Poor Poor Ophelia

by Carolyn Weston

  “Man, don’t you know a charm when you see one? This is my rabbit’s foot.” She laughed excitedly. Then she grabbed his hand. “Come on, let’s go buy me a dime-store chain to hang it on…”

  That damned card sealed in plastic. God, he thought, why didn’t I grab it while I could? They must have found it on the body, he realized. But why hadn’t they said so when he asked?

  Behind his dark glasses, Farr’s eyes began to ache suddenly, and his scalp felt tight as a steel cap—easily recognizable symptoms of tension. By the time he reached home and parked his car in the slot assigned to him, his head was pounding. They were there, he saw, waiting for him.

  NINE

  “That’s a nice Jag you got there, Mr. Farr,” the older of the two detectives began pleasantly. “Must be great driving a bomb like that.”

  “I enjoy it, yes.” Smiling, Farr waited, determined to keep his advantage of being the bothered but cooperative citizen. “What was it you wanted to talk about?” He saw his mistake as the young one shifted uneasily. A warning perhaps? “Sorry,” he said quickly, “I’m edgy, I guess. You can understand. It was one hell of a shock seeing her like that. This way. I’m on the fourth floor.”

  Leading them to the nearest elevator—there were six in the building—he tried to assess the meaning of the young one’s sympathy. If it was sympathy. Generation? he wondered. Krug looked near fifty. And the two were as ill-matched in type as they were in age. Oil and water, Farr thought. Krug was Joe Ordinary and proud of it, but the young one had obviously enjoyed what Farr’s grandmother had always called “advantages.” Poor old lady with her unpronounceable name, what she hadn’t known was that those who had them were unconscious of the fact, only the disadvantaged worried about what they’d missed. I ought to know, he thought acidly as, gravely courteous, he waited for the two to step into the elevator ahead of him. Then he punched the fourth-floor button.

  “Terrific view,” the one named Krug commented as the half-glass cage sank down the side of the building toward the canyon floor below. “That’s the whole north end of Santa Monica Bay, right?”

  “Point Dume there,” the other one pointed out a distant headland. “Just before it is Malibu.”

  “You can keep your Malibu. The way I hear it, it’s nothing but four-flushers out there.”

  Farr glanced at the young one, smiling faintly, but it didn’t work.

  “That the pool for this place?” Krug was looking directly down into the garden which appeared to rise toward them. “Nice,” he said as Farr nodded. “Very nice,” and he grinned at his partner. “Make you wonder why you decided to be a cop instead of a lawyer?”

  The young one laughed. “I know why—” tapping his head. “All the wrong nuts and bolts up here. But maybe in my next life.”

  The elevator door opened. “This way,” Farr directed them. His key was a spare which always stuck, and as he struggled with it, he wondered if his lost keys had been found yet. He must remember to ask at Kenji’s tomorrow. “Brace yourselves,” he said humorously as the latch clicked open. “I’m a lousy housekeeper.”

  The apartment was untidy—newspapers on the floor, a magazine propped up on the circular dining table in front of a dirty coffee cup—but basically it seemed very clean to Casey. Clean and new. And at one glance, he understood that this was not simply a bachelor pad, but an expression of Farr’s taste and personality. Everything went with everything else—like a jigsaw puzzle, Casey thought. Put it all together, it forms a picture: Young Stud Making It.

  “Drink?” the lawyer was asking hospitably. “I’ve got beer, too, if you don’t want booze.”

  “No, thanks,” Krug answered for them. “But you go ahead if you want one.”

  “Not if you don’t.” He gestured toward the massive couch which faced the view windows. “Make yourselves comfortable. If the glare’s too much, I’ll pull the curtains.” He hesitated, smiling at Casey. “By the way, you never answered me, you know. How you got my name to call.”

  “Your card was found on the body, Mr. Farr. Plastic-coated, hanging on a chain around her neck.”

  “You’re kidding. Like an identification tag, you mean?”

  “That’s right,” Krug said. “She never showed it to you, I guess.”

  “Not that I recall, no. But then,” he added, “I didn’t really see that much of her.” Frowning, Farr stared at the floor. “Seems like a peculiar thing to do with a business card.”

