Smoked Out (Digger) Page 6

  He called the Occidental Gift Shop.

  "This is Tim, Lorelei. How are you? Sleep well?"

  "Yes, Tim, I did. I’m just sorry I punked out on you."

  "Don’t worry about it. Some of us can and some of us can’t. Us public-relations types are really good across the bar."

  "Anyway," she said, "I wanted to thank you for a great time."

  "For me, too."

  "I was wondering."

  "What?" Digger asked.

  "Was it as good for you as it was for me?"

  "I felt the earth move," Digger said.

  "Oh, I’m glad. I just…wasn’t sure."

  "No. It was great. You’re an animal, a filthy disgusting animal, and the things you did to my poor body shouldn’t be done to any man’s body," he said.

  "And you liked it?"

  "I can’t wait for the encore."

  "Did I help you with your story?" she asked.

  "Sure did." Digger remembered something. He fished in the night-table drawer for the sympathy card. "Two names came up, Lorelei," he said, looking at the signatures on the card. "Who are they? Ted Dole and Aros or Amos something-with-an-e."

  "Oh, I really talked a lot. I told you about Ted?"

  "You told me where to reach him, but I didn’t write it down," Digger lied.

  "At the Hillfront Tennis Club," she said.

  "And this other fellow…Aros or Amos…?"

  "I’m sorry, Tim, I don’t know anybody like that."

  "Okay," he said.

  "Tim, listen," Lorelei said.

  "What?"

  "Did I take any pills last night? Vitamins or ups or anything?"

  "No."

  "Then I can take everything today?"

  "Everything you want. Don’t forget your kelp."

  "Are you going to call me again?" she asked.

  "Of course. Do I look like a sport-fucker?"

  "Okay. I’ll wait to hear from you."

  "Don’t forget your kelp. And the A and B and C and D and E. And the garlic."

  "Thanks, Tim."

  Next, Digger telephoned his apartment in Las Vegas. Swallowing sleep from her voice, Tamiko answered.

  "This is Digger. How are you?"

  "Oh, I’m fine. I was wondering if you were ever going to call."

  "I have called. I must have kept missing you."

  "Yeah, that’s likely, I guess. I was out a lot. I met—"

  "Koko, listen. There’s a doctor named Welles out here. He took down my license plate, and it’ll come out registered to you if he checks it."

  "What should I tell them if they ask?"

  "That you sold the car to your cousin who moved to California. You guess he didn’t have time to register it yet."

  "You’re the cousin?"

  "Yes."

  "What’s your name?"

  "It’s…er, let me think…It’s Tom Median."

  "What the hell kind of name is that?"

  "I don’t know. It just came out."

  "What do you do?"

  "I’m a traffic safety consultant."

  "Tom Median. Highway expert. Very funny. Maybe they should call you Com Median. You find anything out yet?"

  "No. It’s probably an accident."

  "Money or broads," she said. "Look for money or broads."

  "Same thing, aren’t they?"

  "You’re starting again. Goodbye, Digger. Call me if you need me."

  She hung up before he could answer. Before he could tell her about Lorelei and how he had spent the night sleeping next to her and didn’t touch her, except for one errant hand and one available boobie. Sure. And if she hadn’t hung up early, she would have hung up after that. She didn’t expect him to be celibate on a job. She didn’t even want him to be. Why did he think it was a gift to her when he flaunted his fidelity? Particularly in view of the way she spent some of her spare time. She didn’t care what he did as long as he didn’t tell her about doing it with women with big bosoms. And she did what she wanted to, without even Digger’s usual excuse of drinking too much.

  Koko couldn’t drink and didn’t. She had a common Japanese reaction to alcohol. Cheeks flushed, pulse quickened, then passed out.

  "Too bad you couldn’t take after your American father instead of your Japanese mother," he had told her once. "Then I’d have a drinking buddy."

  "Your mother would love that, my giving you extra excuses to drink."

  "It doesn’t matter. My mother thinks you’re black, trying to pass. She doesn’t trust you."

  "I know, and your father thinks it goes sideways and he’s always trying to feel me up under the table."

