The old pattern re-formed, pointing to Tampett. The gun, the shill, the steerer, Robert Tampett, deceased.
My phone rang, startling me.
It was Fidelia. “What are you doing?”
“Thinking.”
“I … was unreasonable, wasn’t I?”
“Women are. You wouldn’t want to be anything but a woman, would you?”
“Not when you’re around. Joe, quit. I can guess what you’re sitting there thinking about, but where can it lead? Who will be helped if you go on?”
“Justice,” I said. “The law.”
“Technically only. Two unpleasant people are dead. Was either of them any loss to the world?”
“I don’t know. I’m not a judge. And neither are you, Fidelia.”
A silence, and then, “I suppose you’d be angry if I — if I talked about money, about paying you to quit, right now?”
“I’m not angry. The answer is no, Fidelia. I’m no saint, but I still live on the saints’ side of the street.”
“If you go on,” she said, “you’ll never see me again. I suppose that doesn’t bother you.”
“It bothers me. You must realize I’m not enjoying my thoughts at the moment. I’m no lamb-stalker, but the law is the law. I’ve cut some cute corners for fast dollars, but there’s a line I walk, just the same.”
“You’ll send me back to Foy,” she said. “Is that what you want?”
“No. You hired me, remember. I wouldn’t have gone on this hunt if you hadn’t hired me to.”
Silence. Then, “Did you have to say that?” I didn’t answer.
In a moment, I heard the click of a closed line. She had hung up.
Last night she had said, “And you wouldn’t want me for a sister.” I would. If I couldn’t have her as a lover, a friend or a sister, even an in-law would be okay. I loved Fidelia. Everybody who had any sense loved Fidelia.
I went down to the car and headed for Santa Monica.
Chapter Sixteen
He wasn’t in the yard, soaking up the sun, this afternoon. I climbed the outside stairs to the second-floor apartment, on the runway overlooking the court.
He opened the door to my ring and smiled at me. “More eggs?”
“Nope,” I said. “Business, Pete.”
He looked at me appraisingly a moment and then opened the door wider. “Come in.”
I came in and he closed the door behind me. He went over to sit on the piano bench; I sat in a rattan chair nearby. He leaned forward on the bench, his back to the piano, staring at me.
“I had it all figured,” I said, “right to Tampett. It was the only way it made sense. And it made sense, up to him.”
The phone rang and he looked up quickly, startled as I had been in my office. He looked at me. “Answer it,” I said.
He stood up, went to the phone and said, “Hello.”
A pause, and he said, “I can’t run. Where can I run to? Can I run away from myself?” A pause. “Anyway, it’s too late. He’s here.” A pause. “Calm down. Please. Yes, yes, I’ll phone back.” He hung up.
He came back to take the same position on the piano bench, leaning forward, his eyes fastened on me. “Was that Fidelia on the phone?” I asked him. He shook his head.
“Yes, it was, Pete. She phoned before and told you to run away, didn’t she?”
He shook his head again. “Get on with your story, Joe.”
“It made sense all the way to Tampett,” I repeated, “who was a stooge for Foy. But Tampett found himself another stooge, didn’t he? Why didn’t you admit the other day that when Tampett and Serano sat together in that booth, you were sitting with them?”
“I was drunk,” he said. “I didn’t remember sitting with them?”
“Tampett found a new stooge,” I went on. “A man so drunk he almost didn’t know what he was doing. He convinced this man, you, that Brian’s story on Foy would unhinge Fidelia, might possibly destroy her. And you were drunk enough to go along with the idea, weren’t you?”
Richards stared at the floor.
“Tampett gave you the gun,” I continued. “You thought you were helping Fidelia. He said nothing. “Am I right?” I asked quietly.
He looked up. “You could be, Joe. Only remember I was stinking drunk. That’s no excuse to give a jury, I know, but you’re not a jury. And I’m going to tell you something you didn’t know — Foy did help Fidelia. I lied to you before. Fidelia was an addict. Morphine, Joe. And Foy helped her to break the habit.”
