Sweet Wild Wench

by William Campbell Gault

  “Tramp?” she asked. “Is that what you’re thinking?” I lay still on the enormous low bed; I didn’t answer. “I’m not,” she went on. “I’m free. I’m my own woman.”

  I didn’t comment.

  Now she chuckled. “Joe Puma, the flawless, tonight showed a flaw. How are you feeling, Joe Puma, the flawed?”

  “Don’t tease me,” I said. “It was temporary, wasn’t it? I never thought of you as a tramp, Eve.”

  A moment’s silence and she said, “I’ll be frank. I lusted for you from the moment I first saw you. You have a certain — oh, rustic charm. You’re a typical peasant. Don’t misunderstand me. That wasn’t meant as any sort of criticism.”

  “I’m not hurt. I am a peasant. Is there anything to eat in the place? I’m hungry.”

  She turned my way and then she began to laugh. “Men! Oh, men are monsters!”

  “Men are mortal. They must eat.” I rose to a sitting position.

  I looked past her at the narrow road winding up from the highway and I saw a car turn off. I couldn’t tell what kind of car it was, but it was sporting a spotlight, and very few cars do these days. I was trying to remember what car I had seen one on lately. Deke’s? No.

  I asked her, “Is this the only house that road serves?”

  She turned to look down at the headlights swinging around a curve. “No, there are two other houses, but I don’t think they’re occupied right now.” She stared at me in the dimness. “Who could it be?”

  “I think we had better get dressed,” I said.

  She nodded toward another window in the opposite wall. “If the car goes by, we’ll see the lights through here. We can see if it stops, too. That looks out onto the parking area in front of the garage.”

  I was dressed before she was and I went out into the dark kitchen with my shoes in my hand. The kitchen window would give me an even better view of the road and the parking area.

  In a few seconds I saw the dim glow of distant headlights illuminate the grass of the slope behind the house. The glow increased, and then disappeared as the car went around a shielded turn.

  Then brilliance as the sound of a climbing car came from my right, around the last big turn. The car was moving slowly now and a spotlight on the driver’s side went on, the focused beam probing relentlessly for the house.

  I ducked as the beam flashed for the kitchen window. I saw it light the wall behind me brilliantly and then I heard a hoarse curse from the bedroom.

  A few seconds later Eve came along the hall, dressed like a lady again.

  “Who the hell is the voyeur?” she asked. “That damned spotlight lighted up the whole bedroom.”

  “I couldn’t make out the car,” I told her. “It couldn’t be one of your neighbors, could it?”

  “My neighbors aren’t that curious. Well, it went past, didn’t it?”

  “We hope. Perhaps we’d better get out of here before it gets a chance to turn around.”

  She came over to stand close to me. “Satiated beast.” She looked at me seriously. “Are you frightened?”

  “No,” I said. “Are you?”

  She shook her head.

  Burns Murphy murdered, Adams involved; it seemed logical to me she should be frightened. But if I was looking for logic, she would make a bad study.

  I decided it was time to leave.

  As she drove down the winding road, she was humming quietly to herself. I kept an eye peeled for a sign of headlights following us.

  None showed by the time we had reached the bottom, but that didn’t prove anything. It was bright enough for a trailing car to come down the road without headlights.

  At the junction with the highway there was a closed filling station to our right. “Pull in under the overhang,” I said.

  She glanced my way and smiled. “You’re not going to attack me, are you?”

  “Get past the corner of the building,” I went on, and reached over to snap off our headlights.

  If the car behind wasn’t following too closely, this move might not be noticed. If there was a car following us.

  We waited in the dark, listening to the crickets, looking back through the rear window toward the narrow road. Then after about two minutes, there was a muted sound of an engine and a big sedan came into view.

  It was the same Buick that had followed Adele and me. It was Ned Deutscher, and it looked like someone was in the front seat with him.

  11

  I SAID TO EVE, “He can see us now. If he turns toward Santa Monica, follow him after a few seconds. I want to see who is with him.”

  “Do you know the driver?”

