Max Collins - Angel in black

Something close to tenderness crept into her hard-edged voice. “Dr. Dailey is a gentle soul… He’d never do such a thing…”

“In his right mind, you mean?”

She said nothing.

“Listen, Maria-he wouldn’t do it in his wrong mind, either. You’ve been scammed.”

Now she looked at me-startled. “What?”

“Lloyd… I mean, ‘Floyd’… convinced you that he came in here, one night, and discovered what Dr. Dailey had done, right?”

“How… what…?”

“Work with me on this. I’m here to help. Tell me, Doctor. Maria-tell me.”

She shook her head, heaved a big sigh of smoke. “He… Floyd said he came in on the… grisly aftermath. He said he helped Wallace cart the body out… even admitted helping to cut her in half. Said he’d tried to make it look like a… sex crime… to help throw off the police. But Floyd was too new in the office to know that where Wallace suggested the body be disposed of was near his own home.”

I laughed, and she flinched.

I said, “I figured you’d been led to believe some line of horse hockey like that. It’s not true, Dr. Winter. Floyd is Lloyd, by the way, Lloyd Watterson… Lloyd butchered that girl… Your gifted assistant abortionist is a former mental patient known to have committed at least thirteen torso murders back in Ohio.”

“You must be joking…”

“Yeah, I’m joking. This has been a lighthearted afternoon all the way ’round.”

She was weaving in the chair. “My God… can it… is it… true?”

“It can, it is-true.” I gestured toward the door with cigarette in hand. “My friend out there is a former Ohio police official who is helping Lloyd’s well-connected family see that he’s returned to a mental institution, and committed for life.”

Hope leapt into the dark eyes. “And if that happened…”

“That’s right, Maria-then the LAPD would not be involved, nor would the papers. You and Dr. Dailey would be untouched by this scandal.”

Now her eyes no longer avoided mine-rather, searched them. “What do you need from me?”

“I need you to get that fingerless son of a bitch ready to travel by train.”

“When?”

“The sooner the better.”

Her eyes tightened. She stabbed her cigarette out in a jade-green tray. “Done,” she said, rising.

In the hallway, I found Eliot standing outside the operating room, just as Dr. Winter was heading in. I caught a glimpse of Lloyd seated on the abortion table, looking pale, in shock or sedated or both, his right hand bundled in gauze and adhesive, with four side-by-side spots of blood leaching through where his fingers used to be.

“Looks like Lloyd’ll never play the piano again,” I said to Eliot.

“They’ve got him pretty well patched up,” he said. “Since when do you smoke?”

“Only when I get nostalgic for Jap bayonets. Look, Dr. Winter’s going to cooperate with us-Lloyd’ll be ready to travel.”

“When?”

“Soon. Very soon.”

“Today?”

“Now. I’ll help you haul him to the train station, but I have loose ends to attend, so you’ll have to make the trip alone. Shouldn’t be a problem-Lloyd’ll be pumped so full of morphine, he should be nice and cooperative… I’ll see you in a few weeks-at the wedding.”

Eliot smiled, shook his head, as if he were amazed, for some reason. “Thank you, Nate.”

“For what? Not killing that bastard?”

“Yes. And if they ever let Lloyd out of that asylum?”

“Yeah?”

“When we take him out into the desert,” Eliot said, a hand on my shoulder, “I will bring the shovel.”

I didn’t have the heart to tell my friend Eliot Ness that the real reason I hadn’t killed Watterson was that Lloyd’s friend Arnold Wilson had wanted me to.

The bright lights of Hollywood Boulevard took on a shimmering radiance, neon burning in the coolness of dusk, the hard, unpleasant edges of an ugly one-industry town blurred into blemish-free beauty. Like an aging screen queen with a great makeup artist, a gauze-draped key light, and a Vaseline-smeared camera lens, Hollywood didn’t look half bad.

The little neighborhood around the corner from Grauman’s Chinese also benefited from twilight’s gentle touch, seeming even more idyllic, with its pastel stucco bungalows, nicely trimmed lawns, and scattering of palms and pepper trees, with flower gardens whose blossoms glowed vividly in the gathering darkness, lights struggling not to go out.

I parked in the driveway, purposely blocking it, and trotted up the winding walk to the two-story red-tile-roof pink stucco two-flat. I pressed the button and, on the third try, its little electric-chair buzz summoned an answer.

Framed there in the doorway, Patsy Savarino-her red hair tumbling to her shoulders, her mouth lushly lipsticked, the huge green almond eyes emphasized with matching eyeshadow-was proof positive that a woman eight months gone could still look alluring. The former stripper-though small in stature, she’d been voluptuous even before her pregnancy-wore a yellow-and-green abstract-pattern print maternity top and pedal-pusher denims. She was in her bare feet.

“If you’re looking for my husband,” she said, guardedly, “he’s not here.”

“Any of his pals over here? Your upstairs neighbors, maybe?”

“The Hassaus moved out.”

“That was quick.”

“This morning.” She began to shut the door. “I’m alone here and you’re not coming in.”

“Sure I am,” I said, pushing my way in, stepping past her, into the vestibule, at the foot of the stairs to the second-floor flat. It took more than an expectant mother to stop this detective.

Her eyes were wide with indignation-and perhaps a little fear. “Mr. Heller, you’ll have to leave!”

I shut the door and took out the nine-millimeter, to encourage her cooperation, and her fright. But the lush red lips only sneered at me. “Do you often threaten pregnant women?”

“I think this may be a first.” I nodded toward the living room with its array of new, mismatched furniture. “How about your friend Arnold Wilson?”

Her arms were folded over her bosom and her chin was high-for some reason, she reminded me of a barroom bouncer. “Who says he’s my friend?”

“Is he here?”

“Of course not.”

I gestured with the nine-millimeter. “We’re going to have a look around.”

“Are we?”

I took her by the arm and dragged her along-“Hey! Lemme go, you bastard!”-checking every room of the eclectically furnished flat, finding no Bobby Savarino or Arnold Wilson or anyone else. The master bedroom closet was bare, nothing but hangers and a couple empty shoeboxes; the dresser was half-emptied. No male clothing at all.

She stood sullenly in the doorway, leaning back against the jamb, folded arms resting on breasts that had been formidable even before they began revving up for the coming child.

I turned to her. “You have an upstairs key?”

“What if I don’t?”

“I’ll kick the fucking door in.”

She sighed. “Yes, I have a key.”

“Can you handle those stairs all right?”

“Do I have a choice?”

I shrugged. “I can leave you down here tied.”

She grunted a humorless laugh. “Would that be another first, Mr. Heller?”

“No, I just did it the other day-Oh, with a pregnant woman? I believe so.”

Soon, she was dragging her ass up the stairs-albeit a nicely shaped one in the denim slacks, and her legs didn’t look heavy, either; the former No-Pasties-for-Patsy still had pride in her appearance, and hadn’t allowed herself to gain any excess weight, beyond the kid she was carrying.

She unlocked the door and showed me in, and around, the Hassaus’ apartment. The lights weren’t on but they weren’t needed-what was left of the afternoon sun was finding its way through windows whose drapes had been removed. The entire place was fairly emptied out, only a few larger pieces of furniture remaining, chiefly a Colonial-style maple china cabinet in the dining room and a big walnut-trimmed wine-velour overstuffed sofa in the living room.