Gat Heat Page 2

  Her lips puffed very slightly as breath pushed through them. Her head rolled to one side. Then she collapsed and fell suddenly, loosely, like an empty sack.

  But I’d had a hunch she might keel over, and was able to catch her as she fell. Which made two of my hunches, so far, which had been proved correct.

  I carried Mrs. Halstead into the house, laid her gently on the bed, and waited for her to come around again.

  3

  Twenty minutes later Mrs. Halstead was not only back almost to normal, but she was my client.

  She claimed to be extremely curious to know why her husband had phoned me—if he really had, as she put it, which gave me something else to wonder about—but also, and naturally enough, she wanted me to do everything I could to find out who had killed him, and why. I told her there was probably little I might come up with that the police wouldn’t get to first, but that I’d certainly do what I could.

  By then I had called the police and they were on their way from the Hollywood Division, but I’d delayed my call briefly in deference to my client’s wishes.

  When she’d recovered enough to talk intelligently, she had asked me to please, please refrain from filling the premises with all kinds of cops until she could arrange for her guests to get their clothes on.

  It seemed a reasonable request, so I told her, “O.K., but I’ll have to tell the police some of the, ah, clues have been covered up.”

  “You wouldn’t!”

  “I’ve got to.”

  “You mustn’t!”

  “Look, Mrs. Halstead, first of all I’d tell them anyway. If that seems like betrayal, fire me. But in the second place, the police will find out whether I tell them or not—and it’s better for all concerned if I do tell them.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “When the officers get here and find everybody clad in the height of fashion except the … the victim, this will give them pause. They will query the guests—and you—about this unusual circumstance. And they will find out precisely what the score was, believe it or not. Contrary to opinion bruited about in some areas, the police are just as bright as the rest of us—and in some areas, a good deal brighter. You want them to find out their own way and land on your guests—and you—like a ton of bricks?”

  “Oh. Well …”

  “Yeah. So, O.K., tell the people the party’s over—just so long as nobody, but nobody, leaves here.”

  She agreed. In fact, even before she passed the word around—caught me a little off guard there, by the way—I had her give me a list of the names and addresses of all the people present.

  It turned out there had been, aside from the host and hostess, five other married couples enjoying the Halsteads’ hospitality. They were the Warrens, Pryers, Smiths, Bersudians, and Sporks.

  I went along with Mrs. Halstead while she rounded up the guests. She made a lot of racket, yelling names and things like “Lookout!” and “Yaah, here we come!” as we walked, which I thought interesting.

  Even so, we found dark-skinned Mr. Bersudian with redheaded Mrs. Warren; they were sitting in a brightly-striped canvas-covered swing, but they weren’t swinging, merely looking about blankly and breathing through their open mouths.

  We found Mr. Warren and Mrs. Pryer lying on their stomachs, side by side on green grass beneath a weeping willow tree, plucking industriously at the grass, as though they were uncontrollably superstitious and each blade was a four-leaf clover.

  Mr. Pryer came out of the house with Mrs. Bersudian, hand in hand, he saying over and over, “Wuzzamatter?”

  And Mr. Spork, the old fuddy-duddy, was in the pool with, curious to relate, Mrs. Spork.

  Perhaps more curious to relate, we found no Smiths. Mr. and Mrs. Smith were not on the premises at all.

  Since I was now working for Mrs. Halstead, I took the opportunity to question Mr. and Mrs. Pryer, once they pulled themselves together, so to speak. Mrs. Halstead was still looking for the Smiths. I stood near a green chaise longue, on which Hugh and Betty Pryer sat.

  He was in his middle forties, a short, solidly built man with thinning brown hair and long sideburns, good teeth and dark brown eyes that would probably have been intelligent and alert if he hadn’t been so stewed. His wife was a few years younger, a slightly plump woman with small blue eyes and the faint beginning of a double chin, but with a rousing good figure nonetheless. She was quite sober.

  So I talked mainly to Hugh Pryer.

