Night-World (7 page)

Doyle’s voice was soft. “Don’t worry, I won’t touch the phone. If it rings while you’re asleep, I’ll wake you up and let you answer it.”

He was a detective, all right. Or was it just that her reactions were so obvious?

Karen rose, forcing a smile. “Thanks. Maybe I will stretch out for a few minutes.” She started toward the bathroom doorway.

“Mrs. Raymond.”

“Yes?”

“Better not close your door.”

Karen went on into the bedroom.
Don’t close your door. Great. And suppose she wanted to go to the bathroom?

She did just that, moving through the bedroom and leaving the bathroom door ajar. At least he couldn’t see her from the living room, not unless he followed her. This was worse than being in jail. Now she could understand how Bruce must have felt in the sanatorium, under observation, someone watching all the time.
Bruce, where are you? I know you’ve been here.

She knew because she had lied about the bathroom window. When she had left for work yesterday, it had been closed and locked.

She moved to it now, quietly and cautiously, ears attuned for any telltale sound that would show that Doyle might have gotten up. Carefully, very slowly and deliberately, she eased the window down, exposing the lock, with its telltale bright metal streakings, shining in parallel grooves against the marred, painted surface. The lock had been forced open from outside.

Karen had been sure Bruce had been home the moment she’d seen the partly-open window; she never left the apartment without making certain everything was closed. And if she hadn’t had the presence of mind to tell Doyle she’d opened the window, if she hadn’t been quick enough to forestall him, he would have done what she was doing now and had confirmation.

Karen took a deep breath.
Confirmation of what? That Bruce had been here?

It was her first thought at the time. That’s why she’d lied to Doyle.

But now, gazing at the forced lock, she had to admit to herself that she wasn’t sure. After all, Bruce did have his own key to the apartment. Unless, of course, it wasn’t in his possession when he left the sanatorium. Griswold might have placed all of Bruce’s personal effects somewhere for safekeeping, and he might not have had the opportunity to locate his key. Even so, would he have risked entering this way?

The murderer of Dorothy Anderson came in through the bathroom window
—

Maybe it wasn’t Bruce who had forced this lock. Suppose it was the killer?

Karen turned, started back towards the bedroom. She’d better tell Doyle.

Or should she? Her pace slackened and she halted before the bathroom mirror.

She couldn’t tell Doyle; it would be an admission of a deliberate lie, and the moment he knew he’d yank her back down to headquarters—to sit there, behind bars, not knowing what was happening, without a chance of hearing from Bruce, without a chance of his ever getting to her.

But what if he did get to her?

What if it
had
been Bruce after all, trying to get to her—trying to get to her and kill her?

Bruce wouldn’t do that.

Or would he?

Karen met her own wide-eyed stare in the mirror.

Would he?

That was the real question, the question she’d tried to avoid all along. But she had to face it now, just as she had to face herself in the shimmering glass.

Knowing what had happened, knowing what she did about Bruce—did she think he was guilty?

Slowly, Karen retraced her steps to the window and opened it to its former position. That settled that; Doyle wouldn’t realize what had happened. But it still didn’t answer the question.

Was
Bruce guilty?

She didn’t know.

And now, staring through the open window at the empty alleyway, she was afraid to find out.

CHAPTER 10

N
o news is good news—but not to a reporter.

LAPD had no official statement to issue that afternoon, and neither did the Sheriff’s Department. Lieutenant Barringer was unavailable for comment—holed up somewhere for his badly-needed sleep—and Captain Runsvick, fronting for the homicide division, had nothing to offer but advice.

“Play it down,” he said. “Sure, we’re getting a lot of calls and we’ll be checking them out. As soon as we’ve got something, we’ll give it to you. But until we do, no sense spreading rumors.”

A few blocks away, the press was faring no better at the Sutherland Agency. Ed Haskane was perfectly willing to talk, but he had nothing to say. Yes, he was Karen’s boss, but he’d never met her husband. No, she had never spoken about him except when he was discharged from service; then she’d been very excited that he was coming home. Afterwards, he’d just taken it for granted that everything was fine. He had been shocked to learn that Bruce Raymond was in a sanatorium. What was Mrs. Raymond like? A very bright girl, wrote good copy. All of which might well be true, but it didn’t make good copy.

