about Simpson having a place in the desert. I rolled out of bed and called her while the coffee dripped.
'Oh, I don't know,' she said sleepily. 'Somewhere out past Pasadena.'
'It got a name?'
'Springs, some kind of springs,' she said. 'I've never been there. I just know Daddy used to go out there when he was well.'
'Rancho Springs?'
'That sounds right. Will I see you soon, Phil?'
'I hope so,' I said, and hung up the phone. Phil?
I called Pauline Snow.
'Marlowe,' I said. 'Do you know if a guy named Randolph Simpson lives anywhere around Rancho Springs?'
'A guy named Randolph Simpson? Marlowe, where the hell have you been living the last thirty years? Randolph Simpson is not a 'guy.' That's like saying 'a guy named John D. Rockefeller,' for God's sake.'
'Does he live there?'
'Sure. Everybody knows that.'
'Do you have any access to him?'
'Of course not. No one has access to Randolph Simpson. Why?'
'I think he's hooked into the business with the water rights and the land development.'
'Simpson?'
'Dr. Bonsentir is his doctor.'
'That doesn't mean he is involved in some scheme.'
'Few nights ago,' I said, 'a couple of hard numbers leaned on me pretty good on a rainy street in Hollywood. They told me to stay away from Randolph Simpson and Dr. Bonsentir.'
'Because you were poking around in the water rights thing?'
'Because I have been looking for a young woman who went from Bonsentir's clinic to Simpson. The hard boys that poured it to me were driving a Buick sedan registered to the Neville Valley Realty Trust.'
'The people buying water rights up north.'
'Un huh.'
'Doesn't prove Simpson's involved in it. Could be just about the girl.'
'Why are they driving a car registered to the Neville Valley Trust? And how much of a coincidence is it that Neville Valley seems to be connected to Rancho Springs, and Simpson has a place in Rancho Springs, and his doctor is on the board of the development company buying land in Rancho Springs?'
'Okay,' Pauline Snow said. 'You got a point. It's not something you can take to court, or even something I can print-yet. But it's something.'
'How about Chuck and Vinnie,' I said. 'You have anything on them?'
'Just addresses,' she said. 'You want them?'
I did. She rummaged off the phone for a couple of minutes while I put some cream and sugar in my coffee and sipped it. Then she came back and gave me an address in Los Angeles.
'Business address, I assume,' she said. 'I don't know L. A. that well, but that sounds like downtown.'
'It is,' I said. 'I'll go call on them. Anything you can find out about Randolph Simpson is welcome.'
'What are we trying to do, Marlowe? Exactly?'
'How the hell do I know?' I said. 'I was hired to find the girl. I guess we're trying to do that.'
***
I had some toast and drank the rest of my coffee, and in an hour, with my arm still throbbing, but my head feeling better, I was headed downtown.
Gardenia-Tartabull Insurance and Real Estate was in a building on Bunker Hill near Fourth Street that had impressed everyone when they built it. It was less impressive now, but under the grime you could still see the glamour of its youth. The lobby was an open shaft to the roof through which the iron cage elevators went up and down, and around which a tier of filigreed iron balconies marked the floor levels. Gardenia-Tartabull was on the sixth floor behind a pebbled glass door that had notary public in small black letters under the name of the firm.
Inside, at a desk with nearly nothing on it, was a redhead with a lot of hair, wearing a tight green dress. She was tilted back in her chair with her legs crossed, working very carefully on getting her nails painted in a shade of flame to match her hair. I waited for a minute until there seemed a break in the process. She didn't look up.
I said, 'Do you have another job here, or is that it?'
'Wait a sec,' she said. Her forehead was wrinkled with concentration and the tip of her tongue showed between her bright lips. I hooked a straight chair from against the wall beside the door and turned it around and sat on it with my forearms resting on the back. I put my chin on my arms and watched her paint.
'How long does this usually take you?' I said.
She didn't answer, just shook her head and frowned a little harder as she put a smooth swipe of lacquer on
