Trouble Follows Me

by Ross Macdonald

  “You haven’t heard from Honolulu yet?”

  “No. I’m expecting to anytime. I’ll give them another hour or so, and then fly down to San Diego. I want to talk to Lieutenant Swann. His ship’s still there.”

  “Are you going aboard tonight?”

  “If I get away in time.”

  “I’ll see you then.”

  “Right.” He hung up.

  When I opened the door of the phone booth the loudspeaker system was announcing that the San Francisco plane was about to land. I went outside and watched it come in and taxi down the field.

  The second man out of the door in the side of the plane, which was almost too narrow for his bulk, was Gene Halford. He had shed his correspondent’s uniform and was wearing bright new California clothes. But he had the same old face, and it gave me no pleasure to see it again.

  I stepped back from the gate, intending to let him pass without speaking. But before he went by his glance fell on my face. I thought that his heavy body became a little awkward and self-conscious under his new clothes, and I didn’t go out of my way to put him at ease:

  “You were only half a civilian before. I see you decided to go the limit.”

  He flushed and said: “It’s not my own choice. My syndicate wants me to write background material for the big international conference that’s on its way. So that’s what I’m writing.” Then he remembered his sense of importance: “Not that it’s any pressing concern of yours.”

  “I’d hate to feel it was.”

  Halford moved toward me out of the line of passengers which he had been obstructing. There was a vague threat in the way he held his heavy shoulders. “Look here, whatever your name is,” he said. “I’ve had about enough of your gratuitous unpleasantness. I haven’t forgotten that you took a girl away from me that night in Honolulu.”

  “Neither have I. It’s one of my pleasanter memories.”

  “It is, is it? What would you think if I told you the girl was simply sorry for you?”

  “I’d think you have more imagination than brains.”

  “I don’t happen to be depending on my imagination. I spent an evening with Miss Thompson in San Francisco a week or so ago. A very pleasant evening.”

  If I kept hurt surprise out of my face, it was because I’d played a lot of poker. “I expect to see her in an hour,” I said. “I’ll ask her about that evening and probably we’ll both have a good laugh.”

  “Why, where is she?”

  “Out of your reach. So long.”

  I walked past him and up the ramp into the plane. The plane roared, sprinted and took flight. As we went up, the horizon spread out to include many mountains and wide blue meadows of ocean. But my whole mind was involved in a tight little knot of jealousy which wouldn’t come loose. Anderson and his nasty business dropped out of my thoughts. Throughout the short flight to San Diego and the long taxi ride from Lindbergh Field to the Grant Hotel, my mind stayed on Mary and Gene Halford.

  I found her in her room. When she opened the door she said, “Darling! I’m so glad to see you,” and kissed me on the mouth.

  After a minute the knot inside me loosened a little and I kissed her back. Then I held her away from me and looked into her eyes. They were transparent and bottomless, like deep water where men have drowned.

  She laughed with charming girlishness. “You’re awfully solemn, Sam. Are you still thinking?”

  “Look,” I said. “I take you seriously. Can you get that through your head? As seriously as hell.”

  A warm emotion swam up from the shadowy depths of her eyes. But she said, “Really?” with smiling lips.

  “I just said it. I didn’t say it before.”

  “I wondered if you ever would.”

  “But get this. If I take you seriously I expect to be taken seriously myself. I met Gene Halford for a minute at the Burbank airport.”

  “So? I suppose he told you I went out with him in San Francisco.”

  “That’s right. I didn’t like the idea. You told me in Pearl you barely knew him. And you didn’t tell me you saw him in Frisco. I don’t like him.”

  “Neither do I,” she said demurely.

  “You go out with him. And it’s important enough to you that you didn’t tell me about it.”

  “Don’t be silly, Sam. I went out with him once. We just happened to meet the night our transport docked. I didn’t tell you because I was afraid you’d get irrational about it. Just like you are getting.”

  “Sure I’m irrational. I’m irrational about anything with you in it.”

