“Well, we’re not planning to spend a lot of time there. Grab a bite to eat, gas up the jalopy, do our work, and come back.”
“Mendosa’s straight down the road about fifteen miles, just past the icehouse. Probably take you half an hour in this fog.”
“Thanks, Charlie.”
“Glad to do it,” he answered. “Anything I can do for Dan.”
That’s all he said, although I was sure there was more to that story than he cared to tell. He walked in front of the car with a flashlight and guided us through a turnaround and back up to the main road.
It took us just under thirty minutes to crawl into Mendosa. We passed Ferguson’s Icehouse on the right and about two miles from Mendosa we drove out of the fog as suddenly as we had driven into it.
“We got an address on Shuler’s place?” I asked Ski.
“Yeah. End of Bellamy Street on the north end of town. Take a left at the second light, which is Main Street, and then right when the street forks.”
I pulled into the first filling station I saw. The sign out front told us it was warthog miller’s fill-up. The attendant was a short, mean-looking guy with a gimpy leg, oily hair, bad teeth, and the breath to go with it. I told him to fill it up and got out as he was pumping the gas. There was a lot of background noise. People, music, horns blowing. Friday night noises.
“You Warthog Miller?” I asked pleasantly.
“I suppose so,” he snarled.
His eyes wandered to our license plate, the whip aerial on the back bumper, and the spotlight mounted beside the door on the driver’s side.
“Lookin’ for anybody in particular?” he said, too casually.
“Nope. Just gonna grab a bite to eat.”
He finished pumping and asked if we needed oil.
“No thanks,” I said, paid him two bucks for the gas, and got back in the car.
“Sounds like they’re having a riot,” Ski said.
“Friday night in a crooked mill town,” I ventured.
“Ain’t we the lucky ones.”
As we pulled out, I watched Warthog in the rearview mirror. He scurried into the office and dropped a nickel in a pay phone on the wall.
“I think we got made,” I said.
“What a surprise.”
When we got to Main Street I sat for a minute, waiting for the light to change, then took a right.
“I said left at the light,” Ski mumbled.
To our left, Main Street was as dark as a mole hole.
“I gotta make a phone call.”
Main Street wasn’t as bad as I expected. A small town with a tree-lined main drag. We drove six or seven blocks and saw three bars, a nightclub that advertised “dancing ladies” in neon, another that had a sign telling us it featured genuine New Orleans jazz, a gaming parlor with its windows painted black, a billiard parlor, a pawnshop, and a restaurant that bragged “We never close.” Otherwise, there was the usual collection of hardware stores, grocers, meat markets, an ice cream parlor, and a movie theater. But it was a noisy town, with music spilling from the joints and streets filled with people looking in the doors and milling about. A lot of activity for a little town, even for a Friday night.
I drove another block and came to a restaurant called Ma’s Home Cooking.
I parked and we went in and grabbed a table.
A waitress with henna-colored hair piled on top of her head and lipstick the color of blood sashayed over to the table and popped her gum for us.
“Hi, boys, what’ll it be,” she said. “The meat loaf’s the specialty. It’s so good the cook keeps the recipe in a safe.”
“Just two coffees,” I said.
“What kind of pie do you have?” Ski asked.
“What kind would you like, Shorty?” she said with a half-assed grin.
Ski’s laugh rattled the place.
“How about banana cream?”
“You got it,” she said. And to me, “Pie for you, too?”
“No thanks,” I said.
“Two javas, one B.C., coming up.”
I went to the phone booth in the back of the place near the rest rooms and looked up the Shuler Institute in the phone book, dropped a nickel, and dialed the number. A man answered the phone and I asked for Mrs. Fisher. She was on the phone within seconds.
“This is Superintendent Fisher.”
“Mrs. Fisher? My name is Tyler Marchand the Third, from Santa Maria. I’m sure you’ve heard of Marchand Estates.”
“Uh . . . yes, of course,” she said. Took the bait.
