on of lights.

Nothing.

Liddy put the car in gear but didn’t turn her lights on again until we came to Montana Avenue and she turned left, toward Hollywood.

Even at this hour, there was strong illumination on Montana. For the first time I was able to get a good look at Liddy. I laughed, because we were dressed almost identically in black sweaters and black slacks. The only difference in our attire was that she wore a black knit cap covering her blonde hair. I’m a brunette, so I didn’t need a cap to make myself less noticeable, but I’d tied my shoulder-length hair back in a ponytail.

“We look like twin cat burglars,” I said. “Maybe we should stop at a gas station and buy some black grease to cover our faces.”

Liddy shuddered. “That would be awful for our skin. Open the glove compartment and take out the baggie.”

I did as directed and removed a Ziploc bag. “What’s in here?”

“Two pairs of Bill’s powder-free latex examination gloves. So we won’t leave fingerprints. He keeps a box in the bathroom. Aren’t they just like what the police use when they’re investigating?”

“Yes. These are better than the white cotton gloves I brought. You have an unexpected talent for crime, Liddy.”

“Thanks.” In the headlights of cars coming toward us, I saw her grin with pride.

With traffic moving swiftly on Sunset Boulevard at that time in the morning, we reached Laurel Canyon in twelve minutes. At my instruction, Liddy turned left and we headed up into the narrow, winding canyon.

When we were about fifty yards from Kirkwood Drive, I said, “Slow down here.”

Just below the Canyon Country Store, I directed Liddy to turn into the shallow turnaround at the foot of Rothdell Terrace. “Park here, in front of the dry cleaners, but face out toward Laurel.”

Liddy maneuvered as I’d suggested, then stopped and turned off the engine. No cars were behind us on Laurel, nor, for the moment, were any coming from the valley toward Hollywood. We sat in the darkness for a few moments, listening for the sounds of footsteps, and watching for lights turned on in any of the nearby houses.

When we were satisfied that the neighborhood was asleep, Liddy whispered, “What now?”

“We walk up Rothdell and find Ingram’s little pseudo Swiss chalet.”

“Walk? That road looks as though it goes almost straight up.”

“It’s narrow, and I don’t know where it would be safe to park. Besides, if we have to get away fast it’s better to have the car down here, where we can get right onto Laurel Canyon.”

To reduce the amount of noise we made, we opened only Liddy’s driver’s side door. After she got out quietly, I handed her my gym bag, then climbed over the gearbox, and stepped down onto the cement beside her. Liddy closed the Rover’s door with only the faintest
clunk
and locked the vehicle.