I didn't want to say I wasn't, so I let it drift with the aimless current of Sternwood life.
'Still sitting in the window,' I said, 'peeking through the curtains?'
'I live here, Marlowe, or had you forgotten? I like to know who's going in and out.'
'I came in a while ago,' I said. 'Now I'm going out.'
Vivian stepped through the door and closed it behind her. She took in some smoke and held it a long time and then let it trail out slowly as she stared down at the distant line of derricks.
'A walk down memory lane, Mr. Marlowe? Or perhaps you came courting and lost your nerve?'
I shook my head.
'Still the strong silent type, aren't you?'
I grinned at her and nodded and put my hat on with the brim tipped forward over my forehead. I moved off the front step and began to move along down the slope toward my car. Vivian came along with me. I could feel the tension in her. Her movements were jagged with it.
'You talked with Eddie Mars,' she said.
'Sure, after the Regan thing. I said I would.'
'How'd he take it?'
'You know I talked with him,' I said. 'You probably know how he took it.'
'You told him to stay away from me, and from Carmen. You said my father was never to know and if he found out, you, personally, would find a way to put Eddie upstate for a long time.'
'Just making small talk,' I said. 'I hope I didn't upset him.'
'Eddie Mars? It would take more than a cut-rate gumshoe to scare Eddie Mars.'
'I charge full rates,' I said. 'And your father died without knowing.'
'Yes,' she said. 'He did.'
The tight planes of her face softened for a moment. She put her hand on my arm as we walked along the brick pathway toward the gate.
'I'm grateful for that, Marlowe.'
I said, 'Uh huh.'
We were almost at the gate. I had parked my car under a pepper tree on the street, the same way I had the first time, that October when I'd come to call with the look of hard rain in the foothills, because Bernie Ohls, the DA's chief investigator, had told me that General Sternwood needed a gumshoe.
'Why are you here, Marlowe?'
'I came to call on your butler,' I said.
'Without consulting me?'
'This is southern California, Mrs. Regan, in the twentieth century. Servants are now employees, not slaves. I know you don't like that, but you'll have to face it sooner or later.'
She tried to slap me, but I got a forearm up between my face and her hand.
'Bastard,' she said.
'How's Carmen?' I said.
'Fine,' Vivian said.
'I doubt that,' I said. 'She wasn't fine the last time I saw her, when she tried to put five bullets in me like she did Regan.'
'I did what you said, you know that. I took her away. We went to Switzerland, she took some treatments.'
'And now you're back,' I said. 'And where's Carmen?'
'In a sanitarium,' Vivian said.
'Resthaven?'
Vivian gave me a sharp look. The skin seemed to be stretched too tight over her cheekbones.
'What has Norris told you?' she said.
'Privileged communication,' I said. 'What are you doing to find her?'
'That bastard,' Vivian said. 'He told you, didn't he?'
'She shouldn't be running around loose,' I said.
'She's all right. I've got people looking for her.'
'Mars?' I said.
'Eddie has promised to find her. She's probably just run off with some man. You know how Carmen is.'
Vivian was as casually unconcerned as a butterfly on a tulip.
