Hoodwink

by Rhonda Roberts

  ‘Is that why you left the Marines to join the NTA?’

  Honeycutt stared at me for a moment. He hadn’t seen that question coming. ‘That’s a part of it,’ he said slowly.

  He really didn’t want to talk about himself, about his background … which made me very curious.

  ‘Why do you speak French, Honeycutt? You’re not wearing a translator.’

  He searched my face and decided to answer. ‘My mother’s family — the Devereaux — have kept up their French heritage.’

  ‘Devereaux … So was that story about Streak of Lightning Zeb Honeycutt true too?’

  I remembered his face while we were talking to the three Confederate veterans. Yes, Honeycutt’d had some kind of emotional investment in that conversation.

  ‘General Zeb Honeycutt was real. Kannon, surely you must’ve been taught it’s always easier to tell the truth than have to memorise a completely fictitious cover story?’ He said it dismissively, trying to jettison a touchy subject.

  Why did Honeycutt keep looking for ways to stop me asking questions about his family background? ‘So is your real first name Zebediah?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Marshal Zebediah Elijah Daniel Honeycutt … And you’re an eldest son as well.’

  ‘Good guess,’ he conceded. ‘In each Honeycutt generation, the eldest boy gets stuck with the full catastrophe.’

  ‘Sounds like both sides of your family like to keep their links with the past nice and strong.’

  ‘Yes, darlin’, I’m a Southern boy from way back.’

  ‘When I first saw you at the studio, just before you stopped that horse from kicking me, you were watching the Confederate extras …’

  Honeycutt’s face became shuttered.

  ‘You looked so hopeless. Then that night, at Selznick’s party, you said that when you saw those extras you were reminded of Zeb … and that when you think of Zeb, you think of your brother. Why?’

  ‘They both died young and they look alike.’ It was clear Honeycutt was telling a half-truth.

  I waited for the rest.

  He looked away. ‘Zebediah died leading a headlong charge at Gettysburg, just after he’d received news that his wife had died in childbirth. My brother, Kyle, was shot when he was thirteen.’

  My heart ached for him.

  29

  SEARCHING THE GANG’S

  HOUSE

  Earl was down at the Atlanta train depot watching Ada Bronstein sort out three thousand extras dressed in ragged Confederate uniforms. The mechanised dummies were nowhere to be seen. He was sprawled back in his director’s chair with the brim of his hat pulled low and drinking black coffee. When I told him that I was going to spend most of the day showing Devereaux around Los Angeles, he barely heard me. Jittery from too much booze and not enough sleep, he couldn’t care less.

  Forty minutes later I was sitting around the corner from the gang’s house in the San Fernando Valley, waiting for the right moment to act. I’d changed out of my suit and heels and into a pair of men’s navy blue bib-and-brace overalls, a matching work shirt and my stalker shoes. There was a jemmy stuck up my sleeve and I was armed.

  I’d go in the back window and see what I could find.

  Honeycutt had screamed blue-murder when I told him I intended to search the gang’s house while he charmed information about Renfrow out of Selznick. So I reminded him that we had to solve the case to keep Senator Curtis happy and we couldn’t possibly do that if he was following me around like a bodyguard.

  Honeycutt had laughed at that, so I sternly asked him if he was acting like this because I was female.

  That’d hit the spot and he’d turned his complaining down to a low smoulder. I could go as long as I was careful, and yes, of course I would take my gun.

  I was very glad I hadn’t told him about what’d been done to my car last night. Slashed tyres and that evil-looking doll figure scratched into my paintwork would’ve sent him into a hyperprotective frenzy.

  There was no sign of life in either the gang’s house or the rest of the neighbourhood. It was well past starting time for anyone with a job, but my guess was they were all lined up at a local soup kitchen instead, getting some breakfast.

  The only signs of life were some ragged kids playing in the vacant land next to the gang’s house. They’d dug shallow trenches in the dirt with some sticks and were pretending to attack each other. They were throwing rocks, so maybe they weren’t playing after all.

