Dell Shannon - Mark of Murder

Andrews made an incredulous sound. "Five G's? For a lock-picking job? I've run into a lot in that trade, but I never heard of prices like that."

"No, it does seem a bit steep. Well, anyway, for whatever reason, he's thinking it might be very profitable to set himself up in that trade. He's inexperienced, and he sees right away that the main difficulty is publicity. The right kind of publicity. And-I suppose the Sally-Ann business got press coverage-one morning he opens his paper, and lo, here's mention of a woman who's recently been involved in such a business, and reading between the lines he could make out that it's only for lack of evidence you're not holding her. Very likely her address was given-it usually is. I'll have to check with the papers. But, yes, I can see him waiting for the all-clear until he saw she'd been released without charges, and then going to see her and propositioning her. Another little piece of the puzzle, explaining how they could have got together. Well, this fills in a little, thanks very much."

"Good luck on it," said Andrews through another yawn.

He got back to his office just in time to take Alison's call. When he heard her voice he found he was gripping the phone too hard, and felt a sudden constriction in his chest. "Luis-Luis darling-they just called, the hospital I mean-"

"Yes, amada."

"They think he's just a little better! Oh, the nurse was awfully cautious and-you know-roundabout, and said it didn't mean he'll be all right, he could easily have a relapse-you know how they are-but his blood pressure's up a little and his pulse is better. I didn't know if they'd call you, and I- But it's got to mean-"

"Yes," he said. "Good news. We don't know whether it meansThanks, querida… "

He'd just put the phone down when Palliser came in, smiling. "The hospital just called, he's better, his pulse-"

"I know. But they're still not waving any flags. And there's the other question."

"Yes, there's that. But it's something."

"Something," said Mendoza. "And the more I think about that, the more-confusing-it looks. How the hell did it happen, let alone why? I don't know-" He passed a hand over his forehead. "Like to take a little ride with me before lunch?"

The first difficulty about it was, he thought, how had Art been put down~and out? If it had been Elger, no question there; so, on one like Elger, if he'd had reason to suspect him, Hackett would have been watchful-but Elger was enough bigger to have taken him.

But anybody else they knew of in either case would scarcely be a match for Hackett. Larry Webster was big, and he might be tough, but the women… Of course there was that truck-driver husband of one of Nestor's girl friends; he ought to go and see her, get what details on that he could.

And he hadn't asked the Elgers where they'd been on Tuesday night.

Cliff Elger, who had the hell of a temper. And also a reputation and a good business, which he'd want to protect.

"Just ahead," said Palliser beside him. "Stop here."

Mendoza pulled up the Ferrari and they got out. "We can probably see some traces," said Palliser. He led Mendoza up thirty feet and pointed silently.

This road wound up into the hills above Hollywood, through one of many little canyons. The lots were cut out of the hillside, and many of the houses looked down on the road from twenty or thirty feet up; a good many of them were set back, behind trees, fifty or sixty feet. Here and there the hill at one side or the other fell away, and dropped rather abruptly down to a tiny box canyon. There had been a cycle of dry winters, and the underbrush looked scrubby and brown-tall wild grass, a little sage, wild flowering shrubs. Few trees; these foothills didn't grow many trees except those deliberately planted.

At the roadside here, above a steep drop of several hundred feet, there were still traces in the loose earth where they'd taken casts of the tire marks. Some of the marks still showed. Palliser led him across the road and showed him others-the wheel marks of a car pointed straight across the road toward that drop. There had been a two-bar post and rail fence, and about ten feet of it was carried away. It had never been intended as a barrier, being only a couple of feet high; white-painted, it was meant for a guideline at night. No street lights up here, and not every house had a light by its drive.

Where the Ford had gone over, a great swath was cut in the underbrush, ending about two hundred feet down where a young pepper tree had been violently uprooted. "If that hadn't stopped him," said Palliser, "he'd have gone on down another hundred feet. God. And the ignition on-it could have gone up like--"

"Yes. Maybe that was intended," said Mendoza. "X wouldn't have noticed that tree in the dark." He looked around. The nearest house was just a glimpsed roofline about fifty yards away. "We've been very glib about this," he said slowly.

"I don't get you."

"Well, _in the first place, this is something very damned unusual," said Mendoza. "Not a cop getting attacked, but getting attacked in this way. Why did it happen?"

"He found out something on--"

"Yes, I know we said that. But, so he did, and X somehow managed to put him down and out. Why did X go to some trouble to fake this accident?"

"Because, obviously-"

"How much easier it would have been simply to-well, for instance, bash him again until X was sure he was dead, and leave him in the handiest dark street. Or-well, the point is, to start with, this is probably a long way from wherever the first attack happened-"

"Which is probably why," Palliser pointed out.

"Yes, that could be. What's in my mind," said Mendoza, "is a funny little discrepancy. Look, John. After the initial attack, wherever and whyever and however it was made, X could have disassociated himself in several much easier ways. He didn't need to make it look like an accident in order to disassociate himself. As I say, he could have bashed Art's head in, left him in an alley, to make it look like a mugger. But he went to all this trouble instead. What does that say?"

"He's overcautious?" guessed Palliser, following slowly.

"I don't see what-"

"We said, to disassociate himself, he set up this faked accident. lf he was working alone, he went to quite a little trouble on it. Another thing, was there any reason he picked this particular road? Was he familiar with it, for some reason? It'd be lonely and dark, but I don't think it's the kind of road to appeal to neckers, somehow… Quite a little trouble. He'd have to drive up here, from wherever it happened. Stage the accident. Then he'd have to walk down, in the dark, to where he could pick up a bus-because he wouldn't have risked a cab, he might be remembered if we ever did ask-though at that he might have, considering. And you know, John, if it was after ten-thirty or so, there wouldn't be any buses running. Except a very occasional one to L.A.-I'll look it up-only about two between midnight and 6 AM., I think."

"Well…" said Palliser. He didn't get what was bothering Mendoza. Mendoza with quite a reputation as the smart boy, but for the first time Palliser got what Hackett meant when he said that Mendoza had a tortuous mind, looked for complexities and imagined subtleties where they didn't exist.

Mendoza got out a cigarette and lit it, carefully stepping on the match to bury it in loose earth. "I will grant you," he said, "that anybody wanting to set up a fake accident around here would be likely to think right off of a car going over a cliff. Brakes failing, or a moment's inattention, on a lot of roads around here… My own first thought would be, somewhere up in Griffith Park. But it's the summer season, the Greek Theater's open, and there'd be crowds up there, maybe to notice something. Or maybe, as I say, he knew this road for some reason."