and I was willing to bet that somewhere someone was hugging the bejeepers out of something.
I looked at my watch. Four thirty. Susan was taking another summer course at Harvard, and I was supposed to pick her up at five. In L.A. that was barely past lunchtime. They were probably still sipping Perrier at Ma Maison.
Across Berkley Street the young dark-haired art director in the ad agency looked out the window and waved at me. I shot at her with my forefinger and she smiled. I smiled back. Enigmatic. Byronic. Once you have found her, never let her go. The phone rang. I said hello.
“Mr. Spenser?”
“Yes.”
“This is Candy Sloan.”
“Rachel Wallace spoke of you,” I said.
“Oh, good. Then you know the situation.”
“Only very generally,” I said. “Rachel said you’d give me details.”
“Oh, God. Over the phone? I hate to talk about it.”
“How about I make up a set of circumstances and you tell me if I’m getting hot or cold?”
“Excuse me? Oh, you’re being ironic. Rachel warned me that you would be.”
“Ironic,” I said.
“Well, of course you’ll need to know things. I can give you details when you get out here, but essentially the situation is this. I’m a reporter for KNBS-TV, here in Los Angeles. We’re doing an investigative series on labor racketeering in the film business, and I came across pretty solid evidence that production companies were paying off labor-union figures to ensure a troublefree shooting schedule.”
I said, “Um-hmm.”
“When we started digging a little deeper, I got a threatening phone call and recently, when I’ve gotten off work, the same car, a maroon Pontiac Firebird with mag wheels, has followed me home.”
“What was your pretty solid evidence?”
“It’s followed me three nights in a row.”
“No, I mean o[ payola in the movies?”
“Oh. Eyewitness.”
“And what deeper digging did you do?”
“We began questioning other people in the business.”
“Any documentary evidence?”
“Like checks; photographs, that sort of thing?”
“Yes. Stuff that couldn’t be threatened or bought off.”
“Not yet.”
I had the phone tucked into the hollow of my shoulder and my hands in my hip pockets. While I talked, I looked out the window.
I said, “Um-hmm.”
“So,” Candy Sloan said, “the station has agreed to hire someone to help me with this. To act as a bodyguard and help with the investigation.”
“Why not someone out there?” I took my left hand out of my pocket and looked at my watch. Four forty-six. I was going to be late for Susan if I didn’t close this off.
“We couldn’t be sure they would be reliable, and by coincidence, I had recently interviewed Rachel Wallace, and she spoke at length about her kidnapping and how you found her.”
“She mention how I lost her in the first place?”
“She said that was her fault.”
“Mmm.”
“Will you come out here?”
“Two hundred dollars a. day and expenses.”
“That will be fine. The station will pay.”
“And you gotta promise to show me a movie star.”
“Anyone special?”
“Dale Evans.”
There was silence on the other end.
“Or whoever you can find,” I said. “It doesn’t have to be Dale. Mala Powers would be good.”
“I’ll do what I can,” she said. “Are you really this goofy all the time?” There was a giggle at the edge of her voice.