  “Mmmm-hmmm. Fellow named Ned Deutscher, a private investigator. He’s working for Burns Murphy’s brother.”

  The lights of the Buick went on now, and Eve asked, “Is he turning left?”

  “He is. Give him a little time.”

  “I’m excited,” she said. “This is exciting.”

  I waited until the Buick was safely down the road and then said, “Go, girl. He’s really moving. He must have figured he lost us.”

  The Cad began to unwind then. We hit a top of slightly under a hundred miles an hour.

  “Pull in front of him,” I told Eve, “and slow down. I’ll flag him.”

  The Buick was slowing for the light ahead now, and she swung the Cad past and then cut back into the right-hand lane. I leaned out the window on my side and signaled and the car behind headed over toward the apron of the road.

  “Slow down,” I directed Eve. “He’s stopping.”

  “I’m frightened,” she said. “It’s awfully deserted along here tonight, Joe.”

  “Don’t worry,” I said. “He’s probably more embarrassed than we are, now that we’ve caught him snooping.”

  It was Deutscher all right, but he didn’t seem embarrassed. I asked him, “Looking for me, Ned?”

  He shook his head. “I was on the prowl for Jeremiah Adams. I thought he was with Miss Deering.”

  I looked past Deutscher and recognized Clyde Tackett in the seat beside him. I turned back to Deutscher, “Buddy of yours?”

  Deutscher smiled. “He’s a help.”

  “He showed you where the house is, is that it?”

  Deutscher continued to smile. He said nothing.

  Tackett said, “You and your friend Sergeant Kafke saw to it that I lost my job, Mr. Puma. I have to make a living one way or another.”

  “Isn’t it the truth?” I said. I asked Deutscher, “Were you really looking for Adams? Did you follow him from the temple tonight?”

  “That’s right. He went to that hotel in Santa Monica and I figured he was going in to see the Deering girl. So I parked in front and then I got tired of waiting after a couple hours, so I went in. And learned he’d been waiting for her, but she hadn’t come in, so he’d left by a side door.”

  “And he isn’t at home?”

  Deutscher shook his head. “Nor at the temple.”

  I nodded toward Tackett. “And where did you pick up the stoolie?”

  Deutscher said evenly, “Joe, I’m cooperating, like the mayor suggested. But don’t tell me how to operate. I’m still running my own business.”

  I stared at him for a few seconds. Then I said, “Okay, Ned.” I nodded good-night and went back to the Cad.

  “Well?” Eve asked.

  “Deutscher and that snippy little clerk from your hotel. Deutscher must have brought him along to point out your hideaway.”

  “The clerk? Mr. Tackett? How would he know about that place?”

  I looked at her and some perversity stirred in me, some edginess born of the evening’s excitement. Sex ennui? I said wearily, “You tell me. How did he know about the place?”

  “I have no idea. I haven’t been there since I moved into the hotel, and I never saw Mr. Tackett before the day I registered there.”

  Conviction in her voice, but suspicion in my mind. I said, “He must have found out some way. There’d be no other reason I can t
hink of for Deutscher to have him in the car. Eve, if you’ve been withholding anything from me, now would be a good time to come clean.”

  No words from her. She stared at me doubtfully.

  “Maybe Tackett heard about it from somebody else. How many people have you — have gone up there with you?”

  She continued to stare. “What’s happened? What did those men tell you? What’s made you so hostile?”

  “Frustration,” I said. “I go around and around and learn nothing. Everybody lies.”

  She started the engine, her gaze straight ahead through the windshield. “I haven’t lied. I haven’t needed to. Perhaps you’d better not say any more until you feel more reasonable, Joe.”

  “Deutscher,” I explained, “told me he was looking for Adams, and that’s why he came up to the house. He thought Adams was with you. Has Adams ever been there?”

  “Shut up!” she said hoarsely. “Just shut up!” The Cad moved out in a lunge.

  “I’m not checking you,” I said. “I’m checking Deutscher’s story. I’ve no right to check you.”

  She said nothing.

