Big Goodbye, The (19 page)

I was trying to say something, trying to raise my arm to protect myself. I was thinking I could make him understand or catch him off guard, then I was just trying to react, to counter what he was doing, then . . . nothing.

Chapter 41

When I woke up, I was face down on Midge’s kitchen floor with a headache and dried blood on my face. Actually, I just thought I had a headache. When I pushed myself up, the real pain began.

“Have a nice nap?”

I looked around to see Butch smiling down at me.

Pete stepped forward, extended his hand, and helped me up. “You okay there buddy?”

I didn’t say anything. It was a stupid question. Of course I wasn’t okay. I had been whacked on the head with a ceramic canister.

“We got you for breaking and entering,” Butch said. “Wanna tell us what the hell you think you’re doing?”

I thought about whether I should tell them. It would give them plenty of ammunition to implicate Lauren in all the deaths surrounding the case, but I didn’t have a choice. They could help me track down Ann Everett, and that’s what I needed to do.

I told them the truth—maybe not the whole truth, but certainly most of it.

Butch turned to Midge, who had been hovering in the background with Richie in the livingroom.

“And you don’t know where this Everett woman lives?” Butch asked.

Richie had his arm around the little woman, holding her against his red-blooded, all-American fly-boy body protectively. They looked like an ad for the good life the war effort was protecting.

“No, sir,” she said. “I just worked for her. We’ve never talked about anything personal.”

“But you have her number, right?” I asked, adding to Pete, “She’s got her number.”

“Are you sure about all this, Jimmy?” Pete asked. “You seem like you’re—”

“I’m sure,” I said. “We’ve got to find her. And we’ve got to hurry.”

“There’s a lot of things I don’t like about PIs,” Butch said. “A lot. But the thing I don’t like the most is how you fellas always make a mess, then we have to clean it up.”

“Seems I recall a couple of us cleaning up your mess before you were able to make it recently,” I said.

He hesitated, took in a deep breath, and let it out slowly. “Okay,” he said, “so I went out of my head for a moment, and you guys helped me. I owe you one. Just don’t press it.”

I nodded. “I won’t,” I said. “Just help me find Everett.”

Butch looked at Jimmy, who shrugged, then to Midge. “Let’s have the number,” he said.

She gave it to him. He then borrowed Midge’s phone, and called the station while we waited.

“I’m sorry about your head, Mr. Riley,” Midge was saying. “I know you didn’t mean no harm. My Richie is very protective of me.”

“
I’m
sorry I barged in,” I said. “I thought you might be involved in this thing with Everett. I wanted to surprise you.”

“I understand,” she said. “It’s okay.”

Butch replaced the receiver on the cradle and said, “I’ve got an address. Let’s go see if we can’t clean up this mess so you and me can be even.”

It wasn’t me, but Ray he needed to worry about being even with, but I didn’t mention it.

The small block home on Cherry Street in Callaway had obviously been neglected. The yard was mostly dirt with a few tall weeds. Peeling paint flaked off the block and collected in the dirt and weeds on the ground below. Newspaper had been taped over missing window panes and trash spilled out of a tin can in the front corner of the yard.

I had followed Pete and Butch here in my car. I parked behind them on the shoulder of the street and got out.

“You sure this is the right place?” I asked.

“Will you listen to this?” Butch said. “I’ve got a peeper second guessing me. And not just any peeper, but the one who got us into all this.”

“Doesn’t look like the lady’s home,” Pete said, nodding toward the collection of
Herald Tribunes
on the front porch.

“Only one way to find out for sure,” I said.

I started to walk toward the house.

“You wait here,” Butch said.

“But—”

“I can still arrest you for B and E,” he said. “I’s you I wouldn’t push me.”

I knew Midge wouldn’t press charges, she wasn’t the type, but I held up my hand in a placating manner. “Just hurry.”

Moving around Butch, Pete walked much faster to the porch and knocked on the front door. When, after a few moments, there was no response, he knocked again—louder and longer this time. Still nothing. His final knock was not a knock at all but an incessant banging.

“Police. Open up,” he yelled.

When there was still no answer, Pete walked around to the back of the house. Butch walked back toward me.

