by Dell Shannon
Goodis's parole officer was a fellow named Roth. He said, "That's the right address, Van Ness. He's only been out for four months, don't tell me he's been up to something else. Well, I got him a pretty good job with a furniture company, Eagle Rattan Imports, but he's fairly stupid, I don't know how long he'll keep it."
"Did you say a furniture company?" asked Grace.
"That's right. He's driving a delivery van for them."
"Oh, thank you so much," said Grace. He passed that on and Mendoza began to laugh.
"If they weren't so stupid we wouldn't pick up as many as we do, Jase. Go get him and we'll hear what he has to say."
* * *
Glasser and Wanda had gone to the hospital to talk to Mrs. Flowers. Palliser drove down to the address on Van Ness, while Grace looked up the furniture store to go and collar Goodis. The place on Van Ness was another old apartment; the Goodises lived upstairs at the back. When a sharp-featured medium-brown young woman opened the door, he could see past her, just at one glance, several items that looked like some on the list Linda Gilman had given them.
"What you want, bust in here 1ike— Oh." She looked at the badge.
"Come on, Mrs. Goodis. You're coming in to talk to us."
"What about? We haven't done nothing. You damn cops can't—"
"Oh, yes, we can. With you displaying Edna Patterson's furniture all over your living room. But more important than that, your husband left us some nice fingerprints in that house."
"Oh, my God!" she said disgustedly. "Oh, that damn stupid lousy nigger, if I told him once I told him a million times—"
Most of the way back to the office she told Palliser, in various colorful language, just how stupid that no-good Dwight was and how stupid she'd been to marry him.
Ten minutes after Palliser brought her in, Grace came back with Dwight Goodis. He was a great big burly black man in the early twenties, still looking surprised and aggrieved to have been dropped on. As soon as she saw him she screamed, "Goddamn stupid bastard! Leavin' prints all over that damn place!"
An interrogation room was too small for them both; they sat them down in the communal office and Mendoza came out to sit in. "Now, now," said Grace benevolently, "let's not have any of that. Now you know we've got the solid evidence on you, Dwight, suppose you tell us all about the job."
"Damn fingerprints," he said.
"Oh, you make me sick, you dumb bastard. I told you and told you—"
"Let's hear about it," said Palliser. "Just why did you have to kill Mrs. Patterson?"
"Well, God damn it," said Goodis sullenly, "she wasn't supposed to be there—how'd I know she was gonna be there? Eddy said she always went to church Wednesday night, didn't get home till late. I was gonna bring the van, load everything—"
"You were just after the furniture?" asked Grace incredulously.
"Yeah, yeah, that's right. Nice furniture, Eddy said. See, him an' Josie just moved into that place across the street, an' he said he took a letter over to her once, got left their place by mistake, an' saw she hadda lotta real nice stuff. We was just talkin', see, because me and Lois didn't have no furniture atall, and we hadda move outta that place on Fifty-sixth because it's gonna be` torn down, that place was all furnished, and damn it, all we could find for any kinda decent rent we could pay was the place on Van Ness and there wasn't nothin' in it atall. And my God, any o' that stuff so high now, nobody could hardly afford to buy it, and we ain't got good credit . . ."
He was explaining earnestly just how justified the job had been. "And Eddy said why don't I get the van and take some of her stuff while she's at church, it'd be easy as pie—I got the key of the company's garage and the van, see. I just parked it in the drive while everybody along there'd prob'ly be havin' dinner—"
"My God," said Grace suddenly, "we never asked the neighbors about Wednesday night—those upstanding respectable neighbors—I'll bet a lot of them were at church too."
"Yeah, yeah, that's what Eddy said, people on both sides be out too—and we went up to the back door and it wasn't even locked—"
"We, who was with you?"
“Well, Lois, acourse. And Eddy, help move the stuff. Only, God damn it, the old lady was there! She come into the kitchen in a bathrobe, she lets out a yip, and I could see she was goin' to scream an' yell, and I just grabbed her to keep her quiet. I never meant to kill her."