I stared at him, only half believing.
“So help me,” he said fervently, “it’s the gospel truth. And that night, when Tampett got to me with his story, I was so stinking drunk I didn’t know right from wrong.”
“That night you were drunk. But you weren’t drunk when you killed Tampett. Did Tampett try to blackmail you?”
Richards nodded. “He tried. But I didn’t kill him. I swear to you I had nothing to do with Tampett’s death.” He took a hoarse, shallow breath. “And I still don’t believe
I killed Delsy.” He rubbed his throat. “Though I can’t be sure. It was a nightmare.”
“Where’s the gun?” I asked him. “You must have the gun.”
He shook his head. “I brought it back to Tampett. That much I remember. He gave me the gun and conned me about Delsy and how he had to be killed. And then there’s the drunken nightmare and all I remember is bringing the gun back to Tampett.”
“Had you ever shot a gun before?”
He shook his head.
“And you were blind drunk?”
He raised a hand. “I swear it.”
“Then how in hell did you get from Eddie’s to the Avalon Beach? You sure as hell didn’t walk it and you were in no shape to drive.”
“Tampett drove me, I suppose,” he said.
“Tampett? A little while ago you said you remember bringing the gun back to Tampett. If he was with you, you wouldn’t be bringing the gun back; he’d be there.”
His eyes narrowed. “Somebody drove me. I know somebody drove me, because we went around one turn kind of fast and my stomach almost gave out. I remember that. Damn it, I kept thinking of him as Tampett, but it couldn’t have been, could it? He was alibied for the time.”
I nodded — and his doorbell rang. He looked at the door and at me. I nodded again, and he rose and went to the door.
It was Fidelia. She and Pete went over to sit on the piano bench. I sat down again in the same chair. “Well?” she said. I said nothing, trying to think.
“Money, Joe,” she said. “Money, money, money — ”
“Maybe we’re both wrong, Fidelia,” I told her. “Maybe Pete is innocent.”
“I know I didn’t kill Tampett,” he said quietly. “And I can’t believe, drunk or sober, that I could kill anybody.”
“I can’t either,” Fidelia said. She looked at me hopefully.
“Money,” I said. “Nobody kills for loyalty, do they? For love or money, for hate or bigotry, they kill.” I took a breath. “Have you been living on your income lately?”
She stared at me, perplexed. “On my allowance? Yes, strangely enough, I have.”
“All right,” I said. “Now would be the time to tell me the name of the man in Las Veges who tore up the check.”
“Don Ranzio,” she said. “He runs the Yucca Inn.”
“Was his wife a patient of Dr. Foy’s?”
“Briefly. Why?”
I went to the phone and called the Yucca Inn in Las Vegas. I was in luck; Don Ranzio was in and he had heard of me. He told me what I wanted to know.
I came back to sit across from them again. I held Fidelia’s gaze and asked her gently, “How long were you on it?”
Her chin lifted and she colored.
“It’s no time to be maidenly,” I warned her. “How long were you on it and what was it costing you?”
“Does it matter how long I was on it? It cost me well over forty thousand dollars, the price I was paying for it.
I only had one source, and I was paying his price.”
“One source,” I said. “Lou Serano?”
She didn’t answer. She looked at her hands in her lap.
Pete Richards said, “The price she was paying, it could have cost her the wad, eventually.”
Fidelia looked at him and said softly, “So you told him, did you? Why, Pete?”
He didn’t look at her. “Because it might be a lead. Because I don’t want to go to the gas chamber.”
Again, Fidelia looked hopefully at me.
“It’s out in left field,” I said. “Maybe it can’t even be forced into a pattern. But there’s an alliance involved I’d like to connect. All we have is a fingerprint down at the Venice Station and it’s not Lou Serano’s.”
“Lou Serano was sitting in the booth that night,” Richards said. “I always had the feeling he was working with Tampett.”
“Lou works with anyone who can help him,” I explained, “and when the person can no longer help him, he works alone. This much I learned from my phone call — Lou wasn’t working for Don Ranzio.”
