Valley of Shadows

by Paul Buchanan

  Keegan let the dog out of the car before he went back inside the house, that way she could run around the garden. He dialed Zinnia’s number at the Chateau Marmont from the hallway telephone. He watched Nora through the open front doorway as she followed a trail of scent across the rangy lawn and disappeared out of sight. When Zinnia picked up, she seemed no less distressed than when he’d talked to her earlier. She told him there was no sign of Ida Fletcher anywhere.

  “Well, there’s a car parked here, and the boat is gone,” Keegan said. “So they definitely headed over.” He looked out the open front door, but Nora was nowhere in sight. All he could see was the long slope of lawn and the shaggy privacy hedge on the far end of the garden. His client had up and vanished on him. What was the next step?

  He told Zinnia he’d head downtown to his office. He’d make some calls from there, see what he could find out from the Avalon Harbormaster. If there was any news, she could reach him at his office number for the next couple of hours.

  It would still give him time to get home and watch Game Four on TV.

  AT THE GUARD’S shack, Vogel smiled and waved him out, but Keegan pulled to a stop and rolled the car’s window down. Vogel lowered the radio’s volume again and came to the window.

  “Were you on duty yesterday when Mrs. Fletcher came in?” Keegan asked him. “You know the big Fleetwood.”

  “Yeah,” Vogel told him. “I saw the car around three. The big Italian guy was driving.”

  “Yeah, good old Frank,” Keegan said. “Did anyone come back out?”

  “Not on my shift.”

  “Did you talk to the old lady when they came in?”

  Vogel shook his head. “She’s never much of a talker,” he said. “But I got the impression the driver was on his own yesterday. The windows on that thing are tinted so dark, it’s hard to tell, though. Maybe she was back there.”

  “What made you think Frank was alone?”

  “Boss Radio,” Vogel said, as if that should mean something to Keegan.

  “Boss what?”

  “KHJ,” Vogel said. “The Italian guy had it on the car radio. Pretty loud, too.” Vogel ducked back inside and cranked up the radio.

  Louie Louie, oh baby, me gotta go.

  “It’s what I listen to in here,” Vogel said, speaking louder now to be heard over the din of music. “It’s top 40. He had it playing in the car. Wouldn’t have thought it was the old lady’s kinda thing.”

  Keegan thought of the Chateau Marmont bungalow and the smell of marijuana in the air. “The old lady might surprise you,” Keegan told him. He reached past Nora into the glove compartment where he kept a box of his business cards. He pressed one on the car window’s sill and jotted his home number on the back with a ballpoint pen. He fished a ten-dollar bill from his wallet and folded it around the business card. “Do me a favor,” he said, passing it to Vogel. “Call me at these numbers if either of them turns up. Some people are getting worried about them.”

  Vogel pocketed the cash and looked down at the business card, nodding. “Sure thing, Mr. Keegan.”

  THE DOG SEEMED disappointed to get up to the sixth floor and find the office empty. Still, she slunk under Mrs. Dodd’s desk and curled up on the old pillow she kept down. Keegan got Ida Fletcher’s strongbox from the office safe and put it on his desk in the inner office. He’d need the details of Ida Fletcher’s boat and the address of her house on Catalina. He unlocked the box and spread out the papers on his desk, under the fluorescent lights, making sure he knew where everything was.

  He found the thick Los Angeles Central phone book in the stack of books on top of the file cabinets and dialed the Avalon Harbor. After that he tried the Coast Guard, then anyone else he could think of. He worked the phone for an hour to no avail. He was a civilian, after all, and it was a Sunday. No one with any authority felt inclined to give him the time of day. There was only so much he could do on his own. He looked at his watch. It was an hour from game time.

  There was only one real option left. He’d have to swallow his pride and call Lieutenant Moore to ask for a favor. He thought of the Lieutenant at the Ambassador Hotel, blocking his way into Donovan’s send-off party. We need to get past this, he’d told Keegan. Give me a call when you’re ready. I’ll buy you a beer. A beer or a Sunday-afternoon favor. To Keegan they seemed roughly equivalent.

  The Lieutenant’s wife answered on the third ring, and Keegan waited, drumming his fingers on his desk, until Moore’s voice came on the line.

