This Girl for Hire Read online

  Two incidents were unusual during that trip: the sudden appearance of Max Decker, who was supposed to have missed the boat, and a back-slapping relationship that developed between Sam Aces and Bob Swanson.

  We anchored about a half-mile off shore at White’s Landing, the summer site of a YMCA camp. A camera crew went ashore to set up for the next day’s film sequences. I hitched a ride on the small boat. So did Lori Aces, who seemed disgusted with the chaos aboard Hell’s Light.

  “I think my husband likes that cheap Claypool girl,” Lori said. “Did you see the way she kept looping the other half of her lei over the men and hugging them?”

  The boat angled up beside the pier. We climbed out, then separated from the camera crew and started up the white beach. I asked Lori if she knew what had ever happened to Rod Caine. She denied knowing the writer until I told her I was a private detective hired by her husband. We talked about the night Aces caught Lori and Caine under the covers.

  “I was having a drink,” Lori said, “I was lonesome. Sammy works so many nights, you know! Rod came by the house and we had a few martinis. He kissed me a couple of times and then—the next thing I knew we were in bed together.”

  “He must be some man.”

  “I guess so,” Lori said softly. “I’m only eighteen. I haven’t had much experience. In fact, with Sammy it was the first time for me.”

  Now I knew the age score. About thirty-two years difference between Aces and Lori. A wide gap.

  “Have you seen or heard from Caine since that evening?”

  “You won’t tell my husband, will you?”

  “This is strictly between us, I promise.”

  “He called me about three weeks ago. I asked him where he was, but he wouldn’t tell me. He said he was so mad at what Sammy had done, he’d like to kill him.”

  “How badly was his face injured?”

  “He wouldn’t tell me a thing, but he did ask me the strangest question.” Lori looked puzzled.

  “What was that?”

  Lori’s bathing suit had big buttons down the front and she fiddled with them nervously. “He asked me if Sammy’s favorite drink was still a screwdriver.”

  I winced. “You never told your husband about the phone call?”

  “No, I was afraid to. He goes mad with jealousy. Like the night he shoved the glass in Rod’s face. I was afraid he might think there was more to it than just the phone call.”

  “Has Sam ever mentioned Herb Nelson to you?”

  “Sure.”

  “When exactly?”

  Lori said, “Lot’s of times. Sam felt sorry for Herb. He was always trying to get him into bit parts in the Swanson show, but Bob kept saying no. Bob’s one hundred percent louse.”

  We decided to take a swim. Lori was obviously an expert swimmer and her small arms cut the frothy sea with swift, practiced strokes. We went out about a half mile and then floated on our backs.

  The swim did a lot to clear my head. I began piecing things together. Whoever stole my .32 had tried it on me and then brought the revolver aboard ship planning to use it on Aces. The only suspect who hadn’t sailed with us was Rod Caine, unless he was hiding, or was unrecognizable because of a change in his features. I felt like counting Lori Aces out of the race. She was too naive, too sweet, too much in love with her husband. Or was she any of these?

  I considered the phone call to Lori from Rod Caine. The story sounded phony. Knowing Sam Aces, I figured he’d probably been drinking screwdrivers since he was old enough to talk. Who changes an old habit like that overnight? Someone could have faked Caine’s voice. Or maybe Lori lied.

  Floating on a glittering green wave, Lori smiled at me, “How you doing?”

  “Great. What’s Rod Caine sound like?”

  “His voice?”

  “Yes.”

  Lori treaded water for a moment while she thought about the question. “I don’t know. It’s sort of deep. A little nasal. Has a nice quality. He should have been an actor instead of a writer—with his looks and a voice like that. Sounds a little like Sammy, in fact.”

  “Who?”

  “Sammy. My husband.”

