Craig Rice and Ed McBain

The April Robin Murders

One

The water in the oblong swimming pool of the Skylight Motel was that brilliant blue-green color Bingo Riggs had seen pictured in magazines, but had never quite believed. Yet here it was, the same delicious but probably fraudulent blue of the illustrations, and here he was beside it, comfortably reclining on a wheeled mattress-and-wicker affair which someone had informed him was a loafer-lounge — and this, at last, was Hollywood.

It didn’t disappoint him, no, not in the least.

He lit a cigarette and watched his partner, Handsome Kusak, execute a graceful dive, and observed, with a kind of fraternal pride, the admiring glances he was getting from the feminine idlers around the pool. Handsome was a good six inches taller than Bingo, his dark hair had just a slight wave in it, and somehow on the drive from New York he’d managed to acquire a downright magnificent tan.

Bingo sighed, and pulled his new white terry-cloth robe, with its big monogrammed BR outlined in brilliant orange, a little closer over his bony knees. His Hawaiian print bathing trunks were, he considered, infinitely superior to the conservative dark maroon ones that Handsome was wearing; but, after one thoughtful look at his skinny and decidedly pallid frame, he’d put on the robe, announced he had a slight head-cold coming on, and settled for the loafer-lounge beside the pool. And anyway, he didn’t know how to swim.

All that could be put right, he told himself, and he resolved to do something about it fast. Daily workouts in one of those gyms he saw advertised in all the newspapers, offering Corrective Body Building and Conditioning. Swimming lessons, too, in some secluded pool where he wouldn’t run into any of the friends he and Handsome were bound to make. A quart of milk a day. Maybe two quarts. They could afford it now. And he’d rent a sun lamp.

Otherwise, he felt thoroughly pleased with the world around him, especially with the swimming pool. Of course it wasn’t a very big or very elaborate pool, and it wasn’t beside some Hollywood mansion, nor part of a fashionable hotel or exclusive club. Nor for that matter was the Skylight Motel a really first-class motel. But it was a swimming pool, bright blue-green, and this was Hollywood, and he was happy.

He put out the cigarette, stretched luxuriously, and went back to reading the New Visitor’s Guide to Hollywood.

Handsome came splashing up out of the pool and sprawled on the smooth-colored tile beside Bingo, shaking the water out of his hair.

“Bingo,” he said, a shade unhappily, “what are we gonna do?”

Bingo, president of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America: New York and Hollywood (“We’re going to expand, aren’t we?”), put down the guidebook reluctantly, his finger marking the page headed “Chinchilla Farm... Chinese Theatre (Grauman’s)... Ciro’s.”

“Well,” he said thoughtfully, “we got all afternoon yet. We could drive around a little and see things.”

“We’ve already drove around and seen things,” Handsome said. “We’ve already seen Hollywood Boulevard, and Sunset Strip, and we’ve passed by two movie studios and the Brown Derby. I mean, Bingo, what are we going to do?”

Bingo was silent for a minute. There was a cloud, a very tiny one, to be sure, but a cloud, on the horizon of this new paradise, but he wasn’t ready to admit it yet. He said, at last, “I’ll think of something. Handsome, don’t you trust me? We’re going to get rich.”

“Sure,” Handsome said, with perfect confidence. “Only, Bingo, how?”

Again Bingo was silent. He wasn’t ready to admit this either, but he had been wondering the same thing.

After a few minutes Handsome said wistfully, “You want I should go get us some beer?”

Bingo nodded absent-mindedly and fished in the pocket of his robe for a dollar bill. Then he gazed over the pool and thought things over.

It hadn’t been so very long ago, in the shabby furnished room in New York’s West Eighties which had served as office, studio and living quarters for the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America, that he and Handsome had set going to Hollywood and getting rich as their ultimate goal. Now they were in Hollywood, and getting rich shouldn’t prove to be an insurmountable problem. It was just a question of finding the right way to go about it, that was all.

Carrying two cold bottles of beer, Handsome came back from the little delicatessen next to the motel. “We’ve been here three days already,” he said reflectively. “I guess we ought to get our cards printed and get the cameras unpacked and start taking pictures.”

Bingo looked at him sternly. “That,” he said, “is all in the past. Oh, it was all right back in Central Park, when we were just getting started. But we’ve arrived, Handsome. You’ve got to remember, we’re big shots now. We can’t go around Hollywood taking sidewalk pictures and passing out cards to mail in with a quarter, and spieling, ‘An action picture of you has just been taken! See how you’d look in the newsreels—’”

He shook his head and drew a long breath, warming up to his subject. “We’re going to do big things.” What things, he didn’t know yet. “Just look where we are already. Practically yesterday we owed seventeen dollars back rent on a nine-dollar-a-week room. The cameras and two of my suits were in hock. Now—” He waved a hand toward the pool and the motel which, even though second rate, was still the most luxurious place they’d lived in yet. “And we’ve got a whole trunk full of clothes, and two suitcases besides plus the swimming things we bought yesterday, and a swell big maroon convertible, and almost three thousand dollars in cash.”

“Two thousand, seven hundred and seventy-three dollars,” Handsome said. “And fifty-five cents. I took out for the beer.”

“Well then,” Bingo said, as though that answered everything. It hadn’t answered Handsome’s big question though, nor his own, and he knew it. He began firmly, “We’ll start right in looking for some smart investments—” and then stopped short. Handsome, though he never said so out loud, frequently took a gloomy view of Bingo’s smart investments. Even of those that had paid off remarkably well in the end, in spite of putting them through considerable hardship, not to say peril.

He began again. “We’ll start looking for a place to live. A good address. And then, a superexcellent office setup.”

Handsome stared at the pool and said nothing. Bingo was a little relieved at that. Because there was only one sentence that could follow his last one. “... And then find something for the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation to do in those offices.” He wasn’t going to say it out loud.

Oh well, he’d think of something. Or something would turn up. It always had.

He finished his beer, rose, and said as heartily as though he didn’t have a single worry on his mind, “Let’s get dressed and get started, while the day’s still with us.”

As always, it took him considerably longer to dress than it did Handsome. The selection of exactly the right clothes always took a little time. Something conservative for this occasion, he decided, and yet not depressing. He finally settled for the fawn gabardine slacks, the new avocado-green shirt and a lemon-yellow tie that he felt added just the right harmonious and carefree touch. He surveyed himself in the mirror as he tied it. Sandy hair, a sharp-featured, slightly freckled face, blue-green eyes and a wide grin. Oh well, not everybody could look like Handsome.

He folded a lemon-yellow handkerchief carefully and tucked it in his breast pocket, ran the comb through his hair one more time, gave himself a final approving survey in the glass, and went outside.

Handsome had grabbed and put on the first clothes that had been at hand. Bingo sighed. He still hadn’t given up trying to impress the great importance of splendid, or at least well-matched, clothes on his junior partner, yet there were times—

But in spite of the fact that he was wearing navy blue corduroy slacks and a tan pullover sweater — Bingo consoled himself that they were freshly pressed slacks and a new sweater — Handsome was making a highly favorable impression on the gorgeous blonde who sat beside him on the loafer-lounge.

Bingo paused for a moment to admire her. He’d seen her before, and knew that she was the manager of the motel. At least she ran the office, took the registrations and money in advance, and sent the maid down with towels. A frail, white-haired old lady, who seemed to live in a rocking chair in a corner of the office, crocheting lace, had been pointed out to him as her mother. A nice girl, Bingo decided approvingly, looking after her helpless old mother so nicely. Too bad she had to be wasted in a job like this.

She was on the smallish side, and delightfully curved. Her face, well, Bingo tried to find another word for “gorgeous” and gave up. It was that, gorgeous. Her hair was the pure, spun gold usually seen only in home permanent advertisements, and at the moment she had it pulled loosely to the back of her head and fastened there with a turquoise ribbon from which it hung to the back of her neck in engaging little curls. Her pale pink pedal pushers, matching off-the-shoulder blouse and turquoise ballet slippers, did seem rather informal wear for a motel manager on duty, but after all, Bingo reminded himself, this was not New York. And perhaps she did have a touch too much make-up on her startlingly long eyelashes, but after all, this was Hollywood.

And as usual, she’d seen Handsome first. It always happened that way, with gorgeous girls.

“—it was in a Sunday supplement, October 16, 1955,” Handsome was saying as he came near. “I was specially interested in anything about swimming because the week before Florence Chadwick broke a record swimming the English Channel. October 12th. That was the day my great-uncle, Stanley Kusak, celebrated his golden wedding anniversary. He had eleven living children and thirty-eight grandchildren present.”

The gorgeous girl looked a little dazed but game. “Did they all swim too?”

Handsome looked faintly surprised at the question. He shook his head. “No. They all lived on farms up near Albany.”

Bingo decided it was time to lend a hand. He stepped up and said pleasantly, “That article you were telling the lady about—”

“It was about cutting the cost in cleaning swimming pools,” Handsome said. “I thought she might be interested. Did I do wrong, Bingo?”

“No,” Bingo told him, “you’re doing just fine.” The strange working of Handsome’s memory would never stop fascinating him. “I don’t suppose you remember what page it was on.”

Handsome blinked, thought for a moment, and said, “It was on page fourteen, the left-hand corner. Right opposite was a picture story about the Vicksburg Museum. It’s really called the Old Court House Museum, and it’s got more than five thousand items. Mostly small stuff, though.”

The blonde said, “Just what kind of games do you boys play, anyhow?”

“It’s no game,” Bingo assured her gravely. “My partner happens to have a remarkable memory, that’s all. Photographic.”

She looked impressed. “He oughta go on TV. He’d get rich.”

Bingo had thought of that too, more than once, and discarded the idea.

“So should you,” he said gallantly, “Miss—”

“Mariposa DeLee,” she said. “Mrs. Mariposa DeLee.” She added, “I’m a widow.”

“A very pretty name,” Bingo said.

“Just don’t ask me if I thought it up myself,” she said, a little snappishly. “Or if it’s a press agent’s dream. My mother gave me the Mariposa, and I married the DeLee.”

“Mariposa is the name of a lily,” Handsome said politely. “It suits you.”

Bingo wished he could say things like that, just accidentally. “My partner,” he said, “would be wasting his time on TV. Because he’s probably the best photographer in the world.” He whipped out one of their business cards. She examined it, properly impressed.

“We decided to move our base of operations to Hollywood,” Bingo said. “Bigger opportunities out here. Soon as we find suitable business space and get organized, you must look us up.” He might not be six foot one, and with dark, wavy hair, but he prided himself that there was one thing he could do outstandingly well: talk. “You know, a pretty, talented girl like you ought to be working some place where you’d be seen by important people. You’re just wasted working in this motel.”

“I’m working in this motel,” she told him very calmly, “because I own the joint. And I don’t want to be in pictures. I never wanted to be in pictures. All I want is to own a whole chain of motels.” She looked him in the eye.

Bingo caught his breath with an effort. He took another, and closer, look at Mariposa DeLee. This time he looked at the make-up, especially around her eyes, and at the roots of her spun gold hair. He estimated the age of her mother in the rocking chair and did some rapid mental arithmetic. Finally he said, a little lamely, “Well, you certainly have a nice place here, ma’am.”

“And if you want to read more about cleaning your swimming pool—” Handsome said.

She gave him the smile women of all ages reserved for Handsome Kusak, and said, “I’ll call you right up.” The smile was big enough to take in both of them. “I suppose you boys are out to see some more of the town.”

“We’ll be looking around,” Bingo said. “We’ve got to find suitable office space. We thought we’d just drive along the Strip this afternoon. And sooner or later we’ve got to find a permanent place to live. A house, perhaps. Not large, but—” he couldn’t resist — “with a pool, of course.”

“Of course,” she said. “Especially since your pal knows how to keep one clean.” She looked at them thoughtfully. “You know what you ought to do this afternoon? Keep going out on Sunset and look at the houses where all the movie stars live.”

“I’d like to do that,” Bingo said. He added quickly, “As a basis for comparison.”

“Only we don’t know which ones are which,” Handsome said guilelessly, and Bingo could have throttled him.

“That’s no problem,” she said. “You just drive out Sunset Boulevard and you’ll see some stands selling maps of movie stars’ homes. That’s what you need. Shows you right where every one of them is. Stop at the first stand on the right, it’s the best.”

It was a wonderful idea. Suddenly Bingo felt that the whole day was made golden. Someday, he promised himself, they’d do something nice, real nice, for Mariposa DeLee.

They went on out to the shining maroon convertible. Bingo repressed a desire to pat it affectionately. A wonderful day, probably to be a wonderfully lucky day.

Neither he nor Handsome noticed that as they drove away, Mariposa DeLee rushed to the telephone in the office. Nor that the little old lady in the rocking chair had dropped her crocheting and was just laughing like everything.

Two

“She’s a real nice old lady,” Handsome said, heading the convertible up toward Sunset Strip.

“Handsome!” Bingo said reprovingly. “She’s not old. Just mature.” He added, “And very well preserved, too.”

“Okay, Bingo,” Handsome said. He turned expertly up Fairfax Avenue. “Only she remembered reading in the newspapers about Floyd Collins. Which was in 1925.”

“I don’t care if she remembers reading about the San Francisco earthquake,” Bingo said, “and I don’t remember what year that was.”

“1906,” Handsome said. “And she couldn’t have—”

“She was very polite to us,” Bingo said. Somehow he had to regain the few inches of height he felt he’d lost. “Handsome, when you meet a lady like that, a mature lady, who is trying very hard not to look mature, it’s always polite to make like she was getting away with it, which I did.” The inches were beginning to come back. “Why, as soon as I spotted those false eyelashes the night we registered—”

“Gee, Bingo,” Handsome said admiringly. “And I thought she had you fooled!”

The inches were all back in place again, every last one of them.

Handsome swung the convertible west on Sunset Boulevard. Bingo sat up and said, “Drive a little easy. See, on the left there, that’s Schwab’s drugstore.” He glanced at the guidebook. “It says you frequently see a star or two at the counter.” He considered suggesting they stop for a quick malt, but by that time they were a block past. A moment later he said, “There’s the Garden of Allah.”

Handsome peered quickly and said, “It looks like a nice motel, too, Bingo.”

Bingo refrained from comment. He refrained, too, when Handsome remained unimpressed by Sunset Towers and even Ciro’s. He purposely kept quiet as they passed the Lou Costello Building and the Mocambo, but he did indicate the Bing Crosby Building and told Handsome again to slow down, peering intently as they drove past.

“He’s probably away playing golf some place,” Handsome said.

“You don’t think I expected to see him come walking out the door,” Bingo said indignantly. He consulted the book again. “Here are located the Finlandia Baths, where the top stars go for massage.” He didn’t read that out loud, but he made a mental note that as soon as they were settled and organized and doing well, that would be one of his first investments. And well worth while, too. “Look, there’s the Beverly Hills Hotel—”

This, he told himself again, was living.

“You know, Handsome,” he said dreamily, “when we buy a house—” He paused. Naturally they’d buy a house, soon as things got really moving. “What we’re going to get is a movie star’s mansion. The real article.”

“If you say so, Bingo,” Handsome said, with that same serene confidence.

“One that belonged to somebody big, and important,” he went on, half to himself. “So we can say to people, ‘Y’know, this house used to belong to so-and-so.’” He’d say it modestly, of course. “Houses must be being sold all the time. People get divorced, or move, or go to live in Spain or Paris, or Mexico, or some place. I’m always reading about it in the columns. It’s just a question of finding the right place and the right time.” He added mentally, “And the right money.” But that would come.

Sunset Boulevard curved into what the guidebook described as “the truly magnificent part of the city where most of the stars live—” A little way beyond, Bingo spotted a tiny stand, nothing more than a table and a few yards of bunting, with a pennant reading: GET YOUR GUIDE TO MOVIE STARS’ HOMES RIGHT HERE — $1.00.

“That’s the place Mrs. DeLee told us about,” Bingo said. “Pull up, Handsome.”

A plump middle-aged woman in slacks was perched on a stool behind the stand, which was heaped with folded maps. A man was leaning on the stand, apparently idly chatting. He looked up as the convertible came to a stop, said to the woman, “Don’t get up, Florence,” walked over to the convertible and beamed amiably.

“Want to see the movie stars’ homes, h’m? You came to the right place. Tourists?”

“We’re moving our business out here,” Bingo said. He tried to say it curtly, doing his best to feel irritated and just a bit insulted but there was no resisting the stranger’s smile. He reached in his wallet, took out a card of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America: New York and Hollywood, and handed it over.

“Glad to know you,” the stranger said. “I’m Courtney Budlong. Dabble in real estate, though I keep talking about retiring.” He scrutinized the card, and Bingo suddenly was glad he’d gone to the expense of having them engraved. “Well, you’ve certainly come to the right place. Cigarette?”

“Thanks,” Bingo said, glowing.

“Oh, your map,” Courtney Budlong said. He took Bingo’s dollar and turned back to the stand.

Bingo looked him over curiously. He was a plumpish man of medium height, with silvery gray hair — a trifle thin, bright blue eyes, a round, pink face, and a smile that somehow reminded Bingo of the smiles on the Santa Clauses who used to visit the orphanage where he’d lived until his Uncle Herman took him out at the age of twelve. It was a warm smile, a friendly smile, one that asked nothing in return except, perhaps, another smile. Later, Handsome remarked that he reminded him of the second husband of his Aunt Sophie, the one who lived in Scranton and owned the grocery store.

He wore a conservative, but still natty, light tan suit, just slightly and informally wrinkled but looking as though it had been pressed that morning, a white shirt with a button-down collar, a necktie striped in two soft shades of blue, and a Panama hat, the first hat Bingo had seen in three days. His gold cuff links and tie pin were initialed, chastely, C.B.

“Here you are, boys,” he said cordially, leaning an elbow on the car door. He nodded toward the stand. “Like to drop by here now and then and pass the time of day with old Florence. She’s a character, boys, a real true character. Been here fifty years, and what she can’t tell you about this town!” He clucked deprecatingly and shook his head. “Knows just everything that goes on, believe me!” He winked as one successful businessman to another. “Tips me off to some smart real estate deals, too.”

From Courtney Budlong’s clothes, appearance and manner, Bingo was sure the deals had paid off well.

“First trip to the coast?” Courtney Budlong asked, sounding as though he’d been appointed as a one-man greeters’ committee.

Bingo was tempted to make some casual quick reference to “flying business trips but never any time to look around,” but checked himself firmly. “First trip,” he said, and he said it with enthusiasm.

“Well!” Courtney Budlong said. “If you don’t love it here already, you’ll learn to. Say—” A sudden thought lighted up his round, friendly face. “How about my showing you around this little neck of the woods? I know it like I know my old mother’s face! Why, I can tell you things the boys who write the guidebooks never even dreamed of! You won’t need that map — but don’t take it back, Florence needs the buck.”

“That’s nice of you, mister,” Handsome said, warmth in his voice. “But—”

“We wouldn’t dream of taking up your time like that,” Bingo said, hoping he’d be overruled.

He promptly was. “Stuff and nonsense,” their new friend said. “I don’t have a thing to do all afternoon, not one thing. That’s why I was down fanning the breeze with my old friend Florence. Have to be at a dinner down at the Biltmore tonight, but that’s not till six-thirty. It would be a real pleasure to me, believe me, boys.”

“Well—” Handsome said.

“We’d enjoy it,” Bingo said, putting it mildly.

“Fine, boys!” Courtney Budlong said. “Fine, fine. Shall we take your car, or mine?”

He nodded toward a driveway about twenty feet up the boulevard, where a handsome Continental Mark II was parked.

“Still,” he said as an afterthought, “might as well take yours, and let you get the hang of driving around these tricky little streets. You may be living on one of them yourselves one of these days.” He climbed in beside Bingo, crowding them very slightly, and slammed the door.

“As a matter of fact,” Bingo said, “we plan to.” Well, that was the honest truth. He just didn’t say when they planned to. “To tell the truth about it—” Under Courtney Budlong’s warm friendliness he felt himself unfolding. “When we do buy a house,” he confided, “I want to buy one that once belonged to a movie star. That may sound childish to you, but it’s an old boyhood ambition of mine.”

“Not childish at all,” Courtney Budlong said sympathetically. “I once bought a Packard just because it had belonged to Theda Bara. Almost twenty years old when I bought it, and it was the best car I ever owned.”

Not only a cordial friend, Bingo thought, but a kindred spirit.

“Now around this next bend—” Courtney Budlong said. “Say, turn right here on Baroda. I want you to see Gary Cooper’s new house. Magnificent, isn’t it? And look ahead at that view! Talk about available building lots!”

“Very pretty,” Bingo said noncommittally. He wanted to see movie stars’ homes.

“Take a left here,” their volunteer guide said.

A few minutes later he said, “Straight ahead now, across Sunset.”

Sculptured lawns, clipped hedges and definitely palatial houses began to flow together in Bingo’s mind.

“Pelargoniums,” Courtney Budlong said, pointing to an expanse of pale but probably expensive flowers.

“Nice,” Bingo said. He hadn’t come all the way from New York to admire flowers.

“And there, across Sunset, right where we’re heading, is Lana Turner’s house. Right beyond—”

Now names began to flow through Bingo’s mind, replacing the verdure and the architecture. Lana Turner. Lauren Bacall. Judy Garland.

“But just look at the space around these houses,” Courtney Budlong said. “You won’t see anything like that in New York. Why, back East, to have even a little hint of a garden runs into a fortune of money! Here,” he said, almost reverently, “here, people have estates!”

“That’s the sort of place we’re going to want,” Bingo said, half without thinking.

Before he could add “someday,” their new friend had patted him on the shoulder and said, “There’s a house you ought to see. Not only outside, but inside.”

Bingo drew a long breath. “That, I’d like,” he said. He’d seen mansions, he’d seen landscaped gardens, he knew now where Lana Turner, and Judy Garland, and a dozen others lived. But to see the inside of such a house—

“Could it be arranged?” he asked, almost timidly.

“Arranged!” Courtney Budlong said. “Easiest thing in the world. The house is empty, and I have the keys to it right in my pocket.” He leaned toward Handsome. “Turn left at the second street up.”

Bingo half closed his eyes. If it was anything like Lana Turner’s house, or Gary Cooper’s, or any of the others he’d seen, this alone was going to be worth the trip from New York.

“There’s quite a story to this house,” Courtney Budlong said confidentially. “It has no business being empty. You’ll be able to guess, looking at it, what it cost to build. Why, what the ground it stands on is worth! If I told you what a mere building lot is worth, in this neighborhood, you wouldn’t believe me!”

“I suppose it’s for sale,” Bingo said.

“It is,” Courtney Budlong said, “and that’s why I happen to have the keys to it. I don’t even dare tell you how little the price is, because you wouldn’t believe that either. If I had time to handle it properly on the market, I could get ten times what’s being asked. If I only had ten days or so, I could get five times what’s being asked.” He sighed deeply. “But that’s the way things go in this world. It’s a forced sale. Somebody is going to get the bargain of a lifetime!”

Bingo opened his mouth to say that they weren’t in the position, right now, to consider buying a chicken coop. But the chance of seeing the inside of one of the houses he’d been looking at was a little too good to miss. He said modestly, “It wouldn’t do any harm to look—”

“Turn in right here,” Courtney Budlong said.

Handsome turned obediently through the gateway and into a U-shaped driveway, slightly littered with leaves, twigs and wastepaper, which curved around a rather unkempt lawn. At the far end of it stood what, at first glance, seemed to be more a castle than a mere mansion. Built of gray stone, it rose three stories high, with a pointed tower to the left, and a battlemented terrace to the right. From the driveway, it looked enormous; it hadn’t grown any smaller when they pulled up in front of an ornate doorway that would easily have admitted an eight-foot man without difficulty.

“This,” Courtney Budlong proclaimed, “is a house!”

It was all of that and more, Bingo decided. Their guide fished a key ring from his pocket, found the right one, swung the big carved wood door open, and ushered them inside.

It was dark in the entrance hall, but Bingo could dimly make out that its size was in keeping with the rest of the building, and that there were doors on either side of him and one ahead of him.

“Coat closet,” Courtney Budlong explained, opening the door to the left. He opened the one to the right and said, “Informal bar. Both for incoming guests.”

The informal bar for incoming guests had once been something very special, Bingo thought. Now it was almost empty of furnishings, dusty, and even a little cobwebby. The hospitable little curved bar, of some exotic wood, was badly in need of polishing; behind it, a South Seas mural needed a little touching up. There was one bamboo and wicker stool leaning against the wall.

“Island motif,” Courtney Budlong said. “Was charming. Could be, again.” He coughed and added, “Of course, everything’s a little run down.” He spoke as apologetically as though he personally had forgotten to push the lawn mower, sweep out the driveway, and dust the informal bar for incoming guests.

“But here,” he said, with a tone almost of triumph, “is the main room.” He threw open the door with an air of pride.

Bingo blinked. The main room was vastly larger than any room he had ever seen, or even imagined, in a private home. His first impression was that it closely resembled Grand Central Terminal. Across from him was a fireplace, done in black marble. It, too, seemed enormous.

The room was vast, and nearly empty. On either side of the fireplace were davenports, chastely done up in dust covers. Between them was what was evidently a coffee table, now neatly covered with yellowed newspapers. There were two dejected-looking floor lamps. Dust marks on the wall showed where pictures had once been, and that was all.

“The furniture is all in storage,” Courtney Budlong said, “except for a few items not worth storing.” He cleared his throat. “The furniture, of course, goes with the house. I’ll simply call the storage company and tell them to send it over. All antiques, too, beautiful stuff. The paintings, too, of course, and boxes of linens and silver.”

It was going to take a lot of furniture to fill up this room, Bingo thought. He walked halfway into the room. The davenports and table were standard size, he could see, but in here they seemed like doll furniture.

“This room,” Courtney Budlong said, as proudly as though he’d built it himself, “is one hundred feet square. Why, that’s twice the size of the average building lot. And three stories high. It goes all the way up to the roof.” Bingo looked up at the ceiling. It seemed very far away. On either side of the black marble fireplace, French doors led to somewhere. A wide hall turned off to one side of the room, another smaller one to the left. To the left also, a staircase with an ornate balustrade ran up to a balcony that apparently connected the right and left sides of the mansion. Its railing had the same ornate carving, and there were three doors on the other side of it.

“The rest of the downstairs—” Courtney Budlong began.

Handsome clutched Bingo’s hand, said “Psst!” and pointed.

Up on the balcony was what Bingo decided first was a ghost, on second thought, an optical illusion, and finally, a possible human being. In the duskiness of the big room, and at the distance from the floor to the balcony, he could barely make out a woman in gray. Gray dress, gray hair, and — even in the dusk and across the distance he could see — a gray and unpleasant, unfriendly, even malevolent face. The face glared down at them for a few seconds and then the gray figure darted away and was eaten up by the shadows.

Bingo laughed nervously and said, “Does a ghost go with the house?”

Courtney Budlong laughed too, but his was reassuring. “Just the caretaker. Someone has to look after the place. The new owner can fire her, and probably will. Now here in the left wing—”

The door to the left wing led to a club-sized dining room, naked of furniture and pictures but boasting a dusty chandelier. “You ought to see this with the furniture back in it, and the paintings.” More French doors showed a vista of another shaggy lawn, a mass of weed-choked flower beds, and a small fountain, now waterless. “Be absolutely nothing to get these wonderful grounds in shape.” There was a breakfast room, small for this house, but living-room size anywhere else. It, too, looked out on the desolate garden. “The furniture for this room is Early Colonial. Beautiful stuff.”

There was a butler’s pantry, with empty shelves. “China and glassware are all carefully packed in barrels, of course—” And at last, a good-sized kitchen that showed signs of human occupancy. There were pots and pans on the stove that looked sizable enough to provide for a busy metropolitan restaurant, there was a clutter of ten-cent-store china on the drainboard of the sink, and the big refrigerator was cold to the touch. It was, somehow, reassuring.

“The caretaker lives in,” Courtney Budlong said, as though he just faintly disapproved. “Her quarters are right through here—” He tapped lightly on a door leading from the kitchen, heard no answer and opened the door.

The room was not large, nor ornate, but it looked as though someone lived there, and had lived there a long time. A person of simple tastes, though. There was a neatly made-up bed, a slightly shabby carpet on the floor, two hard chairs, a dresser covered with a fresh scarf and sporting a comb, brush and pair of scissors. On the wall was a large and garish reproduction of a Maxfield Parrish painting.

“Pearl was the housekeeper here for a long time,” Courtney Budlong said, “and she’s stayed on as caretaker. Pearl Durzy. Very efficient woman.”

And a frightening one, Bingo said to himself. But Courtney Budlong had said that he could — he caught himself — that the new owner could fire her.

Back in the immense living room, Courtney Budlong paused a moment, and then said, “Let’s see — what part of the house shall we see next?” He thought for another moment, his face broke into a smile, and he said, “The library, of course, and what used to be a replica of a Victorian parlor. Can be again, with the furniture out of storage.”

The library was the size and shape of the dining room, and it, too, looked out on the dreary lawn and silent fountain. “You have no idea how delightful this vista can be, with a little care. And notice these walls.”

The walls, as near as Bingo could make out, were of marble. Pale, pink-grained marble. There were bookshelves along one side of the room, which, Bingo assumed, entitled it to the name of library. “A library, or a study,” Courtney Budlong said. “Or even a music room.” He touched the pink-grained marble almost lovingly. “Beautiful stuff!”

He led them back into the hall that led back into the living room in one direction and apparently came to a dead end in the other one. Another flight of stairs led up from it, a narrower, shadowy and dust-laden one.

Bingo looked back toward the immense living room, then into the pink-grained marble library, and finally looked at Handsome. “This,” he said ecstatically, “certainly beats the Skylight Motel, doesn’t it!”

“The Skylight Motel?” Courtney Budlong said, faint surprise in his voice.

This had to be shrugged off fast, Bingo told himself. He smiled and said, “Coming from New York — well, regular hotels just didn’t seem to have any appeal. You know. We didn’t know anything about Hollywood and a couple of friends recommended the Skylight—”

He didn’t add that the friends had been the classified section of the telephone directory, and a street map of Hollywood.

“I’ve heard of it,” Courtney Budlong said. “Nice, clean place.” His tone indicated that these two bright young businessmen would be well out of it, though.

At that moment the caretaker appeared at the bottom of the stairs as unexpectedly as though she’d done it with ectoplasm. She stood there for just an instant glaring at them, and then scuttled — yes, Bingo thought, that was the only word for it — down the hall and across the living room.

No one spoke for a moment, then Courtney Budlong said, “Poor old soul!” in a kindly voice. “Now let me show you what’s right across the hall—”

What had been the Victorian parlor was almost inky dark. There was one smallish oval window halfway up to the ceiling, but it had been almost completely overgrown by the untended vines. Courtney Budlong reached for the light switch and disclosed another empty room, its walls tinted a dusty and faded green. “Can be charming,” he said. “Completely charming.”

Handsome spoke for the first time since they’d turned in the drive. “Gosh,” he said, and there was real enthusiasm in his voice. “What a place to fix up a darkroom!”

“My partner’s hobby is photography,” Bingo said hastily.

There was another flight of stairs leading up from behind the library, an enclosed, shadowy and dust-laden one. At the top of it, Courtney Budlong flung open another door and announced, “The master suite.”

The master suite was an affair of two bedrooms, two dressing rooms and a bath. One bedroom opened into a smaller room, which Courtney Budlong described as. “The boudoir, of course,” and the other into a similar room which he described as “And naturally, the den.”

From that point on, Bingo began to get lost and to lose count. There seemed to be bedroom after bedroom, bath after bath, connecting hall after connecting hall. The battlemented terrace and the tower, he was told, were purely outside decoration, but of course with a little remodeling — at not too much cost—

At last they came down the main staircase, Bingo’s head spinning a little. This house, with the furniture out of storage, a little paint thrown around, no swimming pool, of course, but there was a perfect space for one in that back lawn—

He pinched himself and reminded himself firmly that this was a mansion for millionaires. Perhaps someday — well, at least it had been fun seeing it.

He caught one last glimpse of the all-gray caretaker, still scuttling, across the living room.

“Let’s go out and have a smoke,” Courtney Budlong said. He led the way through the hall, through the big ornate door, and out to where the convertible was parked, looking a little small in its surroundings.

“And would you believe it,” Courtney Budlong said, “because the owner is anxious to get this off his hands, he’ll sell this as is, complete with the furniture, for twenty thousand dollars!”

He paused to let that sink in. “The furniture — just a matter of phoning the storage company to send it over. Gas — lights — telephone — all in, and paid up for three months ahead.”

Bingo felt a little stunned. He pulled himself together, lighted a cigarette and said, “Wish we could swing it. But moving our offices to the Coast — finding new ones — all that sort of thing—” His voice trailed off on what was unmistakably a wistful note.

“But what’s more,” Courtney Budlong said, “it can be swung for only two thousand cash down. Four quarterly payments — the first one three months from now — of two hundred and fifty dollars each. If it weren’t a forced sale — why, given a little time, I could sell this place for fifty thousand dollars, in today’s market.”

Bingo was thinking fast. With the furniture back in, the grounds cleaned up — yes, it would be a suitable showplace for the heads of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America. He opened his mouth to speak, and closed it again.

“Wonderful neighborhood, too,” Courtney Budlong went on. He indicated a big, salmon-tinted, almost Spanish house on one side of them. “Know who lives there? Rex Strober. The motion picture producer.”

He didn’t need to add, “The great—” Bingo and Handsome added that in themselves.

“And to show you it’s not all movie colony,” he continued, “here is where Mrs. Hibbing lives. Mrs. Waldo Hibbing. Wealthy society woman. Widow of the copper mine Hibbing.”

Bingo had never heard of Mrs. Waldo Hibbing or her late husband, but he tried to look suitably knowing and impressed. The sprawling, super-ranch-style house, which seemed to be made mostly of plate glass and stainless steel, would have impressed anyone, he felt.

“And say,” Courtney Budlong said suddenly. “I almost forgot to tell you. Remember we were talking a while back about movie stars’ mansions? Do you know whose home this was originally? Who it was built for?” He smiled benignly at them. “April Robin!” He paused dramatically. “You remember April Robin, don’t you?”

Bingo looked back at the gray stone mansion, which seemed suddenly to be glowing. “Of course!” he breathed. “Of course I do. Everybody remembers April Robin!”

After one more lingering, almost loving look, he smiled at Courtney Budlong. “Just how fast could this deal be put through? Today?”

Three

“Nothing to it,” Courtney Budlong said blithely. “We’ll just drive down to the office, sign a couple of papers, you make your little down payment, and you own a house.” He patted Bingo on the shoulder. “At least you own one tenth of a house.”

“That only leaves eighteen thousand to go,” Handsome said. His voice sounded a little hollow.

Courtney Budlong laughed encouragingly. “Bright boys like you, you’ll make it in no time. I’ll probably be able to throw a few things your way. And anyway, it’s three whole months before you need to make that next small payment.” This time he patted Handsome on the shoulder.