“She ain’t here,” he said. “We’ll come back later.”

“But what if—”

“We’ll come back later,” he said. “Let us run down the rest of your story. Who knows? If we get enough evidence maybe we get a warrant and when we come back it don’t matter if nobody’s home.”

I couldn’t figure Butch. He seemed genuine in his attempt to be helpful. Maybe it was his way of repaying me or perhaps he was trying to lull me to sleep in order to set me up somehow, but it seemed like good police work.

“Thanks, Butch,” I said.

He grunted.

Pete walked back around and joined us.

“No car,” he said. “No sign of life.”

“Couldn’t we just—”

“You got two choices,” Butch said. “Either way we’re all leaving this empty house. You can go get your head seen about, get some sleep, clean up—who knows?—maybe even shave, or you can go with us to a nice cozy jail cell. It’s up to you.”

“Jimmy, we’re gonna keep looking for this Everett dame and Rainer, okay?” Pete said. “I’ll put out an APB. We’ll find them. I promise. Just go get yourself together and let us do our jobs. It’s exactly what you would’ve said back when you was a cop.”

I nodded. He was right. “Okay,” I said. “I’ll go get my head examined.”

“Long overdue,” Butch said with a mean smile.

“Call me the moment you have anything,” I said to Pete.

“Partner,” he said, his big blue eyes so innocent and boyish they were almost believable, “you know I will.”

I didn’t know any such thing, but I needed them to leave so I could break into Everett’s house.

“Thanks,” I said, nodding, and turned to walk away.

“Peeper,” Butch called after me.

I kept walking.

“Don’t get any bright ideas,” he said. “I’m gonna have this house watched. Midge’s place too.”

Rubbing the side of my head, attempting to conceal my disappointment, I said, “I think Midge’s husband has that covered.”

Chapter 42

Butch probably really would have someone watch Everett’s place—at least at first. Deciding to wait a while before I broke in, I drove back to the office to test a theory I had about what July might have been doing at the office so late the night she was murdered.

When I pulled up in front of our building, I saw that someone, undoubtably Ray, had placed a wreath on the door. He was the grown-up of this outfit. It hadn’t even crossed my mind.

I could tell from the moment I opened the door that the office was empty, and I wondered if it would always be this way. Ray and I were both avoiding it, and I couldn’t imagine that we would ever feel comfortable in it again. My guess was when this was all over we’d be looking for a new place.

Walking up the stairs to her work area, a wave of sadness washed over me. She had made this job fun. Unlike Ray, she was easy to talk to and got most of my jokes and references. She was tough and smart—and probably on her way to making a good detective.

As I reached her desk, I wondered again what she was doing here that night. Why come back so late? What couldn’t wait until the next morning?

I thought I might just know a way to figure out the answers. Even if I did, it probably wouldn’t tell me who killed her, but it’d be a place to start.

Earlier the cops had Ray and I look to see if anything was missing. We had not—at least
I
had not—looked for what she had been working on. I thought it was possible that whatever was under the files and papers the killer had strewn would tell me.

I began with what was on her desk beneath the files.

Before, we had merely done a cursory check to see if anything was missing, now, I returned everything to its file and stacked them to the side. It took a while, but when I reached the bottom I found what I was looking for—except I didn’t like what I had found because it pointed to me. July had come back here from the park to look at our agency's logs, the paperwork we all used to account for our time and to bill clients.

Ray, the former Pinkerton, operated our agency as if we could be audited any minute. July’s primary job was to keep careful records of all our activities—including accounting for all the gas and food ration coupons we used on each case.

The logs she had out started a little less than a year ago and went through the present. They showed, among other things, that following our breakup, I had followed Lauren—often on company time—and had falsified records to cover it. It showed Ray’s legitimate work for Harry Lewis in following his wife and the other small jobs we were handling at the time, and every hour we had logged on every job since that time.

She also had the invoices out, and together they showed that I had done extensive surveillance work for an Erich Stevens, a client I had made up to cover the fact that I was following Lauren and had never billed. Detective that she was, July, watching Lauren run around the track in the dark, had deduced that I had followed her before. But why come here? Why did she think it was so urgent? Did she think I was following her again? Of course I was, but did she think that I was the one they couldn’t get close to or that I had hired Carl—was she that far ahead of us? Did she think Lauren was in danger? That I was going to eventually hurt her? I hope she hadn’t died thinking such things about me.

