Poodle Springs

5

I found an office finally, as close to a dump as Poodle Springs gets, south of Ramon Drive, upstairs over a filling station. It was the usual two-story fake adobe with make-believe ridge poles sticking out through it at the roof line. There was an outside stairway along the right wall that led to one room with a sink in the corner and a cheap deal desk left over from the previous tenant, a guy who maybe sold insurance, and maybe other stuff. Whatever he sold he didn't make enough to pay the rent and the geezer who owned the building and ran the filling station had booted him out a month ago. Besides the desk there was a squeaky swivel chair and a grey metal file cabinet and a calendar that had a picture on it of a dog tugging down a little girl's bathing suit bottom.

"Darling, this is appalling," Linda said when she saw it.

"You should see some of my clients," I said.

"I could just have someone come in…"

"This is what I can afford," I said.

Linda nodded. "Well, I'm sure it will do very nicely," she said. "Now let's go out to lunch."

The phone rang. Linda picked it up.

"Philip Marlowe's office," she said. Then she listened, and wrinkled her nose and handed the phone to me. "It must be a client, darling. He sounds appalling."

I said "Yeah" into the mouthpiece, and a voice I'd heard before said, "Marlowe, this is Ma

"How nice for you," I said.

"Okay, sending a couple of hard boys after you was a mistake. I've made bigger."

I let that slide.

"If you're open for business I'd like to talk to you."

"Go ahead," I said.

"Can you come here?"

"The Agony Club?"

"Yeah. You know where it is?"

"Just out of Poodle Springs jurisdiction," I said. "When?"

"Now."

"I'll be out in half an hour," I said and hung up.

Linda was looking at me with her arms folded across her chest. I let my chair squeak back and put my hands behind my head and smiled at her. She had on a ridiculous little white hat with the hint of a veil, and a sleeveless little white dress and sling strap high-heeled white shoes, the right toe of which was tapping the floor.

"I'll be out in half an hour?" she said.

"First client," I said. "I have to earn a living."

"And our lunch?"

"Call Tino, maybe he'd like to join you."

"I can't go to lunch with the houseboy."

I stood. "I'll drop you off at home."

She nodded and turned and went out of the office ahead of me. When I dropped her off she didn't kiss me good-bye, even though I went around and opened the door for her. A charmer, Marlowe. A model of courtliness.

The Agony Club was northeast of Poodle Springs, just over the line in Riverside County. A famous actor had set out to build himself a castle in the desert and then a reversal of fortune based on an incident with a 15-year-old girl, and the castle was a casualty. It looked like a bordello for wealthy Mexicans, all white stucco and red tile, with fountains in the courtyard and bougainvillaea creeping along its flanks. In the middle of the day it had a slightly tarnished look, like an overaged screen star. There were no cars in the big crushed stone circular driveway. I could hear the hum of the air conditioner somewhere out of sight, like a locust behind the building.

I parked the Olds under the portcullis at the back of the courtyard and walked in through the cooler darkness of the entry. There were two big carved mahogany doors, one slightly ajar. I pushed through it into the suddenly cool indoors. It felt good after the hard desert heat, but it felt artificial too, like the soothing touch of an embalmer. The two hoods who'd braced me the other day appeared from somewhere to the right.

The taller one said, "You carrying?"

"Yeah," I said, "you never know when there might be something to shoot out here."

The smaller hood was only half visible, hanging back in the gloomy doorway to the right. I could see the light from the main room glint off the gun in his hand.

"Can't see Lippy with a gun," the tall one said.

I shrugged and opened my coat and the tall one took the gun smoothly from under my arm. He looked at it.

"Two-inch barrel," he said. "Not much good at a distance."

"I only work close up," I said.

The tall one led the way across the open central space. There were tables set up for blackjack, there were roulette wheels, and tables for dice. Along the far left wall was a polished mahogany bar, with bottles arranged artfully in front of a mirrored wall behind it. The only light now came from a series of tall narrow windows near the ceiling which had probably been designed to look like firing ports in the original. I could see a series of crystal chandeliers hanging unlit from the ceiling. The little hood walked five steps behind me. I didn't think he had his gun out anymore but I didn't want him to catch me looking.

At the far end of the bar three steps led up to a low landing, and a door opened off of that into a big office that belonged to Ma

"Marlowe," he said. "Sit down. You want a drink?"

He got up, went around a rosewood sideboard, took a decanter from it and filled two thick chunky glasses half full. He handed me one and went around behind his desk.

"It's okay, Leonard," he said to the tall hood. "Beat it."

Leonard and his little buddy disappeared silently into the dimness. I sipped my drink, Scotch, better than I was used to, even if my wife did have ten million bucks.

"Glad you could make it, Marlowe," Lipshultz said.

"Me too," I said. "Got to make a living."

"Married to Harlan Potter's daughter?"

"That means she doesn't have to make a living," I said.

Lipshultz nodded. "I got a problem, Marlowe."

I waited.

"What we do here ain't, you know, quite legal."

"I know," I said.

"Ever wonder why we don't get the arm laid on us?"

"No," I said, "but if I did, I'd figure you had backing, and the backing had the kind of money which keeps people from getting the arm laid on them."

Lipshultz smiled. "Smart, Marlowe. I knew you was smart even before I had you checked out."

"So with that kind of co

Lipshultz shook his head sadly. He had a thick nose to go with his red face, and slick black hair parted in the middle and combed tight on each side of his bullet head.

"Can't use that backing in this," he said. "Fact if you don't help me out, the backing is going to maybe send some people out to see me, you follow?"

"If they do you should get better help than the two yahoos you got following you around now."

"That's the truth," Lippy said. "Hard to get people to come out here, I mean this ain't Los Angeles. Not everybody likes the desert. Why I was so glad when I found out you was here. I heard about you when you were operating out of Hollywood."

"Your lucky day," I said. "What do you want me to do?"

He handed me an IOU for $100,000, with the signature Les Valentine across the bottom in a neat, very small hand. Then he sat back to let that sink in.

"Me," Lippy said, "taking a guy's marker for a hundred g's. I must be getting old."

"How come you did?" I said.

"He had money in the family. Always made good before."

"And when Mr. Big that runs you audited the books one day he noticed you were 100,000 short."

"His bookkeeper," Lipshultz said. "And Mr. Black-stone came to see me."

The air-conditioned room was full of cold, but Lipshultz was sweating. He pulled the silk show handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his neck with it.

"Drove right out here himself and sat where you're sitting and told me I had thirty days to cover the loss," Lipshultz said.