Undercurrent

So am I, I thought. 'Did the Chief have any… news?'

'No, I don't think so. He didn't say, if he had.'

And I was not going to say either, not at this point. There were too many intangibles, for one thing, and for another she was starting to bear up fine now and the kind of facts I did know for certain could only have upset her. I said, 'Did he tell you whether or not we-you-could leave for San Francisco tonight?'

'Yes. He said it was all right.'

'Good. I've got to go over to see him now, and there's the chance I'll have to stay on here for another day or so. If so, I'll call you and let you know-and I'm sure the Chief will assign someone to drive you to the airport in Monterey, and make arrangements for someone else to meet you in San Francisco and take you home.'

'All right,' she said. 'But why should you have to stay another day?'

'I'm not certain that I will have to; it just may work out that way.' I paused. 'If it does, would you mind if I called you in San Francisco when I get back? And maybe dropped out to see you?'

She had another of those small smiles for me. 'No, of course I wouldn't mind. I think I'll need someone to talk to, until I can return to my family.'

We touched hands, and hers was soft and moist and very tiny in mine-a child's hand. Christ, she made me feel paternal. I resisted an impulse to kiss her cheek, smiled at her, and left her again with some regrets.

I drove on to City Hall, and this time Quartermain was there. The fat sergeant told me he had come in a half-hour earlier, apparently just after he had left Judith for the second time; the sergeant got a phone okay for me to go in, and buzzed open the electronic doors. Less than a minute later I opened the door to Quartermain's private office.

He was sitting behind the walnut desk with the heels of his hands pressed against his temples, as if he were suffering a savage headache. His sad face had a weary, houndish look. I shut the door quietly, and he said, 'I would have been back two hours ago, but I stopped at the Bay Head to see Mrs. Paige.'

I sat down in the same armchair I had occupied that morning. 'I know,' I said. 'I just left her myself.'

'She seems to be holding her own now.'

'I thought so too. It was good of you to take her out for a walk and something to eat.'

'Yeah, well, she needed it,' he said. He lowered his hands and swiveled around to look at me. 'Donovan, out on the desk, said you'd stopped by twice to see me while I was gone. What's on your mind?'

'Quite a few things,' I told him. 'I've spent the day putting my nose into things, where it probably doesn't belong.'

'Paige's death, you mean?'

'Yes.'

'In what way?'

'Well, it started with the book.'

'The paperback from Paige's bag?'

'Uh-huh. There was a lead in it after all.'

'What sort of lead?'

'The author, Russell Dancer. I'd read some of his pulp stories, and they were set in the San Francisco area- the later ones; so was The Dead and the Dying. So I followed a hunch and looked him up in the local telephone directory.'

'He's listed?'

'R. Dancer, Beach Road, County.'

'Christ, I never even thought of that possibility.'

'You can't think of everything,' I said. 'And you can't know everybody who lives in or around your community.'

'I suppose not,' he admitted. 'I take it there was a connection between Dancer and Paige?'

I nodded. 'Dancer knew him about six years ago.'

'Where?'

'Cypress Bay. Paige lived here for six or seven months, and he was part of a bar-hopping group that included Dancer and several other local residents. He was apparently involved with most of them, in one way or another.'

'How do you mean?'

'Like this,' I said, and I told him the rest of it, slowly, including each of my impressions. He let me tell it once without interruption; then he had me repeat parts of it, asking questions now and then and making notes on a ruled pad. Finally he sat back and tapped the clip of his pen against his front teeth, but there was no disapproval for me on his long face. I thought it was going to keep on being all right between us.

He said, 'I shouldn't have been so quick to discount that goddamned book; it seems to have keyed open a few local closets.'

'I think it ties in further, too,' I said, 'but I can't figure how. I drew nothing but blanks when I asked about it.'

'I don't like the way all this is shaping up,' Quartermain said. 'Last night Paige's death had most of the earmarks of a simple crime of passion, but you've uncovered a hell of a lot of potential complications and involvements. Murder in a town like Cypress Bay is bad enough, but when some of the more respected members of the community begin figuring into it, it's a damn sight worse. I know Keith Tarrant and the Lomaxes, and I'm not going to relish digging into their private lives-especially if it means a large amount of adverse publicity. We're a resort town, primarily, and we can't afford any kind of a major blow-off.'

I did not say anything.

Quartermain made an abrupt deprecating gesture. 'Hell, that sounds callous and insular, and those are two things I try not to be. I didn't mean that I intend to soft-pedal my investigation; I'm a cop and I've got a job to do and I'm going to do it the best way I know how-publicity or no publicity. I guess I was just thinking out loud, lamenting a little.'

'Nobody likes to see a blow-off in his town,' I said. 'A cop least of all.'

'Yeah,' he said, and sighed. 'Well, maybe those skeletons that seem to be rattling around don't include the bones of murder; that's something to hope for anyway.'

'What are you going to do first, if I can ask?'

'Talk to Brad Winestock,' he answered. 'I want to know who this bald man is and why he keeps turning up.'

'I'd like to know that myself.'

He looked at me for a time, meditatively. 'You want to tag along for the ride?'

I sat up straight in the chair. I had not expected anything like that; at best, I had figured him to ask me to hang around for another day or two. 'Hell yes, if you'll have me.'

'You've done a considerable amount of spadework, and I think that earns you the right to sit in-and to hell with the rulebook.'

'Thanks, Chief.'

'Ned-for God's sake.' He got up on his feet. 'I think it's a good idea if Mrs. Paige got out of here and back home; familiar surroundings are what she needs right now. Since you'll be staying on, I'll make arrangements for her to fly into San Francisco International from Monterey. You want to call her and tell her?'

'Yes.'

'Use my phone. I'll go out and have Donovan set it up, here and in San Francisco.'

I rang up Judith at the Bay Head Inn and told her that I was going to have to remain in Cypress Bay another day, after all, and that Quartermain was making preparations for her return by plane. She said that was fine, although she would have preferred driving back with me. There was a warm thing for me in those words, and I held onto it, down inside. I promised to call her as soon as I got home to San Francisco, or if anything came up that she ought to know. I also told her to keep away from television and radio broadcasts, and the newspapers, because they could only upset her-and not to talk to any reporters if they came around; she was better, but not quite ready to find out about her husband's infidelity or background or prison record, and the less she knew for a while, the stronger she would be when she finally had to face the whole truth. She agreed to do as I requested, and asked me to thank the Chief for his kindness, and we said a soft parting.

Quartermain came back, and it was all arranged. So we left his office then, without any more words, and