In midafternoon, Tom Doyle closed the door on would-be interviewers at Karen’s apartment. They had to make do with neighbors, but no one could tell them very much. Only a few of the women around the courtyard pool could remember seeing Bruce Raymond at all, and nobody had actually spoken to him during his brief stay over six months ago. Apparently Karen was looked upon as a loner; she had no friends here and never came down to the pool herself. When Bruce ceased to put in an appearance, most of the other tenants hadn’t even noticed his absence. The few who did merely assumed there’d been a separation or a divorce.

Late in the afternoon a mobile TV unit descended on Griswold’s sanatorium. They’d come out in the morning, only to find the place was off-limits, and the situation now was still unchanged. Squad cars guarded the gates, and Sergeant Cole was supervising an investigatory team inside. If anything had been turned up, it wasn’t ready for release. The camera crew had already picked up exterior footage during their first run, and there wasn’t much point in taking more. They did get a few shots of long-haired local residents clustered across the road, but since the observations of these curiosity seekers were largely confined to mumbled asides about pigs, fuzz and other four-letter commentaries, the visit proved to be a waste of time and film.

It was already dusk when the mobile unit broke its return run downtown to stop at
Raymond’s Charter Service.
Once again they drew a blank; patrol cars stood before the entrance, and a uniformed officer politely refused admission to the newscasters. There was some debate inside the mobile unit about the advisability of sticking around until the police left, but it was getting late and the ten o’clock news waits for no man; they’d never be able to put coverage on the air in time.

Inside the office, Rita Raymond happened to glance through the window just as the mobile unit drove away. She didn’t say anything about it; she was doing her best to say as little as possible.

But it wasn’t easy, not with Sergeant Galpert asking the questions. She didn’t care for the sergeant; he had the persistent manner of a terrier worrying a bone.

“You’re positive that your brother made no attempt to get in touch with you?”

“He may have tried. All I know is he didn’t succeed.”

Galpert frowned. “Meaning he might have come here?”

“I haven’t seen him.” Rita lit a cigarette as she glanced out of the window again. “And neither have your men, apparently.” Rita exhaled, and the fan behind her whirred, weaving the smoke into a weblike tracery. “Tell me, Sergeant, isn’t it customary to bring a search warrant when you conduct an operation like this?”

Galpert looked as though he was going to growl at her for trying to take away his bone. “You admitted us to the property on your own volition. Of course, if you want to bring up technicalities—”

“I don’t want to bring up anything.” Rita checked herself; any show of antagonism would only provoke barking and snapping. “Believe me, I’m as anxious to locate Bruce as you are. But I’ve told you—he hasn’t contacted me.”

“When was the last time you saw your brother?”

“He’s been in the sanatorium since last winter—you know that.”

Galpert nodded quickly. “And you visited him there.”

“Who told you that?”

“Your sister-in-law.”

Rita repressed her frown. Of course Karen would have mentioned the visits, she should have anticipated he’d know about them. No way of holding out now.

“When was the last time you saw your brother?” Galpert repeated.

“Thursday, in the afternoon. I never went on weekends, that’s when we get busy here—”

“Last Thursday afternoon.” Galpert leaned forward; the terrier had a good grip on his bone now and he wasn’t letting go of it. “What happened?”

“Nothing.” Rita stubbed her cigarette. “It was a nice day. We took a walk outside, on the grounds.”

“Just the two of you? No attendant?”

“It wasn’t necessary. He’d been perfectly fine for months—”

“And before that?”

Rita hesitated. “We’d visit indoors, in his room.” She shook her head. “Look, if you’re trying to get me to say he’d been disturbed—”

“Had he?”

“Of course he had, at first. That’s why he was out there to begin with. But he was never violent or irrational like some of the others, not even at the beginning.”

Galpert wasn’t satisfied with the bone; he wanted the marrow, too. “The other patients—you saw them?”

