The Ticket Out (44 page)

“I need to talk to Mrs. Johnson.”

“Were you in the tunnel, honey? Is that what happened?”

A tenant sniffled. Erma said, “Quiet!”

It was no good: the tenants heard “tunnel” and started to cry. Crying led to sobbing. They sobbed into their Kleenex and clutched each other's hands. Dorene's eyes filled with tears. Erma shook her head at me. Then she gave in and cried, too.

I sat down between Erma and Dorene. Dorene's crying was silent. I said, “I need to talk to you about Jules Silverman and Georgette Bauerdorf.”

Dorene didn't answer and didn't look at me. I didn't know if she could hear, or if she was crying because she saw everyone else crying. Her black dress had moth holes.

I tried again. “Mrs. Johnson, I need to talk—”

Dorene opened her lips. She whispered, “Fix me a drink.”

I stood up and walked to the bar. I poured her a bourbon over ice, and the same for the other tenants. I handed glasses around; that stopped the crying. Erma turned hers down. Too early in the day, she said.

Dorene guzzled her drink and seemed to perk up. I'd poured her the stiffest one. I said, “What did you tell Greta about Jules—?”

“Ben!”

Dorene blurted out the name. I said, “What about Ben?”

A tenant wailed,
“It's all his fault! The policemen said—!”

Erma broke in. “Button it, Shirley—we know what happened. You're upsetting everyone.”

Shirley bit her knuckles; she was past sixty and jaundice yellow. Another tenant put an arm around her.

Erma leaned close and spoke low to me. “Ben threatened Dorie, you know, before she collapsed outside. He said not to talk about your Silverman person.”

I spoke low, too. “How do you know?”

“Dorie said.”

“What else did she say?”

Erma shook her head. “Dorie will never tell you what you want to know. None of us knows.”

“She told Greta Stenholm.”

Erma shrugged. “Greta was a beautiful girl.”

I looked at Dorene. A lie came to me. I raised my voice and addressed the tenants.

“Mrs. May died because of a man named Jules Silverman. He is a murderer. Mrs. Johnson has information that will help the police catch Silverman, but she won't give it to them.”

Shirley let loose. “
Flooooooooooo
!”

The other tenants joined in.
“Poor Flo!” “Dorene!” “Tell the police!” “Flo is dead!” “Dorieeeeee!”

Shirley wailed and the tenants sobbed. The noise built but Dorene didn't move or speak. The noise built more. It made my head ache. It didn't affect Dorene.

Erma finally got mad. She reached around me and slapped Dorene in the face. Dorene fell against my shoulder. The tenants gasped and shut up. Dorene lay there and still didn't speak.

Erma heaved herself off the couch, went to the bar, and started pulling out the bourbon bottles. I looked at Dorene: she was watching the process.

Erma said, “You're on the wagon as of now, Dorie. No more joy juice until you tell her what she wants to know.”

Erma set the bottles by the front door and went back for a second load. Dorene's arm shot up. She was pointing into the kitchen.

Erma nodded. “Drunks only understand one language, honey. There's something in the kitchen. I pulled Dorie out of a cupboard this morning.”

I leaned Dorene off me and stood up. “Which cupboard?”

“Under the sink—you'll see where.”

I walked into the kitchen, using the cane to push junk out of my way. The doors under the sink were open. I got down on one knee and stuck my head inside. It was dark. I took the cane, reached for the light switch, and pushed it up. The ceiling light went on. I opened the doors wider.

The cupboard, like the kitchen, was crammed with sacks.

The sacks were paper, plastic, and cloth. I hauled them out and opened them one by one. They held empty liqueur bottles, old restaurant menus, old lingerie, used cosmetic containers,
TV Guides
from ten years ago, Las Vegas souvenirs, obscene corkscrews, joke cocktail napkins, fancy swizzle sticks, and matchbooks from bars all over North America.

My hands got covered with dust. I dumped sack after sack and shoved the contents into a pile. It was nothing but cheap, useless junk.

Erma called from the living room. “Find anything, honey?”

