Too Sweet to Die

by Ron Goulart

  “You’ll be where?”

  Easy thought for a second, then said, “Carmel.” He went out to his dusty car.

  CHAPTER 5

  FOG CAME SWIRLING UP over the dark edges of the high black cliffs, cold as the black night ocean.

  Easy was standing next to his car watching the chunky middle-aged gas station man rub his windshield with a blue paper towel.

  “I’ll do this anyway,” the attendant said. “Even if you’re not buying any gas. Keeps me in shape.”

  “What about this girl?” Easy was holding a photo of Jill Jeffers.

  The station man crumpled the dirt towel into a jagged ball, came back to take another look at the picture. “Boy, there’s somebody who’d make you cream in your jeans for sure.”

  “Have you seen her? She drives a red ’68 Porsche.”

  “They always do, the pretty ones,” said the chunky man. His left canine tooth was missing and when he smiled he poked the tip of his tongue through the gap. “You get class conscious working in proximity to Carmel. I try to keep my place. I never get wise with any bimbo who isn’t in an American car.”

  “Whether or not you tried to pick her up, did you see her?”

  He shook his chunky head. “Wish I had. I like to look, even when I can’t touch. Know what I mean?”

  Easy got back into his Volkswagen and drove on toward Carmel. None of the gas stations on the coast highway near the town had produced anyone who remembered seeing Jill Jeffers.

  Parking on a nameless Carmel side street beneath a pine tree, Easy got out. There was a tea shop immediately to his left, with arched windows and strawberry-patterned cafe curtains. Old women in silk dresses were eating sensible dinners by candlelight. Next came an art supply store with a red tile roof and then a souvenir shop with its windows filled with abalone shell ashtrays and decorative pine cones.

  Around the corner was a small whitewashed adobe hotel, built around a tiled courtyard. The hotel clerk was behind a carved-wood check-in desk, wearing what appeared to be part of somebody else’s bullfighter suit. “Good evening, sir,” he said, glancing up from the local shopping paper he was studying.

  Producing the picture, Easy asked, “Has this girl been here within the last week? I’m an investigator from Los Angeles. We’re trying to locate her.”

  The dark-haired clerk studied the photo. “Why, that’s …” He stopped.

  “That’s who?”

  “I was going to say she looks quite a bit like Senator Nordlin’s daughter. I see there’s a different name attached to the picture.”

  “Has this girl been here?”

  “No, sir. If you were better acquainted with Carmel you’d know our hotel is rather a sedate one. Not a likely place for a single young girl to stay.”

  “What would be a likely unsedate hotel?”

  “You might try the Casa Piña, two blocks toward the beach on your right,” suggested the man in the sequined coat.

  Easy tried that and two other inns. No one admitted seeing Jill Jeffers or registering her, though at the Casa Piña the chubby desk man showed the same guarded flash of recognition the sequined clerk at the first hotel had evidenced. After the hotels and inns Easy checked the cocktail lounges.

  When he stepped out of an ivy-fronted bar on a side street near the ocean two large men left the shadows of a sidewalk walnut tree and drifted toward him through the cold night mist. They were as tall as Easy and each was considerably heftier. Both wore double-breasted blazers and bell-bottom pants. Each had his right fist shoved in his right blazer pocket.

  “Mr. Easy, isn’t it?” asked the one on the left.

  “Nope,” answered Easy. “My name is Frank Luther Mott and I’m just passing through your town on my way back home to Salinas.”

  “Ha, ha,” said the one on the right.

  “We mean you no immediate trouble, Mr. Easy,” explained his partner. He stepped close enough to Easy to nudge him with his pocketed revolver. “Won’t you come for a little walk with us?”

  “Where?”

  “Down to the beach. It’s sparsely frequented tonight, making it a good place for a talk.”

  “I can talk to you right here.”

  “We’re not the ones who want a conversation with you. Please come along now, Mr. Easy.”

  The gun barrel nudged harder. Easy turned and commenced walking downhill toward the black water.

