Darkest Hour

by Nielsen, Helen

  “P.M.? That’s just two hours from now, sir.”

  It was a girl’s voice, young, unjaded. Because he was running scared, Monterey wished that he had paid more attention to who was on duty when he checked in. There was so little innocence or enthusiasm left in the world, and she sounded like someone who might care that another human being was in great trouble. But it was too late for self-pity. The name of the game now was survival.

  “I’m a fast sleeper,” he answered, “and I’ve got an important appointment. Eleven-thirty P.M.”

  It was done. Monterey was suddenly drained of energy and almost giddy with a sense of release. He dropped the telephone back into the cradle. Sam Goddard was dead. Max Berlin would trace Dr. Kwan’s killer to his last contact and wouldn’t be far behind, but Whitey Sanders was alive and Whitey had influence. Whitey could work the magic that would turn the package in Monterey’s bag into a passport to freedom called state’s evidence, and even Max Berlin couldn’t touch a witness who was guarded by federal agents.

  Exhausted, Monterey fell backward on the bed and spread-eagled his arms. High above his head the vaulted ceiling circled slowly as body tension dissolved in warm oblivion.

  “Joe … Joe, baby, it’s okay,” he murmured, and fell instantly into a coma-like sleep.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Thirty minutes after midnight a slender boy with pale blond hair riding the collar of a white satin Byronesque shirt and with black trousers so tightly fitted they might have been glued to his flesh, arched backward, pointed his instrument into the glare of the overhead spot, and reached the climax of a love affair with a silver trumpet.

  It was a moment to remember. Sitting alone at a table outside the circle of light, Hannah Lee lifted one slightly arthritic but still graceful hand and brushed a spontaneous tear from her eye. In a world of anguish and frustration a young man had found himself. He would sweat; he would labor. He would gloat; he would grieve. He would know triumph and torture. But he was a natural at his art and he knew it. Wherever he wandered, he would always be home. Hannah Lee, who had known four husbands and lovers too numerous to recall, was childless; but at the instant the silence following the last note exploded in frantic applause, she was mother, mentor and matriarch. Still strikingly beautiful at sixty-odd, still slender and active in spite of a slight limp—the last physical evidence of an accident that had terminated her theatrical career thirty-five years ago—Hannah was easily the most impressive patron at the Gateway Bar. She wore an unadorned black sheath, ankle-length and split halfway up each thigh, a full-length mink cape and a narrow emerald tiara that sparkled expensively in her still auburn pompadour. But she hadn’t driven seventy-five miles just to make an impression. She had come to attend the opening performance of Buddy Jenks, who at only twenty had suddenly become a young god.

  Her mind was eloquent.

  Madge, darling [she mentally wrote],

  Your son is electric! Once I got your letter telling me he was opening at the Gateway Bar, I determined that nothing short of my own funeral would keep me away. He’s beautiful! He’s a certain winner, and you’ll be driven mad keeping the scheming females away. I wish you could hear the ovation! This cavernous bar is packed with cheering people. Now the lights are coming up and he’s stepping down from the stage. I think he’s looking for me—

  Hannah’s right hand closed over the gold head of her ebony cane—once a necessity and now used primarily for dramatic effect. But she didn’t move. Her sense of theater had taught her the most impressive discipline was immobility. The young man in the white shirt saw her immediately, and she smiled wryly as he came, magnetized, to her side.

  “Aunt Hannah? It is Aunt Hannah, isn’t it? Was I all right? Did I project?”

  Hannah leaned forward and kissed him on the brow.

  “I am ‘Aunt’ Hannah,” she said. “You were perfect. You projected like a jolt to the spinal column. Now sit down and order me a Drambuie.”

  Buddy Jenks smiled like a golden-haired angel.

  “How about champagne?” he suggested.

  “All right, champagne. But only one glass for me. I have an idiot doctor who insists I must beware of overtaxing my heart. Ridiculous! I’ve had the fool thing broken so many times it leaks like a sieve, but I’ve only begun to live…. Buddy—that is what they call you, isn’t it?”

