Death Was the Other Woman Page 13

  “And that’s all right,” Morgana said, “that’s going to happen. But Cecily Watson? Well, Cecily Marksham now. She won’t be coming.” Morgana pantomimed a protrusion from her own slender tummy. “She’s due in December.”

  “Cecily a mother?” The thought shook me slightly. “Who did she marry?”

  “No one you’d know,” Morgana said. “Albert Marksham, of the Humboldt Markshams? See, I didn’t think you’d have reason to know him. He’s nice enough, I suppose. He seems to be, at any rate. But he’s a bit dour for someone so young. Old before his time. He’d not have been my choice.”

  I laughed at that. “Oh, Morgana! If you and Cecily were now making the same choices, I would be concerned.”

  And so it went throughout the remainder of the early evening. Morgana on the phone, seeing who among our old friends she could round up in my honor and, between calls, gossiping with cheerful abandon about how all of our lives had turned out.

  I’d not brought any evening wear with me. Honestly, I had no evening wear beyond what Brucie had given me, but it didn’t feel necessary to point this out. Morgana, of course, had a closet groaning with things. She was slightly more filled out than I was, but that wasn’t a problem. As I’d done with Brucie’s dress on the night of my visit to the Zebra Room, I just wore something Morgana hadn’t worn for two years. It fit me perfectly.

  Morgana drove us to the Embarcadero in the cream-colored Auburn Speedster that Dex had admired so much. We walked arm in arm and enjoyed losing ourselves in the bustling throng. Street vendors plied their wares, but mostly the foot traffic looked busy, like they all had places to go, the terminus being the Ferry Building that loomed over the waterfront and the watercraft that would take them to various destinations within sight of its piercing tower.

  “See,” Morgana said, as we crossed the footbridge from Market Street, “this is what Father would have me become: a tourist in my own city, bound by ferries and schedules.”

  She sounded so put upon that I laughed again. “You’ve nothing to fear, my angel,” I told her. “I tell you, he schemes for himself, not for you.”

  Afterward we clambered back into Morgana’s little car and drove farther on Market Street. She stopped in front of a club and let a valet take her car. The club appeared far more sophisticated than I would have expected from her. I chided myself on this; it was time for me to upgrade my expectations of her. I was thinking of Morgana as I’d known her in our girlhood. She was a woman now.

  If I didn’t know that before we walked into the club, I did moments after, when every male head in the place swiveled to look at us, and by us I’m quite sure I mean her. I forced myself to look at Morgana again, without the shadings of childhood. What I saw surprised me. Once through the sleek glass and metal doors, she moved like a fish who’d been dropped back into her tank—with confidence and assurance and as though she belonged there.

  For my part, I felt a bit like a fish too—one that was out of water. Given the choice, I probably would have picked some place that served tea to meet up with our old girlfriends. Or maybe fancy coffee if we were feeling daring. Clearly, Morgana had other ideas.

  “There’s a blind pig on Fifth Street that I go to sometimes,” she told me. “But this place is one of my favorites. And with the girls coming and it all being in honor of you, I thought something a little more upscale was called for.”

  She was right. I was not so prudish that I would have totally discounted the idea of a blind pig, but I’d never been to an illegal drinking parlor of that stripe and nature, and I didn’t think tonight would be a good time for me to start.

  “There are roulette tables in the back room.” She indicated an unmarked door deep across the club’s chromium and black vinyl interior. The club looked modern, expensive, and entirely vulgar. I was guessing that was the point.

  “I like to play sometimes,” she told me, as though admitting a secret. “Not tonight though. Tonight we’ll all just catch up.”

  “Miss Cleverly!” the maitre d’ gushed, when he caught sight of Morgana. He was so pleased to see her that his mustache quivered faintly. Something about those quivering whiskers put me in mind of a squirrel looking at an acorn. “So delighted to see you again. Your usual table?”

  I raised an eyebrow. If Morgana came here often enough to have a table that was usual, she came here a lot.