  The scent of jasmine and sandalwood blended with the thick hanging fog. Standing a few feet from Easy on the moon-colored sand was a tall slender man of forty. He was tanned and narrow-faced, wearing a short-cropped blond wig. He had the same color hair as the cowboy actor’s fat poodle. “I thought we had satisfied your curiosity via the telephone, Mr. Easy,” he said in his careful voice.

  “You’re Montez, huh?”

  “I am Cullen Montez, yes. Private secretary to Leonard Nordlin.”

  One of the large men flanking Easy asked, “Is the senator any better, Cullen?”

  Montez said, “I’m afraid not, Neil.” To Easy he said, “I can assure you Jill Jeffers, as she now prefers to call herself, is not in Carmel. Nor has she been here recently.”

  “I’m trying to confirm that.”

  “Let me make something quite clear to you, Mr. Easy.” Montez touched his fingertips to the corner of his eye. “My employer is quite seriously ill. Your barging around Carmel, waving Jillian’s picture, stirring up speculation … none of it helps, Mr. Easy.”

  “The guy in the trick suit,” said Easy.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “The hotel clerk who looks like Zorro on a bad day. He’s the one who told you I was in town.”

  “You can see what I mean now, can’t you?” Montez let his little finger slide down from his eye to rest at the edge of his small thin mouth. “Everything gets back to us quite rapidly. So far I’ve been able to screen all your talk about Jillian’s supposed vanishment from Mr. Nordlin.”

  “I don’t have to ask any more questions …”

  “Splendid.”

  “If you’ll co-operate with me, Montez.”

  “I am co-operating. I’ve come out at this uncomfortable hour to have this amiable chat.”

  “Jill called someone from Carmel this past Saturday,” said Easy. “I want to know where she was.”

  “Has it occurred to you Jillian or this person she supposedly called may have been lying?”

  “It occurs to me everybody I’ve talked to all day may be lying,” Easy told him. “You seem to be plugged in to the village communication system here in Carmel, Montez. Why don’t you ask around?”

  Montez smiled a small thin smile and the tip of his little finger slipped into his mouth momentarily. “I already have. I’m concerned about the girl’s fate much more than you. Should she be in trouble, which is highly likely knowing her, it could well produce unpleasant news. Unpleasant news of such a magnitude I might not be able to keep it from my employer.”

  “You’re afraid she’s killed herself?”

  “With Jillian, whom I know a good deal better than you or your anxious client, the possibility of suicide is always present. I needn’t cite the tragic maternal precedent.”

  Easy shifted one foot on the gritty sand. “So what did you find out?”

  “It is as I told you. Jillian has been nowhere near Carmel in quite some time,” Montez assured him. “Now I suggest you return to your unkempt little VW and tool back to the Land of the Angels, Mr. Easy.”

  Easy looked from the sweet-smelling Montez to the two men framing him. “What happens if I don’t?”

  “Ha, ha,” repeated one of the large men.

  Fog came spinning between Montez and Easy, briefly blurring the private secretary. “A great many unpleasant things can reward stubbornness.” Montez took his hand away from his face and reached inside his suit. From a flat black wallet he took ten fifty-dollar bills. “Would five hundred dollars give you sufficient reason to go away?”

  Easy caused a frown to
touch his forehead. “I have a client.”

  “You won’t be betraying your client, since I can positively assure you Jillian is nowhere near Carmel.” He pushed the ten bills toward Easy.

  Finally Easy said, “Okay, I’ll go look someplace else.”

  Montez’s smile grew a fraction broader. “Very good, Mr. Easy. You’ve done the sensible thing.”

  Easy took the money and put it in his own wallet. “Good night, all,” he said. Patting both the large men on the shoulder, Easy backed off. He pivoted, went walking across the sand.

  When he retrieved his Volkswagen, he ran a finger across the hood. “You’re not unkempt,” he said, getting behind the wheel. He drove off.

  After he was certain he wasn’t being tailed, Easy headed the car inland toward the Carmel Valley where the private hospital of Dr. James Duncan Ingraham was located.