  “Maybe not so peculiar from her point of view.”

  Farr’s head snapped up. “What d’you mean by that?”

  “Well, when she needed a lawyer—” Krug hesitated. “You did say you helped her out of a jam.”

  “As a friend, yes. I was able to get bail set—that sort of thing.” He glanced at Casey, then fixed on Krug again. “But there’s something else you’re getting at, isn’t there? The pot, I suppose,” and he blew out his breath. “I assure you I know nothing about it.” Again he looked from one to the other. “Or is that it?” As they waited, his expression hardened. “If you think because you found my card on her, I had something to do with her drowning—”

  “She didn’t drown, Mr. Farr,” Casey said.

  “What killed her,” Krug added, “something or somebody hit her too hard.”

  Farr’s mouth opened, then closed again. Sallow-pale suddenly, he sagged into an armchair. “She kept saying—” He swallowed rapidly several times. “Somebody…but I didn’t—” Then he sucked in a noisy breath. “Murder. That’s what you mean, isn’t it? She was murdered.”

  “Looks that way.” Krug shifted on the couch. “Mr. Farr, a man who said he was a friend of the Berry girl’s showed up at her place last week. Her landlord said this friend had her key. He was there to pick up some stuff for her. He also told the landlord she’d had an accident. Then he drove off—in a Jaguar, the landlord said.”

  “So that’s it.” Farr sighed deeply. “I did her a favor and now I’m involved. Not very smart, was I?” Then he closed his eyes, rubbing his forehead. “All right, I’ll tell you what I know, of course. But let me begin at the beginning. I think it might be easier for me that way—”

  While Farr talked slowly but with very little hesitation, Casey kept watching the light as it changed over the sea. Quite suddenly it was dusk, and Farr rose, turning on lamps, drawing the draperies, closing them into the intimate ambience he had created for himself.

  “Okay,” Krug was saying, deliberate and careful, “let me get this straight as long as we’re stopping for a minute. You meet this girl at a party, you like her, you give her your card, and you figure you’ll call her for a date sometime soon.” He consulted notes which Casey knew to be only a prop: down to the last comma, whatever Farr had said was fixed in both their brains. “This is Friday. The ninth, you think. Okay, Saturday and Sunday, the tenth and eleventh, you got something else to do—or maybe another girl. Then Tuesday, the thirteenth, she calls you for help. She had a wreck Monday, she says, and they found a joint on her, so she’s in the lockup ward at General in L.A. You phone and find out you can arrange bail for her on the possession charge, so you go downtown—L.A., that is—and get her out.” As he paused for a second, his breathing seemed very loud in the quiet room. “Mr. Farr, did you know she used hard stuff, too? They maybe tell you at the hospital she was a junkie?”

  “I don’t believe that!” With obvious effort, Farr tempered his tone. “If there’d been any evidence of narcotics addiction, surely the hospital wouldn’t have released her.”

  Krug glanced at Casey—a point there.

  “She had no record of any kind,” Farr went on. “Nothing. That’s why I was able to get bail set without any delay.”

  “Okay.” Krug made a check mark in his notebook. “Let’s go on—”

  “Wait a minute,” Casey interrupted. “I’d like to ask Mr. Farr—was she left- or right-handed?”
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  “Why—right, I think. I’m not sure, though—”

  “Okay, it doesn’t matter right now.”

  “So you bailed her out,” Krug continued, his ballpoint pen poised. “Then what? You took her home, I suppose.”

  “No, I didn’t.” Appearing anxious and tense, Farr clasped his hands so tight the knuckles whitened. “As a matter of fact, I took her to a motel.”

  “Motel, hunh?” Krug scribbled something. “Any reason,” he asked gently, “other than the usual, Mr. Farr?”

  “I’m afraid so—but at the time I didn’t really believe her.”

  “Believe what, Mr. Farr?”

  “That she was scared to death. That her accident wasn’t an accident at all. Somebody had tried to kill her.” During the moment Krug and Casey stared at him, time seemed to pause between the ticks of clocks. Then Farr inhaled slowly. “She said he’d try again. She knew he would.” He made a futile gesture. “Obviously she was right, wasn’t she?”