I stood up and searched the sacks on the kitchen counter. I searched the sacks in the sink. I searched the sacks in the cupboards over the sink. I searched the sacks that blocked the kitchen door. I searched all the drawers. I searched the broom closet. Dust rose and stuck to my clothes. I brushed it off and sneezed and sneezed.

I pulled sacks out of a corner cupboard. There was a lazy Susan for pots and pans. I twirled it and pulled sacks off. I searched the sacks one by one. I reached behind the lazy Susan and felt around the back edges. My fingers touched something. I pulled it out. It was just another sack—a crinkled paper sack from a defunct local grocery store. The top was twisted shut.

I untwisted it.

The sack wasn't full like the rest of them: I had to reach way down in. I found a bent-up license plate. I pulled it out and unbent it. Enamel flaked off at the crease. It was an old gold-on-black California plate. The number: 59 B 875.

I set the license plate to one side. I was suddenly moving in slow motion.

I pulled a woman's ring out of the sack. It had a violet quartz stone in a filigreed setting.

Amethyst.

I set the ring beside the license plate.

One last thing at the bottom of the sack. I pulled it out.

A roll of light brown, stretchy material. Thin red borders and a frayed end—like someone had torn a section off it.

No labels or identifying trademarks. I took a guess: a Tetra Brand, ten-inch, nonrubber elastic bandage. Obsolete in America by 1944. Impossible for the cops to trace, because any soldier could have brought it home from a foreign hospital. Impossible to find because it was hidden on a back shelf in a private whorehouse in Culver City.

I sat down on the floor and pressed the bandage against my mouth.

I
WAS CLOSE
now. I had one idea and one goal.

I borrowed twenty dollars from Erma and headed out to Malibu. It was Friday afternoon—the coast highway was jammed with traffic leaving town. I sat in the car and sweated because my jacket hid the bloodstains on my shirt. I inched along in first gear. I was in pain but I didn't want to take any pills. I didn't want to mess up my clarity.

I turned inland at Ramirez Canyon and drove up to the Silverman estate. Silverman's gates were standing open. I didn't stop to wonder why—I drove straight in. There was nobody on the road. I drove almost to the house, veered off, and hid the car in the trees.

I'd brought my smallest tape recorder from home. I loaded a tape and wedged the recorder into my jeans. I threaded the microphone wire under my shirt and clipped the minimicrophone to my collar. I checked the mirror. The round black dot looked like a button.

I turned on the recorder and cranked the volume. I closed my jacket over the bulge in my jeans.

I left the cane in the car and limped to the edge of the tree line. A helicopter was parked in a clearing on the land side of the house. The propellers were spinning. I saw a man in the cockpit and a man crouched beside the landing gear. Hannah Silverman was bent over talking to the guy outside. She held her hair to protect it from propeller wash.

The Silvermans were making a getaway.

I stayed in the trees and circled the drive on the ocean side. Stacks of Vuitton luggage sat on the terrace of the house: it was too much for just the weekend. Three Latin maids walked out the front door. One had a picnic basket, one had carry-on bags. One was pushing a dolly. They piled some of the luggage on the dolly, then argued over how to get the dolly down the steps. I ducked, left the trees, and limped across to the terrace. I hid behind the stone balustrade and waited.

An excellent time to run for it, I thought. Doug in trouble, the cops sequestered: when the smoke cleared the Silvermans would not be available for questioning. Jules wasn't taking chances.

I watched the maids wrestle the dolly down the terrace steps. Luggage fell off. They piled it back on and headed to the clearing. I lost sight of them around a corner of the house.

I climbed the balustrade and dashed for the front door. I hopped on my good foot for speed.

The front door was open and the foyer was empty. The whole big place was quiet—I couldn't hear any maids or medical help. I started down the hall toward Silverman's den. Silverman was coming up the hall toward me. He wore street clothes and bombed along in his motorized wheelchair. A blanket covered his lap and legs. On the blanket was his Oscar statuette. He looked fine.

Silverman saw me and stopped the chair. He said, “How did you get in?”

I kept walking. For technical reasons I had to be closer to him. I said, “Your gates are open.”

Silverman tried to go around me. He called, “Hannah!”