  She touched my cheek with her fingers. I caught her hand and kissed its palm. She said, “Please look at it sensibly, Sam. When I came back from Honolulu I had no way of knowing I’d ever see you again. Gene Halford has a lot of important contacts in the radio business. He does a lot of broadcasting himself. Well, I’ll probably be going back into radio after the war. I’d be stupid if I didn’t make the most of my chances.”

  “Do you think you can use Halford? Anything you get out of him you’ll pay for.”

  “I know. I found that out.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I mean that anything I get out of Halford I’ll pay for. There aren’t many men that isn’t true about.”

  “Is that a crack?”

  “How could it be?” She smiled with deceptive sweetness. “I haven’t got anything out of you.”

  I was taking a beating, and I knew it. I said unpleasantly: “Yeah, they pay the boys that write about it a hell of a lot more than the boys that do it.”

  That broke her down. She moved in to me. “Let’s not quarrel, Sam. I detest the man. You and I got along so well from the beginning. At least, I thought we did.”

  My arms accepted her. “I know. Better than with any girl I’ve known.”

  “It’s these terrible things that happened that changed things. You’ve changed, darling.” Her face was against me and her voice was muffled. “We mustn’t let things like that break us up.”

  “Breaking up is a long way from what I had in mind. I didn’t know you were planning to go back into radio after the war. I thought maybe you were starting to have other plans. I was starting.”

  “Plans with you?” she said.

  “Did you think I was playing?”

  “I didn’t know. Sam, do you really mean what you just said?”

  “What did I just say? You make me dizzy standing so close.”

  “That we could have a postwar plan together?”

  “I didn’t know whether I could ask you. It’s hard to look ahead very far. My survivor leave will be over in a few days. And maybe next time I won’t be a survivor.”

  “Don’t say it. You couldn’t die.”

  “Everybody can die. A good many have. You’d have to take a chance on waiting.”

  She smiled very sweetly. “Maybe it’s worth a chance. You look pretty durable. You look pretty, period.”

  “Pretty is a lousy word for a man. Get this straight, though. If we start waiting for each other, no playing around with anybody else. That goes for both of us. My last girl tried it, and she couldn’t hold out.”

  “That hurt you, didn’t it?”

  “It’s where the war hit me hardest.”

  “I wouldn’t be catching you on the rebound, would I?”

  “Maybe you would. Emotions are as strange as anything. Especially mine. If emotions weren’t so strange I think I’d want to marry you tomorrow.”

  “I couldn’t.” She looked at me quickly.

  “Why not?”

  “Tomorrow’s my first day on my new job. I couldn’t take off my first day to get married, could I?”

  “There isn’t anybody else, is there? Not Halford or anybody?”

  “Can’t you see I’m mad about you, Sam?” Her body said the rest, and its language was irresistible.

  After a time I told her about my night in Santa Barbara, and Hatcher’s letter.

  “Sam, I told you you w
ere playing with fire. Promise me you won’t risk it any more. I didn’t sleep at all last night.”

  “I’m extremely crazy about you,” I said. “But I’m even crazier about the idea of seeing Anderson again. Anyway, I never did like the idea of sitting and waiting for somebody else’s axe to fall.”

  She looked at me with a drooping mouth. I kissed her mouth. Then I sat down on the edge of the bed to phone Eric Swann on his destroyer. She sat behind me and put her arms around me.

  In the time between my dialling and the operator’s answer from the Naval Repair Base, I said: “The girl loves me.”

  “Yes, I do. More than you love me.”

  “That’s impossible. You’re much more loveable than I am.”

  The operator answered and I asked for the appropriate extension.

  Mary’s teeth closed lightly on the back of my neck. “Don’t argue or I’ll really bite. You know you don’t love me as much as I love you.”

  The Officer of the Deck on the destroyer answered, and I asked for Lieutenant Swann.

  “I’m not sure whether he’s aboard. Wait a minute, please.”

