Miranda stared at him. Rick made a disgusted noise, and sat down in another chair. Meyer cleared his throat.
“Mind you, Mr. Smith, I’m not an intellectual property specialist, but unless you have another copy of the manuscript—or can find the one that was stolen—there is no investment to protect.”
Smith looked at him stonily.
“The investment is here.” He tapped his forehead. “Whether or not the cops find the final draft. I can always rewrite it. I’ve got a memory like fucking Nestor.”
Rick spoke sharply. “I don’t know who Nestor is, but I hope he remembered his manners better than you do, Smith.”
Smith shrugged and patted his shirt for cigarettes, finally locating a half-empty pack of Pall Malls.
“Miss Peeper here strikes me as a woman who understands English.”
Miranda’s mouth curved into a tight-lipped smile.
“Oh, I understand English, Smith—even the ugly patois you make of it. For the record, I don’t think academic pretension mixes very well with common-man slang, so I suggest sticking to one or the other. Nestor may have been the oldest Greek leader in the Iliad, but he was also a conceited hack.”
Smith raised his eyebrows while he lit a stick. “Well, what do you know? A female shamus who knows Homer. Wonders never cease.”
Miranda bent forward, eyes trained on his face. “You think so? Here’s another one for you: a blue-blood pseudo-intellectual who slums with hoi polloi writing something about Alcatraz worth killing over. If you’ve got half the memory you brag about, Smith, then you won’t have any trouble recalling what you wrote when the cops question you about it. And if you don’t answer, then whether your lawyer gets out of court or not, whether your agent gets a saguaro cactus stuck up his ass, whether you can reconstruct your precious magnum opus and make a dime off it, you’ll be held on an obstruction charge. Inspector Fisher may not wear Florsheim shoes and descend from the fucking Mayflower, but he’s the man you’ll see and right now he’s out of patience. In fact, Smith, you should enjoy meeting him—he’s a real man of the people.”
His eyes bounced between Meyer, Rick, and Miranda, mouth tight-lipped and small. His fingers—thick with well-shaped, manicured nails—played with a matchbook from the Lodge Tavern.
“I’m not sure what sort of game you’re playing, Corbie. And whatever you may think you know about me, know this: my books are mine, a part of me, and they represent a great deal of work, for which I demand and deserve compensation. That said, I will, of course, cooperate with the police.”
Inspector Fisher’s voice growled from the back of the room.
“I’m glad to hear it, Smith. I’ll look forward to your cooperation in just a few minutes. Miss Corbie?”
He glanced at Miranda and motioned with his head for her to follow. Meyer and Rick stood up. The burly cop arched his eyebrows. “What is this, an entourage? I’m only borrowing her for a couple of minutes.”
He turned his back and walked out the door. Meyer started to follow, and Miranda shook her head.
“Don’t worry. If Fisher says a couple of minutes, it’s nothing serious.” She threw Rick an apologetic look. He shrugged.
“I’ll see you when you’re out, Miranda. I’ll just keep Meyer and Smith here company.”
The squat, thin-haired author looked up, eyes narrowed. Miranda stared down at him.
“Thanks. And Smith … I’ll be in touch.”
She gave the author another long look before following Meyer out the door.
* * *
“You get under Smith’s skin or something, Miranda?”
“Let’s just say I was wearing him down for you. He’s got the bright idea that the stolen book is a valuable property—valuable enough to kill for—so he doesn’t want to tell what was in it. Oh, and he won’t say hello without his mouthpiece.”
Fisher shoved the door to the squad room with extra force. “Five minutes alone in a cell with Big Louie and that bastard will be pissing his pants.”
A woman sat in front of Fisher’s desk. Slumped over, narrow shoulders hunched in a V as she stared at her lap. Dishwater blonde, hair hennaed into a reddish tint, in a dress that was expensive about three years ago, now worn-out and faded, hanging loose in all the wrong places.
Eyes wide and deep and blue, haunted by regrets.
Whether for actions or inactions, Miranda couldn’t tell.
