moved to the window. It was dark outside. A cat meowed and someone slammed a screen door. Tin cans fell against cement and the cat meowed again. I moved back to the middle of the room.
“You find him in my car?”
“Uh-huh. Two thirty-eight slugs in him. Looks like he was hit over the head first, then shot.”
“I don’t own a gun.”
“I know that.”
“How’d you find him?”
“A woman, walking along the street. He was lying half out of the car. She thought he was just a drunk. She opened the car door and he fell out. She screamed like bloody hell and some guy called us.”
“Simple, isn’t it?”
“I don’t know, Johnny. Is it?”
I sat down on the bed. Wheeler scratched the back of his neck. We looked at each other.
I said: “You don’t think—”
“You’re not that dumb, Johnny.”
“I hope to hell not.”
“What did Jocko want this afternoon?”
I didn’t answer.
“I thought you hated his guts.”
“I do. I did. Everybody did.”
“What did he want?”
I stared at him. He was a smart one. He’d been on the force for fifteen years. Nothing much slipped past this cop.
“I was working on a case,” I said. “He had tailed me, wanted in on it. Apparently, things hadn’t been too good for him lately. That’s all.”
I thought of the $250,000.
“Who’s the client?”
“Can you sit on it?”
“I’m not promising you anything, Johnny. I’ve got a murder on my hands. Murder plays hell in the department. We’ve got to have a killer.”
I said, “I’m not giving you a killer. I don’t know that there’s any connection. My client happens to be Claire Harding.”
His face showed surprise. “The movie star?”
I nodded.
“Traveling big, Johnny? What does she need a goon like you for?”
“That’s private, until you prove otherwise. Maybe she wanted to talk politics.”
He mulled that over, then smiled, the first time he had done so.
“Okay, Johnny,” he said, “that’ll do. You haven’t any idea why Jocko was killed?”
“Not one, Adam.”
Lying comes easy in this business.
“You’ll be around?”
“Of course. I’m going out to the Harding place tonight.”
“Business or pleasure?”
I smiled now. “Business.”
His smile broadened. “I’ve heard of her. Need any help?”
“You’re married.”
“Uh-huh,” he said. He moved to the door, pausing with his hand on the knob. “You can’t use your car. It’s impounded.”
“Thanks.”
“If you happen to think of anything, any reason for Jocko being killed, you’ll let me know?”
“I can give you a thousand reasons,” I said. “For one thing, he smelled in hot weather.”
Wheeler nodded, seriously. “Dead or alive.” He added: “I’d hate to think you’ve been lying to me, Johnny. I like you.”
“It’s mutual.”
He left.
I took off my pants and went into the shower. The water stung my head, trying to beat some sense into it. I wondered just where that $250,000 Jocko had talked about was. I could use it. The thought of the Riviera came to me again.
3
THE CABBIE SWORE LOUDLY AT THE Cadillac convertible which had swerved in front of us. We turned off Sunset, going north. The houses were in the six-figure bracket, though you couldn’t see them; they were well hidden behind trees and a varying type of high wall; occasional lights sprinkled the dark night and I tried not to think of Jocko Quinn. The cab cut sharply into a driveway, slowing between a host of Cadillacs and Jaguars. I was out of my class, way out.
The door opened before I had a chance to ring the bell. The Filipino’s smile was automatic as I handed him my hat. He motioned me towards the front room and the smile disappeared.
It was a small affair, at that. Thirty or forty people lounged about in the gigantic room, all of them seemingly talking at once; smoke clung to the ceiling, drifting above their heads. I could hear another group out by the pool.
No one paid any attention to me. I looked for either Claire Harding or her husband, seeing neither. I did see the young brunette who had modeled the bikini at the pool that morning. She was the central interest of four men, all of them talking only to her, all of them bald, all of them old enough to be her father, or maybe even grandfather. She was dressed in a white knitted suit with a turtle-neck, and there was no room for improvement. Her eyes caught mine, paused on my face for a moment trying to recognize me, then passed on. I could do her no good.
I elbowed my way through the room. Claire Harding was by the pool. She was dressed in an off-the-shoulder black thing that did much for her. She was talking to two women and a man. The man walked away, looking as if he were angry about something. She followed him amusedly with her eyes, then caught sight of me. Her right hand came out in a signal and the two women turned to look at me.
I made it to her side. She gave me a smile.
“Mr. Phelan,” she said, “so good of you to come.”
I smiled my thanks at her courtesy. I suddenly found myself wondering where Daddy was. Did she hide him at these gatherings?
I caught the tail-end of her introduction.
“. . . is a writer. Really a good one, too, you know. Surely you’ve read some of his things.”
One of the women stared at me. She had tight blonde hair that should have been gray by now, a prominent nose and far too much makeup.
“I do so love writers,” she said.
I played
