Ross Macdonald - The drowning pool

If you didn’t look at her face she was less than thirty, quick-bodied and slim as a girl. Her clothing drew attention to the fact: a tailored sharkskin suit and high heels that tensed her nylon-shadowed calves. But there was a pull of worry around her eyes and drawing at her mouth. The eyes were deep blue, with a sort of double vision. They saw you clearly, took you in completely, and at the same time looked beyond you. They had years to look back on, and more things to see in the years than a girl’s eyes had. About thirty-five, I thought, and still in the running.

She stood in the doorway without speaking long enough for me to think those things. Her teeth were nibbling the inside of her upper lip, and both of her hands were clutching her black suede bag at the level of her waist. I let the silence stretch out. She had knocked and I had opened the door. Undecided or not, she couldn’t expect me to lift her over the threshold. She was a big girl now, and she had come for a reason. Her stance was awkward with urgency.

“Mr. Archer?” she said at last.

“Yes. Will you come in.”

“Thank you. Forgive me for hanging back. It must make you feel like a dentist.”

“Everybody hates detectives and dentists. We hate them back.”

“Not really? Actually, I’ve never been to a dentist.” She smiled as if to illustrate the point, and gave me her hand in a free gesture. It was hard and brown. “ Or a detective.”

I placed her in the soft chair by the window. She didn’t mind the light. Her hair was its natural brown, without a fleck of gray that I could see. Her face was clear and brown. I wondered if she was clear and brown all over.

“What tooth is bothering you, Mrs.—?”

“Excuse me. My name is Maude Slocum. I always forget my manners when I’m upset.”

She was much too apologetic for a woman with that figure, in those clothes. “Look,” I said “I am rhinoceros-skinned and iron-hearted. I’ve been doing divorce work in L.A. for ten years. If you can tell me anything I haven’t heard, I’ll donate a week’s winnings at Santa Anita to any worthy charity.”

“And can you whip your weight in wildcats, Mr. Archer?”

“Wildcats terrify me, but people are worse.”

“I know what you mean.” The fine white teeth were tugging again at the warm mouth. “I used to think, when I was younger, that people were willing to live and let live—you know? Now I’m not so sure.”

“You didn’t come here this morning, though, to discuss morals in the abstract. Did you have a specific example in mind?”

She answered after a pause: “Yes. I had a shock yesterday.” She looked close into my face, and then beyond. Her eyes were as deep as the sea beyond Catalina. “Someone is trying to destroy me.”

“Kill you, you mean?”

“Destroy the things I care about. My husband, my family, my home.” The rhythm of her voice faltered and ceased. “It’s dreadfully hard to tell you, the thing is so underhanded.”

Here we go again, I said to myself. True confession morning, featuring Archer the unfrocked priest. “I should have gone to City College and been a dentist and gone in for something easy and painless like pulling teeth. If you rally need my help, you’ll have to tell me what with. Did someone send you here?”

“You were recommended. I know a—man who does police work. He said you were honest, and discreet.”

“Unusual thing for a cop to say about me. Would you care to mention his name?”

“No, I wouldn’t.” The very suggestion seemed to alarm her. Her fingers tightened on the black suede bag. “He doesn’t know about this.”

“Neither do I. I don’t expect I ever will.” I let a smile go with it, and offered her a cigarette. She puffed on it without relish, but it seemed to relax her a little.

“Damn it.” She coughed once over the smoke. “Here I’ve been up all night, trying to make up my mind, and I still haven’t made it up. On one knows, you see. It’s hard to bring myself to tell anyone else. One acquires the habit of silence, after sixteen years.”

“Sixteen years? I thought it happened yesterday.”

She colored. “Oh, it did. I was simply thinking of how long I’d been married. This has a good deal to do with my marriage.”

“So I gather. I’m good at guessing-games.”

“I’m sorry. I don’t mean to offend you or insult you.” Her contriteness was unexpected in a woman of her class. It didn’t go with hundred-dollar suits. “It isn’t that I think you’ll spread it around, or try to blackmail me—”

“Is somebody else trying to blackmail you?”

The question startled her so that she jumped. She recrossed her legs and leaned forward in the chair. “I don’t know. I haven’t any idea.”

“Then we’re even.” I took an envelope out of the top drawer of my desk, opened it, and began to read the mimeographed enclosure. It informed me that the chances were one in three that I’d enter a hospital within the year, that I couldn’t afford to be unprotected by health insurance, and that he who hesitates is lost. “He who hesitates is lost,” I said aloud.

“You’re making fun of me, Mr. Archer. But just what is the arrangement? If you take the case, you’ll naturally be governed by my interests. But if you don’t, and I’ve told you about this thing, can I trust you to forget it?”

I let my irritation show in my voice, and this time I didn’t smile, or even grimace. “Let’s both forget it. You’re wasting my time, Mrs. Slocum.”

“I know I am.” There was self-disgust in her tone, more than there should have been. “This thing has been a physical blow to me, a blow from behind.” Then she spoke with sudden decision, and opened her bag with taut white fingers: “I suppose I must let you see it. I can’t just go home now and sit and wait for another one.”

I looked at the letter she handed me. It was short and to the point, without heading or signature:

Dear Mr. Slocum:

Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds. Can you possibly enjoy playing the role of a complaisant cuckold? Or are you strangely unaware of your wife’s amorous activities?

The message was typed on a sheet of cheap white typing paper that had been folded to the size of a small envelope. “Is there an envelope to go with this?”

“Yes.” She rummaged in her purse, and handed me a crumpled white envelope, which was addressed to James Slocum, Esq., Trail Road, Nopal Valley, California. The postmark was clear: Quinto, Calif., July 18.

“This is Wednesday,” I said. “It was mailed Monday. Do you know people in Quinto?”

“Everybody.” She managed a strained smile. “It’s only a few miles from Nopal Valley, where we live. But I haven’t the faintest notion who could have sent it.”

“Or why?”

“I have enemies, I suppose. Most people have.”

“I take it your husband hasn’t seen it. James Slocum is your husband?”

“Yes. He hasn’t seen it. He was busy in Quinto when it came. I usually bicycle down to the mailbox, anyway.”

“Is he in business in Quinto?”

“Not in business. He’s very active in the Quinto Players—it’s a semi-professional theatrical group. They’re rehearsing every afternoon this week—”

I cut her short: “Do you usually read your husband’s mail?”

“Yes, I do. We read each other’s—I hardly expected to be cross-questioned, Mr. Archer.”

“One more question. Is the allegation true?”

The blood coursed under the clear skin of her face, and her eyes brightened. “I can’t be expected to answer that.”