Росс Макдональд - The Far Side of the Dollar

“I’m surprised Harley didn’t shoot him.”

“I gather there were professional guns around. Harley was never more than a semi-pro.”

“Why then?” Bastian said, his eyebrows arched. “Why was Harley killed if it wasn’t for money?”

“I don’t think we’ll know until we put our finger on the killer.”

“Do you have any nominations?” he said.

“No. Do you?”

“I have some thoughts on the subject, but I’d better not think them out loud.”

“Because I’m working for Hillman?”

“I didn’t say that.”

His dark eyes veiled themselves, and he changed the subject. “A man named Robert Brown, the victim’s father, was here asking for you. He’s at the City Hotel.”

“I’ll look him up tomorrow. Treat him gently, eh?”

“I treat ’em all gently. Harold Harley called me a few minutes ago. He’s taking his brother’s death hard.”

“He would. When did you let him go?”

“Yesterday. We had no good reason to hold him in custody. There’s no law that says you have to inform on your own brother.”

“Is he back home in Long Beach?”

“Yes. He’ll be available for the trial, if there’s anybody left to prosecute.”

He was needling me about the death of Otto Sipe. On that note I left.

I made a detour up the coast highway on the way to my appointment with Dr. Weintraub, and stopped at Ben Daly’s service station. Ben was there by the pump, with a bandage around his head. When he saw me he went into the office and didn’t come out. A boy who looked like a teenaged version of Ben emerged after a while. He asked in an unfriendly way if there was anything he could do for me.

“I’d like to talk to Mr. Daly for a minute.”

“I’m sorry. Dad doesn’t want to talk to you. He’s very upset, about this morning.”

“So am I. Tell him that. And ask him if he’ll look at a picture for identification purposes.”

The boy went into the office, closing the door behind him. Across the roaring highway, the Barcelona Hotel asserted itself in the sunlight like a monument of a dead civilization. In the driveway I could see a number of county cars, and a man in deputy’s uniform keeping back a crowd of onlookers.

Daly’s boy came back with a grim look on his face. “Dad says he doesn’t want to look at any more of your pictures. He says you and your pictures brought him bad luck.”

“Tell him I’m sorry.”

The boy retreated formally, like an emissary. He didn’t show himself again, and neither did his father. I gave up on Daly for the present.

Dr. Weintraub’s office was in one of the new medical buildings on Wilshire, near Cedars of Lebanon Hospital. I went up in a self-service elevator to a waiting room on the fifth floor. This was handsomely furnished in California Danish and had soothing music piped in, which got on my nerves before I had time to sit down. Two pregnant women on opposite sides of the room caught me, a mere man, in a crossfire of pitying glances.

The highly made-up girl behind the counter in one corner said: “Mr. Archer?”

“Yes.”

“Dr. Weintraub will see you in a few minutes. You’re not a patient, are you? So we needn’t bother taking your history, need we?”

“It would give you the horrors, honey.”

She moved her eyelashes up and down a few times, to indicate shocked surprise. Her eyelashes were long and thick and phony, and they waved clumsily in the air like tarantula legs.

Dr. Weintraub opened a door and beckoned me into his consulting room. He was a man about my age, perhaps a few years older. Like a lot of other doctors, he hadn’t looked after himself. His shoulders were stooped under his white smock, and he was putting on weight. The curly black hair was retreating from his forehead.

But the dark eyes behind his glasses were extraordinarily alive. I could practically feel their impact as we shook hands. I recognized his face, but I couldn’t place it.

“You look as though you could use a rest,” he said. “That’s free advice.”

“Thanks. It will have to come later.”

I didn’t tell him he needed exercise.

He sat down rather heavily at his desk, and I took the patient’s chair facing him. One whole wall of the room was occupied by bookshelves. The books seemed to cover several branches of medicine, with special emphasis on psychiatry and gynecology.

“Are you a psychiatrist, doctor?”

“No, I am not.”

His eyes were melancholy. “I studied for the Boards at one time but then the war came along. Afterwards I chose another specialty, delivering babies.”

He smiled, and his eyes lit up. “It’s so very satisfying, and the incidence of success is so very much higher. I mean, I seldom lose a baby.”

“You delivered Thomas Hillman.”

“Yes. I told you so on the telephone.”

“Have you refreshed your memory about the date?”

“I had my secretary look it up. Thomas was born on December 12, 1945. A week later, on December 20 to be exact, I arranged for the baby’s adoption by Captain and Mrs. Ralph Hillman. He made a wonderful Christmas present for them,” he said warmly.

“How did his real mother feel about it?”

“She didn’t want him,” he said.

“Wasn’t she married?”

“As a matter of fact, she was a young married woman. Neither she nor her husband wanted a child at that time.”

“Are you willing to tell me their name?”

“It wouldn’t be professional, Mr. Archer.”

“Not even to help solve a crime, or find a missing boy?”

“I’d have to know all the facts, and then have time to consider them. I don’t have time. I’m stealing time from my other– from my patients now.”

“You haven’t heard from Thomas Hillman this week?”

“Neither this week nor any other time.”

He got up bulkily and moved past me to the door, where he waited with courteous impatience till I went out past him.

WITH ITS PORTICO supported by fluted columns, the front of Susanna’s apartment house was a cross between a Greek temple and a Southern plantation mansion. It was painted blue instead of white. Diminished by the columns, I went into the cold marble lobby. Miss Drew was out. She had been out all day.

I looked at my watch. It was nearly five. The chances were she had gone to work after her breakfast with Hillman. I went out and sat in my car at the curb and watched the rush-hour traffic crawling by.

Shortly after five a yellow cab veered out of the traffic stream and pulled up behind my car. Susanna got out. I went up to her as she was paying the driver. She dropped a five-dollar bill when she saw me. The driver scooped it up.

“I’ve been hoping you’d come to see me, Lew,” she said without much conviction. “Do come in.”

She had trouble fitting her key into the lock. I helped her. Her handsome central room appeared a little shabby to my eyes, like a stage set where too many scenes had been enacted. Even the natural light at the windows, the fading afternoon light, seemed stale and secondhand.

She flung herself down on a sofa, her fine long legs sprawling. “I’m bushed. Make yourself a drink.”

“I couldn’t use one. There’s a long night ahead.”

“That sounds ominous. Make me one then. Make me a journey to the End of the Night cocktail, with a dash of henbane. Or just dip me a cup of Lethe, that will do.”

“You’re tired.”

“I’ve been working all day. For men must weep and women must work, though the harbor bar be moaning.”

“If you’ll be quiet for a bit, I want to talk to you seriously.”

“What fun.”

“Shut up.”

I made her a drink and brought it to her. She sipped it. “Thank you, Lew. You’re really a dear man.”