  "You know," Digger said, "you’re not so yellow that it’s really noticeable. Why call yourself Japanese? You’re half-American. Why don’t you call yourself American?"

  "If one drop of blood makes you black, don’t tell me that a Japanese mother makes me George M. Cohan."

  "That’s a non sequitur. It does not—"

  "You don’t have to translate for me. I’m the goddamn Phi Beta Kappa around here. I know, it does not follow. But the real problem is that you do not follow. People ask what you are, you goddamn half-breed, and you say you’re Irish or you’re a Jew or anything you want and they accept that. They ask me that and I tell them I’m Italian and they get all over me because I look Japanese. So I’m either lying or I’m a grown-up mongoloid. Either way it’s a pain in the ass. So I tell them I’m Japanese and they let it go at that. You Americans are very exclusive when it comes to mixed breeds of different colors."

  "If you were really Italian, you’d have big tits," Digger had told her, and she threw a glass at him. It was when he first suspected that she was hypersensitive about the size of her chest, which he had always found more than adequate.

  Tired from only half a night’s sleep, Digger lay down on the bed and napped till noon.

  Ted Dole wasn’t even sweating when he came off the practice court and sat down at Digger’s table under the yellow sun umbrella. The patio lounge at the Hillfront Tennis Club was empty. Without being asked, the waitress put a glass of Perrier with a slice of lime in front of him. Digger was drinking vodka.

  "Haven’t I seen you somewhere?" Dole asked. He was bronze-skinned, but up close Digger could see the color did not come naturally to him. Dole had the kind of light, almost transparent skin that would be red and blotchy in the East. It had turned tan in California only because of its owner’s tenacity. He was husky and thick through the shoulders, too thick to be a really top-flight tennis player. His light brown hair, streaked with blond glints, fell in soft waves over his ears, and his smile was wide and natural. He could have been twenty-seven or thirty-seven. Digger made him a native Californian. They all looked good until forty-five, when they fell apart all at once.

  "Perhaps," Digger said.

  "At the funeral. You were there."

  "That’s right," Digger said. "Tim Kelp. Our public relations agency is doing a memorial to Mrs. Welles. We’re talking to all the friends of the family for material."

  "I’m not really a friend of the family."

  "You were at the funeral," Digger said.

  "Yeah, that’s true." Dole turned around and looked at the nearest of eight tennis courts. A woman so beautiful she could have reduced all of New York to gridlock was doggedly practicing her serve to a young man in tennis whites in the far court. Dole watched her toss the ball in the air, then swing around to hit it. Her form looked terrific to Digger.

  "Sweetheart," Dole called. "Throw it higher. You’re not reaching and you’re hitting with your arm all squoonched up. Stretch out. Use that beautiful body."

  She smiled at him and nodded. Dole turned back to the table. "Dumb cunt," he said.

  "I guess the job has its compensations," Digger said.

  "Hmmmm? Oh, yeah."

  "Why don’t the beauties play golf? I play golf. I never met a woman on the golf course that I’d take home to meet my dog."

  "It’s boobs and bu
tts," Dole said. "The pretty ones want to show them off and tennis costumes are better for that. There’s more jiggling in tennis. Besides, women like to sweat. It brings out the animal in them. You play?"

  "Only around," Digger said.

  "Not a bad game, if you win," Dole said. "What’s your name again?"

  "Call me Tim. Tim Kelp."

  "Now what can I do for you?"

  "You were at Jessalyn Welles’s funeral. I thought you could give me something to use in a piece I’m writing. Kind of a memorial to the woman."

  "For who?"

  "For the Hospital in the Hills. A surprise thing for Dr. Welles. He doesn’t know we’re doing it."

  "What do you want from me?" Dole said.

  "Can you give me something to use?" Digger asked.

  "Sure. Jessalyn’s serve was lousy. Her forehand was worse. She never remembered to turn her back on the backhand. She had no foot speed and no arm strength. Sometimes the ball would bounce up and hit her in the face. She’d stand there like a statue. She was the worst tennis player I ever saw. She was a wonderful person. Can you use any of that?"