"And as long as you're stupid enough to let them drop on you, take everybody else to the joint with you!" She looked at the detectives. "There was a hell of a lot of nice stuff there, when I seen how good it was I said, think about the family, most of them needed a lot of things, the welfare only goes so far, you know. And I called up Pete and Joey and Benny and Gene—they're his cousins—and my brother Bill, and they all come and helped load the van. We had a hell of a time, get everything on, but we did it, and just about in time too. We was just comin' up to the corner, starting away, when a car passed us and turned in the drive right next to that place. The rest of 'em had just about got back to their cars. We spent the rest o' the night delivering all the stuff, but I took my pick first. Everybody needed things, better mattresses an' chairs an' tables an' all."
"My God," said Grace, awed. And what a job this was going to be, sorting out where all that had gotten to; and they would all share in the charge; at least Eddy would share the homicide charge, the job had evidently been largely his idea.
"So let's have some names and addresses," said Mendoza briskly."
She began to rattle them off, and Grace took notes. Now they'd be busy the rest of the day bringing them all in, talking to them, getting statements. And looking for the furniture and that was going to clutter up a lot of evidence space downstairs until the case was disposed of—at least until the statements were on file and the D.A. had the case outlined, when the family could have it back.
Palliser had gone to apply for the warrants.
* * *
Mrs. Joan Flowers looked up at them from her hospital bed, and her eyes were filled with tears. She wasn't much hurt, and would probably be released tomorrow. She was a fat, placid-faced woman in her fifties. She said, "The most awful thing about it is Mr. Robillard getting killed. They only told me last night. That's just an awful thing. Everybody liked him so much, and he was so good with the boys—I've heard more than one teacher say that he'd saved a lot of boys from going to the bad, getting them interested in a trade. I sort of feel like I'd killed him myself."
"We'd like to find out who did it," said Glasser. "What do you remember? Can you give us a description of him?"
"I only saw him for a flash—before he shot me, you know. I'd just put the bag of money in the front of my car—"
"How much would there have been in it?"
"Well, it's a big school, and it's scandalous how—even down there—the kids always seem to have money. A lot of mothers too lazy to bother fixing a lunch. A lot of the kids eat at the cafeteria. I suppose there'd be between four and five hundred dollars."
"All right, he came from behind your car and pointed the gun at you. Think back. What did he look like?"
"He was kind of tall," she said slowly. "Kind of thin. He was a white fellow, but dark-skinned-not very old, I guess."
"Somebody told us he thought it looked like a kid named Tommy Hernandez. Do you know him? He was in school last year."
She shook her head. "I don't know any of the kids. They're just faces. I'm back in the kitchens mostly, supervising the cooking."
They drove down to the school and saw the principal, listened to a lot of platitudes and asked about Hernandez. "Oh, yes, he was quite a star on the basketball team last year. Mr. Wrangell was telling me that one of the students there yesterday said the killer looked like him. Ridiculous; What? Well, I haven't any idea where Hernandez is now. He graduated in February, and his address won't be in our files now."
* * *
Hackett and Landers landed at Genevieve Du Mond in Beverly Hills at its opening hour, ten-thirty. It c
ould scarcely be called a shop: the first room beyond the elegant black and gold front door was furnished as a rather bare living room, with a white-velvet couch and chairs, a gilt-framed mirror on one wall; an archway showed them a larger room up a few steps, lined with plate-glass mirrors. There was no sign of any female clothes at all.
Genevieve turned out to be, when she looked at the badge in Hackett's hand, Mrs. Marlene Bloom. She was dark and rather gaunt, with cynical shrewd eyes; and she looked nonplussed at two detectives in her establishment—it could only be called that. But she looked at Hackett's height and bulk with veiled admiration, at Landers' lank dark boyishness with a quick smile.
"And just what's behind the questions about that do at the hotel? Somebody lose a purse or a mink stole?"
"Nothing like that," said Hackett. "It's nothing to do with you at all, I don't think. What about the models you use? Where do they come from?"
"The girls? Well, when I'm putting on a show as big as that, I have to hire extra. I always use Lowrie's agency. I had five extra girls that day. I employ three of my own, to model for clients.”
