Bill Pronzini - Bindlestiff

For Christ’s sake, I thought, she thinks I’m gay!

It struck me funny and I almost laughed out loud. San Francisco has the largest, most outspoken and well-publicized homosexual population in the country; a lot of people who don’t live here, who only come to the city occasionally or not at all, seem to think just about every other male or female is of the lavender persuasion. I hadn’t reacted to Hannah Peterson the way she expected, ergo I must prefer boys. It was ridiculous-but the world is full of ridiculous people.

I managed to keep a straight face, so to speak, and decided not to say anything to alter her misconception. Let her think I wore lace panties and kept a male harem; what the hell. If she knew the truth she would only turn the sex on again. And I did not want to have to deal with that.

I said, “Sit down, Mrs. Peterson. I’ve got some coffee in the kitchen if you’d like a cup.”

“No thanks. I won’t stay long.” She sat on the couch, crossed her legs, and got a pack of cigarettes out of her purse. “Do you mind if I smoke?”

“Go right ahead.”

She lit up, letting her eyes wander around the room as she exhaled smoke. “You have a nice apartment,” she said. “It’s so, um, masculine.”

I said, because I couldn’t resist, “An interior decorator friend of mine designed it.”

“He’s very good.”

“Yeah,” I said. “He’s a sweetie.”

“All those old detective magazines are a nice touch. Do you actually read things like that?”

“Oh no, they’re just for decoration… because I’m a private eye myself. But I’m going to get rid of them one of these days; they collect dust.”

“I imagine they must.”

“Besides, they’re full of stories about murder and violence and human fiends doing all sorts of disgusting things to women. Detective work isn’t really like that, you know.”

A faint frown line appeared on her forehead, as if she might be tumbling to the fact that I was putting her on; but then it smoothed away and she nodded seriously. She may not have been a dumb blonde, but she sure as hell was a credulous one.

But the joke had gone far enough; this was supposed to be a professional discussion. I said, “What was it you wanted to talk to me about, Mrs. Peterson?”

“My father. That photograph of him in the paper and my sister hiring you to find him.”

“You saw the photograph, did you?”

“Yes. I came into the city to do some shopping-I live in Sonoma-and I stopped for a drink afterward at the St. Francis. There was a copy of the Examiner in the lounge. Well, I called Arleen right away, and she told me she’d hired you to go up to Oroville and look for Dad.”

“And?”

“I think she made a mistake. I’m here because I’d like you to reconsider doing what she wants.”

“You mean you don’t want your father found?”

“ He doesn’t want to be found,” she said.

“Oh? How do you know that?”

“He told me as much himself. The last time I talked to him, before he went off to ride the rails.”

“I don’t think I understand.”

“You have to know Dad. Up until he lost his job with the government, he led a very uneventful life. I guess Arleen told you he’s always been fascinated by trains and by the hobo life. Well, losing his job gave him the chance to go ahead and do what he’d always dreamed about doing.”

“Being a hobo,” I said.

“Yes. Spending the rest of his life around trains. He doesn’t really care about money, you see. Not at all. Uncle Kenneth’s twenty thousand dollars wouldn’t matter to him if he knew about it; he’d go right on being a hobo.”

“He’s still entitled to it.”

“But he wouldn’t bother to claim it, that’s the point. He’d want Arleen and me to have it.”

“Your sister doesn’t seem to think so,” I said.

“Of course not.” She punched out her cigarette in the coffee-table ashtray. “Arleen… well, Arleen is strait-laced; she thinks she knows what’s best for everybody. She’s always tried to run my life and Dad’s. Frankly, he was fed up with her. That’s one of the two reasons he told me, and not Arleen, when he decided to go on the road.”

“What’s the other reason?”

“He knew I’d understand because I’ve always loved trains, too-anything to do with trains. I guess his interest in them rubbed off on me when I was a kid.”

“Have you had any contact with him over the past year and a half?”

“No. He wanted it that way.”

“Doesn’t that bother you?”

“Not really. We’ve never been close; closer than he and Arleen, but not tight. Anyhow, even if you went to Oroville and found him, he wouldn’t call her any more than he would try to claim his inheritance. He doesn’t want anything more to do with Arleen. He only wants to be left alone.”

“That ought to be his decision to make, don’t you think?”

“But he’s already made it,” she said. She sounded faintly exasperated, as if she were trying to get an obvious point across to somebody who wasn’t very bright. “He told me he never wanted to see or hear from Arleen again. It would only upset him if you found him and told him about Arleen seeing his photograph in the paper and hiring you. It wouldn’t do any of us any good.”

“Except maybe your sister.”

“Oh, damn my sister. She’s a frump and she’s made Dad’s life, and mine, miserable for years. You met her; can’t you see what kind of person she is?”

I had seen that, all right. And I saw what kind of person Hannah Peterson was, too. Five would get you ten she cared a hell of a lot less about her father than she cared about her half of the twenty-thousand-dollar bequest. And that she harbored the same deep-seated sibling hatred as Arleen had for her. They were quite a pair, these two. Maybe Charles Bradford would be better off if I didn’t find him and try to toss him back into the clutches of his offspring.

But that was not my decision to make. And I found it difficult to believe that Bradford would want Arleen and Hannah to have his twenty thousand dollars; he’d probably want to claim the money even if he never used it, just to keep them from getting their claws on it.

I said, “All of that may be true, Mrs. Peterson, but I don’t see that I can turn down the job just because you want me to.”

Her nostrils pinched up; she was starting to get angry. “If it’s the money I’ll pay you whatever amount Arleen is giving you-”

“It’s not the money,” I said. “If I go along with your wishes, what’s to stop your sister from hiring another detective?”

“You could always tell her you went to Oroville and you couldn’t find Dad. That would satisfy her.”

I shook my head. “I’m sorry, I can’t do it. I’ve already agreed to the job; it’s a matter of professional ethics-”

“Professional ethics!” she said, as if they were a couple of four-letter words. “I read about you in the paper, too. I know what kind you are.”

“You do, huh? I don’t think so, lady.”

“You bet I do.” She got to her feet, glaring at me; it was the kind of look that could cut a hole in a piece of steel. She was on the verge of throwing a tantrum. “You’re just like my sister-a nasty little piece of work who won’t listen to reason. I hope they take your license away again. I hope you go straight to hell.”

I stood up too. “Good-bye, Mrs. Peterson.”

“You damned fag!” she said, and stormed over to the door and went out and slammed it shut behind her, hard enough to shake the pulps on their shelves.

I sat down again. I was angry myself, but it didn’t last long. What was there to be angry about, after all? Hannah Peterson was a spoiled and greedy thirty-three-year-old sex object, and I had just stuck a pin in her balloon and deflated her. Score one for the side of manipulated males everywhere.