  "That last part. A wonderful person. A woman loved by everybody."

  "If you say so." He looked down at his Perrier.

  "You know about her accident. Was Mrs. Welles a bad driver?"

  "No. I never noticed anything unusually bad about the way she drove. She was a woman. She drove like one. She was all right. She was lousy. Like a woman."

  "At the funeral, you were kind of glaring at Dr. Welles. You don’t like him?"

  "What’s to like?" Dole said. "He’s not much of a person."

  "I thought he was a big shot," Digger said. "Doctor to the stars."

  "Only if the stars aren’t sick. He’s the kind of guy rich people go to when they don’t have anything wrong with them. When they really get sick, they go to a real doctor."

  "He’s the head of that hospital," Digger said mildly.

  "Because Jess was on the board of trustees. They picked him because he’s pretty, just the kind of guy you want to trot out at annual meetings."

  "Talk like that, he could make trouble for you here."

  "Him? He’s not even allowed in here."

  "Why not?" Digger asked.

  "I don’t know. Something about cheating at cards, I think. He hasn’t been a member for almost a year."

  "Was Mrs. Welles ever sick?"

  "Not that I know of. These aren’t the kind of questions that wind up in a testimonial about a woman who died in an accident," Dole said. Digger noticed how big the man’s hands were, surrounding his glass of Perrier.

  "I’m just trying to understand the woman. I don’t use any of this stuff," Digger said. "I’m going to write how everybody loved her in a special way, from her husband to her tennis instructor to the clerk in the store she operated."

  "Kelp, you’ve got to be the stupidest public relations man in the world."

  "Don’t tell my boss. I’m up for a vice presidency. My own key to the washroom."

  Dole shrugged as he stood up. Digger said, "Listen, I’m at the Sportsland Lodge if you think of anything good for my story."

  Dole walked back toward the tennis court to help the blonde work on her serve. Digger turned off his tape recorder. When he got into his car in the parking lot, he looked back toward the courts. Ted Dole was standing there, watching Digger, looking at the white Mazda.

  He looked very muscular and very mean standing there, Digger thought. Mean enough to kill Dr. Welles if he took it into his mind. Maybe even mean enough to kill a woman.

  For the moment, Digger was pretty sure that Dole and Mrs. Welles were, as they used to say when Digger was young back before he invented drinking, "a thing." There was Lorelei’s comment on the telephone. "Oh. I really talked a lot. I told you about Ted?" There was a little tinge of guilt in her voice, as if she had talked out of turn and spilled a secret.

  And there was Dole himself. He knew an awful lot about Mrs. Welles’s driving techniques for somebody who just taught her tennis. And he disliked Doctor Welles too much for a casual acquaintance. He had been listening to Mrs. Welles talk. Private talk. Dole would bear watching.

  Digger drove away. Dole still stood, watching him go.

  Chapter Nine

  It was 3:59 P.M. Digger parked in a far corner of the police parking lot where he could see the side exit of the headquarters building.

  There were thirty-four cars in the lot. Digger bet on the Cadillac sedan.

  At 4:08, Lt. Peter Breslin left the building. He stopped at the top of the stairs, crisply modeling his neat three-piece suit, and fished a pair of wraparound sunglasses from his pocket and put them on. He looked around, posing. It took a few long seconds for him to convince himself that Dino DiLaurentis and Francis Ford Coppola weren’t lurking near the entrance with multimillion-dollar contracts for him to sign. He walked into the lot, toward a red Triumph convertible, then two cars past it and got into the two-year-old Cadillac sedan. Little men always favored big cars. Breslin started the car and drove out of the lot. Digger followed him.

  Breslin drove north for two miles along Glendale Boulevard, then turned off onto a narrow-side street. Digger slowed as he went by and saw Breslin pull into a parking lot at the Cup of Ale Lounge and Restaurant. Digger drove on for two more blocks, then swung off the Boulevard, drove around the block, came back and parked in the lot two cars away from Breslin’s.

