Cold Shoulder

by Lynda La Plante

  Nula was leaning over the railings. “Get another bottle, and hurry up.”

  Lyall got into his car and started the engine. Rosie stared hard at Nula, sure it was the right woman. She didn’t know what to do. If Lorraine was with her, maybe they were just talking and she’d go nuts if Rosie suddenly barged in. On the other hand, if Lorraine was in trouble and Rosie did nothing, she’d be just as mad. “Think like a detective, Rosie, come on,” she muttered. “What would Mrs. Super Sleuth Lorraine Page do?”

  Standing on an old crate, she managed to drag the ladder of the fire escape loose and started to climb upward. One or two rungs snapped off as she put her weight on them so she almost fell back to the ground. Halfway up she wondered what the hell she was doing, but by then she was almost at the first landing. She grabbed the railings and ducked under the railing to stand on the first escape. She was scared that if someone saw her they might push her off, so she picked up a garbage bag and tried to look like a resident dumping it. She passed one window after another, peering in, looking for Lorraine. The apartments were run-down and squalid, and she saw no one until the fourth window revealed a couple eating. She dodged back the way she had come and headed up toward the second floor. Suddenly, the bag caught and split and refuse clattered down the fire escape. She froze. The landing window opened below. “What the fuck’s goin’ on up there?” The window banged shut again and Rosie held on grimly, heart pounding. She nearly fell off again when another of the rusted steps gave way and she felt her arm wrench almost out of its socket as she hung on. It was only her anger with Lorraine that kept her climbing.

  It took Lyall just a few minutes to get to a liquor store, buy two more bottles of vodka, and return to the apartment house. This time he parked on the street right behind Rosie’s car, ran up the stairs two at a time to the fourth floor, and banged on the door for Nula to let him in.

  Lorraine was on the bed, her feet tied together with a pair of Nula’s tights and her hands bound in front of her. The empty bottle was on the bed beside her. Nula was dressed and everything was packed ready to leave. Lyall locked the door and tossed the bottles onto the bed beside Lorraine. He was sweating with nerves. “There’s a car smashed up outside, a rental from L.A.—that hers?”

  “Why don’t you ask her yourself?” Nula snapped.

  Lyall picked up the cases. “I’m not hanging around, Nula. I’m getting out now with or without you. If that bitch could find us so can the cops. She’s probably workin’ for them.”

  Nula was unscrewing the cap of a fresh bottle, glaring at him. “You’ll do just what I tell you and so will she.” Nula pushed the bottle between Lorraine’s lips, tilting it. The vodka dribbled down her chin, soaking her new blouse. “Drink it, Lorraine! Swallow it!”

  The vodka hit the back of Lorraine’s throat. She had to swallow but she turned her head away. Nula slapped her face hard and pinched her nose so that when she forced the bottle between Lorraine’s lips she had to swallow. The liquor made her body feel as if it were on fire and the room began to blur. “That’s a good girl, come on, let’s see you finish the bottle.”

  Lyall was frightened. “Christ, you’ll kill her.”

  Nula laughed. “What the fuck do you think I’m trying to do? Get those bags down to the car.” He opened the door and suddenly Nula sprang off the bed and ran toward him. “No! I don’t want you pissing your pants and driving off. We’ll go together. Open the other bottle.”

  “I’m not doing it!”

  Nula punched him and pushed him up against the wall. “We got to do this, we have no choice. She knows enough to get them sniffing around us, and if they pick me up I swear to God you’ll go down with me.”

  Nula sat astride Lorraine pouring the vodka down her throat. Lorraine heaved as if to vomit and Nula withdrew the bottle and again slapped her hard across the face. Her eyes closed and her body went limp, and Nula poured the rest into her slack mouth. The liquid dribbled down her face, into her hair, saturating her. Nula got off the bed. Lorraine was motionless. “Let’s go,” Lyall urged. “We’ll miss the plane, Nula! Come on!”

  Rosie, meanwhile, had reached the fourth floor, and was edging along the fire escape, peering into one window after another, as Nula and Lyall got into their car and drove off. Her legs were shaking, her hands cut from the rusted railings as she inched toward the landing window. She’d break the glass if necessary—she was not going to climb back down. Now she didn’t even care if she was arrested for breaking and entering. She got to her knees and began to crawl the last few yards. It was then she saw Lorraine.

