“No.”
“Where is she?”
“She’s moved.”
“Oh. Well, do you know where she moved to? Maybe she knew where Ms. Synar went after she left here.”
“I don’t know where she is.”
Neuman nodded. “What was her name?”
This last question seemed to bring Valerie Heath to the boiling point.
“Look, goddamn it, I don’t know you from Adam,” she said. “You just walk in here…” She was shaking her head in frustration. “Let me see that ID again.”
“Oh, sure,” Neuman said, and he took it out of his pocket once more, stood, and leaned across the coffee table to hand it to her. This time she actually read the card which, of course, she hadn’t done when Neuman first showed it to her. Moving it away from her until it came into focus at about arm’s length, she concentrated on the words though her hand was shaking so badly Neuman couldn’t imagine how she could read it As she squinted at the ID, Neuman nudged Paula with his knee and tapped the mailing label on one of the magazines lying upside down on the coffee table.
After studying the card a moment, Valerie Heath gestured at Neuman with it though she didn’t get up. Neuman stood again and took it back.
“I’m going to check you out, mister,” Valerie Heath threatened, her lips quivering with emotion. “Tomorrow I’m calling… I’m checking you out, mister. I’m not going to answer any more questions.”
“Ms. Heath,” Neuman said slowly. “Please, I can assure you…”
Valerie Heath jumped to her feet, almost losing her romper top which she quickly retrieved, yanking up on the sides.
“Get the hell out of here,” she said. She was trembling, her eyes blinking furiously, her anger tinged with something besides antagonism.
Neuman and Paula stood, and Neuman started to say something else, but Valerie Heath beat him to it.
“Get out of here!” She stretched a leathery arm toward the front door, a trail of cigarette ashes following the arc of her gesture.
“Look, I apologize if I offended you”-Neuman was keeping up the patter all the way to the door-”but I had to ask these questions. I mean, this is just part of the job. It’s what we have to do if we’re going to help…”
They were outside, and Valerie Heath slammed the door behind them.
“Jesus,” Paula gasped as they walked out through the courtyard. “I thought she was going to start hitting you. I really thought she was going to.”
“You were a lot of help in there, Paula,” Neuman said, grinning at her.
“Next time, hotshot, why don’t you let me in on the game plan and you might get some help. What did you expect me to do?”
They walked back along the drive through the drifting mist of the sprinkler system which was still hissing.
“What was your impression?” Neuman asked as they got into the car.
“Well, for starters, it was a total washout She didn’t give us one ounce of information we didn’t already know.”
“Yeah, but what was your impression about how she reacted to the whole thing about Colleen Synar?”
Paula thought a second. “Frightened. Yeah, she seemed scared, actually. And confused.”
“Yeah, I thought so too,” Neuman said, starting up the car. “And I noticed she didn’t threaten to call the cops if we didn’t get out.” He turned on the headlights and drove past the house. When he got to the intersection where the street entered the mainland, he made a U-turn and started back.
“What’s the deal?” Paula said. “You’re not going to go back there…”
“Just wait a second,” he said. He cut his headlights just before reaching the house again and glided past, doubling back at the end of the street. He pulled to the curb and parked behind one of several cars between him and Valerie Heath’s. He cut the motor.
“I think we really rattled her cage,” Neuman said. “You saw the name on the magazine subscription label?”
“Irene Whaley.”
Neuman picked up the radio and called in the license plate on the Corvette. Paula rolled down her window and flapped the top of her dress for air. The night had grown sultry and with the dead air came an occasional waft of strong harbor odors. When the call came back on the car they both listened. It belonged to Frances Rupp, same address.
Paula looked at Neuman. “What the hell’s going on?”
Neuman shook his head, watching the house. “I do not know.” And then: “Okay, here we go.”
Valerie Heath came out of the front courtyard gates in a hurry. She was still wearing her less than wonderful romper, still smoking furiously, and she was carrying a purse with a shoulder strap. They heard the chirrup of the security system on the car as she hit the disarm button on her key chain, and in a matter of moments she was in the car and was pulling out of the driveway.
“We’re going to follow her?” Paula asked.
They watched her taillights grow smaller and smaller.
“You’d better move it, Casey. She’s-”
“I’m not going to follow her,” Neuman said, taking off his tie and jacket and tossing them in the back seat He rolled up the sleeves of his shirt “I’m going to go around to the back of her place and get her trash. Watch for me at the left front corner of the house. When you see me, pull up into the driveway.’
Chapter 32
They pulled off the Gulf Freeway when they were well out of the subdivisions around Clear Lake, and Houston was still just a glow on the night horizon. Neuman drove down the access road until he came to a dirt track that seemed to lead to nothing but darkness through miles of the flat coastal plain. He turned off and drove a hundred yards or so until the uneven ruts dropped slightly, and the tall clumps of plume and muhly grass hid them from the highway.
“Okay,” Neuman said, cutting the motor. “If you’ll hold the flashlight, I’ll do the shit work.”
“No argument from me, but why don’t we just shine the headlights on it?”
“Because this is going to take a few minutes, and I don’t want anybody seeing us and deciding to drive out here to see what it is we’re doing.”
They got out of the car and Neuman opened the trunk and took out two large plastic bags of garbage and set them beside the road. He took a pair of surgical gloves from a box of them that he kept in the trunk, pulled them on, and walked over to the plastic bags.
“If this doesn’t pay off, I’m going to be pissed,” he said. He bent down and tore open the first bag and began dumping everything out in one of the sandy ruts of the road, walking backward as he shook out the contents of the sack. The hot humid days had steamed everything in the sacks, and the odor was horrendous. Paula held her nose and quickly found the downwind side of the refuse. Taking a step or two into the tall grass, Neuman came back with a stick, straddled the string of garbage, bent down, and set to work.
There was a soft breeze coming across the grasses from the coast, but it was warm and gummy and there was not enough of it to carry away the stench of what Neuman was stirring around with his stick. But more important it wasn’t enough to blow away the host of mosquitoes that quickly found them. The spring rains had provided these insects with enough pools and puddles and mud holes to multiply themselves into numbers that approached plague proportions and within minutes they were swarming as thick as a fog. Paula swatted at them furiously and swore and fidgeted while Neuman inched his way along the rope of garbage. After ten minutes of this Neuman stopped and looked up.
“Paula, if you don’t hold the damn light still I can’t do this,” he said, his voice rising slightly.