  I turned to kiss Mary and her lips clung, parting over mine. The world narrowed to a small burning circle.

  The receiver, which had dropped on the bed, said in a cracked remote voice: “Lieutenant Swann speaking.”

  I swam up out of warm forgetful depths and talked back to him. “This is Sam. How about asking me out for dinner.”

  “Sure. How are you? I thought you were still in Detroit.”

  “Just got in today. Can I bring Mary aboard?”

  “I’m sorry, Sam. No civilians allowed on the Repair Base. Do you still want to come?”

  “Yes. We’ve got things to talk about. Hector Land hasn’t been picked up yet, has he?”

  “No, he’s dropped clean out of sight. We eat at seven in port. Call the ship from the main gate and I’ll send a jeep for you.”

  “Right.” I set the receiver down.

  I stood up and said to Mary: “Well, here I go again.”

  “Damn it. You were going to have dinner with me.” Her voice was quietly furious.

  “I’m awfully sorry. I’ll get back as soon as I can. I should be able to make it between nine and ten o’clock.”

  “I’ll be waiting for you, I suppose. Though you deserve to be stood up.”

  I took a taxi out to the Repair Base. When it dropped me at the gate I saw Chester Gordon standing in the roadway by the guards’ kiosk talking to the Marine guard.

  When I approached the guard looked at my I.D. card, saluted with characteristic Marine elegance and fervor, and moved away.

  “What’s the word?” I said to Gordon.

  He smiled less grimly than he had smiled before. “The pieces are falling into place. Your hunch was good, Drake. A number of the records in the radio station’s record library were marked as you thought they might be. It’s evident that those records were deliberately prepared for the purpose of sending out coded intelligence. I didn’t get the details, but they’ll send an amplifying report when they’ve made a more complete investigation. What do you know about this Sue Sholto?”

  “Not very much. She was reticent. Even her best friend didn’t know much about her. Lieutenant Swann can tell you more than I can. He’d known her for a long time.”

  “I was just talking to Swann on the phone. He promised to send over a jeep for me, but there seems to be a holdup.”

  “I’ll ride with you if I may. I’m going aboard for dinner.”

  “I don’t think I’ve eaten for twenty-four hours or more. Things have been popping so fast. We got a teletype from Chicago—I sent them Anderson’s description because that’s where he got on the train. A man approximating his description, Lorenz Jensen by name, was convicted of contributing to the delinquency of a minor in Chicago in 1934. He served two years and four months of a five year sentence in Joliet.”

  “Did he escape?”

  “No, he was released on parole. But he violated his parole and disappeared. Presumably he left the country.”

  “Anderson was in China in 1936. That tallies.”

  “It’s pretty uncertain. You can never go by description alone, especially after a lapse of ten years. But fingerprints are another matter, and I’ve requested Chicago to send me photostats of Jensen’s prints by airmail. Jensen’s and Anderson’s prints are in the same classification, we know that much.”

  “Did Anderson leave his prints in Laura Eaton’s house?”

  “No, he must have worn gloves. We got them out of his luggage in the baggage room of the Los Angeles station. He left a beautiful set of the thumb and first three fingers of the right hand on a bottle of shaving lotion. That’s the only revealing thing he did leave in his luggage.”

  “When you boys move,” I said, “you move fast and in all directions.”

  “We’ve got the organization, and that’s something amateurs don’t have. I don’t mean that your help hasn’t been extremely useful. We’ve depended more on lay assistance in this war than we’ve ever admitted in the papers.”

  “The word amateur carries no sting for me,” I said. “This looks like our transportation now.”

  We rode in a jeep to the dock where the destroyer was berthed. Eric met us at the gangway, and I introduced him to Gordon:

  “I think Mr. Gordon would appreciate an invitation to dinner. Though he seldom eats or sleeps.”

  “I should warn you about pot-luck,” Eric said. “It’s always pot-luck on this can.”

  “I’ve never been aboard a warship before,” Gordon said. “It’ll be very romantic to eat salt pork and hardtack, and drink a noggin of brackish water.”