I stepped in front of his chair. He dodged the other direction. I stepped in front of him. His rubber tires squeaked on the marble floor. I smelled menthol rub.

I said, “59 B 875.”

Silverman tried to go around me again. I grabbed the wheelchair and wedged one foot against the tire. He hit the green button on his chair arm. I put my finger on the red button. The wheelchair stalled out.

I said, “An amethyst ring. A license plate. A bandage roll.”

“Hannah!”

I said, “You stole her car and the contents of her purse to throw the cops off. You wanted them to think it was a burglary gone bad and they were looking for a thief. You drove east instead of west to throw them off. You picked a black neighborhood to dump the car to throw them off more. When you ran out of gas, you removed the license plate and hitchhiked back to the Casa de Amor, where you knew a drunken brawl was in progress. You needed an alibi because you knew you were seen talking to her in the Canteen parking lot. You picked the worst drunk for your alibi—”

Silverman's face had gotten hard. He said, “You want money, of course.”

“I found the sack in Dorene Johnson's kitchen. The cops don't have anything else on you. The lightbulb with your thumbprint was tossed, and Dorene's too alcoholic to make a retraction stick. But the cops may or may not care about Georgette Bauerdorf now that they have a confession on Abadi and Stenholm. They were looking at you for Greta because she was found in a bathtub, too.”

Silverman grabbed his wheels and tried to back the chair up. I held on. “Are you interested in who killed Ted Abadi?”

Silverman stopped fighting me. He let go of the wheels and shook his head. He said, “Not in the least.”

I stood back. “How is it that Dorene still had the sack? Why didn't you get rid of the evidence?”

Silverman glanced down the hall. There was nobody around—nobody to come save him. A leather pouch hung off the wheelchair arm. Silverman reached in and pulled out a glasses case. He got out his glasses and put them on. He said, “Remind me what your name is, I've forgotten.”

“Why didn't you get rid of the evidence?”

Silverman tilted his head and studied me. “Ann, if memory serves, and I'm told you're some sort of anti-industry critic for Barry Melling.”

“Why didn't you throw everything down a sewer? Why carry it all the way back to the Casa de Amor?”

Silverman crossed his hands over the Oscar in his lap. He had relaxed. “You're offering me a trade. You have the sack but you don't want money. Like every reviewer in the world you want a job in pictures, and you'd like me to arrange it for you.”

“I want what Greta Stenholm wanted.”

Silverman smiled. “Good, because I don't believe anyone who claims altruistic motives. The first time the Stenholm girl blackmailed me, she wanted the name of Ted's killer. I didn't believe her. But I believed her when she asked for money and a deal to write and direct. You want me to satisfy your curiosity on a few matters and provide you an entrée to the picture business.”

I said, “Yes on both counts.”

Silverman nodded. “I will help you on one count. I'll pick up a telephone and find you a job by next week at the latest.”

He reached for his wheels. I wedged my foot against one tire.

“You were in a panic, maybe even a blackout. You arrived at the Casa and realized you still had the license, ring, and bandage roll. You also had a time crunch because your ship left Long Beach at six in the morning, and it was already, say, three. Everybody at the Casa was drunk or passed out. Dorene was a famous pack rat and your best alibi, so you buried the evidence in her kitchen. You meant to come back and get rid of it, and you tried to, say, after the war. You couldn't find it, but Dorene suspected something because you searched her kitchen. To be on the safe side, you've supplied her with booze all these decades. No need to kill her outright—not with her thirst. Besides, you're not a killer. You just had a thing for Georgette that got out of hand. She told you she was engaged to the soldier in El Paso, and you forced your way into her apartment to convince her of your feelings. You were young and in love.”

Silverman took off his glasses and put them back in the case. He said, “You tell a good story.”

“It was an accident—you didn't mean to kill her.”

“You'll hear from someone next week. I'll have them call you at your newspaper.”

“But rape isn't an accident. You stuffed the bandage in her mouth to keep her quiet. That's how she died—suffocation.”

Silverman looked at me. “You're an imaginative girl. You have a great many story ideas, I'm sure.”

“Only one. It's about the murder of a Hollywood Canteen hostess and her best friend's search for the killer.”