"We're interested in one who was there Saturday. She's described as tall, with silver-blond hair and a very good figure."
"Rosalie Packard," she said instantly. "She's one of my girls—and a good girl, a nice girl. What do you think Rosalie's done?"
"We have to talk to her," said Hackett. "Is she here now‘?"
She was studying them. "I don't like this. She's a nice girl."
"She may be, but we have to talk to her. Is she?"
"No. She's not due in until one. Well, I suppose I can't hold out on the police, and you'd find her anyway." She plucked one of her cards from the pretty gilt container on a table and held out her hand; Hackett gave her a ballpoint pen and she scribbled on the card. "I hope you're not going to arrest her. She's going to be a very good model—still getting experience, but she's quick to learn."
"And thanks so much," said Hackett. "Now tell us something else. That fashion show on Saturday. How did the girls get there?"
"Wel1, the Lowrie girls provide their own transportation, but I took my girls, and all the models to be displayed. I've got a station wagon."
"So Rosalie rode out to the Century-Plaza with you. But she didn't come back with you, did she?"
"Well, well, aren't you the smart detective, Sergeant. How did you know that? No, she had a date later, she said her boy friend was picking her up there after the show."
Outside, Hackett looked at the card. "Selma Avenue, that's just above the Strip. I think Luis'd like to sit in on this, let's pick him up on the way."
When they dropped into the office, everything was humming at top speed; everybody was going to be busy on the Patterson thing for a while to come, with so many people involved. They collected Mendoza and went out to Hackett's Monte Carlo again and started for Hollywood.
The Sunset Strip, these days, was looking a little tawdry and tired, in spite of a couple of newish high-rise office buildings. The residential areas above Sunset, once fashionable addresses, had aged into middle-class dreariness. Rosalie Packard lived in an upstairs apartment in an eight-unit building at the top of Selma Avenue; its square stucco design made it look stodgy and respectable.
They climbed steep stairs, found the door; Landers pushed the bell. In thirty seconds the door opened, and there she was. They could see why the bartender had remembered her. She was a very striking-looking piece of goods indeed; long wavy silver-gilt hair, a lovely oval face with arched brows, a beautifully cut mouth, very large blue eyes, and a figure to draw whistles a block away. She was wrapped in a limegreen terry robe, and she stared at the three men on her doorstep and went deathly pale.
"Police, Miss Packard," said Mendoza briskly. "I don't think we need to tell you what it's about."
She was scared to death; she stepped back as she might have from a snake in the path, and she began to cry a little, the tears welling up and rolling down slowly. "Oh—oh—oh!" she said. "Oh, it was all so silly—I never meant anything and Stan never meant anything, it just happcned—it wasn't anybody's fault but you're not going to believe it—oh—oh—oh!"
"Suppose you try us," said Landers.
She just sat down on the couch and looked at them as if she expected them to produce the handcuffs any minute. "I was—just so mad—at Stan"—her mouth was trembling and her voice shook—"and he flies into such a temper at anything—and-it-all-just-happened—"
The apartment was brightly and smartly furnished, and looked unexpectedly homey; it was very neat and clean. There were, unexpectedly, family photographs scattered around: a couple of younger girls enough like her to be sisters, a handsome middle-aged couple, even what looked like a possible grandmother.
"And—oh oh—it was bad enough, it was awful, what happened, but when it was in all the papers—who he was—and all the fuss on TV—0h, my heavens, I've never been so scared in my life! I told Stan you'd find out—oh, oh, oh—and he said no way, don't worry—but I did, and now you have, and you'll say it was murder and put us both in jail and I'll just die of shame—never could look Mother in the face again, she was so dead set against my coming to Hollywood in the first place—she'll say—she'll say—I was tempted of the devil—and it was all just an accident, but I knew you'd find out—oh, oh, oh—"
"Stan who?" asked Mendoza.
She gulped. "Stan P-P-Powell."
"And where do we find him?"
She was weeping in earnest now, "Wh-Whaley and Dunlop Architects. Sh-Sherman Oaks."