As they backed down the drive Bingo gazed at the mansion, at its turret on the one side and its crenellated terrace on the other. At last he said, with a kind of awe, “That sure is a lot of house!”

“Boys,” Courtney Budlong said, “our chance meeting was a lucky one!”

He directed the way into Beverly Hills, pointing out a few spots of interest on the way. There, on their right, was Gene Kelly’s home. And there, ahead and to the left, the Civic Center — impressive, wasn’t it! Now, looking down the street and to your right, Romanoff’s. “Wish I could take you boys to dinner tonight.” But there was that stupid civic affair at the Biltmore. Some night this week, though. “And there’s my office, the gray building with the window boxes. Pull right up there, Mr. Kusak.”

Handsome objected that it was a no-parking zone. “Don’t worry about that,” Courtney Budlong said. “This won’t take a minute. You boys wait here in the car, because I’ll be right out.” The last words took him out of the car, across the sidewalk and into the handsome building with the shining chromium letters: BUDLONG AND DOLLINGER.

“He’s in a hurry,” Bingo said, “got that big important dinner party down at the Biltmore.” He wasn’t making explanations for Mr. Budlong, he was desperately making conversation to postpone the impending and inevitable discussion of their investment.

He looked with admiration at the BUDLONG AND DOLLINGER building. “Back in New York,” he said, “even a big important company like this one would just have some offices in a big building some place. Well, maybe a whole floor. But out here, they got the whole place. All the big firms do.” He looked across the street, a red-brick, nearly Georgian structure wore only one name: HENKIN.

He was still looking at it when Courtney Budlong came bustling out, papers in his hand. “Nice little edifice over there,” the real estate man said. “I remember when we sold it to Leo Henkin. He got it at a steal.” He cleared his throat. “You know, Henkin, the artists’ representative. Handles a lot of big names.”

Bingo nodded knowingly. He’d already learned that artists’ representative was another term for agent. He wondered who the big names were, and whether, if they waited here long enough, he’d see any of them coming or going.

“Well, here we are,” Courtney Budlong said heartily. “Told the girl we were in a hurry. Take another day to get the deed, but this’ll do you in the meantime.”

Bingo examined the first paper, Handsome peering over his shoulder. Neatly typed on Budlong and Dollinger stationery, it declared simply that, to whom it might concern, as of this date, Bingo Riggs and Handsome Kusak, of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America, having made a down payment of $2,000.00 on the property located at 113 Damascus Drive, Los Angeles, California, were empowered to occupy said property pending delivery and signing of the deed. The date, the amount and the names were written in by hand, the firm name having been crowded in with a little difficulty. Below was the owner’s signature, Julien Lattimer, and below that, Courtney Budlong, Agent.

“See,” Courtney Budlong said, “you can move in any time.”

Bingo looked at the paper with a kind of reverence.

“And this,” the real estate man said, “is as good as a deed.” He handed it over. “That’s your deposit receipt. Shows you own a house.”

Bingo looked at it, too, with reverence. It, on a Budlong and Dollinger receipt form, looked like any other receipt in the world, except that it was beautifully printed, and that it represented the ownership of what had been a movie star’s mansion. There were spaces for three signatures at the bottom, one of them already filled in by Julien Lattimer. Courtney Budlong filled in another, handed his pen to Bingo and said, “And you sign here.”

For just a moment Bingo hesitated, the pen cold in his hand. He turned his head and looked at Handsome, met a look that said, more plainly than words, that Bingo was the boss, knew what he was doing, and everything was going to be fine.

The thing was done. The twenty hundred-dollar bills went from Bingo’s wallet to Courtney Budlong’s. The letter and the deposit receipt went into a Budlong and Dollinger envelope and into Bingo’s pocket.

“And the keys, of course,” Courtney Budlong said. He dropped them into Bingo’s hand. “Front door, back door, cellar and garage. Two of each.”

They seemed to feel warm, almost to glow in Bingo’s hand as he looked at them. He’d had keys before, but never to a house he owned. He divided them with Handsome and attached his set to his key chain as though they were talismans.

“Drop in tomorrow and pick up the deed,” their new friend said jovially. “Make it around noon and we’ll run over to the Derby for lunch. No, wait a minute. Make it day after tomorrow. Tomorrow’s a state holiday. Consolidation Day.” He beamed at them. “Boys, I feel you’re going to do big things in Hollywood!”

“We’re certainly off to a good start,” Bingo said, glowing. “Now can we drive you—”

Courtney Budlong shook his head. “Thanks, no. Few things to tend to in the office. I’ll have Yoshiaki drive down and pick me up.”

Handsome headed the convertible toward Fairfax Avenue and the motel. Bingo felt in his pocket, touched the papers as though for luck. He still felt a little stunned.

There had been no criticism, no objection from Handsome. Finally Bingo said, “We can always sell it again, like he said. Plenty of buyers would jump at it. Make a nice little profit, too. In fact, I’d do just that, and put us a little ahead, except that I like the house.” He glanced sidelong at Handsome.

“Me, I like it too,” Handsome said.

Bingo breathed deeply with relief. “Mr. Budlong must be a pretty important man. And remember, he said he’d throw some business our way.”

“Bingo,” Handsome said, “what kind of business?”

“Well—” Bingo said.

“What I mean is,” Handsome said, “he doesn’t know what business we’re in. Only what it says on the card, and that don’t explain very much.”

For that matter, Bingo reflected, he didn’t quite know himself what business they were in. Not yet. He said, encouragingly, “Well, anyway, as I was saying before, Handsome, we’ve come a long way. There we were in New York not owning a thing but the cameras, and them in hock. Bang, we leave New York with this swell car, a lot of luggage and elegant clothes, and twelve hundred bucks and a little over. Not only that, along the way we do better than double it, for very little work. So now—”

“Only,” Handsome said, with just a trace of unhappiness, “we didn’t do that taking pictures.”

Bingo didn’t need to be reminded of that, and what’s more, didn’t want to be. “Handsome,” he said sternly, “we’re not going to run into any murders in Hollywood.”

He leaned back, let the breeze ruffle his hair, and contemplated a happy future. “You know,” he said dreamily, after a few blocks, “that’s the first time I ever met a guy who had a Japanese chauffeur. Mr. Budlong must be doing fine.” They’d be doing fine themselves before long. He looked again at Handsome and caught an expression of worry and a touch of bewilderment.

“Something?” he asked anxiously.

Handsome scowled. “I’m trying to remember. About seeing Mr. Budlong before.” He paused. “I mean, about seeing his picture before.” He paused again. “It’s like this, Bingo. I mean, I’ve seen it and I haven’t seen it.”

“Make up your mind,” Bingo said.

“I’m trying to,” Handsome said earnestly. “One minute I have seen it, and one minute I haven’t seen it. It’s that way.”

Bingo looked at his partner with deep concern. “Try to think where you saw it, Handsome.”

Handsome’s brow almost tied itself into knots. “If I saw it,” he said very slowly. “If I did — and I guess I didn’t. But it would’ve been on page three, section one. Next to it was a story about the big flood in Holland. There was a picture of two people and a dog in a rowboat.”

Bingo felt it safe to assume that Courtney Budlong had not been one of the people in the rowboat. He said nothing, and waited.

“And another thing, Bingo,” Handsome said. He sounded really unhappy now. “About April Robin. I know I ought to remember where I saw pictures of her, only I don’t. Not one single solitary picture.” This time, the pause was a long one. “Bingo, I think maybe I’m losing my memory.”

Bingo drew a long, slow breath. “Handsome,” he said, “what were the people in the rowboat like?”

“Them? There was—” Handsome’s eyes narrowed a little with thought — “a lady and a gentleman. She was all wrapped up in a blanket and he had a hat on. The dog was a little, spotted one. It wasn’t a very good picture either.”

“Go on,” Bingo said gently.

“It was February 7, 1953,” Handsome said. “There was a whole page of pictures on page one, section two. One of Queen Juliana and some refugees, but the rest were mostly water. It was an awful lot of water. I remember it was February 7th because Gus Bembough, he was the day bartender at Morrie Gelhart’s Shamrock Tavern, made a hunch bet on Water Baby in the fifth, and it paid sixty-three, forty. I guess you don’t remember Gus.”

“I don’t,” Bingo said, “but I wish I had his hunch system. And you don’t need to worry about your memory, Handsome, you’re doing fine.”

“If you say so, Bingo,” Handsome said. He sounded a little happier.

“And as far as April Robin is concerned,” Bingo said, “why, she was long before your time. Sure, you’ve heard of her. I’ve heard of her. Everybody remembers her. But you couldn’t possibly have seen her picture, because it was too long ago.”

Handsome sighed with relief. “Sure, Bingo,” he said. “Only it bothered me for a little while.”

“She was one of the greats,” Bingo said reverently. And we’re going to be living in her house, he said to himself.

Once more he leaned back, relaxed, and thought what a good world it was and how glad he was to be in it. Oh yes, there were occasional little difficulties, but nothing that couldn’t be overcome without too much hardship.

It continued to amaze him how rapidly the sale of the April Robin house had been put through. He’d never bought a house before, or even dreamed of buying one, but he’d had a feeling that it was a highly complex and long-drawn-out affair, involving banks, lawyers, practically the Supreme Court. This had gone through as quickly and easily as buying a coffee at a drive-in. But, he reminded himself again, this was Hollywood.

He roused himself as Handsome pulled to a stop in front of the Skylight Motel. “It won’t take us long to pack,” he said. “You can start, and I’ll go tell the old lady — I’ll go tell Mrs. DeLee that we’re leaving—”

Handsome glanced at the dashboard clock and said, “It’s after one o’clock. She’ll charge us for tonight anyway.”

Bingo hesitated for just a moment. Then he said firmly, “No, we own a house, and we’re going to sleep in it.” He thought briefly of the beds in the Skylight Motel, and of the two davenports in the mansion. There weren’t any blankets, either. Oh well, he’d slept on davenports before, and they could pick up a couple of blankets somewhere. A day or so, and all that wonderful furniture would be brought out of storage. Paintings, and linens and silver. Then they’d get the yard fixed up, and get acquainted with the neighbors, the society woman on one side, and the big motion picture producer on the other. No doubt about it, they were really in!

He located Mariposa DeLee in the office and stood for a moment wondering how to break the news to her that the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America was moving out. She’d changed to black velveteen toreador pants, and a filmy white blouse shot through here and there with sparkling silver threads. The decorative rhinestone-centered flowers in the back of her hairdo matched her earrings, and she was wearing a fresh job of make-up, but she didn’t look noticeably younger.

“We hate to leave you,” he said, with his best nonprofessional smile, “but we’ve bought a house.” Bought a house. He loved the sound of the words.

Her carefully outlined eyebrows lifted and she said, “Oh?”

“Immediate occupancy, too,” he told her. “So we’re moving in tonight.”

The eyebrows came down, and her eyes went to the wall clock.

“I know,” Bingo said. “Rooms to be vacated by one in the afternoon. But we don’t mind losing the one night’s rental.” Not so long past, he remembered suddenly, that one night’s rental would have paid for a week in New York with enough left over for a few meals. “We just want to get settled, that’s all.”

She smiled then, eyebrows and all, and said, “Well, naturally!”

“We were very lucky,” he said expansively. “Got a terrific buy.” He paused for dramatic effect. “It’s the old April Robin mansion. You remember April Robin, of course.”

“Who doesn’t remember April Robin!” she said, and then, “Well!” The smile almost glowed like neon. “I’m sorry to lose you two nice, interesting gentlemen. Can I help you pack?”

But by the time they reached Number 7, Handsome was just closing the last suitcase.

Bingo looked at her a little regretfully. She was a nice old girl at that, and nobody could be blamed for wanting to look young, or wanting to own a whole chain of motels. “I hope we can do something for you, sometime.”

“Bingo,” Handsome said, “maybe the lady’d like us to take some pictures of her nice motel to give her, pictures with her in it. She’d take a real good picture in those cute pants.”

Mariposa DeLee beamed with pleasure, made a polite and charming pretense at refusal, and began patting her hair before Handsome had even started unpacking his camera.

Bingo watched approvingly, while pictures were taken by the pool, at the office, in front of the entrance, and back by the pool again. There was no doubt about it, Handsome did come up with some very sound ideas. When they brought over the prints, made purely as a present for her, she’d very likely hit on the idea of having a flock of advertising postcards made up, and probably some large prints — he stopped himself on the verge of going into some mental arithmetic and reminded himself that they were no longer interested in the peanut trade. They owned a movie star’s mansion now, and sooner or later they’d own an office building—

He said good-by to her with real regret and added, “We might even bring the pictures over tomorrow. There won’t be much business doing on a holiday.” She looked a little puzzled. “Consolidation Day,” he added.

She looked puzzled for about half a minute more and then said, “Oh gosh yes, I almost forgot. I’ll be looking for you.”

She said it to both of them, but her eyes said it to Handsome. Bingo sighed, very slightly. It was always that way. Or always had been. Out here in Hollywood, which was full of beautiful, unattached girls, things were going to be different.

The sun was going down as they reached 113 Damascus Drive, and darkness was coming with that unexpected suddenness that still startled Bingo. The April Robin house was beginning to look very big and very somber and very forbidding, without a solitary light showing. Bingo felt just the very faintest of qualms.

But there, to one side of them, walking in his garden, was their next-door neighbor, the famous producer, Rex Strober himself. It had to be Rex Strober, no one who didn’t own a garden could possibly walk in it quite that way. He looked at the great man curiously. Rex Strober was a tall man, thin and stooped, with a deeply gloomy face and half-bald head. He looked, Bingo thought, like a grade school principal who had bought his dark blue suit at a rummage sale.

Just what is the etiquette in a case like this? Bingo wondered suddenly. Exactly who should speak first, and what should be said? Then the great man looked up, Bingo caught his eye, waved and called, “Hello, there.”

Rex Strober stared at him for a full minute, his dour face without expression. At last he said, “Hello,” in a flat and colorless voice, turned, and walked back toward his almost Spanish house.

“There’ll be plenty of time to get acquainted later,” Bingo said grimly, more to himself than to Handsome.

They had begun to unload the car when a voice from the other direction called, “Hello!” to them.

This voice was far from colorless, and its owner far from gloomy. Leaning on the low wall that divided their properties was a woman who appeared to be their other neighbor. The rich society widow, Bingo remembered.

She was a chubby, bright-faced woman whose gunmetal-colored hair appeared to have been carved rather than combed. Her eyes were a twinkling blue, and looked as though they were interested in, and seeing, everything. Even in the rapidly fading light, Bingo could see that her flowered chiffon afternoon dress included practically every color known to chemistry, and that her very small feet wore threadbare and not too clean tennis shoes. No one could possibly have doubted, though, that the pearls at her throat and ears were real.

She called, “Hello,” again, and added, “You two!”

They walked over to the wall. “How do you do, ma’am,” Bingo said politely, wishing he had a hat to tip. “We’re your new neighbors. I’m Bingo Riggs, and this is my partner, Handsome Kusak.”

“And I’m Mrs. Hibbing,” she said sociably. “Mrs. Waldo Hibbing.”

“I remember you,” Handsome said. “From your picture. In the World-Telegram, page three. You were christening a battleship. On April 18th—”

“It was a destroyer, not a battleship,” she said. “And my friends and neighbors call me Myrtie.” She gazed at them with what seemed to be more than neighborly interest. “So you’re the boys who’ve taken the Lattimer place.”

“That’s us,” Bingo said. He’d forgotten that it had ever been, even briefly, the Lattimer place. “Only it’s really the April Robin mansion. You know, the star. April Robin.”

She seemed surprised that he should even ask. “Sure do! I don’t think I missed one of her pictures. But that was so long ago—” She stopped suddenly, the passage of years was evidently something she didn’t like to discuss. “But I’ve only been here the past two years, and to me, it’s the Lattimer place, and—” She broke off again. “It’s so nice that you’re going to live there.”

“We think so,” Bingo said, a little confused.

Mrs. Waldo Hibbing leaned a little further forward. “And I do hope if you find it — you’ll tell me, first!”

Now Bingo was thoroughly confused. “Find what, ma’am?”

“Either one,” she said. “The body, or the money. Either one, it’s going to be so exciting. And if we’re going to be friends, I want to be the first to know!”

Four

“Golly, Bingo,” Handsome said, almost apologetically. “I didn’t know it was that Lattimer. There’s a lot of Lattimers. And the eastern papers didn’t carry any pictures of the house, and the stories didn’t give its address. So that’s why I didn’t know.”

“What Lattimer?” Bingo asked crossly, lifting out one of the lighter suitcases.

“Why,” Handsome said, “the one that was murdered by his wife.”

Bingo let go of his suitcase and turned around. “Just how is that again?”

“He was murdered by his wife,” Handsome said. “Anyway, that was what everybody figured. Only he isn’t legally dead.” He took hold of one end of the wardrobe trunk. “It’s a very funny story, Bingo. Queer, I mean.”

The sky was almost dark now; the April Robin mansion loomed up in front of them forbiddingly, without a single light showing. Bingo looked up at it a little apprehensively.

“Tell me all about it later,” he said hoarsely. “Let’s get these things in and go get some dinner.” He told himself encouragingly that the hollow feeling in his stomach was due entirely to the hours that had passed since their late breakfast.

He took hold of the front end of the wardrobe trunk and marched up to the big, ornate wooden door. He took out his keys and then stood for a moment, holding them in his hand. For as long as he could remember, he’d dreamed of just this, unlocking his own door — their own door, of course — with his own — their own — key. Now he had a fleeting sense that he might be unlocking a chamber of horrors.

“Everything all right, Bingo?” Handsome asked anxiously.

“It’s dark here,” Bingo said. He unlocked the door and flung it open bravely. Then he opened the door that led into the main room.

Seen now in the semidarkness, it seemed to be twice as large as it had by daylight. Large and cavernous. He remembered a newsreel he’d seen of Mammoth Cave, only it had been better lighted. He had a curious feeling that any minute now, a horde of bats would come zooming out of nowhere.

“There’s a light switch here some place,” Handsome said. A moment later the two floor lamps near the davenports created a little island of furniture and light in what was still an abyss of shadows. Another switch clicked, and a half dozen wall brackets, designed to imitate candles in antique holders, added their yellowish glow. They only served to make the small furnished island in front of the fireplace seem more isolated and small.

Bingo glanced up to where, seemingly a vast distance above them, a wrought-iron chandelier held more imitation candles, a lot of them. “I wonder what turns that on.”

Apparently nothing did. Handsome tried every switch in sight, unsuccessfully. “Maybe it’s out of bulbs,” he said helpfully.

“Probably,” Bingo said. He wondered how anyone would ever replace the bulbs in that chandelier without borrowing a ladder from the fire department. “Turn off those side things, we don’t need them.” And they dispelled the one spot of homelike coziness the room had.

“We won’t unpack,” Bingo said, as they deposited the last suitcase inside the door. “We’ll wait till after we go out and eat.” He paused and then said, “I wonder if that caretaker is around. Because right now would be a good time to tell her to go.” One thing was certain, he didn’t want to come back, later when it was really dark, and find that baleful, malicious face glaring at him. Especially, he didn’t want to sleep under the same roof with it.

They stood for a minute, listening. There wasn’t a sound in the big house, anywhere. In the vast cavern of the living room, the little island of furniture and floor lamps seemed very small and defenseless. Suddenly Bingo felt an impulse to throw their belongings back in the car, return to the Skylight Motel and, in the morning, look up Mr. Courtney Budlong and tell him the deal was off. Even if they couldn’t get their down payment back! For one moment the impulse even included going back to New York, not tomorrow morning, but right away.

“I’ll go look for her, Bingo,” Handsome offered.

Bingo shook his head and squared his shoulders. “We’ll both go.”

They found their way to the caretaker’s room, turning on lights all the way. Bingo knocked on the door, lightly at first, and then louder. There was no answer. He reminded himself sternly that they owned the house now, and pushed open the door. The room was empty.

“She must have gone somewhere,” Bingo said, hoping the relief didn’t show in his voice. “So we’ll leave a note for her.”

He ripped a leaf from his address book, considered the matter for a moment, and then wrote:

We have bought this house and moved in. We will not need you any more. Please leave tonight.

Riggs and Kusak

There, that settled that. A load had been lifted from his mind. All at once the whole house seemed better and brighter. And to think that he’d been considering — even very briefly — giving up this wonderful deal! He must have been out of his mind!

“We’ll leave the lights on,” he told Handsome. “It’ll be really dark by the time we get back.”

“It’s really dark now,” Handsome said. “It gets dark out here right away when the sun goes down. Bingo, this Mr. Lattimer—”

Bingo slammed the car door shut and said, “Let’s find a place to eat, first. And then talk.”

He thought about all the restaurants described in the “Where to Go” section of the guidebook, especially those marked with (*), which translated into “a favorite with the stars.” They could afford to go to any one of them. And perhaps they owed it to themselves, as the new owners of the April Robin mansion.

But that would mean going back into the house, opening suitcases, changing clothes. Suddenly he felt entirely too tired. Tired, and still strangely unsettled. Tomorrow night would be time enough. He finally said, “Let’s find a hamburger stand.”

Handsome found several that were only slightly less ornate than the Chinese Theatre. They passed those up in favor of one on Wilshire Boulevard, a pleasant circular affair. Bingo relaxed, settled down, and felt at home at last.

“All right,” he said. “You told me this Mr. Lattimer was murdered, but he wasn’t dead.”

“He hasn’t been murdered long enough,” Handsome said. “So he isn’t legally dead, I mean.” He added, “You don’t need to worry about the house, Bingo, because he wasn’t murdered there so far as anyone knows. Account of, the police kept going over and going over and going over the house trying to find out about his being murdered and trying to find where the money was.”

Bingo sighed. “Start from the beginning.” He took a bite of his hamburger and decided it tasted wonderful.

“I don’t know a lot. Because the eastern papers didn’t carry much,” Handsome said apologetically, seeming to apologize as much for the eastern papers as for himself.

His name had been Julien Lattimer, and although he appeared to be only in his early fifties, he was a retired businessman. And with a lot of money. He’d been married five times, his fifth and final wife being named Lois.

“The News ran a picture of his five wives,” Handsome said. “Not very good pictures, though. Three of them died, and the fourth one got a divorce, and the police — and I guess everybody — think the fifth one murdered him, except nobody ever could find his body, or the money.”

“Looks like he was good at making money, but no good at picking women,” Bingo said. “But not everybody knows how.”

Three years before, the Lattimers had bought the mansion at 113 Damascus Drive, and as far as anyone knew, lived there happily. But according to theory, Lois, who was younger, and tending toward the glamorous in looks, had married him for his money. He had been, according to the stories, just a bit crotchety and hard to get along with. While she had been friendly. A little too friendly, especially with a handsome young would-be actor whose name had never come into the story, and who had remained throughout as an unsubstantiated rumor but still a possible motive.

Then one day early in 1953 — Handsome hadn’t seen that story and wasn’t too sure of the date — Julien Lattimer’s ex-wife Adelle had turned up and asked the police to find either Julien Lattimer or his body, and she suspected it would be the latter. He’d skipped three months of alimony payments, so, after vain attempts to reach him by telephone, she’d gone ringing his doorbell. She was met by Lois, the current Mrs. Lattimer, who told a story about his having gone away on a business trip. That had been two months before and, inquiring in the various places Julien Lattimer usually frequented, Lois could find no one who had seen him or heard from him.

Adelle produced a will, made, she said, at the time of the divorce settlement, leaving her one quarter of everything he had in the world. She was dead-set that he’d been murdered, probably buried in the cellar, and she demanded that the police find his body, and immediately.

Bingo gulped his coffee and said, “The cellar of our house?”

“The cellar of our house,” Handsome said, nodding. “Only they never found any body. Not in the house or anywhere else. And nobody would’ve asked any more questions, except for some funny things. This Lois wife told a bunch of mixed-up things. Like, the night after which she never saw him again, he’d gone to the drugstore to get her some cigarettes. Now wouldn’t you think, Bingo, very rich people in a big house like that, wouldn’t run out of cigarettes?”

Bingo nodded. “Or if they did, they’d call up and order some. Or send the housekeeper or something.”

“Of course,” Handsome said, “he could’ve just wanted some fresh air. Only he didn’t take his car. And the drugstore was almost two miles away.”

“He maybe wanted a walk in addition to the fresh air,” Bingo said.

“Maybe,” Handsome said. “Only, he never did come back. And this Lois wife didn’t do anything about it.”

“Maybe she found she had cigarettes after all,” Bingo said, “or maybe she thought he’d gone to buy them at the factory.”

Handsome didn’t smile. “Then she said, she hadn’t worried and she hadn’t told the police, because he was a very moody guy, and sometimes he would go away for months at a time and not say anything to her or anybody else about it. Then she sort of changed her mind, and said that he had gone away on a business trip but it was all very secret and he hadn’t wanted anybody to know about it and told her not to tell anybody, and furthermore he hadn’t even told her where he was going and she hadn’t heard from him, but she wasn’t worried.”

Bingo stirred his coffee and said, “But that doesn’t mean he was murdered. Or that she murdered him.”

Handsome said, “When the police went all over the house, they didn’t find that he’d taken any clothes with him out of his closet. Or his razor.”

“He could have had other clothes,” Bingo said. “And two razors.” He preferred not to think of Julien Lattimer as being murdered, even if he had been moody, crotchety and hard to get along with.

“Well,” Handsome said, “there was the money.”

“How much?” Bingo asked.

“Fifty thousand dollars,” Handsome said. “I guess to people like the Lattimers it would be merely fifty thousand dollars.” He paused. “But not to most people.”

Only a few days after Julien Lattimer had gone out for cigarettes and never come back, Lois Lattimer had gone to the safety deposit box to which both the Lattimers had had access, and emptied it of securities which she had promptly converted into cash, fifty thousand dollars’ worth of it. During the following months she’d cleaned out the joint checking account.

“So,” Handsome said, scowling a little, “she must’ve figured that some questions might be asked sometime and she had to have some money to make a getaway, and that’s exactly what happened, and nobody’s even seen her since. She just got in her car and drove away, and the car turned up a coupla months later parked on a side street in El Centro but nobody in El Centro had seen anybody looking like her, and for a long time it would look like she’d turned up some place or been some place, all the way from Vancouver to some place in Guatemala, and even once in Hawaii, only it turned out either it wasn’t her or else she’d gone already.”

She’d done a nice job of getting away, Bingo thought.

“And after she’d disappeared, then the police really went to work to find poor Mr. Lattimer’s body, only they never did. There was one story about, maybe she’d put his body in her car and hid it some place way up in the hills where nobody would ever find it. Only then somebody else wrote another story about, she couldn’t’ve very well done that because while poor Mr. Lattimer hadn’t been a very big man, she was a little bitty woman and not very strong, so she couldn’t’ve put his body in her car, and then taken it out and buried it without she had help. Which she could’ve had, of course, if she really did have a boy friend.”

Or the housekeeper, now caretaker, might have helped, Bingo thought. She looked capable of that, or anything. And it could account for the nasty look she’d given them when they were looking through the house. Suddenly he resolved that they would get her out of the house that night if they had to carry her forcibly. He finished his coffee, paid the check and said, “Let’s go home.”

Murdered Lattimer or no murdered Lattimer, it was home to them now! What had happened to the Lattimers was a common-place story. Rich, middle-aged husband with a mean disposition, young and probably pretty and full-of-fun wife. She must have been pretty or he wouldn’t have married her; it had been Bingo’s experience that rich men married girls who either were pretty or were rich themselves. And in time she’d murdered him, done a good job of hiding his body and then gotten panicky and run away. A dull business, he told himself, and nothing that would ever need to bother Handsome and himself.

As they came up the driveway he could see a light showing in what he figured was the housekeeper’s room.

“I hope she’s packing,” he said grimly. “Because if she isn’t, she soon will be.”

He looked up at the forbiddingly big and darkened mansion, reminded himself that it had been built for April Robin, and immediately saw it as beautiful again. Poor Mr. Lattimer, no longer alive to enjoy living in a movie star’s mansion.

That was when the thought struck him. He caught his breath and said, “Handsome! Mr. Lattimer—”

“I know,” Handsome said. “I thought of it, too. Just now.”

“He can’t be dead,” Bingo said, “because he signed those papers this afternoon.”

Both were silent for a moment.

“It didn’t have to be this afternoon, Bingo,” Handsome said. “He could have signed those papers and left them with Mr. Courtney Budlong for when he sold the house.”

Bingo nodded slowly. The papers could have been prepared any time. He remembered that their names, the amount paid and the date had been written in Courtney Budlong’s hand.

“He maybe even could’ve decided he was going to sell the house, and fixed up those papers with Mr. Courtney Budlong before he was murdered,” Handsome said.

“And maybe she didn’t want him to, and that’s why he was murdered,” Bingo added. In that case would they still be properly legal papers? He hadn’t the least idea. But certainly Courtney Budlong would have known if they were or not, and if they were satisfactory to him, that made everything all right.

He walked slowly into the living room and over to the davenport, rehearsing what they would say to the caretaker. What was her name? He recalled Courtney Budlong mentioning it.

Handsome remembered. It was Pearl. Suddenly Handsome sniffed the air. “You smell anything, Bingo?”

Bingo sniffed, and nodded. “Smells like dry cleaning.” He scowled. “She’s supposed to be packing, not dry cleaning.”

He followed Handsome in the direction of the caretaker’s room. So far the only thing he’d thought of to say to her was “Scat!”

The odor grew stronger as they went through the back hall; by the time they reached the door, it was almost overwhelming. Bingo began to feel an unpleasant presentiment that something was terribly wrong.

Handsome didn’t stop to knock. He shoved the door open, fast.

The caretaker was sprawled on the floor, face down.

As he stared at her, the only thought that flashed through Bingo’s mind was that only that afternoon he’d promised Handsome that they were never going to be involved in any more murders in the future!

Five

“She’s breathing a little tiny bit, but not much,” Handsome said. He’d already opened the room’s one window.

Bingo looked down at the floor. There was a wide, wet smear on the rug. In the middle of it a container of cleaning fluid lay on its side. He said dazedly, “Why would anybody be cleaning a rug at nine o’clock at night?” The sponge with which she’d been working lay beside her hand where she’d apparently dropped it.

“Maybe it was dirty,” Handsome said. “Maybe she wanted to leave the room nice and clean when she left.”

Bingo glanced around. There weren’t any signs of packing in the room. “Maybe she just felt like cleaning a rug,” he said, a little angrily. “We better get a doctor. Right away.”

“An ambulance, Bingo,” Handsome said. He’d been looking at the label on the bottle. “I read about this stuff in a magazine once. It said if you breathe in enough of it, you die quick.”

Bingo located an extension telephone in the kitchen. For some reason he hated to call the police. Not that he’d ever had any serious trouble with them himself, or ever expected to, but it went against his nature. Still it was the only way to get an ambulance in a hurry. He sighed, and made the call.

Handsome picked up the unconscious woman and carried her into the living room. “It’s all right moving her,” he told Bingo. “She doesn’t have any bones broken and she hasn’t been murdered.”

Bingo shuddered. He opened every door and window he could find, closed the door to the caretaker’s room tightly, and sat down on the other davenport to wait.

It seemed like a very long time before the ambulance arrived, and while they waited, Bingo stared unhappily at the caretaker. Her bony face, ill-tempered even in unconsciousness, was almost as gray as her faded cotton house-dress now, and her hair was limp and stringy around it. One of her shoes had fallen off.

“Handsome,” he said suddenly, “take a look and see if she stuck our note to her in one of her pockets.” He really didn’t mind approaching her himself, it was just that Handsome was closer.

Handsome searched. “Not here,” he reported.

“Probably in her room,” Bingo said. “We’d better look and see—”

But that was the moment when the ambulance got there. Bingo admitted two efficient-looking young men, who paid no attention to him except to ask, “Where’s the patient?”

Bingo pointed. One of the young men examined her and said, “Emergency Hospital.” The other one got her name, Pearl Durzy, and said, “How did it happen?”

Bingo nodded his head in the general direction of her room and said, “She was cleaning a rug.”

The attendant who had asked the questions went with Bingo for a quick look. He examined the spot on the rug, picked up the empty can and looked at it, and said, “Carbon tetrachloride. That stuff’s pure murder!”

Bingo winced at the word. But this had been pure accident. Even though it was an inauspicious beginning for life in the April Robin mansion, it wasn’t murder.

“She sure inhaled enough of it, too,” the young man said. He noticed a glass on the dresser, sniffed of it, too, and said, “Been drinking. Did she drink much?”

“Not that I know of,” Bingo said truthfully. Somehow he didn’t feel that this was the time to reveal that he’d never seen Pearl Durzy before this very afternoon.

The efficient young man asked Bingo a few more questions and then helped hustle the unconscious Pearl Durzy out, remarking that the cops would be by for the accident report, their own job being not to waste time with such chores, but to deliver the victim.

As the ambulance siren receded in the distance, Handsome said in a shocked voice, “I read an article about that stuff. It was part of a series during Home Safety Week. The rest of the column was about bathtubs and electrical appliances.”

“And what did it say?” Bingo asked wearily. It had been a long, full day and he was beginning to think wishfully of sleep. “Besides not trying to do acrobatics in the bathtub, or go sticking your finger onto live wires?”

“It said,” Handsome told him seriously, and just a bit reprovingly, “that if you have to use carbon tetrachloride to dry clean anything, you should do it outdoors. Or you should have a lot of doors and windows wide open.”

Bingo said, with a feeble attempt at flippancy, “Maybe she hadn’t happened to read the same article.” He frowned, thinking of the little caretaker’s room. The door tightly shut. One window, and it had been shut.

“And the whole bottle of it spilled on the floor,” Handsome said, as though he’d been following Bingo’s thought word for word.

Bingo was silent for a moment. Then he said, “We better look for that note, Handsome.” It had just been an unfortunate accident, but still, the note might call for a lot of tiresome and unnecessary explanations.

But before they could start looking, the squad car arrived in front of the April Robin mansion. Two uniformed officers came in; they, too, were efficient-looking young men. They were also friendly, especially so after Bingo had informed them that they were the owners of the property and had handed them a business card of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America, which seemed to impress them.

The accident investigation was, to Bingo’s relief, short, matter of fact and routine, indeed, almost casual. The shorter of the two remarked that it was an unusual kind of an accident, but anything could happen, he’d seen some funny ones in his day. He wrote down the information that Bingo and Handsome had been out to dinner, that everything had been all right when they left — in fact, the housekeeper hadn’t even been in — that when they returned they’d noticed the odor — noticed, the cop had remarked, how could anyone miss it! — had investigated and immediately phoned for an ambulance. Which, the taller cop said approvingly, had been exactly the right thing to do.

Then Bingo led the way to the caretaker’s room, Handsome trailing along, and opened the door. One of the cops said, “Phew!” and the other said, “Try not to breathe much of this air!” and added, “And you better keep out of this room for a couple days.”

“That’s what the article said,” Handsome said.

