Death Was the Other Woman Page 3

  “Look at her, Lou. She’s just a kid. What are you? Seventeen?”

  I pulled myself to my full height. “I’m twenty-one,” I said truthfully, though I saw the look of doubt in his eyes.

  “Aw, never mind. It looks like nice stuff.” Then to me, he said, “Is it good stuff?”

  “I… I don’t know, honestly, sir. I would imagine so. My mother was from a good Baltimore family, or so my father always told me.”

  “Your mother’s dead, too? Ker-riste, Lou! Sorry, miss. Listen, Lou, what were you offerin’?”

  “Fifty bucks,” Lou said defensively, scratching again. “For the lot.”

  “And how much is the funeral?” Mustard asked, looking at me.

  “One hundred and fifty.” I think by then I was probably close to tears.

  “Listen, kid, Lou’s going to give you two hundred.” I gasped, and if I wasn’t mistaken, Lou gasped too. “But you keep this ring.” Mustard slid a piece that I knew had belonged to my grandmother toward me. It was ebony and emerald set in white gold. “It doesn’t look like it’s worth much anyway,” though he kind of grinned when he said it.

  “That’s just crazy,” Lou snorted from behind his window. “I ain’t gonna do that.”

  “What’s crazy, Lou?” Mustard looked straight at the pawnbroker. I would have sworn I saw Lou shrivel slightly.

  “Nothing,” he muttered, opening his cash register and counting out the money, then writing out the pawn slip. He did it with ill grace, but he did it. “You owe me for this one, Mustard.”

  My savior smiled while he watched me stuff the cash into my handbag. “Come on, kid, I’ll buy you a coffee,” he said, when the transaction was complete. He walked toward the door and held it open for me. I must have hesitated. “Don’t worry, I ain’t gonna bite. I’ve got a proposition for you.” Another hesitation. He laughed. “It’s not that kind of proposition. You’ll see. C’mon.”

  In truth, I felt inclined to trust the man, though I didn’t have to work hard to imagine Mrs. Beeson’s face as I preceded him out the door. He was definitely not our sort of people, was what she would have said. Though, in my new world, I was no longer sure who “our sort of people” were.

  The coffee shop was clean, and the coffee good, if stronger than I was used to. It was just after noon and I hadn’t had breakfast, so when my companion offered me a bowl of soup, perhaps I didn’t hesitate as long as I should have. He didn’t order anything to eat, but when mine came, I started right to work on the chicken-and-noodle concoction, the cook’s special of the day.

  Mustard sat back and smoked while he watched me eat, a grin all but hidden on his face. He didn’t say much about my obvious hunger except, “For a skinny kid, you sure can pack it away. I like to see a broad eat.”

  I put the spoon down neatly on the plate under the bowl and looked fully into his gold-rimmed gray eyes. “I’m not a broad,” I said, tightly but with, I hoped, some authority.

  He raised his eyebrows and just looked at me for a full ten seconds that might have been a minute. Then he laughed, and I could tell he wasn’t laughing at me. “You know, you’re right, kid. I’m sorry. You’re not a broad at all. What’s your name?”

  “Kate … Katherine. Katherine Pangborn.”

  He sat back in the booth and whistled, the cigarette he’d put down in the ashtray forgotten for the moment. “No kid-din’? Are you that Pangborn?”

  I shrugged. Nodded. I probably was. “William Pangborn was my father.”

  He whistled again, then reapplied himself to his previously neglected cigarette. “Sheesh.” For a moment he seemed lost in thought. “Sad times,” he said, exhaling a column of smoke at the ceiling, then crushing his cigarette in the ashtray.

  I nodded again, then went back to my soup. It was delicious, and I honestly didn’t know when I’d see food this good again. Marjorie did the best with what she had for our meals, but she usually didn’t have much. Things were that tight.

  Mustard waited until every speck of the delicious soup was gone before he told me what was on his mind.

  “Look, a buddy of mine—a shamus, see?—his business is doing real well, and he could use a secretary.”

  “Shamus?”

  “P.I., you know. Peeper. Gumshoe,” he explained.

  I looked at him cautiously and waited.

