Росс Макдональд - The Far Side of the Dollar

“There’s no need to go into them. As you would say, the question is academic.”

“Did he attempt suicide?”

“No.”

“Homicide?”

His eyes flickered. “Certainly not.”

He changed the subject hurriedly: “We shouldn’t be standing here talking. If Thomas is alive, he’s got to be found. Harley is the one man who must know where he is, and you tell me Harley is probably on his way to Nevada.”

“He’s probably there by now.”

“Why aren’t you? I’d fly you myself if I could leave my wife. But you can charter a plane.”

I explained that this took money, of which I’d already spent a fair amount in his behalf.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t realize.”

He produced the two-thousand-dollar check that Dr. Sponti and Mr. Squerry had given him on Monday, and endorsed it to me. I was back in business.

STELLA, IN HER hooded bluejacket, was waiting for me part way down the driveway. The girl had a heavy pair of binoculars hung around her neck on a strap. Her face was bloodless and thin, as if it had provided sustenance for her eyes.

When I stopped the car, she climbed uninvited into the seat beside me. “I’ve been watching for you.”

“Is that what the field glasses are for?”

She nodded gravely. “I watch everybody who comes in or goes out of Tommy’s house. Mother thinks I’m bird-watching, which she lets me do because it’s a status-symbol activity. Actually I am doing a bird study for next year’s biology class, on the nesting habits of the acorn woodpeckers. Only they all look so much alike they’re hard to keep track of.”

“So are people.”

“I’m finding that out.”

She leaned toward me. Her small breast brushed my shoulder like a gift of trust. “But you know what, Mr. Archer? Tommy tried to call me this morning, I’m almost certain.”

“Tell me about it.”

“There isn’t much to tell, really. It was one of those calls with nobody on the other end of the line. My mother answered the phone, and that’s why Tommy didn’t speak. He wanted me to answer it.”

Her eyes were luminous with hope.

“What makes you think it was Tommy?”

“I just know it was. Besides, he called at five to eight, which is the exact same time he always used to call me in the morning. He used to pick me up and drive me to school.”

“That isn’t too much to go on, Stella. More likely it was a wrong number.”

“No. I believe it was Tommy. And he’ll be trying again.”

“Why would he call you instead of his parents?”

“He’s probably afraid to call them. He must be in serious trouble.”

“You can be sure of that, one way or another.”

I was only trying to moderate her hopefulness, but I frightened her. She said in a hushed voice: “You’ve found out something.”

“Nothing definite. We’re on the track of the kidnapper. And incidentally, I have to be on my way.”

She held me with her eyes. “He really was kidnapped then? He didn’t go to them of his own accord or anything like that?”

“He may have in the first place. After that, I don’t know. Did Tommy ever mention a woman named Carol?”

“The woman who was killed?”

“Yes.”

“He never did. Why? Did he know her?”

“He knew her very well.”

She caught my implication and shook her head. “I don’t believe it.”

“That doesn’t prevent it from being true, Stella. Didn’t you ever see them together?”

I got out my collection of pictures and selected the one that Harold Harley had taken of Carol in 1945. The girl studied it. She said with something like awe in her voice: “She’s– she was very beautiful. She couldn’t have been much older than I am.”

“She wasn’t, when the picture was taken. But that was a long time ago, and you should make allowances for that.”

“I’ve never seen her. I’m sure. And Tommy never said a word about her.”

She looked at me glumly. “People are hard to keep track of.”

She handed me the picture as if it was heavy and hot and would spill if it was tilted.

At this point a female moose deprived of her calf, or something closely resembling her, came crashing through the oak woods. It was Stella’s mother. Her handsome red head was tousled and her face was brutalized by anxiety. She spotted Stella and charged around to her side of the car. Stella turned up the window and snapped the lock.

Rhea Carlson rapped on the glass with her fist. “Come out of there. What do you think you’re doing?”

“Talking to Mr. Archer.”

“You must be crazy. Are you trying to ruin yourself?”

“I don’t care what happens to me, that’s true.”

“You have no right to talk like that. You’re ungrateful!”

“Ungrateful for what?”

“I gave you life, didn’t I? Your father and I have given you everything.”

“I don’t want everything. I just want to be alone, Mother.”

“No! You come out of there.”

“I don’t have to.”

“Yes you do,” I said.

Stella looked at me as if I had betrayed her to the enemy.

“She’s your mother,” I said, “and you’re a minor, and if you don’t obey her you’re out of control, and I’m contributing to the delinquency of a minor.”

“You are?”

“Reluctantly,” I said.

The word persuaded her. She even gave me a little half-smile. Then she unlocked the door and climbed out of the car. I got out and walked around to their side. Rhea Carlson looked at me as if I might be on the point of assaulting her.

“Calm down, Mrs. Carlson. Nothing’s happened.”

“Oh? Would you know?”

“I know that no harm will ever come to Stella if I’m around. May I ask you a question?”

She hesitated. “I won’t promise to answer it.”

“You received a phone call this morning at five to eight. Was it local or long distance?”

“I don’t know. Most of our long-distance calls are dialed direct.”

“Was anything said?”

“I said hello.”

“I mean on the other end of the line.”

“No. Not a word.”

“Did whoever it was hang up?”

“Yes, and I’m sure it wasn’t the Hillman boy. It was just another stupid mistake in dialing. We get them all the time.”

“It was so Tommy,” Stella said. “I know it.”

“Don’t believe her. She’s always making things up.”

“I am not.”

Stella looked ready to cry.

“Don’t contradict me, Stella. Why do you always have to contradict me?”

“I don’t.”

“You do.”

I stepped between them. “Your daughter’s a good girl, and she’s almost a woman. Please try to bear that in mind, and treat her gently.”

Mrs. Carlson said in scornful desperation: “What do you know about mothers and daughters? Who are you, anyway?”

“I’ve been a private detective since the war. In the course of time you pick up a few primitive ideas about people, and you develop an instinct for the good ones. Like Stella.”

Stella blushed. Her mother peered at me without understanding. In my rear-view mirror, as I started away, I saw them walking down the driveway, far apart. It seemed a pity. For all I knew, Rhea Carlson was a good girl, too.

I drove downtown, and took Sponti’s two-thousand-dollar check to the bank it was drawn on. I endorsed it, under Ralph Hillman’s signature: “With many thanks, Lew Archer.”

It was a weak riposte for being fired, but it gave me some satisfaction to think that it might bring out the purple in Dr. Sponti’s face.

The transfusion of cash made me feel mobile and imaginative. Just on a hunch, I drove back to Harold Harley’s place in Long Beach. It was a good hunch. Lila answered the door.