“No, never. Dr. Griswold had a thing about respecting a patient’s right to privacy.”

“Then how do you know the others were violent and irrational?”

“Bruce told me. Not all of them, but a few.”

“Who, for example?”

Rita’s forehead wrinkled. “I’m trying to remember if he ever mentioned anyone by name.”

“Think.”

“Well, there was one he talked about, several months ago. He’d just come in to dry out.”

“Alcoholic?”

“Yes. The reason Bruce mentioned him was because of the way he ran his business. He was in real estate.”

“Here in town?”

“Somewhere in Los Angeles. Culver City, that area.”

“What’s his name?”

“He did tell me, but I can’t recall—”

“What did he say about him?”

“That he had figured out a new way of picking up property cheap. But you don’t want to hear about the real estate business—”

“Go on.”

“Well, suppose you had a house to sell, and you went to him and told him what you wanted for the property. He’d promise you action if you would give him an exclusive listing—and action is what you’d get. In a day or so he’d bring a couple over, nice middle-aged people with a new car, obviously respectable and responsible. They’d go through your house, and the woman would tell you how much she liked it—just the location they’d been looking for, too. But the man would complain. If you didn’t have a pool, he wanted a house with a pool. If you had a pool, he didn’t want one. The garage wouldn’t be big enough, or he needed copper-pipe plumbing, something like that. And by the time he got through all his objections, he’d offer you a price way below what you were asking—a ridiculous figure.

“So you’d say no, and they’d go away, but the real estate man would tell you not to worry, there were plenty of other prospects.

“Sure enough, in a few days he’d bring over another couple. They’d be driving an older model car and would look a little on the seedy side, but neither of them would complain. And the man would tell you this was just the kind of a house they wanted, only there was a little problem about financing—he’d lost his job in the aerospace industry and in order to swing the deal, you’d have to give him a second mortgage at low interest.

“When they left, the real estate man would reassure you again, tell you to be patient. And after a week or so he’d show up with another couple. Chicano, or maybe black, with several small children. And this would put you off—not because of the ethnic thing, but because it would turn out that they weren’t really interested in buying, just in renting on a month-to-month basis.

“Well, by this time you’d be getting a little discouraged, and the real estate man would give you another hard-sell pitch. He’d admit that maybe the market was a little soft right now, things were pretty tough, but houses were being sold and he knew he could scare up a buyer—maybe if you’d shave the price down to a more realistic figure. Perhaps you’d give him an argument on that, but after all he still had a ninety-day exclusive listing, and half of that time had gone by, so you’d have to hold still and wait for him to dig up more prospects.

“Then he’d let you sweat for a few more weeks. If you called him, he’d tell you to cool it, he was doing the best he could. And finally he’d show up again with another couple. A young couple, driving a microbus, long hair, the whole bit. And they’d tell you your pad was beautiful, man, only they didn’t have the bread, and how’s about a deal where they moved in and looked after the place until you found a buyer?

“After they got lost, you’d sit and wait. And wait. And wait. And when you called the real estate office, your man would always be out and he wouldn’t return your call. Until one day he’d come rolling up with a sharp-looking executive type and his wife and they’d go through the house. Just go through it, no comments. Finally the man would ask the price and you’d tell him, maybe even coming down a few thou on it. He wouldn’t say a word—just look at his wife. And then they’d turn and walk out.

“After that, you’d wait again. Maybe another month would go by and not even a word. Until finally you’d get a phone call from the husband of the first couple who looked at the house, the nice couple with the new car. He and his wife had been thinking about your place, and if it was still for sale he was still ready to offer you the price he’d quoted—cash on the line.

“Chances are, if you really needed to sell your house, that this time you’d say yes. And sure enough, the real estate man would bring them over again, the papers would be drawn up, the deal would go through escrow, and your house would be sold at that ridiculously low figure.

“What you’d never know is that you’d sold your house to this real estate man. Because the nice couple were his employees. And the others—the seedy couple, the black couple, the young kids, the executive type—were actors.”