  We had a steak dinner which Gordon and I punished severely, then retired to the privacy of Eric’s stateroom. Gordon outlined the development of the case and concluded:

  “I hope you won’t think we’re jumping to conclusions, because we’re not. But it’s in the cards for me to ask you what you know about Sue Sholto. Naturally a thorough investigation is being made in Honolulu. In the meantime it’s up to me to find out what I can at this end. Anderson is at this end, and Hector Land is, or was. Can you tell me anything that might link Sue Sholto with Hector Land, or with a man that might be Anderson, or with the apparently subversive activities of those two?”

  I had been watching Eric’s face while he listened to Gordon’s careful lecture. The last month had changed him. When I met him in Honolulu on the day of the party, it had seemed to me that he was suspended between acceptance and rejection of the world. His eyes had been turned outward, but uncertainly. His face had begun to set in the closed, bound look of a neurotic egotism. But the process had seemed then to be susceptible of interruption. Now the process was complete.

  His smiles were no longer spontaneous, his looks were not naïve. The center of his being had retired into a secret labyrinth where it sat like a spider, clutching its means with avarice and regarding its ends with narrow passion. In a word, grief and shock are not always ennobling. Eric thought of the death of Sue Sholto chiefly as a possible obstacle in his naval and postnaval career and a thorn in his comfort.

  “I didn’t know her very well,” he said. “She was just a girl I dated a few times. Naturally if I had any reason to suspect her of illegal activities I’d have reported her. Certainly I’d have had nothing more to do with her.”

  “There was no sign of a relationship between her and Hector Land?”

  “Certainly not. And so far as I know she wasn’t acquainted with anyone who might have been Anderson.”

  “Isn’t it true that she was politically suspect?” I said. “Mary described her as a fellow-traveller.”

  “I wouldn’t know. We never discussed politics.”

  Gordon put in: “Did she show curiosity about naval affairs?”

  “The normal feminine curiosity, I suppose. She didn’t ever try to pump me that I can remember.”

  “How long did you know the girl?�
�

  “A few months. But I was at sea most of the time, and only dated her a few times when I was in port. She had other friends. I don’t see why I should be singled out merely because I was with her on the night she killed herself.” His voice was bitter.

  “You aren’t being singled out, Lieutenant Swann. You simply happen to be available for questioning. Did you know any of her other friends?”

  “No, I never met any of them. She just mentioned them occasionally. I don’t remember any names. And I very much hope that you’ll keep my name out of this when it breaks in the papers. I have a wife in Michigan and if—”

  “I know what you mean. Let me assure you we have no desire to embarrass innocent parties.” As Eric became more reticent and cautious, Gordon became smoother and more glib, like a salesman who has lost a sale but wishes to retain the goodwill of the customer.

  “Mary could tell you more than Eric,” I said to Gordon. “She worked with Sue Sholto and was friendly with her. One woman can find out things about another woman more easily than a man can, anyway.”

  “I’ll get in touch with her tomorrow. Where is she staying?”

  “At the Grant for the present. But I think you’ll have to depend on your Honolulu sources for the bulk of your evidence. I gather that Sue Sholto didn’t talk about herself.”

  “I was about to come to this end of the affair,” Gordon said in a faintly patronizing tone. “Lieutenant Swann, can you round up two or three members of the crew who were intimate with Land?”

  “I don’t think he was intimate with anybody. But I’ll see what I can do. Do you want to wait here?”

  “If you don’t mind my using your room.”

  “Not at all.” Eric went out.

  He returned in about ten minutes with two Negroes. In the interval Gordon cross-questioned me about the circumstances of Sue Sholto’s death. He was particularly interested in the movements of the guests and of Hector Land, which I reconstructed from memory as well as I could.

  The two Negroes who preceded Eric unwillingly through the hatch looked frightened. They exchanged furtive looks. Their mouths were closed and set. Gordon’s introduction of himself capitalized on their fear: