Double

by Bill Pronzini

  It annoyed me—all these people, all that pretense. Because Elaine Picard had been a human being, and she had died badly, and I had seen and heard her die, and death was not something that ought to be ignored or treated with indifference. But there was another reason, too: Timmy and his mother. Something peculiar was going on around here, and that also ought not to be ignored or treated with indifference.

  Some of the conventioneers tried to buttonhole me, but I knew what they wanted and I brushed them off. Lauterbach wasn’t anywhere to be seen. Either he was still out roaming the hotel grounds or he was long gone.

  I left the building again, made my way back through the gardens to Bungalow 6. No Lauterbach. The black maid had vanished too; the place was shut up tight. I tried the door, the windows in the front wall, but there was no way in short of felonious breaking and entering. And after the maid’s visit, I had a feeling that there wouldn’t be anything to find even if I did get inside.

  Fifty feet of landscaped ground—scrub palms, jacaranda, some other vegetation—separated Bungalow 6 from Bungalow 5. But the foliage wasn’t dense enough to obscure completely the view of anybody looking out of Number 5’s side windows toward the front of 6. I followed the path over to 5 and knocked on the door.

  Nobody answered immediately. I thought that maybe this was one of the allegedly deserted bungalows and started to turn away—and the latch clicked and the door edged open and I was looking at a tiny woman somewhere in her seventies. A tiny bald woman: except for a few strands of wispy red hair, the whole top of her head was barren. She saw me looking at it, showed me her dentures in a pleased way, and said, “Never saw anything like it, did you, young man?”

  “Ma’am?”

  “My bald spot. I’m bald as an eagle.”

  “Uh, well ...”

  “Been that way for years now. Started getting the bald spot when I was sixty-two, along with my Social Security. At first I wore wigs, you know. Then I turned seventy and I said phooey on that. When you get that old you don’t mind people staring at you. It’s better than no attention at all.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “You woke me up,” she said. “I was taking a nap. I always do in the afternoons. Old people need naps, same as kids.” She squinted at me out of bright blue eyes. “Are you with the hotel?”

  “No, ma’am. I’m a guest here too.”

  “What do you think of the place?”

  “Well ...”

  “Used to be a first-class hotel—not anymore. Some conglomerate bought it. Japanese, I believe.” She paused. “That’s funny, don’t you think?”

  “Ma’am?”

  “A Victorian hotel with a Spanish name owned by Japanese.”

  “It does seem kind of odd.”

  “The Perkins family built it and they had a sense of humor. Called the place their Spanish Victorian. They knew how to run a hotel, too. Now ... well, the service is terrible. I had to call the desk three times to get clean towels. Three times. And I’ve been coming here thirty years, with one husband or another.”

  “Yes, ma’am. I was wondering—”

  “Drunks,” she said, “that’s something else we never had to put up with in the old days. A bunch of rowdies last night, whooping it up like Indians. One of them puked in the rhododendrons out front. I complained about that, I’ll tell you.”

  “Did you happen to get a good look at these rowdies, Mrs.... ?”

  “Andersen. But it’s Miss. I took back my maiden name when my fourth husband died. Oh, yes, I saw them. Nasty specimens. Never did like a man who couldn’t hold his liquor.”

  “Was one of them a big guy in a red shirt?”

  She nodded emphatically. “He was the loudest one.”

  “Did he go next door, this man?”

  “Next door?”

  “Bungalow Six.”

  “I didn’t see him if he did. When the big fat one puked in the rhododendrons I went straight to the phone to call the manager.”

  “What about the people staying in Bungalow Six, Miss Andersen? Have you seen them in the past day or two?”

  “I didn’t know anybody was staying in that bungalow, not until this afternoon.”

  “Oh? Then you did see them—a little boy about seven, a brown-haired woman in her middle thirties?”

  “That’s right. Why are you so excited about that?”

  “I’m trying to find them,” I said. “They seem to have disappeared. You wouldn’t have any idea where they went?”

