Fugitive Nights (11 page)

“Yes.”

“It's Breda Burrows.”

“Yes.”

“Can you talk?”

“Not really. We're having early dinner.”

“I want you to ask your husband where he went today. Don't press him, but try to get a few details about how his day went and if he was alone.”

“Why?”

“He went on a picnic with a young woman, a woman with long black hair, maybe Mexican. She has a big brown dog and drives a rusty old Plymouth. Do you know anyone fitting that description?”

“No.”

“Does it surprise you?”

“Very much.”

“Can you talk to him and phone me?”

“We can get together.”

“Soon?”

“Yes.”

When Breda told Rhonda Devon where she was, her client said, “I can be over in fifteen minutes, Margie. But don't show me
too
many vacation pictures, okay?”

By the time Breda had returned to the bar, Lynn Cutter was leaning on the baby grand, talking to an attractive female piano player who had just come to work and was warming up with a Cole Porter medley.

The piano player was blond like Rhonda Devon, but not a real blonde. She wore slinky black, and the way she smiled at Lynn made Breda take a closer look at him. He really wasn't a bad-looking guy if only he could get that smart-mouthing under control, and damn it, he
did
have nice buns. Suddenly Breda realized that she hadn't been to bed with a man since she'd left L.A.!

Lynn returned to the bar after Breda sat down. He held his empty glass in his hand with a wistful look.

“
One
more,” Breda said. “We're meeting Rhonda Devon.”

“Yeah? Where?”

“Here.”

“All right! That glimpse through the oleander was interesting.”

“Try to maintain,” Breda said. “We don't fraternize with clients.”

As the bartender set the Chivas in front of Lynn, Breda decided she ought to deduct his drinks from any fee she owed him. Then he'd owe
her
money before the week was out.

Rhonda Devon was thirty minutes and two drinks late, as far as Lynn was concerned. The reason was understandable. She looked like Rodeo Drive, before going shopping at Chanel Boutique, or after lunch at The Bistro Garden. Breda recognized the Liz Claiborne persimmon leather handbag, the cheapest item on her person. Breda could only wonder where she'd bought the persimmon and black velvet jacket with all those pleats. And her black suede pumps probably cost more than Breda's entire outfit.

And yet, the soft dim bar light had an effect not intended. Rhonda Devon looked sleeker but
older
than she had when Breda Burrows had seen her in her living room in the late afternoon twilight. Breda was certain that Rhonda Devon was several years older than she'd admitted.

It was easy to see that Lynn wasn't thinking about calendars. He was looking at money. Ogling, actually. Breda couldn't wait to be rid of this guy.

She said, “Mrs. Devon, this is Lynn Cutter. He's helping me with your problem.”

“I thought you worked alone,” Rhonda Devon said, not offering her hand to Lynn. She wore an eighteen-karat canary diamond on her left hand. It looked like a popcorn kernel.

“Shall we sit over here?” Breda indicated a banquette in the corner, far enough from the piano.

“Vodka martini,” Rhonda Devon said to Lynn, the way she'd say it to a waiter. “Dry, a twist, no olive.”

While Breda and Rhonda Devon got settled at the low banquette Lynn ordered the martini, and another Scotch for himself. Then he sat opposite the two women, across a low enameled cocktail table. Rhonda Devon was smoking and looked not at him but at the martini he'd fetched.

Breda noticed.
Another
rummy, she thought.

Speaking deliberately, having poured too much down on an empty stomach, Lynn described in detail the events of his first day of surveillance. When he'd finished, Rhonda Devon was not quite as contained as when she'd walked into the bar.

Breda detected a perceptible quiver when Rhonda Devon said, “This is unbelievable. I can't imagine it. A young Mexican woman?”

“Probably Mexican,” Lynn said. “She was dark.”

“Why would he want to have a baby with a
Mexican
woman?” she asked her martini.

