Run, Killer, Run

by William Campbell Gault

  He smiled. “Hardly. The total inheritance will be in excess of three million dollars. The first installment, due on her thirtieth birthday, will be almost a million dollars.”

  I sat back and stared at him.

  He continued to smile. The room was quiet.

  Then I said, “Why here? Why you?”

  “I’m not following you,” he said quietly.

  “A girl with that kind of money due,” I explained, “could go to—well, to some lending institution that undoubtedly charges less than I’m sure you do. Don’t get me wrong; I’m not saying you’re a crook or anything like that. But you sure as hell aren’t working on six per cent.”

  He nodded.

  “Or even a clean twenty per cent, by the time you get through working that slide rule,” I continued. “Mr. Morley, it just doesn’t figure.”

  He took a deep breath. “You’re a puzzle to me. I didn’t phone you for an auditing; I phoned you as a prospective client. I’ll say good-bye to you now, Mr. Puma. You obviously don’t want my business.”

  I stared at him for a few seconds and then stood up. I said, “I need the business. I need it real bad this month. But I don’t go into any job blind.”

  It was quiet again, except for the traffic noises from below. Finally, he said, “I’m asking you to find a girl. You’re worried about how much interest she will pay. What business is that of yours?”

  “None,” I said. “I wasn’t thinking of that. I was simply wondering why she came to you for money.”

  •He took another breath. “Because she was fed up with all the red tape the banks go through in processing a loan.

  And she was introduced to me through a mutual friend.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Do you want to give me her name now?”

  “Are you going to take the job?” I nodded.

  “Her name,” he said, “is Fidelia Sherwood.”

  He had me staring again. It was a big family in this town, old and respected. Fidelia had been a blot on the family shield, married to a bogus count at nineteen, to a jazz pianist at twenty-four. She had divorced the pianist two years ago and had only recently been named as a correspondent in a rather messy Hollywood divorce action.

  “Brother!” I said, finally.

  Chubby little Willis Morley smiled smugly. He handed me a note-sized sheet of paper. “Here’s a list of places she’s been found before when she was—missing. It might be helpful.”

  I took the list and he added, “And here’s a letter I want you to give her when you find her.”

  The letter was in a heavy, legal-sized envelope, sealed with red wax. He knew my rates and I knew as much as he wanted to tell me about his business. I took the letter and left.

  The girl was probably not missing in the legal sense. She hadn’t been in touch with him lately and was not available at home, and he was understandably worried. If she had owed me forty thousand, I’d have been worried, too.

  I went down the steps through the odor of dust and varnish, thinking about Fidelia Sherwood, trying to remember all I had read about her in the newspapers. She had never lacked for publicity.

  She was a willful girl, that much seemed certain, even discounting the exaggerations of newspaper feature stories. She was, or would be, an extremely wealthy girl; she was the only heir to the Sherwood money, so far as I had read. Her first husband, the fraudulent count, had graciously bowed out for a settlement reputed to be around a quarter of a million. Her second husband, a true American boy, had asked for no alimony.

  It was now noon and I ate downtown. I came to the heart of this town so seldom I felt guilty about leaving

  it without making some token purchase for the good of the Downtown Association.

  I was glad I ate a full lunch. Because I had a very active afternoon, hitting all the spots Willis Morley had mentioned in his list. The area roughly called Los Angeles includes a lot of communities that aren’t and some very remote neighborhoods that shouldn’t be.

  Nothing. Nobody had seen her and only one man seemed interested in my interest. He was a psychologist named Dr. Arnold Foy, who had a very swanky office on Wilshire. He was a psychologist, remember, not a psychiatrist, and I didn’t know at the time how authentic that “Doctor” title was. In my town, anyone with two dollars and the first month’s office rent can set himself up with a “Doctor of Psychology” sucker trap.

  He was a tall man, thin and about thirty-five, soft-spoken and somehow superior, though perhaps he didn’t mean to be. He was certainly a handsome bastard.

  “Miss Sherwood missing again?” he said wearily. “Oh, God.”

  “You treated her, Doctor Foy?”

  He dismissed the breach of etiquette with a smile. “How long has she been missing?”

  “You tell me and I’ll tell you,” I said. “Did you treat her?”

  “I’m a professional man,” he said.

  I shrugged. “So am I. You’re not an MD, are you?”

  His lean face stiffened. “It so happens I’m not.” He studied me. “Are you implying that only MD’s are permitted ethics?”

  I smiled. “Not exactly. But I guess we both know how little it takes to hang up that ‘psychologist’ shingle. Maybe, between us, we have enough information to do Miss Sherwood some good. Let’s not quibble.”

  He shook his head in dismissal. “I’m sorry, Mr. Puma, but I’m sure we have nothing further to discuss.”

  “We could talk about the Dodgers,” I suggested.

  He smiled his good-bye.

  There was a possibility he was an honest man, but he left a bad taste in my mouth. It was five o’clock now, and the traffic on Wilshire was bumper to bumper and the air blue with smog. I walked to the nearest restaurant.