  “You think you could do that?”

  “Do what?” I said, honestly perplexed.

  “You know … secretarify.”

  I shrugged.

  “Do you type?”

  I shook my head.

  “Take shorthand, maybe?”

  Another shake. I wasn’t even exactly sure what shorthand was, but I knew I couldn’t take it, and if I could, I didn’t know where I’d take it to.

  He looked surprised. “Well, what can you do?”

  I laughed. A gentle laugh but heartfelt. There was a lot I could do, really. In a flash I realized how useless all of it had become. “I can play the piano. I can make a souffle. I can organize a dinner party for twenty-four and ensure there are no conflicts in the seating arrangements.” I paused and contemplated my nails before I went on. “I can do needlepoint. I can crochet. I can ride a horse. And I can knit when called upon.” I looked at my companion and smiled. “But knitting is certainly not my strong point. I know what clothes to wear for every situation …” Then I added, almost as an afterthought, “And I know what sort of clothes you should wear, as well.”

  He laughed and I hoped I didn’t detect a note of pity in that laugh. Then he surprised me by touching my hand very gently and squeezing it so softly I might not have felt it at all. His hand was back to his side of the table and lighting yet another cigarette so quickly, I almost doubted my recollection.

  “Listen, kid.” He reached inside his breast pocket and pulled out a creamy business card, which he handed to me. “Bury your father,” he said kindly. “Do what you need to do. But like I said, my friend needs a secretary. And I figure maybe you need a job. A smart girl like you—who knows how to do needlepoint and make a souffle—should have no trouble answering his phones and figuring out how to type. Call me next week if you’re interested.”

  And then he was gone. I looked at the card. MUSTARD, it said in raised black letters. And underneath: CLinton 2519. I figured maybe I’d call.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  I’VE GOT A SPECIAL AFFECTION for Lafayette Square. By rights it should have been my neighborhood. George Crenshaw and my father had some business interests together at the time Crenshaw developed the Square. Right around then, Bunker Hill was starting to get a bit shabby, and the apartment buildings that have begun to take it over were starting to go up.

  Crenshaw worked and worked on Father to be one of the first people to buy a lot at Lafayette and build a big house there. Father actually gave in and bought one on Victoria Park Drive, then hired the architect Paul Williams to design a house.

  I remember driving out there with Father when I was a little girl, walking around on the lot with him and Mr. Williams while they waved plans around and talked about what would be where: the garden here, the summer kitchen there, and so on. Even a reflecting pool, which I was very excited about because I thought it meant we’d have frogs and lily pads. Maybe we would have too. I’ve thought about that on occasion.

  When it came time to break ground though, my father found he didn’t want to leave our home, increasingly shabby neighborhood or not. I suspected his reluctance had something to do with my mother. They had envisioned raising their family there, in the beautiful house my father built for her on Bunker Hill. My mother had died, but I suspect that some of the dreams they’d shared lingered on in the home they’d created. And so we stayed put.

  All of that meant I knew where Lafayette Square was. And I knew my way around, at least a little bit.

  I didn’t have much trouble finding the address Rita Heppelwaite had given to Dex. He motioned for me to keep driving past the house—a low-slung pile with a lot of white
plaster that looked more like a plantation house than a Los Angeles mansion. I looked at Dex questioningly, but did what he asked, strong-arming the big car slowly back around the Square. About a half block before we reached the house again, he indicated with a flick of one elegant index finger that I should pull over. I did.

  “Now what?” I asked.

  “Now nothin’,” he said, cracking his shiny new bottle of Jack and taking a pull that he chased with a sigh. He offered the bottle across to me, out of politeness I guess, though I figure he’d maybe remember the look I gave him and think twice before he offered the booze again. I do not drink bourbon. I’m not opposed to it for any moral reasons, and like a lot of people, I think Prohibition is a bit silly and not long for this world. But to me bourbon tastes an awful lot like gasoline, which is another substance I don’t drink. And if I were to drink bourbon— or gasoline, for that matter—it wouldn’t be straight out of the bottle. A girl has to have limits, has to know where they are.