  She shook her bald head. “Not a clue. They went away with that Mexican fellow.”

  “What Mexican fellow is that?”

  “I can never remember his name. He’s the assistant manager, I believe.”

  “Ibarcena? Victor Ibarcena?”

  “That’s him,” Miss Andersen said. “I’m not nosy, you understand; I’m too old to be nosy. Only reason I saw them was that I was getting ready for my nap and I like the window open when I sleep. I chanced to look out just as the woman and the boy and the Mexican fellow were leaving. He was carrying their bags.”

  “Did you see which way they went?”

  “Out to the highway. I expect they had a car parked there. That’s the way Hank and I always used to come and go. Hank was my fourth husband. He hung himself.”

  “Ma’am?”

  “Hung himself. Left a note saying there wasn’t much use to go on living when he couldn’t get an erection anymore and had a bald wife besides.”

  She said that with a straight face, but there was a twinkle in the blue eyes and I had the feeling she was pulling my leg at least a little. She was some little old lady. She’d probably mowed the men down pretty good in her time, and not just a field of four husbands.

  I thanked her, and she said, “Don’t mention it, young man,” and I went straight back to the hotel. All right, now I had confirmation that Timmy and his mother had been staying in Number 6. And now I knew that Victor Ibarcena had hustled them away this afternoon. But there was still a lot I didn’t know, a lot that was still puzzling. Like, where had Ibarcena taken them? And why in such a hurry? And why had the desk clerk and the maid both lied to me about them being registered?

  In my room I dragged the San Diego telephone directory out of the nightstand. With Ibarcena away somewhere, and Lloyd Beddoes “unavailable,” the best lead I had to some answers was still Jim Lauterbach. There was only one J. Lauterbach listed in the directory, with an address in National City; but when I dialed the number and let it ring a dozen times, there was no answer.

  I sat on the bed, brooding. And wondered why I was brooding—why I was doing all this work. Maybe it was just restlessness and boredom. For all I knew, there was nothing the least bit sinister about this thing with Timmy and his mother. No danger to them, no fancy intrigue. It was none of my business, in any case, just as Elaine Picard’s death was none of my business.

  Sure. But private detectives are as curious as cats, and meddlers besides; that’s the nature of the beast. McCone knew that and accepted it and didn’t worry about it, but I always had to go around grumbling and rationalizing. So why didn’t I just cut it out? I knew damned well why I was mixing into this thing, and it didn’t have much to do with restlessness or boredom. It was the way Timmy had looked there on that bench, and afterward as his mother was dragging him off: scared and trying not to show it. Brave little kid harboring secrets, on his way to see his dad in some town in Mexico that had monkeys in it....

  The telephone rang. Now who the devil is that? I thought. I snagged up the receiver and muttered a hello.

  “Wolf, good, I caught you in. This is Sharon.”

  She sounded relieved—and a little odd, a little nervous. “What’s up, Sharon?”

  “Well, I need a favor.”

  “What kind of favor?”

  “A small one. Two small ones, actually.”

  “Uh-huh. What are they?”

  “Um, first I need you to come and pick me up.”

  “Pick you up. Wh
at happened, your car break down?”

  “No. I’m downtown—not too far from the hotel.”

  “Where downtown?”

  “The second favor,” she said quickly, “I sort of need you to vouch for me. For my integrity as a private investigator and all that.”

  “What?”

  “They won’t let me go otherwise.”

  “What?”

  “Wolf, I’m in jail.”

  “What!”

  “Well, not really. They haven’t booked me yet.”

  “Booked you for what?”

  “I got picked up in Chula Vista, at Elaine’s house. For, um, breaking and entering. That cop you talked to, Knowles, showed up just as I was coming out and he dragged me all the way back here to the sheriff’s department and if you say I-told-you-so, I think I’ll scream.”

  I didn’t say anything. I just sat there holding the receiver and thinking: Why me, Lord?

  “Wolf? Are you still there?”

