Cat and Mouse (7 page)

“Hell, yes! He worked for me for a couple of months. He mopped the place out—you know—the peon labor. What about him?”

“He was murdered in San Valdesto. Don’t you read the papers?”

“Only the sports pages. My stomach is too weak for the rest of it. What’s going on, Brock? You said you were retired.”

“This one is personal. Scarface threatened me and then framed a young friend of mine for Belton’s murder.”

“He threatened
you?
Has he got a death wish, or what?”

“He threatened me by mail. Was Belton working here when he was coming in for cigarettes?”

“He was. Hey, wait—you think this big slob killed Jasper?”

I nodded.

“Jesus! I’d better keep my forty-five handy. What’s his beef with you?”

“I can only guess. My best guess is that he must have been some hoodlum I had put away when I was working here.”

The woman in shorts and halter came from the table, put a slip and some money on the bar and said, “Remember now, Denny, I’ve got a copy of those.”

“I know, Grace! You’ve told me that a hundred times!”

She smiled and left, taking her calculator along.

“Horse players,” Denny said. “They’re bad enough. But women!”

I didn’t comment. I wrote my phone number on a paper napkin and handed it to him. “If Scarface shows up, call me in San Valdesto. If I’m not there, give my wife the message. I’ll be phoning her.” I put a ten-dollar bill on the counter. “That should pay for the call.”

He pushed the bill back. “Make it my contribution to the hunt. This slob shapes up as a public menace.”

I thought of that silly game called treasure hunt we had played in high school, leaving clues at every hidden stop. Was that what the man was playing with me?

He had lured Corey to the shack by sending Jasper up the hill in the Plymouth. He had left clues there that had sent me to Arcadia House and Denny’s Tavern. Why? To get me out of town, to make me an unprotected target? Or was somebody else slated to be his second victim?

I drove to Heinie’s.

He was behind the bar, arguing with a customer, as usual. “You!” he said. “It’s about time! What brings you into my humble establishment?”

“Your gourmet cuisine,” I said. “I’ll have a steak sandwich and beaker of Einlicher.”

“Yes, sir. Coming right up, sir.”

He went to the kitchen; I went to a corner booth. When he came out of the kitchen, he poured a beaker of Einlicher and brought it to the booth. José, his lackey of all trades, took over behind the bar.

Heinie slid into the booth across from me. “I’ve been reading about what’s happening in your town. Trouble, buddy?”

I nodded. “Trouble.”

“Who’s this Corey Raleigh I’ve been reading about?”

“A young man I trained, a private investigator. The way it’s shaping up, that man who asked about me in here could have framed him.”

“How’d he find you? He didn’t get your address from me.”

“I don’t know. When I find him, I’ll know.”

“If
you find him. Do you know his name?”

I shook my head.

“God damn it, I should have asked him!” Heinie said.

“Don’t feel guilty. He would have lied.”

The lunch trade was beginning to come in now, filling the booths. The drinking trade was lining up at the bar. Heinie said, “I’ve got to get to work. Hang around after you’ve eaten, okay?”

I nodded. “I’ve run out of places to go.”

Heinie was still busy when I had finished eating. I went into his small office and made a collect call to the house.

Jan answered. I told her I might be home today or might stay over; I wasn’t sure yet.

She said, “A man named Harley Belton phoned about half an hour ago. He’s staying at the Sheraton here. He left the room and phone number and wants you to call him. Gould that be the boy’s father?”

“Probably.”

She gave me the numbers and said, “Now, damn you,
please
be careful!”

“I will. I’ll phone you again some time today.”

I phoned the Sheraton and Harley Belton was in. I identified myself.

He said, “I’m Jasper Belton’s father. Sheriff McClune gave me your name. Where are you now?”

“In Los Angeles. In a bar near Beverly Hills. I should be home tonight.”

“Stay there,” he said. “That’s where it all started. I want to help you find that bastard.”

“Mr. Belton, that could be extremely dangerous.”

“Don’t tell me about danger, Mr. Callahan. I spent thirty years in the Marine Corps. Wait for me!”

He sounded like my kind of man. I gave him the address and directions on how to get here.