  When I prodded him, Dex told me that the house we were sitting more or less in front of belonged to one Harrison Dempsey, the “boyfriend” the Heppelwaite broad had talked about. She’d told Dex that she suspected ol’ Harry was stepping out. She wanted my boss to spend a few days tailing this Dempsey character, then report back to her. Where did he go? What did he do? And most importantly, who did he see? All pretty much one-two-three for a shamus. Tailing unfaithful lovers is the bread and butter of most private investigators’ business.

  From Rita, Dex had Harrison Dempsey’s address, a description of his heap—a ‘29 Packard, of a green so dark it was the color of the head of a duck—and the address of his office in the Banks-Huntley Building downtown.

  Dex said Dempsey was a real estate developer and general deal maker, which I knew could mean a lot of things. But whatever it was Dempsey did, I figured he was good at it because both his girlfriend and his house looked expensive.

  We could see the green Packard parked sort of willy-nilly in front of the house, like the guy who drove it had been in a hurry. Or maybe like he just didn’t care.

  Dex told me we’d settle here until Dempsey got in motion. “Rita said he goes to the Zebra Room in the Town House Hotel on Wilshire every evening at eight without fail. So we know he’ll leave a little ahead of that, maybe sooner.”

  “Why not go straight to the Zebra Room and wait for him there?”

  “We could,” Dex agreed, “but then that wouldn’t be tailing him, would it? She wants me to find out what he does, who he sees. Best place to figure that out from is here.”

  “And it’s five now. If we know he doesn’t go to the Zebra Room until eight, why not just show up here at seven-thirty and follow him then?”

  Dex looked at me in a way that let me know I was trying his patience, but when he spoke, his tone was unchanged. “My instructions weren’t to follow him to the Zebra Room, Kitty. My instructions were just to follow him. Period. I don’t know what he does before he goes to the Zebra Room, or that he goes straight there or what. I only knew he’d be here at this time … and then he’d be there. Everything else is a mystery, which is why she needed to hire me, get it?”

  “So what do we do, Dex? Just sit here until then?”

  Dex smiled. “Pretty much, kiddo. Hey, you’re the one who wanted to come along. If you’re bored with our little picnic, pack up your basket and go.”

  I didn’t say anything, nor did I point out to Dex that it wasn’t so much that I’d wanted to come along, but that I hadn’t been sure he was in any condition to drive. And I knew he’d been kidding about the picnic, but now that he’d mentioned it—and it looked like we might be camping out here for some time—I figured a picnic would have been a pretty good idea. I made a mental note that next time I followed Dex on a stakeout, I should pack a lunch.

  It was October, but it was warm enough that we didn’t need the heater running to stay warm, even without a fur coat. We didn’t have a lot to talk about one-on-one, Dex and me. Anyway, he had his new friend Jack to talk to, and they were getting better acquainted by the minute.

  We sat there, silent for a while. I wasn’t aware of any traffic noise floating over from Crenshaw Boulevard, and the neighborhood itself was silent, almost dead. The only sound for a while was the easy rhythm of Dex’s breathing and his regular swigs from the bottle. When after maybe half an hour Dex spoke, his voice startled me.

  “You remind me of her sometimes, you know. Have I told you that before?”

  I looked across the car at him, taking in his red-rimmed eyes, the slight shake of the hand that held the bottle. I knew he was at least slightly drunk. But I also knew I had nothing to fear. Dex could occasionally be a maudlin drunk, but I’d never seen him dangerous.

  I shook my head. “You’ve never said that. Who? Who do I remind you of?”

  I might not have spoken. “She was as young as you are now when we met. Younger maybe. But it’s not just that. Something in the tilt of your head. And now and then, the sound of your voice.”

  “Who?” I repeated. Softly this time.

  “Zoe,” he said, just as softly. He wasn’t looking at me, but at some point above my head. I knew he was looking back. “Zoe,” he said again. “My wife.”

  I blinked at him without saying anything. Once, twice, three times perhaps. I must have done, because I didn’t have words. It was the first time I’d heard even a whisper about a wife.

  “Your wife?” I said, still softly, not wanting to shatter his talkative mood.