“Miss Corbie, this is Mrs. Kyle, Miss Crowley’s sister. Mrs. Kyle, this is Miranda Corbie. She saved your sister’s life today.”
The cop’s voice, as muscular as his body, was uncharacteristically quiet. There was kindness in it and sympathy, lining a deep well of exhaustion.
The woman looked ten or more years older than Louise, skin dry and pasty, as if the sun were a luxury she could no longer afford. Miranda remembered the newspaper article from this morning: Louise’s sister was only twenty-seven.
The last few years hadn’t been kind to Thelma Kyle.
Thelma raised her face—bone structure still delicate, cheek bones too sharp.
“I—I must get out to my sister—be with her when she wakes up—but I wanted to meet you, Miss Corbie. I know what you’ve done for Louise.”
Miranda sat in the chair next to her, impulsively laying a hand on the other woman’s arm.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Kyle. I should’ve seen this coming.”
The other woman’s voice was quiet. “I don’t think anyone could have done that.”
“Mrs. Kyle, Louise didn’t try to kill herself. Someone tried to kill her.”
Fisher shifted in his chair. “Now, wait a minute, Miran— er, Miss Corbie. I brought you in here because Mrs. Kyle wanted to meet you before she left. You and I can go over any specifics after I deal with Smith.”
“Inspector, Louise didn’t write that note and you know it. They must’ve shown it to you, Mrs. Kyle—was it her handwriting?”
The dishwater blonde was hesitant.
“N-no, not anything like how she normally wrote…”
“But the other one was.” Fisher’s voice was tired. “We found another one.”
Miranda gripped the edge of his desk, gloved fingers pressing hard against the wood.
“Where? Why didn’t Gonzales tell me? What did it say? Let me see it—”
Fisher held up a hand. “Hang on, Miranda. Mrs. Kyle, we’ve got the car standing by if you’d like to get to the hospital…”
The woman’s voice was low but firm. “I think—I think I’d like to hear what Miss Corbie has to say, Inspector. If you don’t mind.”
The cop looked from one to the other, tiny beads of sweat dotting his forehead. Thelma Kyle stared at her lap, rubbing her hands back and forth.
One Mississippi, Two Mississippi …
The inspector sighed, glowering at Miranda, and picked up the phone. She took out her cigarette case while he barked orders, lighting a stick and offering one to Thelma, who shook her head. Fisher let the phone drop with a clang and lit an Old Gold from the pack on his desk.
“All right, the evidence is on the way down. Now explain yourself.”
“You didn’t find any prints on the gas valve, did you?”
“No.”
“Louise wasn’t wearing gloves when we found her. You think it’s plausible that she decides to kill herself, writes one note that looks like her writing, according to you, and another one that doesn’t, puts on gloves so no prints show up on the valve or the notes—I know you haven’t had time to test the first one, but no prints on this new one you discovered, right?”
The inspector made a grimace and nodded his head.
“Fixes it so the valve can’t be turned off without a wrench and the nearest window won’t open—neglecting to shut the one that’s warped and open a crack—and then takes off her gloves and puts them away with her things while she blows out the pilot light, ever so lightly turns the burner knob on, and lies on the bed in nightclothes waiting to die? That sound reasonable to you, In
spector?”
Fisher stared at his cigarette. “Frankly, no. But two notes—”
“Exactly. TWO notes.” Miranda leaned forward in the chair. “This is a setup—it’s been a setup from the beginning.”
Thelma Kyle wiped her eyes with a yellowed handkerchief. “Miss Corbie—my husband—I’m divorcing him, you know, it will be final soon, Louise was helping me through it—he had nothing to do with any of this. Louise told me—she told me about those letters she got, and she tried to laugh about it, and I’ve—I’ve been terribly worried about her, and I just couldn’t believe she tried to—to—”
“I promise you she didn’t, Mrs. Kyle. Look, Louise came to me because someone was threatening her and had tried to kill her. Then her boss was murdered and Smith’s manuscript was stolen and the police suspected her, and even suspected—don’t deny it, Inspector—that she was faking the murder attempts, trying to cover her own tracks.”