  I rolled over in the water and studied this dark-haired little porpoise. Who was she trying to kid? That first crack about Caine’s questioning of Sam’s taste in drinks was bad enough, but this took the prize for being obvious. I fried a quick new formula: Lori plus Caine plus revenge plus money equals murder! Sounded plausible. This way Caine didn’t have to be aboard Hell’s Light. Lori could have faked the whole business about finding the gun in the bathroom window. Maybe she wanted to frighten Aces and make me think he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Then powie! The old suicide gag. They slip Aces a pint of poison and make him out a homicidal maniac who hits people with broken glass and who fakes his voice to pin his death on a hated enemy. I was certain now. Lori Aces was in the running. Very much in the running. There was only one disturbing element to my conclusion. Whoever wanted Aces out of the way, apparently wanted to nudge me in the same direction.

  “Come on!” Lori suddenly shouted. “I’ll race you to that cove.”

  She struck out, lightning fast, toward a jagged wall that was narrowed in by a couple of white-capped rocks. I hadn’t noticed before, but the sea was beginning to push itself up into healthy ridges and the wind blew the top of one into my face. I lost sight of Lori in the swell.

  A big wave broke over my shoulders, hurling me under and ripping loose the top of my two-piece suit. I abandoned any thought of heading for the cove and angled toward the beach. Vicious breakers and a strong current drove me into a bed of kelp well beyond the beach and even the cove. I fought wildly, went down once and came up again.

  The second time down I felt an arm around my middle.

  SIX

  HE WAS STARING AT ME WHEN I WOKE UP, A HANDSOME guy with curly black hair that made his head look like a mass of licorice dessert. He had a nice nose, straight with wide flaring nostrils. His mouth was wide with plenty of slack and a small smile etched in the corners. I liked this face. But there was something I didn’t like. The sound I heard somewhere in the distance. The sound of hard rain and violent wind.

  “How are you feeling?” he asked.

  “In one piece,” I said gingerly. “Am I?”

  “Absolutely,” he said with a larger smile. “And may I add, one of the nicest I’ve come across in a long time.”

  There was a warm blanket over me. I reached underneath and felt around for the top to my suit. It was gone. Apparently he’d pulled me out of the briny deep without a stitch covering the upper part of my body.

  “Fill me in,” I said, my eyes avoiding his. “Things are rather hazy.”

  He grinned again. “For my money you’re already filled in. And in just the right places.”

  “Thanks.” I felt my cheeks growing hot. “Where am I?”

  “In my cabin. On the hill overlooking White’s Landing. I was doing a little spear fishing when I found you poking around in my abalone beds.”

  “Was I alone?”

  “Not exactly. There were a couple of wide-eyed fish in the vicinity, but I got there first.”

  The left side of my jaw felt extremely sore. “You didn’t by any chance hit me with a KO punch?”

  “Not until you gave me some of the same in the lower intestine. If you want the facts, ma’am, you tossed me one below the belt.”

  “I’m sorry.” Then I suddenly remembered Lori Aces. With her talent for swimming she should easily have maneuvered her ninety-odd pounds to a safe landing place. Maybe even the beach.

  He interrupted my train of thought. “How about some coffee?”

  “First things first,” I said. “How about some clothes?”

  “Fresh out of clothes,” he teased. “Plenty of coffee.”

  “How’d you get me here?” I asked, trying to sit up. He pushed me down in a firm, nice manner. “You swallowed a lot of water. I had to carry you up the hill. You weren’t about t
o walk on your own two feet. What were you doing swimming around half naked in the first place?”

  “An old custom of mine. It scares the tar out of sharks.”

  “Great!” he said. “You scared the tar out of me. I thought you were a shark for a few seconds. That is, until I put my arm around your waist.”

  “And that convinced you?”

  “Well, no shark I ever knew had what you’ve got,” he laughed. There was a long silence.

  “What’s your name?” I asked.

  “Ralph—Ralph Smith. What’s yours?”

  “Honey West.”

  “The female private eye?”

  “You carried me up the hill,” I said. “Have you got any doubts about my sex?”

  “Not in the least. What are you doing at Catalina?”