  They knew George Halstead was dead—they and everybody else here; Mrs. Halstead had blabbed that at the top of her lungs before I could stop her—and for the first minute or so, the Pryers merely expressed their shock and total ignorance of anything and everything connected with the homicide, Finally I said to Mr. Pryer, “What about the people who aren’t here now? What can you tell me about them?”

  He shook his head, as though trying, unsuccessfully, to clear it, then said thickly, “Well, lessee. The Whists and Rileys dropped out. The Kents and Nelsons weren’t here at all tonight, though. That’s—”

  He chopped it off because little Betty Pryer got him pretty good in the ribs with her elbow. It was neatly done, hardly noticeable at all. But I noticed it.

  She looked up at me, smiling sweetly. “The Smiths?” she said. “That’s John and Nella. I haven’t any idea what—”

  Hugh looked at her. “Smiths?”

  “Yes, you … dear,” she said. “That’s who Mr. Scott is asking us about. John and Nella, who were here earlier, but who aren’t here now.”

  “I didden even know they left,” he said.

  His wife was right, I had indeed been asking about the Smiths. But I was now more interested in Hugh’s woozy response, so I tried to keep him going. “You say two couples dropped out earlier? You mean they were here tonight?”

  He looked at me blankly.

  “Whists and Rileys, wasn’t it?” I encouraged him.

  He began shaking his head again. “No, they weren’t. They weren’t here.”

  “You said—”

  “No,” he broke in. “Ackchully, they weren’t. I must’ve been thinking about another part—another time, somewhere.” He squeezed his eyes shut for a couple of seconds. “I mus’ confess, I had a little to drink, had a couple. Couple thousand, it feels like. You mus’ excuse me, Mr. Scott.” He paused. “Smiths, huh? I didden even know they left.”

  Then the first police car arrived, without siren.

  George Halstead’s body was on its way to the morgue, and the police were still taking statements when I decided to leave. I’d told them all I knew, and they would efficiently cover everything to be done here.

  Also, if they came up with anything significant, I knew I could probably get the info tomorrow. Not only am I on very good terms with the Hollywood and Los Angeles police, but Captain Phil Samson, head of Central Homicide downtown at the L.A.P.D., is my best friend in town. So I led Mrs. Halstead aside and told her I was going to take off.

  She was pale and unsteady, not in very good shape, her large green eyes dulled with shock, but holding up well enough under the circumstances. I knew she wanted to take a sleeping pill and get back into bed, but there were a few questions I had to ask.

  I told her what Hugh Pryer had said, but she merely frowned and shook her head.

  “I don’t understand what he could have meant, Mr. Scott. John and Nella were here. The Smiths. I’ve no idea what happened to them. But neither the Whists nor Rileys was here at any time tonight. I haven’t seen them for, oh, weeks.” She smiled wanly. “No telling what Hugh meant—or thought. I’ve never seen him so drunk.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Hugh seldom drinks more than a highball or two,” she assured me. “But he did tonight. Of all nights.” She chewed on her lower lip. “In fact, most of us did. The party got … well, a little out of hand. If you know what I mean.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “George made a punch. I don’t know what he put in it. But it must have been …” She fini
shed with an expressive shrug of her eyebrows.

  I didn’t say anything.

  She went on, “It was awfully good punch. And everybody … It’s embarrassing to talk about it …”

  “So forget it,” I said. “You don’t have to explain anything to me, Mrs. Halstead.” I smiled. “After all, I’m supposed to explain things to you.”

  She smiled slightly again, and I said, “In which connection, I would like the addresses of those couples Mr. Pryer mentioned.”

  “I told you, none of them was here tonight.”

  “I know. But the person we’re looking for was either somebody present, or—perhaps more likely—somebody not known to have been present. Someone who simply walked in.” I paused. “It’s just for a check. You never know where a lead might come from.”

  She nodded, then gave me the names and addresses from memory, and I jotted them in my notebook.

  She had already told me, and the police as well, that she knew of nobody who might have wanted to kill her husband, no possible motive for the crime. So far as I’d been able to tell, that was the same story the rest of the guests were giving the officers. George Halstead had apparently been extremely well liked by almost everybody. But, clearly, not by everybody.

