Dead Seed (15 page)

Bernie’s elbows were on his desk, his head was in his hands. The air in his office was clean. I sniffed it to make sure.

“Stop sniffing!” he said. “I haven’t had a cigarette for thirty-three hours.”

“Great! The worst is over. Believe me. I’ve gone through it.”

“Not for me, it isn’t over. I’ve gone through it half a dozen times. Holland told me you were going to talk with Lacrosse’s father in Phoenix. Did you learn anything from him?”

It was not the time to give him any more false hopes. “Not much I didn’t already know,” I said. “Did you talk with Ketchum’s boss?”

“Some officer did. Why?”

“I know the man. I’ll talk with him. What about the Alamo Cafe?”

“What about it?”

“That’s his hangout. Remember? That’s where I talked with him.”

“Oh, yeah. I forgot. Nobody went there. And I doubt if they’re open in the morning. Besides, that accountant with the memory problem is coming in to talk with me this morning.”

“Okay. You do the thinking and I’ll do the plodding. I’ll visit my friend first and hit the Alamo this afternoon.”

He nodded. “Brock—thanks.”

“For what?”

“Just thanks,” he said wearily. “Go!”

Even at Corey’s rate of three dollars and thirty-five cents an hour, I was saving the taxpayers some money. I love to feel noble.

The twenty-six handicapper who ran San Valdesto Electronics told me that Gus had put in one day at his firm—Monday. He hadn’t shown up on Tuesday.

“Since I talked with that police officer,” he said, “one of our other security men on the same shift told me he walked with Ketchum to the parking lot and saw a man who was driving a lavender Cadillac talk with him there.”

“Lavender—?”

“You know—a sort of pale purple.”

“I know. Do you have Ketchum’s address?”

He got it for me from personnel. And he assured me that Ketchum’s job was still waiting for him. “He gave me a tip on a horse in the sixth at Hollywood Park,” he explained, “and I made a bundle on him. We need more men like that in this firm.”

In the clear air of Prescott, all the pieces in this puzzle had fallen into place; the pattern was complete. Each character’s role in the tragedy had been defined. Each character had peripheral connections with the others. Both the fire and the murder had their seeds in Skeleton Gulch.

The revelations: The yellow pickup, the wallet, the Morgenstern connection, Mr. Lacrosse’s slip of the tongue—these had all come to light on the trip.

Leaving the scene of the fire is not substantial evidence of arson. Carrying a wallet bearing a victim’s initials is not acceptable evidence of murder. And trying to explain to a jury that a man with the middle name of Tryden was automatically involved with the star of a picture containing that name should give the jury a few laughs.

A deal, a trade-off, is one police route to a conviction. In the secretive cast of this tragedy we would have to find a player who would be willing to deal, who would sell out his fellow conspirators for a lightened sentence.

Ex-cops know about deals. But Bernie had not taken that route. And now his ace in the hole was missing, and his other high card either frightened off, paid off, or dead. All Bernie had left was the signed statement of Mrs. Lacrosse. It was possible that she would have second thoughts about cooperating with the law now that Alvin had been arrested.

The address for Gus Ketchum was a two-story wooden house on Castro Street, newly painted a dull but serviceable gray. A sign next to the front door informed any passerby that there was a room for rent. I hoped it wasn’t the vacated room of Gus.

The woman who answered the door had the same general contours as Mrs. Lacrosse, but her smile was bright and the cotton floral-print dress she wore was immaculate.

I told her I was trying to locate Gus Ketchum.

She nodded. “So are the police and his bookie and his boss. Are you a friend of his?”

“Kind of. My name is Callahan. I’m the man who got him his new job out at San Valdesto Electronics.”

Her smile was even brighter. “Gus told me about you. You’re Brock the Rock! My late husband was one of your most devoted fans.”

I tried to look modest. I asked, “Do you think something serious might have happened to Gus?”

She shook her head. “I doubt it. He came home Monday night after work acting like a man who had just come into money. He told me he’d be out of town for a while but not to rent his room. He paid me for the two weeks he owed me and a week in advance.”

“Do you think he’s left town, then?”

She studied me doubtfully. “I’ve already told you more than I told the police. I don’t want to get Gus into trouble.”

