Not Exactly a Brahmin (18 page)

He kept hold of my hand. “Another time. Soon. After all, I need to call you when I find out about de Gaulle.”

Grabbing my purse, I led him out the door and to the car. I dropped him on Shattuck and headed toward the hills.

The Lois Palmerston I had talked to on the phone bore no resemblance to the cool, beautiful woman I had seen last night. What had happened to make her fall apart so quickly?

T
HE
P
ALMERSTON HOUSE WAS
just as dark and empty-looking as it had been at seven when I had talked with Billy Kershon. I turned off the ignition and watched for movement inside, but there was none. Had Lois Palmerston been so distraught that she’d forgotten where she was when she called me?

The light at the gate was off, but I had been here often enough to find the bell. I rang. The rain ran along my hair, into my collar, down the back of my jacket. I could, I thought, have been curled up on the chaise lounge with the most attractive man I’d met in years; instead I was standing in the rain outside the house of a woman who might not be home. Or worse, a woman who had been here twenty-five minutes ago and now was gone, or who was unable to get to the door.

But the door opened a crack, and the gate buzzer sounded, and I pulled the gate open.

“Have you been sitting with the light out all evening long?” I asked as I walked in the front door.

In the dark, she seemed to be nodding.

I felt for the light and turned it on.

When I had seen her this morning, Lois Palmerston had looked unstrung, but now she was a wreck. The combs had fallen out and her hair hung in stiff, reddish-blond clumps, some clumps swaying out to the side from where the combs had trained them, others hanging limp along her neck. There was a streak of ash across her cheek, and ground-in ash on her silk pants. She’d dribbled coffee on her blouse. She looked more like a chronic alcoholic than the woman I had seen last night.

She pressed her thumb against her cheek to steady her hand as she moved a cigarette to her mouth. The house was thick with smoke. I took her arm and propelled her into the living room, then felt in the likely spot for the light switch and turned on the lights. She started.

Sitting her down on the sofa, I said, “Now what is the matter? Tell me.”

She drew in long on the cigarette. “They’re … they’re going to get me.”

“Who?”

“Just like they did to Ralph. It’ll be easier with me. They’ll just come.”

“Who? Who is going to get you?”

She looked over at me as if seeing me for the first time. “I can’t tell you.”

“You
can
tell me,” I said in a calm voice.

“No. They’d find out.”

“I’m a police officer. I can protect you.”

“No one can help me. They’re outside.”

“Now?”

“Maybe. I don’t know. Before. Before I called you. I heard them then.”

“Were they trying to break into the garage?”

“No, not the garage. I would have heard the door go up.”

“Where, then? Where were they coming in?”

“The front window.”

I looked at the picture window, the lower half covered with wooden shutters. It didn’t open. But the one near it on the side of the house did. “I’m going to look around outside. You just stay here.”

“No. Don’t go.”

“I’ll only be right outside. You can see me through the windows.”

She stared blankly at me. I took her by the hand and walked her to a spot where she could see out both windows. I considered asking her for a flashlight, but even that request seemed more than she could handle. Instead I ran to my car and extricated the one in the glove compartment.

Through the rain I flashed the light along the window frame. There were no marks. But since this window didn’t open, there was no reason there would be. And in the state Lois Palmerston was in, it was questionable whether any menace had existed except in her own imagination. In front of the window were three or four small bushes that had grown together, forming a low hedge that reached just to the window. Three feet of grass separated the street and the hedge. I flashed the light on the bushes but they looked intact. Then I let the light fall to the grass.

There were footprints on the grass. The ground was soft from the rain. The prints must have been fairly clear when they were made, but by now any identifying information had been washed away. From their general shape, particularly the squared-off heel, they looked like they had been made by running shoes.

I followed the footprints to the corner of the front window. Again, I checked the window itself, but there were definitely no marks on the frame.

Behind the wooden shutters Lois Palmerston stared at me, her hazel eyes wide in terror. They looked as if they’d drawn the life from the rest of her pallid face. I forced myself to smile at her and point to the side window. Then I aimed the flashlight down. The prints suggested the running-shoed figure had stepped back from the front window, perhaps when he realized it didn’t open, and moved around to the one at the side. The prints led right up beneath it.