  TEN

  It had something to do with her brother, Holly kept explaining that morning he bailed her out. Something Del had seen. At the gas station where he worked. Something in the trunk of somebody’s car—

  “Oh, for God’s sake, Holly,” Farr groaned, “all these somethings and somebodys. Either be specific or forget it. I’m not listening to any more of your fantasies.”

  “Oh, man, you’re so square. Fantasy,” she cried. “You think it’s a fantasy my car’s totaled?”

  “No, and that stick of pot they found on you isn’t, either.”

  “Sure, like you never turned on, I suppose.” She slumped in the bucket seat beside him—a pale waif with a bump on her head. “Okay, Mouthpiece,” she sighed. “What do I do now—cut my wrists because I got busted?”

  The truth was, he didn’t give a damn what she did, but having involved himself this far, he could hardly admit it. Thoroughly sick of her and the long wasted morning she had caused him, he dodged through the traffic clogging the downtown Los Angeles Freeway, wondering how to reach Santa Monica from here. No use asking her, he thought savagely. Kooks don’t bother about how to get anywhere—

  But as it happened, this one did, and twenty minutes later, on the Santa Monica Freeway, they were as far west as Bundy Drive. More relaxed now in the lessening traffic, their restful silence, Farr glanced at Holly, who seemed to be dozing. “Hey,” he said gently. “I’ll need directions now. Turn off at what—Lincoln Boulevard?”

  She stirred and yawned, looking pasty and very young—like a sick child, he thought. Concussion, they had said at the hospital. She was very lucky to be alive at all. “Some mouthpiece—” she was smiling sweetly at him. “Like he doesn’t even know where he lives yet.”

  “We’re not going to my place, I’m taking you home.”

  “Oh, no, man, not there!”

  “Holly, for God’s sake, you’re in no condition for fun and games. Now come on, how do I get you home?”

  “Couldn’t I just…I’m not going home!” She looked terrified suddenly. “Don’t take me there, he’ll be waiting. Man, look, don’t you see? All he had to do was call downtown. He’ll know I’m out—”

  Oh, Christ, he thought as he listened to her babbling, what in hell have I got myself into? Someone is trying to murder her. Paranoia. She isn’t a kook at all, she’s crazy. “All right,” he said finally. “Okay, Holly. Then where to—your brother’s?”

  “You bastard”—she was crying now—“you’re scared shitless you might have to do something for somebody.” Then snuffling, she closed her eyes. “I don’t know where to go. I don’t know! A motel, I guess. Please, David. If I don’t lie down soon, I’m going to barf or pass out or something. Just leave me someplace—”

  Turning off onto Bundy, he drove north for a way, trying not to think beyond the immediate problem of finding a place to put her. Where had he seen motels in town? Wilshire Boulevard? Must be, he thought. After all, Wilshire was the end of Highway 66.

  There were three in a row—low boxy stucco structures dominated by huge signs. Farr turned into the first one.

  “Yes, sir,” the man in the office said cheerily, “this time o’ day we got nothing but space.” He glanced at the car. “Double bed, I guess?”

  “Whatever you’ve got.”

  “Rightee-o. That’ll be ten dollars. Sign here, please.”

  Hesitating for only a second, Farr wrote “H. Berry, Los Angeles,” and the license number of his car.

  “Rightee-oh, Mr., uh, Berry, is it? Here’s your key. It’s the last one on the right. Got a pool over there, if you feel like taking a dip. Enjoy yourself,” he called as Farr hurried out.

  The room smelled dusty and closed up—like a summer place, Farr thought with a twinge of longing for the Northeast. Holly seemed ready for collapse, he saw when he went back to the car. And as he helped her out and into the room, she started to cry again. “Look, it’s all right,” he kept saying nervously. “It’s all over now. Tomorrow you’ll feel like new. And if you’re worried about court, forget it. All you have to do is smile at the judge, you’ll get a suspension.”

  Unresponding, she slumped onto the bed. Without bothering to take off anything but her shoes, he got her in between the covers. By the time he had opened the dusty draperies and rain-spotted windows, she was fast asleep. Or unconscious, he thought.