“That’s not why I’m here. I want to get him out of trouble. Did he tell you I paid off his bookies for him?”

“He did. And got him a job. And my late husband wasn’t often wrong about people—except for his relatives. There’s this woman he’s been seeing. She lives in those red-brick apartments over on Janeiro Street. Her name is Stella. I don’t know her last name, but how many Stellas can there be in there?”

I thanked her. I asked her to have Gus phone me if he showed up. She promised me that she would.

A light-green Chevrolet pickup had parked behind my car while I had been talking with the landlady. Dwight Kelly was standing next to it as I came along the walk.

“Looking for Gus?” he asked me.

“No. Trying to rent a room. How’s business, Red?”

“I eat. How come your kike buddy isn’t with you?”

“Watch it, creep!” I warned him.

He smiled, the happy warrior. “That’s what he is, isn’t he? Don’t tell me you didn’t know he was a yid.”

Enough, enough, enough. I caught him flush in the mouth with an overhand right. The back of his head thunked into the cab of his truck and he slumped. He was on his way down when my right knee crashed into his groin.

In my neighborhood, the residents would now be phoning the police. Not in this neighborhood. I climbed into my car and headed for the red-brick apartment house on Janeiro Street.

I
N THE PSEUDO-SPANISH
or stucco tract architecture of San Valdesto there are very few red-brick apartment houses. There was only one on Janeiro Street.

In the small lobby, one of the eight mailboxes held the name of Stella Jankowski. I pressed her bell. No voice came from the small speaker in front of me, nor did the sound of a release buzzer come from the lobby inner door.

Two presses later, I went up two steps and tried the door. It was not locked. I walked up a flight of stairs and down a narrow carpeted hall to apartment number 22. Nobody answered my ring there. If I had been a TV shamus, I would have now picked the lock with my special lock-picking tools.

In real life, I could spend the next five years behind bars if I entered illegally. Private eyes on the boob tube sure get away with murder.

Back to the car. Where now, sourpuss? To the Alamo Cafe.

The pungent odor of onion filled the dim room. The customers were almost all Chicanos, and most of them were consuming large bowls of chili. Who could judge chili better than they? I took a stool at the bar and ordered a bottle of beer and a large bowl of chili.

From the corner booth, somebody called, “Hey, muscles!”

The vested-suit brokers sat there. The one facing me called, “Come and eat with us if you’re looking for Gus.”

I took my beer and chili along and slid into the booth next to the skinniest broker. His partner asked, “Gus owe you?”

I shook my head.

“He paid you the hundred and ten?”

I shook my head again. “How much does he owe you this time?”

“Nothing,” he said. “We owe him. When that happens, he’s usually on the phone two seconds after the race. Is he out of town?”

“I don’t know.” I took a sip of beer. “I’ll bet he put a few bob on that sixth at Hollywood Park and burned you guys.”

The man nodded. “He told you?”

“Nope. I had the same horse. So did his boss.”

“Sarkissian?”

“No. His new boss, a friend of mine, a horseplayer.”

“You gamble?”

“Once in a while. Only on overlays and boat races. If I told you that sixth was a boat race, would you believe me?”

“At Hollywood Park? Never!”

“Okay, then I won’t tell you.”

“I suppose you won’t tell us who handles your action, either.”

“He’s not local. He’s in Beverly Hills. I don’t play for peanuts.”

“We can handle anything up to a grand.”

I smiled and said nothing.

“Look,” he said, “if Gus still owes you, here it is.” He reached into his jacket pocket for his wallet, took out five twenties and a ten and laid them in front of me. “We’ll deduct it from his winnings.”

I picked up the money. “Thanks. We may never find Gus. One of my Vegas friends told me he owes a man there who is not as patient as you two. Can I buy you boys a drink?”

Like Prentice Coldwell had, they ordered daiquiris. That figured. They gave me a card with their names and telephone number on it and assured me they could go higher than a grand if they had to.

I told them I would let them know if I found Gus and hoped they would do the same for me.

They promised that they would. I gave them Vogel’s home phone number and told them I was home only at night. “Just ask for Lester,” I said.

I finished my chili and had another beer to quell the fire within.