  “The elusive Jim Keegan,” he said, making a big deal of it. “I didn’t think you’d actually ever call.” Keegan could hear birds singing in the background. He could imagine the man in his shirtsleeves on some sunny patio, stretched out on a chaise lounge with the Sunday Times crossword, feeling easy and guiltless.

  “Don’t get too excited,” Keegan said. He found himself sliding into their old glib repartee without really intending to. “I’m only calling because I need a favor.”

  “Still, I’ll take it,” the Lieutenant said. He kept the tone bright and jovial, still pretending like nothing had happened—like a woman had never washed up on the beach with a bullet in her. “Not that I haven’t done you enough favors over the years, Jimmy. What is it you need this time?”

  Keegan gave the Lieutenant a quick rundown of the situation: Ida Fletcher and her bodyguard unaccounted for, the empty Newport house, the missing boat. “I called the Catalina harbormaster, but that was a no go,” he said. “They won’t tell me anything.” He moved the phone from one ear to the other. “And someone needs to swing by the house over there to do a welfare check.”

  The Lieutenant sighed into the phone, like he was mulling the information over. “Yeah, the harbormaster is going to be pretty tight-lipped,” he said. “A lot of celebrities tie up their sailboats there. Movie stars who don’t want to be bothered.”

  “But the harbormaster will talk to you, right?” Keegan said. “Big shot with the LAPD.”

  “I appreciate your faith in me, Jimmy,” the Lieutenant said, “but Catalina is LA County Sheriff’s Department. I’m pretty much a civilian myself when it comes to those guys.”

  “Come on, Lou,” Keegan wheedled. “Aren’t you guys in blue all some big fraternity? Isn’t there some deputy you know over there who owes you a favor?”

  Moore sighed again. “You know it’s a Sunday, right?” he said. “You know the World Series is on in about an hour?”

  “I wouldn’t be asking if it wasn’t important,” Keegan said. It was true. He would have happily gone the rest of his life without dialing this particular number, without burying this particular hatchet.

  He heard a small groan on the other end of the line, like Moore was reluctantly getting to his feet. “What’s the name of the old lady’s boat?”

  Keegan shuffled through the papers on his desktop until he found the boat’s title. “Seven of Swords,” he said.

  “Like the tarot card?”

  Tarot card? It had never occurred to Keegan to wonder what the name might mean. “If you say so,” he said.

  He could hear movement on the other end of the line, like the Lieutenant was headed back inside his house, carrying the phone.

  “And where do you want the welfare check?” Moore asked.

  Keegan found the deed for Ida Fletcher’s Avalon house and read him the address: 13 Tradewinds Lane. It was settled. Moore would make some calls and get back to Keegan in a few hours.

  “Call me at home, Lou,” Keegan said, as a little dig, before he hung up the phone. “I’ll be taking it easy, watching the game.”

  THE PHONE IN Keegan’s kitchen rang a few minutes after the game’s final out. It had been a sweep. LA beat New York 2–1, in a low-scoring pitcher’s duel. The Dodgers won the Series in four straight games, and even all the way up here on the hill, Keegan could hear the commotion—bugles and car horns and firecrackers—down in the valley. He switched off the television set before he went into the kitchen to pick up the ringin
g phone.

  “I don’t have a whole lot of news for you, Jimmy,” the Lieutenant told him.

  According to the harbormaster, The Seven of Swords hadn’t docked in Avalon. The captain of the Catalina Sheriff’s station sent a deputy by the old lady’s house on Tradewinds Lane. The front gate was chained shut, but the deputy climbed over and banged on the door. There was no answer. He checked with the house next door, and the couple living there said the house had been empty for months. If the old lady had arrived on Catalina, she’d done it pretty stealthily.

  “I checked with the Coast Guard too,” the Lieutenant went on. “No SOS calls or incident reports all day. Looks like you’ll just have to wait and see.”

  “Thanks, Lou.”

  “Give me a call at the station tomorrow and touch base,” the Lieutenant said. “Something might come in overnight.”