The taller cop wheeled on him and said, “What article?”

“My partner happened to read an article about this stuff in a newspaper,” Bingo said. “And he happened to remember it.”

The two cops were willing to let it go at that. They began a very fast job of examining the little room, while Bingo watched anxiously from the door.

There was no sign of his note anywhere in the room.

“Looks like she might’ve got dizzy and tipped the whole bottle over,” the shorter cop theorized. “Then she was too dizzy to get up and get out.” The taller cop agreed that it might have happened that way very easily. Then they gathered up the empty cleaning-fluid can, and the glass from which Pearl Durzy had been drinking, and carried them out into the living room.

“Y’can smell that stuff way in here!” the tall cop said. “You guys better watch out you don’t breathe it in yourselves. Now, identification for this gal—?”

Bingo and Handsome looked at each other helplessly. “Her name’s Pearl Durzy,” Bingo said. “Caretaker here.”

The shorter cop called out, “Look in her purse.”

The tall cop make a quick trip back to the bedroom, returned, and said, “Can’t find one.”

“Hell,” his partner said, “all women got purses.”

The two of them made a quick search of the room, and came back looking frustrated. There had been a coin purse in the pocket of a gray coat in her closet, containing three bus tokens and a dime.

“Let somebody else worry about it,” the short cop said. “They can ask questions at the hospital when she comes to.” He paused. “If she comes to.”

Bingo said uncomfortably, “Can we find out how she is?”

“Sure,” the taller cop said sympathetically. “I mean, maybe.” He called the Emergency Hospital, put down the phone, shook his head and remarked that she was pretty bad. “Say!” he said, suddenly changing the subject and looking around. “Isn’t this the Lattimer place?”

“Was,” Bingo said. The warm feeling of pride began to come back. “Only we just bought it.”

“So this is what it looks like inside!” the cop said. He looked around with a kind of awe. “Could stand a little more furniture, though.”

“It’s in storage,” Bingo said. “Be moved in tomorrow or next day.” He added, with a studied air of carelessness, “This house used to belong to April Robin, the movie star. Why, it was built for her! You remember April Robin?”

The tall cop said, “April Robin! I was just a kid then, but—” And the shorter cop said, “Remember her! Oh boy, do I!”

A pair of swell guys, Bingo reflected after they had gone. For a brief moment his almost rapturous mood returned. He glanced again around the huge room, picturing the way it was going to look once the furniture had arrived. Then, with a jolt, his mind came back to Pearl Durzy.

“Handsome,” he said, “I didn’t see anything of that note when the cops were here. In her room, I mean. Or anywhere in her purse.”

“I didn’t either,” Handsome said. There was a faintly worried note in his voice. “Maybe we’d better take another look.”

They not only took another look, they searched the room. They looked in drawers, in boxes, in the pockets of the few dresses that hung in the wardrobe. At Handsome’s suggestion, they looked in all the wastebaskets.

“It simply isn’t here,” Bingo said at last. He had a feeling that he was hearing his own voice from somewhere very far away. “It isn’t here anywhere.”

They went back in the living room and sat down. Bingo lit a cigarette nervously.

“And if it isn’t here,” Bingo went on, inwardly shrinking from the implications of his own words, “somebody must have taken it away.”

They looked at each other for a moment. Then Handsome said miserably, “I said it was an accident, Bingo. I mean, I said she hadn’t been murdered, which amounts to the same thing. Because it looked like it was an accident.”

“It did to me, too,” Bingo said. “And to the cops.”

There was another unhappy silence. Then Handsome said, “She could’ve been knocked out first.”

After a while Bingo said, “It still could’ve been an accident. Why, any number of things could’ve happened to that note.”

“Sure, Bingo,” Handsome said reassuringly. Neither of them believed that for a minute. “Only, Bingo. Are you going to call up the cops and tell them about it?”

“I don’t know,” Bingo said. He thought it over. He foresaw that if he did, there would be a lot of troubles and complications, all of them wasting valuable time. On the other hand, murder — especially when it happened in his own house! Their own house.

He suddenly realized that it wasn’t murder yet, and began to feel much better. “We’ll wait,” he told Handsome. “She’s still alive, and by tomorrow she’ll most likely be better. In which case, she herself can tell what happened. If she isn’t, well—” He paused. “Tomorrow will be time enough. And it’s late and we’re tired.” He pounded the cushions of the davenport experimentally. A little bumpy, but he’d slept on much worse. “And I have a hunch we’d better get these lights off pretty soon. Because our next-door neighbor struck me as the type of dame who’d come right over to see what the ambulance and the police car were all about.”

Handsome began bringing over the blankets they’d picked up at an Army-Navy store, and unpacking pajamas. Before he’d gotten very far, there was a buzz at the door.

“What did I tell you?” Bingo said. He sighed. “Better answer it, though.” No point in insulting a new neighbor, especially a rich society widow.

The visitor who came into the room wasn’t Mrs. Waldo Hibbing, however. She was a tallish young woman with a bathing beauty type figure not at all concealed by dark green sharkskin slacks and a bright green, flame and white print blouse. She had long, smooth dark hair, not black, but close to it, coiled loosely on the back of her head, bright blue eyes which seemed to be shooting off sparks at the moment, and a slightly sulky bright red mouth. Bingo, having become a shade more skeptical during the course of the day, took a close look at her long, sooty eyelashes and decided that this set was real.

She stood in the center of the room, her fists on her hips, looking first at Handsome and then at Bingo, and then back again.

“I was driving by and saw the lights,” she said, “and I thought I’d better investigate. Who are you two guys, anyway, and what the hell are you doing here?”

“I’m Bingo Riggs,” Bingo said politely, “and this is my partner, Mr. Kusak.” He handed her a card of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America. “And who are you, and won’t you have a chair?”

She had an arm of the davenport instead. “I’m Mrs. Julien Lattimer. And is this some kind of gag?”

Handsome said, “You’re not the Mrs. Lattimer that murdered her husband. She was littler, and blond.”

“No, I’m not,” she said, and smiled at him, the instinctive way that women smiled at Handsome. It was a slightly grim smile, though. “I’m the Mrs. Lattimer who divorced her husband. Adelle Lattimer. In fact, I’m the Mrs. Lattimer who’s going to inherit a quarter of everything he had in the world — as soon as I find his body.”

“You’re much better-looking than your picture,” Handsome said judiciously. “The one I saw, I mean. It was in the News. January 25, 1953. You had short hair.”

Adelle Lattimer looked at Bingo and said, “I don’t know what all this is about, but your partner fascinates me.”

“He fascinates a lot of people,” Bingo said. “It’s just that he remembers everything. He could probably tell you what horse won in the seventh on that day.”

“Not that day,” Handsome said. “January 25, 1953, was a Sunday and they weren’t running.”

“It would be more helpful,” she said, “if he could tell what horse was going to win in the seventh tomorrow. But I guess that’s asking too much. And all this is a lot of fun, but just what are you boys doing here?”

“We live here,” Bingo said stiffly.

She glanced around the room, observing its lack of furniture, and not overlooking the half-unpacked luggage and blankets. “You don’t look particularly settled and cozy,” she commented, “but I admit you do look moved in. And granted it’s none of my business — yet — just who told you that you could live here?”

“Nobody,” Bingo said, even more stiffly. “Nobody had to. Because we bought the house.” His hand started for his pocket, and the papers given him by Courtney Budlong. Then he changed his mind. He agreed heartily, but silently, with Adelle Lattimer that it was none of her business, and he intended to leave it that way.

She stared at him. “Is this another gag?”

“It’s no gag,” Bingo said. “We bought it from Mr. Julien Lattimer. Through Budlong and Dollinger in Beverly Hills.” There, that ought to hold her.

“But you can’t have bought it from Julien Lattimer,” she said, still staring at him. “He’s dead. He was murdered.”

“So you say,” Bingo said. “But a firm like Budlong and Dollinger knows what it’s doing.”

She nodded at that. “But damn it,” she said, “if the son of — if he isn’t dead, where the hell is he?” She looked accusingly at Bingo and Handsome as though they’d deliberately hidden him.

“Why should we know?” Bingo asked. “We just bought a house from him, that’s all.”

“You mean you didn’t see him?” she demanded.

“No, we didn’t see him,” Bingo said. “We saw Mr. Budlong, the real estate man.”

She scowled, and looked very lovely in spite of it. “It all sounds fishy to me. Very fishy.”

Before Bingo could say anything in return, Handsome broke in and said placatingly, “Why don’t you just check with Mr. Budlong? He’ll be able to explain everything to you, without any trouble.”

“Sure,” Bingo said. “He’ll be able to tell you all about Mr. Lattimer.” He started to add, “Dead or alive,” and decided against it.

“I’m going to do exactly that,” she said. “The very first thing in the morning, too.”

Bingo started to remind her that tomorrow was Consolidation Day, and decided against that, too. Let her find out about it for herself, even if it did put her to an inconvenience. It was Handsome, still placatingly and very amiably, who did remind her.

“Oh, hell,” she said. “I never can keep track of these California holidays.” She sniffed. “Consolidation Day! Silliest-sounding thing I ever heard of!”

“Maryland has a holiday named Repudiation Day,” Handsome said. “On November 23rd. I don’t know why. And Boston has Evacuation Day on March 17th, and I don’t know anything about that, either. So Consolidation Day doesn’t sound so funny. And there must be some reason for it, only I don’t know what it is.”

“And I don’t particularly care,” Adelle Lattimer said. She sounded a little more agreeable. “All right, I’ll see Mr. Budlong day after tomorrow and get this straightened out. I don’t suppose there’s a drink in the house?”

Handsome went to investigate the kitchen. Their guest relaxed a little. Suddenly she took a deep breath. “What smells funny?”

“Just a little dry-cleaning fluid,” Bingo said. “Got spilled out in the back room.” No point in telling her any more details about that, either.

Handsome came back with glasses and a quart of beer he’d found in the icebox. Adelle Lattimer lit a cigarette, settled down, and began to look comfortably at home. “You boys from New York?”

Bingo nodded and said, “We’ve only been here a few days, as a matter of fact. Decided to move the business out here. The headquarters, anyway.”

He was pleased to see that she looked suitably impressed. “Doing well?”

“Couldn’t be doing better,” he assured her. “Takes a little time to get settled, of course. We haven’t even decided on our office space yet — but we’re thinking of a nice little building of our own, somewhere on the Strip, or in Beverly Hills.” Well, he was thinking about it. It was one of the main topics of his thought these days. “A good place to live came first.” He cleared his throat. “I suppose you know this place used to belong to April Robin.” He wondered whether or not she’d lived in this house, as Mrs. Julien Lattimer.

She looked unimpressed, took a gulp of her beer, and said, “The hell you say.”

“You remember April Robin, of course,” Bingo said.

“I don’t remember her,” Adelle Lattimer said. “Sure, I know who she was. But after all, she was before my time.”

Bingo doubted that. He decided it was time to change the subject anyway. “You certainly seem anxious to find Mr. Lattimer,” he prodded her.

She put her glass down, hard. “Look. He’s worth money to me. If he’s alive, he owes me nearly twenty grand in back alimony. Nineteen thousand two hundred, to be exact. Dead, he’s worth a quarter of what he left, if you follow me.”

“I get the idea,” Bingo said.

“And it’s plenty,” she told him. “But being married to him for two years was worth it. Of all the dull, dreary little characters. Oh, he did have a certain charm when you first knew him. Sort of poetic, and serious. Looked poetic, too. Dark hair with a little gray. Graceful. You know the type. But after you got to really know the stodgy, penny-pinching, gloomy little bastard—” She paused and said, “I guess I shouldn’t speak bad of the dead.”

“If he is dead,” Handsome said.

“And if I can prove it,” she said. “Don’t think I haven’t tried to have him declared dead by the courts, because I’ve been doing practically nothing else. With no success. If his body doesn’t turn up, somewhere, sometime, I’ll have to sit out the seven years, I guess.”

“If we find it,” Bingo said, “we’ll be glad to let you know.”

“Do that,” she said. Then she looked at him suddenly, her bright blue eyes narrowing a little. “In fact, if you boys want to pick up a little extra loot for yourselves, you might spend your spare time looking around. If you’re going to live in this house, you might just stumble onto something, so to speak.”

“Not his body, I hope,” Bingo said. He said it lightly, but with an icy spot in his stomach.

She said, very seriously, “Look, if his body had been here, it would have been found. But there might be something to lead to where it is. The cops went over this place with an extra small-size fine-tooth comb. No dice. After she—” the tone of voice in which Adelle Lattimer said “she” left no doubt in Bingo’s mind as to whom she meant — “got cold feet and scrammed, they went over it again. And again no dice. Finally the court appointed a trustee to look after the place and the rest of the estate. The trustee had the place gone over with an even smaller fine-tooth comb than the cops used. No dice ever, anytime, for anybody.”

Bingo said, “And what makes you think we’ll be more successful than they were?”

“Well,” she said, “you live here. I tried to get a private dick in here on my own. No luck. First she was living here, and then her housekeeper stayed on as caretaker. Phony insurance inspectors — electrical repairmen — we couldn’t get anybody in. But you are in.” To Bingo’s relief, she didn’t ask questions about the caretaker.

“Naturally,” she said, “I don’t expect this for nothing. Anything you turn up that leads to finding his body — I’ll give you a cut of what I get.”

Bingo thought for a minute. “A quarter?”

“I was thinking more of five percent,” she said.

They discussed the figure back and forth for a while, plus the fact that even five percent of the at least hundred thousand dollars she stood to inherit was a considerable sum, and ended by agreeing on ten.

“He was a rich widower when I married him,” Adelle Lattimer said. “I think he married me because he thought he’d be more of one. Richer, I mean, not more of a widower. But I disappointed him. I own a nice little hat shop in Pacific Palisades, but that’s all. It’s just that I look and act rich, and that’s what fooled him. So we wrangled for a couple of years, and I got a smarter lawyer than he did, and quicker, and got my four hundred a month alimony, now long overdue, and my share in his will.” She smiled. “I’m a shrewd businesswoman, in my way.”

Distinctly one he wouldn’t care to have on the other side in a deal, Bingo thought. He said, “This — Lois that he married — was she rich?”

Adelle Lattimer shook her head and laughed. “I don’t think she had a dime. No, this time Julie was the sucker. He fell in love with her. I mean he really fell in love with her. She’s a pretty little thing. Not much sense, if she picked him. Unless she married him for his money, which is what probably happened.”

She poured the rest of the beer into her glass. “It’s to laugh, I mean it! Here this poetic-looking smoothie makes a thing out of marrying women with money. Finally, when he’s got it made, a cute little bleached-blond babe comes along and marries him for his dough, and ends up killing him for it. Well,” — she lifted her glass — “good luck, boys.” She finished her beer in a gulp, and rose. “If you find anything, I’m in the phone book.”

They showed her to the door and watched while she got into a convertible several inches longer and several shades brighter than theirs.

“Handsome,” Bingo said when she was gone, “how much did this guy leave?”

“There wasn’t any exact figure,” Handsome said. “It was about half a million bucks, though.”

Bingo sat down on the slightly lumpy davenport and did a little fast mental arithmetic. Adelle Lattimer would get a quarter of that, according to the will. And ten percent of that—

“But Julien Lattimer’s not dead,” he said suddenly. “He can’t be dead. Handsome, how could he sell us his house, if he was dead?”

“We’ll find out from Mr. Courtney Budlong,” Handsome said soothingly. He brought over Bingo’s mauve and lime-green striped pajamas, slippers and a blanket.

Bingo settled himself as comfortably as he could on the davenport and, for a moment, considered telling Handsome to leave on one of the lights. Then he decided to keep quiet and see if Handsome might not have the same idea. After all, a strange house in the dark — even if there wasn’t much furniture to trip over—

Handsome put a flashlight on the table by the davenport. Bingo sighed inwardly and let it go at that.

A little light came in from the windows off the balcony, just enough to make the room seem even more enormous, and more empty. Bingo pulled the blanket tight around his chin and tried to shut his eyes. There was still the odor from the caretaker’s room.

Suddenly he felt an almost overwhelming desire to wake Handsome, to pack everything and pile it into the convertible, and head for New York. He told himself firmly that they’d at last arrived in Hollywood, that they were going to get rich, that already they owned a house that belonged to April Robin, with a famous motion picture producer and a society widow for neighbors, and that they would make all kinds of valuable contacts through their friend Mr. Courtney Budlong. He thought of Ciro’s, of the Sunset Strip, of Hollywood and Vine. He tried to visualize a little office building in Beverly Hills, with their name in chromium letters like those on BUDLONG AND DOLLINGER. He still wanted to go back to New York.

He found himself even thinking wistfully of Eighth Avenue on a cold rainy day in March, or of West 34th Street in a July heat wave.

The future suddenly seemed filled with entirely too many problems. Not the least of them being that the April Robin mansion had probably seen at least one murder.

New York seemed so far away, so very far away.

Finally, with the feeling that daylight was about two ticks of the clock away, he slept.

A series of resounding buzzes at the door woke him. He sat up, rubbing his eyes, and realized that while daylight had gotten here all right, it hadn’t been here long. He looked at his watch. Seven in the morning. Who would be calling at seven in the morning?

Handsome had thrown on a bathrobe and gone to open the door. He came back with two men, an anxious look on his face. “It’s the police, Bingo,” he said.

Bingo grabbed his own bathrobe, thankful that it was the forest-green flannel one.

One of the men was tall and very thin, with the most deeply lined face Bingo had ever seen. It was also the saddest face he had ever seen, with a thin, mournful mouth and weary eyes. “I’m Perroni,” he said. “My partner’s Hendenfelder.”

Hendenfelder was also tall, but heavy-set. His face was round, pinkish and expressionless.

Handsome whisked the blankets away. The two plain-clothesmen sat down. Bingo just sat still and worried.

“Might’s well come straight to the point,” the one named Perroni said. “The Lattimer case is my baby. Been on it since he was reported missing. Found no proof he was murdered yet, but I will. Now you had a little trouble here last night.”

“The housekeeper tipped over a can of cleaning fluid,” Bingo said quickly. “Breathed in a lot of it. I hope she’s better.”

“She didn’t tip it over,” Perroni said, in his melancholy voice. “Somebody poured it out and put her nose down in it, after feeding her a drink loaded with knockout drops. And she isn’t better, she’s dead.”

Bingo sat holding his breath. In his heart, he’d known all along it was that way, but he’d refused to admit it.

“And also,” Perroni said. “What’s all this nonsense about you buying a house from a man that was murdered four years ago?”

Six

“It isn’t nonsense, and we have bought a house,” Bingo said. “And nobody seems to know if the guy was murdered or not.” It wasn’t exactly the tone of voice to use to a cop and he knew it, but this was entirely too early in the morning to be polite to anybody.

“Oh now, let’s be friendly about this,” Detective Hendenfelder said. His attitude seemed to imply that if Bingo and Handsome had really bought the house, they were important people and should be treated courteously as such, and if it turned out that they hadn’t, no real harm would have been done. “Too bad we had to wake you up so early, but that’s the way things are because — well, because that’s the way things are. Let’s have a cup of coffee and talk this over, h’m?”

Perroni simply said, “Where was this woman’s room?”

Bingo rose and showed him. The first cigarette of the day was making him feel a little better, and if the big fat-faced cop was willing to be friendly, why, Bingo was willing to go along with him. Besides, he and Handsome had nothing to worry about, and nothing to lose except a little time.

The small room still smelled heavily of cleaning fluid. Perroni sniffed and said, “Whew!” He looked it over with sad, mournful eyes, and finally said, “Have to go through her things, but we can do that later.” He led the way back into the living room, to Bingo’s relief.

“All right,” he said with a sigh, taking out a notebook. “What do you know about the woman?”

“Nothing,” Bingo said. “Absolutely nothing. She was around yesterday afternoon and we saw her — not to speak to — when Mr. Budlong was showing us the house.”

“Budlong?” Detective Perroni asked.

“Mr. Courtney Budlong,” Bingo said.

“Budlong and Dollinger?”

“They sold us the house,” Bingo said. “Or, Mr. Courtney Budlong did. Say, did you know that this house used to belong to—”

“Stick to the woman,” Perroni said.

Bingo said stiffly, “That’s the only time we ever saw her. Alive. Mr. Budlong said she’d been the caretaker. And that her name was Pearl Durzy.”

“That’s the only time you ever saw her?”

“Just like I told you,” Bingo said. He wished Handsome and the fat-faced cop would hurry up with that coffee.

“You’re not being very informative,” Perroni complained.

“I don’t know what you want to know,” Bingo said.

The coffee arrived just in time. Handsome had even located some cinnamon rolls and warmed them. Life began to get brighter.

“You looked the house over yesterday afternoon,” Perroni said, as though his patience were being strained toward its outer limit, and declined coffee. “Then what did you do?”

“Then,” Bingo said, “we went into Beverly Hills with Mr. Budlong and bought it.”

“Just like that,” Perroni said.

Bingo nodded and said, “Yes, just like that.” How else would anyone buy a house?

“We’ll get back to that later,” the detective said. “What did you do after you bought the house?”

“We went back to where we’d been staying, and packed,” Bingo said. “A very nice place. The Skylight Motel.” He was beginning to wish again that they’d stayed there. “We took some pictures of it, and then we came back here.”

“Took some pictures?” Perroni asked.

“A present for the lady that owns it,” Bingo said. And whose business was it, anyhow?

“Professional pictures?” Hendenfelder said, with a show of interest.

Bingo handed him a card of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America. He looked impressed and handed the card to Perroni, who didn’t.

“All right,” Perroni said, tucking the card in his pocket, “you came back here. Where was this Pearl Durzy then?”

“We don’t know,” Bingo said. “She wasn’t here.”

“How do you know she wasn’t here?”

“Well,” Bingo said, “there wasn’t any light on. In her room, I mean.”

“She could have been sitting in the dark,” Perroni said, “or taking a nap.”

“Yes,” Bingo said. “She could. It just didn’t feel like she was here, that’s all.”

Detective Perroni looked at him glumly and silently.

“Or she could have been dying already,” Hendenfelder said.

Bingo shook his head. “We’d’ve smelled the cleaning fluid.”

The skeptical look on Perroni’s sad face expressed what he thought of that for proof. “Go on,” he said.

“Well,” Bingo said, “we got acquainted with our next-door neighbor. Mrs. Waldo Hibbing. Her first name’s Myrtie. She’s a widow.”

“We know everything about Mrs. Hibbing,” Perroni said.

Bingo looked at him in surprise. Mrs. Waldo Hibbing didn’t look as though she’d ever been involved with the police, even for a minor traffic violation.

“It’s been our business to know everything about everybody in this neighborhood,” Perroni explained, with that air of exhausted patience. “Since Julien Lattimer was murdered.”

Bingo opened his mouth to say that Mr. Lattimer couldn’t have been murdered, and then shut it again.

Perroni waited a minute, and then said, “Well?”

“Well,” Bingo said, “we spoke to our other neighbor, too. Mr. Rex Strober. But we didn’t exactly get acquainted with him.”

Detective Hendenfelder snorted. “Nobody gets acquainted with Rex Strober,” he said.

“Then you did what?” Perroni asked.

“We went out to dinner,” Bingo said.

Perroni sighed deeply. “Look, you don’t have to volunteer any information, but just to save us all a little time—”

“Okay,” Bingo said. “We went out to dinner. At—” He turned to Handsome.

“Goody-Goody’s,” Handsome supplied. “It’s down toward the ocean.”

“It’s a hamburger joint,” Hendenfelder said.

Bingo started to say that they were tired of fancy Hollywood restaurants and that they just happened to feel like going to a hamburger joint, especially since they were tired from a long, busy day.

Handsome said, “It’s a very swell hamburger joint, too,” and conveyed exactly what Bingo had had in mind.

“I’ll say it is,” Hendenfelder said. “I eat there all the time.”

And the cashier would remember their being there, Bingo thought.

“It was quarter to seven when we left here,” Handsome said. “Half past eight when we left there. Took about half an hour to drive home.”

“That’s what I mean,” Perroni said. “Helping out with a little information on things we’d have to ask about anyway.” It didn’t seem to make him look any happier, though.

“And when we got back,” Bingo said, although not feeling any particular desire to be helpful, “we smelled this stuff, and looked to find out what it was, and found her, and brought her out here where there was some air, and called for an ambulance. Just as fast as we could, too.”

“That could check,” Hendenfelder said. “Doc said she’d only been inhaling the stuff about an hour, maybe hour and a half. Long enough, though. But if they were at Goody-Goody’s from about seven or seven-thirty till eight-thirty, that would check.”

“Now look here,” Bingo said. “You said this dame — this lady — was murdered—”

“Knockout drops in the drink,” Perroni said. “Killer figured he was being smart. Knew the doc might find she’d been drinking, because of the way the stuff she breathed in worked so fast. So he must have rinsed out the glass, and then put a little whiskey in it. No knockout drops in the glass. Found effects of them in her, though.”

“All right,” Bingo said indignantly, “but why ask us so many questions and fuss about where we were when, and all that stuff. We didn’t murder the lady. Hell, we didn’t even know her.”

Perroni looked as though he was thinking that people did murder perfect strangers on occasion. But he said, “Last night the squad car boys got the idea you knew all about carbon tetrachloride and how it worked.”

Bingo sighed and said, “You don’t understand.”

“You can say that twice,” Perroni said.

“It was a Sunday newspaper during Home Safety Week,” Handsome said. “About bathtubs and ladders and not leaving matches around, and stuff like cleaning fluids and ant poison.” He paused. “There was an article about great screenplays of yesterday on the opposite page, with a picture of Greta Garbo and John Gilbert.”

Perroni looked at Bingo and said, “What’s with this guy?”

“My partner remembers everything he reads,” Bingo said. “Just the way it looked when he read it. That’s how he happened to remember the article.”

Hendenfelder looked impressed. Perroni looked doubtful, but let it pass. “All right,” he said. “We can check on all that stuff. Now,” he said, with a cold note of skepticism, “you claim to have bought this house.”

“We have bought this house,” Bingo said, just as coldly. He took out the precious papers and handed them to Perroni, who looked at them and handed them on to Hendenfelder.

Hendenfelder scrutinized them and finally said, “Looks as though they have bought this house. But I thought there was more to buying a house than just this.” He handed the papers back to Perroni.

“We still have to get a deed,” Bingo said, “but that takes a day or so. Mr. Courtney Budlong said this would be all right in the meantime.”

Perroni looked at Hendenfelder. “Hell,” the round-faced man said, “I wouldn’t know about buying a house. I’m just a cop, and I live with my in-laws besides.”

“I live in a hotel, myself,” Perroni said. “We can check all that with Budlong. But look at that signature.”

Hendenfelder looked. “Looks like his,” he said after a minute.

“We can check that with a handwriting expert,” Perroni said. “But if it is his signature—”

“He’s alive,” Hendenfelder said. “I don’t know anything about ink, either, but that don’t look like he wrote it any four years ago.”

“No, it don’t,” Perroni said. “And if that is his signature, and he is alive, then damn it, I’ve wasted four years of time on this case.” He looked just a shade more sad.

“Budlong and Dollinger’s a good firm,” Hendenfelder said.

That cheered up Bingo, but not Perroni.

“I told you, we’re going to check with Budlong,” Perroni said. He sounded sad. He looked at his watch. “Office will be open by now.”

Bingo finished a second cup of coffee. He was beginning to feel himself again. This was just a silly mistake, a mix-up of some kind. And the murder — if it was murder, he was still inclined to doubt it — had nothing to do with their purchase of the April Robin mansion.

Perroni went to the telephone, the papers still in his hand, and dialed. He asked for Courtney Budlong. Then he said, “How’s that?” and then, “Well, what Mr. Budlong is there?” Finally, “Okay, when will he be in?”

He hung up, folded the papers, put them in his pocket, and looked accusingly at Bingo. “I don’t know what you guys are trying to pull off, but—”

“We’re not trying to pull off anything,” Bingo said coldly.

“Maybe not,” Perroni said. “Only there isn’t any Courtney Budlong.” They stared at him.

“Nobody there ever heard of a Courtney Budlong,” Perroni said. “The only Budlong is Victor Budlong.”

Hendenfelder nodded and said, “He’s a big shot in the Chamber of Commerce,” as though he felt that was very important to the situation.

“There’s some mistake,” Bingo said bewilderedly. “Mr. Budlong — Mr. Courtney Budlong — was going to a big civic dinner last night—”

The two detectives looked at each other. “Far’s I know, there wasn’t any big civic dinner last night,” Perroni said. He scowled at them. “And also, far’s I know, there isn’t any Courtney Budlong, either.”

“But there has to be,” Bingo said. He added, “He had his initials on his cuff links.”

For the first time, there was a smile on Perroni’s face, a faint one, though.

“That does look like Lattimer’s signature,” Hendenfelder said.

“We’re going to straighten this out right now,” Perroni announced. “You guys get dressed. We’re going straight down to Budlong and Dollinger and talk to Mr. Budlong in person. The only Mr. Budlong. And his name isn’t Courtney.”

Seven

“But look,” Bingo said. “He wasn’t going to be in his office today. Mr. Budlong wasn’t, I mean.”

“What Budlong?” Detective Hendenfelder said.

“Our Mr. Budlong,” Bingo said. “Mr. Courtney Budlong.”

Hendenfelder said nothing, and said it tactfully. He watched the street and concentrated on his driving.

Bingo was riding into Beverly Hills with Hendenfelder in a dark sedan which, to his great relief, didn’t look in the least like a police car, though he hadn’t seen any signs of either Mrs. Waldo (Myrtie) Hibbing or the great Rex Strober watching from their windows. Handsome was driving the convertible, with Perroni as a passenger. The idea had been Perroni’s.

“He said the office wouldn’t be open because of the holiday,” Bingo said, grasping at a straw.

“What holiday?” Hendenfelder asked, not skeptically, just curiously.

“Consolidation Day,” Bingo said. “Today is Consolidation Day.”

Hendenfelder slowed down, stared at Bingo, pulled over to the curb and stopped. From the glove compartment he took out a little paper-bound book marked Information, and turned to a page headed “California Legal Holidays.”

“I don’t see anything here about Consolidation Day.”

Bingo looked at the page. He looked at it for a long time. Then he said weakly, “There must be some mistake.”

“Sure,” Hendenfelder said soothingly. “People are always making mistakes.” He put the book away and started the car again. “It’ll all get straightened out.” He added, “One way or another.”

A few blocks farther Bingo pointed and said, “That’s where he lives,” grasping at another straw.

Hendenfelder glanced up the curving driveway toward the big and beautiful house. “Sure,” he said. “Andy.”

“No,” Bingo said. “Mr. Budlong. Mr. Courtney Budlong.”

“That’s where Andy lives,” Hendenfelder said. “I mean Andy of Amos and Andy.” He added, “A very nice house, too.”

“But Mr. Courtney Budlong’s car was parked in the driveway,” Bingo said desperately. “A blue Continental. He left it there and we rode in our car so Handsome could learn his way around this part of town. And then when we left him at his office he said he had a few things to tend to there, and that — I think his name was Yoshiaki — would pick him up later—” His voice trailed away into a miserable nothing.

“This’ll get straightened out,” Hendenfelder said again. “Things do.”

Bingo settled back and tried to admire the houses, the lawns, gardens and clipped hedges which had seemed so beautiful yesterday, and thought with longing of upper Broadway and 92nd Street in the dead of a rainy winter.

Suddenly he said, “His cuff links. And his tie pin. Mr. Courtney Budlong’s. They had initials on them. C.B.”

“Could’ve stood for almost anything,” Hendenfelder said. He glanced at Bingo. “But don’t get me wrong. I don’t disbelieve you. I don’t disbelieve anybody. It don’t pay. Especially here in Hollywood.” He braked the car to a stop in front of Budlong and Dollinger, and said, “Perroni got here first, like always.”

The handsome little building with the chromium letters hadn’t changed since yesterday, but to Bingo it seemed to have a slightly sinister look. The interior was handsome too, and under any other circumstances he would have appreciated and admired it, right down to the last ceramic ashtray. But today he only wanted to get everything over with and get out, and fast.

The other Mr. Budlong — Bingo still refused to consider him the only Mr. Budlong — was as impressive as his building, tall and almost military, with heavy horn-rimmed glasses and iron-gray hair. He greeted Bingo as cordially as though there were no “little difficulty,” as he expressed it, in a beautiful, sonorous voice that was accompanied by a firm, warm handshake. A little difficulty, he added, that could be straightened out.

Bingo recognized and admired, with a professional eye, the air of a fellow super-salesman. Somehow he began to feel unaccountably better.

Perroni, it seemed, was on the telephone to headquarters with a description of “Mr. Courtney Budlong.” Meantime, Victor Budlong said, the trustee of the Lattimer estate — or, the representative — Mr. Herbert Reddy, was on his way over.

“Trustee?” Bingo said. He hoped there wasn’t a quaver in his voice.

“Naturally,” Victor Budlong said. “When Mr. Lattimer disappeared, and was believed to be dead—” Mr. Victor Budlong cleared his throat delicately and added, “Murdered, in fact, although neither legally dead nor legally murdered, and later when his wife disappeared, the court appointed a trustee for the estate. A trust company, of course. Their representative in charge of the Lattimer estate, Mr. Reddy, will be along shortly.”

He beamed at Bingo and Handsome as though suggesting that he would like to be on their side. Bingo suddenly found himself hoping, with a kind of desperation, that Victor Budlong would be on their side and in full force. It began to look as though they would need him.

“It’s just a little mix-up,” Bingo said, with what he hoped was an air of serene confidence, “and as you say, Mr. Budlong, it can be cleared up very quickly.” He thought it wise to add, “We like the house very much.”

Victor Budlong went right on beaming. He said, “I’m not familiar with the property myself, but—”

“Charming,” Bingo said, instinctively quoting Mr. Courtney Budlong. “Wonderful neighborhood, too. And it used to be the April Robin mansion.” He paused for effect. “You remember the star, April Robin—” He let his voice trail off.

“Remember her?” Victor Budlong said, almost with reverence. “I used to have an autographed picture of her! And to think this was her house!” He offered cigarettes. “Are you in the Industry?” He said that with an air of reverence, too.

Bingo hesitated between “In a way,” “More or less,” and just plain “Yes,” and finally silently handed over a card of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America.

“Well!” Victor Budlong breathed.

“We’re not really settled yet,” Bingo said. “We only recently decided to transfer our headquarters to Hollywood. The logical place, of course. Naturally, we’re not particularly settled yet. But once we get this little tangle fixed up, then it’s just a matter of finding suitable office space, somewhere here in Beverly Hills or on the Strip, and getting everything under way.”

In the background he heard Handsome cough faintly. But this was no time to boggle at trifles.

“Well!” Victor Budlong said again, and this time he said it in a cordial and extremely helpful manner. “Exactly what kind of space do you have in mind?”

Bingo crossed his fingers, plunged in, and said, “Well, eventually of course, we want to build our own little building. Nothing elaborate, but tasteful.” There, that sounded just right.