“Why not?” Lynn said. “I wouldn't mind. For starters there's Vikki Carr and Linda Ronstadt. Then there's Millie Valdez, she owns half of a Toyota dealership down in Indio. And there's …”

Vowing to cut off his booze, Breda interrupted him. “How about the rusty old Plymouth, Mrs. Devon? Is it familiar?”

“The car, the woman, the dog—none of it means anything to me.”

“How about the guy your husband picked up in Painted Canyon?” Lynn asked. “Baseball cap. Husky. Late thirties maybe. Probably another Latino. How about him?”

“I can't understand that either,” Rhonda Devon said, and now Breda thought that both her voice and her chin quivered. “The man must've needed a ride. My husband would pick up
any
stray. He's always been that way. When we're in Los Angeles he gives money to every beggar on the street.” Then she said angrily: “He's a child, really. He never had to work for anything in his whole life. He doesn't understand how … vile people are. I don't understand what he's doing!”

“He's a man of a certain age,” Breda said. “This sort of thing happens, Mrs. Devon.”

“But to want a baby when he can't have sex. And with a …” Rhonda Devon realized that she'd raised her voice, and covered her discomfort by taking a sip of the martini. Then another. Her hand trembled when she smoked.

“How far do you want us to go, Mrs. Devon?” Breda asked, with more compassion in her voice than Lynn thought she owned.

“I have to know it all now,” Rhonda Devon said.

“You're still not ready to confront him and just
ask
?”

“No. This is his affair … I guess that's an apt word, isn't it? And … he's never questioned me about anything in all our years of marriage.”

“Were you married before?” Lynn asked.

“Yes,” she said. “Twice.”

“And was he?”

“No,” she said. “I was his first and only love. He always
said.
”

Lynn glanced at Breda and said, “When Breda phoned you a little while ago and asked you to talk to your husband, did you?”

“Yes, I asked him very casually about his day, after I'd told him all about my rotten day on the golf course.”

“And did he tell you he went hiking?”

“Yes,” she said, “but not in Painted Canyon. He said he'd driven down to the Indian reservation and hiked in Andreas Canyon. He said it was wonderful because there were no tourists. He said it was spectacular looking at cottonwoods and sycamore and wild tamarack. He said the water in the creek was especially cold … and sweet.”

B
efore Rhonda Devon left the French restaurant, Breda asked her a few more questions about the household and got a list of all service people from the maid to the pool cleaner. After finishing her drink Rhonda Devon said good night, adding that she now wanted progress in a hurry.

Breda's plan for the next day was simply for Lynn to do a reprise. She had a detailed report she had to write for a defense attorney, and had already decided to advise the lawyer to plead the guilty bastard guilty. Breda hated to admit how much she needed Lynn's assistance.

She tipped the valet parking boy for both her car and Lynn's, and her parting shot to him was, “Go straight home for a change. Get a good night's sleep and maybe you can stay awake on a stakeout.”

After giving her one of the most insincere smiles Palm Springs had seen since Tammy Faye Bakker sold her house, Lynn Cutter did what she figured he'd do: He drove straight to The Furnace Room.

By the time Lynn entered the saloon it looked like someone had tossed a smoke grenade. Everybody was always bitching about the lousy air conditioning, but this night was the worst. Lynn took a few gulps of outside oxygen and practiced shallow breathing.

Wilfred Plimsoll, wearing a peacock-blue Ascot, spotted Lynn when he bellied up to the bar. The old actor poured him a double Scotch, then went back to a thespian argument with a pair of drunks who had “conventioneer” written all over them.

Wilfred bellowed, “De Niro! Pacino! Only the
serious
artists work on the boards!”

One of the locals, a retired dentist with a mouse-gray hairpiece going green around the sideburns, said, “Like Magic Johnson, Wilfred?”

Wilfred moaned painfully. “Not
those
boards! I'm not talking slam dunks! The boards! The stage! Where the bard speaks!”

“Movies're where it's at today,” one of the conventioneers insisted.

“You oughtta simmer down, Wilfred,” the dentist advised. “I've seen blood clots with better color.”

