County Kill Read online

  Committed, now. Bigmouth Callahan. No fee, no retainer, no sense, no anything but my big mouth and the faith of a dirty-faced kid with family trouble.

  Bud sighed happily and the flivver murmured contemptuously and I thought about Mrs. Warren Temple Lund the Second, who had married at seventeen — married a hot-rodder who ran a filling station in Beverly Hills. He had probably used only two names and no number until he had met a Christopher.

  I asked Bud, “Did your father call his filling station the Warren Temple Lund the Second’s Filling Station?”

  “Nah. He just called it Skip’s. That’s what everybody calls him — Skip. My Aunt Glenys gave that dopey name to the newspapers when Dad and Mom eloped. Aunt Glenys is kind of — well — ” He broke off, abashed.

  “I know exactly what you mean,” I comforted him, “but you have to admit she is a beautiful woman.”

  “Maybe,” he said. “Isn’t Miss Bonnet your girl? Isn’t she the lady that fixed up Aunt Glenys’ house — you know, a-a-”

  “An interior decorator,” I supplied. “Yes, she’s my girl. Do you think she’s pretty?”

  “She’s a lot prettier than Aunt Glenys,” he said stoutly. “And peppier, too. How come you’re not married yet?”

  “I — uh — don’t make the kind of money Miss Bonnet needs to maintain the kind of living she likes. The way things are in my business, Bud, I may never make that kind of money.”

  “Money, money, money.” He sighed. “Is that all grownups ever think about? It’s all they ever talk about.”

  “It’s all most of them know, Bud,” I explained. “That’s why I want you to enjoy what you’re going through now. Once you’re out of high school, life just isn’t the same any more. It gets real dull.”

  “Couldn’t you be a coach?” he persisted. “Couldn’t you play with the Rams again and have enough money to marry Miss Bonnet?”

  “No,” I said. “Son, I am what I am and not a bit ashamed of it.”

  The Monte vista turnoff now, and I swung the flivver that way and we climbed the ramp in a stiff silence.

  At the top, Bud said, “I wasn’t criticizing; I was only asking. Turn right on that road next to the filling station.”

  He directed me from there along a winding, black-top road bordered in eucalypti and palms, past estates and cottages, past a country club, to a driveway flanked by stucco pillars.

  We turned in here. The pillars were chipped and rain-streaked, the driveway pitted and long and poorly maintained. The lawn was a dried-out gray, dotted with succulents. If Mrs. Lund had a gardener, he wasn’t doing his job.

  Ahead of us now we could see the house, two-story, old and massive, faintly Norman, and newly painted. There was a green Pontiac station wagon on the drive before the front door. A red Porsche two-seater was parked behind it. There were no police cars in sight.

  But as we stepped from the car the law erupted from the shrubbery — two uniformed men and a man in plain clothes — and the uniformed men had their guns out and pointing straight at my belly.

  And the man out of uniform barked sharply, “Damn you, stand right where you are!”

  I stood like a statue, lacking a wreath.

  And Bud said, “For criyi, are you guys off your rocker? This is Brock (The Rock) Callahan, for criyi!”

  TWO

  THE UNIFORMED MEN were troopers, borrowed from the State Patrol station on the other side of town. The man in plain clothes was a detective-sergeant out of San Valdesto Headquarters and not actually in his jurisdiction, as this was county.

  But he was a friend of James Edward Ritter’s, and Mr. Ritter appeared to be more than a friend of Mrs. Lund’s. Ritter had called him in after clearing it with the Sheriff’s Department.

  His name was Sergeant Bernard Vogel and he explained all this to me carefully and politely in the living room of the Lund home. He was a man of medium height and impressive width and his politeness didn’t fool me for a second. He was a sharp, tough pro, and I would guess he could get real mean if he had to.

  Bud and his mother had gone through a damp reunion. James Edward Ritter had watched it quietly, making his own judgments, I was sure. He was a man almost my size, but stuffier and a shade older. He kept glancing our way as Vogel talked with me in one corner of the immense room.

  When Vogel finished, I said, “I’m glad to see there aren’t any reporters around.”