Thelma interjected with urgency, raising her voice. “Louise would never hurt anyone—ever! She even stopped—stopped writing me when Shorty—I mean, my—my husband—before he got sent up, anyway, and didn’t write again til he was in prison. How could they even think—”
“It’s their job to think of every possibility, Mrs. Kyle. And just so you know, Inspector Fisher’s one of the good ones.”
“Thanks, Miranda.” His tone was wry. “Go on.”
“So then she has an alibi for when Alexander is killed—”
Fisher interrupted. “Who you found—”
“And you can’t break it. Meanwhile, word gets out in the papers about Mrs. Kyle and Cretzer and her husband.”
“And?”
“And Louise is found, nearly dead, with a note she didn’t write but one that implied she was involved in or knew something about Alexander’s killing and—even more importantly—that it had something to do with you and your husband’s gang. ‘God help my sister’? That doesn’t sound like the same Louise Crowley that was trying to help her sister get a divorce, does it? Or the same Louise Crowley that hired me to protect her.”
The blond women with the haggard faced raised her eyes to Miranda’s. “That’s—that’s true. It’s what I’ve been telling Inspector Fisher. Louise was the strong one—she was helping me, making things better for herself. She never liked Shorty—my husband, I mean—never liked any of it, but she wasn’t a rat, never, never. Oh God—what if—what if she doesn’t wake up?”
Thelma Kyle held her face in her hands, body wrenched, hunched over in grief. A cop in a sloppy uniform, shirttail hanging out, approached the inspector and handed him a manila folder. Wordlessly, Fisher handed it to Miranda.
“The note’s inside. We found it in a desk drawer.”
Miranda studied the message. Same office stock paper as the one she’d found on the night table. Handwriting much more like Louise, even if the wording wasn’t.
If I can’t have the man I’d love, I’d rather not live at all. I’m sorry for all the harm I’ve caused
Miranda looked up. “Ends rather abruptly, don’t you think?”
The tired cop shrugged. “Maybe it was a rehearsal piece.”
“In more ways than one. Notice the motive is completely different? Sounds like it was written before Alexander was killed, not after.”
Thelma was reading over her shoulder and shook her head, still trembling. “That’s not Louise’s writing. It’s an imitation.”
The inspector scratched the heavy stubble on his chin, misery etched in every wrinkle. “You sure, Mrs. Kyle?”
“I know my sister’s handwriting, Inspector Fisher. That’s how we’ve been communicating since—since I never saw her while Shorty was on the lam. This looks a little like hers, but the e’s aren’t right. Neither are the i’s. Louise dots them differently than that.”
Fisher’s thick fingers drummed the desktop as he looked at both of the women, frowning.
“So what’s your theory, Miranda? That Louise is an innocent victim? Hell, everyone’s innocent on this goddamn case—beg your pardon, Mrs. Kyle—no one’s guilty. That’s the problem.”
She glanced up at the clock on the wall then back down to Fisher.
“Someone is framing Louise as a fall guy. I think this second note proves it. Someone was setting her up with those letters, the attempts on her life—someone who wanted to make them look like a self-made alibi, easily destroyed by cyanide in her desk and a suicidal confession. Someone who had access to her and who may be connected with the Rock.”
Fisher slammed his hand down on the desk. “Christ, Miranda, you expect me to believe—”
“That Louise is innocent? You’re goddamn right I do, because she is. Whoever killed Niles was after Smith’s manuscript—Alexander’s murder was probably planned for a later date but he surprised the thief. Just look at the sequence: she gets threatening letters, probably written on a typewriter in Alexander’s office. You test those yet?”
He shook his head. “No time. We’ve been working on the alibi with Blankenship.”
“Test them. I’m sure you’ll find they were typed there. Then she says she was almost hit by a car and receives chocolates with poison in them—probably powdered cyanide, since that’s what was in Alexander’s gin and what was found in her desk. Then Alexander’s murdered, she’s suspected, and the next day supposedly tries to kill herself but was actually—reading between the lines of the note I found—bumped off by bad company, since the handwriting is obviously not hers. The result’s the same, either way, whether you believe the suicide or she’s knocked off by a button man. If she’s dead, she can take the blame for everything.”