The lunch trade began to drift out; the bar trade stayed to argue. Heinie came over to sit across from me, bringing his steak sandwich and Einlicher with him. José followed him, bringing me another beaker. We didn’t talk much.

I spotted Harley Belton as soon as he walked in. He could have been the model for a Marine poster, lean as a greyhound, ramrod-straight shoulders, eyes of arctic blue, and a crew haircut.

He walked right to the booth where I was reading the morning
Times.
“You’re Callahan, aren’t you? I’ve watched you play.”

“Guilty. Can I buy you a drink?”

“A double bourbon on the rocks,” he said. He sat down across from me.

I called out the order to Heinie and asked, “Have you had lunch?”

He nodded. “I brought a couple of sandwiches along to eat on the way. Have you learned anything here?”

I told him what I had learned and my suspicion that our quarry evidently wanted to play hide-and-seek. I told him about the clues he had left behind and the ploy he had used to trap Corey.

“Those cuties can outfox themselves,” he said. “I brought along the letters from my son. There might be some leads in them.”

I said, “Mrs. Patino told me he rarely wrote to her.”

“She’s my wife’s daughter,” he explained. “She and Jasper were never very close. My first wife died three years after he was born. I can’t say I was much of a father, away on duty so often, and Jasper never really got along with my present wife.”

I said nothing.

He took a swallow of his drink. “Gad, that was a dumb move to Arizona! I thought Tritown was boring. Compared with Sun City, it’s Paris.”

“How old are you?”

“Fifty-three. I joined the Marines when I was eighteen and retired when I was forty-eight. I had a smart buddy in the service who told me where to invest my money, so I’m not hurting. Could I buy you a drink? I’m going to have another.”

He had another double bourbon, I another beer.

“You got any kids?” he asked.

I shook my head. “I married too late.”

He took a deep breath. “I had one—and blew it! He was a smart and sensitive kid. It’s not easy for a dumb Marine to understand a smart kid.”

Again, I said nothing.

“And killing the creep,” he said, “won’t bring Jasper back.”

“Easy, Harley! We’re not the law.”

“I know, I know,” he said wearily. “Jasper—that’s a dumb name to give a kid, right? My first wife had a rich uncle by that name. Hell, he didn’t leave the kid a dime.” He finished his drink. “Santa Monica and Venice, that’s where most of his letters were written. Should we headquarter there?”

“It makes sense. I know a fairly nice motel in Santa Monica that won’t gouge us. You can follow me.”

He followed me. He practically tailgated me to the Bayside Inn. He was driving a new Camaro, but with a lot more horses under the hood than Corey’s old one. Harley, like Larry and Bernie, didn’t favor foreign products, probably their only area of agreement.

At the desk, the dapper clerk smirked and said, “Twin beds or a double bed, gentlemen?”

Harley turned rigid. I said quickly, “Twin beds,” thus saving the man from a flying trip through the plate-glass window that fronted on the parking lot.

In our second-floor room, Harley said, “This is really kook country, isn’t it?”

“It is,” I agreed. “Let’s look over the letters.”

“The name of the man we want isn’t in them,” he told me. “They were mostly about the kids he met here. The only man he mentioned is somebody the kids called Big Bear.”

“Why don’t you make out a list of them,” I suggested, “while I take a shower?”

He nodded agreement.

H
ARLEY HAD THE LIST
made out when I came from the shower. Some were only first names. But there were other means of identification; one a poet, another a guitar player, another the publisher of an antiestablishment press in Venice.

Harley smiled. “Names, names— Guess what my middle name is.”

“You tell me.”

“I’ll give you a hint. I grew up in Milwaukee.”

“Davidson?”

He nodded. “My old man grew up with Bill Harley and Walter Davidson. The difference is that they built motorcycles and he only rode them. So they wound up rich and he wound up with a couple of broken legs.”

“And you wound up in the Marines. Do you have any tattoos?”

“None I’m going to show you. A tattoo is also a call sounded before taps, notifying us to go to quarters.”

“I’m sure there’s some symbolism there that escapes me,” I said. “To get back to the here and now, what did Jasper say about this man called Big Bear?”

He picked up one of the letters and read aloud: “‘I first saw him when I was working in a Venice bar. He never talked much there. Later I got to know him at several of Duane’s parties. Duane admires him, a true revolutionary, he claims. I’m not sure I agree but he certainly is interesting.’”