  “The Los Angeles papers weren’t notified about your call,” he explained. “There’ll be a local man who may want some answers when we get down to Headquarters.”

  “We?” I said. “My job’s finished, Sergeant.”

  “Yes. But you certainly won’t object to a few questions, will you?”

  “About what and from whom?”

  “About young Warren and from us. The Los Angeles papers and the wire services can pick up their copy from the local paper. There’ll be one reporter with a photographer from the local paper down at the station. We’re doing the best we can about publicity, but there’s only so much we can expect after this morning’s headline, of course.”

  I said nothing, thinking.

  “Well …?” he asked.

  “How about the sheriff?” I stalled. “Isn’t he going to be miffed about you city slickers getting all the ink?” I lowered my voice so Bud wouldn’t overhear. “The way I understand it, Johnny Chavez wasn’t a city kill either.”

  He frowned and inhaled heavily.

  “I don’t want to make any enemies,” I explained hastily. “I may be around town for a few days and I can’t afford enemies.”

  His frown deepened and his voice was gruffer. “Around town? Why?”

  I shrugged.

  “Callahan,” he warned me, “we’ll get along a lot better if you’re completely frank with me.”

  “All right, Sergeant. It’s because of Bud — of young Warren. I promised him I’d help find his father. I guess he doesn’t know about this suspicion of murder bit yet. He doesn’t know you’re looking for his father.”

  “We can’t keep it from him forever,” he said. “He can read. You do a lot of charity work, do you, Callahan?”

  “Never. But … well, Bud’s a fan of mine, and I knew his aunt at one time — she was my first client — and …” I sighed. “So I’m a sucker for kids and I happen to have a couple bucks in the bank at the moment. Is there some reason why you don’t want me around town?”

  His face stiffened. “Now what in hell did that mean?”

  “You tell me. You’ve been acting like a cop in a TV show. My reputation is pretty sound in and around Los Angeles, Sergeant.”

  “We don’t need any smog-town help up here,” he said flatly. “We wouldn’t have half the troubles we do have if it wasn’t for the smog-towners who are moving in here.”

  Hick-town resentment, provincial petulance — who could argue against an attitude that knot-headed? I said nothing.

  And then Mrs. Lund was coming over with Bud, her arm around his shoulders. “I’m sorry, Mr. Callahan, that I haven’t been able to thank you until now. It’s been — hectic.”

  “You’re welcome,” I said. “I guess I’ll be leaving now, Mrs. Lund. The sergeant wants me down at Headquarters.”

  She smiled and looked at the sergeant as I looked at her. She had chestnut hair and deep-blue eyes and a candid, direct gaze. She looked like the All-American girl, too many cocktails later. There was a slackness in her face too old for her twenty-nine years.

  She asked Vogel, “No trouble, Bernie, is there? Mr. Callahan isn’t in any kind of trouble, I’m sure.”

  He put on his customer’s smile. “Routine, June. Are you a member of the Callahan fan club, too?”

  Her chin lifted and the slackness was gone from her face. “Skip is. I’ve only heard of him through Skip. And Bud here.” She turned to me. “Could you come back for dinner? Bud wants it, so much!”

  “I can make it, thank you,” I said, and looked at Vogel. “If I’m free by that time.”
r />   He took a deep breath, looked at me and at Mrs. Lund, and nodded heavily in assent.

  I went down in my car; Sergeant Vogel followed in a Department car. At Headquarters he took me right into the chief’s office.

  Chief of Police Chandler Harris had snow-white hair and a pudgy face and a voice like crushed rock in a rusty bucket. He pointed at a chair, told me to sit down, and nodded at Vogel.

  Vogel left the room and Harris leaned back in his chair to stare at me. It was possible that he was trying to intimidate me, but that had been tried by major-leaguers. I stared back blandly.

  Finally he admitted grudgingly, “I checked you out while Vogel was talking to you. Both in Beverly Hills and Los Angeles. You check out pretty solid for a peeper.”

  “I’m glad you didn’t call Santa Monica,” I said. “I’m not a peeper, Chief. I’m a licensed and bonded private investigator. Let’s not get our semantics muddled.”

