Poodle Springs

Behind Victor's house, at the little cement pad path that led around the house to the front door, was a mailbox. The lettering on it said Larry and Angel Victor. I went on, two houses down, and cut through another narrow cement pad path with weeds forcing up through the sand beneath the pads. In front of the houses was the beach walk and then the beach and then the fat Pacific Ocean waddling in onto the coastline.

Two houses down, Larry Victor was sitting on a beach chair on his front porch with his feet up on the railing. Next to him was the black-haired young woman with big dark eyes from the picture on his desk. She had on some kind of loose-fitting Hawaiian dress and little white sling strap high-heeled shoes, and she had let the dress slide halfway up her thighs as she sat with her feet up beside Victor's. They were drinking Mexican beer from the bottle and holding hands. It was the kind of domestic scene that the insurance companies use when they try to tell you that enough life insurance will make you secure. I stood halfway behind a patch of giant geraniums, at the corner of the beach house two doors down, and watched.

Marlowe, the all-seeing, sees all, peeps at everything. The girl leaned over and kissed Victor and the kiss lingered and developed. When the kiss and ensuing struggle ended Victor reached up in an automatic gesture and straightened his hair. I smiled. Bingo. Les Valentine with a hairpiece.

14

I drove back to the Springs in time for a late supper which Tino made up for me in the kitchen. Linda was at the Racquet Club and didn't get home until I was finishing the last of the salad that Tino insisted on serving after the meal.

"It is how it is done, Mr. Marlowe," Tino said. "Everyone does it this way in the Springs."

"Everybody but me, Tino," I said. "I eat my salad before the meal."

Tino shook his head. "Mrs. Marlowe said we will never civilize you, Mr. Marlowe."

"I'm as civilized as I'm likely to get," I said.

/"You are very fine the way you are, Mr. Marlowe."

At which point Linda entered.

"Well, darling," she said, "look at you home from a hard day's gumshoeing. How nice."

She came over and gave me a light kiss. I could smell the booze on her breath.

"Would you like some supper too, Mrs. Marlowe?"

"No, Tino, please, just a large Scotch, light soda, on the rocks."

Linda sat across from me in the kitchen. Tino brought her the drink.

"Did you detect anything very good today, darling?"

"I found Les Valentine," I said.

"How exciting for you. I'm sure it compensates for missing our di

"Perfect," I said. "Myrria Loy couldn't have read it better."

"Don't be rude, darling. You did stand me up, you know."

"I know," I said. "And I'm sorry I had to. But the whistle doesn't blow at cocktail time, for me."

"And I knew that when I married you," Linda said.

There was nothing in that for me. I let it pass.

"It would be encouraging, darling, if sometimes I felt that you'd shirk the job to be with me."

"It is the only way I can be with you," I said. "Your old man has about a hundred million bucks. If I start shirking my job to be with you, pretty soon I'll be laying around having my eyebrows plucked."

"You're such a goddamned fool," Linda said.

"Probably," I said.

Linda nuzzled her drink again.

"Don't you even want to be with me?" she said.

"Damn it, that's the point. Of course I want to be with you. I'd like to spend all my time in bed with you, having cocktails by the pool with you, helping you sort your lingerie. And if I give in to that, what am I? You could get me a little jeweled collar and we could go for walks."

Linda stood and turned away from me, the drink half finished in her hand. She took two steps toward the door, stopped, threw the glass at the sink. It missed and banged against the cabinet and broke and splattered on the rug. She turned and collapsed into my lap with her mouth against mine.

"You bastard," she said, her mouth open against mine. "You unbreakable bastard."

I picked her up and headed for the bedroom. Money had its uses. Tino would clean up the drink.

In the morning Linda had a headache and we stayed in bed drinking orange juice and coffee and waiting for the headache to dwindle.

"Too much Scotch," I said.

"Of course not," Linda said. "I go to a quiet party and have a couple of teenie drinks, and come home sleepy, and… well, I certainly didn't get much sleep."

"I noticed that," I said.

Tino rapped softly on the bedroom door and then came in with a breakfast tray.

She turned her head away quite quickly.

"Ah, but Mrs. Marlowe," Tino said with a smile. "Mr. Marlowe will eat his and most of yours, I believe."

Tino put the tray down on my side of the bed and went out. I set to work to prove him right.

"How can you, you beast," Linda said.

"Exercise," I said. "Healthy indoor exercise all night. Makes me hungry."

Without looking, Linda groped over, found half a piece of toast and took a small bite of the point. She chewed it carefully. Then she leaned back against the pillow carefully to rest and let it settle.

"You said last night that you found Muffy Black-stone's husband," Linda said softly, her eyes still closed.

"Yes," I said. "He's living in Venice under the name Larry Victor. Has a photography studio in Hollywood."

"I'm sure Mr. Lipshultz will be very proud of you, darling."

"If I tell him."

"Why wouldn't you?" Linda said.

I was looking at her profile, the way the fine vein pulsed in her lowered eyelids.

"There appears to be a Mrs. Victor."

Linda rolled her head over on the pillow so she was full face to me and slowly opened both eyes.

"Is there really," she said. "That little, timid, water bug of a man?"

"In L.A. he wears a rug and no glasses. A regular stallion."

"A rug?"

"A toupee, long blond, smoothed back," I said.

"Dresses like the agent for a B-picture starlet." I reached over to my bed table and got the rolled-up picture of Sondra Lee. I handed it to Linda.

"He specializes in this type of picture," I said.

Linda looked at the photograph and turned it quickly over in her lap.

"Oh," Linda said. Then she turned the picture back over carefully and peeked at it again. Her eyebrows came together in the loveliest frown I'd ever seen. She studied the photograph again.

"Her breasts are awfully small," Linda said, "and she has a little pot belly."

"That's hardly a pot belly," I said.

"Men like pictures like this?"

"Some men," I said.

She looked at me, and silently pulled the covers back.

"I like the real thing," I said.

She nodded her head slowly, as if satisfied with the answer, and put the covers over her again.

"Muffy's husband takes pictures like this?"

"Hundreds," I said.

"How did you find them?" Linda said.

"I burgled his office," I said. "Don't tell."

She wrinkled her nose.

"Must you do this work?" she said.

I didn't answer. She put her hand on my arm.

"Yes," she said, "of course you must. It's just so…"

"Yeah," I said. "Isn't it."

We were quiet for a moment. Linda studied the picture some more.

"So why don't you tell Mr. Lipshultz?"

"I don't know. It's just that, he and the other wife… I followed him home. She was glad to see him…" I shrugged.

"Well, what about Muffy?" Linda said.

"Yeah," I said.

"Oh," Linda said.

She looked once more at the picture. Then she put it down on her night table and turned toward me and paused. She rolled back onto her back, reached over and turned the picture facedown, then turned back to me.