“No, Rita, at the moment I don’t know why. I don’t know if I even trust my own judgment anymore.”
“Look, Jimmy, you may be a little rash at times, a bit impetuous, but you care. You care and you fight for what’s right, and you don’t give up. No, we won’t have to close the office. Working together, we’ll get through this.” She gave me a tender smile. “And I don’t think some rich jerk playing childish games is going to put us out of business. He hasn’t got a chance. Bye.” She closed the door behind her.
I could’ve hugged her right then, and maybe I would have if she hadn’t already left.
What she said made sense, a lot of sense. We’re not through yet, not by a long shot. Screw that bastard, Haskell. I’ll get to the bottom of this case even if I have to take down the whole goddamned gang of them: Byron, the DA who lied about Roberts back in ’45; the woman in the miniskirt; and even the current District Attorney himself-that righteous bastard, Rinehart.
With friends like Rita and Sol at my side, how could I miss? But more important, because of their friendship, regardless of what happened, I knew I’d never be alone.
I started to walk into my office when the phone rang. It was Joyce, Sol’s secretary. “Jimmy, our man at the DMV ran the Mercedes plate number. Don’t know if it’ll do any good, though.”
“Didn’t the guy give you a name?”
“Yes, but the car is registered to a big industrial firm on the East Coast, an outfit called Federal Carbide Corp. I called them. But no one would speak with me about the car. Very close-mouthed about it.”
I’d heard of Federal Carbide. Any part-time do-it-yourselfer knew the name; their logo was embossed on the back of almost all the sandpaper sold on the planet.
Knowing who owned the car without knowing the name of the driver wouldn’t help. It just raised more questions. I wondered what a giant corporation like Federal Carbide had to do with all this. I didn’t think the company hired babes in miniskirts to run around in expensive sports cars peddling their products. Buy our sandpaper and as an extra added bonus the gal in the Mercedes will give you a little treat.
I sat at my desk and opened the drawer, eager to get started on the case again. I pulled out the Roberts file and thumbed through it, looking for something I may have missed, something that would give me a new lead to pursue.
Maybe it was a coincidence, maybe ESP, or maybe something else, because just as I got to the section in the police report regarding the bungalow where Vera had been murdered, the phone rang. “Is this Jimmy O’Brien?” a woman asked in a soft voice.
“Yes, I’m O’Brien.”
“My name is Gayle Goodrow. I’m Ida Hathaway’s niece. I’m her only living relative and I’m trying to put her affairs in order. I’m at the motel now.”
“I’m sorry about Mrs. Hathaway,” I said. “But how can I help you, Miss Goodrow?”
“The police gave me your number. The detective said my aunt had a box full of files and papers, but the box had been stolen. He said you told him one of the files in the box contained an insurance policy, said you saw it.”
“Well, I saw the file, but I don’t think it held an actual insurance policy. She was looking for some old phone records in the box and pulled out a thick file secured with rubber bands. She said it was her insurance policy. I think she used that term figuratively. You know, like-”
“That’s right, Mr. O’Brien, the file had nothing to do with insurance.”
“I really didn’t think it did, but it was none of my business.”
“The police said your client murdered my aunt, but I don’t think he’s the one who killed her.”
I almost bolted out of my chair. “What are you telling me?”
“I don’t like discussing this on the phone.”
“Discussing what?”
“It’s been going on for years.”
“What’s been going on?”
“On the next-to-last day of the month, every month without fail, going back farther than the bank has records, someone has been depositing $500 in my aunt’s account. Today’s that day. There was no deposit.” She paused for a few seconds before continuing. “Mr. O’Brien, the money has something to do with that so-called ‘insurance policy.’”
“Oh my God,” I said in a whisper.
“Her murder wasn’t reported in the media, and I hadn’t sent out the notices yet.”
“That means only the police and people in the DA’s office knew she was dead,” I said.
“And the person who stopped making the deposits knew,” she said, “the person who murdered my aunt.”
CHAPTER 27
Gayle Goodrow and I agreed to meet at a location somewhere close to the motel. She suggested Ships, a coffee shop on La Cienega in West Hollywood. I told her I’d leave immediately and would be there in about forty-five minutes.
The traffic ran fast, and I drove faster than most of the other vehicles on the freeway, arriving at the fifties version of a space-age-styled coffee shop five minutes early.
On the drive I wondered about Gayle Goodrow, about how much she knew. But just as important, I wondered how much she’d tell me. Before I hung up, she had implied that the documents in the insurance file were related to a murder “that happened in the motel years ago.” I knew from various sources that the only murder that ever took place at Dink’s Hollywood Oasis was Vera’s. But there were a few things I couldn’t figure out. One, if Mrs. Hathaway’s documents were, in fact, related to Vera’s death and she was extorting someone on the threat of revealing the contents, why would the person being blackmailed cough up the money for almost thirty years and then decide to pop her now? Two, would all of this help me find Roberts? And finally, why did Gayle Goodrow call me? Why didn’t she just tell the police about the papers in the file and about the blackmail scheme?
The restaurant was practically deserted in the early afternoon. The lunch crowd-if there was one-must have left by now. One skinny guy who sat at the counter sipping coffee gave me the once-over when I entered. A waitress clad in a bright uniform, but wearing a dull smile, met me at the door and handed me a plastic menu. I told her a friend would be joining me shortly.
But then I saw her, a plain woman in her mid-thirties, sitting in a booth by the front window. She had the same build and manner as Sandy Dennis, the actress who’d played the mousy wife in The Out of Towners. She looked small, pale, and almost transparent and at any moment it appeared as if she might simply fade away and dissolve into the fabric covering the seat. The woman stared at me with a questioning look on her face and nodded slightly when our eyes locked. I walked to the booth.
“Miss Goodrow?” I asked.
“Yes, please sit down, Mr. O’Brien.”
Miss Goodrow sat proper-like with her hands folded in her lap and her shoulders hunched, her elbows tucked close to her wispy frame.
I slid into the booth across from her. “Let skip the formalities, if it’s okay. Please just call me Jimmy.”
“And I’m Gayle.” Her hand trembled when she raised it above the table to shake mine. “I’m nervous talking about this,” she said in a voice just above a whisper. “There are frightening details you should know, but can… can I trust you?”
“You called me, remember? You must have had a feeling that I could be trusted.”
“You defend people in trouble, and I thought… Anyway, I had to talk to you.”
“Anything you say to me regarding your aunt’s murder is protected-client privilege. Our conversation will be kept strictly confidential.” I leaned in closer and spoke softly. “Now, Gayle, what’s this all about?”
“I’m scared. Whoever killed my aunt could kill again.”
“Have you talked to the police about any of this?”
“Oh my God, no. They could be in on it.”
“In on what? The murder, the blackmail, or both?”
She made a tent with her hands and placed them in front of her mouth, her eyes dropping to the tabletop. I w
anted to ask her again about the cops, but the waitress appeared, ready to take our order.
Gayle looked up. “Just coffee for me, please.”
“Make it two,” I added.
As soon as the waitress left I said, “Gayle, I can’t help you unless you tell me what this is all about. That is, if you want me to help.”
“This whole mess just won’t go away.” The fear showed in her eyes and it was real. “I don’t know much. My aunt didn’t tell me the whole story. But certain people might think I know more than I do.”
“How about if we start at the beginning?”
Gayle glanced around. Two men wearing business suits had entered and now sat at the counter. “I’m not comfortable here,” she said.
“We can talk in my car. Nobody will be able to eavesdrop.”
One of the businessmen tapped his buddy on the shoulder and looked over at us. He turned away when I looked back at him. They whispered together for a moment, then started to banter with the girl working the counter. She let out a giggle after one of the men made a crude remark about her full figure. She took it as praise.
“Yes, the car would be better,” Gayle said and started to climb out of the booth.
I stood just as the waitress arrived with our coffee. “Are you leaving?” she asked. “What about your coffee?”
“Something came up,” I said and dropped a buck on the table.
We cruised aimlessly though the streets of West Hollywood with neither of us saying a word. As I drove, I waited for Gayle to open up. I couldn’t blame her for being reluctant to talk, but I felt strongly that she wanted to tell me what was on her mind. Sooner or later she’d come around, but I couldn’t wait forever.
“Gayle, I’m here to help. Talk to me.”
She stared straight ahead, her eyes focused on something far away. Finally she said, “The papers my aunt had belonged to a woman who’d been murdered in one of her bungalows back in the forties. She found them in the woman’s room when she discovered the body, before she called the police.”
I hit the brakes and swerved to the curb. I turned to face her. “Do you know what was in those papers?”
“No, she wouldn’t talk about it. She didn’t tell me anything about the papers until recently. I took accounting courses in junior college and a few years ago I took over the bookkeeping for the motel-taxes, paying the bills, that sort of thing. Aunt Ida was getting up there, and it became more difficult for her to take care of the books herself.”
“That’s when you noticed the extra money being deposited every month, correct?”
“Of course. But when I asked her how to classify the transaction, she told me to enter it in the ledger as ‘miscellaneous income.’ I figured there was something shady going on. Otherwise she would’ve explained it. But I had no idea it was blackmail.”
“Where’d you think the money came from?”
“I thought maybe she had a boyfriend on the side, something like that. She said she’d been getting the same payment every month for years. Since before Uncle Dink passed away. She said he didn’t know about the money. I think she was kind of proud of what she was able to pull off. Maybe that’s why she finally let me in on it. At least part of it.”
“So she never said who was paying her.”
“That’s right, just that it was a big shot. Someone who wouldn’t miss the money. Petty cash to him is how she put it.”
I put the Chevy in gear and pulled away, driving down Oakwood, a residential street with tress and nice homes with well-groomed yards. While I drove she continued to talk.
“I feel ashamed,” she said. “I just let it go. I did as she asked and entered the deposits as miscellaneous income. I tried not to think about it, but it was always there. I was her accomplice in a crime. It didn’t matter if the person was wealthy, it was wrong. I know I should have done something, but what could I do? And she did need the money. The motel had been operating in the red for the last few years.”
“Why do you think the police might be involved with your aunt’s death?”
“Because one time I pressed her. I told her that maybe someday the authorities would find out what was going on, about the money, the extortion. But it didn’t trouble her.” Gayle’s voice sounded weaker. “My aunt laughed. She actually laughed at me, saying her guy was ‘the authorities.’ She said he was high in the government and he had the police under his control.”
Her voice trailed off and she became silent again. I looked at her and saw the fear and vulnerability etched in her face. I kept driving aimlessly. Heading west on Wilshire, we entered the city limits of Beverly Hills, and I continued to let my mind wander, thinking about what Gayle had been telling me.
She’d told me a tale of blackmail and murder, a story about a politician with cops in his pocket, a man with the soul of a rattlesnake. She was talking about a person who had helped frame Roberts. But could the guy have been a high-powered cop? Mrs. Hathaway had told her niece that her blackmail victim was someone high in the government. That meant if he were a cop, he’d likely been someone in a position of authority: a captain, commander, or even a deputy chief. Then again, the person could’ve just as easily been someone in the District Attorney’s Office. Frank Byron, the DA who put Roberts behind bars in ’45, definitely fit that description.
But how could Vera have documents relating to Byron in her possession? She had only been in town for a few days before she was murdered, hardly time enough to get involved in the Los Angeles political scene. Besides, I didn’t see Byron as a murderer. Maybe a corrupt DA back in his day-a loudmouthed egomaniac now-but a murderer? No, I didn’t think so.
I turned right on Rodeo Drive, a street lined with stores that sold expensive chintz to sculpted matrons of the rich and famous. We cruised past the Luau Restaurant, an upscale tiki bar owned by one of Lana Turner’s ex-husbands, Steve Crane. It was the kind of place that had been big back in the fifties and sixties: bamboo furniture, masks and carvings and torches hanging about, and sexy Asian waitresses wearing skimpy hula-girl outfits festooned with an abundance of colorful leis. Drink a few of their killer Zombies and you’d be crawling home on your hands and knees.
“Do you think you could take me back to my car now, Mr. O’Brien… I mean, Jimmy?”
“Of course, but can you think of anything else I should know? I don’t suppose Mrs. Hathaway mentioned any names.”
“No. As I said, she was tight-lipped about the whole affair.”
“It doesn’t make sense,” I said. “The guy pays her every month for almost thirty years, and then suddenly he breaks into her shed, steals the documents, and kills her. Doesn’t make any sense at all. Do you think she tried to raise the stakes, demand more money, something like that?”
“That’s what I figured at first, when they told me she’d been murdered, but then I thought about something she’d said…”
“Like what?”
“I didn’t mention this before. I didn’t want you to get angry.”
“Angry about what?”
“She called me a couple of days after you met with her. Told me about you, that you were trying to help a prisoner who’d been blamed for a murder he didn’t commit. She said she let you copy some old records that she had stored away.”
“Yeah, that’s true,” I said.
“She had second thoughts about cooperating with you, that you more or less caught her off-guard. She told me she’d made a big mistake.” Gayle took a deep breath and held it for a moment before exhaling. “What my aunt said next terrified me.”
“I can tell you’re scared, but who wouldn’t be-”
“I don’t think you understand, Jimmy,” she said.
“What do you mean?”
“I’m not frightened for me.”
“What?” I asked.
“I thought she meant it would be you… that if you continued to snoop around, you would get killed.”
CHAPTER 28
When we parted ways at Gayle’
s car back at the Ships lot, I told her I’d stay in touch and let her know if I discovered anything new about her aunt’s murder. She climbed out of the Chevy and walked slowly to her car, turning once to give me a final look, a pitiful look you’d give to a condemned man.
My mind reeled with what Mrs. Hathaway had told Gayle about getting killed if I continued to snoop around. But a couple of questions suddenly occurred to me. Was the old lady’s remark just conjecture? Or did she know for certain that the bad guys were going to try to stop me dead if I got too close to the truth?
I took a deep breath and wheeled out of the parking lot, but what I saw next stole my breath away. I spotted a black Buick Century parked next to the curb down about fifty feet. The car pulled out and followed as I whipped around the corner at La Cienega, heading toward the freeway on-ramp. I stepped on it. Clipping the light at Wilshire, I barreled down the boulevard, zigzagged a few cars, and shot up the freeway on-ramp. I changed lanes and stole a glance over my shoulder. The Buick was nowhere in sight.
While driving back to Downey, keeping a rational mind, I thought about the car. There were a million black Buicks in L.A., and I wondered if the car on La Cienega was the same one that had been stalking me, the one with the two clowns in it. I imagined that I’d probably see a black Buick every time I turned a corner. The memory of my last encounter with those two bozos had been all too real.
Mabel had returned to the office by the time I got back from West Hollywood. But she didn’t look up, just handed me a pink phone message as I walked past her desk. The air held a distinct chill.
I was halfway across the room when she said, “It’s from Sol. He’s at Rocco’s. He wants you to meet him there as soon as you get in. Doesn’t he ever do business in his office? Jesus!”
So she was speaking to me after all. I turned to face her. “Any other calls?”
“No new clients called. And you’ve got Rita chasing around on that no-fee Roberts case. What’s the matter with you?”
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