“The age of enlightenment this isn't!” Wilfred cried. “Don't you people understand? The first cousin of today's cinema is the comic book!”

Lynn noticed that Wilfred had done some work on lawyers that day. A new sign over the cash register was headed, “Nature Guide to the Desert.”

And below that, “Endangered species: Fringe-toed Lizard, Bighorn Sheep, Honest Lawyer. (If the latter is ever spotted, do not attempt to feed ordinary lawyer bait: i.e., greenbacks, cocaine, hookers, deep-pocket defendants, adolescent boys.)”

Wilfred Plimsoll had assumed his stubborn Franklin Roosevelt pose. The cigarette holder danced as his jaw jutted presidentially.

The booziest conventioneer turned to Lynn Cutter. “Did he really have a part in
Mildred Pierce”
? I just
loved
Joan Crawford.”

“Yeah, but he's a real Shakespearean,” Lynn said. “Only guy west a Buckingham Palace that can blow out a candle saying why or when or whoopee cushion.”

The dentist, who had sonar like a bat when a free drink was in the offing, sidled up and said, “Wilfred's been in lots of movies. I saw him standing behind Cyd Charisse in that picture with Fred Astaire. Cyd and Tony Martin come to town a lot. I did a root canal on her maid's sister. Wanna hear about it?”

Another drunken tourist turned to Lynn and said, “Hey, buddy, where's the action in this town? And I don't mean these old actresses. Best-looking actress I seen so far coulda played the lizard in
Night of the Iguana.
Any broads around here young enough their vaginal walls ain't collapsed?”

“Hey, don't sell The Furnace Room short,” Lynn said. “It's a hotbed of intrigue. Only reason it's so tame tonight is the temperature dropped five degrees. When it's cool outside these pensioners get sorta quiet. When it heats up this whole joint goes on a rampage. Sorta like a yeast infection.”

Wilfred Plimsoll, who'd won fifty bucks betting on the L.A. Kings that evening, aimed his cigarette holder at the wall clock, and with a sidelong glance at Lynn's glass poured half a refill saying, “On the house, my boy.”

“Armageddon comes to Palm Springs!” Lynn said. “Must be the end a the world!”

“Not so loud!” Wilfred said in a stage whisper.

“Are you Detective Lynn Cutter?” asked a boyish tenor behind him. The speaker was obscured by cigar smoke and by two pensioners, one of them so loaded his hearing aid was in backwards. The deaf guy kept saying, “Speak up! Speak up!” to everybody.

“Who wants to know?” Lynn asked the boy tenor, trying to nudge the deaf pensioner aside.

The old guy yelled, “Can't ya say excuse me?”

“Excuse me,” Lynn said.

“Speak up, goddamnit!” the pensioner hollered at him.

Lynn leaned toward the old guy's ear and said, “Either turn your hearing aid around or lemme hang on to it and you do the lindy hop or the hokey pokey. One spin'll set it right, okay?”

“What? Can't you speak up?” the old geezer yelled.

Lynn finally got a good look at the owner of the tenor voice. He was a short kid with red hair, big blue eyes and a Bugs Bunny grin. He wore jeans, red lizard cowboy boots and an L.A. Raiders sweatshirt. “Are you Detective Lynn Cutter?” the young man repeated.

“Yeah, who're you?”

“My name's Nelson Hareem,” he said, showing Lynn his police I.D. card. “I work at …”

“You the one they call Dirty Hareem?”

Nelson sighed, hung his head a bit and nodded. “Uh huh.”

“AKA Half-Nelson?”

“Uh huh.”

“You're famous!” Lynn said. “I heard about you from some cops in San Berdoo. I didn't know you were working out here in the desert.”

“One more famous episode and I'll be workin a beat in a
different
desert, that's what they told me.”

“Sahara?”

“Uh huh. Everybody jist wants me to handle NRC calls and go home at shift change.”

“What're NRC calls?”

“Nobody really cares.”