  “Burns Murphy is dead,” I reminded her. “Others may die. It’s very important that I get whatever truth is around. I’d like you to ask the desk clerk tonight if it’s true that Deutscher came in to ask about Adams.”

  “Why should he?”

  “I don’t know,” I said patiently. “He claims he did. I have a feeling he may have been checking on me instead of on Adams. If that’s so, I mean to find out why.”

  She was silent.

  At the foot of Sunset, Eve turned left, climbing the hill toward the Palisades.

  Along the side of the road here, surrounding a small pond of natural drainage, gilded turrets rose and a huge windmill appeared briefly through the shrubbery. It was a cult, active and respected.

  Eve said then, “Don’t hate me, Joe. I haven’t lied to you.”

  “Okay, okay. But everybody lies to me. And sometimes their lies boomerang and the liars are sorry later. And occasionally dead.”

  The Cad went winging down Sunset. She said nothing and I had a feeling she was thinking. Finally she said, “There couldn’t be any suspicion of Jeremiah, could there? He’d hardly call you if he had just killed Burns, would he?”

  “It seems unlikely. Though it’s a situation that has happened before. Have you any stronger suspects?”

  Her voice was thoughtful. “A cult, a new religion like Jeremiah’s is bound to attract a minority of unbalanced people. I’ve met a few there. Any of these, learning that Burns Murphy was investigating their idol, could get angry enough to — ” She shrugged.

  “Go over the edge?” I finished.

  She nodded. “And that could be the reason Burns phoned Jeremiah. Imagine it. This temporarily insane parishioner in Burns’ office, and Burns trying to reason with him.”

  “Or her,” I added.

  “Or her,” she admitted evenly. “So what’s the logical way for Burns to convince the killer that he was no threat to Jeremiah? He phones Jeremiah and asks him to come over.”

  It made sense, more sense than anything I’d been able to dream up. It had the smell of truth. I said, “You must have been thinking a lot about this murder.”

  “Naturally,” she said.

  “You wouldn’t have any favorite suspect, would you?”

  “None,” she said. “I never really became friendly with any of the more rabid parishioners. There are some weird ones in the group, though, I must admit.”

  Knowing only one of them, I’d agree to that. She probably considered herself rational and adjusted. And maybe she was.

  The Cad swung to the right on Burlingame, heading for San Vicente. A deserted, quiet street, with the tall trees forming an arch over the road, blotting out the cold stars.

  Then, as we came abreast of Adele’s house, I was startled by the blast of twin air horns shattering the night’s silence.

  It was a second before I realized the horns were the Cad’s.

  Eve laughed quietly. “Don’t mind the pixie in me. I resent Adele Griffin.”

  “It wasn’t very kind,” I admonished her. “We had some trouble with another horn-blower last night.”

  “It wasn’t kind,” Eve agreed humbly. “And she does need her sleep — a woman her age.”

  We had no further words the rest of the trip to the parking lot. There, she pulled up next to my weary Plymouth.

  I said, “Be careful now. And if you learn anything I should know, be sure to tell me, won’t you?”

  “Of course,” she murmured. “Do we kiss good-night?”

  I leaned over and kissed her. Nothing. I was depleted, bushed, disenchanted and doubtful.

  “My!” she said. “Aren’t we cool?”

  “I’m tired,” I explained. “I have a headache. Eve, please be careful. Remember that a man has been murdered.”

  “I’m trying to forget it,” she said. “Good-night, limp lover. I’ll be around.”

  The Cad went sighing off into the darkness and I climbed into my heap. Stud Puma, the over-sexed investigator, fornicating his way to the moment of truth. She was a fragrant and shapely flower from a sick house. I wondered what her mother had been like.

  There was a light on in my apartment, I saw, as I came along the walk from the garage. Premonition stirred briefly in my tired blood, but then I realized a waiting enemy would hardly turn on a light.

  I opened the door quietly and went into the living room. There was a small table lamp glowing in there and Deke was sleeping on my studio couch.

  He looked innocent and peaceful and contented. I took off my shoes and went out to see if there was any coffee in the pot that I could warm.

