in as deep a voice as I could, “Allan Pinkerton, here.”
At the other end a voice I remembered said, “Mr. Spenser, please.”
I said in my Pinkerton voice, “One moment, please,” and then in my normal voice, “Hello.”
The voice on the phone said, “Spenser, do you expect to deceive anyone with that nonsense?”
I said, “You want to hear me do Richard Nixon?”
“No, I do not. I haven’t time. Spenser, this is Rachel Wallace. I assume you recall me.”
“Often,” I said.
“Well, I have some work for you.”
“Let me check my schedule,” I said.
She laughed briefty. “Your sense of humor is much too complete for you to be busy.”
“Are you suggesting I offend people?”
“Yes. Myself included, upon occasion.”
“Only upon occasion?”
“Yes.”
“What would you like done?”
“There’s a young woman in California who is in trouble. She needs the kind of help that you are able to offer.”
“Where in California?”
“Los Angeles. She has uncovered what appears to be a large scandal in the motion picture industry and she feaa that her life may become endangered.”
“And you’d like me to go out and look after her?”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t do all that well with you.”
“I think you did. I recommended you to this woman.”
“She’s a friend?”
“No, I met her only once. She’s a television reporter and she interviewed me on the last leg of a book tour. I told her about our adventures. Later on she contacted me through my publisher and requested your name.”
“You must have spoken well of me.”
“I told the truth. You are strong and brave and resourceful. I told her that. I told her also that our politics were miles apart.”
“Politics is too abstract for me,” I said. “I don’t have any.”
“Perhaps you don’t. I told her if you were committed, you would never give up and that, politics aside, you were quite intelligent.”
“Intelligent?”
“Yes.”
“I’m reading a book by the president of Yale,” I said.
“Good for you. Will you help the young woman in California?”
“I need more details.”
“She will supply them. I told her I’d call and clear the way; so to speak.”
“When will I hear from her?”
“This afternoon. Shortly after I hang up.”
“What’s her name?”
“Candy Sloan. Will you do it?”
“Probably.”
“Good. Give my love to Susan.”
“Okay.”
“Perhaps next time I’m in Boston, I can buy you lunch.”
“Yes,” I said. “Call me.”
“I shall. Good-bye, Spenser.”
“Good-bye.”
I hung up the phone and stood and stared out the window. It was June. Below, at the corner of Berkley and Boylston, good-looking women in summer dresses crossed at the light. A lot of men wore seersucker jackets. I didn’t. Susan said I wasn’t the type. I asked her what type I was. She said leather vest, no shirt. I think she was kidding. It was June, seventy-two degrees, clear. The murder count in the city was down ten percent from last year,