  “A smog-town smart aleck,” he said. “College man, huh?”

  “Stanford,” I admitted.

  He continued to stare, appraising me.

  I said quietly, “Sergeant Vogel told me the local paper would want to ask some questions. Will that be soon? Mrs. Lund is expecting me for dinner.”

  He opened his hands and looked at the palms. He studied the top of his desk. I waited.

  Finally he said, in a quieter voice, “We’ll have to compose our story first.”

  I frowned in artful innocence. “Story …?”

  His voice less quiet. “Of course. Do we want to tell those nosy people that the Lunds are getting a divorce, that Jim Ritter was the one who called us in, that Mrs. Lund was drunk when you phoned? Do we have to spread all that out for the world to read?”

  “Absolutely not,” I agreed. “The kid’s got it rough enough already.”

  “The kid?” he said doubtfully.

  “Warren Temple Lund the Third,” I explained. “My client.”

  “Oh.” He nodded. “Sure. Fan of yours, isn’t he? Never could see that football. Baseball’s more to my taste.”

  I said nothing. It was a free country.

  So we dreamed up a gasser and called in the local news-hawk and his Brownie buddy. And one more — a man from the local TV station.

  The way we explained it, Bud had gone to pay a surprise visit to his Aunt Glenys in Beverly Hills. (Vogel had already alerted her.) But, we went on, his Aunt Glenys hadn’t been home, so Bud had wandered around town and finally looked up his old idol, a friend of his Aunt Glenys’, former Stanford All-American and Ram immortal, Brock (The Rock) Callahan, presently an impeccably respectable private investigator.

  The name of Bud’s father was not mentioned in this account we presented, and Harris made it clear in answering the reporter’s questions that Bud’s trip and his father’s disappearance had no connection.

  He lied about that, and I substantiated it. We were lying allies for the moment, and I could hope that that would give me a few unharassed days in San Valdesto.

  I didn’t bring up the subject, though. So long as he didn’t, there would be no reason why I couldn’t hang around town, having not been told not to, if you follow me. Our mutual lie made us uneasy allies — more than I had hoped for on entering his office. When the situation worsened, I would have to come up with something stronger, if possible.

  Vogel wasn’t in sight when I came out of the chief’s office, and I didn’t wait to look him up. I bought a local paper and drove over to the north side of town, to a motel I had stayed at before called the Deauville Dobe.

  The summer rates were no longer in effect and I got a nice unit near the pool. I could write this off as a vacation; how else could I justify it without being sentimental?

  It was now six o’clock, but I phoned Jan at her shop and she was still working.

  I told her, “I’ll be here for a couple of days. I thought you could pick up some of my clothes for me and come up to share my vacation.”

  “I can’t make it,” she said ruefully. “I’m just starting the Kesselring place and it takes all day every day. Maybe I could come up Saturday night and stay over Sunday.”

  This was Thursday. I said, “Do that. And could you ship some clothes up to me?”

  “Wait,” she said. “I think Glenys is coming up to be with her sister and she could — oh, no!”

  “No, what?”

  “If she brought up your clothes, she’d know I have a key to your apartment.”

  “So? Would it make her jealous? She wouldn’t care.”

  “Oh, shut up! You’re so vulgar.”

  I was vulgar. She had the key, but I was vulgar. I said nothing.

  A silence on the line for a few seconds, and then she said, “I suppose I could tell her the superintendent let me in. O.K., that’s what I’ll do. What’s your address up there?”

  “I’m staying at the Deauville Dobe. But it would be better if she brought the clothes to her sister’s house. I’ll pick them up there.”

  I didn’t want to put an image into Jan’s mind, a mental picture of Glenys Christopher coming into my cozy motel room, a grip full of my clothes in her hand. Jan has an extremely unreasonable imagination.

  “All right,” she agreed. “And, Brock … why are you staying there? Did June Lund hire you?”

  “Well,” I stalled, “not exactly. You see, the boy — well, he doesn’t know his father is wanted by the police — not yet — and I thought maybe — ”

  “Brock Callahan,” she said acidly, “those people are rich. If you want to do charity work, do it for the poor. You make me sick!”