Fisher stared at her, his wide thumb grazing the shadow of beard on his chin.
“Maybe—just maybe—you’ve got something. But I don’t like it. I don’t like two notes and I don’t like the cyanide. Hell, I don’t like the whole goddamn—excuse me, Mrs. Kyle—case. Reads like something in Dime Detective.”
“I agree with you. But we’ve got another problem and it’s urgent. When Louise wakes up she’ll be able to identify who knocked on her door. There was no struggle, no sign of strangers, according to Inspector Gonzales, and she was in her nightclothes—which means whoever she let in was someone she knew or at least wasn’t afraid of. So she’s still in danger … and so is everyone connected with Smith’s book, from Smith to Mrs. Kyle.”
“But—but my husband and Joe don’t have any gang, Miss Corbie, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell the inspector! Sure, Shorty talked to that man Smith, he wrote me about it from McNeil, but all he told him was what was already in the papers, that’s what he said, and they don’t have a gang—it was just them two, always just them two!”
Miranda nodded. “I don’t disbelieve you, Mrs. Kyle. But whoever’s behind this is somehow connected to Alcatraz or your husband. You’re in danger. So is your sister. So is Smith. I asked Gonzales to put a watchdog on Louise’s room, but that’s not enough. I think—if Mrs. Kyle agrees—we should let on to the newspapers that the murder attempt on her sister was successful.”
Fisher’s mouth opened and shut with a snap. “Miranda, you know what the hell you’re asking? With every goddamn hack—excuse me, Mrs. Kyle—on this story and the DA and the chief down my throat, you want the whole police department to tell the public Louise Crowley is dead?”
“Yes. Because some uniformed bull will fall asleep on duty and forget he’s supposed to watch her, or someone will send flowers or another box of chocolates. Two notes and a change in motive? Too much goddamn evidence. That means improvisation—a departure from the plan. And that makes this bastard even more dangerous, whether or not he’s part of some kind of Alcatraz conspiracy. Which may or may not exist. Maybe Smith can tell us.”
She leaned forward, twisting out the cigarette stub in the overflowing ashtray. Mrs. Kyle stood up shakily, hand on the back of Miranda’s chair.
“Mr.—I mean Inspector Fisher, please—I’d like to see my sister now. I’ll—I’ll agr
ee to a-a body guard, if that’s what you and Miss Corbie think best. And I will agree to—to tell the newspapers that Louise … that Louise didn’t live. I just hope—I pray—that it doesn’t—doesn’t become true.” She fell into the handkerchief again, sobbing in heaves. Miranda rose and put a hand out to steady the younger woman.
“Your son is where, Mrs. Kyle?”
“My—my mother, in Washington. I sent him away as soon—as soon as I could.”
“Did Louise ever write you about George Blankenship? About their relationship? He’s not—she went to the mat for him, and frankly, I can’t figure out why. He’s a bad gee—a bully and a coward.”
Thelma looked up, cheeks wet. “We—I guess we’re attracted to the wrong kind of men, Miss Corbie. Louise never wrote me about this George—but if he helped her in some way, she’d be loyal. She stopped writing when—when Shorty—she didn’t want to have to rat, so she cut her own sister off. That’s Louise.”
Fisher stabbed out the Old Gold and rose from the desk.
“I’ll have someone drive you over to Children’s, Mrs. Kyle, if you don’t mind waiting a few minutes.”
The blonde stood up, nodding, and wavered through the partition gate and out the door.
Miranda spoke in an undertone.
“I’ll pay for Louise—if she does make it—to be put in a sanitarium—Dante’s, they’re discreet. Give me a week, Inspector Fisher. One week to finish this before I get ready to leave San Francisco.”
The cop ran thick fingers through his gray and black hair. Sweat made circles around his armpits and ash and mustard stained his tie.
“I’ll try to push it through about Miss Crowley, but no guarantees. What about your boyfriend? Can he help?”
Her forehead wrinkled. “You mean Rick? He could make some calls—and Herb Caen will help, too.”
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