“If you’re not looking for too large a place,” Victor Budlong said, as though the idea had just come to him, “I know of something that might do very nicely until you decide to build. Charming little suite of offices. Furnished, too. Very pleasant. Provincial style waiting room.”

This time Bingo said, “Well!” with just the right note of interest.

“As a matter of fact,” Victor Budlong said enthusiastically, “it’s only a step or so from here. Almost across the street. Would you like to take a look at it, just for fun, while we’re waiting?”

Bingo said that would be very pleasant indeed. Handsome went along, his face impassive. Officer Hendenfelder said, tactfully sounding very unofficial, he’d like to come too, if nobody minded, he always liked to see the inside of these classy buildings.

Across the street, and one door down from the nearly Georgian brick building wearing the name HENKIN, was a two-story nearly Colonial, done in well-nigh dazzling white.

“Upstairs is a model agency,” Victor Budlong said. “Fine outfit. One of the best. Don’t know if you use models or not, but in case you ever should—”

Handsome had decided reluctantly to enter into the spirit of things and said, “Oh, we do!”

This time Victor Budlong made it “Well, well!” with enthusiasm. He added, “I must show you my daughter’s picture.” He looked through his keys, nodded toward one of the white columns, and said, “Pure Ionic. Must admire their simplicity. You should see some of the buildings that go up in this town! Talk about ornate! But this—” He waved a beautifully manicured hand. “Simple!” He quoted Bingo right back at him. “Tasteful!”

He threw open the beautiful, simple door as though he were unveiling a war memorial. An instant later he said, “Excuse me a minute,” slipped into the waiting room, and closed the door.

Bingo stood perfectly still, saying nothing and almost not thinking. In the moment when the door had been open he’d caught a glimpse of the room beyond it, a quick, shadowy glimpse, but enough to reveal the outlines of a sofa. There had been a girl on the sofa, a girl with extremely white skin, and wearing a pair of deep orchid pants and brassiere, a small string of pearls, and a lot of long, red hair. He noticed too, in that brief glimpse, that she was a trifle plump.

Suddenly, with a startling whir, the blinds shot up behind the windows, and the door was reopened. Victor Budlong looked perspired and very pale, but not rattled. Angry, perhaps, but not rattled.

“Wanted you to see this at its best,” he said, not sounding angry, either, but magnificently calm. “With the glorious California sun shining in. You being from New York, you’ll really appreciate this.”

“This” was a medium-sized room. Even to Bingo’s unpracticed eyes it was beautifully and probably expensively decorated, with its small receptionist’s desk, pale pink telephone, carved chairs, end tables, oil paintings and sofa. There was a heady and heavy odor of perfume in the air.

Victor Budlong said, “Beautiful room. Simple.” He opened a window and said, “Now right down this way—”

“Down this way” was a narrow hall with three more oil paintings. From the hall opened three offices, a conference room, a bathroom complete with tub, a ladies’ powder room, and a tiny kitchenette.

“Everything,” Victor Budlong said. “And everything furnished!” He added, “Simple! Utilitarian! Tasteful!” He began to draw a long breath.

Bingo beat him to it with “Charming!”

“Well,” Victor Budlong said modestly, “I just wanted you to see it.” He led the way back to the reception room. “And the rental—” He paused. “As a matter of fact, the building is for sale. With the model agency’s long-term lease on the top floor, it would pay for itself. But since you’re planning to build—”

“We are,” Bingo said quickly. He thought he heard a soft sigh of, relief from Handsome.

“The rental is absurdly low,” Victor Budlong said. “Twelve hundred a month. And while you’re building—” He paused again, to prove he was no high-pressure salesman. “You’ll want to look around before you decide.” The next pause was longer, and meaningful. “But since I feel that the inadvertent use of my name has put you to a little difficulty — I think I can arrange to have it held for you — for an extremely small deposit.”

He clapped an almost paternal hand on Bingo’s shoulder. “We’ll talk it over back in my office, yes?” and led the way out.

Crossing the street on the way back, he walked a good distance ahead with Detective Hendenfelder, chatting idly, and giving his prospects a chance to talk things over.

There wasn’t time, Bingo thought, to explain to Handsome all that was in his mind. He said, “Handsome—”

“Everything’s going to be all right,” Handsome said. “That girl probably wears glasses.”

Bingo blinked. “You saw her too?” Obviously Handsome had seen her too, he reminded himself. He wondered if Detective Hendenfelder had. “How do you know she probably wears glasses?”

Handsome said seriously, “Because, Bingo, girls with that color skin and that color hair, natural, always have bad eyesight. If they have brown eyes, I mean.” He added, “They usually get fat easy, too, and freckle. I read about it in a magazine article once. Of course, I couldn’t see the color eyes she had. The article said—”

But they were in through the entrance of BUDLONG AND DOLLINGER before Handsome could go into more details.

“While we wait,” Victor Budlong said, with that warm cordiality, “shall we be comfortable in my private office? And talk over the possibilities of that little office suite?”

Victor Budlong’s private office was not small, nor was it simple, but Bingo decided it must be tasteful. Handsome gazed around with a puzzled and faintly reminiscent look, and finally said, “I been here before.”

Victor Budlong chuckled happily. “So you think, so you think. This is a small-scale, but almost exact, replica of the Mayor’s office in New York’s City Hall.” He smiled proudly and said, “Just a little foible of mine.”

Hendenfelder spoke up unexpectedly and said, “This is Hollywood. Everybody’s got to have some foibles.”

Bingo wondered suddenly, and uncomfortably, where Perroni was, and what he was doing.

“How right you are,” Victor Budlong said, offering more cigarettes. “Now that little suite of offices—”

The extremely small deposit turned out to be a mere two hundred dollars. The advantages were manifest and obvious. Bingo hesitated only a minute or two, keeping his eyes resolutely away from Handsome.

Drawing up the papers, turning over the money, and affixing signatures was also a matter of minutes.

“At least this time,” Victor Budlong said, handing over the receipt, “you’re dealing with a genuine Budlong.”

Bingo managed to pretend that he, too, thought that was very funny.

“And if you’d like to use the offices temporarily between now and when you move in permanently,” Victor Budlong said, “my girl here has a set of keys. And if you’d like to have a design drawn up for your firm name on the building, there’s an artist I can heartily recommend. He did ours.”

Bingo mentally measured the size of the little nearly Colonial building as a background for the name International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America, and decided that they would not need just an artist, but a genius. Possibly an engineering genius. But that was a detail to be worked out in its own time.

“Oh yes,” Victor Budlong said, as though he’d just remembered. “My daughter’s picture!” He pulled an oversize glossy print from his desk drawer and handed it to Bingo.

“Janesse is a talented girl,” he said, spelling out the name, and adding, “Numerology. Her mother’s idea, not mine. Could be changed, of course. Real talent. Not just a father’s prejudice, either.” Proudly.

Janesse Budlong’s black and white picture showed a delicate and almost lovely face, perhaps a little too thin, slightly parted lips curving in a delicious smile, large and incredibly soulful eyes, and a lot of glossy hair which tumbled over her shoulders, one of them invitingly bare.

“I can see she’s talented,” Bingo said admiringly. “And beautiful.” He meant that, too.

Handsome looked at the picture thoughtfully and critically. He said at last, “It’s hard to tell much from pictures. Even if you take pictures yourself, I mean. You have to see a person in person.”

“Exactly,” Bingo said, quickly taking the picture from Handsome and returning it. “We’d certainly like to meet the young lady, when we get settled and going.”

Victor Budlong looked pleased almost to the purring point, and said, “Well! I’m sure that can be arranged!”

Herbert Reddy from the trust company arrived at that moment, with Perroni a few steps behind him. He was a short, chubby, breathless little man, baldheaded and with a round, pink, bewildered face, who looked as though he might bounce like a rubber ball. He wasn’t bouncing now, though. He looked at Bingo, at Handsome, at Victor Budlong, at the papers in his hand, and finally said, “This is very confusing.”

“There’s nothing confusing about it,” Perroni said sourly. “These guys got took, that’s all.”

“But look—” little Herbert Reddy began anxiously.

Perroni waved him aside. “I been on the phone. Bunco squad has a make on this artist. Description fits. Small-time artist, works mostly on widows. Usually oil stocks. Uses the name Chester Baxter.”

“Courtney Budlong,” Bingo said, trying to sound firm. He began thinking of the initialed cuff links and tie pin.

“Same fella,” Perroni said. “It checks.”

Bingo found himself about to say, “Courtney Budlong,” again. Instead he said, wildly and unthinkingly, “The furniture.”

“What furniture?” Perroni said.

Bingo heard himself talking about the furniture that was in storage and that was to be delivered immediately, the antiques, all beautiful stuff, the paintings, the boxes of linen and silver. He heard his voice fading away.

“There isn’t any furniture,” Perroni said scornfully. “Lattimer’s widow sold every stick of it except those pieces of junk in the living room and the housekeeper’s room. When she found out we were on to her and the whole deal, and might find his body any day, she sold everything she could lay her hands on before she beat it. Isn’t that right?”

“That’s right,” Hendenfelder said. He looked sympathetic about it.

“There isn’t any Courtney Budlong,” Perroni said. “There never was any Courtney Budlong any more than there was any furniture. You got took, that’s all.” He seemed to be glad of it.

Victor Budlong, the genuine Budlong, took a hand. He said smoothly, “Coming from New York, where everyone rents, naturally you wouldn’t know the complications of real estate transactions.” He gave a brief and bewildering lecture about contracts, escrow, payments, first and second mortgages, title search and other details.

“Maybe,” Bingo said, “we’d better go back to the big city, where a guy is safe!”

“This is all very interesting,” Herbert Reddy said stiffly, in a high-pitched, almost squeaky voice. “But you’re overlooking the important feature. Mr. Julien Lattimer’s signature.”

“Mr. Julien Lattimer,” Perroni stated flatly, “was murdered by his wife nearly five years ago.”

“Mr. Julien Lattimer’s signature,” Herbert Reddy said, “is on both those papers. Or maybe you think they were signed by his ghost?”

Eight

“All right,” Perroni said. “All right! I admit the signatures look alike.”

“I’m not a professional handwriting expert,” Mr. Reddy said, “but I say they’re written by the same hand.”

Everybody, including Victor Budlong’s middle-aged and dignified secretary, had looked curiously at the signatures on the papers Bingo had been given, and at the undisputed Julien Lattimer signatures Mr. Reddy had brought with him for comparison purposes. Everyone had agreed that yes, they did look very much alike. Including Perroni.

“I guess I looked at his signature enough times to remember it,” Perroni said, looking as though the sorrows of the universe had accumulated on his narrow shoulders. “When the question arose of whether or not his widow might’ve forged his name to some checks before she took off, which it turned out she had done, and not too skillfully, either.”

“Skillful enough to fool a few people,” Mr. Reddy said coldly.

Hendenfelder threw everything into renewed confusion by suggesting that Mrs. Lattimer, whether wife or widow, had forged these particular signatures.

“These,” Mr. Reddy said, “are not forged.”

Victor Budlong helpfully pointed out that obviously it was time to refer the signatures in question to a handwriting expert. Los Angeles, he reminded them, had the best handwriting expert in the world.

“Me’n’ Hendenfelder’ll take these downtown to him,” Perroni said. “That way there won’t be no argument anywhere.”

Mr. Reddy announced in a determined voice that he was going right along as trustee for Mr. Lattimer’s estate, somehow managing to convey by his tone of voice that Mr. Lattimer was not only alive but probably in the best of health. “In the meantime,” he said, “the house—”

Everybody looked at everybody else a little helplessly.

“And the keys to the house—” he went on.

Everybody looked at Bingo.

“Mr. Budlong gave them to me,” Bingo said, in what he was afraid was a very weak voice. He took them out of his pocket. “I mean, Mr. Courtney Budlong.” He could feel his voice growing weaker. The keys still warmed his hand, though. If necessary, he’d fight anyone in the room, maybe in all Beverly Hills, for their possession.

“Mr. Courtney Budlong,” Perroni said, and snorted rudely.

“The man who called himself Courtney Budlong,” Bingo said. His fingers tightened on the keys.

“But where did he get them?” Hendenfelder asked suddenly.

This time everybody looked at Mr. Reddy. Mr. Reddy, in his turn, looked at the keys in Bingo’s hand and said unhappily, “I don’t know. He must have gotten them from someone.”

“From, for example, who?” Perroni asked.

Mr. Reddy spread his hands helplessly. “There were a few sets. I have one. The trust company had it made. Mr. Lattimer and Mrs. Lattimer had keys. And the caretaker. This Pearl Durzy.” His face lighted up. “They could have been gotten from her!”

Bingo thought of the look Pearl Durzy had given their Mr. Courtney Budlong. He thought of the fact that she’d had nothing in her possession except a few bus tokens. He decided to keep his mouth shut, slipped the keys unobtrusively into his pocket, and hoped someone would change the subject right away.

Someone did. Mr. Reddy said, “While we’re asking questions, I’d like to know how that letter, and that receipt, were on Budlong and Dollinger paper?”

Everybody looked this time at Victor Budlong, who came within an inch of his life of losing his composure, his dignity and his voice, but who managed to state that he had absolutely no idea, that he’d had no part in this disgraceful piece of chicanery, that he was a businessman of long and good standing in his community and a member of the Chamber of Commerce, and that he would ask Miss Meadows.

Miss Meadows stated efficiently that as far as she knew, it was impossible for anybody to get hold of any Budlong and Dollinger stationery or receipts, but she would make inquiries.

Suddenly Bingo said, “Look, yesterday Mr. Courtney Budlong came in here. We waited for him out in the car. He was in here just a little while, and then he came out with these papers. Maybe you’d better make those inquiries right now.”

The slightly alarmed young receptionist was called in. Yes, she remembered the man who answered the description of Courtney Budlong. He’d come in yesterday and spent some time trying to sell her a magazine subscription, and then gone out again. But he hadn’t been near any of the office stationery or anything else.

There didn’t seem to be any more questions from anybody. Finally Bingo got all his courage together, looked Mr. Reddy in the eye, and said, “Well—?”

“It’s an unprecedented situation,” Mr. Reddy said. Then he repeated, “This is very confusing.” He not only looked as though he wouldn’t bounce, he looked as though he’d been deflated.

“Confusing,” Victor Budlong said, in his beautiful, sonorous tones, “but not impossible. I am not a lawyer. But I would say that if these two signatures are genuine, the gentlemen are at least temporarily entitled to live in the house in question.”

He read the letter aloud. “It states very clearly,” he said, “that having paid the sum of two thousand dollars — no mention of to whom — they are entitled to occupy the mansion pending delivery and signing of the deed—”

“But this guy who called himself Courtney Budlong didn’t have any authority,” Perroni said.

“If that is Julien Lattimer’s signature,” Victor Budlong said, “it doesn’t matter whether he did or not.” There was a silence while everybody thought that over.

“I don’t want to see any trouble, or any suits against the estate,” Mr. Reddy said, in a thin, worried little voice. “And there ought to be somebody staying there, now that Pearl Durzy—” He looked at Bingo and Handsome a little dubiously.

“I’ll vouch for these young men,” Victor Budlong said heartily. “They’re businessmen. Just rented an office, in fact. Important men in the Industry.”

Everybody looked impressed, except Perroni.

“All right,” Perroni said, back to his normal gloom. “Only don’t you guys go shooting your traps off to the columnists.”

Bingo upped his eyebrows at him.

“In this town,” Perroni said, “anything happens to anybody, even the old cat having kittens, they got to run right to the phone and call up the columnists. You guys keep this out of the newspapers. Until we find Mr. Lattimer’s body.”

Bingo suddenly remembered Adelle Lattimer and reflected that he was just as interested as anybody in finding Julien Lattimer’s body. He said, with all the dignity he could muster, “I’m sure nobody wants to see any of this get into the newspapers.” He wondered if he sounded anything like Victor Budlong.

Perroni looked skeptical, but he nodded glumly. “We kept that dame’s death quiet, so far.”

Hendenfelder softened things by adding, “And if none of this gets into print, maybe we can catch that guy and get your two thousand bucks back.”

He didn’t say it with conviction, and Bingo didn’t feel any real hope, but at least it was the brightest thought of the day so far.

Apparently everything was over, at least for a time. Victor Budlong wished them a cheery good morning, told Bingo and Handsome he’d be in touch with them soon and arrange a meeting with his little girl, and that meantime if they needed anything, call on him. Miss Meadows smiled at them amiably. Mr. Reddy shook hands nervously and said he would talk to them later. Perroni went to make one more telephone call.

Hendenfelder came over to the convertible and leaned an elbow on the door. “By Perroni,” he said, “Julien Lattimer’s murdered, and his wife murdered him. Probably right. But Perroni isn’t going to be happy until he finds the body. He don’t care so much about finding the wife, he just wants to find the body. And he’ll do it, too.” He sighed. “That’s the way he is because, well, that’s the way he is.”

“Hollywood,” Bingo said. “Everybody’s got foibles.”

“Even cops,” Hendenfelder said. He went on in a confidential tone, “My advice is, what you guys oughta do is get yourself a lawyer right fast. I don’t know much of that kind of law, but it sounded to me like you maybe own that house after all. Enough of it so you ought to have a lawyer. Everybody ought to have a lawyer all the time anyway. Especially out here in Hollywood. I come from Milwaukee, myself. Believe me, out here, people are different.”

“They have foibles,” Bingo said, nodding sagely.

“And you can repeat that any time,” Hendenfelder said. He dropped his voice. “Say, I know it’s been a long time since she was there, but you living in what was her house, you think maybe you might run into, sometime, some souvenir of April Robin?”

Bingo thought it was just possible.

“Account of,” Hendenfelder said, “I got a niece back in Milwaukee she collects stuff like that. Some real genuine souvenir of April Robin, why her Uncle Horace, he’d be a hero!”

“I’ll make it a point to look,” Bingo promised. He looked at Detective Horace Hendenfelder’s pink round face, and thought how nice it would be for him to be a hero, even if only to a movie-struck niece in Milwaukee.

“I’ll do something for you someday,” Hendenfelder said gratefully. “And don’t forget now, get you a lawyer fast!”

Perroni came out from his telephone call, walked over to the convertible and said grudgingly, “If we ever do find that guy, and if he has any of your dough left, you’ll get it back.”

Bingo thought that would be very nice, and said so.

“And if while you’re staying in that house,” Perroni said, “if you run into any helpful information, will you get in touch with me right away?” He said it as though he didn’t expect much.

“It’s my duty as a citizen,” Bingo said, a little stiffly.

“Nuts,” Perroni said. “Do it as a favor to me.”

The two plainclothesmen walked away. Bingo lit a cigarette and sat brooding.

This was Hollywood. This was where they’d come with their two thousand, seven hundred and seventy-three dollars and some odd cents, to get rich. Rich, and famous, and own a beautiful and beautifully furnished mansion like the ones Louella Parsons described in her Sunday interviews, preferably one that once had belonged to a movie star. All they’d accomplished so far — he corrected himself, all he’d accomplished so far — was to sink two thousand dollars of their working capital in a house that probably wasn’t going to belong to them, and two hundred more in a suite of offices they probably never would have any use for. There wasn’t any furniture for the house and, what was more, there wasn’t going to be any furniture, ever. The antiques, the oil paintings, the boxes of linens and silver didn’t exist.

And half of the lost investment was Handsome’s. And he still didn’t have the faintest idea of what they were going to do in Hollywood to get rich and famous. He thought longingly of Columbus Circle, and didn’t dare turn his head to look at his partner.

“You did swell, Bingo,” Handsome said suddenly and admiringly.

Bingo did turn his head, to stare. He knew Handsome had spoken truthfully. Handsome was incapable of not telling the truth.

“I mean,” Handsome said, “protecting our investment that way. Like making friends with Mr. Victor Budlong and putting a deposit on that office place so he’d be on our side when the trust company man got there. And making friends with that Hendenfelder, too. It was smart, Bingo.”

Bingo flicked an ash off his cigarette and said, “Well, in the business world, you learn things like that. Some people might call putting out that two hundred dollars throwing good money after bad, but I look on it as an investment.”

“And if we find Mr. Lattimer’s body for that lady,” Handsome said, “we’ll get everything back, and a lot extra.”

Bingo was silent. He hadn’t thought of that angle, not thoroughly at least. But if a cop like Perroni thought enough of their position as inhabitants of the April Robin mansion to ask them to keep their eyes open, and if a shrewd-looking babe like Adelle Lattimer thought enough of that same position to offer them a sizable cut for finding her late ex-husband’s body, they were sitting very nicely. All the more reason, he told himself, for hanging on to their possession of the mansion.

“Except,” Handsome said thoughtfully, “if we do find Mr. Lattimer’s body, it proves he was dead when he signed those papers. I mean, Bingo, when he didn’t sign those papers. And then it isn’t our house.”

Bingo thought that over, too. He weighed the advantages of the cut of what Adelle Lattimer would get if they did find the body, against the advantages of possibly, even probably, owning the mansion if they didn’t.

“We better take that cop’s advice,” Bingo said. “We better find us a lawyer.”

Handsome suggested looking in the classified section of the telephone book. Bingo pretended he hadn’t heard.

The almost Georgian building across the street caught his attention, and the inspiration came to him.

“That Leo Henkin,” he said thoughtfully. “He’s the top agent — I mean, artists’ representative — in Hollywood.” He decided not to add that it had been Courtney Budlong who had told them so. Anyone could see from a look at that building how important Leo Henkin was. “And we ought to get acquainted with him anyhow. Asking his advice about a lawyer is as good an excuse as any.”

Again he sat thinking. He considered a number of ways to introduce himself and Handsome to the great man. Most of them were romantic, and all of them were impractical.

“Okay, Bingo,” Handsome said agreeably. “Let’s go in and ask him.” He began getting out of the convertible.

Of course, Bingo thought. To Handsome, it would be as simple as that. Handsome had the direct and uncomplicated mind of a newspaper photographer, Handsome who had once found a missing heiress by looking in the telephone book. And, he realized, Handsome was right. He looked in the rear-view mirror, straightened his tie, ran a comb through his sandy hair, and said, “Let’s go.”

He was glad that he’d worn the herringbone worsted suit he’d debated buying as possibly too conservative for Hollywood, the land of the Hawaiian sports shirt and the gaudy slacks. Today it was just the right touch to make a good impression. Obviously it had made one on Victor Budlong.

The nearly Georgian illusion vanished the instant they opened the ivory enameled door and walked into a waiting room that seemed to be furnished almost entirely with odd-shaped articles of wrought iron and pale gray leather. Bingo glanced around curiously for the small-paned windows he’d seen from the street and realized that they were either ornaments attached to the outside walls, or had been covered over by the grayish white of the interior. Light obviously came from some source, but it was impossible to tell where.

The result, Bingo decided, was effective and he admired it, but he was glad when a plate-glass panel on the far side of the room slid open, and an unglamorous office girl said, in a nasal voice, “Well?”

He handed her a card and said, “Mr. Henkin, please,” in a voice that indicated he wasn’t going to put up with any waiting or any other nonsense. She looked down her nose at the card, went away with it, came back and said, a shade more amiably, “Mr. Henkin wonders if you’d mind waiting just a minute. He’s on a long distance call.”

There were trade papers on the wrought-iron objects which appeared to serve for tables, and Bingo glanced at them with the idle air of one who has read them already with his morning coffee, and resolved to subscribe to them before the day was over.

A buzzer sounded, and the girl ushered them into a hallway papered in a red and gold oriental design. She was a trifle dumpy, and wore black oxfords, Bingo noticed. Several doors were open along the hall and he glanced into the offices curiously. One of them appeared to have its walls entirely covered with oversized photographs of very young and very beautiful men and women, the next had its walls covered from floor to ceiling with shelves filled with multicolored books. Beyond, a door opened into the office of Leo Henkin himself.

Bingo was beginning to consider himself an authority on offices, but he wasn’t entirely prepared for this one. Like Victor Budlong’s, it was neither small nor simple. Unlike Victor Budlong’s, it hadn’t been copied from anything Bingo had ever seen before.

There seemed to be horses, or reminders of horses, everywhere he looked. The walls were covered — instead of with pictures of young and beautiful people, or with brightly colored books — with framed color prints of famous thoroughbreds; an uncomfortable-looking occasional chair had apparently been fashioned from a western saddle, two standing ashtrays had been cunningly made from stirrups, and the crystal ashtray on the desk was framed with a horseshoe.

Leo Henkin rose to his full five foot three and a half, from behind his leather-topped desk, and said, “Sorry to keep you waiting, sit down and make yourselves comfortable,” all in one breath. He looked at the card, which, Bingo reflected, he’d had more than time to memorize by now, and said, “Moving here from New York, h’m, well, you’ve come to the right place.” He said that in one breath, too, like a set speech. Then he relaxed, smiled and said, “And what can old Leo Henkin do for you, h’m?”

For a long time Bingo had wondered what a Hollywood agent looked like, especially a top Hollywood agent like Leo Henkin. Earlier in his life he’d had dealings with an agent who handled carnival attractions exclusively, and in spite of his better judgment, he’d unconsciously expected all Hollywood agents to look just like him. Now, to his surprise, Leo Henkin did, except that his beautifully cut suit was pearl-gray instead of off-purple. Leo Henkin had a perfectly round head on his short, stocky body, his eyes were bright blue and threatening to twinkle, his thin hair was pure white. He looked fatherly, benevolent and helpful.

“If you’re looking for talent,” he said, “if you’re looking for stories, if you’re looking for new faces or old faces, Leo Henkin can help you.” He paused, waiting.

“All of that,” Bingo said, plunging right in for the second time that morning. “But not at the moment. In fact, we really just came in to get acquainted. We’re going to be neighbors, in a manner of speaking.”

Leo Henkin nodded and said, “Vic Budlong just rented you the old DeFosse building. Not so old either. You got a good deal on it.”

Bingo opened his mouth and shut it again.

“Leo Henkin knows everybody and everything that goes on,” the great man said, with what was close to a chuckle. He looked at the card again.

“We’ve just come out here,” Bingo said quickly. “Decided to shift our headquarters to Hollywood. So right now we’re just beginning to get organized. Just picked our building this morning. And as a matter of fact, we wanted to ask you for a little information.”

“You’ve come to the right place,” the agent said. “Leo Henkin’s been here a long time.”

“Well,” Bingo said, “it’s this way.” He paused. No, he was damned if he was going to tell Leo Henkin the story of Courtney Budlong and the questioned purchase of the April Robin mansion. He had a secret hunch that if Leo Henkin knew everything, it would usually be only a matter of time before he’d passed it on to the everybody he also knew. A lawyer, now, was supposed to keep secrets. “My partner and I need a little legal advice.”

“Lawyers!” Leo Henkin said. “The town’s full of lawyers. What kind do you want? What specialty? Divorce? Criminal? Lawsuit? Girl trouble? Income tax? Leo Henkin knows them all.”

“Well,” Bingo said, wondering how to explain what he wanted without telling too much of why he wanted it, “it’s like this. We’re in possession of some valuable property. In fact, I can’t tell you how valuable this property is.”

“Ah,” Leo Henkin said rhapsodically. “That’s the thing? A good property! A valuable property! With that, you can do anything! With that, you can get anything. You want stars? Leo Henkin can get you stars. You want big writers? Leo Henkin can get you big writers. Directors?” He waved a hand, hinting that he had them by the gross. “You need money? Studio space? Leo Henkin has a friend who can handle that. What do you need lawyers for?”

For one mad moment Bingo had the feeling that Leo Henkin could probably produce the body of Julien Lattimer from a desk drawer, on demand, or bring Mr. Courtney Budlong out of a closet. He said, coming back to earth slowly, “There’s a little complication.”

Leo Henkin waved the other hand. “Complications! What are complications? Ignore them. Think big.”

“If we didn’t think big,” Bingo said, trying to match him gesture for gesture, “we’d still be back in New York.” Taking sidewalk pictures at two-bits a throw and living in a furnished room. “But there’s a little question about the ownership of the property—”

“Well, in that case,” Leo Henkin said, also coming down to earth, “you need the best of lawyers. Always make sure your property is clear. No point in running into lawsuits after the picture’s made. And Leo Henkin has just the man for you.” He reached for the telephone and said into it, “Get me Arthur Schlee.”

Bingo opened his mouth to ask a question, and shut it again. This was no time to quibble about legal fees, when the future of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America was at stake. This was a time to think big.

“Best man in town for this sort of thing,” Leo Henkin said, holding the phone and waiting. He added, “His cousin’s a judge.” Then he said into the phone, “Art, I got a couple of friends of mine here. Mr. Riggs and Mr. Kusak. They own the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America. Yeah, that’s the one. They have a little problem about that certain important property they own, and I recommended you.” He paused. He looked at Bingo. “If you’re free, he can see you right now.”

Bingo swallowed hard and said, “The sooner the better.”

“Right away,” Leo Henkin said into the telephone, and hung up. He looked at them closely and said, “How about telling your friend Leo Henkin a little more about this property?”

“Gladly,” Bingo said, “as soon as we know it’s all clear and completely ours.” He would, too.

“Good, good,” Leo Henkin said. “That’s the way to talk. Never give away any facts about a property to anybody until you’re ready, not even an old friend like Leo Henkin.” He pushed a cigarette box at them. “We’ll lunch soon and talk it over, h’m? But don’t tell me about it now. Let’s change the subject. I hear you’ve bought a house.”

Changing the subject was something Bingo could welcome with enthusiasm at that moment. “And what a house,” he said. “I haven’t counted the rooms yet!”

“Nineteen,” Handsome said, “and four porches.”

“Oh, Leo Henkin knows the house,” the agent said.

“It used to belong to April Robin,” Bingo said. “It was built for her. You remember April Robin,” he added, and then hated himself.

Naturally Leo Henkin remembered April Robin, and that the house had been built for her. “What a girl!” he said. “What a star! Another Norma Talmadge, believe me. And what depth! Great depth!” He shook his head sadly. “Too bad, too bad. What a tragedy!”

Bingo waited hopefully for details. None came.

Leo Henkin shook the sorrow from his benevolent face, beamed at them again and said, “This property of yours. Is it musical?”

“Not exactly,” Bingo said. “No.” He drew a long breath. “In fact, it’s quite the reverse.”

They finally got away only by promising to keep in the closest of touch.

Out in the convertible, Bingo loosened his tie a little and said, “One thing, out here these big, important guys are certainly easy to see and talk to.”

“Sure,” Handsome said. He started the motor. “Account of, Bingo,” he added with serene confidence, “we’re big important guys ourselves, now.”

“Naturally,” Bingo said. He hadn’t exactly thought of that before, but of course it was true. “What he was saying — whatever did happen to April Robin, anyway?”

Handsome was silent and looked miserable.

“I forgot,” Bingo said quickly. “It was long before your time.”

“Maybe it’ll come to me.” Handsome paused. “Maybe she was the first person who got murdered in our house.”

Nine

Arthur Schlee’s office turned out to be a mere block and a half away, in a modest but businesslike tan stucco building, with Schlee and Schlee on a chaste bronze name plate beside the door.

Handsome parked the convertible, sighed and said, “When I was eleven years old I spent almost all summer with my Aunt Sophie’s mother-in-law. She lived in a little town in New Jersey, just like this.”

Bingo stared at him. He, too, had been in New Jersey, and he could think of nothing remotely like Beverly Hills. Certainly he’d seen no tan stucco buildings.

“I mean,” Handsome said, “everything is right close to everything else, and everybody knows everybody else. It’s real nice, Bingo, like New Jersey.”

“In New Jersey,” Bingo said severely, “you don’t see Hollywood stars.”

“No,” Handsome said. He didn’t add that so far they hadn’t seen any here, either.

Arthur Schlee looked just a little like a character actor made up for the role of a successful lawyer. A fatherly, dignified and thoroughly respectable lawyer, one whose cousin was a judge. He greeted Bingo and Handsome cordially, but gravely.

“So you’re the young men who bought the April Robin house,” he said. “Glad to know friends of Leo Henkin’s.”

Bingo stopped himself on the verge of asking, “How did you know about it?” This was like that small town in New Jersey in more ways than one, he decided. Not only did everybody know everybody else, but knew everything about everybody else.

“And I understand you’re having a little trouble about some property,” he said. “Sit down and tell me about it.”

“Well,” Bingo said, “this is an extremely confidential matter. It mustn’t be mentioned to anybody. Not even to Mr. Henkin.” He’d almost said, “Especially Mr. Henkin.”

“My dear young man!” Arthur Schlee said. Just that, no more, but it was enough.

Bingo hoped he wasn’t blushing at even hinting that a respected member of the legal profession wouldn’t keep secrets.

“Just give me the details about this property,” the lawyer said. He pulled a pad of paper closer and picked up a pencil. “And how you acquired it. First, story, book, play—”

“No,” Bingo said. “I mean, neither. In fact, this hasn’t anything to do with our business at all. It’s a very personal matter. That’s why it’s confidential.”

Arthur Schlee laid down his pencil and said, “Woman trouble? In that case I’d better call in my brother. He specializes in—”

“No,” Bingo said. “No, no, no. It’s—”

Well, he reflected, if you have a lawyer, you’re supposed to trust him and tell him everything. He drew a long breath and told Arthur Schlee everything about the purchase of the April Robin mansion. Everything, that is, except the size of the dent the purchase had made in their capital.

“It isn’t the money involved,” he said at last. “It’s a minor loss.” He didn’t dare look at Handsome. “But we want to keep the house.”

“Of course you do,” the lawyer said. “Of course you do. Who wouldn’t want to keep that house? With its memories of April Robin.”

“You knew her?” Bingo said excitedly.

“I remember her,” Arthur Schlee said. He said it reverently.

There was a little silence.

“I,” Arthur Schlee said, “am a very busy man.” He leaned back in his mahogany chair, placed his fingertips together, and went into details about how busy he was, and with what important things, until Bingo began to feel apologetic for taking up even five minutes of that precious time.

“But,” Arthur Schlee said at last, “there is nothing I wouldn’t do for friends of Leo Henkin. Literally nothing. Yes indeed, I will take your case.”

The tone in which he said it gave Bingo the feeling that their ownership of the April Robin mansion was settled, right here and now. He mentally thanked Hendenfelder for his advice, and resolved to do something very nice for him, as soon as things straightened out.

“There are a great many things that will have to be looked into,” the lawyer went on. “And I shall look into them. I shall look into every aspect of the matter, and I shall advise you. And because you are friends of Leo Henkin, for whom I would do literally anything, my retainer will be extremely small. Five hundred dollars, and no other expenses. Unless we should have to go to court.”

There was no time to think it over, and if there had been, the decision would have been the same.

The five hundred dollars changed hands. Bingo pocketed a receipt and said, “What do we do in the meantime?”

“In the meantime,” Arthur Schlee said, “you go right on living in the house.” The assurance with which he said it was worth five hundred dollars to Bingo right there.

Outside in the car, though, he faced the matter of explaining it to Handsome. Again Handsome beat him to the problem.