  He lifted up his shirt and removed the cassette from the recorder. He was satisfied that there was still enough recording time on it, so he snapped it back into the machine, fixed his shirt and went into the Cup of Ale.

  The cocktail lounge was cold and dark. The bar was a large oval in the middle of the floor surrounded by small tables. There was a bandstand at the far end of the room.

  Breslin was sitting alone on the far side of the bar talking to the barmaid. She was a tall, brown-haired young woman. Her uniform was a blue-and-white sailor’s top and light blue shorts. She had on mesh stockings and powder blue high-heels. She had a lot of straight white teeth arranged in a slightly lopsided smile that was somehow charming and that she was using now on Breslin.

  Digger walked around the bar and sat on the stool next to the policeman. Breslin looked up.

  "Hey, Burroughs, right?"

  "Yup."

  "Michelle, a drink for my man."

  The girl nodded to Digger.

  "Vodka rocks. Finlandia if you’ve got it. If not, anything."

  "We’ve got it."

  "City of eight million people. Unusual us stumbling into the same bar," Breslin said.

  "Must be our destiny. Ahhh, bullshit. I followed you."

  "The white Mazda?"

  "Yeah."

  "I was wondering about that. But I haven’t declared war on the mob or anything lately, so I didn’t think there was a contract out on me yet."

  "I’ll have to work on my technique," Digger said. "I’m slipping."

  "No, you’re not. I’m just good," Breslin said. "Well, you followed me, you found me, what’s next? Drink hearty."

  Breslin was drinking a martini. Digger drank half of the vodka. It felt good. He was glad to be in a bar again. If he had his choice, he might stay in a bar for the rest of his life.

  "I wanted to talk to you about Jessalyn Welles," Digger said. "Unofficially."

  "Pay the man his money, for Christ’s sake."

  "What if he killed his wife?"

  "Why would he kill his wife?"

  "You married?" Digger asked.

  "No. I used to be, though."

  "Me, too. So you know why."

  "I left. I didn’t shoot her," Breslin said.

  "Me neither," Digger said. "How can you shoot moss? But didn’t you ever want to?"

  "Sure. Every day and every night. Sometimes a couple of times every day and every night."

  Digger said, "So did I. But you and me, we left. Some people don’t leave, particularly if there’s a million-dollar rewa
rd for staying."

  "Why do you keep banging your head against a simple accident?" Breslin asked.

  "Because it just doesn’t wash for me yet," Digger said.

  "You’ve got a hunch," Breslin said.

  "Something like that."

  "I don’t trust hunch-players," Breslin said.

  "You should if they win."

  Both men finished their drinks at the same time. Breslin waved to Michelle who was standing at the end of the bar near a cardboard container that held a bottle of cheap wine. It was supposed to look like a cardboard wine barrel. Digger wondered who would possibly drink a wine that was packaged inside a cardboard wine barrel. Breslin held up two more fingers.

  "Mine this time," Digger said. He put a twenty-dollar bill on the bar.

  "What do you want from me?" Breslin asked.

  "I came to offer you a deal."

  "I’m listening."

  "Wait a minute."

  The barmaid refilled the drinks, took Digger’s twenty and put sixteen dollars on the bar. She hovered a moment, waiting to see if anyone would invite her into the conversation, then walked away.

  "I need the file reports," Digger said. "Autopsy. The interviews. Who’d you talk to?"

  "Welles and the housekeeper."

  "Okay. I need those. Copies of them and everything else."

  "You’re asking me to violate department regulations," Breslin said.

  "Exactly."

  "What do I get out of it?"

  "If I can nail him, I’ll give it all to you. Your arrest. Your glory. I don’t want credit. When they write a book about it, you can star in the movie."

  "I’m too short, I told you. You must be pretty well connected in your company that you can do without praise," Breslin said.

  "I am truly loved by one and all," Digger said. "I won’t lie to you. The company will know I had something to do with it. But they don’t want public credit. It’s not good for the insurance company image to have the public think that old BSLI hires gumshoes to go around and help them avoid paying people their claims. My people don’t care who gets credit as long as they don’t have to pay the million."