She was not any happier to see me than the receptionist had been. But she had more self-possession and this was a public place; when I sat down across from her she didn’t protest and she didn’t tell me to drop dead, either verbally or with her eyes.
“I didn’t expect to see you again,” she said.
“Meaning you hoped you wouldn’t. ”
The delicate shrug. “More questions?”
“Some. Go ahead and finish your lunch while we talk.”
“I had every intention of doing that,” she said. She plucked a mussel out of its shell and washed it down with a sip of wine.
“Well?”
“Frank O’Daniel,” I said. “You heard about what happened to him, of course.”
“Of course.”
“Well, like you said the other day, a beauty salon is a good place to find out things. There’s been gossip about Mrs. O’Daniel; I thought there might have been some about her husband too.”
She didn’t answer right away. One of the waitresses came over to the table, to find out if I wanted anything, but I gestured her away. At some other time, and with some other companion, I might have ordered a meal just so I could put it on my expense account and see what Barney Rivera would say. Not today. I kept my attention on Penny Belson’s face.
“I don’t know what you’re after,” she said at length. “Frank O’Daniel and another woman-that sort of thing? I’ve heard nothing like that.”
“What have you heard, then?”
She sighed. “I suppose the only way I’m going to have any peace is to be frank with you. All right. Evidently he was planning to divorce his wife, sell his house and his interest in Northern Development, and move away. ”
“Who told you this?”
“One of my customers.”
“Which one?”
“I won’t tell you that. She’s no one you know, no one connected with Northern Development. She is a good customer and I don’t want to lose her.”
“Where was O’Daniel moving to?”
“The Bay Area somewhere.”
“Did he have a business opportunity down there?”
“I don’t know.”
“Why was he selling out and moving, then?”
“Why do you think? His company is in financial trouble and his wife is a bitch. Isn’t that enough reason?”
“Is there anything else you can tell me, Miss Belson?”
“Not about Frank O’Daniel.”
“About Helen O’Daniel then. About any of her other affairs.”
“She’s had several. Would you like a list of names?”
“I was thinking about one in particular. An artist named Paul Robideaux.”
It surprised her-genuinely so, I thought. She said, “Robideaux. That name is familiar…”
I could have told her where Robideaux lived; she’d probably find it out anyway, soon enough. But I didn’t want to have to explain things, and I didn’t want to witness the catty pleasure it would give her. I said, “Thanks for your help, Miss Belson,” and got on my feet.
“Wait,” she said. “This artist, this Paul Robideaux-”
“Actually he’s a writer and his real name is Hasselblatt. Thanks again. ”
I left her sitting there sipping wine and looking coldly thoughtful.
The smells in Rive Gauche had made me hungry, so I stopped at a McDonald’s and had a Big Mac and some fries and a strawberry milkshake. Then I drove back to George Fulbright’s law offices.
But Fulbright hadn’t known anything about Frank O‘Daniel’s intentions to sell out his interest in Northern Development and move to the Bay Area; he seemed amazed at the possibility. “I can’t understand how Mr. O’Daniel could have seriously considered such a move without consulting me,” he said.
“Can you think of any reason why he wouldn’t have consulted you?”
“No, none. ”
“Did he have any business affiliations in the Bay Area?”
“Not that I’m aware of. He knew people there, of course-business people. I know two or three myself that I could check with…”
“If you’d do that, Mr. Fulbright, I’d appreciate it.”
I made the sheriffs department my next stop, to see if Jim Telford was in. He was. He’d just come back from Musket Creek, where he’d been all day and where he hadn’t found out much. He had nothing else encouraging to tell me, either. The police lab had been over the remains of the Kokanee, and a professional diver had swept the lake bottom, with the same results in both cases: no evidence to support the theory that the explosion and O’Daniel’s death had not been an accident.
Telford hadn’t talked to Paul Robideaux because Robideaux hadn’t been home, and he was interested in what I had to tell him about my own meeting with the artist and Robideaux’s affair with Helen O‘Daniel. Still, there wasn’t anything conclusive in it. The prowler angle stumped him as much as it did me. And so did Frank O’Daniel’s somewhat odd behavior of late.
Lots of possibilities-lots of apparent dead ends.
When I left Telford I drove over to the Redding Police Department and had another, brief talk with Hank Betters. The only thing he had to tell me was that Martin Treacle had been bugging him for police protection and the department, reluctantly, had obliged by assigning a “temporary bodyguard. ” A waste of the taxpayer’s money, Betters said, but it was better that than having Treacle go to the newspapers and build a flap about police indifference.
It was four o’clock by the time I got into my car again. I was fresh out of leads, and I was also hot and tired and my face was hurting some; I headed for the Sportsman’s Rest. On the way I stopped to buy a couple of ice-cold cans of Lite beer. The stuff tasted like beer-flavored water, but you got used to it. And now that I was watching my weight, it was a hell of a lot better than no beer at all.
Something had begun to rattle around in the trunk, and when I got to the motel I opened the lid to see what it was. The stone cup I’d found at the fire scene in Musket Creek. It had come loose from where I’d wedged it behind the spare tire. I’d forgotten about the thing-I should have given it to Telford long before this. I took it inside the room and put it on the dresser so I would remember to take it to the sheriff’s department later on.
Kerry wasn’t there; still over at Whiskeytown or wherever in her rented Datsun. I opened a beer, drank some of it to cool off, and then went to the motel office to see if I’d had any messages. Two calls, both from Barney Rivera. Call back as soon as possible. Urgent.
Trouble, I thought wearily.
Back in the room, I sat on the bed with my beer and put in a call to Great Western Insurance in San Francisco. When Barney came on he said, “Anything to report? Christ, I hope so.” He sounded harried.
Well, he wasn’t the only one. I said, “Nothing yet. I’m working on it, Barney. I told you I’d call when I had something to report.”
“Yeah, well, I’m getting flack here. I’m going to have to bring somebody else in to give you a hand. That’s the directors’ idea, not mine.”
“Terrific. Then we can stumble over each other like Abbott and Costello. ”
“I’ve got to do it. The directors want results. They don’t want to pay double indemnity twice; that’s four hundred thousand bucks-big money.”
“I know it’s big money,” I said. “And if they have to pay it I’ll get held responsible and you won’t throw me any more investigative bones. Right?”
“Did I say that?”
“You didn’t have to. Look, Barney, I’m doing the best I can. Give me another day or two.”
“I don’t know if I can…”