  “Not tonight, Zack. I’ve got some friends coming. Old friends from school.” She indicated me, and Zack inclined his head at me politely. “So maybe somewhere quiet where we can chat. Not too quiet though, Zack. You know I like to see what’s going on.”

  “Very well, Miss Morgana,” Zack said. “I have just the thing.”

  He led us to a raised banquette, not far from the door that led to the gaming room. I had the feeling that giving us this table was as much for his benefit as it was for ours: it probably wouldn’t hurt an establishment like this to fill a very visible table with young women.

  “It’s perfect,” Morgana said, taking her seat in a rustle of silk. “And bring me a sling, wouldja Zack?”

  I was pleased that from my vast experience with nightclubs—having been to the Zebra Room a total of one time—I was able to order a grown-up drink with confidence.

  “Kir Royale, please.”

  Our friends began arriving in short order. Oddly, I found them all vastly changed and completely the same. This one grown more stout, that one more plain. This one was a duckling who had become a swan. All had genteel backgrounds, but our surroundings and the times we lived in had made us seem common, at least in this venue. We spoke that way. We drank that way. We laughed without covering our mouths, and we ate whatever we liked with abandon. Mrs. Beeson would have been mortified. We had a wonderful time.

  Deep in the evening—and all of us filled with drink and food and fun—a harried woman entered the club, her general air of distress catching my eye right in the middle of one of Gladys Carmichael’s most engaging stories.

  The harried woman was so out of context for me that at first I couldn’t place her. And then I did: Rita Heppelwaite. What had thrown me off was not only that she was in San Francisco, but also her mien. I had not before seen her when she didn’t look voluptuous and ready for something warm and exciting. Tonight she didn’t appear to be either of those things. In fact, she looked off-kilter and distraught.

  I nodded at appropriate moments as Gladys continued her story—something about the first time her beau had met her grandmother. It hadn’t gone well. Beyond that, I couldn’t have said—I was watching Rita Heppelwaite make her way across the crowded club. It looked to me like she was searching for someone. Fruitlessly, because she just kept on searching. When finally she came to the door at the back of the club that Morgana had pointed out to me earlier, Rita took one last furtive look around, then disappeared through it.

  “Excuse me,” I said, rising. I didn’t realize I’d interrupted poor Gladys until I noticed everyone looking at me oddly. “I’m sorry, darling,” I said, patting her hand, remembering as I did so that none of us had ever listened very deeply to Gladys’s droning stories. “I need … that is … I’ll be right back,” I said, and I rose and left the table without giving anyone a chance to reply.

  The room was crowded and it took me some time to make my way to the door. Before I did though, I noticed Morgana behind me.

  “What are you up to?” she asked.

  I smiled, feeling suddenly seventeen again and on some silly adventure that would land both of us in dutch with Mrs. Beeson.

  “I’m not sure,” I replied. “That is, I saw a woman come through the club and go into the gaming room. A woman I know from Los Angeles. She’s one of my boss’s clients—or she was—and I don’t know, Morgana. It just seemed odd, and I wanted to see where she was going.”

  “You’re funny,” Morgana said without rancor, even while she got us moving again. “You’ve turned into quite the little detective yourself, haven’t you? Well, you’re not going withou
t me. You’d not get into the gaming room without me anyhow. They don’t let just anyone in, you know. It’s a secret. Come on.” With that she pulled me behind her until we reached the door.

  Once inside I could see that she was right. I’d never have gotten in by myself. A man slouched near the door, never taking his eyes from it. He was in his mid-thirties, with sparse hair and a good suit. I would have been more likely to take him for a doctor or a lawyer with bad posture than a house peeper.

  When he saw Morgana, he nodded to her respectfully. “Evening, Miss Cleverly.” Judging from this, I gathered she was a good customer back here. I found myself only slightly shocked at the realization.

  “Evening, Silk. This is my friend, Miss Katherine Pangborn. I was just showing her around.”

  Another polite nod, this one in my direction. “Go ahead, Miss Cleverly. Just let me know if you need anything.” Silk might have looked like a doctor, but he didn’t sound like one. He sounded like he was in the right job.