  The gang’s van had been gone when I arrived, so I waited for another half an hour watching the curtained front windows for signs of occupancy.

  Nothing.

  That was long enough for me to wait so I walked across to the vacant land and straight into the gang’s back yard. The kids were too taken up with their own struggle to care who I was.

  The back yard was bare except for an outside toilet. Even better, there was no dog poop around. I hadn’t heard or seen evidence of a watchdog last night, but you never know. The toilet door was broken and hanging off its hinges. It stank as though it hadn’t been emptied for a long, long time.

  There was no one in the closed-in back porch but I couldn’t see any further into the house. I slid the jemmy down my sleeve and out, then used it to lever up the side window. I was up and inside in less than five seconds, dropping noiselessly to the floor.

  The kitchen seemed the same as last night. It was clean; all the dishes put away, nothing on the stove except a kettle. No breakfast mess.

  I was hunting for anything that told me who these men were and what they were up to, and especially any connection to Renfrow or Earl.

  The icebox held nothing; they’d drunk all the beer and even the ice had melted. I opened the cupboard but it just held dishes, cutlery and some basic cooking equipment. On the lower shelf there were orderly rows of cans: beans, beef, vegetables.

  The only other thing was a neat stack of newspapers sitting in the corner near the stove. It was fire starter material, probably. I flicked through the top papers and got a surprise.

  All of the newspapers were recent, but none were local. They were from across North America and from an odd assortment of markets: The New Mexico Horse Dealer, The Oregon Tractor Monthly, even The Saskatchewan Spinner’s Yarn.

  Had the gang taken the pile from a rubbish dump to use as kindling? I was betting reading wasn’t their favourite leisure choice.

  My eyebrows shot up when I found a recent issue of The New York Times. The Sunday edition.

  I couldn’t see Otis sorting through anything more intellectual than a cartoon segment. But when I folded out the newspaper, I realised I was wrong …

  Very wrong.

  The New York Times, dated two days ago, had been folded open at the society page with the banner heading, ‘Gala Night for Refugee Relief Fund’. There was a photo of a smiling Susan Curtis in eveningwear entering a building on the arm of a bald man with horn-rimmed glasses called Floyd Nugent.

  The facetious caption underneath said: ‘Will There be an Assets Merger Between the Shipyard Heiress and the Head of Everyone’s Favourite Charity?’

  What on earth was going on?

  Susan was getting romantic with another man?

  With no time to speculate, I folded the paper and stuck it into my front bib pocket.

  Then I sorted through the rest of the pile of papers. Was this just a coincidence or would I find more articles related to Earl? I stopped before I reached the bottom. I needed to see what was in the rest of the house first. If I had time I’d come back to the newspapers.

  The kitchen door led onto a hallway, which went straight through to the front door, bisecting the house. There were three doors off the hall. Two on the left, one in the middle on the right. They were all shut. The hall, like the kitchen, was stripped down. There were no coverings over the light fittings and the floorboards were bare. They’d been repaired in places with cheap pinewood slats.

  I crept along to each door and listened but there were
no snores, nothing.

  Time to open door Number One.

  If the van arrived back I’d escape out the back window and if there were still people in the house I’d leave by the front door. So I started with the room nearest the front of the house, turning the knob slowly and keeping the door opening to a minimum to prevent any squeaky hinge sounds.

  The smell hit me first. Someone had urinated in here, and worse.

  The front room was empty except for two stretcher beds and a used kerosene lamp sitting on the floor with a box of matches next to it. The light fitting in the centre of the ceiling was broken. The stretchers had no sheets or pillow cases, just two old blankets and one filthy striped pillow each. The bare floor was covered in an unholy mess of dirty clothes, rotting food scraps and overturned empty beer bottles.

  I gave it a quick run through but there was nothing of interest. No newspapers, no papers or books of any kind. Nothing in the clothes pockets except gum wrappers with used gum in them. Under one pile of clothes was an empty chamber pot. Unwashed.

