The Far Side of the Dollar la-12 Page 22

  `I have reason to know that,' she said. `I knew Mr. Sipe. That is, I talked to him once, and he left an impression that I haven't been able to wipe out of my memory. He was a gross, corrupt man. He came to my house in Brentwood in the spring of 1945.

  He was the one who told me about Ralph's affair with Miss Drew.'

  `He wanted money, of course.'

  `Yes, and I gave him money. Two hundred dollars, he asked for, and when he saw that I was willing to pay he raised it to five hundred, all the cash I had on hand. Well, the money part is unimportant. It always is,' she said, reminding me that she had never needed money.

  `What did Sipe have to say to you?'

  `That my husband was committing adultery - he had a snapshot to prove it - and it was his duty under the law to arrest him. I don't know now if there was ever such a law on the books-'

  `There was. I don't think it's been enforced lately, or an awful lot of people would be in jail.'

  `He mentioned jail, and the effect it would have on my husband's reputation. This was just about the time when Ralph began to believe he could make Captain. I know from this height and distance it sounds childish, but it was the biggest thing in his life at that time. He came from an undistinguished family, you see-his father was just an unsuccessful small businessman - and he felt he had to shine in so many ways to match my family's distinction.'

  She looked at me with sad intelligence. `We all need something to buttress our pride, don't we, fragments to shore against our ruins.'

  `You were telling me about your interview with Otto Sipe.'

  `So I was. My mind tends to veer away from scenes like that. In spite of the pain and shock I felt - it was my first inkling that Ralph was unfaithful to me - I didn't want to see all his bright ambitions wrecked. So I paid the dreadful man his dirty money, and he gave me his filthy snapshot.'

  `Did you hear from him again?'

  `No.'

  `I'm surprised he didn't attach himself to you for life.'

  `Perhaps he intended to. But Ralph stopped him. I told Ralph about his visit, naturally.'

  She added: `I didn't show him the snapshot. That I destroyed.'

  `How did Ralph stop him?'

  `I believe he knocked him down and frightened him off: I didn't get a very clear account from Ralph. By then we weren't communicating freely. I went home to Boston and I didn't see Ralph again until the end of the year, when he brought his ship to Boston harbor. We had a reconciliation of sorts. It was then we decided to adopt a child.'

  I wasn't listening too closely. The meanings of the case were emerging. Ralph Hillman had had earlier transactions with both of the extortionists. He had been Mike Harley's superior officer, and had thrown him out of the Navy. He had knocked down Otto Sipe. And they had made him pay for his superiority and his power.

  Elaine was thinking along the same lines. She said in a soft, despondent voice: `Mr. Sipe would never have entered our lives if Ralph hadn't used that crummy hotel for his crummy little purposes.'

  `You mustn't blame your husband for everything. No doubt he did wrong. We all do. But the things he did nineteen or twenty years ago aren't solely responsible for this kidnapping, or whatever it was. It isn't that simple.'

  `I know. I don't blame him for everything.'

  'Sipe, for instance, would probably have been involved anyway. His partner Mike Harley knew your husband and had a grievance against him.'

  `But why did Tom, my poor dear Tom, end up at that same hotel? Isn't there a fatality in it?'

  `Maybe there is. To Sipe and Harley it was simply a convenient place to keep him.'

  `Why would Tom stay with them? They must be - have been outrageous creatures.'

  `Teen-age boys sometimes go for the outrageous.'

  `Do they not,' she said. `But I can't really blame Tom for anything he's done. Ralph and I have given him little enough reality to hold on to. Tom's a sensitive, artistic, introverted boy. My husband didn't want him to be those things-perhaps they reminded Ralph that he wasn't our son, really. So he kept trying to change him. And when he couldn't, he withdrew his interest. Not his love, I'm sure. He's still profoundly concerned with Tom.'

  `But he spends his time with Dick Leandro.'

  One corner of her mouth lifted, wrinkling her cheek and eye, as if age and disillusion had taken sudden possession of that side of her face.

  `You're quite a noticer, Mr. Archer.'

  `You have to be, in my job. Not that Dick Leandro makes any secret of his role. I met him coming, out of your driveway.'

  `Yes. He was looking for Ralph. He's very dependent on Ralph,' she added dryly.

  `How would you describe the relationship, Mrs. Hillman? Substitute son?'

  `I suppose I would. Dick's mother and father broke up some years ago. His father left town, and of course his mother got custody of Dick. He needed a substitute father. And Ralph needed someone to crew for him on the sloop - I sometimes think it's the most urgent need he has, or had. Someone to share the lusty gusty things he likes to do, and would like a son to do.'

  `He could do better than Dick, couldn't he?'

  She was silent for a while. `Perhaps he could. But when you have an urgent need, you tend to hook up with people who have urgent needs of their own. Poor Dick has a great many urgent needs.'

  `Some of which have been met. He told me that your husband put him through college.'

  `He did. But don't forget that Dick's father used to work for Ralph's firm. Ralph is very strong on loyalty, up and down.'

  `Is Dick?'