My cash flow was improving. I had picked up a hundred and seven dollars today, a hundred and ten minus the cost of two daiquiris. I had netted thirty dollars in Skeleton Gulch, forty-seven at poker minus the seventeen I had lost at kill-the-cat. I went to the station.

Vogel’s office was still free of smoke. He asked irritably, “What the hell happened over there on Castro Street? Kelly claims that you attacked him.”

“He complained to
you
?”

“No. To his friend here. His friend came in and told me.”

“Does his friend have a name?”

“Don’t change the subject. What happened?”

“You don’t want to know.”

“I want to know right now!”

I told him.

He stared at me. “That’s why? That’s—that’s—” He shook his head. “Jesus, if I worked the way you do—”

“Nobody would call you a kike,” I finished for him. “How did it go with the reluctant accountant?”

“Better than I expected. He might be enough, even without Gus.”

“And the wallet?”

“The DA laughed at me. He said that’s not evidence. There was no full name on it or in it, no credit cards, nothing.”

“And by this time Gus has admitted he was in the fire area with his truck. And the DA has pointed out that is not against the law.”

“Of course.”

I told him what I had learned about Gus and his girlfriend and gave him her address. I told him about the driver of the lavender Cadillac who had talked with Gus on the parking lot. And I told him, “If you get a call some night and the man asks for Lester, you’re Lester.”

I went on to explain about my meeting with the brokers and gave him their business card for possible investigation by his peers.

And then, to impress him, I told him about the forty-seven dollars I had won playing poker in Skeleton Gulch.

“You—? Were you playing with kids?”

“Nope. Some goyish rifle club slobs. Is it all right if I go home now?”

“Go with God, you crazy mick,” he said. He yawned and stretched. “I’ll have the Jankowski woman watched. And there can’t be too many lavender Cadillacs in town. Go!”

“You didn’t say thanks.”

“You’ve had your quota of thanks for the day. Bless you! Close the door on your way out.”

It was too early for Jan to be home. I stretched out on the patio and looked back on the day. It had been like starting over from square one. I had most of the obvious answers, but they were obvious only to me.

Now that I had given Vogel partial vengeance for his Kelly hatred, he might accept my Kelly trade-off informer theory. Though Kelly wasn’t our weakest link.

From the house next door came sad, sweet music—“Where are the clowns?”

They are in Skeleton Gulch, secluded sweetheart, playing kill-the-cat.

Corey came before Jan. “What did you learn in Arizona?” he asked me.

I gave him all of it over our beer and added what I had learned today.

“Did the police check to see if Alvin used any of the credit cards?”

“I told you—there were none.”

“Now,” he said. “But a man that rich must have carried some. And there’s Alvin, heading back for Arizona, not staying in any town where he’d be recognized. I’ll bet he charged a few things before he dumped the cards. They wouldn’t do him any good at home.”

“That makes a lot of sense,” I admitted. “You’re getting smarter every day. I’ll tell Vogel.”

“I started smart and studied under a great teacher. I don’t know what kind of car Sarkissian drives. But I’ll find out tomorrow.”

“Could Penelope find out if he recently made a large cash withdrawal from his bank?”

“She could try.” He took a sip of beer. “You know, I’ve been thinking, maybe she ought to get paid, too. She’s been a help, hasn’t she?”

“You’ve got a point. I’ll talk it over with her.”

“Nah. Forget it. She’s kind of—of—”

“Honest?”

He smiled. “Right! She’d make a lousy private eye, wouldn’t she?”

He left. The soothing music continued next door. Drift on, you dreamers. Reality will catch up to you yet. Bulldog Corey Raleigh is on your trail.

Kelly hadn’t followed me to Gus’s rooming house. He had probably gone there to make sure Gus stayed bought. In Kelly’s world, the honorable man is the crook who stays bought.

Jan came home to tell me her current client was now sold. “But today I landed another one of those impossible creatures to educate. This one is a man.”

“You could flutter your eyelashes at him,” I suggested.

“He’s sixty-eight years old! He’s planning to marry a twenty-three year old woman, and he wants to surprise her with a completely furnished dream home. Have you had your drink?”

“No. I’ll make them. Martinis?”

She nodded.

We sat and sipped and listened to the music from our neighbor’s house. “Do you still love Lydia?” she asked.