  The pot was almost half full. I turned a low flame under it and then heard Deke stirring in the living room. I went in there to find him sitting up.

  “Well,” he said. “You’re finally home. Where were you prowling tonight, tomcat?”

  “I’m heating some coffee,” I said.

  He yawned. “You never confide in me. I don’t want your front-line girls. I could be very happy with your castoffs, Joe.”

  “I’ve been working,” I said stiffly. “What’s new?”

  “Nothing on Murphy that you don’t know. He ran booze, but he’s been an honest man for a long time.” He yawned again. “Except for his political shenanigans. Deutscher you know all about too. Plays both ends against the middle and usually comes out on top. The one that surprised me was this weasel Tackett.”

  “He hasn’t any record,” I said. “I checked that.”

  “Maybe not. But he booked horses right from the hotel desk there. And he’s played in some free-wheeling poker games, big money games with the Vegas hoodlums. Among his friends, the little bastard is known as a very sharp operator. Most of his friends are con-men.” He paused. “Like Jeremiah Adams.”

  “He’s a friend of Adams?”

  “No, no, I didn’t mean that. I meant Adams is a con-man, too, isn’t he?”

  I shrugged. “Maybe. I’m warming some coffee. Want some?”

  He ran a hand wearily through his hair. “I guess. I’ve been shooting craps. What an idiot’s game that is.”

  I turned toward the kitchen and he said, “Wait, one more thing. I couldn’t confirm it, but there’s a persistent rumor that Deutscher almost lost his license because of a blackmail charge a couple of months ago. Somebody in the Department went to bat for him and helped to hush it up. The way I heard it, Kafke is the man in the Department who stuck his neck out.”

  “That’s a pretty serious charge, Deke. Would you call it a strong rumor?”

  “Strong enough. It came from a former cop.” He stretched. “Could you make that cocoa instead of coffee? I’ve got coffee nerves.”

  “If there’s any milk,” I said. “I’ll see.”

  There was milk, and I put plenty of cocoa in, the way Deke likes it, and added a dash of vanilla.

  But when it was ready and
I brought it out, he was snoring quietly on the studio couch. I took off his shoes and covered him with a blanket.

  I drank all the cocoa myself, before hitting the hay.

  12

  IT WAS A TROUBLED NIGHT, filled with dreams of violence. I wakened to the hiss of the shower. There was a bad taste in my mouth and in my misused body my Latin temper smoldered. Where was I getting? Nowhere. What was I doing about it? Nothing. The taxpayers were being robbed as I spent their time in various beds.

  The sound of the shower stopped and I climbed achingly out of bed. I was showered and shaving when Deke came to the bathroom door. “Twenty seconds, Joe, before the eggs get hard. Hump.”

  They were fine eggs. The morning Times informed me there was no new development in the death of Burns Murphy. The funeral would be held this afternoon.

  “I think I’ll go,” Deke said. “I kind of liked Burns.”

  I hadn’t disliked Burns, but I disliked funerals. They gave me the creeps for some reason or other.

  Deke put five one-hundred-dollar bills on the table. “Will you stash this for me? I’m playing cards tonight and I don’t want to leave myself without eating money.”

  I put the money in my wallet. “I thought you lost last night?”

  “Hell, no! I made four grand.”

  “Then what were you grousing about last night?”

  “It’s just a lousy game. All luck. Brains are a handicap. There’s no skill involved.”

  “But there’s skill involved in poker?”

  “There’s discipline, Joe. Patience, that’s all you need in poker. Enough patience to wait for a good hand.” He took a breath. “You should play more of it. It wouldn’t hurt you to learn a little patience.”

  “Yes, Father,” I said irritably. “Look who’s lecturing.”

  He looked at me. “Why are you so owly this morning, Joe?”

  “I don’t know. It will go away.”

  “I don’t think you like your job,” he said. “I don’t mean as an investigator; I mean working so cosy with the Department. You were never happy when you were in the Department.”

  “I was happy with everything but the money,” I said. “Don’t fret about me, Deke. It’s just a — bad time.”