More recently, her logs were incomplete. There were hours logged with no client, clients with no hours, and several hours unaccounted for. Maybe she had come in to catch up on her bookkeeping. She had to know that Ray would be unhappy if he saw the condition everything was in. He had never once been late turning in a report to her, and she was usually good about accounting for everything once she had it. Was she going through something we didn’t know about? Was she killed for something that had nothing to do with the Lewis case or anything to do with our agency? If so, why was she killed the same way the other victims were?

On my way back to Ann Everett’s place, I stopped by Rainer’s sanatorium to check on Ray, but he wasn’t there. It was early evening, the end of day, and Clip was still sitting on the building.

I parked next to him near the service station down from Rainer’s and got into the passenger side of his car.

“What the hell happened to you?” he asked.

“I didn’t duck fast enough,” I said.

“From what?”

“An incoming ceramic canister.”

“Shit, man,” he said, “side of your face is all . . .”

“You should see the canister,” I said. “Where’s Ray?”

“Haven’t seen him.”

“What time was he supposed to be back?”

“’Round noon,” he said.

“Six hours ago?”

He nodded.

“And you haven’t heard from him?”

“Nah,” he said.

Something was wrong. Ray was never late, and had he been able, he would have gotten word to us. Had he met up with July’s killer? Had he been detained by Rainer? Was Butch behind his absence? Is that why he had been semi-helpful this afternoon?

“Any sign of Lauren?” I said, nodding toward the sanatorium. “Or Rainer?”

He shook his head. “Place dead.”

“Up for a few more hours?”

“Your dime,” he said. “Been overtime for four hours now.”

“You’re worth it, aren’t you?”

“Worth a hell of a lot more than that,” he said. “More’n your one-arm, broke ass can afford.”

“Good thing I’m not too proud for charity.”

Chapter 43

If the cops were watching Everett’s house, they were doing a damn good job of it. I drove around a few times before I parked a couple of blocks down and walked into her backyard. If I had more time, I’d have been more careful, but I didn’t.

The back door was unlocked. When I opened it and went in, no one with a badge and a gun jumped out.

It was dark outside now, and there were no lights on inside. I pulled a small flashlight out of my left coat pocket, clicked it on, and had a look around—a little bit at a time.

In contrast to the exterior, the inside of the house was neat and clean, everything in its place.

The house was small, and it didn’t take me long to determine no one was home.

It was furnished modestly, devoid of any of the modern conveniences Midge enjoyed, and I found it difficult to believe that Ann Everett had ever actually lived here. It was much more likely a hideout or the home of one of her cohorts. The fact that its address matched the phone number Midge had for her didn’t mean it was connected to her at all.

There were men and women’s clothes hanging in the closet of the only bedroom. I tried to recall if I had seen Everett ever wear any of them, but couldn’t remember. The drawers were mostly empty. There was nothing between the box springs and mattress. The medicine cabinet had the barest of essentials. Nothing was hidden in the linen cabinet.

The kitchen cabinets were nearly empty—just a bottle of Snider Catsup, a couple of cans of Heinz Home Style Soup, and a few boxes of GE lamps. It had been a long time since anyone had prepared a meal here. There was nothing in any of the appliances.

There didn’t seem to be anything helpful anywhere, so I decided to go.

As I was about to leave, I heard the chimes of the large clock in the living room. I turned to take a closer look at it, moving the beam of my flashlight up and down. Ornate and over six feet tall, the squarish frame had a swinging pendulum on a long chain between two columns in the center and a round clock face at eye level of a tall person.

The base of the clock had a door with a handle. I opened it. There was nothing in it, but as I studied it, I could tell that the back wall was much more shallow than the depth of the clock. Thinking it might be a false wall with a hidden compartment, I tapped on it. It sounded hollow, but I couldn’t get it open, and I didn’t have time to figure it out. I stood and kicked it in. It shattered, some of the pieces falling into the cuffs of my trousers, and inside was the large envelope Freddy had given to Lauren on the beach behind the Barn Dance.