Bill Pronzini: Nightshades

“Thanks,” I said. “Thanks a lot.”

“It’s the truth and you know it. You’re brooding right now. I can see it in your face.”

I started to say something angry-and swallowed it. She was right. But why the hell shouldn’t I be brooding? Ex-husband gone whacky and involved in some screwball cult-who the hell knew what might happen. It scared me, thinking about it. I loved her; if anything happened to her…

“You’ve got to promise me you won’t try to see or talk to him,” she said. “Will you promise me that?”

“How are you going to get rid of him, then?”

“I’ll find a way. It’s my problem.”

“It’s mine too-”

“It’s mine, dammit, don’t start in now, just don’t start in. I’ll find a solution to this, don’t you worry.”

“ You’re worried. Look at yourself.”

“I’ll get over that; talking about it’s made me feel better already. Now promise me you won’t interfere.”

“As long as he stays in L.A.-all right.”

“Even if he comes back to San Francisco. Promise me.”

“Kerry, don’t try to shut me out of this. I’m involved whether you want me to be or not. I-”

“I knew it,” she said, “I knew it, you big pigheaded Italian bastard!” and she began to bawl.

I sat there. Crying women unman me; two seconds after one starts in I feel awkward and helpless and I can’t think straight. All I was able to do, after a time, was to say, “Kerry, don’t cry, babe, don’t cry,” and to put my arms around her and pat her like some idiot trying to burp an infant. She kept on crying against my chest. I kept on murmuring and patting.

Then she shifted position and put her arms around me, and the crying became snuffling, and the snuffling slowly subsided. And then, to my amazement and probably to hers, she was kissing me and I was kissing her back, and other things were happening, and pretty soon there we were thrashing and humping and making noise like a couple of kids having their first big fling.

Yeah, I thought a while later, when we were both still and my head was more or less clear again. Today is definitely going to be a humdinger.

While Kerry was showering I called Helen O’Daniel’s number again. Still nobody home. Jim Telford wasn’t available, either; he’d been in this morning, and now he was out again, and the deputy I spoke to didn’t know or wouldn’t say when he’d be back. I called the Northern Development offices. Nobody answered.

I looked up Shirley Irwin’s name in the local directory, found a listing, and dialed her number. She was home, at least, and she gave me the name of the firm’s lawyer, a man named Fulbright who had offices not far from the Sportsman’s Rest. He was also both O’Daniel’s and Munroe Randall’s private attorney, she said.

I asked her how Treacle was holding up, and she said she hadn’t seen him since yesterday afternoon and he’d still been nervous and worried then. I said, “How did it go with Lieutenant Telford?”

“Not very well. Mr. Treacle kept demanding police protection.”

“Did he get it?”

“The lieutenant said he’d see what could be done. But Redding isn’t in his jurisdiction; it would have to be arranged with the municipal police.”

“Uh-huh.”

She said then that she was afraid Treacle was becoming paranoid. “I asked him if he wanted me to open the office today, and he said no. I’m to say he’s out of town if anyone contacts me. He doesn’t want to see anyone.”

Except me, I thought. I thanked her and rang off.

Kerry was out of the shower and half-dressed by this time. I took my own shower, using cool water in deference to my burns. I put on shirt and slacks, and we went out for a quick breakfast at the place next door. It was another hot day, with scattered clouds but no sign of any more thunderstorms. The air had a vaguely dusty smell again, as if the rain had never happened.

When we got back, there was a message that Treacle had called again. I girded myself and returned his call. He was calmer than he had been yesterday, but the paranoia was there in his voice and in what he had to say. I placated him by saying that I was making headway on the investigation, which was neither a lie nor the truth, and that the authorities were making progress too. Then I asked him if he knew about Helen O‘Daniel’s affair with Paul Robideaux. He said no, sounding astonished. He also seemed surprised when I told him about O’Daniel’s apparent decision to file for divorce.

He wanted me to come over to his condo later, fill him in on the details of my investigation; he meant he wanted me to hold his hand. I said I would, lying in my teeth, and put an end to the conversation.

I left Kerry in the room-and in a relatively good mood; she said she was going for a drive to Whiskeytown-and took my car to the low-slung, modern building that housed the offices of Fulbright and Gault, Attorneys at Law. George Fulbright turned out to be a youngish, solemn, saturnine man with a precise mustache and a precise way of speaking. He was willing to talk, the circumstances regarding his two former clients being what they were; I’ve never met a lawyer who didn’t like to talk, once you got him primed.

He told me that the personal assets of Munroe Randall were “substantial,” although he wouldn’t name a figure, and that the personal assets of Frank O‘Daniel had dwindled in recent months and were now “on the smallish side.” He said that yes, both men had made out wills. Randall’s estate went to his mother and two siblings back in Kansas; no one locally received a bequest. As for the O’Daniel estate, such as it was, Helen O’Daniel was not the principal inheritor. In fact, she stood to inherit only the fifty percent the California community property law entitled her to.

“Who gets the other fifty percent?” I asked.

“A brother in Washington state,” Fulbright said, “and a sister in Alturas. Evenly divided between the two.”

“Why did he disinherit his wife? Was that provision in his will all along?”

“No. Mr. O’Daniel asked me to rewrite the will several months ago, when it became apparent to him that his marriage had failed.”

“Then he was going to file for divorce?”

“Oh yes. The last time I spoke to him, two days ago, he asked me to prepare the papers.”

“Why did he wait until now? Why didn’t he ask you to file months ago?”

“I gathered it was a difficult decision for him.”

“He didn’t say anything about financial reasons?”

“Not to me, no.”

“Do you know if he told Mrs. O’Daniel about his intentions?”

“Yes, he said he had.”

“Did she know he’d changed his will?”

“I believe she did.”

“Then she also had to know that if he died, and she was still married to him, she’d be responsible for his corporate debts if Northern Development went under. That’s the law, isn’t it?”

“Why yes, it is.”

“And the company is likely to go under?”

“I’m not at liberty to discuss that,” he said. Meaning yes, it was likely. “But I don’t see…”

I let him not see; I didn’t say anything. I was thinking: Well, there goes her motive for killing him. She got her fifty percent whether he was alive or dead-fifty percent of not much-and that was all she got. And if he was alive, she’d be better off: just wait for the divorce to go through and she could go her merry way without worrying about his business debts.

There went any profit motive for killing Randall, too, because he also hadn’t left her anything in his will. Helen O’Daniel may have been attractive and desirable and hell on wheels in the sack, but she wasn’t fooling any of the men in her life. Not where it counted, anyway.