“That’s the only time Jasper mentioned him?”

He nodded. “That was his last letter to me.”

“This Duane is the one who publishes the
Venice Vendetta,
isn’t he?”

He nodded again.

“We’ve got a lot of time before dinner,” I suggested. “Let’s run over and talk with Duane.”

He tapped the letter. “This is Jasper’s last address. Let’s go there first.”

It was an ancient frame house of two stories, newly painted, only a few blocks from Denny’s Tavern. The sign next to the door informed us that there was a room for rent. Harley turned the old-fashioned bell crank in the door.

A normally thin but currently pregnant black woman in a flowered print caftan opened the door a few moments later.

Harley said, “I am Jasper Belton’s father. My friend, here, is a police officer from San Valdesto. Could we ask you some questions?”

“Of course,” she said. “Come in.”

She led us to a small and sparsely furnished room in the front of the house. It now served as a living room but had probably been a front parlor when the house was built.

We sat on a worn velour-covered couch, she in a matching chair. She said, “Your son was a fine boy, Mr. Belton. I liked him.”

“Yes,” he said. “And I’m afraid I was a bad father. Do you know any of his friends—particularly a man who calls himself Big Bear?”

She shook her head. “Jasper’s friends rarely came here. He knew I didn’t like them. Jasper mentioned that man but I never learned his real name.”

“Was he moody when he was here?”

“At times,” she said. “Who isn’t—at times? He told me that doctor up in the San Fernando Valley thought he had schizophrenia.” Her smile was sad. “You know what Jasper told
him?
He told him ‘physician, heal thyself.’ Doctors—! I’ll be going to a midwife.”

“Was he ever on drugs when he was here?”

She hesitated.

“I have to know,” Harley said.

She nodded. “He was, I’m almost sure, the last week he was here. Before that, if he was, it didn’t show.”

“Nothing else?”

“Nothing,” she said, “except that I sure miss him.” Tears came to her eyes. “I hope you find that mother-fucking son of a bitch!”

“I assure you, ma’am,” Harley said in an even voice, “that we intend to find the man you have just described so accurately.”

He was silent as we walked to my car. After I had started the engine, he said, “Nice lady. I should have married
her.”

“Duane next?” I asked.

He nodded.

The office of the
Venice Vendetta
was a narrow place, sandwiched between a deserted sidewalk restaurant and an adult bookstore.

A thin youth with a pale complexion and wheat-colored hair was laying out photos on a table on the other side of the counter. He was wearing a pair of old khaki trousers, sandals, and a sweat-stained T-shirt.

He studied us. “Yes—?”

“I’m Jasper Belton’s father,” Harley said. “You’re Duane?”

“Yeah. So? And who’s your friend?”

“I have a number of names,” I said. “You can call me trouble.”

“Oh, God!” he said. “A comedian!”

“And large. We came here to find out the name of the man known locally as Big Bear. We think he’s the man who murdered your friend Jasper.”

“Jasper—dead?” He came to the counter.

“Dead,” I said. “Don’t you read the papers?”

“Not the commercial ones. Jesus!”

“All we want from you,” I told him, “is the name of the man who calls himself Big Bear.”

“So help me, I don’t know it. I never knew it.”

Harley said, “Jasper told me in one of his letters that you admired the man.”

He nodded. “Oh, yes! Until the bastard left town owing me seventy dollars.”

I smiled. “I guess he wasn’t the true revolutionary you thought he was.”

He glared at me. “God damn you, lay off! Jasper was my friend.”

“So was the man who killed him,” I said. “The man he met through you. Learn to live with that!”

“You said you
think
he killed him,” he pointed out. “You don’t
know.
I have no reason to want to defend him after he stiffed me. But a man is innocent until he is proven guilty.”

“Yes. Is Big Bear bald? Does he have a scar on his right cheek?”

He stared at me and nodded.

“Does he smoke Corinth cigarettes?”

He nodded again.

“Do you know where he buys them now? He stopped buying them at Denny’s Tavern.”

He shook his head. “I don’t know where he bought them, then or later.”

Harley put the list of names on the counter. “Could you help us with the last names and addresses of these friends of Jasper’s? They might have some information we can use.”