This Girl for Hire (16 page)

Fighting a blackout, I grabbed the edge of the bar and shot a flare up in the general direction of Joe King. He got my signal and breezed over.

“For God's sake, Honey,” Joe said angrily. “You look like Hell-warmed-over for the Fourth-of-July. What's happened?”

“Have you seen Swanson in the last few minutes?” I demanded.

“No. Haven't seen him since this morning.”

“You're sure?”

“Of course I'm sure,” Joe said. “What are you doing in men's clothes? I hardly recognized you.”

“My dressmaker's on vacation!” I said, holding my head. There was a lump on the left side that would have frightened an ostrich. I studied the crowd. The character who leveled me with the blunt instrument had to be around somewhere. And I felt certain that character was Swanson.

I dashed across the street to the Hi-Ho bar. The same sort of candlelit fandango
was going on. One difference. Danny Marble was sitting at a table with a blonde about my size. One difference here, too. This gal didn't have a lump on her topside. I joined them.

“Gee, Honey,” Danny said warmly, “where you been? I looked for you.” He glanced at his partner. “Oh, I'd like you to meet Toni.”

Toni was about twenty and stacked to the rooftops in a flashy orange dress.

“I owe you an apology, Danny,” I said. “I was sure your story about another gal was a phony.”

The big youth grinned. “Well, I didn't tell you the absolute truth. I knew you weren't Toni in the first place.”

I scanned the surrounding populace. No Swanson.

“Listen, Danny,” I said quickly. “Did you go to my cabin after the card game?”

“Yeah, I was worried. It was raining bad and I knew you weren't exactly dressed for the weather.”

“How'd you know that?”

Danny said, “I found your bathing suit. It was caught in a fence outside our cabin. So I took it to your place.”

“Did you try the door?”

“Sure. But I knocked first.”

“Was it unlocked?”

“Yeah, it was,” Danny said. “That surprised me, because you weren't there and I saw you lock it when we left for the
Phoenix
.”

“You did see me lock it?”

“Of course. I even tried it after you turned the key. Don't you remember?”

I nodded dazedly. Blackness was drawing in again
and I needed air. Without an explanation, I headed for the street. The night mist felt cool to my face. I walked up one street and down another. More than anything I wanted to come face to face with Robert Swanson, television's gift to humanity. I wanted to take that gift and give it back to the Indians, piece by piece.

I wound up at the police station and quickly phoned the Los Angeles Sheriff's office, homicide.

“We're socked in solid, Honey,” Mark explained, after he got on the phone. “I've been trying to charter a plane for the past three hours, but everything's grounded. You might have mist, but we've got the works. Lightning, thunder, hail. It's like pea soup outside.”

“You should crawl inside my head,” I groaned. “Pea soup doesn't begin to describe the weather conditions. Somebody slugged me.”

Mark swore. “I told you to stay out of trouble. What happened?”

I gave him the details and then said, “I suppose you know about Decker?”

“Know about him? Clements had me on the phone for forty-five minutes. Why do you think I've been trying to break every law of aerial navigation to get over there?”

“I thought you wanted to see me,” I said miserably, trying to make light of the situation. “Now I know the truth. All you want is to gaze at Decker's body and take notes.”

“Whose body do you want me to gaze at? If it's yours, I won't bring a note pad, I'll bring a deck of cards.”

“Where'd you hear about that?”

“What difference does it make?” he said. “Next time I find out you've been playing strip poker, I'm going to slap you in the pokey so fast
you'll think you came up with seven aces!”

“That does it!” I retaliated. “I'm going out and start the biggest strip-poker game in history. By the time you get here, you'll think Catalina is a nudist camp.”

“Is that so?” Mark said, suddenly serious. “You're a sassy blonde with plenty of guts and body, but when it comes to the think department, you've got another think coming.”

“What do you mean?”

“You
think
Swanson hit you, right?”

“Right!”

There was a slight crackling pause. “Okay. If your Villa door was open after you locked it earlier, someone must have opened it with a key, right?”