  Two drinks and a slice of roast beef later, I drank my coffee and considered the last place on my list. It was a bar, way out near the beach, on the border between Santa Monica and Venice. I’d had a busy day through Los Angeles traffic and I was aching to get home, but my professional conscience drove me west, toward the ocean.

  The name of the place was “Eddie’s,” a piano bar struggling for respectability in an area overrun with pansy beds. There were a couple of the lavender lads in a corner booth, giggling together, when I came in.

  Behind the bar, the big man in the white jacket looked sour. He studied me doubtfully.

  I shook my head. “I’m one of the virile ones. Are you the boss?”

  He nodded. “I’m Eddie. Those guys in the corner bother you, I can bounce ‘em. I’m looking for an excuse.”

  “They don’t bother me,” I said. “I’m looking for a woman named Fidelia Sherwood. Has she been in lately?”

  “Last night,” he answered. “She’ll be in again, probably.” He looked at the clock behind the bar. “In about twenty minutes, I’d guess, if you want to wait.”

  “I’ll wait. I’ll have a bourbon and water.”

  He set the drink on the bar and glanced annoyedly at the corner booth. “I try to keep ‘em out. They keep all the good trade away.” He sighed. “Every dime I own is tied up in this joint. I know now why I got it cheap.”

  I nodded sympathetically and glanced at the piano, a baby grand, on the stage set into the far curve of the bar.

  The bartender must have misread my glance. Because he said, “Pete’ll be in soon. Maybe they’ll come together.”

  “Pete?” I asked blankly.

  “Pete Richards,” he explained. “Why do you think she hangs around here?”

  Pete Richards … Ah, yes, the second husband, the pianist. “Oh,” I said. “Oh, yes, of course.”

  “You looking for him, or her?” he asked me.

  “Her,” I answered, and showed him the wax-sealed envelope.

  He frowned. “Summons?”

  “No,” I said, and then realized I couldn’t be sure. “I doubt it,” I corrected myself. “How long has Richards been working here?”

  “Since he went on the booze, again. About a month. Nobody el
se will have him when he’s on the booze.” “An alcoholic, eh?”

  The big man shook his head. “I don’t think so. Just one of them compulsive drinkers; he can always navigate. I’m not much for this progressive stuff, but his piano is okay with me.”

  “He’s about like Shearing, maybe?” I asked.

  “About,” he said, and smiled cynically. “And cheaper. When he’s on the booze, anyway.”

  “Does Miss Sherwood drink heavily?”

  “Richards,” he said. “Her name is Richards. Her divorce didn’t change that.”

  “All right. Does Mrs. Richards drink heavily?”

  He looked at the bar. “Maybe you’d better ask her that when she comes in. I don’t yak about my customers.”

  His attitude had cooled in the last minute. I held his gaze and asked, “Did I say something wrong?”

  “No.” He took a deep breath. “You’re a private eye, right? Your name Puma?”

  I nodded. “And you don’t like private investigators?”

  He shrugged. “I don’t like to yak about my customers with ‘em.”

  I ordered another drink and said no more. A couple came in and took the booth next to the gigglers. One of the gigglers said, “Tourists,” loud enough to be heard at the bar.

  The bartender stared at them for seconds, and then went over to take the couple’s order.

  A girl came in, glanced quickly at the piano, and then came over to climb onto a stool in front of the bar. Her hair was between chestnut and auburn, her eyes a greenish-blue, her figure firm and slim and proud. She was wearing a light-green linen suit.

  “Miss Fidelia Sherwood?” I asked.

  “Fidelia Richards,” she said, and looked at me without interest.

  I slid the letter across the bar toward her. “From Willis Morley. He’s worried about you.”

  From behind me, one of the weirdies in the corner called, “Fidelia, darling, come over and sit with us!”

  She glanced their way, waved, and shook her head.

  She looked back at me. “Do you work for little Willis?”

  “Just for today. My day is done. Mr. Morley will want your new address. I think you’d better play along with him. You see, the law is on his side.”

  She picked up the envelope and tapped it on the bar. She smiled and said nothing. I sipped my second drink and lighted a cigarette.

  The gay, gay, gay voice behind me called, “Come over here, Fidelia. We’re certainly better company than that!”

  The hair on my neck bristled, but I didn’t turn around. They were sick, I told myself; they had their problems. But why did they have to be vocal?

  Fidelia smiled sadly and then the big man came around behind the bar again and she ordered a Scotch on the rocks. “Pete’s late,” she added.

  He turned to look at the clock, nodded, and fixed her drink. I sipped mine and stared at nothing.

  The bartender told me, “No trouble, understand? I don’t like ‘em, but they’re paying cash tonight.”

  I nodded.

  Fidelia Sherwood Richards said, “You’re Joseph Puma, aren’t you? You’re a friend of Mona Greene’s.”

  “I was,” I admitted. “Is she still in Italy?”

  She nodded. “And happy. Married and happy. She’s expecting a baby, and she’s a little worried about that. She’s thirty-nine, you know.”