* * *
Stan Powell was big and burly, with shoulders like a prizefighter's and sandy-red hair. He sat in the chair beside Mendoza's desk and said candidly, "Hell, hell, hell. My God, I'm just sorry Rosalie's involved in this damned thing, but then it wouldn't have happened without Rosalie. I know I've got hell's own temper, it goes off like a bomb."
"It was my fault too," she choked. "Let him pick me up—like a cheap tart—but he was polite—"
"Oh, for God's sake!" said Powell. He was only about twenty-six; they'd heard by now that she was twenty·two.
"I had a date to meet Rosalie there—she had this fashion show bit there, and it'd be just as convenient to pick her up there. Five-thirty to six, I said. Only I got hung up on the freeway. I'd been out in Tarzana at the site of a new shopping center we're designing, and I was on the Ventura Freeway, there was a big semi had turned over and traffic was piled up for miles. I was stuck, no way to get off. I just had to sit there until they finally got one lane clear, and I never got to the Century-P1aza till after seven o'clock." He was talking bluntly, roughly, and that would be his natural manner: an almost aggressively honest young man. "I pulled into the public hotel lot behind, the one where you don't have to pay, and just as I turned up one aisle looking for a slot, I saw Rosalie getting in a car with this fellow—couldn't miss her hair in the arc light—"
"Oh, it was all my fault—if I hadn't—"
"And, God, I just lost my temper—we're practically engaged, she should have known I had some good reason for being late, but she's got a temper too—"
"I was—so mad—at you, and he was pretty smooth, made me laugh—"
"It was too late to get at them there, he was backing out, so I took off after them, and when he got onto Olympic I knew where they were heading—same place we'd been going to, she's crazy about the damn fool place, Madame Nu's in Little Tokyo. He pulled in the lot, found a slot and drove in, and I just slammed out of my car and caught them as they got out. I said something like what the hell you think you're doing with my girl, and he started to say something but I didn't listen, I hit him and I connected all right, but—"
Powell lifted his shoulders in a massive shrug and planted both hands on his knees: they were square capable artist's hands. "I'm no boxer, I got him on the shoulder and he was off balance and fell back against the car, and Rosalie let out a yelp and—well, he didn't get up. My God. I didn't believe it but he was unconscious, he'd knoc
ked himself out. Rosalie was in a dither, but I said no sweat, put him in the car and leave him somewhere, when he wakes up maybe he'll think twice about stealing another man's girl—and maybe Rosalie'll think twice about stepping out on me again—"
"Why in God's name the County Courthouse?" asked Mendoza.
"Well, I didn't want to leave him right there, in case he came in the restaurant and started a scene. And just a few blocks up there was this empty lot—Rosalie was trailing me in my car—"
"I was shaking so bad I could hardly drive—"
"And I just left him. And—"
"Did you wipe your prints off the wheel?"
"Well, for God's sake, no—why should I? I thought he'd come to and be okay. We went back to the restaurant and, well, made up— And then, sweet Jesus, on Monday it came out who he was, and he was dead—I didn't believe it, I thought some hophead must have come along after we left and hit him on the head for his roll—could that have happened?" They shook their heads at him. "But what the papers said—my God, I never meant to kill anybody!"
"That's a very interesting little story, Mr. Powell," said Mendoza. "For what it's worth, I don't think you'll spend much time in jail. At an educated guess, the D.A.'s going to call it voluntary manslaughter, and you might get a suspended sentence." He looked at Rosalie paternally, across his steepled hands. "I don't think Miss Packard will be charged with anything, although she did—mmh—supply the provocation."
"Well, praise heaven for that!" said Powell. "Okay, chief, bring on the handcuffs, I'm ready. I hope the firm will take an open view about it, it's a good job."
Landers took him over to the jail. The warrant had been applied for, and he would probably make bail. Wanda said sympathetically that she'd drive Rosalie home.
"The only thing is, Luis," said Hackett, "the D.A. may want to make an example of him, and a judge might go along. Soft as be damned on the street punks hitting old ladies over the head, but the respectable citizen who kills an important politician deserves the full treatment."