There was a silence.
Again, I looked at Fidelia. “Another question. Did
Brian Delsy know you had been on morphine and that Serano was your supplier?”
She nodded and didn’t look at me.
“Foy and Tampett,” I explained, “was one connection we uncovered. I should have looked further. Because there was another alliance, with more to gain.” And I thought, money, money, money — it’s always love or money. I asked Richards, “Would you risk your neck if it might save you from the gas chamber?”
“Hell, yes,” he said.
So we set it up. It was still a Santa Monica deal, so I went down to talk with Sergeant Loepke and Mel Braun. Loepke didn’t like it.
“We have procedures,” he said. “We can’t get tricky. We’re police officers, Puma.”
“Okay,” I said wearily. “How about letting the West Los Angeles boys in to work with me, then? Or the boys from the Venice Station?”
He drew himself up haughtily. “We handle our own affairs in Santa Monica. We don’t need outside help.”
“I do, Sergeant. Lieutenant Lusk, at the Venice Station, has a fingerprint he hasn’t matched up. We might need it.”
“If we need it, we’ll get it.” He took a deep breath. “All right, let’s have the name of your suspect.”
I shook my head. “If you won’t work my way, Sergeant, I’m not working with you.”
He sat there, glaring at me.
Mel Braun said quietly, “I’ll work with him, Sergeant. You won’t need to be involved. And I’m sure Locker will work with me. Puma’s right on this one; standard police procedure won’t do it.”
Sergeant Loepke’s face was immobile, his jawline tense.
I said, “Remember the talk we had at my place? I’m for any procedure that brings criminals to justice, Sergeant. If that’s dishonest, then I am, and I don’t give a damn. I hate killers.”
Sergeant Loepke got up and went over to the water cooler. He drank three paper cups full of water, crumpled the cup in his hand and threw it at the waste basket.
“Damn these kind of shenanigans,” he said gruffly.
“Sergeant,” I said, “you fight evil any way you can lick it.”
He shook his head. “That’s not true. But go ahead. I’ll stay here until I hear from you. I’m an hour past quitting time right now, but I’ll stay here to sweat ‘em, if you’re lucky.”
It was in the most exclusive area of Santa Monica, on San Vicente Boulevard. I parked a couple of blocks away, on a side street. I didn’t want Serano to know I was with Richards, if Serano wasn’t already there.
It was a fairly large house, hidden from the boulevard by a tall hedge behind a fieldstone wall. There were two cars in the parking area near the garage, but neither of them was a black Caddy convertible.
“Wait here,” I said to Richards, and went along under the shadow of the overhang to the side door of the garage.
It was unlocked, and I opened it. My pencil flash showed me the Cad convertible. Lou Serano had hidden his car, too. And perhaps he wouldn’t be visible in the house.
I came back to Richards and we went up to the front door together. Our host opened the door only seconds after we had rung his bell.
He peered out at us in his cherubic way and said, “I thought you were coming alone, Mr. Richards.”
“I’m representing him, Mr. Morley,” I said with dignity. “I’m also representing Mrs. Richards.”
Willis Morley permitted himself a cynical smile. “I’ll bet. I’ll wager, however, that none of your clients gets quite the personal service you give yourself.”
I sighed. “A man has to eat, Mr. Morley. Is your family home?”
“I’m alone,” he said impatiently. “Come in, come in.”
We went through the hallway to the living room and through that to a den at the rear of the house, behind the garage. It was a warm night, and the windows were open.
The den was paneled in walnut, furnished in bright leathers and light-toned woods — real first-class California living.
As we seated ourselves, I asked, “When will Serano be here?”
“I don’t know any Serano,” Willis Morley said blandly.
He sat behind a low walnut desk.
“When I phoned you,” Richards protested, “and mentioned that I’d like to see Lou Serano at the same time, you didn’t say you didn’t know him.”
Morley smiled. “Didn’t I? Is it important? I repeat, I have no idea who Lou Serano is.”