  “I know. Mrs. Richards, you will get in touch with Willis Morley, won’t you?”

  She held up three fingers. “On my scout’s honor. I don’t know why he should be worried. When things pile up I always hide out for a while. This isn’t the first time.”

  “Do you want to give me your present address,” I asked, “to take back to him?”

  “The Avalon Beach,” she told me. “Do you know where that is?”

  “I do. Will you be there long?”

  “I’ll be there tonight.”

  Again, the door opened. The man who came in was young-looking, but he was the kind who always would be. He had an attractively weak face and a crew cut and lustrous brown eyes, now bloodshot.

  He stood next to Fidelia and they exchanged some words too low for me to hear. Then he walked over to the piano.

  I finished my drink and said to Fidelia, “Please get in touch with Mr. Morley, won’t you?” I started to get off the stool.

  “Wait,” she said. “I want you to hear him.”

  I ordered another drink and settled back.

  He was a little beyond me. Shearing’s about my limit. The mild Shearing. This was more intricate, and occasionally, to my untrained ear, dissonant. Maybe it was meant to be.

  Others drifted in, a few beatniks and some washed people and a few who looked like they were brothers of the duo in the corner booth. Another bartender had joined the boss and they kept busy.

  I had no place to go but home, so I drank and listened. Maybe it was the alcohol. Or maybe it was the fact that Fidelia Sherwood Richards had moved over to take the stool next to mine and I could smell her expensive perfume.

  At any rate, the piano of Pete Richards began to get through to me; I felt an empathy for Richards.

  Next to me, Fidelia moved closer and asked, “Is he coming through?”

  “Something is,” I admitted, “though I’m musically illiterate.”

  “He’s complicated,” she said. “He’s as complicated as Bach.”

  And then a big, white hand came from somewhere and rested on hers, and a petulant voice said, “Fidelia, I insist that you join us.”

  I turned to face the bigger of the two men who had been in the booth. He had looked big enough sitting down. Standing, I could see he was a giant.

  He blotted out the rest of the room. He wore an Italian silk suit, black as sin, and a fawn-gray silk shirt and the insolent smile of the oversized nonconformist.

  A tremor moved through me and I said, “Don’t be pushy. Miss Sherwood is comfortable right where she is.”

  He moved in closer, crowding between us. The tremor in me was stronger now, and I tried to control it. I put a hand on his arm.

  He turned to appraise me.

  I said, “I promised the bartender I wouldn’t start a fight. Don’t make me break a promise.”

  He smiled. “Run along, process server; you’ve done your duty.” He moved in toward the bar, and my stool began to teeter.

  I put a forearm across his chest and shoved him back.

  His big, white hand came swinging across the bar to slap my face, and I started to go over backward with the stool. I jumped in time, landing with my feet well spread as the stool clattered to the floor.

  It wasn’t a very bright thing to do, but I swung the right hand as soon as my feet were solid. It landed high on his cheek.

  His head twisted and he stumbled into the bar. A woman screamed and somebody grabbed my arm and the big pansy swung from outer space.

  I ducked, he missed, and I came forward to put the top of my head into his beefy face.

  Now both bartenders were between us and a few of the customers had come over to help them. My tormentor and I stood a few feet apart, glaring at each other over the heads of the people between. Blood dribbled down from his nose and from a gashed lip, and his eyes were murderous.

  The boss, Eddie, said, “You leave now, Puma. He’ll leave in a couple of minutes. Unless you want me to call the law.”

  “I’m on the way,” I said. “This is more his kind of place, anyway.” I shrugged free of the men holding me and started for the door.

  “Wait,” Fidelia called, and I turned to see her worming through the crowd. “Wait for me.”

  I felt warm. It wasn’t much of a conquest to have her leave the pansy for me, but it was encouraging to think she would leave the ex-husband she admired so much.

  I waited at the door and we went out together. It was dark now, a clear, fairly warm night. She took a deep breath and stared up at me.

  “You must have a car,” I said. “It’s impossible to live in this town witho
ut a car. Why do you need me?”

  “I don’t need you,” she said. “I don’t need anybody; it’s one of my vices. And I have a car. But not here. I came in a cab.”

  “Now, why would you do that, Miss Sherwood, if you have a car?”

  “Because I have another vice,” she answered. “Alcohol. At times. And I don’t like to drive when I’m drunk.”

  I stared at her and she stared at me and we thought our separate thoughts. I doubt if hers were as vulgar as mine. Finally she said, “Don’t call me Miss Sherwood.”

  “Okay, Mrs. Richards.”

  “Call me Fidelia,” she said. “Do you know what it means?”

  “Hell, yes,” I said. “Any Latin knows that. It means faithful.”

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  Copyright © 1954 by William Campbell Gault, Registration Renewed 1982

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  This is a work of fiction.

  Names, characters, corporations, institutions, organizations, events, or locales in this novel are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, used fictitiously. The resemblance of any character to actual persons (living or dead) is entirely coincidental.

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  eISBN 13: 978-1-4405-3916-9