Poodle Springs

"Got some ID?" he said.

I fished my wallet out again and handed it over and the cop looked at the contents in the light of the spotlight. They were both plainclothes, one fat with his tie snugged up around his neck but off center. The other one, the one doing the talking, was a tall, loose-built guy with glasses. He had on jeans and a tee shirt and wore his gun inside the belt of his jeans in front.

"My name's Bob Kane," he said as he handed me back my wallet. "You mind telling me why you were chasing this lady?"

"I wanted to give her a ride home," I said.

Kane smiled happily.

"Hear that, Gordy?" he said to his fat partner. "Guy just wanted to drive her home."

Gordy had his gun still out but was holding it at his side pointed at the ground.

"No shit," Gordy said. He was wearing a wide-brimmed panama hat with a big flowered band.

"She didn't seem to want to ride home," Kane said. "She kind of looked to be ru

"She didn't recognize me," I said.

"You know this guy?" Kane said. His glasses had big round lenses and his eyes were pleasant and heartless behind them, enlarged a little.

Angel nodded. "I know him," she said.

"So how come you were ru

"Like he says, I didn't recognize him."

"How you know him?" Kane said.

"He's a… a friend of my husband's."

"Really," Kane said. "That so, Marlowe?"

"I know him," I said.

"Yeah?" Kane stepped back and leaned against the door of the unmarked police car. He folded his long arms and looked at us for a while.

"Marlowe," he said. "Aren't you the guy found the body in her husband's office?"

"Yeah," I said. This wasn't going well, and I had a sense it wasn't going to get better.

"And now you're down hanging around his office and you just happen to run into his wife and chase her and she runs because she doesn't recognize you."

"Exactly," I said.

"If I was a smart copper," Kane said, "I wouldn't be out here around four o'clock in the morning on stakeout. So this is probably too deep for me, but it looks kind of a fu

"You're too modest," I said.

"Yeah, probably am, been a failing of mine," Kane said. "You aren't pla

I shrugged.

"You want this guy to give you a ride home, Mrs. Victor?"

Angel nodded.

"Fine," Kane said. "Go ahead."

"Bob," Gordy said, "you oughta haul them in."

"For what?" Kane said.

"Hell, for questioning, hold them until morning, let the lieutenant talk with them."

"Lady's worried about her husband," Kane said. "We'll let him take her home."

"Damn it, Bob," Gordy said.

"Gordy," Kane said, "one of us is a sergeant and one of us isn't. You remember whether it's me or you?"

"You, Bob."

Kane nodded.

"Okay, why don't you go ahead and drive Mrs. Victor on home, Mr. Marlowe. We'll be moseying along behind just to sort of keep track."

He handed me back my gun, I put it under my arm so it would be there when the next guy wanted to take it away, and Angel and I went on down to my car and pulled away. In the rearview mirror I saw the headlights of the unmarked car fall in behind us.

24

"Where's Larry?" Angel said. She was small on the front seat beside me. The dashboard clock said 4:07.

"He's safe," I said.

"I can't wait to see him," she said.

"Can't," I said. "You'd lead the cops right to him."

"Where is he?" she said.

"It's better not to tell you," I said.

"I'm his wife, Mr. Marlowe." She turned in the seat toward me.

"That's why the cops are following you," I said.

"Following?"

"You think they just happened by?" I said. "They have a tail on you."

She turned in the seat and stared back at the headlights behind us.

"Following me?"

It was as if the last half hour hadn't happened.

"Yes, Ma'am," I said.

"Is he all right?" she said. She turned back from staring at the tail and tucked a leg up under herself and leaned an arm against the back of the seat. As she spoke she bent toward me a little.

"He's fine, Angel. He's safe. He misses you."

She nodded. "I miss him."

We were the only cars on the road as we drove toward Venice. The cops lounged along three or four car lengths behind us.

"Who are you?" Angel said.

"Marlowe," I said. "I'm a private detective on a case."

"Are you a friend of Larry's?"

"I just met him once before, the night we ran out on the cops."

"So why are you helping him?"

"Beats me," I said.

"That's no answer," she said. The cop headlights behind us lit most of the interior of my car. In the light her eyes were wide and dark and full of sweetness.

"You're right," I said. "I don't think he killed the woman, but he seems to me the kind of guy that might have a little trouble in his background. Not a tough guy, and not co

"Larry wouldn't kill anyone."

"No," I said. "I don't think so either. Are you married to him?"

Angel nodded. There was pride in that nod, and contentment, and something more, something protective, the way a young mother nods when you ask if that's her baby.

"Almost four years," she said.

"Ever hear of a guy named Les Valentine?" I said.

"No."

"Woman named Muriel Blackstone?"

"No."

We were on Wilshire and when it ran out against the Pacific we turned left and drove along the empty beachfront. The moonlight on the waves emphasized how empty the ocean was, and endless, rolling in from Zanzibar.

"Larry's in trouble, isn't he?"

"He's wanted for murder," I said.

"But he didn't do that. He's in some other kind of trouble," she said. "The kind that brought you to him."

In the moonlight the buildings looked stately, like Moorish castles, the peeling paint and crumbled stucco smoothed out.

"He is, isn't he, Mr. Marlowe?"

"There's a gambler named Lipshultz," I said. "Larry owes him money. He hired me to find him."

She nodded, a nod of confirmation.

"He's had trouble before, hasn't he?" I said.

"He's an artist, Mr. Marlowe. He's imaginative. Many people have said he's a genius with a camera."

"And?" I said.

"And he's impulsive, he's not good with rules. He feels something, he does it. He has an artistic temperament."

"So he bets hunches," I said.

"Yes."

"And they sometimes don't pay off."

"No, they don't. But he has to be free to follow his intuition, don't you see. To limit him is to stifle him."

"He ever been in other kinds of trouble?"

She was silent for a bit, looking out at the silver ocean rolling slowly toward us. On the beach below, above the tide line, some bums were sleeping, clutching their scraps of belongings.

"I think he's had some trouble with women."

"Like what?" I said.

"I don't know, he never said. I don't question him."

"Why not?" I said.

"I love him," she said. As if it answered all the questions.

"So what makes you think there was trouble with women?"

"There were phone calls for him from a woman, and when he hung up he was angry."

"Un huh."

"And…" She looked at her lap for a moment, where she had folded her hands. I waited, listening to the wheels murmur over the asphalt.

"And?" I said.

"And there was a picture, I saw."

I waited.

"It was a picture of a woman. She was undressed and posing…" She stared harder at her hands. If the light had been better I think I'd have seen her blushing.