“You’ve been highly recommended by several people in my club—I won’t mention names, I’m sure you respect their confidentiality—and I’m sure you’ll understand when you hear my predicament.”
“Which is, Mr. Marchand?”
“My brother has become a real problem. He’s a drinker and we have tried everything. He’s very tight right now and I wondered if I might bring him by there.”
“You mean now?!”
“I really need your help. I’ve been told you are a truly concerned establishment. I’ve driven over forty miles.”
“Mr. Marchand, we require a letter of sponsorship and a substantial deposit prior to an examination. This late at night . . .”
“This is an emergency, Mrs. Fisher. He’s been drinking for days. What better time to evaluate him? I can be there in ten minutes. I’ll be glad to give you whatever deposit is required.”
She hesitated for a few seconds and finally she said, “Alright, Mr. Marchand, but I’ll have to talk to you before we admit him. There are a lot of details . . .”
“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” I said, and hung up.
The waitress was back by the time I returned to the table, carrying coffee in each hand and the pie perched on one of the cups.
“There you go,” she said. “Shorty, you look like a man who’d just love an order of that meat loaf.”
“And so I would,” Ski said. “But we’re running a little late for an appointment.”
“Well, ain’t that a boot in the ass,” she chirped, and retreated to the back.
Ski took a long swig of coffee and glanced casually over the lip of the cup through the front window as he was drinking. He set the cup down, smiled, and said casually, “We got company.”
“What kind?”
“Two guys. Dark blue Buick, spotlight on the side, tall aerial on the back bumper. Trying hard not to look at us.”
“Sounds like my first trip to San Pietro.”
“Maybe you just naturally irritate people, Zeke.”
“Yeah,” I said. “It’s giving me a complex.”
The front window of the place was behind me so I couldn’t see our company.
“Somebody just lit a cigarette,” Ski said. “They’re still trying hard not to look over here. Think we can ditch ’em?”
“We’ll give it a try.”
He gulped down his pie and we left. I drove to the next intersection.
“Hang on,” I said.
I grabbed a left, slammed down the gas, turned at the first left, and pulled in an alley behind the row of buildings facing Main Street. I killed the lights and waited. A minute later the Buick roared by. I pulled out of the other end of the alley, turned back onto Main, and drove toward Bellamy.
We had no trouble finding the Institute. It commanded several acres at the end of the street, a few blocks off Main, and was surrounded by an eight-foot stone wall with broken glass on the top. I wondered whether it was to keep the patients in or keep unwanted people out.
The main building was an enormous white Victorian gingerbread structure with a porch that surrounded it. It looked quite elegant. Three stories high with four spired towers topping it off. There were several outbuildings on both sides. The manicured lawn boasted trees and a small fish pond. Wooden porch swings hung from the heavy limbs of the sturdier trees.
Inside, things would be less cheerful. Drunks screaming with the D.T.’s would be locked away in rooms with padded wall
s; the elderly would be treated like children; schizoids would be locked away in padded rooms or strapped to beds chained to the floor. I knew about institutions like Shuler’s and about dementia.
“Make like you’re drunk, but don’t make a lot of noise,” I said.
We walked up the steps to the main office. Old memories flashed back and my stomach cramped as I entered the place.
A smallish, trim woman in a gray gabardine suit came out of an office as I entered the foyer. She had a stern face and her blue-white hair was mannishly cut in a short bob. She wore round glasses, her suspicious eyes framed in gold. She was followed by a surly hunk of a man in his late twenties, his body apparently molded by barbells. He was wearing a white nurse’s uniform.
“Mrs. Fisher? I’m Tyler Marchand. We just spoke on the phone.”
Ski staggered past them into the office, dropped heavily in a chair, closed his eyes, and started humming to himself.
I looked at the hulk and back at her.
“Can we go in your office and talk?”
Randy stood stiffly, arms hanging loosely at his sides.