  “Yeah, I’m still here. But I wish I wasn’t.”

  “There’s nobody else I can call,” she said. “Except my family, and I’d never hear the end of it if I did that. Will you come? Right away?”

  Go directly to jail, I thought. Do not pass Go, do not collect two hundred dollars. I sighed. “So tell me how to get there,” I said.

  13 McCONE

  I was sitting in the hallway on one of those uncomfortable molded plastic chairs when Wolf came out of Knowles’s office. He looked at me, his expression a mixture of disapproval and concern, and nodded at the bank of elevators. I got up and followed him over there. He punched the down button impatiently.

  “Doesn’t Knowles have anything else to say to me?” I asked.

  “He seems to think it’s all been said.”

  “Yes, I guess it has.” The Lieutenant had told me I was lucky he wasn’t going to book me for breaking and entering; he’d told me to keep my nose out of his case. On the other hand, I was to report anything I heard or remembered about Elaine Picard immediately; and I was to let him know if I planned to leave San Diego. He hadn’t expressed appreciation for my cooperation, even though I’d done my damnedest in that quarter.

  Wolf made an annoyed noise and punched the button again. The doors of the nearest car slid open and we got on. In silence we rode to the lobby and went through the main door to C Street. Wolf led me around the big pinkish building that housed the sheriff’s department and onto Union Street, where a clunky-looking Chevy Monza was parked in front of a bail bondsman’s office. The car was pale yellow, with plenty of dents and scrape marks. Leave it to Wolf to rent the most scabrous vehicle in the airport fleet.

  We got into the car and he started the engine. It wheezed to life like a wino waking up after a particularly bad night. Wolf said, “Where to?”

  “Go down here and get on the freeway to Chula Vista. I’ll tell you how to get to Elaine’s house. My car’s still parked near there.”

  Immediately I regretted mentioning Elaine. Wolf’s brows came together in a frown as he eased the clunker out of the space and turned toward the waterfront, where the freeway entrance was. “You really got yourself into it this time, didn’t you?”

  “Listen, I know what you’re going to say, and I’d rather not hear it, if you don’t mind.”

  “Well, it was a dumb thing to do.”

  “I know.”

  “You can lose your license—”

  “I know!”

  We drove in silence for a couple of blocks.

  I said, “Anyway, I cooperated with Knowles. He can’t fault me on that.”

  Wolf was concentrating on his driving, trying to get over toward the freeway on-ramp.

  “I found some evidence in Elaine’s house and turned it over to him right away.” Actually, I’d turned it over to him when he’d announced his intention to search my purse.

  “What kind of evidence?” Wolf guided the car into the stream of southbound traffic on Highway 5.

  “A letter from Elaine to her lawyer, saying she suspected something illegal was going on at the Casa del Rey.” Briefly I outlined its contents for him.

  When I finished, he was looking thoughtful. “Well, now,” he said. “Maybe that ties in with something I’ve discovered that doesn’t seem to be strictly aboveboard.”

  “Oh, what?”

  “Guests who were staying in one of the bungalows, but weren’t registered.”

  “Who?”

  “A woman and a little boy. They were at the hotel this morning, then gone suddenly this afternoon. Another guest saw them leaving with the assistant manager, Ibarcena. But when I asked about them at the desk, the clerk said they’d never been there. One of the maids denied it too.”

  “Hmm. It’s illegal not to register guests, but that can’t be all of it. I wonder what’s going on. They didn’t seem to be there against their will, did they?”

  “No. The woman seemed nervous and suspicious, though.”

  “What about the kid?”

  “Quiet and scared. He said his mother made him afraid.”

  “That’s not good. Well, maybe Ibarcena’s giving free room and board to his relatives.”

  “They didn’t look Mexican. And that’s hardly something that Elaine would get upset about.”

  “Or not be able to figure out. She’d just have complained to Beddoes, and that would have been the end of it.” I stared out the window at the industrial section of National City.