  So, simply as routine, I asked, “Was this the first marriage for both of you, Mrs. Halstead?”

  “For me, yes. George was married before.”

  “His former wife live out here?”

  “Yes, Agatha lives in Culver City now.”

  “Agatha?”

  “Agatha Smellow. She and George were married for, oh, twelve or fourteen years, I guess. She later married a man named Smellow, but he died after a year or two.”

  Agatha Smellow, Culver City. Probably not worth much, but you never know. “Mr. Halstead and his former wife were still friendly?”

  “Not very. He couldn’t stand her. And she hated him.”

  “Oh? Hated?”

  “I don’t mean hated. I shouldn’t have said that. They still saw each other occasionally after she divorced him. There was a lot of bitterness connected with the divorce, though.”

  “She divorced him?”

  “Yes.”

  Mrs. Halstead’s face was virtually without expression, like a mask of wax, but right then I noticed the shimmering softness of her green eyes. They filled with tears, and the tears spilled silently, and glistened down her cheeks.

  I had kept her talking about it long enough—too long. I looked around, caught the eye of a police lieutenant I knew, and jerked my head toward the house. He nodded.

  I took Mrs. Halstead’s arm and led her to the back door. There I said, “Sorry I kept digging at you.”

  “It’s all right. I want you to—dig. I want you to …”

  She stopped speaking, leaned her forehead against my shoulder and sobbed quietly, her arms hanging loosely at her sides.

  After a little while she said, “Good night, Mr. Scott.”

  “Good night, Mrs. Halstead.”

  She turned and went into the house.

  The lieutenant—a tall, bald man named France—was leaning against a white-stone outdoor barbecue grill when I walked over to him.

  While he lit a cigar I asked him how it looked.

  He puffed a couple of times, then said, “You ask me, nobody in this bunch busted his head in. They’re shook up. Which is natural enough. But I can’t smell anything else, Scott.”

  “What about this John and Nella Smith?”

  “Another team’s checking them out now. Haven’t heard yet. You got anything else we can use?”

  “Nothing important so far. Except what I told you.”

  “Yeah. Naked as jaybirds. Bloody nudists.” He shook his head, looking around. “This is how the rich live, huh?”

  “I guess. Some of the rich, anyhow.”

  “Jaybirds of a feather,” he said. “Looks like every damn one of them’s in the excruciatingly painful tax brackets. Where I wish I was.”

  “Yeah, it hurts so good.”

  “You coming downtown?”

  “I’ll be in. Tomorrow O.K.?”

  “Yeah, if you don’t have anything special to add.”

  “Not yet. When I do, you’ll know it.”

  “That’s a good fellow, Scott. See you.”

  I nodded, walked back toward the side gate I’d come in earlier. Near the pool, seated in metal-frame chairs laced with strips of plastic webbing, were Sybil Spork and Mrs. Angelica Bersudian. Sybil looked extremely delicious in clothes, too. She was peeling an orange and licking her fingers.

  Mrs. Bersudian had looked quite a bit better naked. In clothes she appeared fat. She wasn’t fat. Angelica Bersudian was a tall, bosomy, healthy-looking gal, thirtyish, with thick black hair and heavy lashes drooping over slumbrous eyes. She was speaking to Sybil in a low, humming voice as I walked by them.

  Sybil dropped a handful of orange peelings into a redwood wastebasket, then looked up at me.

  As she caught my eye she smiled slowly.

  “Whoo,” she said.

  4

  Driving home, top down on my Cad convertible, the thought kept coming back: I wonder what she meant by that?

  I was also wondering why her name had to be Mrs. Spork. Spork was bad enough, but the Mrs. ruined it entirely.