  “It’s okay,” Buddy said. “I sign my checks ‘A. Howard Jenks,’ but it’s okay if you call me Buddy.” He signaled the waiter and ordered the champagne while Hannah instructed herself not to mention that she had been present at his birth and that she had given him his first bath after his parents brought him home from the hospital. The things mothers and pseudo-aunts recall on the occasion of important reunions are seldom suitable to delicate young egos. And Buddy Jenks and his silver trumpet would need all the ego he could muster for the cruel road that lay ahead.

  Now that the initial meeting was over, Buddy looked perplexed.

  “You’re alone,” he said.

  “And you’re disappointed,” Hannah observed.

  “Well, no. Not exactly. But when I got the wire saying that you were coming to my opening, I thought maybe Simon Drake would come with you. I hear he’s quite a guy.”

  “He is quite a guy, quite a lawyer and quite a friend to have. But he’s in San Francisco.”

  “You came all by yourself?”

  The unconscious brutality of the young underlined each word with incredulity. “I’m not a basket case,” Hannah said dryly. “And here is the waiter with our champagne. Fill my glass to the brim, please. I’m allowed only one glass but nobody said anything about how many ounces.”

  It wasn’t the waiter; it was the maître d’. He was a small-eyed man with ears that clung to his head as if they had been pasted back when he was a child. He smiled thinly and poured two glasses of champagne.

  “Put it on my tab, Alex,” Buddy ordered.

  “Compliments of the establishment,” Alex murmured.

  “Say, thanks!”

  Alex moved away and Buddy’s eager young eyes turned back to Hannah. “Is it true that you were crippled a long; time ago by a rifle fired by one of your lovers?” he asked.

  “My, you do mature early these days, don’t you?” Hannah remarked. “And it’s not at all true. It was a handgun—a Luger, if I remember correctly. He was one of those terribly overdramatic Teutonic types. Never turn your back on a Teuton, Buddy. They have no sense of humor. But enough of my lurid past. Let’s drink to your bright future. To Buddy Jenks and his magic trumpet—”

  Hannah raised her glass to her lips and sipped daintily while Buddy looked on with open admiration. She focused her gaze on the entrance to the bar and then drained the glass without taking it from her lips. Two men were in earnest conversation in the doorway. One of the men was the maître d’, Alex, the other was a life-sized piece of yesterday brought to life. Suddenly Hannah placed the empty glass on the table and whispered hoarsely, “Buddy Jenks, ask me to dance with you.”

  The night was replete with surprises for Buddy.

  “Now?” he whispered back.

  The rhythm emanating from the bandstand was a wild, weird beat, and the floor was alive with writhing bodies jerking in savage compulsion. “It’s not exactly ‘our song,’” Hannah admitted, “but I won’t embarrass you. I remember Gilda Gray in an age when ‘camp’ was a place to pitch a tent. The biggest deadbeat in the west just walked into the room, Buddy, and I think he’s recognized me. Let’s get moving.”

  Buddy was quick on the upbeat, and the gyrating group made a perfect place for getting lost. As they melted into the melee, Hannah saw Monte Monterey step forward and try to elbow his way toward them. “Hannah,” he called, “Hannah Lee—” Hannah swung about toward the bandstand and rocked with the rhythm. Through the rotating beams of psychedelic light she glimpsed Monterey’s face, stark and searching. The lights changed and he was gone. Moments later the screaming anguish ended and she returned to the table with Buddy. Th
ere was no sign of Monterey anywhere.

  Buddy groped awkwardly for a compliment. “Say, you’re a good dancer, considering. I mean, considering how styles have changed.”

  Hannah winked at him. “Stop while you’re ahead,” she said. “I know exactly what you mean, and you’re absolutely right. That workout we just had was rougher than fifteen minutes in my gymnasium at The Mansion. It’s past my bedtime, too. I was hoping to see Whitey Sanders before I left.”

  “Do you know Whitey?”

  “For years. Where is he? That chap you call Alex told me he would be here by midnight.”

  “He was grounded,” Buddy said. “Storm over the mountains or something like that. We don’t expect him until tomorrow.”