“We’re still just protecting our property, Bingo,” he said.

Bingo sighed. “Any more of this,” he said gloomily, “and we’ll protect ourselves right out of business.” He drew a long breath. “Handsome, it was more than just having a lawyer make sure we keep our house all right. But Mr. Leo Henkin recommended that lawyer. If we’d just walked out when he told us how much it would cost, how would that have looked to Mr. Leo Henkin? To a valuable contact? Handsome, we need valuable contacts in our business.”

Handsome didn’t ask, “What business?” He started the car and drove silently in the direction of Sunset Boulevard.

“Handsome,” Bingo said desperately, “everything’s going to be all right. We came to Hollywood to get rich, and we’re going to get rich. You know that.”

“Sure, Bingo,” Handsome repeated. “I know that.”

“Well, then,” Bingo said. There really didn’t seem to be anything else to say, not at that moment.

Handsome sighed and said, “Bingo. You remember when we kidnapped Mr. Pigeon?”

“We didn’t kidnap him,” Bingo said severely. “We were only protecting him from harm.”

“Okay, Bingo,” Handsome said. “Only, while we were protecting him from harm we used all our money, and we had to provide for him because he was our guest, and we had to hock both the cameras.”

“And my best suit,” Bingo said.

Handsome said, “And it turned out fine.”

It not only had turned out fine, it had provided them with the maroon convertible, suitcases filled with clothes, and the means to head for Hollywood.

“And, Bingo,” Handsome said, “you remember when we were in Thursday, Iowa, and we ran out of money again?”

Bingo winced. Their stay in Thursday, Iowa, had been the result of one of his investments that hadn’t turned out too well. Not at first, at least.

“But everything turned out all right,” Handsome said, “and when we left Thursday, Iowa, we had five hundred and twenty-seven dollars and forty-seven cents more than we got there with.”

Bingo said cheerfully, “Well, see what I mean? And we’ll do a lot better than that right here in Hollywood.” He thought everything over for a moment and then said, “Handsome, how much money do we have left?”

“Fifty-two dollars and twenty-five cents,” Handsome said. “And, Bingo—”

“All right,” Bingo said. “I know. We’ll get out the cameras and buy a permit.” He drew a long breath. “And here in Hollywood, we ought to do fine. With all the tourists that come out here, probably wanting to have their pictures taken in front of the Brown Derby and places like that to send home to the folks. And we’ve got lots of film and paper and everything, so at two-bits a picture we’ll be making a clear profit.” He began to add up the profit in his mind. “And we’ll take Mrs. Mariposa DeLee the pictures we made for her for a present, and maybe she’ll want to order some to advertise her motel.” The profit began to mount. “Why, there are all kinds of opportunities out here, Handsome.”

He wondered if they ought to take time to have lunch at Romanoff’s, since they were so near. No, he decided, better to wait until another time and take a guest with them, such as Leo Henkin, or their other new-found friend, Victor Budlong. Someday, perhaps, Rex Strober himself.

There was a good chance that the police would find Courtney Budlong and get part of that two thousand dollars back. With a good lawyer like Arthur Schlee, they could hang on to the April Robin mansion. If Julien Lattimer had been murdered, they could quite possibly find his body and collect enough from Adelle Lattimer really to own the April Robin mansion and get a nice start in business. If Julien Lattimer should, by chance, turn out to be alive, well, there was his signature on the papers, Courtney Budlong or no Courtney Budlong. Chester Baxter, rather. In the meantime, they had friends in high places, and they practically had an office. The rest was just a simple little matter of getting started.

The April Robin mansion looked even better than before as they turned in the driveway. He hadn’t noticed that there was a small rose garden to the left of the house, just coming into bloom. He made a mental note that something would have to be done about getting that vast expanse of lawn mowed, and the driveway swept clear of leaves.

Too, he reflected as they went into the enormous living room, something would have to be done about furniture. But all that could be attended to as soon as Arthur Schlee had cleared up everything.

He sat down to smoke a cigarette while Handsome prowled the kitchen in search of something for an early lunch. There was no point in going out to take pictures on an empty stomach. After lunch Handsome could get out the cameras and load them, they’d find a place to get cards printed while they waited, take out a permit, and go back in business.

He heard a car come to a stop outside in the driveway, and instinctively stiffened. But no, it couldn’t be bad news. They had a lawyer now, and they had friends.

The buzzer sounded. Handsome opened the door and Hendenfelder came in, beaming. “Some nice fast work,” he reported. “We got that Chester Baxter right away from your description. Perroni’s outside with him now. Couldn’t’ve had time to spend much of your dough.”

“See,” Bingo told Handsome. “I knew everything was going to be fine.”

Hendenfelder went back to lend a hand, in case Chester Baxter came in under protest.

There was protest, all right, but it was purely vocal. From where they waited, Bingo and Handsome could hear a furious insistence to the general effect that, “Never saw this house before in my life. Never heard of these two guys from New York. Who do you think you’re pushing around, anyway? I never used the name Courtney Budlong, and I never heard of a Courtney Budlong. What’s more, I was in San Diego all day yesterday, and I can prove it.” There was a little indignant muttering about “false arrest.”

Detective Perroni ushered a plumpish, well-dressed man of medium height, with silvery white hair, into the room. “Here he is,” he announced. “Chester Baxter. You identify him and we’ll go down to headquarters and sign a complaint, and then we’ll see where he hid your money at.”

Bingo took a long, close look. Then he shook his head regretfully and said, “No.”

“What do you mean, no?” Perroni said crossly. “This guy is Chester Baxter. He even admits it.”

“He may be Chester Baxter,” Bingo said, “and he looks a lot like Mr. Courtney Budlong. But he isn’t Mr. Courtney Budlong. In fact, he isn’t anybody I ever saw before in my life.”

ten

“And I never saw these guys before in my life, either,” the man who wasn’t Courtney Budlong said. “What’s more, I don’t care if I never see either of them again.”

“All right, but you don’t need to be nasty about it,” Bingo said. “You aren’t Courtney Budlong, anyway.”

“I never said I was Courtney Budlong,” Chester Baxter said. “I never heard of a Courtney Budlong.”

“Sure you haven’t,” Perroni said. “Because Courtney Budlong doesn’t exist.”

Chester Baxter looked from one to the other, both indignant and bewildered. “What is this?” he said at last. “First you say that I’m Courtney Budlong. Then this guy says that I’m not Courtney Budlong. And now you say there isn’t any Courtney Budlong. Somebody’s wrong somewhere, and this time, it looks like it’s the cops.”

Perroni growled in his throat.

“And anyway,” Chester Baxter said, “I was in San Diego up to ten o’clock last night, and I can prove it with a phone call.”

Hendenfelder said mildly, “Just what were you doing in San Diego, Chester?”

“That’s my business,” Chester Baxter said.

“Oil stocks, or uranium?” Perroni said.

Chester Baxter told him to go to hell.

“Now, now,” Hendenfelder said in gentle reproof. “Talk like that won’t get you anywhere, Chester. What was the name of the lady you were with?”

“Mrs. Hodgkins,” Chester Baxter said. “Mrs. Verna Hodgkins.” He paused. “How did you know it was a lady I was with?”

“Same way I know she’s probably a widow and has money,” Perroni said. “Modus operandi. Well, we’ll check. What’s her telephone number?”

Chester Baxter said, “Now wait a minute.” The truculence had gone suddenly out of him. “This lady’s my fiancée. I don’t want you calling her and saying you’re the cops checking my alibi.” He became plaintive. “Give a guy a break. Just when I see a chance to settle down and lead a nice respectable life, don’t go and mess it up for me.”

“We’ll be tactful,” Hendenfelder said. “I suppose you were talking over business deals with this fiancée.”

“That’s none of your business either.”

“Watch it, Chester,” Hendenfelder said. “The last one of your business deals got you five years.”

“I told you,” the little man wailed, “this is all different.”

“Shut up,” Perroni said, “or I’ll hold you on a vag charge, anyway.” He turned to Bingo. “Use your phone?” Bingo nodded, and the sad-faced detective headed for the kitchen, Chester Baxter trailing along and making imploring remarks about the necessity for using tact.

Hendenfelder shook his head gravely. “So many crooks and con men in this world!” he observed. He sighed. “If more dames knew the dangers rich widows are exposed to there wouldn’t be so many of them killing their husbands!”

Bingo was silent, wondering if the observation covered Mrs. Julien Lattimer; if, that is, she was a widow.

Hendenfelder had evidently been having the same thoughts. “Speaking of widows,” he said suddenly. “That Mrs. Lattimer—” He paused. “Did you guys get you a good lawyer?”

“The best,” Bingo assured him.

“Good thing,” Hendenfelder said. “Because when Perroni does find Lattimer’s body—” He paused again. “When Perroni sets out to do a thing, regardless of how long it takes him, he gets it done.” Bingo inferred that even if it were a matter of Mr. Lattimer’s still being alive and eventually dying somewhere of old age, Perroni would find the body. “When he finds the body and then finds Mrs. Lattimer, well, then you will really have to have yourself a good lawyer. Because then who is going to finish selling you the house?”

“It’s complicated,” Bingo admitted.

“Of course, maybe when he finds Mrs. Lattimer, a jury’s going to say she didn’t kill him,” Hendenfelder went on. “You never can tell, with juries. Then you can do business right with Mrs. Lattimer.”

If she wanted to sell the house, and if there was any money to buy it with, Bingo thought.

“Or maybe the jury will find her guilty, and then she won’t inherit the house, and then,” he said, “then things will really be in a sad mess!” He smiled at them encouragingly. “But that’s what lawyers are for. I’m glad you got a good one.”

It occurred to Bingo that in addition to looking for Julien Lattimer’s body, looking for the missing Mrs. Lattimer might be a sound procedure. He said casually, “She just up and disappeared and never was heard from again?”

“Oh,” Hendenfelder said, “she’s been heard from plenty of times. Less’n a year ago, she cashed a bad check in El Paso, but she got away. She’s been reported from all over. Perroni’ll find her.”

Or, Bingo told himself, we will.

“’Course,” Hendenfelder said, “Perroni’s got to find the body, first.”

“But those signatures,” Bingo said. “Mr. Lattimer’s.”

“Still can be forged,” Hendenfelder said. “But you should worry, you got a lawyer.”

Arthur Schlee was really going to earn that retainer, Bingo reflected.

Perroni came back with a pleased-looking Chester Baxter.

“All right,” Perroni was saying. “All right. It checks. And these two gentlemen say you’re not their Courtney Budlong.”

“I’m not anybody’s Courtney Budlong,” Chester Baxter said. “Never was.”

“All right,” Perroni said. “Beat it. But watch yourself, Chester, watch yourself.”

They watched as Chester Baxter scuttled through the doorway without a backward glance.

“Funny,” Hendenfelder said, “it really seemed like we had the guy.” He added, “Wonder if we ought to tip off that widow in San Diego?”

“None of our business,” Perroni said gloomily. He looked at Bingo and Handsome. “You watch out for reporters, now. There’s a story already printed about that Durzy woman dying here. A little story. We haven’t said yet she was murdered. But if they come around asking questions—”

“You don’t need to worry,” Bingo said coolly. “We know how to handle the press.” He added, “My partner used to be a newspaper photographer himself. Long ago, of course.”

“Well!” Hendenfelder said. “Used to think I might like to be one.”

They went away. Bingo sank down on the nearest sofa. Before he could speak or, indeed, think of anything to say, the door opened noiselessly and Chester Baxter’s voice said softly, “Hey, you fellas!”

“Please,” Bingo said. “The last thing in the world we want right now is to buy oil well stock.”

“Don’t get me wrong,” their visitor said. “You just got a bad impression of me, that’s all. I’m your friend. I came back to help you out.”

“That’s very nice of you,” Bingo said. “But—”

Chester Baxter sat down and said, “I heard all about this con this Courtney Budlong pulled on you, and I must say, it wasn’t very friendly of him.”

“Look here,” Bingo said, “we’d just as soon that story didn’t get around. Not until they really find Courtney Budlong.” He only hoped the man who wasn’t Courtney Budlong didn’t have a touch of blackmail in mind.

“Naturally,” Chester Baxter said. “Naturally. And that’s where I come in.”

Handsome took a step forward, not a threatening one, but a cautious one.

“How?” Bingo asked suspiciously.

“Well,” the visitor asked, “would you like me to find Courtney Budlong for you?”

Bingo eyed him thoughtfully. “For how much?”

“Please!” Chester Baxter raised a protesting hand. “We’ll talk of that aspect later. Though, if I succeed in getting your money back for you — and after all, I will have expenses — naturally, I think a small cut—”

“How small?” Bingo asked. And then, “Do you know where this guy is?”

“Frankly, no. Not right now. But I think — I hazard a guess — I’ll do better at finding him than you will, or than the police will.” He smiled. “You might say that we both travel in the same line, though not for the same company.” It seemed to Bingo that there was a certain fine logic in what he said. He nodded thoughtfully.

“Furthermore,” Chester Baxter said, “I have a certain amount of personal interest. This man didn’t use my name, but he used my initials. Practically the same.”

“All right,” Bingo said, “but how much of a cut?”

The subject seemed to be not only sordid but downright distasteful, but it did get discussed. Chester Baxter thought half would be just fine — half of what was recovered, in case some of it had been spent in the meantime. Bingo said that the whole idea was ridiculous and to forget about it. Chester Baxter pointed out that keeping quiet about the whole affair was part of the deal, and how about a quarter?

Bingo said that sounded like blackmail to him, and threatened to call Perroni.

They finally agreed amiably on ten percent. Then Chester Baxter said, “—And in the meantime, if you could advance me a little for expenses — carfare, telephone calls—”

That called for more discussion. Bingo did some rapid mental figuring and reluctantly handed over a ten.

“Okay,” Chester Baxter said, pocketing it, “I’ll find your damned Courtney Budlong for you. And I’ll find him for myself. I don’t mind his using my initials so much, or using my modus operandi, or even looking a little like me. But this caper of his nearly gummed up this very nice little deal I’ve been working up to a successful conclusion down in San Diego.” He grinned, a definitely nasty and wolflike grin. “After I get your dough back for you, I’ll settle a few personal matters with him myself. Then if the cops still want him, he’s theirs.”

After he had gone, Handsome said thoughtfully, “It shouldn’t be so hard to find a guy with the initials C.B. who looks like our Mr. Courtney Budlong looked.”

“True,” Bingo said. “But we don’t have time to tend to it ourselves right now. Now, let’s go take pictures.”

Eleven

“Okay, Bingo,” Handsome said. “Where do we start taking pictures?”

“Wherever there’s people,” Bingo said.

It was still early in the day. A quick job on the cards had been managed. “An action picture of you has just been taken. See how you would look in the newsreels or tomorrow’s paper. Send this card with 25¢ and your address—”

There had been a brief, but not insurmountable, problem about the address on the cards. “Since we already practically have an office,” Bingo had said, “and it’s a very swell address—” He decided to call up Victor Budlong.

Victor Budlong said of course it was perfectly all right to use the office as a mailing address until they moved in, which he trusted would be soon. He personally would see to it that Miss Meadows put a card with their firm name in the mail slot. If there was anything more he could do, he would be delighted. He hoped everything else was proceeding satisfactorily?

“Fine,” Bingo assured him. “Fine and double fine.”

To be on the safe side, he ordered a batch of cards, not to be mailed in, but to be filled in and collected on the spot. “There’s a lot of people,” he reminded Handsome, “who are happy to give you their address and their two-bits right away, but might sometimes forget about it when they got home. Like I told you back in Central Park, you gotta pick your people accordingly.”

By the time they returned from getting their license the cards had been ready, printed — thanks to some overstock at the cut-rate and quick-job printers, and some fast haggling on Bingo’s part — in a vivid shocking pink, with the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America printed in a startling and brilliant green. Dignity, Bingo had explained, would come later.

Now it was barely one o’clock, and they were ready to begin a day’s work. “Wherever there’s people,” Bingo repeated.

“There’s people everywhere,” Handsome said, glancing at the traffic and at the sidewalks of Hollywood Boulevard.

“Tourists, I mean,” Bingo said. “Tourists who want a souvenir picture taken in the heart of Hollywood to send home to their friends and families. Or to keep for their memory book. Wait a minute, Handsome, let me look in the book.”

He began thumbing through the New Visitor’s Guide.

“Alligator Farm,” he read. “Ambassador Hotel. Angel’s Flight. Arrowhead Lake.” He paused. “I guess this section is all by alphabet. Most of that sounds pretty far away.” He turned a few pages.

“Look under ‘H,’” Handsome suggested.

Bingo turned another few pages. “Hollywood Bowl, Hollywood High School, Hollywood Cemetery, Hollywood Post Office — Here we are, Handsome. Hollywood and Vine!” He read enthusiastically, “‘Famous throughout the world, the center of the motion picture capital draws thousands of tourists daily—’”

“Six blocks from here,” Handsome said.

Eighteen blocks of driving later, they found a parking lot within walking distance of the center of the motion picture capital. Bingo handed Handsome a stack of the mail-in cards and said, “I’ll take the camera.”

There was a hurt look in Handsome’s eyes.

“Only,” Bingo said hastily, “because while I don’t take so good pictures like you do, more ladies take cards when you pass ’em out, and the ladies are the ones who send in most of the quarters.”

Fifteen minutes later they had tried all four corners of Hollywood and Vine. Bingo had hopefully taken a few pictures, Handsome had done his smiling best to hand out the pink and green cards. No one had paid the slightest attention.

Finally they stepped into a doorway and paused for a cigarette. “Everybody’s going to lunch, or everybody’s coming back from lunch,” Handsome said, as though he were personally apologizing for the deficiencies of Hollywood and Vine.

“Everybody except us,” Bingo growled. He glanced again at the New Visitor’s Guide and read aloud, “‘Here you will see celebrities, beautiful girls, Hollywood characters—’”

“None of them seem to want to have their picture taken,” Handsome said.

Bingo drew a long breath and said, “Maybe we just picked a bad time of day, Handsome.” He glanced down Vine Street. His eyes narrowed and he said, “I see a bunch of tourist-looking people standing still.” He took one more quick look at the guidebook. “‘The Brown Derby, favorite rendezvous of stage, screen and television stars.’” He stuck the book in his pocket and said, “Sure, Handsome, those people are hanging around there hoping somebody will come out that they can get an autograph off of. That’s the place for us to go into business.”

He took a few steps, paused, looked at Handsome and said, “I’ll take the cards, I talk faster. You take the camera, you make better pictures. But every time you snap one of a lady, give her a big wistful smile like you wished you knew her better.” He added, “And when they smile back, I hand out the card.”

It began well. With a few nudges from Bingo, Handsome singled out a pair of near-middle-aged women in print dresses; an obviously married couple, he in a Hawaiian print sports shirt (Bingo immediately resolved never to wear one again), she in a powder-blue traveling suit and flowered hat; and a blissful-eyed, hand-holding honeymoon pair.

“A newsreel-type picture of you has just been taken—” Bingo began. He greeted the two women — schoolteachers on vacation, he guessed — with, “You’ll want to take home a picture of yourself, snapped right in front of the famous Brown Derby, favorite rendezvous of stars—” They took a card. He noticed the admiring glance the woman in the traveling suit was giving Handsome, and said, “Send some pictures to the friends back home — show them how you look in the heart of Hollywood—” To the honeymoon couple he said warmly, “What a wonderful souvenir of the happiest days of your life—” and followed it up with congratulations to the groom and felicitations to the bride.

The man in the Hawaiian shirt, who had taken a card, said, “Hey, bud, you know your way around this town. How can me and the wife get tickets to some TV shows?”

“Nothing to it,” Bingo said, “I’ll be glad to help you out. When you send in that card, put in a note of what shows you’d like to see, and I’ll get tickets for you. And don’t forget, if you like the picture, we’ll happily make an enlargement for you, practically at cost — say, how about my partner catching a couple more of you, right in front of the door—”

Two pictures later, though, he felt suddenly as though the glacial cap had moved down from the North Pole. He shoved the cards hastily in his pocket, and turned his head to signal Handsome.

Pushing through the crowd, and unnoticed by it, were Leo Henkin and Rex Strober.

It was too late to catch Handsome, who went right on taking pictures.

“Well!” Bingo said. “Here we meet again!” He saw Leo Henkin’s eyes rake over Handsome with the camera. Rex Strober was looking at nothing but his watch.

“Taking pictures?” Leo Henkin asked, implying that they could be two boy scouts with a Brownie camera.

“Of course!” Bingo said, marshaling up all the enthusiasm he could. “We’re always taking pictures. For background ideas! And people! What is a picture without people? Clothes! Mannerisms! Above all, faces!” He drew himself up to his full five foot five and said, “Faces! Above all, faces!”

“You hear that?” Leo Henkin said to Rex Strober. “These boys are artists!”

Rex Strober was busy opening a package of cigarettes and paying no attention.

Handsome said solemnly, “‘Some faces are books in which not a line is written, except a date.’”

“Boy,” Leo Henkin said. “What a line! Original?”

“Longfellow,” Handsome said. “It was the caption under a picture in the—”

“Except a date!” Leo Henkin said. “You listening, Rex?” Rex Strober was now looking for matches.

“These boys have a great property,” Leo Henkin said as he and Rex Strober left. “And Leo Henkin has the inside track on it—” They disappeared into the Derby.

Bingo looked after them wistfully. “Handsome,” he said, “let’s move on. There’s no telling who we might run into here, and let’s not take chances with our dignity.” He led the way back toward Hollywood Boulevard.

“There were more people there,” Handsome said, a little wistfully. “And more coming.”

“Another time,” Bingo said. “And at some other place.” At the moment he was tempted to add, “And in some other world.”

They walked in silence to the corner of Hollywood and Vine. At the corner a newsdealer spotted the camera still hanging around Handsome’s neck, smirked and said, “I let’cha take my pitcher for a quarter.”

Bingo came back with a startling jolt into the world he lived in, looked through narrowed eyelids at the dealer and said, “It’s a sale. But only if you give us three papers for free.”

After a brief argument, money changed hands, a picture was taken, and copies of the Examiner, the Mirror and the Herald Express were tucked under Bingo’s arm.

“And if you’d like some postcard pictures of yourself to send to your many out-of-town customers—” Bingo began.

“Buster,” the newsdealer said, “you just take your own side of the street, and we’ll get along fine.”

Bingo decided it was not the time for discussion. “Maybe we could sell him the negative,” he muttered to Handsome as they headed for the parking lot. He paused to cast a last look at Hollywood and Vine, half closed his eyes and pictured Columbus Circle in a dreary February rain, lower Broadway in a sleet storm, and 42nd Street and Fifth Avenue in the hottest July in the history of the weather bureau. He wished he were in any one of those dreamed-of scenes. Indeed, at the moment he wished he were anywhere else in the world, including a small igloo on the fringe of the polar cap.

Handsome nudged him and said, “Hey! Isn’t that June Melrose?”

Bingo left the polar ice cap, took a quick look, shook his head and said, “Looks like her. But most of these beautiful thirty-six by twenty-four by thirty-six blondes look so alike. Especially in those jersey slacks.” He added wistfully, “I really would like to get a look at June Melrose sometime!”

Then suddenly it came back to him, like an unexpected and wayward sunbeam popping out through a rift in what had been darkly threatening clouds.

This, he reminded himself, was Hollywood. This was where he and Handsome had come to get rich and famous. A few temporary setbacks were certainly not going to stop them now!

He slid into the car and said, “Wait a minute. Let’s us take one more look in the guidebook.” He thumbed through it. “Olivera Street.” He shook his head. “Too far from here, right now. La Brea Tar Pits. No profit for us in a batch of prehistoric animals that didn’t have any more sense than to go and get stuck in some place they didn’t have any business getting into in the first place.”

Handsome didn’t say, “Like us.” He just went on wiping the windshield.

“Gilmore Stadium,” Bingo read on. “Nothing doing there at this hour of the day. Greek Theatre.” His face darkened. “Closed this time of year. Griffith Planetarium. Wrong kind of stars for us, right now. Hey!” He beamed at Handsome. “Grauman’s Chinese Theatre! That’s where we should’ve headed for in the first place!”

Handsome started the car and began feeling the way out of the parking lot.

Bingo leaned back, half closed his eyes, and rehearsed: “What a wonderful souvenir to take home to your folks! A picture of you, standing beside the—” He consulted the book again. “—The imperishable memories of the stars you love! Betty Grable’s legs! Jimmy Durante’s nose! Trigger’s hoofprint!”

“Lots more,” Handsome said.

“Sure!” Bingo said. “Handsome, that’s the place everybody from out of town heads for when they get to Hollywood!” He drew a long breath. “Handsome, we might even find April Robin’s footprint there!”

“If she was after 1927 we will,” Handsome said, threading his way through Hollywood Boulevard traffic. “Account of, Bingo, that’s when it opened up. The first stars were Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks, Norma Shearer—”

Bingo said accusingly, “You’ve been reading the guidebook.”

“Uh-uh,” Handsome said. “There was this article about it. Pictures of everybody. In a Sunday supplement. On the opposite page was an article about Reelfoot Lake in Tennessee being formed by an earthquake in 1811. There was a picture of the lake, too. Right straight across the page was a picture of Mickey Rooney.” He angled around a waiting taxi and said, “It was a real good article. About the theatre, I mean, not the lake. I remember it especially account of my Aunt Elsieday, who was Irish, and married Uncle Steve. The second time, I mean. For him, not for her. My Aunt Elsieday was in San Diego in 1925 and saw a little bit of a movie being made with Gloria Swanson, and that’s why she was so interested in the article.” He added, “The picture was Madame Sans-Gene.”

Bingo half closed his eyes. “How deep was Reelfoot Lake, and what page was the article on?”

“Bottomless,” Handsome said. “At least when the article was written nobody had got to the bottom of it. It was on” — he paused just a moment — “page five. The article about Grauman’s Chinese Theatre was on page four. There was a design across the top—”

“Never mind right now,” Bingo said. “Just remember, we could just possibly find April Robin’s footprint in the concrete!”

Handsome missed a bus by inches and said, “Bingo, April Robin. Do you think there’s something wrong with my memory?”

“She was before your time,” Bingo told him again. “And turn right—”

Handsome swerved expertly into the parking lot, said, “They got a nice place to leave a person’s car. Bingo, do I take the camera or the cards?”

Bingo slid out of the car and said, “Let’s look the place over before we decide.”

It was, as always, a matter of what kind of prospects were in the crowd he expected in front of the theatre. He gave Handsome a reassuring smile and said, “Everything is going to be all right.”

But everything wasn’t all right, he realized several minutes later. There were people around the theatre, lots of people. There was a line of them, waiting at the box office for tickets to the two P.M. show. There were stragglers coming out from the earlier show. And there were tourists, all kinds of tourists, the ones he had hoped for, wandering through the lobby. Only, he realized almost immediately, they were all taking pictures of each other.

The spiel he had been rehearsing died quietly in his throat.

Good-looking young ushers were showing the tourists around. The tourists were not only taking pictures of each other, they were taking pictures of the ushers.

All right, he told himself, he’d been wrong before. Like the time he’d loaded up two cameras for a St. Patrick’s Day Parade and found himself caught in a pedestrian traffic jam on the corner of 47th and Fifth. But at least something could be accomplished here.

He caught the eye of one of the ushers and said, “Can you help me find Reelfoot Lake?”

The young man blinked and said, “Sir?”

“I mean,” Bingo stammered, pulling himself together as best he could, “April Robin. You remember April Robin?”

“Oh,” the young man said. “Yes,” and then, “Of course.” He looked a little unhappy. “The great April Robin. She was quite some time ago—”

“You probably don’t remember her yourself,” Bingo said kindly.

“Well,” the young man said, “my father was a great admirer of hers—” He gulped. “We’ll look—”

“Never mind,” Bingo said, not quite as kindly. “We’ll find her prints.”

The young man looked relieved and went away.

Fifteen minutes later Bingo said, “Maybe if we asked the manager. Or somebody.” He had a mental picture of April Robin’s footprints. Tiny, delicate, high-arched. Suddenly he spotted an elderly man with a tiny dust sweeper, busily engaged in keeping the concrete as spotless as hands could make it. He cleared his throat. “You’ve been here a long time?”

“Since before the Hoover administration, friend,” the elderly man said gently. “Pleased to make your acquaintance. Will you please move just a little to the left? Thank you, friend.” He swept expertly around their feet and said, “May I assist you in any way?”

“We’re looking for some footprints,” Bingo said.

The sweeper gestured with one hand to indicate that the foyer was full of them.

“I mean,” Bingo said, “some very special footprints.” He drew a long breath. “April Robin’s.” He mustered up his best smile and said, “You know. April Robin?”

“Ah yes,” the sweeper said. “Ah yes! April Robin!” He leaned on his broom and gazed into nothingness as though he were seeing flowers in the spring, moonlight on magnolia blossoms, and stars over the sea. “April Robin!” he said again, dreamily. He looked at Bingo and said, “You must know, I was once an actor. I was a spectator in the fight scene in The Spoilers. The first version. And I did a small bit in a picture with Theda Bara. But I was not cut out to be an actor. Although once I drew gunfire from William S. Hart—”

“April Robin,” Bingo prompted.

The old man shook his head and said, “There will never be another like her!” Potential tears formed in his red-rimmed eyes.

“Her footprints,” Bingo said. “We want to see her footprints. They must be here somewhere—”

The sweeper suddenly seemed to be nearly six feet tall. “My dear young man,” he said. “My very dear young man. Since the time in 1927, when the prints of Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks were marked, not on the drifting sands of time, but in imperishable and immemorial concrete, there has not been a star of great magnitude who has not left a mark here. And never has so much as an inch of concrete been removed, nor left unswept. I would like to quote to you—”

He paused and said, “Perhaps I should explain to you, I am a poet. If you would care to have a small volume of my work, privately printed—” As though by magic, a pale gray pamphlet appeared from his pocket. “I regret that I must sell them, for the cost of printing alone—”

A line ran quickly through Bingo’s mind. We’ll be glad to make extra copies for the cost of material. He returned the old man’s smile and said, “Sure, pal. How much?”

The pale gray pamphlet, titled Alas, Sweet Memories, cost one dollar.

“And now,” Bingo said, getting grimly back to the subject, “since you do remember April Robin, I’m sure you’ll help us find her prints here.”

The potential tears threatened to materialize. The poet shook his head. “Some memories are too painful. Since you know her story, and are making a sentimental pilgrimage, I know you will excuse me. I am sure you will find them by yourselves.” He turned his back and began sweeping.

Handsome looked around and said, “Bingo, there’s more footprints here than there were on those sands of time the old guy was talking about.”

“I know,” Bingo said unhappily, relinquishing — but only momentarily — a cherished dream. “We’ve got to find a place to take pictures.”

“And, Bingo,” Handsome said. He paused.

“I know that, too,” Bingo said. “You’re hungry. Let’s drive out to that hamburger stand. Goody-Goody’s. It’ll give us a chance to think.”

Halfway to Beverly Hills, Handsome said, “Well, we got a few pictures in front of the Brown Derby. And that guy who might want some special prints. If we can get him some tickets to some TV shows.”

“Easiest thing in the world,” Bingo said, wondering how it was done. Of course, they knew Leo Henkin. He could probably get tickets to anything. Maybe Victor Budlong could, too. Or their next-door neighbor, Rex Strober.

But somehow he felt that the senior member of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America should not be asking small-time favors like that, even if it meant a sale of extra pictures to the man in the Hawaiian shirt.

He sighed, leaned back, closed his eyes and wished he were asleep.

Coffee and the smell of hamburgers revived his spirits a great deal. He lit a cigarette, gave the waitress his best smile, and reached for one of the newspapers Handsome had been carrying. He glanced through it idly, coughed, put down his coffee, and said as calmly as he could, “I see there’s been a murder in our house.”

Handsome said, “It’s in this paper, too. Only it says, suspected murder.”

“That’s the conservative press,” Bingo said.

The stories told only of the death, probably murder, of one Pearl Durzy — not specifying Miss or Mrs. — caretaker in the house from which two Lattimers had disappeared, one presumed murdered, one presumed still in flight from the law. There were details about the carbon tetrachloride. There was a statement from Detective L. Perroni. There was, in one paper, a two-column picture of the house. There was no mention of Bingo and Handsome, nor of Mr. Courtney Budlong, nor any details of their purchase of the house. Bingo thanked his and everybody’s stars for that, and grumbled a little that the house was referred to as the Lattimer residence, with no mention of April Robin.

Handsome shoved the papers aside and said, “Bingo, something is all wrong about everything.”

“Nonsense,” Bingo said. “Every business has its little setbacks. We just picked a bad day and some bad locations, that’s all. And we still have half the afternoon ahead of us.”

Handsome stirred his coffee, scowled and said, “I don’t mean that. I mean, Bingo, everybody seems to be worried about all the wrong things. Like for instance—”

“Like for instance we’re worried about taking pictures and making money,” Bingo said grimly.

Handsome waved that aside. “The house,” he said. “I mean, like who owns the house. And this Perroni and everybody else seems to be mostly worried about, where is Mr. Julien Lattimer’s body, and where is Mrs. Lois Lattimer, if she did kill him, assuming of course that he was killed.” He looked up unhappily and said, “You know what I mean, Bingo?”

“It drifts my way,” Bingo said.

“Well,” Handsome said, “so far as I can see, nobody seems to care who murdered Miss or Mrs. Pearl Durzy. Nobody seems to be even trying to find out who murdered her. Or why, Bingo. In fact,” he finished, pushing his coffee cup to one side, “nobody even seems to be trying to find out who she was.”

Twelve

“Handsome,” Bingo said sternly, “we bought a house. We practically bought a house. It had a caretaker and the caretaker got killed. It isn’t any of our business.”

“Okay, Bingo,” Handsome said unhappily, “if you say so. Only, it reads here like she didn’t have any folks anywhere, and she should be buried nicely, and besides, nobody seems to care who murdered her, except maybe us.”

Bingo waved his newspaper at Handsome and said, “The police are working on the case.”

Handsome said nothing. He just looked worried and miserable.

“All right,” Bingo said at last. “We’ll go home and call up—” He paused. “That Hendenfelder, not Perroni. Maybe they’ve found out some more about her by now.” He jammed his cigarette viciously in his saucer and said as reassuringly as he could, “If there’s anything to find out, we’ll find it.”

He added, out in the car, “And if we spot any likely places to take pictures—”

“We’ll stop,” Handsome said.

“Just a question of finding the right place at the right time,” Bingo said with false cheerfulness. A matter that was going to involve a little more careful study of the Visitor’s Guide. He yawned. The day was half gone. They had a roof over their heads and it was a roof that could stand a little exploring. He puzzled over that thought for a moment. The house itself could stand a little exploring. It wasn’t just a matter of finding a hint as to where Julien Lattimer’s body was hidden, assuming that he had become a body. Nor of finding a little souvenir of April Robin to please Hendenfelder. It had suddenly become a matter of finding out just what had happened to Pearl Durzy, and why.

