there was. Gunther had said it was logical. Whoever was working with Paul would have to go back to his house to see if there was anything that could link the two of them. The killer might do it quickly or might take a long time. The killer might even say the hell with the whole thing and run for Acapulco.
But this killer had been in the game for a long time, had poisoned some elephants and started a fire the year before, had shared a hatred for the circus, and, if I was right, done some very dangerous and equally dumb things.
I parked in the driveway and went in, making a lot of noise. I didn’t want to catch the killer there and get myself killed. I was after a confession where others could hear it. I went into the living room, kicking things, singing “Flat Foot Floogie” and alerting any living thing within a hundred yards. The person I was trying to alert was not a hundred yards away but upstairs somewhere. I heard the creak and the step, and then it stopped. I kept singing and hurried for the phone.
There was no click on the line to indicate that anyone had picked up an extension. I asked for a number from the operator. It was 5454 and meant nothing to me.
“
“Right,” I said loudly. “I’m out at Paul’s place now.”
“
“No, no point in staying here,” I said. “Look, it doesn’t mean anything unless you’re willing to tell the sheriff. Are you willing to tell him or not?”
“
“I can’t force you to do anything,” I said with exasperation. “You can just pack up with the circus and go. Just forget two murders. If you saw who took the Tanuccis’ harness, and it wasn’t Paul, then it was someone working with Paul.”
“
“OK, then we talk. Come to town. Mirador. Right in the center of town there’s a little bar called Hijo’s. I’ll be there in ten minutes. It shouldn’t take you more than fifteen or twenty. We’ll talk, and if you agree, we go to the sheriff. Look, they’re trying to nail all this on me.”
“
“Just come,” I insisted. “Your life isn’t worth a box of popcorn if the bastard knows what you saw.”
I hung up the phone. I wondered whether I would have fallen for it, but it was hard to tell. I wasn’t a killer and I wasn’t crazy. Something creaked very slightly upstairs. I didn’t want to give the killer a chance to consider getting rid of me on the spot. I counted on the killer wanting me to point out the possible witness at Hijo’s, but I have been wrong so many times that I more than half expected a sharp phutt of a bullet hitting my back or the vibration of a chair against my head. I got neither. As I climbed into the cabin of the truck, I noticed a curtain move on the second floor of Paul’s house. I drove on down the road.
The trip back was faster than the trip out. I knew my way now. I parked on the street in front of Alex’s car, where the truck had been before, and stepped out. A little Mexican kid about nine stood outside the door.
“I seen you before,” the kid said, squinting up at my bristly chin and unforgettable face. “You came through when that guy got bumped off. Hey, you the guy they was looking for last night who cut off old Two-face’s head?”
“I didn’t cut off anyone’s head,” I said. “Now beat it.”
“Cost you,” he said.
I looked at the sun, the white clouds, and then at the sweet-faced kid asking for hush money.
“What’s the going price for covering a murder?” I said, digging into my pocket. I didn’t want to keep talking, but I didn’t want him messing the setup. I was willingly contributing to the delinquency of a minor.
“Four bits,” he said.
“Reasonable,” I said, giving him two quarters.
He took them in his hand and examined them carefully.
“You think I’m a counterfeiter in addition to a murderer?”
“Just being careful,” he said, pocketing the coins. “Don’t worry. I didn’t see nothin’, I don’t know nothin’, and I don’t say nothin’.”
I hadn’t seen a car at Paul’s house, but the killer wouldn’t have been dumb enough to park in the driveway. It would take a few minutes to get to wherever the car was, but that car couldn’t be far behind me now.
“Take it easy,” I said to the kid, moving toward Hijo’s.
“Hey, I take it any way it comes,” he said with a big grin.
“Ever thought of being a movie producer?” I said in front of Hijo’s.
“What’s it pay?”
“Almost as good as hush money,” I said.
“I’ll think about it,” he said seriously. “Hey, you’re not going into Hijo’s, are you? You can get in trouble in there, my old man says.”
“Got to,” I said with a grin. “I’ve got a killer to catch.”
The kid looked at me like I was crazy as I pushed open the door and left the day behind me.
15
None of the boys were whooping it up at Hijo’s saloon. I stepped back two days in time. There were three people at the bar, a drunk at a table, and music playing. They were the same three people I had met there the last time. Only the music was different. At least I think it was different. It was a woman almost weeping in Spanish.
The Falstaff Beer sign sputtered on the wall, trying to keep up with the weeping woman on the radio, but was a beat or two behind.
My eyes adjusted slowly to the bartender sitting behind the bar with his head in but one hand this time and what looked like the same cigarette drooping from his chubby lips.
“You still with the circus?” called Jean Alvero, the whore with the heart of a dove.
I stepped to the bar, eyeing Alex’s brother Lope, who wore the same denims but might have changed his shirt. The only thing different about him was the bandage over his head and right eye.
“Right,” I said, keeping an eye on Lope, who walked over to me. The drunk at the table was awake. It was early. He probably didn’t pass out till nine or ten in the morning.
“No trouble,” I said to Lope, holding out my hand. His smaller friend was standing behind him, thumbs hooked in his belt.
“No trouble,” said Lope. “I was drunk the other time. I deserved this.” He pointed to his head. “I’ll buy you a beer.”
“I’ll take a Pepsi, and thanks,” I said with my smashed-face grin, “but I don’t think it will be healthy to drink with me.”
Lope’s remaining eye went narrow. He had put out his hand in friendship, and if I turned it away he was going to lose what was left of his face.
“Don’t get me wrong,” I added quickly. “I’m expecting trouble through that door, and I don’t want anyone too near me when it comes.”
Lope understood that. His eye opened wider. “I’m not afraid of a little trouble,” he said, looking back at his faithful companion Carlos, who grinned broadly.
“Fair enough,” I said. “Keep an eye on me from the end of the bar, and if trouble breaks out, go for the one with the gun, knife, or chair in his hand, providing it isn’t me.”
Lope grinned, I think, and belched something at the bartender, who tore himself away from the radio to get me a warm Pepsi.
Lope and Carlos returned to Jean Alvero. I toasted her with warm Pepsi. “I thought you come back to see Jean Alvero,” she said. I’d noticed that opera and movie stars and whores referred to themselves in the third person. Maybe they had something in common.
“I did,” I said, trying to watch the door without insulting my hosts by turning my back. “It was your beauty