“It’s alright, Randy, finish your rounds,” she said officiously, without looking at him.
“You sure? The lush is a big one.”
“He won’t cause you any trouble,” I said. “He’s a pussycat.”
“Go on,” she said, and Randy left. I followed Ione Fisher into her office.
“So you’re Mr. Marchand?” she said with a snap in her tone.
“Yes,” I said. “You’ll have to forgive Raymond, my brother; he forgets his manners when he’s under the weather.”
Ski let his arms fall loosely, his mouth fell open, and he was still as a pillow.
Her office was pleasant, considering where we were. There was a vase of flowers on her desk and polka-dot curtains dressed the windows. I strolled over to the window facing the rear of the compound and looked the place over. The road made a wide arc around the rear grounds. In the center of the arc was a large, three-story building. There were no windows on the first floor; small, slitted oblongs of light every four or five feet on the second. The third floor looked like it belonged to a hotel. Sliding glass doors opened onto small balconies on the three sides I could see. I watched an elevator climb up one corner of the structure.
A muffled, inhuman cry echoed from one of the lower floors; a moment later I heard the sharp crack of a leather strap and the cry became a barely audible moan. Then the quad fell silent again.
“Seems pleasant enough,” I said, and turned back to Nurse Fisher.
She sat down behind her desk and folded her hands on its top.
“How long has he been drinking?” she asked.
“About twenty years.”
“No, no, I mean this time,” she said, her frown deepening.
“Oh, let’s see, it was Mother’s birthday . . . sixteen days.” I changed the subject. “Your place is quite impressive,” I said. “These towered rooms on the floors above, is one of them available? I want Raymond to be as comfortable as possible.”
“The tower suites are reserved for special visitors.”
“Is that right. How does one become a special visitor?”
“Get elected to the board of directors,” she said. “Have a seat, Mr. Marchand. I’ll have to take down some information before we even consider accepting your brother.”
“Thank you.”
Before she went any further, a phone rang in the outer office.
“Excuse me, my secretary left an hour ago,” she said, and went into the office and closed the door. I got up and looked out the front window. No cars. So far, so good.
She was gone about two minutes. When she came back, her expression had changed from stern to angry.
“Guess what?” she said.
I raised my eyebrows.
“There aren’t any Marchands in Santa Maria,” she said smugly. “No Marchand Estates. Nobody up there ever heard of you. What’s your game, whoever you are?”
“You’re very good,” I said. I took out my wallet and showed her my badge.
“My name’s Bannon, Central Homicide, L.A. Police,” I said. “Raymond here is Detective Agassi, my partner.”
Ski opened his eyes and sat up in the chair with his hands on his knees and offered her a brief smile.
“What do you want?”
I put it to her bluntly. “When’s the last time you heard from Lila?”
She looked like I had thrown cold water in her face. The question stunned her and she just stared at me.
“Let me hit it from another angle,” I said. “Did your daughter come down here and hide out with you after the Riker trial?”
She got control of herself.
“You better get out of here before . . .” She hesitated.
“Before what? Your sadistic flunky Randy comes back?”
Her face was white. “I haven’t seen or heard from Lila in over twenty years,” she whispered. “She left me when I married Ollie Fisher. She hated him. Look, people here at the Institute don’t know about Lila. Nobody at this hospital was even here when it happened. Now please leave.”
Her face tightened and fear began to take the place of anger.
“Be straight with me,” I said. “Have you been in touch with Lila at all since Arnie Riker’s murder trial?”
She lit a cigarette with a shaking hand. “I told you, she walked out of my life when she was fourteen.”
“Never written? No phone calls?”
She shook her head.
“In all these years, she’s never been in touch with you? No Christmas cards, birthday cards . . .?”
Her eyes widened. “NO!” She looked toward the front window and back at me. Ski walked over to the window and stared down the road.
“Why are you here? Why are you doing this to me?”