  Frightened, Farr bent over her, trying to feel for a pulse. But he couldn’t find the spot on her wrist. And it seemed to him she was breathing naturally—deep exhalations, sour-smelling to his nostrils.

  Poor little nut, he thought. But pity was a luxury he could not afford—not if pitying her meant trouble. The thing to do is get out, he decided. She’ll be all right tomorrow. And if she isn’t? Well, for Christ sake, he wasn’t a welfare bureau. One weekend doth not a guardian make. He’d already spent half a day bailing her out.

  Recalling that she’d had a purse with her—one of those fringed hippie pouches with a shoulder strap—he looked for it, finally locating it on the floor of the car. He’d leave some money for her, he decided. But as he spied her keys at the bottom of the bag, guilt assailed him. Money or no, by tomorrow morning she would look like a vagrant in the clothes she was wearing. Shouldn’t he run by her place and pick up some things? Toothbrush, for one. Toothpaste. A dress or something, and clean underwear. After all, it was only ten minutes from where he lived, she’d said, which meant no more than twenty from here.

  That he was bargaining away the coldness of his desire to be rid of her with this last service, Farr was well aware. But even so, as he drove off again, he felt better. He’d leave a note when he got back, he decided. Something diplomatic which would make it perfectly clear he’d had it. A twenty-dollar bill to sweeten the words. A clean outfit to wear. Even a kook like Holly might be grateful…

  “So you bail out this girl you don’t know from Adam,” Krug repeated back as he had before, “a couple of hours at a party, that’s all. And on the way back out here to Santa Monica, she gives you this story about somebody running her off the road, trying to kill her. So you figure—what?—she’s nuts, maybe. But to keep her quiet and get her off your back, you dump her in this motel, right?”

  “I didn’t dump her,” Farr said furiously. “Going to the motel was her idea.”

  “Okay, you remember the name of the place?”

  “The Red something. Moon, I think. Yes, that was it. Red Moon Motel. It’s a couple miles west of Bundy.”

  “When was it you went by her place, Mr. Farr? On Pacific. Was it that same day?”

  “Yes. Right after I—right after she checked in.”

  “She asked you to go get her things, is that it?”

  “No.” He looked exhausted by now—so uptight trying to stay clear of trouble, Casey guessed, he was ready to come apart at the seams. “She fell asleep almost immediately, you see. Strain, I
suppose. And the concussion. But I knew she’d want a change of clothes—”

  “So the clothes bit was your idea.”

  “Do you remember,” Casey asked, “what sort of thing you picked up? Like a dress, for instance—”

  “No, pants. One of those pants suits,” and his voice trailed off, toneless, almost a whisper. “He must have followed me.”

  “What’s that?” Krug leaned forward. “I didn’t get that, Mr. Farr.”

  “I’m trying to tell you,” he shouted. “Jesus Christ, how many times do I have to tell you? He must’ve followed me—”

  “Who’re you talking about, Mr. Farr?”

  “Whoever she was afraid of! He must’ve been waiting for her, just like she said. And when he saw me with her clothes—”

  “Hold on,” Krug stopped him. “Just take it easy, okay?” He waited, then went on calmly: “Let’s not worry about what she said right now. What we’re interested in is what you did.”

  Farr leaned back, and from then on never looked at either one of them again. “Nothing,” he said flatly. “I didn’t do anything. She was still asleep when I got back. So I left her things—a note and some money. Then I went back to the office.”

  “What time was this?”

  “One, I suppose. One-thirty at the latest. I worked till around seven. Then I had a dinner date. A business thing. I got home around midnight.”

  “You didn’t go back to the motel.”

  “No, not that night. Not till the next morning, around eight-thirty.” He looked blindly over their heads. “I suppose I was worried about her. Anyway, she wasn’t there. And everything was gone. Purse—clothes—everything. I thought she’d probably gone home. Either that, or to her brother’s.”

  “But you didn’t check. You don’t know if she did.”

  Farr shook his head.

  “So the last time you saw her alive, then, was Tuesday the thirteenth, around noon.”