  She banged on the window. Lorraine half turned her head but then went back to untying her legs. She kept flopping over and she was giggling. Rosie banged on the window again but Lorraine seemed oblivious. Rosie attempted to open the window but it held firm. She pressed her face closer as Lorraine tried to stand, lurching into the wall, then into the dressing table. She rolled around laughing and then she saw the bottle of vodka that had fallen off the bed.

  Rosie kicked at the window. The glass cracked but only after she had used both feet was there a hole big enough for her to undo the lock.

  Lorraine paid no attention to her. She was trying unsuccessfully to drink from the bottle. Rosie heaved her bulk through the window. The glass cut her leg and she was gasping for breath from the effort. She reached Lorraine as she lifted up the bottle to drink and grabbed it. Lorraine screamed and tried to hold on to it but Rosie wouldn’t give in. She tore the bottle from her, ran with it into the bathroom and poured the contents down the sink. She was heaving and panting for breath. She looked at her reflection in the old cracked bathroom mirror—her face was red and shiny with sweat, her clothes were filthy, her hand bleeding. As she gasped for breath, she became aware of an ominous silence from the other room and dropped the bottle. Lorraine had passed out. She looked green, her breathing rasping, rattling. Rosie was terrified that she was choking and dragged her to the bathroom, hung her over the edge of the tub, then ran water over her, pushing at her lungs. Lorraine heaved and coughed, then vomited. Rosie forced her under the cold water tap. She was like a pitiful rag doll, unable to fend Rosie off, unable to do anything as she retched.

  Rosie got her to her feet and forced her to walk up and down. Her head lolled on her chest; she couldn’t speak; her eyes were unfocused and she didn’t seem to know who Rosie was. She mumbled incoherently and then slithered to the floor. “Lemme sleep.”

  Rosie dragged her up again, walking her up and down. She was crying—she was so afraid. She didn’t know if she should call an ambulance and she kept asking Lorraine her name but she couldn’t reply, just kept saying that she wanted to sleep. It wasn’t until she had been violently sick again that Rosie helped her to the bed. She stripped off Lorraine’s clothes and drew back the sheets, rolling her naked body farther onto the bed.

  “Lorraine? It’s Rosie.”

  Lorraine’s eyes drooped and she gave a weak smile. Rosie went into the filthy kitchen in the corner of the room, enclosed by a grease-splattered curtain half hanging off its rail. She brewed some coffee, able to keep her eyes on Lorraine as she was doing it, then went back to the bed and shook her. Lorraine moaned and swatted at Rosie to leave her alone. But Rosie persisted, made her sit up and tried to get her to drink the coffee. After half an hour, Rosie could tell she was coming around. She asked where she was and Rosie said they were in San Francisco, but it didn’t seem to sink in. She closed her eyes again but Rosie still wouldn’t let her sleep: she pressed ice cubes wrapped in a pillowcase to Lorraine’s head. “Rosie, I have to sleep. Leave me alone.”

  Finally, Rosie lost patience. “Right. I’m going to leave you. You disgust me—just as you got everything going for you. Why did you do it?”

  Lorraine threw aside the sheet. “I got to have a drink, Rosie, I’m going crazy, my head aches. Just get me a drink.” She held her head in her hands. “I got to make a call—got to call Bickerstaff. Is there a phone here?”

  “T
he state you’re in you can’t call anyone.”

  Lorraine squinted up at her. “They forced it down me.” She tried to stand but the room spun and she had to sit down again. “Nula, you got to get her arrested, she’s with that photographer Craig Lyall. I got to call Bickerstaff.”

  Rosie didn’t know whether to believe her or not. She stood with her feet planted like a solid oak. “Well, you can’t do nothin’ about that now. They’ve gone.”

  “Shit.” Lorraine picked up the ice pack and rested it against her head. “You saw them leave?”

  “Yeah.”

  Rosie poured more coffee and a glass of water. “Start drinking this and as much water as you can take—go on, take it.”

  Lorraine did as she was told but when she attempted to get up off the bed she felt faint. “Rosie, start looking in the garbage. See if they left anything that might tell us where they’re heading.”