“A woman was murdered down in Los Angeles a few days ago. We can’t track her back beyond 1924. Somebody was paying her five hundred dollars a month for all these years, and we think the dead woman may have been Lila.”
She stared at me and tears welled up in her eyes.
“Sergeant . . .?”
“Bannon.”
“Sergeant Bannon, why would you think that?”
“The dead woman showed up in L.A. in 1924—with no past.”
“For the last twenty years I have lived each day hoping I would hear her voice. Or get a card. Anything to let me know she’s alive. She was my only child. Do you have any children?”
I shook my head.
“Can you understand what that was like?”
“Yes, I can, and I’m sorry I have to bring it up,” I said. “Do you have any pictures of Lila, even from when she was a child?”
She slowly shook her head.
“I couldn’t afford to keep them,” she said. “I was going to quit here and leave when she testified at Riker’s trial but nobody cared about me.” She hesitated for a moment and then said, “This girl who was murdered, why do you think it may have been Lila?”
“It’s the only lead we have right now that makes sense.”
“What happened to her?”
“She was drowned in her bathtub.”
“Oh my God.” The tears started working down her cheeks.
“We could be wrong, Mrs. Fisher,” Ski said sympathetically. “We could be wrong, but we need to make sure.”
She swallowed hard and said, “I was afraid to go and afraid to stay. Do you have any idea what these people are like? Have you ever met Guilfoyle?”
I shook my head.
“Guilfoyle heads security here. Sometimes he goes into what they call the rage ward. He likes to beat on them himself when they start getting out of hand. He calls it ‘playtime.’ Randy says he even brings his out-of-town friends in and lets them do things. Once, one of them broke a young girl’s fingers.”
“And you stayed here knowing that?”
“I didn’t know anyplace else to go,” she said. “It was a
good job.”
“Car’s coming,” Ski said.
“Oh my God,” she cried.
“It’s Guilfoyle,” Ski said. “Now what’s the play?”
I turned to Mrs. Fisher.
“Let me handle this,” I said. “I’ll cover you, don’t worry.”
“There’s three of them . . .” Ski started, and the office door burst open. The man who came in was about five-eight. He was a ghost. White hair, no pigment in his skin. He was carrying a snub-nosed .32. He looked the room over with red eyes.
“You,” he said to Ski. “In the chair.”
Ski didn’t move.
Guilfoyle came in behind the albino, shoving him aside. He was as mean-looking as the reputation that preceded him. Tall, round-shouldered, a beer belly tightening the vest of his three-piece suit, drooping dead eyes, a mouth turned down at the corners. A hairline scar etched one side of his face and he had big hands with gnarled fingers, which he kept flexing into fists. He was wearing a brown fedora with the brim snapped down over one eye.
A third thug came in behind him. More of the same. A feral-looking blond hooligan pushing six feet, who walked on the balls of his feet.
“There’s no need for rough stuff,” I said.
“Shut the fuck up,” Guilfoyle snarled.
“We’re police officers,” I said.
“No shit,” he said with a twisted excuse for a smile. “You were made before you got to Main Street.”
“I don’t know what you’re all riled up about,” I said. “We got a man in homicide named Red Marcus, who’s got a drinking problem. We were told this might be a place could help him.”
Guilfoyle snickered. “That’s the biggest lie I heard since Santa Claus.” He said to the albino, “Frisk ’em.”
Ski got a little taller when he said it. The albino reached out to get Ski’s gun and Ski grabbed his wrist.
“Nobody takes my gun,” he said.
The other thug pulled a .38 and went toward him.
“It’s true,” Ione Fisher said. “They were just . . .”
Guilfoyle reached around and slapped her hard with the back of his hand, knocking her to the floor. “You speak when I say so,” Guilfoyle said.
As he said it, Ski twisted the albino’s wrist backward, snatched his gun, and threw him away like a wet bath towel.
Guilfoyle was distracted long enough for me to pull my Luger. I backed up a foot and aimed it at Guilfoyle’s head.
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