“I—guess so,” I stammered. “I never thought about it.”

“Of course you never thought about it,” Mark said. “Hot heads die young. You've got a brain that's saturated with gasoline.”

“Who says so?”

“I do. Someone throws a match and you blow, everytime.”

I thought about that with my muddled tank of gasoline. Mark was so right. I had been hurt and gone haywire. Ignited was a better word. I'd blown when the chips were down.

“Okay,” I said, “I've just installed some asbestos. Fire away!”

“Check with the manager of the
Villa,” Mark advised. “If your cabin wasn't broken into, then someone used a key. Maybe Swanson gave a song and dance about being your husband and the manager opened the door.”

“Think you're smart, don't you?”

Mark said, “It's easy when you're born that way.”

“Very funny,” I said. “Well, make a joke out of this. I think I've found a connection between the Nelson case and the four murders over here.”

“What's the connection?” the lieutenant barked.

“The metal case containing Rod Caine's lab equipment. I believe it was used to transfer heroin.”

“Do you know for sure?”

“No. But I'm going to find out. You'd better break up the atmosphere as soon as you can and get over here before I win that bet of ours by default.”

Mark told me to stay out of dark cabins, promised to tear holes in the sky and then hung up. I walked to the manager's office after reaching the Villa and rang the bell. A squat little man clutching a candle came to the door.

“Did you open up cabin thirty-six for someone this afternoon?” I asked.

He stared blankly at the candle, then shook his head. “What about the woman who rented the cabin to me this morning? Maybe she opened it.”

“That's my wife,” he said. “I'll ask her.” He disappeared.

He returned shortly. “Yes, she opened up thirty-six. It was early this evening. About six-thirty
or seven. The man said his name was West. Said he was your husband—that you misplaced your key.”

“I haven't got a husband. What'd he look like?” The manager's face dropped a foot. “This is terrible. Was something taken? It was raining so hard and my wife probably thought—”

“What'd he look like?” I repeated.

He hurriedly disappeared inside again and returned with his wife, a dumpy blonde in a faded negligee.

“What are you trying to start anyway?” she bellowed. “You were with the man when I gave him the key.”

I tried to unscramble that one.

She continued, “I don't give out no keys unless the renter is there, and you were there. Now what do you say to that?”

“What was I wearing?”

The dumpy one chewed for an instant on a fingernail. “A raincoat and hat, and—and an orange dress. I seen it under the coat.”

“What'd the man look like?”

“Hard to say. He was wearing a trench coat and hat. I never got a good look at his face. He had a lot of pimples, that's all I saw.”

“That's enough,” I said. “Thanks.”

I bent into the wind as I walked down the main street again. Rain drove in under my jacket, drenching my skin.

They were still sitting at the table in the Hi-Ho bar. I crossed over and plumped down beside
blonde, busty Toni. She did resemble me in many respects. I studied Danny's pockmarked cheeks.

“Did you open my cabin door tonight?” I asked him carefully.

“Yeah, I told you,” Danny said. ‘The door was already unlocked.”

“Who unlocked it?”

“I dunno.”

“The manager's wife down at the Villa says you unlocked it, Danny.”

“She's crazy!”

“She says I was with you at the time.”

“Well, now you know she's crazy for sure,” Danny said.

I glanced at the other blonde. “Except it wasn't me she saw, was it, Danny? It was Toni.”

“Does that make sense?”

“No, it doesn't,” I said. “That's why I want to know why you did it.”

Danny looked at Toni and swallowed hard. “The manager's wife is wrong.” He got to his feet. “We better go, Toni.”

I shoved the kid into his chair. “Now, listen, mister,” I said, “someone was waiting for me inside my cabin tonight when I got back. He didn't care about playing strip poker or diving for abalone, he just wanted to split my skull in half. And he would have done it if I hadn't dodged. Now, why'd you open that door, Danny?”

“I didn't!”

“You wanted that metal case back. You
wanted to be absolutely certain you hadn't left any heroin caps inside, didn't you?”

