“You’re a heartless bastard.”
“Am I? Locking you up with four lovely women-that’s what every red-blooded American boy dreams of, or so I’m told.”
“Okay, okay. When will you be back?”
“Before ten. Just hang in.”
“I still don’t know exactly what I’m supposed to do if someone comes to the door.”
“Just find out who he is and what he wants. You don’t keep him or her out. Let Mrs. Crombie decide about that.”
Masuto’s radio phone was speaking to him as he drove off. Wainwright’s voice was demanding, “Where the hell are you, Masao?”
“Turning a corner two blocks away.”
“Well, get over here. Do you know what time it is? It’s eight o’clock, and I’m sitting here on my butt when I should be home eating a decent dinner, and I’m sitting here because the Los Angeles cops are sore as hell. They want your scalp and they want me here when they take it.”
“I’ll be there in two minutes.”
“What in hell have you been up to?”
“Two minutes.”
Masuto pulled into his parking space on Rexford Drive and went inside. Wainwright was pacing in front of Masuto’s office. “What’s this all about?” he snapped.
“I don’t know. I have to call my wife.”
“So help me, Masao, if there’s one thing a crummy little police force like ours can’t afford, it’s a ruckus with the L.A. cops. Not now. Not with the city refusing to shell out a nickel for new equipment. We depend on those miserable bastards. I don’t want them to mark us lousy.”
“Who did you talk to?”
“A lieutenant, Pete Bones. He’s coming up here with a Captain Kennedy.”
“Pete’s an old friend.”
“He didn’t sound like a friend, old or new.”
“Let’s take it easy and wait until they get here. Meanwhile, I have to call Kati, or I’ll have more trouble than the Los Angeles cops could ever give me.”
Masuto went into his office and dialed his home number. The first thing Kati said was, “Your dinner has spoiled.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I don’t think you are. I think it’s something you’re saying. There are other policemen in the world and they work from nine to five and they see their children and their wives.”
“You haven’t gone to that women’s consciousness-raising session yet?”
“I’m going tonight. I thought you would be here. Then when I realized you would not be here, I telephoned Suzi Asata, and she will be my baby sitter. I will have to pay her five dollars. I don’t think it ought to come out of my household money. I think it ought to come out of your pocket.”
“I agree with you,” he said meekly.
“You do?”
“Yes. Why should that surprise you?”
“Oh, Masao, why do you make me so angry?”
“I don’t think you’re really angry.”
“Please tell me that you will not do anything dangerous tonight.”
“I promise you.”
“And what will you do?”
“Only talk to some ladies.”
“Stop teasing me. Why must you always tease me?”
“I’m not teasing. I promise to tell you the whole story when I see you. I am not talking to these ladies for pleasure. I am talking to them because they are part of this case I am on.”
“I sometimes think that it is always a pleasure for you to talk to American ladies.”
“Kati, I love you.”
“Well-”
“Believe me. And how are the children?”
“Someday you will see them and decide for yourself.”
He put down the phone as Polly entered. She was still small, blonde, and pretty. “I stayed an extra hour waiting for you, Masao.”
“Oh?”
“I’m not making a pass. I’m saving that until you get divorced.”
“I have no intention of getting divorced,” he said severely.
“Baloney. All cops get divorced. Their wives can’t put up with them. Anyway, we can save that discussion for another time. What I got for you now is a very funny phone call.”
“Tell me about it.”
“First place, foreign accent but phony.”
“How do you know it was phony?”
She shrugged. “You watch enough TV, you know. He says to me, Who’s on the poisoned candy case? Me, nobody tells me anything. I just answer the phone, and everything else I do, which is practically everything around here, it’s guess-work. So I ask for his name, and he says Horst Brandt, to go with the phony German accent.”
“Address?”
“Just as phony, I’m sure.” She took a slip of paper from her purse and read him the address. It had a familiar ring, and Masuto consulted his notebook. It was Alice Greene’s address on Roxbury Drive.
“Does it mean something?” Polly asked him.
“Maybe. Maybe not. You’re sure he said candy? Nothing about eclairs?”
“What eclairs? Candy, eclairs. Nobody tells me a thing around here.”
“And you’re sure it was a man’s voice, not a woman’s?”
She stared at him in disgust. “What am I, Masao, a jerk, a nut? A man’s voice. I told you that.”
“I’m sorry. Go on.”
“So I tell him that if it’s a homicide case, it’s Sergeant Masuto’s department. Then he says, ‘Masuto? You mean that Jap plainclothes cop?’ He sort of forgets his accent too, and believe me, I get plenty steamed with that kind of talk and I’m ready to tell him to buzz off and sell his apples somewhere else, but I got enough sense to know that it may be important, so I tell him, yes, but we don’t talk about people that way, and then he wants to talk to you, and I tell him you’re not in but expected.”
“Very interesting,” Masuto said.
“Okay, I’m going. But if you don’t tell me what this is all about tomorrow, I won’t talk to you again.”
“Promise. And thank you, Polly. Thank you for waiting.”
“You can say that again.”
For a few minutes after she had left, Masuto sat at his desk and stared at the door facing him. He was still staring at it when Wainwright opened the door and said shortly, “They’re here. In my office.”
Masuto followed Wainwright into the captain’s office. Bones and Kennedy were seated. They made no move to rise, nor did they smile or do any more than nod their heads coldly. Kennedy was the very image of a proper Los Angeles cop, about forty-five, trim, handsome, sandy hair, cold blue eyes.
Bones opened the conversation by saying, “God damn you, Masuto, we dragged our asses up here for your cute tricks, Like we got nothing else to do with our time.”
Watching Masuto, Wainwright saw his dark eyes harden, his mouth tighten. He had fought for Masuto before, and he often said that Masuto was the best cop he had on his force, but he also knew that Masuto was unpredictable. Whereby he stepped into the moment of silence and said, “Now, hold on, Bones. I don’t know what you and Kennedy are so pissed off at, but you’re in our town, and that calls for a little bit of restraint. So suppose you tell us what this is all about and we’ll save the name-calling.”
“I’ll tell you what it’s all about,” Kennedy said coldly. “Today this joker-” nodding at Masuto-“comes