  “In that case I may as well get started for home. It’s a long drive—”

  “You drove?” Buddy demanded. “Did you drive the red Rolls that was given to you by a maharaja? Mother told me about it, and I’ve seen pictures of it in classic-cars magazines!”

  Hannah shook her head. “Your mother has her facts mixed. It wasn’t a maharaja. It was an English lord and he only made the down payment. Nothing, Buddy, absolutely nothing is what you get for free in this life. End of lecture. Now, if you want to escort me to the parking lot I’ll be on my way.”

  Buddy led her out through the doorway where the small-eyed Alex still maintained his enigmatic poise.

  “Thank Mr. Sanders for the champagne and tell him that I’ll take him on at poker anytime he cares to drive over to Marina Beach,” Hannah said. Alex nodded and opened the door. An attendant brought the Rolls, vintage 1926 and still as mechanically perfect as the day Hannah paid the dealer what was still owed on the purchase price. Buddy helped her inside the car and she immediately became the secondary attraction.

  The Rolls was legend. Hannah Lee was legend, and Simon Drake was responsible for giving new life to both. It was Simon, the brilliant young bachelor lawyer flush with early success, who discovered a dilapidated old Victorian house in the heights area of Marina Beach with a “For Sale” sign fastened to the wrought-iron gates. Intrigued, he had stopped to inquire about the house and remained to delight in his second discovery: Hannah Lee, an internationally famous entertainer of the Ziegfeld era, who lived in retirement amid the crumbling ruins of outdated grandeur. Simon had purchased the house, known to all Marina Beach as The Mansion, and restored it to the glory that was its due—but only with the condition that Hannah remain in residence as a combination Queen Mother and poker companion. She was the hostess for his parties and the confidante for his moods. It was a perfect platonic arrangement which gave self-made Simon the background he needed and insured high-spirited Hannah against a drab apartment in a retirement community. Restoration of the Rolls was Simon’s housewarming gift to Hannah. The exterior was a renewing of the original red; the interior was in black satin with a black leather padded instrument panel. No detail was lost to the admiring eyes of Buddy Jenks. The dinner crowd had left the Gateway, and the show crowd wouldn’t leave for two hours. The parking lot was deserted. Buddy had time to listen to the purr of the motor while Hannah arranged the folds of her cape.

  Saying a last good night, Buddy stepped back out of the way as Hannah set the Rolls in motion. It was at least two hundred yards to the street with no visible object in any direction. Hannah’s eyesight was excellent. Over her shoulder she caught a glimpse of something large and black moving diagonally toward her out of the darkness. An instant later she heard Buddy yell, “Lights! You damn fool, turn on your lights!”

  Hannah’s foot rammed the brake pedal but it was too late. The moving object was a black sedan that seemed to be out of control. Just before the impact of the crash she caught a glimpse of a face behind the steering wheel. An instant later the front of the sedan gored the proud nose of the Rolls, and Monte Monterey leaped out of the car into the arc of Hannah’s headlights. He seemed in a state of shock. He stood for a moment with arms outstretched as if to block a movement already halted. His mouth formed words she tried vainly to lip-read through the windshield.

  “Hannah, I need you—” Suddenly mobilized, he lunged forward and clawed his way along the side of the Rolls. He grabbed the side mount for support and then fell forward against the open window. “Hannah, please listen—”

  And then he stopped. He looked beyond her toward the rear of the parking lot. He shook his head slowly and, still shaking it, began to back away from the Rolls. A siren began to scream in the darkness and then a spotlight focused on Monterey. He didn’t try to speak again. Ducking like a back-fielder returning a punt, he reversed himself, plunged through the glare of headlights and then disappeared down the dark street beyond the parking lot.

  Hannah heard shouting and then she heard Buddy Jenks bearing down on her like a rescuing knight, immediately before she felt herself being gently pulled from the Rolls.

  A huge policeman wearing a crash helmet stood before her.

  “Are you all right, lady?” he asked.

  “It was all the fault of the guy in the Ford,” Buddy volunteered. “I saw the whole thing. He didn’t have lights.”

  “I asked the lady,” the policeman said politely. “Are you all right? Can you tell me what happened here?”