  Rosie found nothing in the disgusting kitchenette, but moving around the bed she spotted a small trash can by the dressing table filled with cotton balls and tissues smeared with makeup. She tipped them out onto an old newspaper and poked around. She found nothing and wrapped up the mess in the newspaper—then opened it again. There were marks around the air-flight ads. “There’s this. What do you think?”

  Lorraine forced herself to look at the paper: two airlines had been underlined and their phone numbers circled. “Call Delta and American airlines, see if any flights are leaving this afternoon with a Mr. Lyall on board.”

  “They won’t tell me. They never tell you what passengers are boarding—that’s a law, isn’t it?”

  Lorraine craved a drink, her whole body screamed for one, but she gulped the water. “Say it’s an emergency, something to do with kids.… Anything, just find out which airline they’re on.” Lorraine hung on to the headboard as she stood up. She inched her way into the bathroom, where she saw the vodka bottle and reached out for it. A single drop remained in the bottom and she drank it before she retched again, clinging to the washbasin. She saw herself in the mirror: her face was pale green, her eyes red-rimmed, and her lips swollen.

  Rosie stomped in. “Two seats booked by Mr. Lyall for the four-fifteen flight to Las Vegas. Now what?”

  Lorraine’s eyes were closed. “Did they go off in a cab?”

  “No, Lyall had a car. So, now what do I do?”

  She told Rosie to call Ed Bickerstaff. “This is what you say to him. Tell him you’re my partner—Jesus, just tell him anything—that it’s to do with the murders of David Burrows and Holly, you got that?”

  Rosie reached for the phone as Lorraine crashed to the floor.

  Ed Bickerstaff hung up. He wondered if he could trust the information. He would have been happier if it had been Lorraine herself who had called—she had never made any mention of a partner. He decided there was nothing to lose, so he put in the call to send agents in Las Vegas to arrest Craig Lyall and his companion. He then arranged for a search warrant to look over Lyall’s studio. As he was leaving his office, he received the phone call he had been half expecting: Steven Janklow’s plea would stand as guilty on seven counts of murder, but his mental state had been scrutinized and eight doctors and four psychiatrists had declared him criminally insane and medically unfit to stand trial. He would be held in a secure mental institution for life, with no hope of release. Mrs. Thorburn had still not made any contact with him. Brad Thorburn continued to monitor his brother’s welfare via the family lawyers but did no more than that.

  The subsequent arrest of Lyall and Nula would be welcome as a show of the FBI’s thoroughness, but Bickerstaff was wondering if he had made a mistake. He called Rooney to double-check on Lorraine but he was away, and although he’d already ordered that Nula and Lyall be brought in, he was nervous enough to want to run it by the chief. Bickerstaff embroidered the facts a little, pointing out that Lyall’s arrest might further clarify Janklow’s guilt. It might also confirm that Art Mathews had instigated the murders of Angela Hollow and David Burrows. It sounded so good in the telling that he felt more confident.

  “Who’s the informant, Ed? And how come you haven’t discussed this with anyone else from my department?”

  Bickerstaff blushed. “It’s Lorraine Page.”

  The chief gave a fish-eyed stare. He rubbed the stubble on his chin and took a deep breath. As usual his shirt buttons seemed about to pop as his chest expanded.

  “Lorraine Page? You’d better hope to Christ that it pans out as well as the Janklow tapes she did.” He hesitated. “Has she got something else on Janklow?”

  “I’ll get back to you as soon as I hear anything.”

  The chief glared. “So you’ll be staying on? What you doing, Ed, taking up permanent residency in Pasadena?”

  Bickerstaff seemed fazed. “Of course not, and you know as well as I do I can’t walk away from this until I see if it’s connected. I mean, if it ties in with the original investigation …”

  “You sure it’s not tied in with you trying to whitewash your fuckup with Art Mathews?”

  Bickerstaff stood square-jawed in front of the desk, retaining his composure. “I’m just trying to do my job. Nothing has been whitewashed and I’m not making any excuses for the Art Mathews fuckup, but I would like to check any new evidence that may come to light.”

  “How much did Page hit you for?”

  Bickerstaff smiled but it was totally without humor. “She doesn’t get a cent.” He closed the door behind him silently. He had not added that Lorraine’s payout depended on her providing evidence that proved Mathews’s part in the hammer murders. If she did bring in the goods, five thousand dollars was not much to pay for the FBI coming out smelling like roses.