  CHAPTER 6

  NAKED PEOPLE. THEY WERE everywhere in the fog, two dozen of them, jumping up and down and howling. Easy stood with his back to the raw adobe wall he’d just climbed over. When he had heard the first scream he threw his big right hand up toward his shoulder holster. Now he relaxed, watching the naked people bounding on the wide side lawn of Dr. Ingraham’s sanitarium. There were more nude women than men and they were screaming and yowling with more enthusiasm and abandon. One naked man was rolling on the grass, pounding his fists on the wet lawn. Another was skipping through the mist and fondling anyone he could catch.

  “Hagopian would enjoy this,” Easy said to himself. He crossed the patch of dry grass he’d landed in.

  He was fifteen feet along a curving white gravel path when a small naked blonde stepped from behind a gnarled cypress tree, smiling. “There’s no need to be timid and standoffish,” she said in her small vaguely southern voice. “Just get down to your skin and start howling.” On tiptoe, she grabbed Easy’s wide ten-dollar necktie and tried to undo it. Her hands were much warmer than the night.

  “Wrong direction,” cautioned Easy. “You’re tightening it.”

  “I’m not too adept at undressing men yet. This is only my third Howl Therapy session and I don’t think I’ve shaken off every single one of my inhibitions.”

  “You’ve made a good start.” Easy took her hands in his, lifted them off his tie. “Is Dr. Ingraham here?”

  “He never disrobes,” said the naked girl. “It would spoil his authority as a patriarchal symbol. Besides, he’s already screamed away all his childish hangups and deep-seated traumas. Wouldn’t you like to howl, even if you keep your clothes on?” They were moving closed to the long low sanitarium buildings and one of the colored floodlights planted around the lawn hit the girl and turned the nipple of her uptilted right breast a soft purple.

  “I’m here on business,” said Easy. “I don’t think I’ll have to take my clothes off to talk to Dr. Ingraham.”

  “We don’t have to do anything,” said the small naked girl. “That’s what you learn from Howl Therapy. Having to do things is a construct imposed on our absolutely free wills by patriarchal and parental reinforcements, which are …”

  “Who are you?”

  Directly in front of them in the fog was a pretty brunet, fully clothed, down to a white smock, and carrying a clipboard. “My name is John Easy,” Easy told the brunet. “I’d like to talk to Dr. Ingraham.”

  The brunet frowned at the small naked blonde. “I think you’d benefit more from this session if you howled on the grass with the others.”

  Squeezing Easy’s arm, the small girl retreated, saying, “Let me know if you decide to join.”

  “I’m afraid, Mr. Easy, Dr. Ingraham couldn’t see you until tomorrow,” said the brunet. “By the way, how did you get in? We always keep the gates locked during night outdoor therapy sessions.”

  “Over the wall.”

  “Very unorthodox.”

  “I seem to be lacking in deep-seated inhibitions,” said Easy, “which may explain it. I want to talk to Dr. Ingraham about a girl named Jill Nordlin. I’m a private investigator from Los Angeles.”

  The brunet touched the middle of her upper lip with the tip of her tongue. She tapped her felt-tip pen on the edge of her clipboard. “Who was that?”

  “The doctor should know her as Jillian Nordlin, though she’s now Jill Jeffers. She’s a former patient of his.”

  “Oh, yes, of course. That was before my time, but everyone is aware of her father around here.” The pen tapped again. “I’m Dr. Marlys Newborn. The doctor is for Ph.D. and not M.D. in this case. What exactly is the problem, Mr. Easy?”

  “Jill has disappeared, Dr. Newborn. There’s a possibility she’s in the Carmel area someplace. I’d like to know if Dr. Ingraham has heard from her or can tell me where she might be.”

  “Obviously you’ve already talked to her father?”

  “Not directly, but I’ve talked with his minions.”

  Dr. Newborn smiled faintly. “Come inside and I’ll see if possibly the doctor can talk to you. Though to the best of my knowledge he knows nothing about the Nordlin girl.”

  On the foggy lawn a husky black woman knocked the fondling man down and he yelled in protest.

  The pretty brunet Dr. Newborn led Easy up a red tile stairway and along a red tile corridor. She put him in a small carpeted library, saying, “I’ll see what I can do.” She left him in the darkwood room.