  “Honey,” I said soothingly, “this is a little vacation for me. Now you come up Saturday night. I miss you.”

  “I’ll try. Remember, now; don’t be a damned fool.”

  A financial fool, she meant. I promised I wouldn’t.

  I showered and read the local paper. The story of Johnny Chavez was there; he had been found by a sheriff’s deputy making a check of the isolated cabins that dotted the various peaks in the area. According to his sister, Mary Chavez, Johnny had gone up there with Skip Lund on a hunting trip. What they were hunting in October Miss Chavez was not prepared to state.

  Chavez had been killed with a.30-.30. That’s a deer-rifle caliber. Could they have been hunting deer? The story ended by stating that Warren Lund was being sought for questioning in connection with the “shooting.” It hadn’t been established as murder yet.

  I climbed into the flivver and headed for Montevista.

  As I came up the long, bumpy driveway my headlights picked up my client in front of the garage. He was putting his bike away.

  “Hi,” he said. “Do you know who won today? That dopey paper boy forgot to leave us one.”

  The Series was on in New York. I said, “The Yankees, in the tenth. Glad to be home again?”

  “I guess.” He glanced toward the lighted living-room window. “Mom’s already had a couple of drinks. Martinis.” He made a face.

  “It’s the cocktail hour,” I said cheerfully. I put a hand on his shoulder. “Someday you’ll be old enough to drink. It’s — like medicine to some people.”

  “Sure,” he said.

  What do you tell them? In the reflected light from the living-room window I looked at my client and he at me. Adults, I thought; damn them all!

  I ruffled his hair. “Remember what I told you: you’re your own best friend. Let’s go in and join the party.”

  We went up and through the entry hall and into the bright living room. June Lund was sitting on an enormous, curving sofa of chartreuse silk, her slim legs curled up under her, both hands encasing her Martini. Next to the fireplace, whisky and ice in his glass, James Edward Ritter stood like the lord of the manor. For some reason this man annoyed me. He was such an unctuous square.

  “Hello,” June said, and “Good evening,” Ritter said, and I nodded and smiled at them both.

  “Drink?” she asked.

  “I rarely touch the hard stuff,�
�� I told her. “I’d appreciate a glass of beer.”

  “Of course,” she said. “Any special brand?”

  There was only a slight slurring of her sibilants and very little glaze in her eyes, but I had a feeling that she was carefully avoiding any appearance of drunkenness.

  The maid had come in and was waiting for my order.

  “I favor Einlicher,” I told June Lund, “but I don’t often find it.”

  She looked at the maid and the woman shook her head.

  “Miller, then?” I asked, and the maid nodded and went out.

  For a moment all three of them were looking at me. It was then that Bud said proudly, “Mr. Callahan’s going to find Pop.”

  Both Ritter and Mrs. Lund looked startled, but I thought there was another emotion on the face of Ritter — annoyance.

  June Lund said blankly, “Find?” She stared worriedly at Bud.

  “What’s wrong with that?” Bud asked belligerently. “He can tell him to write, can’t he, when he finds him? Then I’ll know what Pop’s doing.”

  His mother said steadily, “Didn’t I tell you he was on a trip? Do you think I’m lying to you?”

  Bud flushed and studied the carpeting on the floor.

  His mother glanced at Ritter and then said gently to her son, “It’s time to wash up, tiger. We’ll be eating soon.”

  He went out quietly, taking my heart along. The maid brought my beer.

  When the maid had left, Ritter said, “That boy needs discipline, June. He’s insolent.”

  I looked at him over my beer. He met my glance and the contempt in his eyes probably matched mine.

  June Lund said quietly to me, “We’ve kept the papers from him so far. But he’ll have to go to school tomorrow and the other children will know.” She sighed. “His father has found some strange friends up here, Mr. Callahan.” She paused again, glanced at Ritter, and continued in a near whisper. “One of his very special friends is Mary Chavez, the sister of the man who was killed.”

  Ritter said sharply, “Damn it, June, you’re talking to a private investigator! Show a little discretion.”