  “Investigating the buffalo. What’s your excuse?”

  “I’m writing a novel.”

  “What’s it about?”

  Smith walked over to stoke the fire. “That nasty, dirty little business called television.”

  “You sound as if you know something about the subject.”

  He was pensive for a moment. “I do. I was around when the first TV show went on the air in Los Angeles.”

  “Are you still in television?”

  “Nope. It got too dirty for me.”

  “You ever know a writer named Rod Caine?” He bent over the fire and tossed on another log. “Yeah,” he said after a pause, “I know him.”

  “What’s he like?”

  “Why?”

  “He may be working his way to the gas chamber. If he’s the sensible type maybe I can warn him off before he kills a client of mine.”

  Smith stood up, turned and looked at me, half grinning, half serious. “You’re kidding! Who’s your client?”

  I told him the story. He listened attentively, especially when I mentioned the poisoned drink mixed at the Golden Slipper and Lori’s disappearance earlier in the huge swell. Smith, expressing concern for her safety, pulled on a raincoat and hat.

  “You should have told me there were two of you,” he said. “Even if she made shore, she might be battered to pieces in this storm.”

  He ran out of the cabin and the wind lashed the door shut behind him. It was a furious gale leadened with rain. If Lori hadn’t found shelter, her chances for survival in this kind of storm were about as good as a hundred-mile-an-hour approach to a hairpin curve with no warning signs. I wondered how Hell’s Light was taking the blow. Probably the customers in the swimming-pool bar were so frightened, they were drinking with both hands and getting stiffer than boards. I hoped Sam Aces wasn’t too stiff. His kind of stiffness could turn out to be permanent if he didn’t keep a weather eye open.

  I searched around for some clothes. In the closet was an old pair of white dungarees with the cuffs rolled up. There was quite a space to make up for around the middle, but an old piece of rope helped cinch in the waist A red-striped cotton shirt, minus any buttons, hung on the same hook. I slipped it on and tucked the tails inside the trousers to keep the shirt together.

  Smith returned a few minutes later soaked to the skin and breathing heavily. “I slipped on a rock down near the boat cave and went in up to my shoulders,” he explained. “Didn’t make much difference. I was drenched by that time anyway.”

  “See anything?”

  “Yeah. One of the permanent buildings down on the YMCA site lost part of a roof. Same thing may happen to us if it gets any worse.”

  I winced. “Nothing of Lori Aces?”

  He stripped off his wet shirt. “Maybe she made it to one of the caves at the south end of the beach. She’d be safe there.” He knelt before the fire. “How about something to eat? You must be starved!”

  “What about yourself?” I studied him carefully. His body was deeply bronzed from the sun. Then I said, “You’d better get out of those wet pants.”

  He grinned and pulled me down next to him in front of the fireplace.

  “I don’t take orders from nobody,” he said quietly. “Especially a female investigator who packs a .32.”

  “How’d you know I carry a .32?”

  “I don’t know.” He shrugged his shoulders. “A .32 seems about the right caliber for a woman.” Then his lips touched mine, and they were warm and soft. He lifted his head finally and whispered, “I told you I was fresh out of clothes. Where’d you get these?”

  “In the closet,” I said.

  He touched the opening at the top of my shirt and kissed me again.

  I felt my legs wobble slightly as I forced myself up. “What’ll it be? Bacon and eggs, hot cakes, waffles—?” He came after me and his hands pulled me close to him.

  “Aren’t—aren’t you hungry?” I stammered. His mouth kissed the bruise on my chin. “You—must have worked up a big appetite wandering around in the rain—”

  “Yeah, I did,” he said.

  “I’d—better get into the kitchen then—”

  His lips moved over my mouth shutting out the words. He picked me up and carried me into the bedroom.

  “Look,” I said, “I don’t even know you—”

  Wind suddenly bit furiously into the cabin. The roof trembled and screeched as shingles ripped loose into the stormy sky. One of them hit the bedroom window splintering glass across the room.