“Bingo,” Handsome said, “there’s a bunch of people in front of our house.” He slowed down the convertible.

Bingo looked. There were a few cars parked along the street, and a few dozen people arranged at the edge of the driveway. One curious observer had ventured a little way up the driveway toward the house itself.

“If one more thing has gone wrong,” Bingo said, “we’re going right back to New York.”

“It’s the newspapers,” Handsome said, as though he were personally apologizing for them. “Account of Miss Durzy — Mrs. Durzy — either dying or getting killed here and it being the house from which Mr. and Mrs. Lattimer disappeared. It gives the address of the house in the story and there’s one picture of the house, only not a very good one. I remember when a Mr. Clement Hathaway, who was a society man and rich, hanged himself from a tree in Central Park, for no reason anybody ever knew, and for weeks afterward people were coming to look at the tree and cut off little pieces of it for souvenirs.” He added, “I don’t know why people act that way, only they do.”

“I don’t even care why they act, that way,” Bingo said happily. “I’m just glad that they do.” The word “souvenirs” had not only rung a bell in his mind, but set a whole series of them ringing.

“Pull up in the driveway,” he told Handsome. “After all, we almost own the place. But don’t run over anybody that might be a customer.”

The shining maroon convertible seemed to belong where it was going, and the curiosity seekers stepped back almost respectfully.

“This time,” Bingo said, “you take the camera!” He slid out of the car, pulled the quick give-away cards from his pocket, and smiled his most engaging smile.

“What a souvenir!” he said. “What an item for your memory book! A picture of you taken at the scene of at least one crime!” He waved majestically toward the mansion. “Come right on up the driveway, don’t hang back!” He beamed at a pair of embarrassed but happy matrons.

“An action picture of you,” he told them. “Go on, walk right up to the door and put your hand on the knob! That’s the ticket! What you’ll receive from us is practically a newsreel shot—”

The pair of matrons obliged, for three poses. “Just put your name and address on this card,” Bingo told them. “It’ll be twenty-five cents for each print, mailed to you within twenty-four hours!”

They decided, after a whispered conference, that they each wanted three prints of each pose. And this, Bingo reminded himself, was the day that had started off badly!

A middle-aged man with thin lips and eyes that seemed to have just come from an ice-cube tray, stepped up and said, “Now wait a minute! I don’t know these ladies, but I believe in helping my fellow man or woman, and how do they know they’re ever going to get those pictures they already paid for?”

Bingo said suavely, “If you’ll kindly look at the business address printed on each card—”

It was not just the Beverly Hills address, but the firm name, International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America, which seemed to do the trick. The man with the iceberg eyes retreated a little.

A plump woman in a gaudy slack suit pushed a gangling teenager forward and said, “Go on; Harvey, right up by the doorway. This’ll be a nice picture to send your father.”

“Right on the very spot!” Bingo said. “Right in front of the mystery mansion!”

A couple who looked like vacationers moved forward, the man muttering under his breath, “This seems silly to me, Helen, but if you insist upon it—”

Bingo turned to Handsome and said, “Get a really good picture of these two honeymooners!” He flashed a smile at the man and said, “Turn your head a little — so! Get your profile just right!” He waited till he knew Handsome was through, and then said to the man, “Haven’t I seen you on the screen?”

The man coughed, said, “Guess not. I’m in the wholesale hardware business, back in Bloomington, Illinois.” He coughed again, this time with even more embarrassment, and said, “And this isn’t exactly a honeymoon. Helen and me, we were married twenty-six years ago next May 10th.”

Helen bridled a little and said, “And it seems like yesterday!”

“Believe me,” Bingo said, “you look as though it has been only yesterday! Let’s get one more picture of you, gazing into each other’s eyes!”

A dozen customers later, Bingo began looking for a place to put the quarters. He solved it by slinging the camera case over his shoulder.

“You may never have an opportunity like this again—”

The cold-eyed man returned and said, “Look-a-here, boys, I don’t want to seem unpleasant. But isn’t this trespassing or something? These here people don’t have a right to be here, and you don’t have a right to be taking pictures—”

“Mister,” Bingo said, “I have a paper in my pocket giving us the right to occupy and use this property. Anyone here now I consider my guest.” He suddenly remembered that the paper was in the hands of a police handwriting expert at the moment. He said quickly, “If you’d like to step inside and use our telephone and call Mr. Victor Budlong, of Budlong and Dollinger” — he rolled out the syllables mellifluously — “he’ll put you right.”

“There’s been a murder here,” the man said. “Maybe the cops won’t like—”

“My good friend,” Bingo said, “use that same telephone and call Detective Hendenfelder.”

The heckler muttered something Bingo didn’t catch, and drifted away, not — Bingo noticed with a few thanks to his lucky stars — in the direction of the telephone.

Then there was someone who asked, breathlessly, “Does anyone have any idea where that Mrs. Lattimer buried poor Mr. Lattimer?”

Bingo gestured and said, “There’s a lot of lawn and garden, ma’am. If you’d like to borrow a shovel—”

And someone else who asked, “Which is the window of the room where the last murder was committed, and could I get a picture—?”

Inevitably, the cars parked along Damascus Drive attracted other cars, and the curious people moving up the driveway drew others to follow them. A small boy pushing a bike shoved up close to Bingo and whispered that for five bucks, cash on the line, he could really mess up traffic on Sunset Boulevard and divert it up Damascus Drive. Bingo gave him two, wished him luck, and hoped Handsome wouldn’t run out of film.

The afternoon wore on, little by little the crowd drifted away until there was no one left but the cold-eyed heckler.

“You boys have a nice racket here,” he commented. “Sorry I don’t want a picture taken,”

“You’re in the Industry?” Bingo asked. He’d learned to use the sonorous and almost reverential tone he’d heard earlier in the day from Victor Budlong.

“Well, in a way, yes, and in a way, no,” the man said. He seemed to be thawing a little. “I train birds.” The startled looks on the faces of Bingo and Handsome were obviously nothing new to him. “I also rent out reptiles. Snakes, turtles, horned toads. Any time a studio needs to rent a reptile, they call on me.”

You never could tell when you might need a friend, Bingo reminded himself. Or when you might want to rent a rattlesnake. “Let’s get a good picture of you, right here in the entrance. No charge. A gift from us.”

“No, thanks,” the man said. “I don’t need any pictures of me. And I don’t want one taken of me right here.” He glanced up at the house. “Especially not here.” He seemed to be saying it to himself.

Bingo looked at him closely. No, he didn’t fit any of the descriptions of Julien Lattimer. He was too tall, too sharp-faced, his hair was somewhere between blond and gray.

“I would like to look around a little, though,” the man said. He came close to smiling. “My name is William Willis.”

“And you train birds,” Bingo said, “and rent reptiles. We’re Bingo Riggs and Handsome Kusak, and we take pictures. And we’d enjoy having you look around some other time. But right now my partner and I need to print up a batch of pictures.”

William Willis moved his thin lips into another smile and said, “I’ll come back.”

They watched him march down the driveway, and Bingo said, “I’ve felt warmer weather in January.”

“If he’d said his name was William Willis in the first place,” Handsome said, “I’d’ve remembered him right away. He does a night-club act with his trained birds. Not the snakes, just the birds. There was a story about him in the Journal, because of his having had his birds in a New York night club for a record-breaking run. Two and a half months. There was a picture of the birds, right next to a picture of Christine Jorgensen coming home from Europe. She had on a mink coat.”

Bingo sorted that out carefully in his mind and said, “Maybe if he’d had his birds along, he’d’ve had a picture taken. And let’s get to work and—” He remembered suddenly. “And call up Hendenfelder. To ask about Pearl Durzy.”

A cheerful voice called, “Yoo-hoo!” from the far side of the garden wall. It was Mrs. Waldo Hibbing, waving at them cordially. Bingo walked over to the wall, wondering how long she’d been watching.

“Well!” she said. “Gracious! For newcomers, you two boys certainly have a lot of visitors!”

“We were taking pictures,” Bingo said. From where she’d been, she couldn’t have seen money and cards changing hands. “We collect faces. Interesting faces. And while we’re getting established here, we’re collecting as many faces as we can.” It sounded lame even to him, but it was the best he could do in a hurry. He handed her one of their business cards and said, “We found our office space today. Lovely little building in Beverly Hills.”

She looked at the card and said, “My!” Then she flashed a toothy smile at him. “Maybe you could get me taken on a studio tour sometime! I’ve wanted to go on one ever since I came to Hollywood!”

“Gladly,” Bingo said, wondering just how it could be done. That, and TV show tickets for the man in the Hawaiian shirt. “Of course, right now we’re pretty rushed—”

“I can see you are!” she said. “And heavens! I saw the papers this morning! Imagine a thing like that happening right after you moved in here!”

Bingo agreed with her that it was a terrible thing. He added, “Did you know this Pearl Durzy at all?”

“Goodness no,” the widow said. “I scarcely ever saw her, in the whole two years I’ve lived here. She just never went out of that house. She had her groceries delivered and everything. It was like she haunted it, I mean.” She paused suddenly, her eyes widening. “Now that’s funny! I guess the only time I did see her leave the house was last night!” She added, “Before she was murdered, of course.”

Bingo started to say, “Naturally,” decided that would sound a little silly, and said, as casually as he could, “About what time?”

“Well,” she said, “well, I don’t know the absolute exact hour. But it was a while before you got here. Before you moved in. I just happened to be looking out the window and I just happened to see her.”

Mrs. Waldo Hibbing, Bingo decided, would probably be happening to look out the window whenever anything interesting happened in the neighborhood. “You didn’t see what time she came back?” he asked, still keeping it very casual.

She shook her head regretfully. “I went out to a movie,” she said. “I don’t, very often, but last night I did, and I didn’t get back until, mercy! almost midnight. But I did see her go, and she looked just like a poor little ghost, and small wonder, cooped up in that house all these years!” She turned her eyes to the house. “It must be wonderful inside, though!”

Bingo didn’t rise to that one. He said, “My partner and me would love to have you come visit us. Soon as we get the furniture in.”

“Oh,” she said, “I wouldn’t mind there not being furniture.”

“We would,” Bingo said politely. “We’d like you to see it at its best.” He changed the subject back. “Imagine you seeing that poor Pearl Durzy last night!”

“And almost the only time she’d ever left the house!” the widow Hibbing said. She glanced over Bingo’s shoulder and said, “Heavens! You have more company coming!” Bingo turned, looked, and recognized the car even before he saw Perroni getting out. “Important business,” he said, and headed back to the April Robin mansion.

Handsome was ushering the two police officers into the cavernous living room, which suddenly seemed darker and more dismal than it had ever been. He thought suddenly of Pearl Durzy, living alone here, never leaving the house. Not a newspaper delivered daily, no radio to listen to, no television to watch. What had she done with herself all those years?

At the moment, Perroni didn’t seem to have Pearl Durzy on his mind. He looked at Bingo as though he had been somehow offended.

“It checks,” Perroni said sourly. “Yes, it checks. Clark Sellers says it’s Julien Lattimer’s signature. And when he says somebody’s signature is somebody’s signature, it’s that person’s signature.” He glared at Bingo and Handsome as though daring them to dispute him.

Bingo felt his spine stiffen. “And who is this Clark Sellers?”

Perroni and Hendenfelder looked at him as though he’d asked who George Washington and Abraham Lincoln were.

“Look here,” Hendenfelder said gently. “You think of doctors. Who do you think of?”

“Mayo brothers,” Bingo said promptly.

“You think of the South Pole, who do you think of?”

Bingo said, “Penguins,” and Handsome said, “Admiral Byrd, but mostly also Roald Amundsen, he reached the South Pole on December 14, 1911. And the next year—”

Hendenfelder said, “You think of electricity, you think of Benjamin Franklin. You think of wireless, you think of Marconi.” He smiled at them amiably. “And when you think of handwriting—”

“You think of Clark Sellers,” Bingo said. “Okay, if he says this is Julien Lattimer’s writing, this is Julien Lattimer’s writing.”

Perroni said, “Now, where’s Julien Lattimer?”

“I don’t know,” Bingo said. In his heart he felt that if he did know, he wouldn’t tell.

Handsome said placatingly, “Mr. Courtney Budlong must know where he is, if he got those papers signed.”

“This,” Perroni said coldly, “is final. There is no Courtney Budlong and never was a Courtney Budlong.”

Hendenfelder said mildly, “Once we find the man who called himself Courtney Budlong—”

“That will be the day,” Perroni said. “The day to remember. If we do.” He glowered at Bingo and Handsome as though they were personally responsible for all the troubles he’d had in his life, including corns, stomach ulcers and income tax. “Meantime, Mr. Reddy says you can stay on. Until further notice. And I’m going to have another look around the house.”

He stalked off toward the staircase. Hendenfelder sat down on one of the two sofas and said, “Y’know, a guy’s feet get tired even driving a car.” He shook his head sadly. “This really breaks Perroni all up. The handwriting expert, I mean.”

Bingo said, “Maybe he signed those things a long time ago. Before he was murdered.” It was a flimsy idea, but the best he had at the time.

“Uh-uh,” Hendenfelder said. “According to Clark Sellers’ office, those signatures were written with a liquid graphite pencil. And that pencil didn’t come on the market until sometime in 1955.” He sighed. “This is really rough on Perroni.”

“It’s rough on a lot of people,” Bingo said, “including various people who seem to have gotten murdered.” He drew a long breath. “In fact, we were going to call you up to ask a couple of questions.”

From overhead he could hear Perroni’s footsteps, slow, measured and patient.

“About Pearl Durzy,” Bingo went on recklessly. “There’s a lot about her we don’t seem to know.”

“Brother!” Hendenfelder said. “There’s a lot about her nobody seems to know.”

“You mean,” Handsome asked, “like who murdered her?”

“Not only that,” Hendenfelder said. “But mostly — who was she?”

Thirteen

“She was Pearl Durzy,” Bingo said, a little helplessly.

“Who says so?” Hendenfelder asked. He rubbed a handkerchief over his forehead.

“But,” Bingo said, even more helplessly, “she was identified.”

“Sure,” Hendenfelder said. “You identified her. How many times had you seen her? Once, and by your own story you weren’t even introduced. So you say she was Pearl Durzy. She was pointed out to you by someone who said she was Pearl Durzy, and now nobody knows where he is, or who he is, either.”

Bingo scowled. “But somebody must have known her.” He added, “Everybody has somebody who knows them. Like friends. And relatives.”

“Far’s we can see,” Hendenfelder said, “she didn’t have neither. I mean, she didn’t have nothing! Almost like she didn’t exist even. Except, we got her body in the morgue.”

“Mr. Reddy,” Bingo said. “From the trust company. He’d know about her. She, well, she worked for him, in a manner of speaking.”

“Mr. Reddy, he doesn’t know anything,” Hendenfelder said. “She’d been the housekeeper here for Mrs. Lois Lattimer. When the trust company took over this place, it seemed all right to keep her here as caretaker. It was,” he said, frowning, “it is a very unusual situation. He’d been told she was Pearl Durzy and he just took her word for it and kept her on here. Every month he came and looked at the place and made sure everything was all right, which it always was, and paid her her salary and went away. Then there was a man who came in two times a month to look after the lawn and the shrubbery and stuff, but he didn’t know Pearl Durzy. He just came in and did his work and went away, which was all that was expected of him. Mr. Reddy paid him with checks. From the looks of the place, he didn’t work very hard. Sure, he saw Pearl Durzy, and he knew her name was Pearl Durzy. I mean, he knew it because somebody had told him that was who she was, same way everybody else did, including you and,” he added, “us.”

“Fingerprints,” Handsome said.

Hendenfelder gave him a pitying look. “Sure. We got her prints. Only it looks like she never had her prints taken. Account of, hers don’t match up anywhere. People don’t just go out and have fingerprints taken so’s they can be identified properly if they are suddenly found dead or dying. They got to be booked for a crime, they got to apply for a driver’s license, they got to apply for some security job, they got to join the army. It looks like Pearl Durzy never done any of those things.”

“But,” Bingo said, “she must have a social security card. Or a bank book. Or letters, or — something—”

“She didn’t have a social security card,” Hendenfelder said. “On account of it seems like she didn’t need one in this type job. And Mr. Reddy paid her in cash every month. She didn’t like checks. So he would bring her out, every month, her hundred dollars in cash, and inspect the house, which she kept pretty nice. The bills for the light and the gas and everything else, why, the trust company took care of that.”

Bingo did some rapid figuring. Pearl Durzy had been here since the trust company took over, and that had been when? 1953? 1954? Her only expenses had been for the meager groceries from the neighborhood market.

“Where did she put all that money?” he asked.

Hendenfelder said, “Why do you think Perroni’s giving this place another going-over right now?”

“I thought maybe he was looking for mice,” Bingo said.

That didn’t seem particularly funny to Hendenfelder. “She must’ve put it in a purse,” he said. “Every lady has a purse even if she don’t go out much, because she always has a lot of stuff to carry.” He frowned and said, “You should only see the stuff my wife carries in her purse. A compact, and a lipstick, and her wallet and coin purse, and keys, and chewing gum, and old letters, and Kleenex—”

Handsome said, “Well, maybe. Only it seems like this Pearl Durzy wouldn’t need a lot of things like that. She didn’t put stuff on her face, and her coin purse was in her coat pocket, and if she almost never went out of the house, maybe she didn’t bother with keys, and probably she never got any letters from anybody, or if she did she didn’t keep them, and—”

“The money,” Hendenfelder said. “She would have had to put that somewhere every month, when Mr. Reddy gave it to her.” There was a small silence while each of them figured how much money Mr. Reddy must have given her, at a hundred dollars a month.

“And she didn’t spend much for her groceries,” Hendenfelder said.

“She could have had a bank account,” Bingo said.

“Sure,” Hendenfelder said. “Where? Perroni’s been trying to find out about that all day.”

Bingo started to say, “But money doesn’t just vanish!” and then checked himself, thinking of the capital of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America.

Hendenfelder sighed and said, “Usually when a person gets killed, or is found dead, they have folks or friends which turn up and make the legal identification, and claim the body. But this Pearl Durzy, she don’t seem to have anybody. And living here alone the way she did, all by herself, and not getting acquainted with the neighbors—”

He didn’t say any more. He glanced around the great shadowy room, all but denuded of furniture. The glance took in the balcony, the rooms upstairs, the dreary emptiness in which Pearl Durzy had lived.

“She didn’t have a radio set or a TV,” he commented. “And she didn’t get the daily papers delivered.”

Bingo closed his eyes for a moment. He tried not to think of the house as it had been those past years, with the little gray ghostlike figure of Pearl Durzy moving through it, living her secret and dreary life. What did she do with all her waking hours? Not just for a week, or a month, but for years.

“She certainly kept the place pretty clean, though,” Hendenfelder said suddenly. “Guess maybe she thought Mrs. Lattimer might come back sometime.”

“If you could only find Mrs. Lattimer now,” Bingo said. He had a vague hope of cheering up Hendenfelder.

The look Hendenfelder gave him told him that he’d failed completely.

“And there’s never been a trace of Mrs. Lattimer?” Bingo pressed.

“Sure,” Hendenfelder said. He reached for a cigarette, found an empty pack, accepted one from Bingo and said, “You know how it is when a person disappears. They get reported from everywhere. Kansas City, Vancouver, some place in Guatemala. We got one reliable trace from El Paso, but then she was gone again. Oh, she took off with the dough and probably married some handsome young guy, and she’s just sitting pretty some place thinking we’re a bunch of dopes.”

“She was young and pretty,” Handsome said, “wasn’t she?”

“Yeah,” Hendenfelder said. “She was in show business. Night clubs. Then somehow she met Mr. Julien Lattimer, who fell for her and married her, and you oughta know the rest of the story backwards and sideways by this time.” He looked tired and discouraged. “And this Pearl Durzy, who used to be her maid or something, came to work for them as a housekeeper. And then all that business happened. And instead of nobody worrying about it much as time went by, Perroni, he went on worrying. And now all of a sudden, this happens. Oh well,” he said wearily, “in this business that’s the way things are because—”

“Because that’s the way things are,” Bingo finished for him sympathetically.

Perroni came down the long stairs from the balcony. He looked unhappier than ever.

“Nothing,” he said. “So now we got a motive. Murder for robbery. She must’ve had all that dough some place in the house. Well, it isn’t in the house. And when I look, I look thorough.” He looked nastily at Bingo and Handsome.

“When I rob old ladies of their savings,” Bingo said, “I lure them into a park and hit them over the head. I don’t fool around with dry-cleaning fluid.” He added, “Besides, we have an alibi. Not just Goody-Goody’s. But the lady next door, Mrs. Waldo Hibbing” — he stressed the name just slightly — “saw Pearl Durzy leaving here before we came back with our luggage.”

Perroni and Hendenfelder looked at each other, and then back at Bingo and Handsome.

“You mean, she left the house?” Perroni asked. He sounded a little incredulous.

“Why not?” Bingo said. “Maybe she wanted some fresh air. Maybe she didn’t like the company.”

Perroni said, “But where did she go?” He didn’t say it to anyone in the room. “Why?” His brows were puzzled. “She never left the house. She almost never left the house.”

He thrust his hands in his coat pockets and glared at Bingo and Handsome. “You guys seem to have brought all the trouble,” he said, not so much angrily as reprovingly. “Mind you, I’m not accusing you of doing anything wrong. So far.” He started for the door, paused, turned and said, “After the handwriting experts got through with those papers, I sent them to Mr. Reddy. You’ll have to work that out from there. But I’m still going to find Julien Lattimer’s body.”

Hendenfelder shrugged and followed him out of the house.

“Bingo,” Handsome said thoughtfully when they were gone, “maybe he will find Mr. Lattimer’s body. With Mr. Lattimer still alive in it.”

“That would be nice,” Bingo said. “Then that would be definite proof he signed those papers. And I suppose I’d better call up our lawyer and tell him about it. And call Mr. Reddy and tell him we know what the handwriting expert said.” He paused. “And call Mr. Henkin and tell him many thanks for getting us such a fine lawyer. And call Mr. Victor Budlong just to say hello. And call up Adelle Lattimer and tell her we haven’t had any luck, but we’re still looking.”

“Why don’t you take a nice nap while I make the pictures?” Handsome said anxiously. He dumped out the contents of the camera case, and began counting. “Plus what’s in your pocket.”

Bingo added a heavy handful of quarters to the pile.

“Seventeen dollars and twenty-five cents,” Handsome reported. “Plus what might come in the mail, and repeat orders. We almost never did so well as that in New York, Bingo.”

“We almost never bought a haunted house in New York, either,” Bingo said.

“Bingo,” Handsome said, “we got paper and everything to send out these orders, so they’re just profit. And we’ve got the car, and all our clothes and stuff, and some money left over, and it’s not such a very long drive to New York—”

Bingo took a long look at his partner. It wasn’t Handsome who was homesick for New York.

He said, “Let’s just print up the pictures, and talk things over later.” He drew a long breath. “Handsome, we came out here to get rich and famous, and a few little setbacks aren’t going to worry us. Not for long.”

Handsome departed gratefully for the improvised darkroom.

Bingo leaned back on the lumpy sofa and thought things over. If he gave Handsome his share of the convertible, plus all the camera equipment, sold his clothes and his wrist watch, and the luggage that was his, he might just be able to pay back Handsome for what he’d lost in this venture. That would give Handsome a car, and a nice financial stake for the future.

And as far as he was concerned, he’d manage. Hadn’t he always? Hadn’t he figured a way to make a cut from all the newspaper routes around the little grocery where he’d worked after its owner, his Uncle Herman, had taken him out of the orphanage where he’d spent his first twelve years? And hadn’t he done all right at door-to-door selling, crew managing, and running concessions at county fairs? In a place like Hollywood, he’d do all right for himself.

He eased into a more comfortable position on the sofa and began to wonder how Handsome would do for himself. And decided, not too well. That put a different aspect on things.

He half closed his eyes and remembered back to a time when he’d made a brief stab at being a sidewalk photographer for See-Ure-Self, Inc., and resigned some thirty seconds after learning that See-Ure-Self, Inc., kept seventeen and a half cents from every quarter turned in and, furthermore, required a four-dollar deposit on all cameras.

It had been shortly after he’d met Handsome and learned that Handsome owned two cameras and had a back week’s pay due from the newspaper where he’d worked, that the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America had been formed.

But now perhaps he’d pushed their luck too far.

On the other hand, if there was still a chance—

He picked up the telephone reluctantly and dialed Arthur Schlee’s number. The lawyer said that the news was wonderful, that he’d already been informed by Mr. Reddy, with whom he was in constant touch. Now that there was no doubt that the signatures were genuine, the rest of the situation would not be so complex. Difficult, yes, but not impossible. He had sent a messenger over to the trust company’s office to pick up the papers from Mr. Reddy, for his own personal examination. There would, of course, be no charge for the messenger service. The retainer was adequate, as he’d said, although naturally if the case should go to court—

Bingo thanked him, and then called Leo Henkin, who came on the line promptly.

Bingo only wanted to thank him for recommending such a fine lawyer. Mr. Henkin said it had been a pleasure to do a favor for a friend, and how had the pictures turned out? And how soon could they talk business about that Great Property?

“Soon,” Bingo said, wishing with all his heart there was a property. He called little Mr. Reddy.

Mr. Reddy said the whole situation was entirely unprecedented, but he had been glad to send the papers over to Mr. Schlee, and he hoped that everything was going to be all right. He hung up before Bingo had a chance to ask him a few of the questions he had in mind about Pearl Durzy.

At least, Bingo told himself, putting down the phone, he’d done his best for the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America.

He glanced again around the big and almost empty room, at the unlighted chandelier, at the balcony. He thought of Pearl Durzy, alone here for so many years, without so much as a book or a radio or a television set, not even a daily newspaper. Seeing Mr. Reddy once a month when he came in with her hundred dollars in cash, and made his quick and perfunctory inspection. Speaking, perhaps, to the grocery boy. Not even making friends with her next-door neighbor, Mrs. Hibbing, who would undoubtedly have loved to have someone to visit with, especially someone who could satisfy her curiosity about the house next door. Hiding her money somewhere, saving it, perhaps — and for what possible future purpose? Spending her time going from empty room to empty room, endlessly dusting, polishing, cleaning. Keeping a house clean for people who would never return to it— This sort of thinking, he told himself, wasn’t going to get him anywhere.

He put Pearl Durzy resolutely out of his mind, and along with her the ghosts, if they were ghosts, of Julien and Lois Lattimer. He thought of April Robin. But that had been so long ago—

He thought of the rose garden she’d planted. Perhaps a small rosebush, properly packed for sending through the mail, would be the souvenir Detective Hendenfelder would like to send his niece in Milwaukee.

Somehow, he would get tickets to a TV show for the man in the Hawaiian shirt.

Somehow, he would arrange a studio tour for Mrs. Waldo Hibbing.

Somehow, he would find Julien Lattimer’s body, for Adelle Lattimer.

And Mr. Courtney Budlong had to be somewhere.

Everything was going to be all right, it always had.

He was beginning to sink pleasantly into that nap Handsome had recommended, beginning to dream of rosebushes whose buds opened out suddenly into the faces of April Robin, of Lois Lattimer, of Adelle Lattimer, even of Pearl Durzy as she must have looked, long ago. The rose-faces nodded to him warmly and amiably, the leaves on the rosebushes held themselves out to him and turned miraculously into dollar bills. Then his Uncle Herman’s face appeared through the smiling blooms, red-faced and cross, reminding him that he’d never get rich or famous or anything else if he didn’t get up and sweep out the store in the morning, and Uncle Herman’s hand reached out through the dollar-bill leaves and shook him rudely by the shoulder.

Bingo sat upright, rubbing his eyes.

It wasn’t Uncle Herman, it was Handsome. He smelled faintly of photographic chemicals, his good-looking face was pale, and his eyes were very bright.

“Bingo,” he said, “I’m sorry I woke you up. But I’ve been making these pictures, and there’s one you got to see, right away.”

Bingo yawned and said, “We don’t have to mail these out right now, do we?”

“I made an enlargement of this one,” Handsome said. “Because I thought I saw what I was looking at, and then I wasn’t too sure, so I made an enlargement right away.”

Bingo took the picture and gazed at it. It showed the pool of the Skylight Motel, with Mariposa DeLee posed gracefully against the loafer-lounge. It showed, also, most of the apartments in the background, including the one they had briefly inhabited.

“A very nice picture,” Bingo said approvingly. “She ought to order a whole bunch of these. Maybe not such a large size, but—”

“Bingo,” Handsome said, “just please look where I’m pointing. The window of the apartment over near the office. There’s somebody looking out of it. I wasn’t real sure until I enlarged it, but—”

Bingo looked closely. It wasn’t what he’d expected to see, or even wanted to see.

“It isn’t a very good picture of her,” Handsome said apologetically, “because of the light, and because it was through a pane of glass, but, Bingo, that’s Pearl Durzy.”

Fourteen

Bingo said, “Well, I wonder what she was doing there!” He realized immediately it wasn’t the brightest remark of a lifetime, but it was the best he could do under the circumstances.

“Well,” Handsome said, “maybe she had some business with Mrs. Mariposa DeLee.”

“And left this house, for the first time in years, to go see Mrs. Mariposa DeLee, just after we’d come here and bought this house, I mean, practically bought this house, and then she came back here and somebody murdered her.” Bingo paused. “Maybe we’d better call up Perroni.”

Handsome said, “If you think so, Bingo.” He said it a little limply.

The partners exchanged a long and thoughtful look.

“On second thought,” Bingo said, “maybe we ought to talk to Mrs. DeLee ourselves. After all, we have an excuse to visit. To deliver those pictures we made for a present for her.” Suddenly he stood up straight. “Excuse, nothing!” he said indignantly. “A lady who later got murdered in our house, for some reason was in her house, motel I mean, shortly before she got murdered, and she should consider herself lucky it’s just us, her friends, asking questions!”

Handsome said meekly, “I’ll put the prints in an envelope. The ones we made for presents.”

Suddenly everything seemed all wrong, unpleasantly and terribly wrong. There could be no possible link between Pearl Durzy, the April Robin mansion and Skylight Motel. There couldn’t be. And yet, there was the picture, and Pearl Durzy looking through the window.

Perhaps everything could suddenly be all right. Perhaps the questions about Pearl Durzy could be answered in a hurry.

He wasn’t reassuring himself one bit. He told himself there was no reason to be frightened. Then he told himself that maybe it would be better to call Perroni after all. Then he told himself that they didn’t want to get any more involved with the police than they were already. Then he told himself that it might be a good idea to get a good night’s sleep and worry about all this in the morning. Then he just wished, again, that he were back in New York.

But there was still the April Robin mansion. He turned his head to look at it as Handsome drove down the driveway. And at least for the time being, it was as good as theirs.

Going down Sunset he said suddenly, “Slow down, Handsome.” He spotted the map stand and said, “Stop a minute.”

Why hadn’t it occurred to him before? Florence, who had the map stand, who’d been established there for so many years, who was an old friend of Courtney Budlong! She’d have the answer to who Courtney Budlong was, and where.

He dodged traffic across the street, put on his most engaging smile and said, “Florence, where can I find Mr. Budlong? Your friend, Mr. Courtney Budlong?”

She gave him a cold glare and said, “I don’t know any Mr. Budlong, and my name isn’t Florence. D’ya want to buy a map?”

Bingo said, “We bought one, yesterday. Remember? Mr. Budlong was here talking to you. He brought it over to us. He said he was an old friend of yours.”

She went on looking at him coldly. He went on desperately, describing Mr. Courtney Budlong. She not only looked cold, she looked blank. “He said he’d known you for years,” Bingo said. “He told us you knew everything about Hollywood and everybody in Hollywood—”

The woman said, “My name’s Lillian. I’m from Kansas. I’ve been here six months and I don’t know anybody, and I run this stand on a concession. Yesterday there was a gent stopped by to pass the time of day. I never saw him before. He just walked up here and started to gab. You guys stopped and bought a map and he handed it to you and gave me the money. And if anything was wrong with that map, don’t blame me, blame the printer.”

“There was nothing wrong with the map,” Bingo said. “And thank you very much.”

He was grateful that Handsome didn’t ask any questions on the rest of the way to the Skylight Motel.

Mariposa DeLee was deeply engaged in a fan magazine in the front office. She had on turquoise-blue ranch pants, a ruffled lemon-yellow blouse, and there was a turquoise-blue ribbon on her curled pony tail. She didn’t look a day over fifty. She put down the magazine when they came in, smoothed back her hair a little, smiled and said, “Well! Didn’t you boys like your house?”

“Sure,” Bingo said. “We’re crazy about it. We’re crazy about you, too. So we brought you the pictures we made for you. The presents.”

She reached for the envelope and looked happy.

“There’s an enlargement in there,” Bingo said. He hoped his voice didn’t sound hoarse. “We made it special. Take a real, good close look at it.”

She said, “Oh, I know I’ll like it!” and then her voice stopped suddenly. She was silent for a moment, and motionless. Then she looked at them.

“Okay,” she said, and her voice was hard as nails, “did you take this on purpose?”

“Believe me, lady,” Handsome said earnestly, “we didn’t know there was anybody there. We were just trying to take a nice picture of you by your swimming pool.”

There was another brief silence. Then she shrugged her shoulders. “All right, you got a picture of somebody looking out the window. I suppose you could retouch that out.”

“That somebody has already been retouched out,” Bingo said. “Or don’t you read the newspapers?”

Mariposa DeLee laid the picture down and said, “Yes. I read about it. And that’s all I know. What I read in the papers.”

“She was here,” Bingo said. “She’d never left the house where she was caretaker, not in years. Yesterday she came here. And then she went back to the house, which we had just bought, and somebody murdered her.”

Handsome said gently, “We didn’t think we ought to tell the police about this picture. Because you’re a friend of ours.”

“So if maybe you’ll tell us why she was here,” Bingo said, “and looking out the window—”

“She was here to see you,” Mariposa DeLee said, suddenly, wearily. “She saw you going around the house, talking about buying it. She knew you were going to get gypped, because she knew the house wasn’t for sale. She heard you say something about staying here, at the Skylight Motel, and she came here to warn you, that’s all.”

“Then,” Bingo said, “why didn’t she come right out and talk to us, instead of hiding behind a window?”

“Because—” Her voice stopped again.

“The police would really be fascinated with this picture,” Bingo said. “But since we are old friends—”

They stared at each other for a long moment. Then Mariposa DeLee suddenly seemed to look much older, and much smaller. “All right, boys,” she said, “come inside and have some coffee.” She led the way into the apartment behind the office, nodded to the aged woman who sat with her crocheting, said, “Okay, Maude, you can beat it,” and switched on an electric percolator.

She smiled wanly at Bingo and Handsome as the old woman trotted dutifully away, and said, “I know what you’re thinking, that’s no way to talk to your poor old mother. But if we’re going to be frank, we might as well be good and frank. She’s not my mother, and she’s not as old as she looks.” She reached for coffee cups. “Owning and running a place like this, with the kind of customers that show up from time to time, a girl needs a certain kind of window dressing, if you catch on. I got Maude from Central Casting, and she’s very happy with her job.”