  “Thanks,” she said, as she moved me more deeply into the room. “I’ll do that.”

  I was so agog at my surroundings that at first I forgot all about Rita Heppelwaite. Where the front of the club had been deeply modern, back here was a sea of green baize and smoke. The patrons were predominantly male; the women that were there were mostly scantily clad, showing plenty of cleavage and carrying drinks or hawking cigarettes. When I remembered to look for her, I realized Rita should be easy to spot. But she wasn’t there.

  I turned to Morgana, shaking my head. “I’m sure I saw her come in here.”

  Morgana spread her hands in a universal—if dramatic— gesture. “We’ll ask Silk,” she said, leading me back to the entrance.

  “Miss Pangborn thought she saw someone come in here. Someone she thinks she knows.” I was glad Morgana hadn’t said it was a friend. Clearly, for Rita to get in, Silk must have known her. And she wasn’t any kind of friend of mine.

  “Uh-huh,” Silk said.

  “But we can’t see her now. Is there another way out?”

  “Sure,” he said, pointing to a door in the back wall neither of us had noticed before. A potted palm stood between the door and the room, not hiding it exactly, but blending it into the decor. He grinned. “Place like this has to have a back way out.”

  “Where does it lead?” Morgana asked.

  “Back alley. Dead end one way. Boynton Court the other. Couple of buildings with fire escapes either way offer other options. But listen, you said ‘her.’ It was a dame?”

  “That’s right,” I said. “Quite a beautiful one. Dark red hair. Lovely figure …”

  “Sure. I know her, all right. That’s Rita Mayhew. And I know that’s the twist you were lookin’ for, ‘cause she was in here for just a few minutes. Then I saw her take the air.” He pointed again at the door. “It didn’t look like she was coming back here either. Where you know her from, miss? She’s not in your league at all.”

  “Los Angeles,” I said. “And what league is she in?”

  “Well, she’s not the roulette player you are, Miss Cleverly. But then she’s missing something you got. Something she won’t ever have.”

  “What’s that?” Morgana asked.

  “Well, don’t take this the wrong way,” Silk said, looking abashed. “But you can afford to lose. It gives you an edge. Her type—” he hooked a thumb at the door “—her type never can. Fact, she’s in to Hopscotch for five large.”

  “Five large,” I repeated. Five thousand dollars seemed an impossible amount of money to me. A lifetime’s worth of trips on Angels Flight. A trip to Europe. A car. A new stove. More.

  Morgana didn’t bat an eye. “That’s a lot of change,” she said.

  “You’re not just whistling ‘Dixie,’” Silk nodded. “That’s why I let her in here tonight. Figured she musta come through with Hopscotch’s dough. Else why would she even be in town? She knows she’s gonna get zotzed if she doesn’t pay up.” He described a gun with his left hand, indicated pulling a trigger. Zotzed. I shuddered.

  “Would that really happen?” I asked. “Would she really get… zotzed?”

  Another shrug from Silk. “You didn’t hear it from me.”

  Somehow this apathetic denial was more frightening than anything he’d said before.

  Heading back to our table, I saw the back of a man’s head. It looked familiar. All of my old friends were looking at him, and each face held a look of sheer horror.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  “ONCE A WEEK, like clockwork, this guy went to his barber for a haircut and a shave. One day he goes in to get his ears lowered and his chin scraped and notices there’s a different barber. Doesn’t think anything of it. Sits down in the chair, starts talking baseball, the weather, the price of biscuits, who knows? Next thing you know, fffft.” Dex sliced his index finger across his own throat. “Straight razor. They left him in the chair in front of the big picture window as a sign.”

  “What kind of sign?” Gladys asked shakily. Our other friends were just as mesmerized, their faces never leaving Dex’s. And he does so love an audience.

  “The kind of sign that says: This man messed with the wrong people.” Dex shrugged his shoulders, as though acknowledging another element of the universe’s great inevitable. “There you are, kid,” he said, noticing me. “I was startin’ to get worried.”