  The howls from the lawn seemed much farther away than they were. The windows were of thick rippled glass, leaded, and covered with rich red draperies. The chairs and sofa were low and of black synthetic leather. The yellow light came from two parchment-shaded floor lamps and fell mostly on the authentic-looking Persian rug. The only magazines on the little table next to the black chair Easy chose to sit in were an automobile club publication called Motorland and some two-year-old issues of The Lancet.

  Easy skimmed an article about obesity in the young, then got up and watched the fog press in tight against the thick windows. Once he thought he heard a scream from somewhere inside the sanitarium.

  “What is it, what is it?”

  A fifty-year-old man had rushed into the room. He was five feet tall, with a small round head. His hair was thin and spidery and acne spots glowed on his cheeks and forehead.

  “Dr. Ingraham?”

  “Of course, of course,” said the little ugly man. He put his cigarette back in his mouth, biting down hard. “Now what’s all this about that goofy Nordlin girl?”

  Easy walked closer. “Jill has disappeared. She’s been missing since last Friday.”

  Dr. Ingraham spit out cigarette smoke. “So what, so what? She’s a very high-strung girl, a spoiled brat from a very tense home. Her father’s goofy, too. A nasty man with a vast and onrushing ego.” The ugly little doctor bit into his cigarette again. “You’re a professional man, Easy. I’ll tell you something I don’t tell those galloping yahoos out there.” He spit smoke in the direction of the draped windows. “A goofy father produces a goofy daughter. A spoiled brat grows up to be a spoiled bitch. You can’t get away from taints like that.”

  “Has Jill been here?” put in Easy, looking down into the doctor’s small red-streaked eyes.

  “No.”

  “She called a friend and told her she was in Carmel Saturday.”

  “A goofy girl is liable to tell anybody anything.” Dr. Ingraham turned to the magazine table and straightened the pile. “Is there anything else I can do for you?”

  “Do you know where Jill might be?”

  “No.”

  Easy watched the little ugly doctor. “Why did you agree to talk with me?”

  Ingraham laughed and smoke came out of his mouth and nose. “Look up psychiatrists in the Yellow Pages sometime, Easy. You’ll find, in most parts of our great golden state at any rate, a substantial listing. I’m where I am because I have distinguished myself from the pack of them. One of the ways you do that, as I shouldn’t have to tell you, is to take special pains. Kissing ass is how some of my younger patients put it. I alwa
ys try to find time for influential people, or for people such as yourself who work for influential people. It’s called public relations.”

  “Oh,” said Easy, “is that what this has been?”

  “Your humor is as elephantine as you are,” the little doctor told him. He suddenly slapped his watch crystal with his hand. “That’s all the time I can give you.”

  “I was hoping you’d have a moment to inscribe my copy of Scream Yourself Sane.”

  “Good night, Easy.” Dr. Ingraham went to the open doorway. “As a matter of fact, I wish you well in your quest for Jill. With all her faults, she’s a rather lovely girl. Rather lovely.” He spun around and walked out.

  Dr. Newborn didn’t return to guide him and after a moment Easy left the library. Outside the fog was rolling and spinning. The howl group was breaking up, trudging across the wet grass to retrieve their clothes from a lighted wing of the private hospital. The fondling man was on his feet again, making a few final efforts as the group scattered.

  Easy took a short running start, got himself boosted, to the top of the six-foot wall. He hesitated an instant, then dropped over on the road side.

  The valley side of the road was silent and no cars were moving on it. Easy walked toward his Volkswagen, which he’d left off the road and under three dark oaks.

  The driver’s door opened before he touched it, the overhead light went on. One of Cullen Montez’s large sidekicks was sitting behind the wheel. He had a long-barreled .38 revolver pointed at Easy. “My,” he said, “you don’t keep your promises very well, do you?”

  “No, I’d better give you the money back.” Easy started to reach inside his coat.

  “Whimsical, very whimsical.”

  The other large man grabbed Easy from behind, with an elbow around his throat.

  His partner came out of the car, jabbing a fist into Easy’s groin.

  Easy doubled, trying to throw the one large man over into the other one. It didn’t work.