  As Bickerstaff was about to enter his office he was handed a fax informing him that Lyall and Nula had been arrested in Las Vegas. Lyall insisted they were there to get married. Bickerstaff requested they be brought to L.A. for questioning in connection with a homicide investigation and a possible accessory to murder charge.

  He’d received no reply to his calls to Lorraine’s apartment, and was getting impatient. Nula and Lyall were on their way to Pasadena from Las Vegas and he hadn’t the slightest idea what he was going to question them about. What had they overlooked in previous interviews? Or was it possible that Lorraine Page had, yet again, withheld vital evidence? If she had, she was now in dangerous waters, and Bickerstaff would damned well make sure she drowned.

  Rosie and Lorraine hardly spoke during the long drive back to L.A. It took all of Lorraine’s willpower not to beg Rosie to buy a bottle. The need to drink was stronger than her headache and sickness. She felt despairing and, worse, inadequate. It was the end of the agency, the partnership—she was back at square one and it hurt. But nothing was stronger than the urge to drink. She had not beaten it. She felt it had beaten her, that it would always beat her; that was what really hit home hard and made any thought of a future a hopeless dream.

  The phone was ringing as they opened the front door. It was Bickerstaff. Rosie asked him to call back, and hung up before he could remonstrate. She then called Jake, who said he’d be right over. When he arrived Rosie had cooked some spaghetti and set the table. Jake put his arm around her shoulder. “How you doing?”

  “Fucked! I had a future and a job yesterday but today, well, I dunno. You got to talk to her—this guy Bickerstaff keeps calling.”

  Jake nodded and went into the bedroom. Lorraine was awake, sitting on the edge of the bed. She had on a bathrobe and looked pale, sickly. She gave that look of hers, tilting her head, that slight squint. “It’s no good, Jake, I’m not going to make it. I blew it so badly. I got overconfident, arrogant. You know, I thought I was so damned clever, and if it wasn’t for Rosie I’d probably be dead.”

  He squeezed her hand. “It’ll always be a part of your life. You can never have one drink. Even if you think you’re strong enough to deal with it you won’t be because it’s an illness, Lorraine.”

  Lorraine was cr
ying. “All I want is a drink, Jake.”

  He stood up. “Lemme tell you something. I want one. Rosie wants one. We all want one. You’re no different. We all feel like you do, so get your ass off that bed and come in and eat.”

  He walked out and she got up slowly. When she joined them at the table, he pulled out her chair.

  “Thanks for helping me out this afternoon, Rosie.”

  “Think nothing of it, partner, but next time you tell me to wait outside, I want to know how many minutes, who you’re going to see, and why.”

  Lorraine doubted if there would be a next time. The phone rang. Rosie answered and handed it to Lorraine. “You better talk to him, it’s Bickerstaff.”

  Lorraine took a deep breath. “Hi, Ed. We just got back. It was a long drive.… Yeah, yeah, no problem. I’ll be there.… Sure, thanks.” She hung up and sighed, completely deflated. “They want me at the station. They’re sending a squad car. I can’t think straight—I can’t even see straight. They’re going to take one look at me and they’re gonna know. I’m still plastered, look at my hands, I’ve got the shakes so bad.”

  Jake took off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves.

  “Let’s get that shower running.”

  Lorraine looked at them deadeyed. “Oh, God, not again …”

  20

  Nula had been separated from Lyall on the way to Pasadena but the flight to Las Vegas had been long enough for them to get their story straight. Lorraine had not yet arrived at the station when their lawyer angrily confronted Bickerstaff, insinuating that he was wrongfully holding them on the word of a known drunkard, a woman who had arrived at his clients’ apartment in San Francisco attempting to blackmail them. He doubted if Bickerstaff would be able to make any sense of what Ms. Page had leveled against his clients as she had been so drunk when they had last seen her that they had left her in the apartment. Time was against Bickerstaff—without strong evidence implicating them he could not hold Lyall and Nula longer than twenty-four hours. He was in a hot seat of his own making and could ask for no help from the LAPD. This had been an FBI arrest and Bickerstaff was on his own.