  He put me on my feet hurriedly, grabbed his slicker and vanished into the night.

  I glanced down at the front of my shirt.

  The flesh underneath was crimson and I was trembling.

  It was still raining when I awakened. The bedroom window had been boarded up, but Ralph Smith was nowhere in view. Wind rustled softly in the distant dark.

  In the living room I found him curled up like a big dog in front of the fireplace. I shook my head and crossed into the kitchen. The clock said it was a few minutes after midnight.

  The old-fashioned wood stove was all set for a fire. I lit a match to it, started some bacon sizzling in a skillet and looked for a fork. The kitchen drawers were filled with everything except silverware.

  I walked into the living room, rummaged around in a desk drawer and came up with a couple of knives and forks. Leave it to a man to keep books and papers in the kitchen and silver in the desk!

  Something else in that drawer startled me. A photograph of Lori Aces! Sweet, little, childlike Lori Aces. She got around more than measles. There was a signature on the front of the picture. I Love You Passionately—Lori. She obviously was as crazy for Sam Aces as a detonator hooked up to a ton of dynamite. First Rod Caine, now Ralph Smith. No wonder he got excited at the mention of her name.

  I shoved the picture back and started toward the kitchen when I saw the bronze statuette of an Emmy, television’s equivalent to motion picture’s Academy Award Oscar.

  The inscription read, For outstanding achievement in the development and creation of the Bob Swanson Show, WBS Network.

  The winner’s name was etched on the face of the plate in fancy letters. Rod Caine.

  SEVEN

  IRAMMED THE STATUETTE DOWN HARD BREAKING A GLASS bowl. The sound brought him to his feet, a startled expression on his face. “What in hell’s the matter?” he yelled. “The roof coming off?”

  “You can say that again!” I boomed. “The roof, two floors of furniture and the kitchen sink.”

  He glanced around. “You out of your mind?”

  “Yes, I am, Mr. Caine!”

  The puzzled expression drained out of his handsome face. He took the statuette and placed it back on the shelf. “So, you found out? You’ve been looking for me, haven’t you? Well, here I am!”

  “Thanks,” I said.

  “I suppose I should have told you right away. But I’m not trying to hide anything. Ralph Smith is my nom de plume.”

  “What?”

  “Pen name. Fictitious.”

  “You mean fake, don’t you?” I realized I was shouting. “That’s you all over. Just about as fake as they come!”

  He s
hook his head.

  “How come no facial scars?” I asked. “Plastic surgery?”

  “Some,” Caine said. “The wounds weren’t as bad as they looked. I was practically healed inside of two weeks.”

  “Why didn’t you go back to Television Riviera?”

  “I was fired. Besides, I was glad to be out of there. This new novel’s much more important to me. Aces actually did me a favor.”

  “Now you’d like to return the favor,” I said.

  “Not the way you think!”

  “Did you call Lori three weeks ago and ask if Aces still drinks screwdrivers?”

  “Don’t be idiotic.”

  “Did you say you’d like to get Aces for what he did to you?”

  “No!” Rod insisted. “I haven’t seen or talked to Lori Aces for over four months.”

  “This is important,” I said. “Whose idea was it—the martinis, the kisses, bed?”

  “Lori’s idea. The whole thing. She invited me up with the understanding Sam was out of town for a couple of days. I was floored when he walked in.”

  “Imbedded is a better word,” I said. “Where’d you go after you ran out?”

  “Into the bay.”

  “Then where?”

  “To a small yacht that was anchored about a half mile down from Lori’s place. There was a doctor on board. I told him I’d been attacked by something in the water. He stitched me up and that was that.”

  “No questions about why you were naked?”

  “No more than I asked you!” He grinned again. Rod Caine had a most infectious smile.

  “How long have you been living on the island?”

  “About three months. I moved to Catalina after the plastic surgery, bought this cabin and started working on the novel.”