  `He's fanatically loyal to Ralph,' she said with emphasis.

  `Let me ask you a hypothetical question, without prejudice, as they say in court. If your husband disinherited Tom, would Dick be a likely heir?'

  `That's excessively hypothetical, isn't it?'

  `But the answer might have practical consequences. What's your answer?'

  `Dick might be left something. He probably will be in any case. But please don't imagine that poor stupid Dick, with his curly hair and his muscles, is capable of plotting-'

  `I wasn't suggesting that.'

  `And you mustn't embarrass Dick. He's come through nobly in this crisis. Both of us have leaned on him.'

  `I know. I'll leave him alone.'

  I got up to go. `Thank you for being frank with me.'

  `There's not much point in pretending at this late date. If there's anything else you need to know-'

  `There is one thing that might help. If you could give me the name of the agency through which you adopted Tom?'

  `It wasn't done through an agency. It was handled privately.'

  `Through a lawyer, or a doctor?'

  `A doctor,' she said. `I don't recall his name, but he delivered Tom at Cedars of Lebanon. We paid the expenses, you understand, as part of the bargain that we made with the mother.'

  `Who was she?'

  `Some poor woman who'd got herself in trouble. I didn't actually meet her, nor did I want to. I wanted to feel that Tom was my own son.'

  `I understand.'

  `Does it matter who his parents were? I mean, in the current situation?'

  `It does if he's wandering around Los Angeles looking for them. Which I have reason to think he may be doing. You should have a record somewhere of that doctor's name.'

  `My husband could tell you.'

  `But he isn't available.'

  `It may be in his desk in the library.'

  I followed her to the library and while she rummaged in the desk I looked at the pictures on the wall again. The group photo taken on the flight deck must have been Hillman's squadron. I looked closely at their faces, wondering which of the young men had died at Midway.

  Next I studied the yachting picture of Dick Leandro. His handsome, healthy, empty face told me nothing. Perhaps it would have meaning for somebody else. I took it off the wall and slipped it into the side pocket of my jacket.

  Elaine Hillman didn't notice. She had found the name she was looking for.<
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  'Elijah Weintraub,' she said, `was the doctor's name.'

  22

  I PHONED DR Weintraub long-distance. He confirmed the fact that he had arranged for Thomas Hillman's adoption, but he refused to discuss it over the phone. I made an appointment to see him in his office that afternoon.

  Before I drove back to Los Angeles I checked in with Lieutenant Bastian. He'd been working on the case for nearly three days, and the experience hadn't improved his disposition. The scarlike lines in his face seemed to have deepened. His voice was hoarse and harsh, made harsher by irony: `It's nice of you to drop by every few days.'

  `I'm working for Ralph Hillman now.'

  `I know that, and it gives you certain advantages. Which you seize. But you and I are working on the same case, and we're supposed to be cooperating. That means periodic exchanges of information.'

  `Why do you think I'm here?'

  His eyes flared down. `Fine. What have you found out about the Hillman boy?'

  I told Bastian nearly all of it, enough to satisfy both him and my conscience. I left out the adoption and Dr Weintraub, and the possibility that Tom might turn up at the Santa Monica bus station at nine that night. About his other movements, and the fact that he had probably been a voluntary captive in the Barcelona Hotel, I was quite frank.

  `It's too bad Otto Sipe had to die,' Bastian grumbled. `He could have cleared up a lot of things.'

  I agreed.

  `Exactly what happened to Sipe? You were a witness.'

  `He attacked Ben Daly with a spade. Daly was holding my gun while I examined Harley's body. The gun went off.'

  Bastian made a disgusted noise with his lips. `What do you know about Daly?'

  `Not much. He has a service station across from the Barcelona. He struck me as dependable. He's a war veteran-'

  `So was Hitler. L A says Daly had previous dealings with Sipe. Sipe bought secondhand cars through him, for instance.'

  `That would be natural enough. Daly ran the nearest service station to where Sipe worked.'

  `So you don't think Daly killed him to shut him up?'

  `No, but I'll bear it in mind. I'm more interested in the other killing. Have you seen the knife that Harley was stabbed with?'

  `Not yet. I have a description.'

  Bastin moved some papers around on top of his desk. `It's what they call a hunting knife, made by the Oregon firm of Forstmann, with their name on it. It has a broad blade about six inches long, is very sharp and pointed, has a striped rubber handle, black and white, with finger moldings on it. Practically brand new. Is that an accurate description?'

  `I only saw the striped rubber handle. The fact that the blade is quite broad, sharp, and pointed suggests that it's the same knife that stabbed Carol.'

  `So I told L A they're going to send me the knife for identification work.'

  `That's what I was going to suggest.'

  Bastian leaned forward, bringing his arms down heavily among the papers on his desktop. `You think somebody in town here stabbed him?'

  `It's an idea worth considering.'

  `Why? For his share of the money?'

  `It couldn't have been that. Harley had nothing left by the time he left Las Vegas. I talked to the high-roller who cleaned him out.'

  `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 teen-aged 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.