“Maybe you’d better let me pour the coffee,” Handsome said, in his gentlest voice.

Mariposa DeLee looked at her hands, forced a smile and said, “Well, maybe I am a little nervous.”

Half a cup of coffee and two puffs of a cigarette later, she said, “All right, in this world a certain number of people are going to get gypped. For those who can afford it, it’s sometimes a laugh. I came up in the world the tough way, and I’d rather be on the side of the ones who are doing the gypping. If I can do it in a nice way, and without hurting anybody, I mean. Someday, I’ll own a whole chain of motels.” She added, “I hope you boys know what I mean.”

Bingo did. But he only said, “This Pearl Durzy—”

“I’ll get to that,” she said. She took another gulp of coffee. “Hell, I looked at it this way. You boys are rich, you’ve got a big business, you can afford to lose a little dough. And Charlie said he had a nice little thing lined up, if the right people could be steered his way. So I steered you his way.”

“Charlie?” Bingo said.

“Charlie Browne. Browne with an ‘e.’ He’s been a friend of mine a long time.”

“Plump little guy?” Handsome said. “Real gray hair and glasses, and dresses neat?”

“And wears cuff links and a tie pin with ‘C.B.’?” Bingo prompted.

“That’s him,” she said cheerfully. “I gave him those cuff links myself.” She looked at them sharply. “Now don’t misunderstand me, boys. Charlie was strictly a friend and a kind of business partner. No sentiment. He was, you could almost say, sort of related to me. We were friends way back when his wife died. And she was a sister-in-law of mine.” She poured a little more coffee. “Maybe I’m boring you.”

“Go on about Charlie Browne,” Bingo said. “I can’t hear too much about him!” Or about Courtney Budlong, either, he thought.

“Well,” Mariposa DeLee said, “this was a couple of years ago. I had a nice little place in Kimballsville. Where I started, as a matter of fact. Eight nice cabins, filling station and a little store. My sister-in-law, Miss DeLee, came out there. At least, I thought she was Miss DeLee, I didn’t know she was married. She didn’t have a lot of money, and she was real sick.”

She sighed and said, “She was such a sweet little thing, I would have taken care of her even if she hadn’t been a sister-in-law. Then her husband — that’s Charlie Browne — got there, and he just took charge. He was so good to her. Why, he nursed her as if he’d been her mother, not her husband. And when she died, it like to have broken his heart.” She sighed again. “She was buried right there, right in Kimballsville.”

There was a very brief pause. “Well?” Bingo said at last.

“Well, we went on being friends, and he gave me a lot of good business advice, and helped me set up this place and the one I have out near Victorville. I mean, he’s a friend, a real friend.” Then suddenly she looked up, her eyes narrowed and she said, “I mean, I considered him a real friend. He told me he had a very nice thing set up, if I could steer just the right people to him, and like I told you, I figured you could afford to lose a little money and Charlie certainly needed it. So all I was to do was call him up and tell him you were going out on a tour of where the movie stars lived and that you’d stop along the way to pick up a map. I didn’t know what he had in mind until he came back here and told me about it.” A smile touched her lips. “It was a smart stunt, any way you look at it.” The smile faded. “He was going to give me two hundred dollars, which was no more than fair, considering. But just about then, this old woman turned up.”

“Pearl Durzy,” Bingo said.

Mariposa DeLee nodded. “I didn’t know what her name was. But she was mean. Mean, and sore! She’d come out here to warn you boys off that house deal, which of course she would’ve been too late to’ve done, and then she saw Charlie and she got almost wild. And just about then you came driving up to check out and pick up your things. Charlie said he’d handle everything, and he told me to go out and see you, which I did.”

She drew a long breath. “She was right in here, in this apartment, all the time you were checking out, and taking pictures and everything. Charlie said something to her to calm her down, I don’t know what it was, but it worked. Because when I came back in, he said everything was fine, and she was going to go straight home, and there wouldn’t be any trouble.”

“But there was,” Bingo said softly. “There was a little trouble.”

“I don’t think Charlie Browne would’ve murdered her, or anybody,” Mariposa DeLee said, the friendliness gone from her eyes now. “He was too nice to his sick wife. But he never did give me my two hundred dollars.”

A little matter of murder might not bother Mariposa DeLee, Bingo reflected, but not getting her cut of two thousand dollars would. He said, “If you’ll tell me where I can find him—”

She shook her head. “I don’t know where he lives. The only phone number I had for him was a drugstore phone booth. But,” she said, “I’ll find him for you. I’ll get your money back for you, too. So don’t worry.”

Find him, her eyes said, dead or alive.

Fifteen

“Bingo,” Handsome said, halfway home, “how much of what that Mrs. DeLee told us do you believe?”

Bingo sighed and was silent for a moment. Then he said, “I don’t know just why, but somehow I believe most of it.” He noticed they were passing the spot where the map saleswoman had been during the daylight hours, and scowled deeply. “Mr. Courtney Budlong,” he said, “I mean, Mr. Charlie Browne, said something to Pearl Durzy that made her calm down and go straight home. I wish I knew what it could’ve been.”

“Maybe,” Handsome said diffidently, “he told her he was going to give her two hundred dollars, too.”

Bingo thought that over. He was beginning to have a feeling that their Mr. Courtney Budlong, Charlie Browne, not only wouldn’t give anybody the time of day, but even the day of the week. On the other hand, he could have, in what must have been an emergency, promised Pearl Durzy two hundred dollars or more. He could have promised that he’d bring it to her that evening. He could have put the whole thing on a basis of good fellowship, and mixed her a drink. He could—

“I suppose he’d have had to murder that nice old lady,” Handsome said thoughtfully, “to keep her from telling us about everything.”

“Stop reading my mind!” Bingo snapped. Then, sorry for his temper, he added, “Please.”

Only the man who called himself Courtney Budlong would have had any reason to murder Pearl Durzy. Only he would have had reason to remove the note they’d left for her, telling her they wouldn’t need her any more.

A few blocks later Handsome said thoughtfully, “I suppose we ought to tell the police. Mr. Hendenfelder, I mean.”

Neither of them had the faintest idea of telling Perroni.

“Later,” Bingo said firmly. “It’s been a long day.” He added, as an afterthought, “Anyway, Handsome, the police don’t know where he is. So they couldn’t very well arrest him for murder.”

“No,” Handsome said. “Only, Bingo, they’re looking for him, anyhow. They might look for him a little harder.”

“I doubt it,” Bingo said. “Not with that Perroni thinking he might know where Julien Lattimer is.”

It had grown dark now, the sudden California darkness. As they turned in the driveway the enormous house loomed ominous and shadowy, only a faint light showing through the vines that overhung the front windows. Bingo shuddered.

“It looks sort of haunted,” Handsome said. He laughed, a strained little laugh. “Maybe April Robin haunts it.”

“We don’t know whatever happened to April Robin,” Bingo reminded him, keeping his voice steady somehow. He pushed open the front door and said, “It’s haunted by somebody, anyway.”

There was a girl stretched out on one of the davenports, reading a movie fan magazine. From the door they could see very brief lime-green shorts, halter and matching sandals, a lot of very white skin and a heavy mass of copper-red hair. She sat up as they came in, put down the magazine, and smiled.

There were a great many things to say, Bingo reflected, and none of them really seemed to fit the occasion. He stood by the doorway, deciding between “How did you get in?” “What are you doing here?” and “Who are you?”

Handsome said, “Well, hello again!”

The smile widened. Bingo noted dimples, attractive ones. “Oh, you did see me this morning.”

“Sure,” Handsome said easily. “And you ought to have more clothes on now. It gets colder than you’d expect after the sun goes down out here.”

“I have a coat,” she said, gesturing.

A mink, of a pale bluish gray, had been thrown over the arm of the sofa.

“After all,” she said, “if I’m going to ask you gentlemen for a job posing, or acting, you need to see my figure, don’t you?”

“It’s a nice figure,” Handsome said judiciously. “But you’ll have to watch your weight. People with that color eyes and hair tend to put on weight. They freckle, too.”

At least, Bingo said, he hadn’t told her she ought to wear glasses. He sat down on the other davenport before his knees gave way completely, lit a cigarette, and tried to look as though this sort of thing happened every day of his life.

“This morning was an accident,” she said. “I’d been posing for some pictures up in the model bureau, and I got tired. It was a late, late night last night. So I slipped down the back stairs and was just catching a quick nap in the vacant offices. I didn’t know anybody was going to come in, honest.”

Bingo found himself smiling back at her, and repressed it quickly. “But tonight—”

She shrugged her shoulders. Lovely shoulders, Bingo observed. “I knew you were just out here from the East, and you probably hadn’t seen any faces yet. And this seemed a good way to bring myself to your attention.” She added, “I’m a very ambitious girl.”

“I can see that,” Bingo said. “And just how did you get into what are now going to be our offices?”

“Oh that,” she said, as though it weren’t in the least important. “I used to use that empty office a lot. I’d snitched a key. From Pa.” She took a slim platinum cigarette case from a pocket of the mink. “I forgot. You don’t know who I am—”

Before Bingo could say, “You must be Janesse Budlong,” Handsome said, “We recognized you from your picture.” He paused. “It isn’t a very good picture, though.”

“I’ll say it isn’t,” she told him. “I hope you can take a better one.”

“I hope so too,” Handsome said earnestly.

“Look here,” Bingo said. “Why?” He felt a little helpless. “You don’t need to—” He gestured feebly. “What I mean is, a girl like you shouldn’t have to be an actress or a model or anything.” He gestured again, toward the platinum cigarette case and the mink. “It’s like this. You’ve already got all these things.”

“I told you I was ambitious,” she said, lighting a cigarette. “Just because Pa’s rich doesn’t mean I can’t be ambitious. I photograph well, and I can act, too. I guess I’ve been to about every dramatic school there is out here. Only nobody wants to give me a chance. Everybody figures, if a girl has a rich Pa, she can’t act.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised if you could,” Bingo said mildly.

“Pa told me about you boys,” she said. “About you renting the office, and about your big picture and television company, and about you buying the April Robin house.” She sighed. “Golly, she must have been wonderful! And to think of you living here!” She said it with a kind of awe.

“She was indeed,” Bingo said. He found himself liking this girl. He likewise found himself wondering if Pa had told her the little complication involved in their purchase of the April Robin mansion. No, most likely not.

“Pa said he told you about me, and he’d arrange for us to meet,” she told them, “only I guess I got a little impatient, and so here I am.” She smiled again, this time appealingly. “I didn’t tell Pa, but he won’t mind. He’s very ambitious for me, too.”

“He is indeed,” Bingo said. “And it was very nice of you to drop in.” He thought fast. “And your father is going to have the surprise of his life.”

Victor Budlong had been very helpful to them. There was a better than average chance that he was going to be needed for more help in the future, while the actual ownership of the April Robin mansion remained undecided. “We’re going to take a few test pictures of you right now.” She had not, it seemed, come unprepared. While Handsome got out lights and a camera, she pulled a tiny suitcase from behind the davenport, a suitcase that contained an amazing amount of wardrobe.

Handsome took pictures in the shorts and halter, in the mink, in a ginghamish little housedress, and finally, in a demure navy blue sheath with a tiny white collar.

“You know,” she said thoughtfully, as she emerged from the improvised dressing room wearing the latter, “I bet I look a little like April Robin looked! And here I am, having my picture taken in what used to be her house!”

Watching her pose, Bingo had a sudden feeling that she might be right. She might put on weight, as Handsome had predicted, but she didn’t have it now. And she was small, with tiny, beautiful hands and feet. Wearing the demure navy blue dress, she could indeed be imagined as April Robin had looked.

“Whatever did happen to her?” she said at last, the pictures over, and the wardrobe back in its case.

“I don’t know,” Bingo said. “Nobody seems to know.” He paused. “Why not ask your father?”

She shook her head. “He doesn’t know. In fact, he didn’t even know this had been her house, until this morning.”

A sudden thought struck Bingo. “Look here,” he said sternly. “Look here, Miss Budlong.”

“Please call me Janesse,” she begged prettily.

“All right. Look here, Janesse. You said you snitched a key from your father to get into our offices. Before they were our offices, I mean. Only,” he said, and very sternly now, “you didn’t snitch a key to get into this house from your father, because he didn’t have one, because his company didn’t handle this house.”

There was a rather dreadful silence.

“The door—” she began weakly.

“The door was not unlocked,” Bingo said, scowling at her. “I locked it myself.”

This time there was a longer silence.

“Well?” Bingo demanded.

“Oh, all right,” she said. There was an almost sullen note in her voice. “I snitched a key from somebody else. He doesn’t know it, because I snitched it and had a copy made and put his back again.”

“Why?” Bingo asked.

“Honest,” she said, “it was only because I was curious to see the inside of the house.”

“Because of April Robin?” Bingo asked.

“No. I didn’t know about April Robin having built the house until today, either. It was because of the Lattimers. The murder and everything. I read about it, and I was curious.”

Handsome had paused in the middle of putting away his equipment. Bingo said, trying to hide his interest, “Did you ever find anything interesting here?”

“No. Because I never got in. That housekeeper was always here. The one that was murdered last night.” She looked up suddenly. “I bet Mrs. Lattimer murdered her, too. I bet Mrs. Lattimer came back because that housekeeper could have proved she murdered Mr. Lattimer, and murdered the housekeeper so she wouldn’t tell!” Her brown eyes were glowing.

“She waited a long time to do it,” Bingo said. “And don’t change the subject.” He’d almost said, “We know who murdered the housekeeper,” and caught himself just in time.

“Well, she might have,” Janesse Budlong said.

“Who did you snitch the key from?” Bingo almost roared.

She stared at him, her face suddenly unhappy. “A friend of mine. A sort of a boy friend of mine. Not exactly a boy friend, either. I just sort of romanced him along a little because he was sure he could get me in pictures. He’s a real big shot. And — I think, last week — we were driving past here in my car and he bragged he had keys to it.” She drew a long breath. “He even promised to show me through it sometime, but he never did. I guess he was just a show-off. So when I saw a chance to snitch one of the keys and get it copied and get it back, why, that’s what I did.” Her tone of voice added that she was glad she did.

A grim and suspicious thought had been growing in Bingo’s mind. “Tell me,” he said very gently, “did you ever provide him with any writing paper and office supplies?”

She grinned. Then she grew very sober. “How did you know about that?”

“Never mind,” Bingo said. He gave her his friendliest and most reassuring smile. “We’re going to be friends, Janesse. And something is going to come of those lovely pictures we took tonight.” Just what, he had no idea, but he’d worry about that later. “So as a friend, you really ought to tell us—”

“It was for a joke he wanted to play on someone,” she told him. “A few pieces of letter paper and some forms and some envelopes from Pa’s office. It was just for a harmless joke.”

Two thousand bucks’ worth of harmless joke, Bingo thought. But at least, that cleared that up.

“All right,” he said, “who was he?”

She shrugged her shoulders again. “I don’t see any harm in telling you. It was Clifford Bradbury. You may meet him sometime.”

Bingo and Handsome glanced at each other. “We’d like to,” Bingo said. “We’d like to very much.”

Another thought struck him. “I don’t suppose he ever told you how he happened to have the keys to this house?”

She stared at him. But before she could say a yes, a no, or just look stubborn, there was a startlingly loud ring at the door.

Janesse Budlong jumped up, collecting the mink, the cigarette case and the small suitcase in one quick move. She looked around a little helplessly.

Handsome pointed wordlessly toward the empty library. Janesse nodded and fled. The doorbell rang again.

“Damn it, Handsome,” Bingo said, ignoring the doorbell, “how did he get keys to this house? Nobody seems to worry much about that, either, except us. And,” he added, scowling, “he may still have a set.” It wasn’t a cheering thought.

Sixteen

It was Chester Baxter who stood in the doorway. He looked tired and a little dusty, and there was a faint odor of beer on his breath. But he looked pleased.

“You’ve found him?” Bingo said excitedly. “Where is he? What’s his real name?”

“Give a guy a chance to catch his breath, willya?” the small man said, puffing. “I walked all the way here from the bus stop.” He came in and sat down. “Why people want to live miles and miles from a bus stop, I don’t know. I ought to have a car.”

“We’re not going to buy one for you,” Bingo said. The next moment he relented. Chester Baxter did look very tired indeed. “Handsome,” he said, “do we have any beer left?”

They did. Handsome brought it out. Bingo offered a cigarette. The little man seemed to revive considerably.

“All right,” Bingo said. “Where is he?”

“I don’t know where he is right this minute,” Chester Baxter said. He finished the beer in a gulp. “But I know where he’s going to be later tonight. That’s what I need the extra expense money for.”

“Who said anything about extra expense money?” Bingo demanded.

“I did,” Chester Baxter said. “Just now.” He raised a placating hand. “Wait a minute. I don’t need very much. Five dollars will do it. I have had expenses I didn’t anticipate, making my investigation this afternoon. But since I succeeded in my objective—”

“How do we know you’re going to find him?” Bingo said, trying to be stern. “How do we know you won’t just keep coming back with more stories and your hand out for more expense money?”

Chester Baxter gave him a wounded look. “Sir,” he said stiffly, “there is a matter of honor. Especially in my business.”

Bingo could see the justice of that. He reached for his wallet, took out a five-dollar bill and handed it over. “Is it any of our business what you’re going to use it for?”

“Expenses,” the small man said, pocketing the money. “Frankly, buying drinks for various people in the place where your Courtney Budlong, whose real name is probably Twivelpiece, or Ripsling, or Slidge, or something like that, is going to be, later in the evening.”

Bingo eyed him thoughtfully. “If you know exactly where he’s going to be—” he began slowly.

Chester Baxter shook his head. “It would not do at all. Yes, certainly you could inform the police and they could pick him up at this place I am speaking of. Or you could go there yourselves. But,” he said firmly, “the proprietor of this place is a friend of mine, and so are many of his regular patrons. It would not do for the police, or the general public, to get the impression that this is a favorite recreation place for—” He paused.

“All right,” Bingo said, “we get what you mean. And when he turns up at this thieves’ hangout, what do you plan to do?”

Chester Baxter looked pained at Bingo’s choice of words. “I shall tag along and find out where he holes up,” he said. “And immediately let you know.” He added, “I may even engage him in conversation at the bar, though it might be better not.”

“Much better not,” Bingo agreed. He wondered if he ought to tell the small man that Courtney Budlong-Charlie Browne-Clifford Bradbury was not only a con man, but probably a murderer.

“And don’t worry about me,” Chester Baxter said, “I can take care of myself.” His lips pulled back in an unpleasant grin. He was silent for a moment. “You know,” he said reflectively, “I’ve been thinking. There is more to this than the matter of the little job he pulled on you.”

“Five dollars,” Bingo said firmly, “is all!”

Chester Baxter waved his hand deprecatingly. “Who said anything about more money? No. I have been doing some looking into the future, yours and mine.”

“When I need our fortunes told—” Bingo began.

“You don’t follow me at all,” Chester Baxter said. “This man gave you papers in exchange for your money. I saw them at the police station. They had Julien Lattimer’s signature on them. His genuine signature.”

“Well?” Bingo said.

“So,” Chester Baxter said, with a look of triumph, “Julien Lattimer must still be alive somewhere. There must be a reward for finding him.”

“No doubt,” Bingo said.

“All right then,” Chester Baxter said gleefully. “Our man, your Courtney Budlong fella, he must know where Julien Lattimer is. It only remains to sweat it out of him. Therefore,” he finished, “since I find him, I’m entitled to half the reward.”

“Ten percent,” Bingo said automatically, and before he’d had time to think it through.

“Now, now, now,” Chester Baxter said. “I will have done all the work. And I will have taken all the chances.”

Bingo remembered again that the man they were seeking had, in all probability, killed Pearl Durzy, and said, “Twenty-five percent, and that’s final.”

“Oh, all right,” the small man said. He smiled and said, “I probably would have settled for ten.”

“Only,” Handsome said, “look. What’s to stop you from going right to the police when you find him, and collecting all the reward yourself? If there is a reward?”

It was another of the times Bingo wished Handsome would have kept his good-looking but big mouth shut.

Again Chester Baxter wore a pained look. “My dear young man,” he said, “I don’t want to be mentioned in connection with this, in any way. I will give you the information. You can give it to the police, or follow it up yourselves. If there is any money coming, I will drop around and collect.”

There would be no doubt of that, Bingo told himself.

“However,” Chester Baxter said, “think how it would look in my profession if it became known that I had, so to speak, put the finger on this guy? I have a reputation to maintain.”

“I would never, never damage anyone’s professional reputation,” Bingo said very solemnly. “Your name will never be mentioned.”

After the small man had gone, Handsome sighed and said, “Bingo, do you think he really knows where our Mr. Courtney Budlong is, or did he just want another five bucks?”

Bingo had been wondering the same thing, but he said, “He sounded like he knew. And if he does, it’s worth five bucks.”

A moment passed. “Bingo,” Handsome said, “it’s like you were saying this afternoon. If he finds our Mr. Courtney Budlong, and then the police find where Mr. Julien Lattimer is, what if he wants his house back?”

Bingo had been thinking that, too. He said crossly, “Don’t bother me with trifles.” Then, in a milder tone. “Remember, we’d get our two thousand bucks back.”

“Less what might’ve been spent out of it,” Handsome said gloomily. “And less the ten percent to this little guy.”

“Don’t be a defeatist,” Bingo said severely. “Think big. And there are other houses.” In the depths of his heart, he knew he was going to be a little relieved to get out of this one, but he wouldn’t have admitted it to Handsome, or even to himself. He called, “Janesse!”

There was no answer. He called again, louder. Handsome went to look, came back and reported, “She’s gone.”

“Gone?”

“There’s a door out of that pink marble library,” Handsome said. “She must’ve slipped out that way.”

Bingo scowled. “Maybe she just wanted to go home.” He brightened. “Oh well, we found out where that writing paper and the receipt came from.”

“And we got some nice pictures,” Handsome said. “She photographs fine, Bingo. I can tell even without printing them. Bingo, maybe she’s a property.”

Bingo stared at him. “A few days in Hollywood, and already you’re learning the language.” He relaxed, loosened his tie and undid his shoes. It had indeed been a long day.

“Only, Bingo,” Handsome said, “do you think we ought to tell the police we know about the writing paper now? And about him murdering Miss Pearl Durzy?”

“Tomorrow, maybe,” Bingo said. He yawned. “Handsome, we don’t know for sure he murdered Pearl Durzy. And also, if we tell about the paper we could maybe get Janesse in trouble, and like you say, maybe she’s a property.” He smiled wearily. “We don’t call them, they’ll call us.” He yawned again.

Handsome went into the improvised darkroom. Bingo stretched out on the davenport to think everything over. He thought it over for roughly thirty seconds, and then closed his eyes.

He woke some time later from a complicated dream involving April Robin (looking very much like a combined Janesse Budlong and Mariposa DeLee), the Brown Derby, his Uncle Herman, a swimming pool, and food. Mostly food. The dream seemed to persist as he half opened his eyes, and he realized simultaneously that he was hungry and that there was a maddening and wonderful smell of food in the air.

“I remembered we didn’t have any dinner,” Handsome was saying. “So I took two dollars and went up to Goody-Goody’s and got a sack of hamburgers. And some milk. I hope I did okay, Bingo.”

“Handsome,” Bingo said fervently, “you never did better in your life.”

Two hamburgers later he sighed happily, leaned back, lighted a cigarette and said, “Handsome, I just thought of something. For so long we talked about coming to Hollywood. Now we’re in Hollywood. In a mansion that used to belong to a movie star. And we’re only a few minutes’ drive from the restaurants we always talked about. Romanoff’s. The Brown Derby. Chasen’s. Don the Beachcomber. All the rest. And what happens? For three meals in a row we eat hamburgers, from Goody-Goody’s.”

Handsome said seriously, “They’re swell hamburgers, though. And, Bingo. Those pictures. Janesse Budlong.”

Bingo looked up with quick interest. “Well?”

Handsome just said, “Gosh!”

He produced them. Bingo looked at them for a long moment. Then he said, “Gosh!”

“Only,” Handsome said, “nobody has done anything about it. Girls come from all over the world and get to be movie stars. And here’s a girl lives right here, probably all her life, and looks like this, and never gets anywhere. Bingo, why is that?”

Bingo didn’t know, but he wasn’t going to say so. “Maybe she can’t act.”

Handsome looked skeptical. Then he said, “She was acting most of the time she was here, and she was good.”

Bingo had to concede that. “Maybe she never knew the right people before.”

“Her pa does,” Handsome said stubbornly. “Her pa must know everybody, a big important man like him.”

“Maybe that’s why,” Bingo said. “Maybe everybody got sort of used to seeing her around, and just kept thinking she was just Mr. Victor Budlong’s little girl, and never thought of her as audience-bait.” He liked that last phrase and rolled it around his tongue. “Audience-bait. Well, she knows us now.”

There was someone at the door. Bingo said quickly, “If that’s Perroni and Hendenfelder, don’t tell them about Chester Baxter and—” It was not Perroni and Hendenfelder. It was Adelle Lattimer.

She came in majestically, walking with a panther-like rhythm. She was wearing a pearl-colored slack suit that sparkled where the light touched it; a string of what Bingo decided had to be rhinestones coiled through her sleek dark hair and matched another string wrapped around her wrist. She looked beautiful and more than beautiful, Bingo thought, wondering how long it would be before he saw a woman wearing skirts in public again.

“Sorry for the late visit, boys,” she said cheerfully, sitting gracefully on the arm of the davenport across from Bingo. “But your light was on. And I have to protect my interests. Also, I have something to ask you about. Is there any beer in the house?”

There was. The late Pearl Durzy had left the refrigerator well stocked.

“Thanks, boys,” she said. “Now listen. Do you know a cute, funny little confidence man named Chester Baxter?”

Bingo and Handsome looked at each other. Then Bingo said, “Well — well, yes. But what makes you think” — he’d almost said, “How do you know?” — “he’s a confidence man?”

“Written all over him,” Adelle Lattimer said. “Besides which, he came to me with a very confidence man type proposition. He also said he was working for you, which is mostly why I am here.” She finished off a glass of beer and poured another. “Amazing, how I keep my figure. Must be my metabolism. Anyway, is he working for you, or is he working for you?”

“Well,” Bingo said uncomfortably, “you might say that, in a way, he is.”

“That’s what I wanted to know,” she said cheerfully. “Because he tells me he’s going to find some buzzard you guys are looking for in some connection with this house-buying deal. He didn’t tell me in just what kind of connection.”

Chester Baxter, Bingo decided, was, in his way, a man of honor.

“Anyway,” she went on, “he tells me this character he is going to locate knows where Julien Lattimer is, and that you know about it. Am I right or am I wrong?”

“You’re right,” Bingo said. “I mean, according to what this man Chester Baxter says.” He was beginning to feel very unhappy about the whole thing.

“Fine,” she said, even more cheerfully. “That’s exactly what I wanted to know. Because if Julien Lattimer is alive, and this little con man finds him, then the chances are that I collect my back alimony.” She looked at Bingo and Handsome sympathetically. “Too bad you won’t get to collect for finding his corpse. Thanks for the beer.” She rose to leave.

“Just a minute,” Bingo said. It was late, and in spite of the nap and the hamburgers, he was cross. “Chester Baxter is working for us. If through him Julien Lattimer is located, any deal has to be made through us. Chester Baxter is also a friend of ours. What cut of the alimony are you ready to offer?”

“Why, you damned New York high-binders!” she said. She sat down and called them worse than that. Then she lit a cigarette and said, “All right, we’ll talk business.” After fifteen minutes of bickering, they decided on the same agreement as for finding Julien Lattimer’s body. Ten percent. At that point, Bingo decided that the whole arrangement should be put in writing. Fifteen minutes later she’d agreed to that too, and written a brief note.

“This is probably illegal,” she said, “and hard as hell to explain if the cops ever find it, but you’ve got the note, and you’ll have to do the explaining. When do you expect to hear from this little guy?”

“Tonight,” Bingo said, and immediately bit his tongue.

She nodded. “Maybe I’d better stay here tonight.”

“There are only these two davenports,” Bingo said stiffly. “And my partner and I have done a long day’s work. Unless,” he added, with a faint touch of malice, “you’d like to sleep in what was Pearl Durzy’s room.”

Adelle Lattimer didn’t flinch, but she said, “Maybe I’d better not stay. It wouldn’t look good, if the wrong people came in. I guess I just have to trust you to call me.”

“We’ll call you, all right,” Bingo said. There wasn’t any doubt of that. Living or dead, Julien Lattimer was going to mean money to them now.

After she had gone, he thought the whole thing over again. She was right, of course. The deal probably was illegal. Furthermore, it was definitely immoral.

On the other hand, he told himself, if Julien Lattimer was dead, he’d probably want to have his body found, and wouldn’t mind two young businessmen getting a small reward. Whereas if he was alive and hiding out so he wouldn’t need to pay alimony, he deserved to be found.

But Julien Lattimer, if alive, was a rich man. There was all that money that Herbert Reddy was looking after so tidily. He didn’t have any reason to hide out to avoid paying alimony.

The whole train of thought, he realized, was getting him right back to nowhere on every trip.

“Bingo,” Handsome said, a little anxiously, “Chester Baxter said he was going to find our Mr. Courtney Budlong tonight. Which means we’ll hear from him tonight—”

“I know,” Bingo said. “I don’t like to sleep in my clothes either. But I guess we’d better be ready to move fast.” The herringbone worsted suit needed pressing by now anyway, he consoled himself, and the natty brown pin-stripe was ready on its hanger for tomorrow.

He took off his tie, slipped out of his shoes, loosened his belt, and made himself as comfortable as he could, pulling the blankets up to his chin. Handsome turned off the lights.

Lying there in the darkness of the enormous room, he became aware of the faint perfume in the air, a light, delicate perfume. It could have been Janesse Budlong’s. It could have been Adelle Lattimer’s. He hoped with all his heart it belonged to one of them. He hoped it belonged to some living woman—

Nonsense, he told himself sternly, there were no ghosts. He closed his eyes and tried to think of something else. Inevitably, his thoughts went to April Robin.

It was some time later when Handsome whispered, “Bingo, are you still awake?”

It would have been so easy to pretend he was asleep, but he whispered back, “Yes,” and then said out loud, “What am I whispering about? There’s nobody here but us.” He opened his eyes and said, “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing, Bingo,” Handsome said in the darkness. “Only I was thinking. Wouldn’t it be funny if it turned out Pearl Durzy was, I mean had been, really, April Robin?”

“That’s funny,” Bingo said sleepily. “I was just thinking the same thing.”

Neither of them spoke after that. This time, when Bingo finally slept, he didn’t dream.

He had no idea what time it was when Handsome shook him very gently by the shoulder and whispered, “Bingo! Psst!” He sat up, wide awake.

“Bingo,” Handsome whispered, very low, “I think we’ve got a prowler. I think someone’s trying to get in our house.”

Seventeen

“Don’t get excited,” Bingo hissed. “Don’t turn the lights on. Don’t make any noise.” He wondered if Handsome could hear his teeth chattering.

“Should I call the police?” Handsome whispered.

“No!” Bingo told him. “We’ll handle this ourselves.” He stood up, thanking his stars he had his clothes on. “It can’t be Chester Baxter,” he whispered, “he’d ring the bell. It can’t be Courtney Budlong, he probably still has keys.” He drew a long breath. “Never mind who it is. We’d better look!”

The faint but definite sounds of someone in the garden had ceased momentarily. Now they began again, soft and stealthy. Someone seemed to be looking for someone.

Bingo caught himself about to say, “You look outside, and I’ll watch inside in case he tries to open a window.” That was no way for the president and senior partner of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America to behave. He slipped on his jacket and said, “Be careful, now.”

There was the unmistakable sound of a window being tried at the rear of the house.

As they slipped outside, Bingo realized that it must be near morning, there was a faint, grayish light. He wondered a little wildly if here in Southern California daylight came in with a rush the same way the dark came down. If it did, it should be bright as noon any minute now.

They stole around the corner of the big house, keeping to the shadows of the wall through the rose garden, and then they saw him, a tall, attenuated figure, cautiously trying a window.

Bingo saw Handsome brace himself for a flying tackle, put out a quick restraining hand, thrust his right hand into the pocket of his jacket and said in a voice that, to him at least, sounded strong and steady, “Stand still, or I’ll shoot!”

The man turned around, slowly.

“Keep your hands where I can see them,” Bingo barked, using a line from a long-remembered movie, “and walk over here.”

The dark figure moved closer, empty hands in sight. As the dim gray light struck his face, Bingo recognized the ice-eyed man who had been in the crowd the afternoon before. He didn’t look ice-eyed now. He looked a little frantic.

“Well,” Bingo said, “you pick a funny time to go collecting souvenirs. Or are you looking for a new place to train birds and keep rentable reptiles?”

“I got about as much right to be here as you have,” the man said sullenly. “I’m William Willis.”

“You told us that already,” Bingo said. “That doesn’t explain why you’re trying to break in our house.”

“If it is your house,” William Willis said. He pulled back his shoulders and said, “I’m Mrs. Lois Lattimer’s brother.”

“Well,” Bingo said. “That makes things different.” He added quickly, “But not very different.”

William Willis said, “Mister, I don’t have anything against you, and I don’t think you have anything against me. I hope. Can we sit down some place and talk this over?”

“Sure,” Bingo said. “Let’s go inside out of the cold.” He remembered just in time to add, “But don’t forget, I’ve got you covered.”

William Willis marched obediently into the house and sat down on one of the davenports. Handsome switched on the lights and vanished into the kitchen to make coffee.

Seen now at this hour, the tall, thin man seemed about as formidable as an abandoned kitten. Bingo relaxed, took his right hand out of his jacket pocket, and lit a cigarette. It pleased him to observe that his hand was not shaking.

“All right,” Bingo said, sounding as stern as he could, “go on and explain.”

William Willis cleared his throat and said, “The question seems to be, who explains first.”

“We have nothing to explain,” Bingo said coldly. “We own this house and we live in it.”

“So you told me this afternoon,” William Willis said. “You’ll pardon me if I sound a little skeptical.”

Bingo thought things over for a moment. No, he was damned if he was going to explain the whole situation to this intruder, who, for all he might be Lois Lattimer’s brother, was still a stranger. “There are still some formalities to go through,” he said, using up all the dignity he had in the world, “but our lawyer, Mr. Arthur Schlee, assured us that our letter of sale and our receipt are sufficient for the present.” He stressed the “Mr. Arthur Schlee” just a trifle.

William Willis made no comment.

“Now,” Bingo said, “you explain what you’re doing trespassing on — prowling around — our property in the middle of the night.”

“I—” William Willis paused.