  I was wondering about a number of other things, too. From brief talks with some of the Halsteads’ guests and a chat with Lieutenant France, I had a few other facts. George Halstead’s skull had been bashed in with a smooth, heavy rock—there were small boulders all over the place, lining paths, in decorative clumps, and scattered in and among the plantings—which had been found in a clump of dichondra about ten yards from the body, near an outside phone apparently used by swimmers around the pool. So either Halstead had been clobbered where he fell and the stone tossed away, or he’d been struck and then dragged to where I’d found him. The police hadn’t come to a decision on that when I left.

  Halstead was worth a couple of million dollars, perhaps more. All the guests present were, at least, well-to-do. Or “Jaybirds of a feather” as Lieutenant France had said. He’d also said he doubted that anyone present had banged Halstead in the brains, and if that’s what he thought, I was inclined to go along with him. Which left the disappearing Smiths, whom the police were now checking on, and the others Hugh Pryer had mentioned: the Whists and Rileys, Kents and Nelsons. Plus, of course, any one of perhaps two or three million other people.

  Even so, it was possible that by the time the police finished their investigation tonight there’d be no further investigating to do. Often it happens that way, and a case is closed shortly after it opens. But until and unless that happened, I was interested in talking to a few people myself, particularly the Whists and Rileys.

  I was remembering Hugh Pryer’s mention of them and the not-so-sly dig in the ribs from his wife. It has been my experience that when a husband says something apparently innocuous and his wife instantly gets him a good one in the ribs, the comment may well be considered nocuous. So, while driving to Hollywood Boulevard I checked the addresses I’d jotted down as Mrs. Halstead gave them to me.

  The Rileys lived in Pasadena, farther then I felt like driving at this hour—it was after midnight. But the Whists were living at the Norvue, which was in Hollywood and only a few blocks out of my way. So when I hit Hollywood Boulevard, instead of turning at Vine and continuing on to North Rossmore and home, I kept going to Highland Avenue and swung left toward the Norvue, three blocks ahead.

  It was a new building, twelve stories of swank apartments and suites built around an enclosed pool-and-patio area and outdoor dining room and expensive as hell. I’d never been inside the place. The Whists were in 12-C, which I presumed would be one of the four penthouse suites on the Norvue’s top floor.

  As I turned to park in the curving drive before the lobby entrance, I noticed something mildly disturbing. Or, rather, noticed it again.

  Checking traffic and keeping a casual eye
on my rear-view mirror has become a habit with me, so before pulling into the Norvue’s drive I glanced at the mirror, fingering up the turn indicator to signal for a right turn. The only car behind me was half a block back, but the left headlight was a little cock-eyed and tilted up slightly, so that its beam glared more than the right one. It wouldn’t have been important, except that I’d noticed that same cock-eyed light behind me a few minutes earlier.

  By the time I’d pulled into the drive and started slowing to a stop, the car had gone on by, and I didn’t get a good look at its make or color. It was a dark sedan, but that was all I knew.

  I turned off the ignition, left the Cad where it was, and went into the lobby.

  It probably wouldn’t have looked more expensive if they’d built the furniture out of new money. The carpet was off-white, thick, spongy, probably fifty bucks a yard—and there were a lot of yards. The furniture, divans and chairs and even “love seats,” was a little spindly for my taste, but it looked as rich and as modern as Mars flights. A bank of elevators was on the right; and on my left behind arcs and planes of black steel bands and rich red woods the shade of vitamin-enriched blood stood, at alert attention, a thin man with a kindly face.

  He was dressed in a black suit, an unobtrusively patterned white shirt, and a white silk tie, and he stood there beaming kindness at me.

  I waded to the desk and said, “Good evening.”

  “Good evening, sir. May I aid you?”

  They didn’t just help you here. They aided you. That was probably good. “I’d like to see the Whists. Ed and Marcelle.”

  Mrs. Halstead had told me their first names, so I tossed them in, probably thinking that my casual familiarity with penthouse dwellers might make up for the lack of class of my chops. But that was a pretty sneaky thing to do, I immediately realized, so I added, “Actually, I don’t know them. Not intimately. Not even personally, that is.”

  “No matter.”

  “What?”

  “No matter, sir. They are not here.”

  “Oh? They’re out for the evening?”