  I crept down the hall to the next room on the left side of the house. It was a bedroom too, but this one was clean and austerely neat. The same two stretchers stood in the middle of the floor, but they were made; the blankets even had hospital corners. And there was no smell. Well, not compared to the first room.

  My guess was this was where Otis slept.

  There was a duffel bag full of clothes under each stretcher. The first bag was stuffed with clean clothes. At the very bottom, wrapped up in a clean handkerchief, was a picture of an older woman standing in front of a factory. In the second bag, the clothes were not only clean but also carefully folded and grouped. Socks with socks. Shirts on top of shirts. But again, no personal possessions.

  Except for the one photograph, neither bedroom had anything that gave their occupants an identity.

  No letters, no phone numbers or address books … nothing.

  I moved across the hall to the last room. It was the largest one, but it was just a storage room, chock-full of old furniture. Not treasured antiques, but haphazardly stacked remnants of a former occupant. A broken-down sofa with stuffing spilling out, an old stove, an even older icebox.

  It was as though Otis and the boys had taken over this house, stuffed everything that irritated them into this one room and then brought in just what they needed for daily life … a new stove, a new icebox, a new radio. They’d repaired the floorboards but hadn’t had the time or inclination to replace the broken light in the front bedroom.

  How long had they been here and why?

  I needed more information. I needed a handle on who these guys were.

  I went back to the kitchen and quickly went through the rest of the newspapers. There was only one other New York Times, so I took that.

  As I stood up again the stove caught my eye. Maybe they just didn’t bring any personal stuff with them or maybe they were being scrupulous in keeping their identities secret. If it was the latter they probably used the stove to destroy stuff.

  I unhooked the cover on the fuel section.

  Bingo.

  Lying on top of the ash was a three-quarters-burnt piece of notepaper; across the top was printed ‘The Grave Digger’ and ‘Coffin Bait’. It had to be the note Otis was scribbling last night during the radio play. But underneath that was a half-burnt pasteboard business card. I carefully lifted it out.

  All that was left on it was an address … 208 Santa Monica Boulevard.

  When I got back out through the window the kids had gone. There had to be people here, behind those broken doors and windows, but why didn’t they come out? Would they tell Otis about me? I couldn’t have waited till dark to break in; I just didn’t have the time.

  If there was a chance they may tell Otis about me I might as well see if they’d tell me something about him. I had the feeling he wasn’t the most sociable of beings but it was worth a try.

  I dodged the potholes to reach the falling down shack opposite. The rags across the windows twitched as I hit the doorstep. I knocked and waited. The door creaked open and a painfully thin woman shyly put her head out; her face was grey with exhaustion. A skinny little boy had his bony arms wrapped around her knees. He was sobbing pitifully.

  My heart lurched at the sight. Depression USA was like the Third World.

  ‘Jemima.’ The woman’s voice was throaty, as though it was worn out too. ‘Take young Henry for me.’

  A young girl’s calloused hand reached from behind the door and took the little boy’s. He tottered off, still crying.

  ‘Can I help you?’ The woman’s greeting was tentative, as though I was bound to bring trouble but her upbringing forced her to be polite while she received it.

  ‘Good morning, ma’am.’

  Her eyes flickered at the ‘ma’am’. ‘Mornin’.’

  ‘I’d like to buy some information.’

  At the word ‘buy’ she became agitated … as though anything involving money was too difficult to contemplate. ‘Pardon?’

  ‘I want to ask you some questions about the men that live across the road.’ I nodded at the gang’s house. ‘And I’m willing to pay for the privilege.’

  She started to shut the door.

  I stuck my boot in the opening. Then I showed her the greenbacks.

  She stared at them, licking her lips nervously. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘I’m a private investigator, ma’am. I’m investigating a break-in that happened last night and I need some answers.’

  The woman didn’t believe me, but the money had her mesmerised.

  She glanced up and down the street then grabbed my hand. ‘Come inside, girl.’

  The back of the house had fallen in; they were living in the two front rooms. The young girl and the little boy were playing in one room on a broken mattress. The other room was the kitchen, bathroom and washhouse combined.

  The woman was ashamed, so I stopped looking around. There were no chairs so we stood.

  ‘Can I see the money again?’

  I showed her the twenty dollars. She checked that the two tens were real and handed them back.

  ‘What do you want to know, miss?’

  ‘Do you know the men that live opposite?’

  She licked her lips, trying to work out what would please me best.

  ‘Don’t worry about lying to me, ma’am. I’ll give you the money even if you don’t know them.’

  She wasn’t sure whether to believe me or not, so I put the notes in her hand. She crumpled them up in her fist and hid it behind her back. As if to say I’d have to knock her down to get them back.

  ‘No, miss, I don’t know them boys. They keeps to themselves. Like everyone else in this place.’

  I could believe that. ‘How long have they been here?’

  She waited.

  I brought out another ten.

  ‘They arrived in the middle of the night about two months ago, miss.’

  ‘What do you know about them?’

  ‘They drive a green Packard van. They stick together.’

  ‘Anyone come to visit them?’

  ‘Nah. They’re never home anyways. Just late at night.’

  ‘Do you know who they are? Or where they go?’

  She thought for a moment. ‘All I know is a delivery van left a box on their front steps yesterday. The van had a sign on the side.’

  ‘Yes, what was it?’ I saw the woman staring at the ten-dollar bill in my hand. I gave it to her.

  Then added five hundred dollars on top of that …

  I wasn’t going to make a good Time Investigator; I just couldn’t walk away from her misery without doing something …

  The sight of all that cash made her words tumble out in a rush. ‘The van was from Central Casting, miss. You know … that big Hollywood acting agency.’

  Acting agency … What the hell did that mean?

  Were Otis and his gang out-of-work actors moonlighting as burglars?

  30

/>   THE ANTIQUE SHOP

  Dodging the electric trolley cars zipping along Santa Monica Boulevard, I started counting the street numbers. By the time I got down to the three hundred numbers, the road was just a block or so away from the palm-filled park running along the waterfront.

  The address on the business card from Otis’ stove had to be somewhere in the next block.

  It was lunchtime and the beach end of the Boulevard was packed. Between the trolley cars, the sightseers and the pedestrians zigzagging across the road, the traffic had wound down to a crawl. I began searching for a parking spot.

  The place was a mix of snappily dressed businessmen in matching suits and hats out for a pleasant ocean-side business lunch, interspersed with tourists, also in suits and hats, window shopping in the ritzy Santa Monica stores. The only difference was that the tourists were in couples: the men had cameras slung around their necks and the women had their holiday hats on. The kind of hats you’d only wear in a neighbourhood where no one could possibly recognise you; large, brightly coloured floral numbers seemed to be popular.

  I spotted a free parking space and dived for it.

  No. 212–16 Santa Monica Boulevard was a white Spanish rococo theatre. The rest of the block was a pricey double-storey, brick and plaster job, full of up-market shops. They all had the same matching stained-glass panels framing their display windows and over the tops of the doorways. The recurring motif was a green and gold pineapple. Guess someone was trying to bring that Waikiki feel to the area.

  The address I was searching for was third up from the corner, wedged in between Champs-Elysées Fashions and A.G. Geiger’s Rare Book Shop.

  When I saw No 208 I cursed under my breath.

  I should’ve recognised the address. It was on the back of Bonifacio Neves’ photograph, Earl’s Portuguese antique dealer. This was his shop.

  It was called Novo … New? Curious name for an antique shop …

  I stood planted to the pavement, letting the tourists eddy around me. So much for a connection between the gang and Renfrow. Were they working for Neves instead? Did Neves pilfer his wealthy clients after he got to know their houses?