  Another swig from the bottle. Another hand over the growing bristle on his chin. “I met her when I was in France. During the war.” He was quiet so long I thought he might not say anything else. Just as I was about to give him a gentle prod, he spoke again. “I was injured pretty much as soon as I got off the boat.” He gave a small laugh, but I could hear something more. “I was at the Battle of Neuve Chapelle, the first one, in nineteen fifteen. Have you heard about it?”

  I shook my head.

  “It was the first battle of the war for the Canadians. The Americans weren’t there yet. They wouldn’t be, either, for another couple of years. It was …” Here his voice drifted away, as though he were struggling for words or managing his thoughts; I couldn’t tell which.

  “I was injured,” he said finally, indicating his thigh. “Took a bayonet right there. Went clean through my leg.” I could feel myself grimace, but I didn’t say anything. “I was lucky too,” he went on. “Like I said, it was early. We didn’t understand the scale of the thing then. We didn’t know what it would be. So many men died that day. Good men. Bad men. They all died the same.”

  Dex told me that Zoe’s family had a farm near the little town of Neuve Chapelle. It was here that the Allied forces brought their injured, and Zoe’s family had pitched in to help. What else, she asked in her labored English, could you do when war broke out almost in your backyard?

  Comparatively speaking, Dex’s injury had been slight. Within a few days he was hobbling around behind Zoe, helping her help.

  I had some trouble with this image at first. Dex as the doting helper, that is. But then I mentally shaved fifteen years off him, trimming away the jaded air along with the lines. I imagined him fresh off the boat and probably scared as hell. The tall, gawky, smooth-faced young man, not much more than a kid, trailing behind an earnest and beautiful young woman like a pup.

  “Every leave I had, I’d come back to her. To Zoe. I was just a kid—just nineteen. But we fell in love.” He spread his hands as though this had been an inevitable thing. Inescapable. “We were married at a church near her home early in nineteen sixteen. Didn’t have much of a honeymoon. All of Artois was pretty torn up by then. It was a crazy thing to do, marriage in that dangerous time. But I loved her, Kitty. I would have done anything for her. I would have laid down my life for her.”

  The sound of my name startled me. I hadn’t even been sure Dex was aware I was still there. His voice was hypnotic, or hypnotizing; I’m not sure whi
ch. But it was as though the world outside the big black car had ceased to exist, and the torn-up French countryside was more real to me—perhaps to both of us—than the upholstered seat we shared.

  “There was a small house on her family’s farm …” Here his voice broke slightly. I looked at him quickly, but I could see no sign of it on his face; only the slight unevenness in his tone betrayed emotion. “After Zoe and I were married, her father gave me a good price on renting the land from him … Do you want to hear this?” he said suddenly, breaking the spell. “I can stop now if you like. I don’t even know why I’m telling you.”

  I hadn’t spoken for so long that I needed to clear my throat before I could answer. Or maybe emotion held me back. “No, please,” I said, when I found my voice, “go on.”

  He looked at me a long moment before he continued. Another swig. Another hand through unruly hair. He seemed to debate with himself before he continued, but continue he did. By now I knew it was more for his own sake than for mine.

  He took a long pull from the bottle and turned to face out the window. I had the feeling he didn’t want me to see whatever might be in his eyes.

  “My son was born in the summer of nineteen sixteen.” Now there was joy splashed in with the pain. “I wasn’t there. It was around the time of the Battle of the Somme. We called our child Raymond, because it was a name we thought would work in both languages—English and French—and I knew someday I’d want him to see my home. It would be part of him. Raymond.”

  A son, I thought. Born in 1916. He would be around fifteen now. An adolescent. Surely the age when a son needed his father most. I waited for the rest of the story. I waited for a long while. There had been long pauses already in Dex’s tale. I gave him the space he needed to think about it all, to pull out the last painful bit. I had no doubt that it would be painful, that Dex’s story didn’t have a happy ending. It would explain a lot. The hurt I’d heard in his voice as he told the story. And all those tortured days slumped in his chair in the office. Everything was a little clearer, or so it seemed at the time. So I waited quietly, feeling as though an answer was at hand.