Because of the steep slope of the lot, the side window was a foot farther off the ground than the front one, so that entering here would not be a question of just stepping inside, as one might have from an open front window, but of hoisting up and climbing in. The attempt would have left visible marks on the window frame. I let the light fall on the bush beneath the window. Several small branches were broken. I moved the light up to the frame, ran it along the edges, up one side and down the other, and along the bottom twice. But there were no signs of attempted entry. There were no marks at all.

I focused the light on the ground. The drop to the backyard was steep. The next window back was eight feet off the ground. If anyone were going to break in, it would be through the side window. And unless Lois had turned it off, the house was protected by a burglar alarm system.

Lois was staring down at me. I smiled again and shook my head. Then I aimed the light down. The footprints went no farther. They looked as if they had backed up the way they’d come. But the rain was getting heavier and it was no longer possible to discern which were the toe-heavy forward steps and which the more even backings away.

Motioning to Lois, I moved back to the sidewalk. Without any expectations, I tried the garage door. It didn’t move. By the time I got back inside, the rain had soaked into my jacket again.

Lois was standing at the door shivering. Now, in my wet jacket, I realized how cold it was in this house.

“Haven’t you put the heat on?” I asked.

“I never turn it on. Ralph always did that.”

There were no floor heaters, as many California houses have. This one would have the more expensive central heating. I looked for the thermostat and turned it up to seventy-two. Then I took her by the arm and sat her down on a sofa. I felt as if I were shifting a mannequin.

“You were right,” I said. “There was someone out there tonight. But there are no marks on the windows. So either they decided not to break in or they never intended to. Now, Mrs. Palmerston, who would have reason to be out there under your windows?”

“I don’t know.”

“You said ‘they.’ Who are ‘they’?”

“I don’t know.”

“You must have some idea, some suspicion.”

“No. I don’t know. I don’t know.” Her voice had the same pale, ethereal quality as her face. I couldn’t decide if she really didn’t know, or if she just couldn’t summon the energy to put her suspicions into words. She stabbed out her cigarette in the ashtray. A quick glance showed me that every ashtray in the room was overflowing. She’d been chain-smoking since I had left her last night. If she was going to be at all lucid, she needed food.

“We’re going to the kitchen,” I said. “I’ll fix you something to eat.”

“I can’t eat.”

“Of course you can.” Taking her by the arm, I half pulled her up.

The kitchen was a big remodeled room with portico windows. The center island held a stove, a chopping block, and a counter with two stools. Lois was in no condition to balance on a stool. I left her leaning against the counter.

Thankful that Inspector Doyle couldn’t see this, I scrambled eggs, toasted bread, and found some cocoa in a cabinet. I made enough for two.

“Eat,” I said before she could protest. “You haven’t eaten in thirty-six hours; you can eat. Now go ahead.”

She ate, hesitantly at first, then mechanically. I toasted more bread and she ate that.

When she was done, I said, “Now I want you to tell me what is going on.”

“I’m afraid.”

“Yes?”

“The people who killed my husband, they’re going to kill me.”

“Who are they?”

“I don’t know.”

“Why would they want to kill you?”

She shook her head.

“You must have some idea.”

“No. I told you, I don’t. Stop pushing me.”

I took a breath. “Mrs. Palmerston, you called me at home when I had company. I left my house, and my guest, to come up here because you asked. Now the least you can do is to make an effort to discover what you are afraid of.”

She lit a cigarette and said, as if she were talking to an idiot, “There was someone outside.”

“True. But you don’t suspect it was a prowler or a burglar. You didn’t call for a beat officer. You called for a Homicide detective. You figured the person outside was someone connected with your husband’s murder. Now what makes you think that?”

She just shrugged and smoked.

“Mrs. Palmerston, you say you’re afraid of your husband’s killer, but you do everything in your power to keep me from finding that person. You wouldn’t talk to me earlier. You wouldn’t let me inside. Then you filed a harassment complaint. After all that, you call me and tell me you’re afraid. Now what is it you expect me to do about that?”