  Though he’d been putting on a show for my friends, I could see something was different about him tonight. Something that had been absent when he’d dropped me off earlier in the day. And then I realized that the brightness he’d worn since his near escape the night of Brucie’s shooting was gone. He looked like the old Dex again. I’d barely gotten to know sunny Dex, and I missed him already.

  “Dex, what are you doing here?”

  “Your boss has been regaling us with tales from the underbelly of Los Angeles,” Susan Hammond said with a delicate shudder. “I didn’t realize your life had taken such a dangerous turn.”

  “How did you find me?” I said to Dex.

  “I’m a detective, remember?” he said, smiling.

  Morgana snorted. “I’ll bet Smith told him, is what. Or he flattered one of the house girls.”

  “You were right the first time,” he said, extending his hand to Morgana. “Your houseman told me. How do you do? I’m Dexter J. Theroux.”

  “I figured that much,” Morgana fairly purred. “And I’m—”

  “I know who you are,” Dex interrupted, keeping her hand in his just a beat too long. “The girls here told me who Kitty was with.”

  “Kitty!” Edwina Bryson twittered. “That’s funny. I never would have thought of you as a Kitty, Katherine.”

  I didn’t like the way this was going. Not any of it. “What are you doing here?” I asked again.

  Dex was suddenly more serious. “We’ve gotta go” was all he said.

  “What? Now?” I asked. “But it’s almost midnight. Where are we going?”

  The other girls had fallen silent, watching the exchange between Dex and me with rapt expressions. “You’re on a case,” Morgana breathed. “You didn’t tell me you were on a case, Kitty.”

  “I’m not. It’s almost midnight,” I said again. “And don’t call me Kitty.”

  “Why?” Morgana pouted prettily. “He does.”

  “I can’t make him stop,” I said.

  “We gotta go,” Dex said again.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake” I said, exasperated now. “All right. But will you at least tell me where we’re going?”

  Dex shook his head. “Not here.”

  The girls were all watching this exchange closely. I could see that they’d suddenly cast me in a role from a detective novel, something shoddy and forbidden, where there’s a woman on the cover doing a lot of heavy breathing. If I’d been in a lighter mood, I would have laughed, seeing my exchange with Dex through their eyes. Here I was—Katherine Pangborn from school—in a nightclub in San Francisco sought out by a darkly handsome man with a
dangerous demeanor. A man who told stories threaded with violence and who was now urging me into the night with him. I saw admiration in their faces. And unexpectedly, I saw some envy there as well. I could have told them about how I often didn’t have the nickel I needed to take Angels Flight, but I did not. I didn’t mind them thinking I was in the middle of an adventure. And anyway I presently had my hands full with Dex.

  “Fine,” I said to him, “we’ll go, if it’s so all-fired important. But when will we be back?”

  I was dismayed when he shook his head. “We’re not coming back. We’re heading straight back to L.A.”

  “But my things …” I started to tell him that I had to get my valise from Morgana’s house, but he intercepted me.

  “Already in the car.”

  “And my dress …” I indicated the evening dress I wore.

  “You can keep it, Katherine.” I started to protest, but Morgana’s eyes beat me down. It wasn’t charity, the look said. It was too small, though she wouldn’t have liked to say that in public.

  Defeated, I slumped back in my seat, taking a final sip of my Kir Royale before saying good-bye to my friends. Short as the visit had been, it had been wonderful to see them. We all made promises to keep in touch, which none of us probably meant even while we said the words. Envy or no, our lives had gone in very different directions.

  Dex and I had a few minutes to wait for the attendant to bring the car. “I was having a really good time, Dex,” I said, as we stood at the curb. And even while I said it, I hated how plaintive my voice sounded.

  “I know you were, kid. I could see that. They’re nice girls too. They care about you. You’ll come back sometime. See them.”

  “Will I?” I asked.

  “Sure you will, kid. Sure you will. You’ll do whatever you like, you’ll see.”

  It wasn’t until we were under power that I asked Dex what had been so all-fired important that he needed to roust me out of my perfectly fun evening.