Danny got to his feet. “You're crazy!”

I pushed him down again and reached for his right shirt sleeve. “Show me your arms. Danny!”

“No!” He pulled away.

I grasped Toni's left arm and straightened it out. In the slender white hollow was a blue vein, punctured with tiny, dark needle marks.

“Now what do you say, Danny?”

“That doesn't prove anything. Now leave us alone!”

“You were in my cabin, weren't you?”

“No!”

“You're a liar. Who's supplying you with junk? Swanson?”

“Na!”

“Who?”

“Nobody! I didn't open your door. I wasn't in your cabin.”

I kicked his chair and Danny went head-over-heels into another table. Chairs, people, food, glasses and candles went hurtling every which way. The Hi-Ho bar seemed to rise up in one stupendous wave and break for the front door. In the wild excitement two people vanished into the night rain—Danny Marble and blonde Toni.

I could have kicked myself I was so mad. Nothing was damaged in the Hi-Ho except my hopes for a quick solution to the cabin attack. Mark was absolutely right. My temper always got the better of
me at the wrong time.

Outside, the street lights went on and the rain stopped. I returned to my cabin, made certain the metal case was gone, then climbed the long flight of steps to the chimes tower.

The hillside area, above the dark, dimly lit city, seemed deserted until the crunch of footsteps rose be hind me. I whirled. A big shape loomed up in the dark ness. I caught the man in the glare of my flashlight. It was Rod Caine.

He wore a sleeveless shirt and on the lower part of his right arm was a long, deep scratch.

“R
OD! WHAT ARE YOU DOING ON THIS ISLAND
?” 

“Honey, am I glad to see you alive,” he said, trying to put his arms around me.

I stepped back. “I told
you to stay aboard
Hell's Light
. Why didn't you?”

He frowned at my cool reception. “I got a message.”

“You were supposed to ignore any messages.” I stared at the slash on his forearm.

Rod shook his head. “This one I couldn't ignore. It was from Bob Swanson, a note saying he was going to kill you.”

“Where is it?”

He shrugged his big shoulders. “I don't know. I guess I lost it. It shook me up so much I just hopped a water taxi and came on into Avalon. Thank God you're all right.”

“Who delivered the message?”

“It came by the same water taxi,” he said, irritated by my questions. “What's the matter?”

“What time'd you arrive in Avalon?”

“I don't know. Four-thirty. Five. What difference
does it make?”

“It makes a big difference,” I said. “Max Decker was murdered around that time.”

“Yeah,” Rod winced. “I heard about Max. Too bad.”

“Who'd you hear it from?”

“Chief Clements. He told me you were staying in number thirty-six at the Villa. I went there. The door was open, but nobody was around, so I finally came up here.”

“What time did you see Chief Clements?”

“About two hours ago,” Rod said. “What is this, anyway? Am I a suspect again?”

“Where'd you get that scratch on your arm?” Rod looked at the long deep wound. “I got mixed up with a woman. Does that answer your question, Miss District Attorney?”

I took a firm hold on the butt of the flashlight. “I never thought you'd do anything like this.”

“Like what?” Rod's nostrils flared angrily. “If you must know the truth, Lori scratched me with her fingernails. We got into an argument about you. She got mad and drew blood. Is that what you're talking about?”

“When did this happen?”

“About an hour before I received the message from Swanson. Lori wound up with a black eye, but I had to do it. She would have cut me to ribbons. What's this all about?”

“Is Lori still aboard
Hells Light
?”

“As far as I know she is,” Rod said. “I don't think she'd travel far with an eye like that.”

“All right,” I said, “let's go see her.”

I started down the path toward
town. Rod stopped me abruptly. “What difference does it make if Lori has a shiner? I didn't mean to hurt her. What's the matter with you?”

I studied him in the glare of the flashlight. “If Lori Aces doesn't have a black eye, or if she's gone, Rod, you're in trouble. Big trouble. Understand?”