  “There’s another thing,” Wolf said. “One of the people from the convention, a local op named Jim Lauterbach, was hanging around that bungalow. I got the feeling he was also interested in Timmy and his mother.”

  “Lauterbach. I met him. He’s kind of seedy, originally from Detroit. Wore a bright red shirt.”

  “Yeah, that’s the one. I tried to find out where he has his agency, but it wasn’t listed in the directory.”

  “That’s because he took over a friend’s operation. The Owens Agency, I think he said.”

  Wolf nodded. “I guess I should tell Knowles about all this.”

  “You’d better. We don’t want you in trouble too.”

  His look told me he didn’t appreciate my attempt at humor. After a moment he said, “You’re not going to keep on poking your nose into this business, are you?”

  “Of course I am.”

  “Sharon—”

  “Look, you yourself think that Elaine’s death might not have been an accident. It certainly wasn’t a suicide; people who are going to kill themselves don’t usually make appointments to review their tax situations—or write letters to their attorneys to protect themselves from being implicated in illegal situations. Something is going on at that hotel.”

  “Yeah, and the sheriff’s department will find out what it is. I’ll talk to Knowles—”

  “I’ve got a feeling that Knowles isn’t going to probe that deeply. Plus, Elaine’s death might not have anything to do with what’s going on at the Casa del Rey. There could be a more personal motive.”

  “Like?”

  “Like that Rich fellow, for instance—the one who accosted her in the bar. Tell me again what he looked like.”

  “Good-looking, wavy brown hair, funny gray-blue eyes. Younger than her, maybe in his late twenties. Sharp dresser—Madras jacket and white slacks. You know the type.”

  “How were his eyes funny?”

  “Well, they had odd little lights in them—like fires, only down deep so you couldn’t really pinpoint them. Why are you asking all this?”

  “Because even if Rich didn’t have anything to do with Elaine’s death, it occurred to me that if he were her boyfriend, she might have told him what was going on at Casa del Rey.”

  “Possibly.”

  “And if I find him, it might be a shortcut to getting that information.”

  I told Wolf which exit to take and directed him up F Street toward Elaine’s house. When he turned the car onto Hilltop Drive, he said, “How do you expect to find Rich, with j
ust a first name and a description?”

  “Oh, stop—there’s my car.” I unhooked my seat belt and started to get out. “Thanks so much for rescuing me, Wolf.”

  “Hold on a second.” He put a hand on my arm. “How do you expect to find this guy Rich?”

  “Well ... it stands to reason she’d have her boyfriend’s name in her address book.”

  “You’re not going back in that house?”

  “Certainly not.”

  “Then how—?”

  “I’ve got her address book in my purse.”

  He stared at me.

  “Let me explain before you go getting stuffy and paternal again,” I said. “One of the first things Knowles said was that he was going to search my purse to see if I’d taken anything from the house. I said that wouldn’t be necessary, that I’d give him what I’d taken. And I did—the letter and also a love note I found crumpled up in the wastebasket.”

  “A love note?”

  “Yes.” I told him what the note said. He looked thoughtful, but didn’t comment. “Anyway, Knowles has both letters now. But I was confused, and I forgot about the address book.”

  “Uh-huh. But you remembered later, so why didn’t you give it to him then?”

  “Because after I’d leveled with him and turned over the other stuff, he still insisted on pawing through my purse. He dumped everything out on the seat of his car and then tossed the stuff that was obviously mine back in. I guess he figured the address book belonged to me.”

  “And you didn’t tell him otherwise.”

  “No. It wasn’t really withholding evidence. And after what he did, I just didn’t feel like cooperating anymore.”

  Wolf frowned, looking genuinely puzzled. “I don’t see why not.”

  “Obviously you don’t know anything about women and their purses.” My hands curved protectively around mine, just thinking about Knowles’s treatment of it. “Purses are very private property. We keep all sorts of stuff in them, stuff we wouldn’t want anyone else to see. ”

  “Like what?”

  “Well, in mine I keep a rock.”

  “A rock.”