Ace Atkins - Devil’s garden

“Fishback?” Sam asked. “Hell of a name.”

“Who else?” Geauque asked.

“His chauffeur and his dog, Luke.”

“I once saw him in a picture where that dog could climb a ladder,” Sam said. “I didn’t believe it.”

“You a fan of Mr. Arbuckle?”

“I’ve always been partial to Wallace Reid. My grandmother said I favored him.”

“No need to worry about Sherman and Fishback,” Dominguez said. “They can testify to Mr. Arbuckle’s behavior and to the fact that he was alone with Miss Rappe for only ten minutes. At no time did they ever hear screaming or violent sounds coming from the room.”

“Who else was there?” Geauque asked.

“Mainly a bunch of floozies and showgirls and the like. A nightgown salesman named Fortlouis. Some fella named Kingstone we can’t find.”

“Doc Kingstone?” Sam asked. “He’s a boxing promoter. Met him down at the Wonderland on fight night. You have the names of the girls?”

“Well, there’s Maude Delmont. Mr. Geauque has a copy of the complaint signed. She said the Rappe woman told her that Mr. Arbuckle had forced himself on her and, in doing so, crushed her.”

“What do we know about Delmont?” Geauque asked.

“Not a thing.”

“The Rappe girl?”

“Typical Hollywood chippie. The papers have been calling her a starlet, but I can’t find a soul in Los Angeles who can name a picture she’s been in.”

“She and Arbuckle friendly?” Sam asked.

“Mr. Arbuckle said he didn’t even discover Miss Rappe was in his room until he’d finished taking a shower. She’d passed out by the toilet.”

“How’d she get to the bed?”

“Mr. Arbuckle said he carried her.”

“Other witnesses?” Geauque asked.

“Cops are looking for a couple of showgirls who were in the room when Miss Rappe made the statement to Maude Delmont. About Roscoe hurting her.”

“Names?” Sam asked. He opened his tweed coat for a little notepad and pencil.

“Alice Blake. Zey Prevon or Prevost-something like that. Roscoe said one of the girls, Miss Blake, worked at a joint called Tait’s. You know it?”

“Sure,” Sam said.

“This Prevon or Prevost woman worked as a cigarette girl somewhere.”

“I’m on it,” Sam said. And the men turned away from each other, but Sam stayed by the door until Geauque turned back and caught Sam’s eyes.

Geauque showed him the palm of his right hand and nodded. “Of course.” He reached into his desk drawer and pulled out a check ledger, writing one out to Sam for a week’s advance.

“How’s Jose?” he asked.

“Big as a house.”

MAUDE DELMONT HADN’T LEFT the St. Francis except to visit Virginia once at Wakefield Sanitorium before the poor girl died. She’d told the day manager she just didn’t have the energy to change hotels and he instantly started an account to pay for all her room service and phone charges, as she called down to Los Angeles every other hour looking for that rat bastard Al Semnacher. She ordered room service a lot, had her two outfits laundered daily, and read stories in The Call, the Examiner, and the Chronicle about a producer she knew named Henry Lehrman calling Arbuckle a beast for what he’d done to Henry’s poor sweetheart. He said if he came face-to-face with Fatty, he’d kill him.

That was a riot. Last she’d known, Lehrman wouldn’t answer a single cable Virginia sent to New York.

That afternoon Maude lay on the thick feathered mattress in a black housecoat-thinking black was a nice touch when she had the doorman go out and fetch some items for her-with one arm draped across her eyes, the Victrola from the party now in her room but this time playing a slow funeral dirge and some other kinds of depressing music, mainly opera. She really liked the stuff from Tosca, and the bellman told her they were going to do a performance of the opera in a couple weeks, it being opera season and all.

Maude thought San Francisco was some kind of town to actually have a goddamn season for opera.

An hour later, two cops stood at the foot of her bed. Another one stood by the hotel door. A big woman in a big blue wool sweater and big skirt down past her ankles. She wore a woman’s version of a police hat pinned to her head and kept a little brown purse clutched to her side, where she probably kept her gun.

The cops, Griff Kennedy and Tom Reagan, introduced her as Katherine Eisenhart.

“Now, these two girls, were they friends of yours?” Kennedy asked.

“No.”

“Had you met them before Mr. Arbuckle’s party?”

“No.”

“Were they with Miss Rappe before she went to room 1219?” Tom Reagan asked.

“Yes,” Maude said, dropping the arm from her eyes. “Yes. They were admiring her dress and hair. I remember that.”

“What about after?”

“When I beat down the door?”

“When you said you knocked on the door,” Reagan said.

“Hammered with all my might against that beastly lock?”

Kennedy looked to Reagan and Reagan back to Kennedy and, for the life of her, Maude could barely tell the two thick Irishmen apart except that Kennedy-or Griff, as he said-had red hair and Reagan’s hair was blond, and Reagan’s head looked like some kind of melon.

“Do you know where we can find these young ladies?” Kate Eisenhart asked, stepping away from the door and out of the shadows. A window was open in the hotel room and they could hear the high tinny squawk of horns and the clanging of the cable cars out on Powell. The curtains blew slightly in the breeze.

“No.”

“What about Mr. Semnacher?” Eisenhart asked.

“I don’t know what’s become of Mr. Semnacher. He left shortly after Miss Rappe became ill.”

“Did he speak to Miss Rappe after she became sick?” Reagan asked.

“Did he know Miss Rappe well?” Kennedy asked.

“Did he see the girl sick in 1219?” Kate Eisenhart asked.

Maude Delmont tossed her head from side to side on the pillow and groaned. “My head feels like it’s going to explode. All these questions and I’ve yet to put my best friend in the world in the ground. Can’t I mourn for her?”

Kennedy looked over to Reagan. Reagan walked to the open window looking out over Union Square and the Spanish-American War Monument.

Kate Eisenhart sat on the bed and there was a noticeable shift in the mattress as she felt Maude’s forehead and traced the line of her jaw with the tips of her stubby man fingers. Maude smiled up at the big woman and the woman’s cheeks flushed.

“Did anyone else hear Miss Rappe say that Roscoe Arbuckle had hurt her?”

“Just the girls.”

“Alice and Zey?” Reagan said.

“Yes.”

“But you don’t know them?” Reagan asked.

“No.”

“And you don’t know where to find them?” Kennedy said from the window.

“One of them sang at a speakeasy. I don’t know what the Zey girl did. To be honest, she was the less attractive of the two, although I think she fancied herself as an actress.”

Maude watched the two men grow restless and play with their felt hats in their hands, kneading the wool and exchanging glances, and all Maude wanted was for room service to arrive with her lamb chops with mashed potatoes and a cherry tart on the side.

Maude closed her eyes and opened them again, and Kate Eisenhart was smiling at her, and, from the big weight on the bed, Maude could feel the policewoman’s breathing grow heavy and labored whenever she met her eye. The thick roll of fat under Kate’s jaw trembled a bit.

“Now, now. I know what it’s like to lose a friend. I bet you can’t even eat.”

“No, ma’am.”

“Tom, Griff-you two skedaddle. I’ll stay with this poor creature.”