Lullaby Town

front of the camera. I spoke with people I know at the Bank of America and the phone company and the police, all of whom are checking their computers for information about her past or present, but I probably won't hear from any of them until tomorrow. I talked with the man who was her theatrical agent, Oscar Curtiss, who is trying to be helpful but probably won't be. It goes like that sometimes. He wanted me to tell you that because he would like to do business with you.'

Peter made a little flipping gesture with his drink. 'Fuck'm.'

I shrugged.

Peter said, 'That's it?'

'Yep.'

'I thought it would go faster.'

'Most people do.'

Peter poured himself another three fingers of the Knockando, took it to the glass doors, and drank it. He stared out at the canyon for a while, then put the glass and the bottle on the floor and turned back to me. It took an effort to get himself turned around, like a tall ship in a wind with a lot of sail. He said, 'I'm calling you out.' Marshal Dillon.

I said, 'Yeah?'

He nodded. 'You're goddamned right. I didn't like the way you spoke to me at the studio today, and I don't like the way you're speaking to me now. I'm Peter Alan Nelsen and I don't take shit.'

I looked at Dani. She said, 'Why don't we just leave, Peter? He doesn't want to party. We can go somewhere and party without him.'

Peter said, 'Hey, Dani, you wanna leave, leave, but I'm calling this sonofabitch out.' Peter sort of swayed forward, squinting the way you do when you're seeing three or four of something that there's only one of.

He said, 'C'mon, goddamnit, I'm serious,' and put up his fists. When his fists went up the cat howled loud and mournful and flashed out from under the couch. He grabbed Peter's ankle and bit and screamed and clawed with his hind legs. Peter yelled, 'Sonofabitch,' jumped sideways, stumbled into the chair, and fell over backward. The cat sprinted back under the couch.

I said, 'Some cat, huh?'

Dani helped Peter up, then righted the chair. Peter said, 'Lemme alone,' and pulled away from her. When he did he fell to his knees. He said, 'I'm all right. I'm all right.' Then he passed out.

I said, 'Is he like this a lot?'

Dani said, 'Pretty much, yeah.'

'I'll help you get him outside.'

'No, thanks. You could get the door, if you want.'

'You sure?'

'I can bench two-thirty. I squat over four.'

Nope. She wouldn't need the help.

Dani lifted him into the chair, then squatted in front of him and pulled him onto her shoulders and stood up. She said, 'You see?'

I got the door.

She moved out past me and stopped on the porch and looked back at me. 'I know it doesn't show, but he really likes you. You're all he talked about this afternoon.'

'Great.'

She frowned, maybe looking a little angry. Defensive for him. I liked that. 'It's not easy being him. Here's a guy with all he has going, and he can't just go hang out, you see?'

'Sure.'

'Everybody in his life is there because they want to screw him. Any time there's a woman, he's thinking it's because she wants to rip him off. Any time a guy says he's Peter's friend, it's because he wants to be in business with Peter Alan Nelsen, the big deal, not with Peter Nelsen, the guy.' She said it as if we were just standing there, as if Peter Alan Nelsen wasn't an outsized yoke across her shoulders.

I said, 'He's got to be getting heavy.'

She smiled softly. 'I can hold him all night.'

I followed her out to a black-on-black Range Rover and opened the right front door. She eased him into the front seat and carefully placed his head on the headrest and buckled the seat belt around him. She tested it to make sure it was snug. I said, 'Everybody's out to screw him but you.'

She nodded, then shut the door and looked at me, and there was something soft within the hard muscle. She said, 'Are you going to quit? He pulls stuff like this and most people quit.'

I shook my head. 'I'm liking you too much to quit.'

She made the little soft smile again, then went around to the driver's side, got in, and made a U-turn onto the little road that winds down the blackness toward Laurel Canyon and Mulholland Drive.

I went back into the house and picked up the empty glasses and the Knockando bottle and cleaned up the spilled booze. The cat came out from under the couch and watched me for a while, and then he left. Off to do cat things, no doubt.

When the glasses were put away, I went out onto the deck again and looked down into the dark canyon below. It was open and free and, beneath me there, lights moved along the curving roads.

Maybe they were Dani and Peter, but maybe they weren't.

CHAPTER SEVEN

The next morning I rose early and was out on the deck again while the sun was still low in the east. The canyon below was cold and green with a faint hint of haze, and high overhead a red hawk rode a growing thermal, looking for gophers.

I did slow stretches and then the Twelve Sun Salutes from the hatha yoga and then an easy tae kwon do kata and then a hard one, snapping the moves with power and speed and certainty of purpose. It feels clean to do it that way. Sometimes when I practice in the early evening, the two little boys who live in the cantilevered house down the street come over and watch and we talk about things that are important to small boys. I find that they are important to me, too. In the morning, I am always alone. Lately I've noticed that I work out less in the morning and more in the evening. Maybe Peter Alan Nelsen was feeling that way, too.

I showered and shaved and put out two eggs for poaching and made a batter for blueberry cottage cheese pancakes. While I waited for the griddle to heat, I called my answering machine. There were messages from my friends at the Bank of America and the phone company and from Lou Poitras. My friend at the B of A said that their credit check showed that no one named Karen Shipley or Karen Nelsen or listing either of those names as either a maiden or former name possessed a credit card of any kind anywhere within the United States. My friend at the phone company said pretty much the same. Lou Poitras said that Karen Shipley had once gotten a ticket for parking in a red zone but had paid it promptly. Her address at that time was the apartment she had shared with Peter Alan Nelsen. He said that if I found her, I probably wouldn't have to assume she was armed and dangerous, but that I might want to bring along backup just in case. That Lou. He's a riot, isn't he?

I made four pancakes and the poached eggs, then crushed the poached eggs on top of the pancakes, poured a large glass of nonfat milk, and brought the food and the milk to the table. The cat had left during the night. Sometimes he eats breakfast with me, but sometimes he doesn't. When he doesn't, I don't know what he eats. Maybe small dogs.

Karen Nelsen had no phone in either name, but I had sort of expected that. After ten years, the odds were large that she had remarried. The credit cards were another matter. If she had a credit card under Nelsen or Shipley, or with Nelsen or Shipley listed as a former name, she should've turned up. That was odd, but there were explanations. Maybe she had joined a cult and no longer had a name. Maybe she had given over all earthly traits and artifacts to a higher being named Klaatu, and in return Klaatu had blessed her with eternal bliss and escape from snoopy private cops. Or maybe she simply didn't like credit cards. Hmmm.

I had run through all of my leads and I had come up with nothing and it made me feel small. I needed another