  Hannah’s mind was filled with incidents. Monterey recognizing her at the bar and trying to make contact. Failing, he left the bar. Outside in the parking lot he could have seen the famous Rolls—an everyday familiar when he was making his debut on Gower Gulch—recognized it and waited for her to come out. But the parking-lot boy brought the car to her and she was getting away from him. All he could do was ram the Rolls to make her stop because something terrible was happening in his life and he needed help.

  The officer was waiting for an answer. Hannah looked at him glassily and delicately smothered a hiccough with one hand.

  “I’m very sorry, officer,” she said tightly, “but I’m just too drunk to have seen anything at all.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  When the last cable car of the day has completed its run, the streets of San Francisco start to growl. Actually, they have been growling all day; it is only when the traffic noises and the people noises cease that the cable noises can be heard. At two o’clock in the morning, driving downtown from a party, Simon Drake became acutely aware of this fact. Perhaps, because of the hour, or of the stimulating company he had just left, or merely because it was a lovely night when profound realities seemed to spring forth from the darkness like great blazing stars in an ebony sky, it struck him, sharply, that this discovery had deep significance. Cables do not cease to roll when the day is done. Rivers do not flow only when they are watched. Nothing is without motion. In this mellow and mildly intoxicated mood Simon rolled the black XK-E into Del Webb’s Townhouse parking lot, parked and sauntered into the lobby. There, awaiting his room key, he learned how really mobile everything could be.

  He had received an important long-distance call from La Verde. Immediate answer was requested. It sounded sticky so he asked for his key and took the elevator up to his room. The maid had been in to turn down the bed and close the drapes. Very nice. He switched on the bathroom light and checked the soap dish. This was one of the few motels in the country that supplied a full-sized cake of soap, and Simon grinned in anticipation of a quick shower, a deep sleep and a warm breakfast. He paused briefly before the lavatory mirror and loosened his tie. Success had come quickly and he still had to remind himself who it really was in that hand-tailored dinner jacket and pleated shirt—really Simon Drake who had worked as a garage mechanic days and studied law and investment programs nights until he was admitted to the bar and exchanged the tool box for a brief case. He was holding up well, he admitted to the reflection in the mirror. Only a touch of gray at the temples, still clear-eyed after the four-day struggle to complete Brad Merton’s divorce settlement, and the subsequent eight-hour celebration in Brad’s newly established bachelor quarters. Removing the dinner jacket, Simon frowned. The stomach could be lea
ner. It called for a renewal of workouts in the torture chamber Hannah called her gymnasium. He tossed the jacket onto the chair and watched the desk clerk’s memorandum flutter to the floor. The call to La Verde. He retrieved the paper and put through the call, puzzling sleepily over what possible contact he might have in that unpretentious settlement.

  And then he was told.

  “La Verde Police Department,” the man said.

  Simon stopped being sleepy.

  “Simon Drake here. I have a message to call—”

  “Simon Drake? Thank God! Hey, lady, your lawyer is on the phone. Now will you stop threatening to contact the American Civil Liberties Union?”

  “Hannah,” Simon said, “what are you doing in La Verde?”

  With the exception of his fiancée, Wanda Call, whom he had saved from a murder charge when her young husband was found dead in their honeymoon apartment, Hannah Lee was Simon’s only true love. Independent and outspoken, she was still the eternal woman, passing from cycle to cycle with the grace of Aphrodite and the humor of the Marquis de Sade.

  “I’m in the drunk tank,” Hannah responded, “but I won’t cooperate. They want to make a film of me walking the chalk line and all that jazz. The blood, breath and urine routine. I’m pleading the fifth. I refuse to allow my body to testify against myself. I demanded my constitutional right to speak to my lawyer.”

  Had there been no such constitutional right, Simon reflected, Hannah would have staged a revolution and created one. Aloud, he said:

  “Are you drunk?”

  “No,” she answered.

  “Then why are you in the drunk tank?”

  “Because I told the officer I was drunk when the accident occurred.”

  “Accident? What accident?”

  “Oh, stop wasting my dime,” Hannah fumed, “and come down here and get me out of this mess.”

  And then the man’s voice, which Simon later learned belonged to Officer Glenn Quentin, broke in on the line.