Loretta and her parents went up to visit their farmer relatives in Bakersfield—immediately. I wasn’t worried about him taking my warning lightly. Loretta was the only person he loved in life. He might not have ever said anything, or even have bought her a present at Christmas, but Milo would have laid down his life to protect that woman.
The next thing I did was to call the Leora Hartman/Brown phone number.
“Hello?” a proper Negro voice queried.
“That you, Oscar?” I asked, trying to mask my surprise.
“To whom am I speaking?” he asked in return.
“It’s Mr. Minton speaking. I, um, I wanted to speak to Miss Fine.”
“Where did you get this number?” he asked suspiciously.
“This is the number I got, man. Something wrong?”
“This is my private line, not the house phone.”
“What can I tell you, Oscar my man?”
Oscar paused long enough for a machination. Then he said, “She’s still dressing, Mr. Minton. I’ll see if she will return your call later.”
“Don’t bother. Just tell her that I’ll be by in an hour or so. I have some reporting to do.”
“I’m not sure if she’ll be here. She said that she was going to do some shopping.”
“Tell her that I have some hot news for her. She’ll stick around for that.”
“If you have something to tell her, I will be happy to pass it on.”
I thought about Bradford, about how he was willing to filter the truth to and from his employer.
“No thanks, man. I better report to the one that’s payin’ me.”
“I can’t promise that she’ll be here when you come.”
“Just promise that you’ll tell her what I said and we’re jake.” On that note I hung up the phone.
“Who was that?” Fearless asked.
“You in this with me now, aren’t you, Fearless?”
“Yeah, Paris. You know it, man. You my boy.”
“There’s money here,” I said. “Mr. Wexler plus BB is twenty thousand right there. Now Miss Fine might even be more than that. But I don’t like all these other people involved.”
“People come and go, Paris. They come and go. But you’n me be right here, baby. Don’t you worry ’bout that.”
His certainty almost made me confident.
I felt bad about the Wexler murders. Life is a precious thing. But they were dead and I didn’t know why. Maybe, if I found out what Kit had done to Miss Fine, I could solve the crime and retire too.
THE GATE TO THE FINE RESIDENCE was open when we got there. Oscar was waiting at the door by the time we reached the desolate front yard.
“Mr. Minton,” he said. “Miss Fine is waiting for you in the study.”
“Bring us to her,” I said in a confident voice.
“Your friend will have to stay here,” he informed me.
“The hell he will.”
“Miss Fine is only expecting you.”
Rose Fine, wearing a white satin gown and elbow-length black gloves, peeked around a corner down the hall from us. She snorted, then giggled and disappeared behind a pile of bound files.
“You tell Miss Fine that I’m here with my fellow investigator—Fearless Jones. If she wants to hear what I have to say, then she will have to talk to both of us.”
Oscar was stuck. I had called him on his personal phone. He knew something was wrong and whatever it was it was bad news for him. If it was his house he would have ushered us out of the door and gone to hide under the bed.
But it wasn’t his house.
He turned and walked through a scuffed-up lime-colored door. When he was gone Rose Fine poked her head out again.
“Hello, Miss Fine,” I said.
“Do I know you gentlemen?” she asked me.
“Sure you do. Don’t you remember? I sat on the wood bench and you took the barber’s chair. Oscar got you a shot of whiskey.”M
“He wasn’t here, though,” she said, referring to Fearless.
“This is my friend. His name is Fearless. We’re doing something for your sister.”
“What?”
“Lookin’ for a boy name of Bartholomew.”