I said quietly, “He’s the man who sold Fidelia Richards morphine at a price about five hundred per cent above the current figure. And you’re the man who gave her the money for it — at what usurious rate, Mr. Morley? Since she’s been off it, she hasn’t needed your money, has she?”
“My books are open to any authorized person,” he said stiffly. “You can get yourself into a lot of trouble talking usury, Mr. Puma.”
“Can I? When Mrs. Richards is ready to go into court and swear that when she signed a note for a thousand dollars, she only received five hundred? Each time, she only received half of the face amount of the note.”
“She can swear any way she wants to,” Morley said. “The papers speak for themselves, and the interest rate is plainly stated on all the notes. A discussion of discounts is far too involved for us to indulge in it tonight.”
“How about a discussion of murder?” I asked him. “Are you ready for that?”
His face showed nothing. “You’re not making sense,” he said.
“Maybe not. You know, I got too involved in the Foy-Tampett axis to realize there was another — Serano-Morley. Serano feeding poor Fidelia the kind of stuff that only Morley would advance her money for. And then when Foy cured her, both of you suffered.”
“I don’t know any Serano,” he said.
“Along comes Delsy,” I went on, “who knows about both alliances. And so when Tampett conned Pete, here, into going after Delsy with a gun, Serano had a stake in that, too. And so did you. Serano drove Pete over and when he realized Pete was too drunk to shoot straight, he did the job. And it wasn’t until this afternoon that Pete remembered that Serano had driven him to the Avalon Beach.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. If this Serano person is involved in murder, why aren’t you looking for him?”
“We are,” I said. “Call him out.”
“You’re being ridiculous,” he said primly. “For the last time, I don’t know any Lou Serano.”
“Then what,” I asked him quietly, “is his car doing in your garage?”
There was a long silence. Morley looked at me and I stared at him and Richards looked at the top of Morley’s desk.
I said, “Serano tried to con me into believing a man named Don Ranzio was interested in Fidelia’s welfare and Lou was working for him. Ranzio told me this afternoon that that was a lie. Do you
want to bring him out now?”
Morley’s voice was almost a whisper. “What do you want from me?”
I said, “I want you to cancel all that paper you hold on Mrs. Richards. I want you to give me Serano for the law. And what you figure my services might be worth …” I shrugged.
“Blackmail,” he said.
“Call it an adjustment of accounts. And what’s a little money to a man like you? Give us Serano and get out of town for a couple weeks. Everything will be all smoothed out by the time you get back.”
His eyes left mine and flicked toward a closet door. I followed his gaze and saw that the door was partly ajar. I moved my chair around so that my back wouldn’t be toward that door.
Willis Morley’s blue eyes came back to examine Richards and me thoughtfully. His voice was calm. “You’ve put together a story, but it’s all guesses, isn’t it? You haven’t got a thing to take into court.”
“I’ve got Pete here to put the finger on Lou Serano. And Mrs. Richards to explain about your financial shenanigans.” I paused. “And down at the Venice Station, Lieutenant Lusk has an incriminating fingerprint he hasn’t matched up, one that was picked up in the place where Tampett died.”
His voice was less calm. “Fingerprint?”
I nodded. “It could be Lou Serano’s, though I should think Lou’s prints would be on file some place. Tell me, did he take a cut of your business with Mrs. Richards? And then did you take a cut of his?”
Again, he glanced toward the closet door.
“We don’t do business?” I asked.
“I don’t think you have anything to sell,” he said.
“I’ve got my story, and Serano’s presence here makes the story look halfway acceptable to the police. That and the stories of Mr. and Mrs. Richards are half a case.” I stood up. “The fingerprint Lieutenant Lusk is holding could be the clincher.” I reached for the phone on his desk. “We’ll call him.”
His chubby hand came over to press on the cradle switch. “Just one second.”
I stood there holding a dead phone in my hand while Willis Morley bent over the desk, staring up at me.
And now the door finally opened and Lou Serano came out. He was smiling. He didn’t look at all frightened.
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