Stardust

It was framed in cardboard, like the picture of Jill, only this one was a school picture. Vera handed it to me. It was a picture of a little girl, maybe ten. Dark hair, dark eyes, olive skin, and a clear resemblance to Jill Joyce.

“Who’s this?” I said. “Granddaughter,” she said.

“Jillian’s daughter?” I said.

“Yuh.”

I looked at the picture again. In the indefinable way that pictures speak, this one was telling me it wasn’t recent.

“How old is she now?” I said.

“Jillian?”

“No, your granddaughter.”

The burst of humanity had drained her. She was back in the rocker, with her bottle. She shrugged. Her gaze was fixed on the blank picture tube. I slipped the picture out of its holder and put it inside my shirt. Then I folded the cardboard and put it back in the drawer.

“You see her much?” She shook her head. “She live around here?”

She shook her head again. She drank a little Southern Comfort from the bottle.

“Far away?” She nodded. “Where?”

“L.A.,” Vera said. Her voice was flatter than a tin shingle.

“She with her dad?” I said. Sincere, interested in Vera’s family. You’re in good hands with Spenser. Vera shrugged.

“What’s her dad’s name?”

“Greaser,” Vera said clearly.

“Odd name,” I said.

“Told her stay away from that greaser. Took my granddaughter.”

“What did you say his name was?”

“Spic name.”

“Un huh,” I said helpfully.

“Told her not.”

“What’s his name?” The helpful smile stretched across my face like oil on water. I could feel the tension behind my shoulders as I tried to squeeze blood from this stone.

“Victor,” she said. “Victor del Rio.”

“And he lives in L.A.”

“Yuh.”

“You know where?” She shook her head. “You ever see your granddaughter?”

She shook her head again. She was frowning at the blank television, as if the fact of its gray silence had just begun to penetrate. She leaned forward in the rocker and turned it on. Then, exhausted by the effort of concentration, she leaned back in the rocker and took a long pull of her Southern Comfort. The talk show had given way to a game show; photogenic contestants frantic to win the money, a faintly patronizing host, amused by their greed.

I stood silently beside the seated woman lost in her television and her booze. She was inert in her chair, occasionally dragging on the cigarette, occasionally pulling on the bottle. She seemed to have forgotten I was there. I had other questions, but I couldn’t stand to ask them. I couldn’t stand being there anymore. I turned and went to the door and stopped and looked back at her. She sat motionless, oblivious, her back to me, her face to the television.

I opened my mouth and couldn’t think what to say and closed it, and went out into the putrid weed smell and walked back out Polton’s Lane, trying not to breathe deeply.

Chapter 23

FROM the Hyatt in Mission Bay, I called Mindy at the Zenith Meridien production office in Boston.

“The trail,” I said, “leads to L.A., sweetheart.”

“Are you doing Cary Grant?” she said.

“You got some smart mouth, sweetheart. No wonder you’re not an executive.”

“It’s not a smart mouth that gets a girl ahead in this business, big guy.”

“Cynicism will age you,” I said.

“So will you. You want a hotel in L.A.?”

“Yes, please.”

“Zenith always puts people up at the Westwood Marquis,” Mindy said. “Okay with you?”

“I’ll make do,” I said.

“Okay. Corner Hilgard and LeConte, in Westwood Village.”

“I’ll find it,” I said.

“Super sleuth,” she said, and hung up.

I checked out of the Islandia and headed back up the freeway. Having a production coordinator wasn’t bad. Maybe I should employ one. I needed a hotel reservation and airline bookings every two, three years. In between times she could balance my checkbook.

The drive from San Diego to L.A. is not much more interesting than the drive from L.A. to San Diego. While I drove, I thought about what I was doing. As usual I was blundering around and seeing what I could kick up. So far I’d kicked up a child and another significant other in Jill Joyce’s life.

So what?

So I hadn’t known that before.

So how’s it help?

How the hell do I know?

The Westwood Marquis had flower gardens and two swimming pools and a muted lobby and served tea in the afternoon. All the rooms were suites. Zenith Meridien must be doing okay.

Everybody I saw in the lobby was slender and tended to Armani sport coats with the sleeves pushed up. I had on jeans and a sweatshirt with the sleeves cut off. My luggage was a gray gym bag with ADIDAS in large red letters along the side. I felt like a rhinoceros at a petting zoo.

I unpacked in my pale rose room and took a shower. Then I called an L.A. cop I knew named Samuelson and at 3:30 in the afternoon I was in my rental car heading downtown, on Wilshire.

The homicide bureau was located in the police building on Los Angeles Street. Samuelson’s office looked like it had eight years ago when I was in there last. There was a desk, a file cabinet, an air conditioner under the window behind Samuelson’s desk. The air conditioner was still noisy and there was still something wrong with the thermostat because it kept cycling on and shutting off as we talked. Samuelson appeared not to notice. He was a tall guy, nearly bald, with a droopy mustache and tinted aviator-style glasses. His corduroy jacket hung on a hook on a hat rack behind the door. Beyond the glass partition the homicide squad room spread out like squad rooms in every city. They all seemed to have been designed from the same blueprint.

“Probably a squad room on Jupiter,” I said, “looks just like this.”

Samuelson nodded. He had on a white shirt and a red and blue striped tie with the tie at half mast and the collar unbuttoned. He leaned back in his swivel chair and put his hands behind his head. He wore his gun high on his belt on the right side.

“Last time I saw you,” Samuelson said, “you’d finished fucking up a case of ours.”

“Always glad to help out,” I said.

“So what do you need?” Samuelson said.

“I’d like to talk with a guy named Victor del Rio.”

Samuelson showed no reaction.

“Yeah?” he said.

“He’s not listed in the L.A. book,” I said. “I was wondering if you had anything on him.”

“Why do you want to talk with him?” Samuelson said.

“Would you buy, ‘it’s confidential’?”

“Would you buy, ‘get lost’?”

“I’m backtracking on a murder in Boston; del Rio was once intimate with a figure in the case. He fathered her daughter.”

“And the figure?” Samuelson was perfectly patient. He was used to asking. He learned everything he knew this way. One answer at a time, nothing volunteered. If he minded it didn’t show.

“Jill Joyce,” I said.

“TV star?”

“Un huh.”

“You private guys get all the glamour work,” Samuelson said. “She try to bang you yet?”

“Ah, you know Miss Joyce,” I said.

Samuelson shrugged. “Victor del Rio runs the Hispanic rackets in L.A.”

“That’s heartwarming,” I said. “A success story.”

“Yeah, a big one,” Samuelson said.

“So where do I find him?” I said.

“If you a

“Why do you think I’ll a

“Because you a

“Yes.”

“You licensed in California?”

“No.”

“Of course not,” Samuelson said. “Del Rio’s got a place in Bel Air.”

“Not East L.A.?”

“Are you kidding,” Samuelson said. “That’s where he makes his money. It’s not where he lives.”

“You got an address?”

“Wait a minute,” Samuelson said. He picked up the phone and spoke into it. Outside in the main squad room an L.A. cop with his handcuffs dangling from his shoulder holster was talking to an Hispanic kid wearing a banda