“I expect you to protect me,” she said in a surprisingly steady voice. “I’m a taxpayer. We pay a lot of taxes to the city. I expect protection.”

I pressed my fist into the chopping board. “The police department is not a guard agency. We do investigations. If you want a twenty-four-hour guard, get a Doberman.” Before she could respond, I said, “Now I’m going to go through the house to make sure no one did get in.”

I hurried out of the kitchen, through the dining room, and up the stairs before she could follow me. There was no one else in the house; I was sure of that. But I was also sure that Lois Palmerston was no more likely to allow me to search the house now than she had been earlier today. I could see in her the woman who had lived off the Munsons for years and then not deigned to invite them to her wedding. If lack of reciprocity were cash, Lois wouldn’t have needed Ralph Palmerston’s money.

The second floor consisted of three rooms and two baths. For form’s sake I checked the master bedroom and the large bathroom. Then crossing the hall, I listened, but there was no sound of Lois approaching. Either she knew I wouldn’t find anything useful up here, or she
believed
that I was looking for an assailant and she wanted to keep out of the line of fire. Or exhaustion had caught up with her and she was too tired to bother.

Of the two small rooms, one was a guest room. I checked the dresser drawers and closet but there was nothing but spare blankets there. Making my way through the adjoining bathroom, I came to what looked like an office. It was done in mahogany—heavy desk, bookshelves, green leather swivel chair. It looked like an office where John Farrell, the lawyer, would have felt at home.

I listened again, but still there was no sound of Lois approaching. It would take time to search through all the desk drawers and the closet for Ott’s reports, more time than could be explained by looking for an intruder.

I started with the center desk drawer. I pulled it open. On top, was a brown 8½ × 11 envelope. Sliding the papers out, I found Ott’s reports.

I turned to the last page of the bottom report. I was in luck. In caps, it was headed
SUMMARY:

Persuant to your instructions of September and subsequent, I have made inquiries about the five persons you indicated, their compelling interests and what is vital to the sustenance of said interests:

Adam Thede—Sunny Sides Up health food breakfast restaurant. Suppliers of non-organic vegetables: J & R Farms (pesticide use); Oliver Hernandez Farms (herbicide use). Always Fresh Bakery (wheat procured from G.P. Fulmot of Topeka, Kansas, which uses herbicides and pesticides and sells to commercial bakeries). [“9/26” was handwritten in pencil.]

Carol Grogan—1397 Ordway, Berkeley dwelling. Second mortgage in arrears since June of this year. Holder Peter Hargis. Mr. Hargis is willing to sell for a significant profit. [“10/12” was handwritten in pencil.]

Nina Munson—handcrafted jackets sold at Amber Crescent (owner Ruth Katz), Handmade Wraps (owner Estelle Usher), the Normandy (owner Thomas Juriss), and One of a Kind (owners Grace and Robert Simmons.) [“10/25” was in pencil.]

Jeffrey Munson—Munsonalysis. Accepted contract from Von Slocum Mining five years ago. Von Slocum is a major supplier of small mining equipment to South Africa.

As we agreed re: your subject at Trent Cadillac, the conclusion is too obvious to require my services.

This report, following the three preliminary reports, concludes our contract regarding those persons known as Shareholders Five. It has been a pleasure being of service to you.

The report was signed by Herman Ott.

I sat staring at it. Nina and Jeffrey Munson, and—Jesus Christ!—Sam Nguyen.

Or could he possibly have meant—I swallowed—Cap Danziger? I didn’t even want to consider that and its implications. I started riffling through the pages of the full report. Maybe Ott had been less cryptic there. Damn Herman Ott and his professional ethics. Any other private eye would have taken Palmerston’s money for the fifth Shareholder and considered it a gift. I skimmed the pages. I had to know who this fifth member of the group was. Was it possible that the man who had been kissing me on my chaise lounge was involved in Ralph Palmerston’s murder?

Trips to Salinas, Visalia, Delano motels, charges for meals, phone calls, car rentals; Herman Ott was thorough.