Эд Макбейн - The April Robin Murders

She scowled, and looked very lovely in spite of it. “It all sounds fishy to me. Very fishy.”

Before Bingo could say anything in return, Handsome broke in and said placatingly, “Why don’t you just check with Mr. Budlong? He’ll be able to explain everything to you, without any trouble.”

“Sure,” Bingo said. “He’ll be able to tell you all about Mr. Lattimer.” He started to add, “Dead or alive,” and decided against it.

“I’m going to do exactly that,” she said. “The very first thing in the morning, too.”

Bingo started to remind her that tomorrow was Consolidation Day, and decided against that, too. Let her find out about it for herself, even if it did put her to an inconvenience. It was Handsome, still placatingly and very amiably, who did remind her.

“Oh, hell,” she said. “I never can keep track of these California holidays.” She sniffed. “Consolidation Day! Silliest-sounding thing I ever heard of!”

“Maryland has a holiday named Repudiation Day,” Handsome said. “On November 23rd. I don’t know why. And Boston has Evacuation Day on March 17th, and I don’t know anything about that, either. So Consolidation Day doesn’t sound so funny. And there must be some reason for it, only I don’t know what it is.”

“And I don’t particularly care,” Adelle Lattimer said. She sounded a little more agreeable. “All right, I’ll see Mr. Budlong day after tomorrow and get this straightened out. I don’t suppose there’s a drink in the house?”

Handsome went to investigate the kitchen. Their guest relaxed a little. Suddenly she took a deep breath. “What smells funny?”

“Just a little dry-cleaning fluid,” Bingo said. “Got spilled out in the back room.” No point in telling her any more details about that, either.

Handsome came back with glasses and a quart of beer he’d found in the icebox. Adelle Lattimer lit a cigarette, settled down, and began to look comfortably at home. “You boys from New York?”

Bingo nodded and said, “We’ve only been here a few days, as a matter of fact. Decided to move the business out here. The headquarters, anyway.”

He was pleased to see that she looked suitably impressed. “Doing well?”

“Couldn’t be doing better,” he assured her. “Takes a little time to get settled, of course. We haven’t even decided on our office space yet — but we’re thinking of a nice little building of our own, somewhere on the Strip, or in Beverly Hills.” Well, he was thinking about it. It was one of the main topics of his thought these days. “A good place to live came first.” He cleared his throat. “I suppose you know this place used to belong to April Robin.” He wondered whether or not she’d lived in this house, as Mrs. Julien Lattimer.

She looked unimpressed, took a gulp of her beer, and said, “The hell you say.”

“You remember April Robin, of course,” Bingo said.

“I don’t remember her,” Adelle Lattimer said. “Sure, I know who she was. But after all, she was before my time.”

Bingo doubted that. He decided it was time to change the subject anyway. “You certainly seem anxious to find Mr. Lattimer,” he prodded her.

She put her glass down, hard. “Look. He’s worth money to me. If he’s alive, he owes me nearly twenty grand in back alimony. Nineteen thousand two hundred, to be exact. Dead, he’s worth a quarter of what he left, if you follow me.”

“I get the idea,” Bingo said.

“And it’s plenty,” she told him. “But being married to him for two years was worth it. Of all the dull, dreary little characters. Oh, he did have a certain charm when you first knew him. Sort of poetic, and serious. Looked poetic, too. Dark hair with a little gray. Graceful. You know the type. But after you got to really know the stodgy, penny-pinching, gloomy little bastard—” She paused and said, “I guess I shouldn’t speak bad of the dead.”

“If he is dead,” Handsome said.

“And if I can prove it,” she said. “Don’t think I haven’t tried to have him declared dead by the courts, because I’ve been doing practically nothing else. With no success. If his body doesn’t turn up, somewhere, sometime, I’ll have to sit out the seven years, I guess.”

“If we find it,” Bingo said, “we’ll be glad to let you know.”

“Do that,” she said. Then she looked at him suddenly, her bright blue eyes narrowing a little. “In fact, if you boys want to pick up a little extra loot for yourselves, you might spend your spare time looking around. If you’re going to live in this house, you might just stumble onto something, so to speak.”

“Not his body, I hope,” Bingo said. He said it lightly, but with an icy spot in his stomach.

She said, very seriously, “Look, if his body had been here, it would have been found. But there might be something to lead to where it is. The cops went over this place with an extra small-size fine-tooth comb. No dice. After she—” the tone of voice in which Adelle Lattimer said “she” left no doubt in Bingo’s mind as to whom she meant — “got cold feet and scrammed, they went over it again. And again no dice. Finally the court appointed a trustee to look after the place and the rest of the estate. The trustee had the place gone over with an even smaller fine-tooth comb than the cops used. No dice ever, anytime, for anybody.”

Bingo said, “And what makes you think we’ll be more successful than they were?”

“Well,” she said, “you live here. I tried to get a private dick in here on my own. No luck. First she was living here, and then her housekeeper stayed on as caretaker. Phony insurance inspectors — electrical repairmen — we couldn’t get anybody in. But you are in.” To Bingo’s relief, she didn’t ask questions about the caretaker.

“Naturally,” she said, “I don’t expect this for nothing. Anything you turn up that leads to finding his body — I’ll give you a cut of what I get.”

Bingo thought for a minute. “A quarter?”

“I was thinking more of five percent,” she said.

They discussed the figure back and forth for a while, plus the fact that even five percent of the at least hundred thousand dollars she stood to inherit was a considerable sum, and ended by agreeing on ten.

“He was a rich widower when I married him,” Adelle Lattimer said. “I think he married me because he thought he’d be more of one. Richer, I mean, not more of a widower. But I disappointed him. I own a nice little hat shop in Pacific Palisades, but that’s all. It’s just that I look and act rich, and that’s what fooled him. So we wrangled for a couple of years, and I got a smarter lawyer than he did, and quicker, and got my four hundred a month alimony, now long overdue, and my share in his will.” She smiled. “I’m a shrewd businesswoman, in my way.”

Distinctly one he wouldn’t care to have on the other side in a deal, Bingo thought. He said, “This — Lois that he married — was she rich?”

Adelle Lattimer shook her head and laughed. “I don’t think she had a dime. No, this time Julie was the sucker. He fell in love with her. I mean he really fell in love with her. She’s a pretty little thing. Not much sense, if she picked him. Unless she married him for his money, which is what probably happened.”

She poured the rest of the beer into her glass. “It’s to laugh, I mean it! Here this poetic-looking smoothie makes a thing out of marrying women with money. Finally, when he’s got it made, a cute little bleached-blond babe comes along and marries him for his dough, and ends up killing him for it. Well,” — she lifted her glass — “good luck, boys.” She finished her beer in a gulp, and rose. “If you find anything, I’m in the phone book.”