  IT MADE NO sense that Ida Fletcher and Frank the Boxer would have gone over to the Bel Air mansion—especially after the way they reacted when Keegan had told them Danny Church seemed to be staying there—but it was the only other place Keegan could think of where the old lady might have gone. It was a long shot, but he had to rule it out.

  Sure, the old lady had made it clear that she didn’t want Keegan to have anything to do with her nephew, but the situation had changed. The house on Monticello Drive belonged to her, and Keegan would have to rule it out as a possibility. If he ran into Danny Church there, it wouldn’t really be his fault.

  Keegan locked the dog in the house—it would be dark before he got back home—and headed down the hill. He took Santa Monica Boulevard through Beverly Hills. Down here, the World Series celebration seemed to be going on full tilt. At every bar, customers spilled out onto the sidewalks and into the street, all of them wearing blue. Just past the country club, a couple of drunken men reeled along the road’s centerline, wrapped in an American flag. To them, all the blaring car horns around them were just part of the celebration. Keegan changed lanes to keep out of their way. The sun was barely setting, and bedlam already reigned. Tomorrow would be a hangover Monday in Los Angeles, a total write-off.

  Keegan turned onto the long, dusky shadows of Beverly Glen and turned on his headlights. When he got to the address on Monticello Drive, he found the big front gate standing wide. He pulled through and paused at the foot of the drive, idling. The massive house was dark. The cobblestone driveway was empty. At least he wouldn’t have to deal with the nephew.

  Keegan pulled up the car to the foot of the front steps and parked. He climbed the broad front steps, key ring jingling in his hand. The lamps on the portico were dark and none of the front windows were lit. He knocked on the big front door anyway and pressed the doorbell a few times for good measure. There was no answer, no sound from inside. He fumbled with the ring of keys in the gathering darkness. He knew it was large and bronze-colored, but, with so little light, it was hard to make anything out. He was still searching for the right key when a pair of headlights turned off Monticello, going much too fast, and bounced up onto the long drive. The lights swept across the front of the house, sending shadows skittering across the entryway.

  Keegan watched the red Jaguar careen over the cobblestones, engine gunning. It lurched to a stop behind his MG. The driver’s door opened, and Danny Church scrambled out like he was late for something. “James!” he shouted with game-show-host enthusiasm. He wore a black turtleneck under a tailored gray blazer. Again, the clothes looked expensive but rumpled. The outfit, the car, the foppish persona—it all struck Keegan as part of the Danny Church affectation, the charming scoundrel, the loveable cad.

  “You’re just the man I wanted to see!” the kid said, jogging up the front steps. “I’ve been trying to call old Aunt Ida out on Catalina like you suggested.”

  Keegan shook his head wearily. The last thing he needed was for the old lady, wherever she was, to hear that he’d been aiding and abetting her nephew. “Look, Danny, I didn’t suggest any such thing,” he said. “I never said she was on Catalina.”

  “Right! Right! Mum’s the word!” The nephew made the lock-the-mouth-and-throw-away-the-key gesture, like he and Keegan were partners in crime.

  Keegan gave him a pained shake of the head.

  “No one picks up out there, though,” the kid rattled on obliviously. “The phone just keeps ringing.”

  Church took Keegan’s hand and wrung it, and Keegan felt a deep sense of misgiving. It was a mistake to come out here. Here he was, after all, face to face with the man he had promised his client he’d avoid. “Look, I just came to look the place over,” Keegan said. “It’s part of my job.”

  “Indeed, it is,” Church said merrily. He stepped past Keegan, key already in hand, and unlocked the door. “Sorry I wasn’t here to greet you,” Church prattled on, pushing the door open. “I just stepped out for a bite of dinner.” He reached inside the house and switched on the big lamps on either side of the door and the foyer lights inside. “The Bouzy Rouge,” he said. “‘A bit of Old France on Sunset’—except that it’s nowhere near Sunset. It’s right out there on Stone Canyon. Ever been?”

  He felt a prick of suspicion. Something about Church naming the restaurant, telling Keegan where to find it, didn’t sit right. It was never a good omen when someone volunteered more information than they had been asked for. In Keegan’s long experience, there was no surer sign of a lie.

  “I must have driven right past it on the way here,” Keegan said. “Never been inside, though. I’m sure it’s out of my price range.”

  Church stood to one side. He bowed and swept out his hand, inviting Keegan inside. “Come in, come in,” he said. “Go about your business. We’ll have a drink together when you’re done.”

  Keegan stepped through to the white-tiled foyer with its high, glimmering chandelier.

  “That place was my favorite growing up,” Church continued as he closed the door behind them and twisted the deadbolt lock. “The restaurant, I mean. It was my go-to birthday destination. It might be the reason I moved to France in the first place.”

  Again, volunteering information no one had asked for—a bright red flag. The kid seemed intent on convincing Keegan about where he’d just been. But if he was lying about the restaurant, where had he been?

  “You’ll have to join me there some night,” Church went on. “As an aspiring restaurateur myself, I’d love to hear what you think of the place.”

  Keegan nodded slowly. “Yeah,” he said with no hint of enthusiasm. “We’ll have to do that.” It wasn’t just Church’s lie that bothered Keegan; the kid was acting strange in other ways. He seemed even more manic and scattered than the last time Keegan had talked to him. But his glibness felt forced now, contrived. It was a show put on for Keegan. Church was clearly hiding something.

  Keegan looked around the formal entryway. It was lit up brightly, but the rest of the house was in shadows. He peered through the dark arches at the far end of the foyer and up the sweeping double staircase. The place felt like a dark, empty shell, a series of comfortless, cavernous rooms. He turned to squarely face the nephew and looked him in the eye. “I’m going to have to take a look around,” he said firmly. “It’s just part of what your aunt hired me to do.”

  Church nodded. He seemed eager to cooperate. “Very well, James,” he said. He made an odd salute—all hand flourish and a click of the heels. In certain company, the gesture might have passed for droll and charming, but the affectation only heightened Keegan’s sense of unease.

  “I’m going upstairs,” Keegan said, watching the kid for any reaction.

  “And I shall retire to the billiard room,” Church answered back. “You make your rounds, and I will make our drinks. What say we reconnoiter in…” He pulled back the sleeve of his blazer and glanced at his wristwatch, a Rolex. “What? Five minutes?” He turned and headed along the dark hallway, switching on lights as he made his way. “We can compare notes and plan our next steps,” he called out without looking back. His voice echoed in
the vaulted space.

  Keegan turned to the big sweeping staircase. He had no idea what he might be looking for. There was no plan, just a sense that something here wasn’t right. On the upper landing, he ran his hand along the wall, feeling for a light switch. He found it, and a row of wall-sconce lamps suddenly lit up a grand hallway with a dozen or so doors scattered along it on either side.

  He made his way along the hall, ducking his head into each room in turn, flipping the wall switches to find broad, bare spaces with no signs of life. Sure, there were beds and dressers and nightstands, but the rooms felt forsaken. Just like the house in Newport, there was nothing personal here—no keepsakes, no fondly placed curios, no silver-framed photos on bedside tables. The rooms felt scrubbed of any clue as to who might have lived here.

  Keegan easily found the room Church was squatting in by the smell of his cigarettes and the rumpled linens. The three open suitcases stood lined up against the wall along with a banded leather trunk. But even this room felt occupied rather than lived in.

  Keegan thought of the nephew’s dismay when he’d realized the old family portrait had been moved. You don’t suppose I’ve fallen out of favor? Well, the painting wasn’t in any of these rooms, but neither was anything else that was personal or idiosyncratic. Perhaps the whole world had fallen out of old Aunt Ida’s favor.

  When Keegan came back downstairs, he found the nephew smoking in the billiard room again. He was sitting on a barstool, one elbow on the marble bar top, staring into the middle distance. At first, he didn’t seem to see Keegan standing in the doorway, but when Keegan cleared his throat, the other man roused himself, instantly, to his usual high spirits—as if a light switch had been flipped on.

  “My late, lamented uncle was quite a connoisseur of the finer things,” the kid said. It was as if he’d scripted the line during Keegan’s absence. Two small crystal tumblers lay on the bar top now, brimful with whiskey. He picked up one of the glasses and held it out to Keegan. “Single malt. Speyside,” he said. “Eighteen years. Only the best.”