Bingo looked at him with a sudden rush of sympathy. Their visitor looked pale, extremely tired, and more than a little disturbed. Bingo had a lot of questions to ask, but he decided to let them go until Handsome came back with the coffee. William Willis, he thought, didn’t look like the brother of a woman who had murdered her husband. If Julien Lattimer had been murdered. He looked right now like a weary man, approaching old age, who trained birds for a living and rented out reptiles of all kinds.

A cup of coffee later, everybody felt better. There was even a little color in William Willis’ sallow face. He put down his coffee cup and accepted a cigarette.

“Those papers you mentioned,” he said, scowling. “Was Julien’s signature on them?”

“Yes. But he’s supposed to be dead,” Bingo said, feeling his way with care.

“If he isn’t,” William Willis said, a twisted smile on his thin mouth, “he will be in two more years.”

It took a minute or so for Bingo to figure that one out. Sure. Seven years. Julien Lattimer would be legally dead. “Your sister—” he began.

“My sister,” William Willis said, “will at that time inherit everything. And, it is considerable, I assure you.”

“But your sister can’t inherit if—” Bingo paused again.

Again there was the wry, crooked smile. “My sister can’t inherit the estate if she murdered Julien. But you forget, that remains to be proved.”

Bingo thought that over. True, if Julien Lattimer or his body stayed lost until the seven years were up, it would be a damned difficult thing to prove that his wife had murdered him.

Handsome said earnestly, “I remember a story in a Sunday supplement about a wealthy millionaire and his wife. It was June 5, 1949, the day before prohibition was repealed in Kansas after sixty-nine years. There was a story in the main news section about that, too.”

“Were this wealthy millionaire and his wife in Kansas?” William Willis said, looking a little bewildered.

“Uh-uh,” Handsome said. “Long Island. It was on a right-hand page and there were pictures of both of them and their house. Neither of them was very good-looking, and I didn’t think much of the house.” He added, “Right across was an article about why people walk in circles when they get lost. Do you know it’s because practically everybody has one leg longer than the other?”

By now William Willis looked thoroughly confused and a little apprehensive. He looked anxiously at Bingo.

“It’s all right,” Bingo assured him. “My partner remembers everything. And that’s the way he remembers it.” He gave Handsome a stern look and said, “What about these millionaires?”

“Oh,” Handsome said. “They shot each other. And then his relatives and her relatives both wanted to inherit all the money. So it was a question of who shot who first. And who died first. And if the one who died last shot in self-defense, so it wouldn’t be murder. It was kind of a problem because it looked like they both shot at about the same time.”

“How did it come out?” Bingo asked, fascinated in spite of himself, and forgetting his own troubles for the moment.

“Well,” Handsome said, “it turned out there wasn’t any money anyway because it seemed he had invested all of it in a tin mine somewhere where there wasn’t any tin. So it didn’t really matter.”

“But this does matter,” William Willis said. “I loved my sister very much. But I’ve got to think of myself, too. If Julien Lattimer is dead, and then if anything would happen to Lois—” His voice faded away.

“You’d be able to buy a lot of birdseed,” Bingo said, “and food for those rentable reptiles.” He counted to ten and said, “Where is your sister now?”

The look on William Willis’ face simply said that he was not going to answer that. Whether or not he knew where she was hiding was another question.

“A little more coffee,” Bingo said. He felt another rush of sympathy for their visitor. “Mr. Willis,” he said warmly, “I’m beginning to think we’ll all get a little further if we’re friends.” He looked at the man who had so obviously been up all night, who must have been through a bad few years. He was glad to see Handsome bring some warmed up coffee cake along with the pot of coffee.

The smile he gave William Willis came from his heart. “You were prowling around what may or may not be our house. We don’t care, and I speak for my partner as well as myself.” He felt the smile widening. “Maybe if you’d tell us why you were trying to get in the house, and what you were looking for, we could help you find it.”

William Willis looked up at him with anguished eyes.

Handsome brought some butter to put on the coffee cake and said, apologetically, “I wish we had some jam. Or some eggs.” He set the butter on the coffee table, produced a handful of paper napkins he’d found somewhere, and said, “Like in that story, Mr. Willis. I mean, if Mr. Julien Lattimer is dead but if your sister didn’t kill him, then she inherits this house and almost everything else, and then if anything happened to her this would be your house, so in a way you could consider us trespassers.” He handed William Willis the sugar. “But if you look at it this way, if Julien Lattimer is alive, and if he did sign those papers, why then we practically own this house and you are a trespasser.”

Bingo had a sudden and fleeting thought that maybe Handsome should have been a lawyer instead of a photographer.

Handsome handed William Willis the cream and said, “But it’s nicer to have you as our guest.”

“That’s exactly what I mean,” Bingo said. “So drink your coffee, and then let’s us all go looking for what you came here to find.”

“I don’t know what I’m looking for. Believe me, I’m telling the truth. It just seems to me that there must be something—” He paused. “I never was able to get into the house before. There was the caretaker guarding it. Last night I thought I could break in. I had no idea you would be here. I thought the house would be empty. That I could get in and dig around and look around—” He paused. “I don’t know what I expected to find, or where I expected to find it. Believe me, believe me, it was just that I wanted to search the house, by myself.”

Bingo said gently, “The police have done everything but tear down the walls.”

William Willis said, “I loved my sister very much.” He lifted his head and suddenly he didn’t look quite as tired, quite as defeated. “She was beautiful. She could have gone a long way in show business, if she hadn’t married that horrible, really horrible man for his money. She did, and it was a terrible mistake.” He stopped himself suddenly and said, “Look, I can’t possibly tell you all about it right now. Only it wasn’t just because of Julien Lattimer’s money. She was very frail, very delicate, her heart wasn’t too good. This Julien Lattimer offered her what seemed to be a snug harbor, a secure refuge. She didn’t realize—” He paused, bit his lip, and said, “She was an artist, a real artist. She did a slack-wire act—” His eyes suddenly looked into faraway and unseen places, as though he were seeing his little sister perform on the stage. For just an instant, Bingo could see her too, a dream image as April Robin was a dream image, frail, delicate, lovely, floating over space on a slack wire—

Bingo brought himself back to this earth and this day with a jolting effort. “Look, pal,” he said. “If we’re going to be friends, let’s you answer me just one or two quick questions. Do you know anyone named Courtney Budlong?”

William Willis brought himself back to earth, too. He looked a little bewildered and said, “No.”

“Do you know a Mr. Chester Baxter? A Mr. Charlie Browne?”

William Willis had never heard of them, either.

“Clifford Bradbury?” Bingo asked.

William Willis shook his head and didn’t even bother to say no. Bingo realized he was running out of questions. Not only that, but he wasn’t getting any answers.

“Mr. Willis,” Bingo said deprecatingly, “I’m what you might call sort of a fan of wire acts, and I don’t remember any Lois Willis.”

William Willis looked at him wearily and said, “Her name wasn’t Willis. I thought I told you, she was my stepsister. Her name was Lois DeLee.”

There was a little silence, and then Handsome said, “Oh.” Then there was a longer silence.

Bingo had a gross of questions to ask now. The question was, which one to ask first. He was turning them over in his mind when the doorbell rang with a grimly authoritative sound.

It was Perroni and Hendenfelder. They looked as though they’d been awake all night, too.

Perroni flashed his hard and professional smile and said, “Well. You’re up and dressed early this morning.”

Bingo cast desperately around for an answer and finally said, “We got up at dawn to watch the sunrise.”

“You couldn’t have picked a better time for it,” Perroni said. He looked at William Willis and said, “What are you doing here?”

William Willis looked helpless. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out of it.

“We’re businessmen,” Bingo said indignantly. “Mr. Willis trains birds and rents out reptiles. We’re just talking over some future deals.” Why he should cover up for William Willis, he didn’t know, but it seemed to be the thing to do at the time.

Perroni looked as though he believed William Willis had been there on a business deal, and also that flying saucers landed on a regular schedule at Giant Rock, but he didn’t make an issue of it.

“We brought you a little news,” Hendenfelder said. “That’s why we’re here so early. About Chester Baxter.”

“He’s dead,” Perroni said, making it obvious that he didn’t like to waste time.

“Found in an alley in Ocean Park, with his throat cut,” Hendenfelder said.

“And,” Perroni added grimly, “where were you boys all last night, and can you prove it?”

Eighteen

Bingo didn’t answer. He sank down on the davenport and whispered, “The poor little guy!”

“Well!” Perroni said. “So he was a friend of yours?”

Bingo didn’t answer that, either. He was thinking of Chester Baxter, a con man and not a very successful one, but with great plans for his future. Maybe if he’d succeeded in his mission it would have brought him the stake he had obviously needed so badly. Enough to take him back to San Diego and the rich widow. Maybe everything would have turned out fine. Little Chester Baxter had left the house, not so long ago, with a gleam in his eye and high hopes in his heart. And then, in an alley in Ocean Park — Bingo felt his stomach tilt a little.

Little Chester Baxter had been a man of honor, in his profession and according to his lights, and someone had cut his throat.

Bingo didn’t want to talk to Perroni, he didn’t want to talk to anybody. He just wanted to get away by himself and think things over. To his relief, Perroni turned his morose gaze on William Willis.

“All right, Willie, what are you doing here? Looking for your sister? We’ll find her first.”

William Willis moistened his lips. “It’s like these gentlemen said. I came over here to talk picture business.”

“Birds,” Handsome said helpfully. “Birds and reptiles.”

Perroni ignored him and went on coldly, “You sure pick a funny time of day for a business visit.”

“I get up very early every day,” William Willis said, his voice a little shaky. “That’s the way I am.”

“Sure,” Hendenfelder said amiably. “That’s the way you are because that’s the way you are.”

William Willis smiled at him wanly. “It’s what you might call a — well, like a—”

“Just a personal foible,” Hendenfelder said. “We know. This is Hollywood. Everybody’s got their little foibles.”

Perroni looked as though he wished Hendenfelder had smothered in his cradle, and said, “We’ll skip that. We can check why you’re here. Tell me, Willie—”

“Just because my sister was involved in a murder,” William Willis said, with sudden and incredible dignity, “just because she is suspected of a murder of which she is entirely innocent, there is no reason to call me Willie.” He lifted his chin another half inch and said, “My name is William Willis.” Even Perroni was put back on his heels for a moment or so.

“All right, Mister Willis,” the sad-eyed detective said icily, “did you know Chester Baxter?”

“I never heard of a Chester Baxter.” The look on his face dared Perroni, the whole police department, or anyone in the wide world to prove otherwise.

“And if I may be so rude as to ask,” Perroni said, “where were you last night and what were you doing?”

William Willis’ stare returned icicle for icicle. “I was in Bakersfield until one o’clock,” he said. “With my birds. Doing a benefit performance for a homeless dog shelter.”

Perroni nodded to Hendenfelder. “Check,” he said. Hendenfelder went into the kitchen to telephone.

Bingo reached for a cigarette. His hands were trembling, but only a little. He wanted to tell somebody about everything. About the deal with Chester Baxter. About Lois Lattimer’s name being DeLee. About Courtney Budlong having murdered Pearl Durzy. But he didn’t want to tell Perroni. He wasn’t even sure he wanted to tell Hendenfelder. He wished he were back in New York, twenty blocks from home, without carfare, and in the middle of a blizzard.

Perroni turned his unhappy gaze on Bingo and said, “And Mister Willis came here, at this early hour, to talk about the picture business?”

Bingo looked him straight in the eye and said, “You don’t think I’d lie to the police, do you?”

“Yes,” Perroni said, and settled that question once and for all.

“Handsome,” Bingo said, in a voice he hoped sounded bored, “call up our lawyer, Mr. Arthur Schlee. Tell him there’s a couple of cops bothering us, for nothing. Tell him if it’s out of his line, to get” — he searched his memory fast — “Jerry Giesler!”

Perroni held up a hand and said, “Any time you are going to need a lawyer, I’ll let you know. Right now, this is only a routine investigation. Me, I don’t care about this Chester Baxter character being murdered.”

“I do,” Bingo said, before he could catch himself.

Hendenfelder had come back from telephoning, and stood in the doorway, listening.

“And just what was this Chester Baxter character to you?” Perroni demanded.

“Nothing,” Bingo said miserably. Chester Baxter had been a crook, a con man, one who picked on wealthy and gullible widows. He thought of the ugly smile he’d seen on Chester Baxter’s mouth at the thought of catching up with the man who called himself Courtney Budlong. But he said, “It’s just that, well, nobody wants to be murdered.” There wasn’t anything else to say.

“That’s why you have a police department,” Perroni said. “But this Chester Baxter character doesn’t count.”

He’d counted very much to Chester Baxter, Bingo thought.

“My particular job is arresting Lois Lattimer for the murder of her husband,” Perroni said doggedly.

“Lois didn’t kill him,” William Willis said.

“And besides,” Bingo said, “he can’t possibly be dead.”

Hendenfelder eased himself into the room and said quietly, “It checks, Perroni. This guy’s bird act did a show last night in Bakersfield, the dog shelter benefit. Drew a big crowd and went over great.” He acknowledged William Willis’ thanks with a nod and a smile and said, “He didn’t get away from Bakersfield until almost one o’clock, so he couldn’t have gotten back here in time to cut Chester Baxter’s throat.” He coughed and said, “Besides which—” and then paused.

Perroni looked coldly at William Willis and said, “All right. Go home.”

William Willis lit a new cigarette and didn’t move. “Stay here, then,” Perroni said. He turned to Bingo and Handsome. “And where were you last night?”

“We weren’t out murdering Chester Baxter,” Bingo said. He was beginning to get mad now. “Handsome, go on and call Mr. Schlee.”

“Forget it,” Perroni said. “I only asked a simple question.”

“We were here,” Bingo said.

“I won’t ask you to prove it now,” Perroni said, in a very tired voice. He thrust his hands in his coat pockets, squared away and said, “Chester Baxter came back here to see you. Twice.”

Bingo started to say, “How do you know?” and then shut his mouth. But Perroni had caught his expression.

“We weren’t watching you, and we weren’t watching him,” he said. “But a guy from the bunco squad was keeping an eye on him. He came back here twice. So he must have had some kind of business with you. He went to a joint on Olympic. The Owl’s Roost. As might have been expected. It’s sort of a hangout for those guys. He bought drinks for a few people. He got confidential with a few people. To the effect that he was on the trail of some really important cash money. Then somehow the guy from the bunco squad lost sight of him around midnight. This morning a guy who lives a couple blocks from there went to take out his garbage, and found him.” He paused, fixed a grim stare on Bingo and said, “Well?”

“It’s a little complicated,” Bingo said. He wished William Willis weren’t present. Uncle Herman had told him, time and time again, “When in doubt, tell the truth.” He said uneasily, “Perhaps if I could talk with you alone—”

“I’m involved in this, too,” William Willis said. “My sister. My sister didn’t cut this man’s throat.”

“Nobody said she did,” Perroni told him, “and shut up.”

“Well,” Bingo said, “well, it’s like this. We wanted to find Mr. Courtney Budlong. I mean, the man who called himself Mr. Courtney Budlong.”

“Naturally,” Hendenfelder said soothingly. “Naturally.”

“And this Mr. Chester Baxter,” Bingo plunged on desperately, “was sure he could find him. He made a — we made a — an arrangement with him. In fact, he said he was sure he could find him last night.”

There was a little silence.

“I guess,” Hendenfelder said at last, and very gently, “your Mr. Courtney Budlong didn’t want to be found.”

Bingo had a sudden vision of Courtney Budlong’s friendly, benevolent face and silvery hair, and said, “No!” before he had time to think. “I mean. What I mean is — Mr. Courtney Budlong wouldn’t murder anybody—” He felt his voice stop dead in his throat.

“That type usually doesn’t,” Hendenfelder said.

“But,” Bingo said, “but he did!” He gulped. He looked at Hendenfelder as he said it. “He killed Pearl Durzy.”

No one said anything. It seemed to Bingo for a moment that he was completely alone in the world and probably at the bottom of a deep, deep well.

“Nice of you to tell us now,” Perroni said at last. “And why didn’t you tell us in the first place?”

He was not only alone in the world, but that world was coming to an abrupt end any minute, Bingo thought. He couldn’t, he daren’t involve Mariposa DeLee in this, since she was busily looking for the man who called himself Courtney Budlong. Yet, on the other hand, there was the chance that Mariposa DeLee could also be found up an alley with her throat cut.

Perroni began prowling around the room, ostentatiously looking under the davenports, behind the doors and in the fireplace. “What are you looking for?” Bingo asked. He was now beginning to wish the world would come to that abrupt end and get it over with.

Perroni stopped his prowling, resumed his stance and said, “I’m looking for the cat that got your tongue.”

William Willis thought that was very funny. Bingo didn’t.

Handsome said suddenly, “We figured out, Bingo and me, that he was the only person who needed to kill her. We were going to call you up and tell you about it, only it was sort of late at night, so we were going to call you up this morning.”

“And,” Bingo said quickly and with a smile, “being from out of town, we figured you were just like ordinary cops, and we didn’t want to disturb you too early. We didn’t know you cops work so hard and so long.”

Perroni didn’t fall for that one. “You should have called me right away if you had any ideas. On the Lattimer case, I’m working twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week and no holidays. How did you figure this out, or” — with the nasty smile — “am I being rude?”

“Well, look,” Bingo said. “Mr. Courtney Budlong — maybe we’d better go right on calling him that. It’s not so confusing.” Much less confusing than calling him Charlie Browne, or Clifford Bradbury. “When he showed us the house, this Pearl Durzy was around. She gave him some very dirty looks. And then, after we left—” He thought fast. A lot of details had to be skipped. “Well, I mean. We figured she knew he didn’t have the right to sell the house, and so she went and looked him up and tried to get some of the money, and he brought her back here and killed her.”

He realized right away that it didn’t sound convincing, it didn’t even sound intelligible.

Hendenfelder said, “But with Mr. Lattimer’s signatures on those papers, he did have the right to sell the house—”

“Julien Lattimer,” Perroni stated flatly, “is a murdered man. His wife killed him.”

“My sister,” William Willis said, “did not kill anybody.”

“You keep out of this,” Perroni said. He added, “Lois Lattimer would also have had reason to kill her. And to kill Chester Baxter.”

Everything came to another standstill. Handsome cleared his throat and said, “Only, I keep thinking. Pearl Durzy could’ve been anybody. Like she could’ve been, for example, April Robin.” He added diffidently, “On account of, nobody seems to know who Pearl Durzy is. Was.” He paused and then said even more diffidently, “Fingerprints.”

Perroni made a rude noise through his nose. “The Durzy woman evidently never had her prints made. The ones I got off her remains don’t match any other prints, anywhere.” Suddenly he relaxed a little, sat down on the arm of the davenport and said, “There just are no damned fingerprints anywhere. None of Mrs. Lois Lattimer. She didn’t drive a car much, and evidently when she did, she didn’t worry about a license. There aren’t any prints of Julien Lattimer, either.” He looked as though it were a personal affront to him.

There was another long pause. William Willis rose, stretched, looked at his watch and said, “I’ve got a fifteen-foot boa constrictor that has to be fed right on the nose of nine. And it’s quite a drive to my place—” He looked challengingly at Perroni.

“We know where to find you,” Perroni said sulkily.

William Willis looked at Bingo meaningfully and said, “I’ll be in touch with you. Soon.”

“Fine,” Bingo said heartily. “We’ll get some good pictures.”

Handsome said, “That reminds me. Mr. Hendenfelder. You wanted a souvenir to send to your little niece in Milwaukee. Why not a nice picture of you taken in the rose garden?”

Hendenfelder thought that was a wonderful idea. Handsome collected his camera and they followed William Willis into what was now sunlight.

Left alone with Perroni, Bingo said, “Believe me. I’m only trying to help.”

“You could have helped more if you’d stayed in New York,” Perroni said. “You guys come out here, you get into this house-buying mix-up, and all hell breaks loose. People get killed. I’ve been going along looking for Julien Lattimer’s body, and tracing Mrs. Lois Lattimer, and now, just where am I?” He lapsed into a melancholy silence.

“We’d like to help find Mr. Lattimer’s body,” Bingo said, “and Mrs. Lois Lattimer.”

Perroni gazed at him with mournful eyes and said, “Somehow I think my job would be easier if you didn’t help.”

Bingo said earnestly, “Look, the real reason we got together with Chester Baxter to locate our Mr. Courtney Budlong wasn’t because of the money we’d lost. It was because, obviously, our Mr. Courtney Budlong was a lead to Mr. Julien Lattimer.”

“I figured that out all by myself,” Perroni said sourly.

“Mr. Julien Lattimer did sign that letter and that receipt,” Bingo said.

“According to our top handwriting expert, he did,” Perroni said. “And when Clark Sellers says a signature is genuine, the signature is genuine.” He pulled his shoulders back in the gesture of one who will not concede the possibility of defeat. “But Julien Lattimer was murdered.” Perroni assumed the stance of a dedicated man.

“Mrs. Lattimer,” Bingo said. “She’s got to be somewhere.”

“That check in El Paso,” Perroni muttered. He wasn’t talking to Bingo now, nor to anyone, he was repeating something he’d said to himself over and over. “And the checks she passed here before she lit out. Those checks here were strictly phonies. She wrote them to herself, signed her dead husband’s name, endorsed them, and got away with it. Then, bang, she was gone. Reported in Acapulco, Kansas City, Toronto, hell, I can’t even name the places. Never the right babe, though. These small blondes all look alike. The check from El Paso, Lattimer’s signature was genuine. It was a check made out to Mrs. Lattimer by Julien Lattimer. Endorsed by her. Then she vanished. Where?” He glared at Bingo as though he might be hiding her in his pocket.

“She’s somewhere in this town,” Perroni said. “And she’s a killer. Maybe gone a little bit nuts, ready to kill anybody.”

Handsome and Hendenfelder returned before Bingo could say again that Julien Lattimer had been alive when he signed those papers.

Hendenfelder was beaming. He said, “I bet those pictures turn out swell! I’ll do something for you someday.”

Handsome said quickly, “You’ve done a lot already.”

Perroni stood by the door for a moment, glancing around the room as though he was considering searching the house again. Then he said, through tight lips, “I’ll find his body. And I’ll find her. You’ll see!” and went out with Hendenfelder.

Handsome looked anxiously at Bingo for a moment. Then he said, “I think there’s enough stuff left in the refrigerator to make us some breakfast—”

“Throw it all out,” Bingo said hoarsely. “It belonged to Pearl Durzy. Right now, I can’t eat a dead woman’s food.”

“Just as you say, Bingo,” Handsome said solicitously.

“Right now, I can’t eat anything,” Bingo said. He sat perfectly still for a moment. “Handsome, we’ll go to Goody-Goody’s after a few minutes, and get ham and eggs and fried potatoes.” He wasn’t going to admit he was scared, not to Handsome, not even to himself.

“Bingo,” Handsome said. “That Hendenfelder. He’s a very friendly person. He gave me the address of the Owl’s Roost. And the name of the bartender. And the names of some of the people who go there. He said the best time to drop in is around six or seven, after this bartender, his name is Matthew, comes on duty.”

It would be so easy to pack their belongings, take what cash they still had on hand, and head for New York. Fast. Bingo counted to five and then said, “Not a bad suggestion. We’ll drop in there tonight.”

The sun was streaming through the windows now, and this was a bright, brand-new, unused day.

He rose from the davenport and said, “While you finish up the pictures, I’ll take a shower.” He scowled. “We’ve got to get some TV show tickets for that guy in the Hawaiian shirt, and a studio tour for Mrs. Hibbing.” A thought struck him. “And I’ve got to call up our lawyer, and Mr. Henkin, and Mr. Victor Budlong, and I should call Janesse Budlong and tell her how well the pictures turned out, and most important of all, I’ve got to call Mrs. Mariposa DeLee—” He yawned. “Maybe I’ll take a quick nap first—”

He kicked off his shoes and stretched out on the lumpy davenport. He heard Handsome’s footsteps going toward the improvised darkroom. He saw a dusty sunbeam high above him in the big room. He saw, in what began to be a dream, the body of little Chester Baxter, somewhere in some dark alley, his throat cut. Then he heard and saw nothing at all.

Nineteen

It was an itchy and uneasy sleep, troubled by dreams he didn’t want to remember, and interrupted by thoughts he didn’t want to think.

The unpleasant dreams were complicated ones, and in technicolor. In one of them Janesse Budlong appeared, wearing a brief, becoming and bright green bathing suit. She smiled and said, “Look, I’m not really Janesse Budlong, I’m Mariposa DeLee!” and suddenly there was Mariposa DeLee in a sequin-studded slack suit, confiding, “I’m really not Mariposa DeLee, you know, I’m Mrs. Waldo Hibbing.” Then Mrs. Waldo Hibbing, in a brightly printed chiffon dress and scuffed tennis shoes, said happily, “Please don’t tell anyone, but actually, I’m Lois Lattimer—” She faded into a vague and shadowy figure who whispered through a mist, “No one must ever know, but I’m Pearl Durzy—” and then the mist grew deeper, and a voice from somewhere breathed, “And all this time, I’ve been April Robin—”

“Adelle Lattimer,” a voice said suddenly, and Bingo sat up, wide awake. He realized instantly that it was no longer morning. He realized, too, that he was hungry. Very hungry. And there was a tantalizing odor of bacon and coffee in the air.

The voice had been Handsome’s voice, and it went on apologetically, “I didn’t like to wake you up, Bingo, only I got to thinking about Adelle Lattimer—”

He yawned, looked at his watch. “Gosh, I’ve slept the whole day away.” He blinked and stretched. “What about Adelle Lattimer?”

“Well,” Handsome said worriedly, “it could be, she’s in danger. Account of, Chester Baxter being murdered.”

“Slower, please,” Bingo said. “And maybe a little louder.”

“I mean,” Handsome said, “account of her having also made a deal with Chester Baxter. Which possibly somebody might’ve known about. And if Chester Baxter was murdered by somebody who didn’t want him to find where Julien Lattimer is—”

Bingo tried to sort that, and a lot of other things, out in his mind, which was still a little clouded over by the technicolor dream. He said at last, “Maybe we ought to warn her. Maybe we ought to call her up.” He paused. “But she must know about it already. Why, the whole day’s gone. The newspapers—”

“Sure, Bingo,” Handsome said. “Only it seems like if she’d read about it in the newspapers, she’d’ve called to tell us.”

“All right,” Bingo said. “We’ll call her. We’ll call a lot of people, too. Especially, Mariposa DeLee. Because of what William Willis told us last night.”

He rose, stretched his aching muscles and went to the telephone.

Adelle Lattimer was not in her little hat shop in Pacific Palisades. She had not been in all day. Her residence phone didn’t answer.

A strange voice at the Skylight Motel said that Mariposa DeLee was out, and no one knew when she’d be back.

Bingo went back to the couch, sat down and said, “We’ll try a little later.”

Handsome came in with a tray. Bacon and eggs and hot buttered toast, and a pot of coffee. “I went to the store and bought things,” he said, “right after I came back from the post office.”

Bingo paused in the act of stirring his coffee. “The post office? Why?”

“To mail the pictures,” Handsome said. “There were a lot of them. Ninety-one cards came in today.”

“Gosh!” Bingo said fervently. He began doing some mental arithmetic, paused and said, “But those cards—”

“Well,” Handsome said, “I didn’t want to wake you up. But I’d printed up all those other pictures and mailed them out. So I went down to our office—” He paused.

“That’s right,” Bingo said. “It’s our office. Go on.”

“And there were ninety-one cards there. So I made them up and mailed them out. Including the man who wanted the TV tickets.”

That brought up another problem, a minor but annoying one. “We got to do something about that.”

“Oh, sure,” Handsome said. “I put a note in with his pictures. Where he’s to call for the tickets. They’ll be in his name.”

Bingo looked up blankly, his mouth full of bacon.

“The Red Skelton Show on CBS,” Handsome said, “and the Groucho Marx Show on NBC. And a couple of others. I hope he likes them.”

“I’m sure he will,” Bingo said. He didn’t want to ask, but he had to. “How did you get the tickets—”

“Why,” Handsome said, “I just called up the big TV studios and asked.”

After a few minutes Bingo said, “Oh.”

“And, Bingo,” Handsome said, “the nice old lady next door. That Mrs. Hibbing. She lived out here all this time and she never got to go through a movie studio. And she being such a friendly lady, and a next-door neighbor and everything, I didn’t think you’d mind if I fixed it up. For day after tomorrow. She was very pleased when I told her.”

Bingo laid down his fork and said heavily, “I suppose you just called up a movie studio.”

“Well,” Handsome said, “naturally.” He drew a long breath. “I remember Twentieth-Century Fox especially because I read an article once about how they paint the sky out there. The big background sky, I mean. How many men it takes to do it, and how they work, and—”

“Never mind the sky,” Bingo said.

Handsome looked a little hurt. “They were very nice and helpful,” he said. “After I explained that I was with the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America. And I gave him the number of our Beverly Hills office and explained it was only temporary until we could build our own building. A very nice and helpful lady arranged everything for Mrs. Hibbing.”

He paused and looked anxious. “Did I do wrong, Bingo?”

“No,” Bingo said, a little hoarsely. “No, Handsome, you did just fine.” He said it with all his heart.

Handsome beamed and looked relieved. “And after postage stamps and some gasoline for the car, and the groceries, we cleared—”

“Don’t bother me with details,” Bingo said. “We have things to do.” A seemingly endless number of them, and the big question was, which was to be done first.

“When in doubt,” he told himself, “call your lawyer.” He drained the last of the coffee, went to the phone and called Arthur Schlee.

Arthur Schlee said that he was terribly sorry, but he simply hadn’t had time to go into all the details of the very complex situation.

“We understand,” Bingo said smoothly. “We know what it is to be busy. But I have something else, nothing to do with this case, and something immediate.” Think big, he told himself, and think big fast! “I — we — need a personal management contract drawn up just as quickly as possible. We have something just too good to let get away from us.”

Arthur Schlee made them a little speech regarding personal management contracts, bringing in the detail of the laws against non-licensed agents, and the Thirteenth Amendment.

“We understand all that,” Bingo said. “We just want a brief little personal management contract between a certain party and ourselves. No money changing hands except the customary one dollar given in good faith. We guarantee to star her in our first production. In return, she will not—” He paused on the verge of saying “run around in bathing suits” and said, “Will not pose for any photographs or discuss any picture roles.”

“Within how long a period?” Arthur Schlee said.

“Within a period of seven days,” Bingo said. “That’s how sure we are of immediate production.”

“I see,” Arthur Schlee said. “And what is the name of the party?”

“Janesse Budlong,” Bingo said. “Janesse with two esses.”

Arthur Schlee seemed to be catching his breath. Finally he said, “How soon—?”

“It’s a simple thing,” Bingo told him. “Have your secretary type it up, the customary number of copies” — he wondered how many that would be — “and rush it over here by messenger within the hour, with a notary.” He ignored the muttered protests on the other end of the line and said, “We’re from the East, Mr. Schlee, and we’re used to doing things fast. Fast, and big. Now can you get that over here right away? And incidentally, how much will your fee be on this?”

This time Bingo had the impression that Arthur Schlee was counting on his fingers. Finally the lawyer said, “My dear young man, a friend of Leo Henkin’s is a friend of mine. I hope I may have the pleasure and privilege of representing you in your entire picture setup. Ordinarily, a contract like this might take days, and run into thousands. But under the circumstances—” He seemed to sigh. “I’ll rush it right over. And shall we say — two hundred and fifty?”

“Not a bit too high,” Bingo said bravely, “but make it fast.” He hung up the receiver, turned to Handsome and said, “How much can we raise on the car, fast?”

Handsome said, “Well—” He paused. “Maybe quicker, Bingo. Those two big cameras we got in New York.”

“Look up a good hock shop,” Bingo said. “Near here. And get over before they close.” He looked at Handsome. “I know what I’m doing, believe me.”

“Sure,” Handsome said cheerfully. “You always have.”

Bingo lit a cigarette, and then called Janesse Budlong. She said, before he could do more than identify himself, “I’m so sorry I ran away last night, but honest, I got scared and—”

“Forgotten and forgiven,” Bingo said warmly. “To you, everything is forgiven. Because we’ve looked at the pictures of you.”

There was a little gasp at the other end of the line. Not the gasp of the would-be model and/or actress who would go to any extremes for that one good break. It was the gasp of a very small child coming down the stairs on Christmas morning. “You mean, they’re — any good?”

“So good,” Bingo said, “that right now our lawyer is drawing up a personal management contract and he’ll have it here within the hour. Now don’t be alarmed. It’s a very simple thing, obligates you to almost nothing, and even that for a very short time, and obligates us to star you in our first production.”

Janesse Budlong said, “Oh!” It sounded like a prayer.

“Can you be here within an hour?” Bingo asked. “Would you like a lawyer of your own, or your father, or anybody else along to approve the contract?”

“Oh no,” she said. “No. I mean, I want Pa to know, he’ll be so pleased, but, well, what I mean is, I trust you guys. I’ll be there.” She giggled. “With clothes on.” She hung up.

Bingo lit a new cigarette, glanced briefly at the afternoon paper Handsome had brought in and dropped on the coffee table. The murder of Chester Baxter was a small paragraph. There was no mention of his possible connections. A man identified as Chester Baxter had been found up an alley with his throat cut, that was all. He tossed the paper aside.

He’d gone this far, he couldn’t stop now. Think big, he reminded himself, and go right on thinking big. He dialed Budlong and Dollinger and asked for Mr. Victor Budlong.

“Well, well, well,” Victor Budlong said. “How very nice to hear from you! Is there any way I can be of any help?”

“You sure can,” Bingo said. “And you sure have been. That office address has been a great help, and the office suite itself is going to be fine for a few weeks. But I’d like to talk with you about building. Perhaps you can help us find the right location? Introduce us to contractors?”

“Well!” Victor Budlong said. “As a matter of fact, there are two splendid building lots available, one right here in Beverly Hills, the other on the Strip.” He lowered his voice and said, “The one on the Strip is the better buy.”

“We’ll look them over,” Bingo said. “Right now, we’re in pretty much of a rush but — let’s say, three forty-five on Thursday?” He thought fast and said, “I may be able to bring my architect along.”

“Well, well, well,” Victor Budlong said. “Fine, fine, fine!”

“Now another thing,” Bingo said, this time rushing it. “We looked up your daughter, Janesse. My partner took some pictures of her. They are—” He paused for just the right timing. “I dislike to use the word. But — spectacular! She just hasn’t been photographed properly before. And what’s more, Mr. Budlong, that girl can act!”

“I always thought she could,” Victor Budlong said. “Only it was a matter of getting started—”

Bingo pulled all his salesmanship into working order and said, “The only reason was because — she was handicapped by being the daughter of a famous man.”

“Oh now,” Victor Budlong said. “Come come, now. I’m not—”

“Oh yes, you are,” Bingo said, fast. “You’re a very famous man, and you know it. Only because we came out here from New York—” He cleared his throat and said, “What I’m trying to tell you is this. We want to sign your daughter to a seven-day personal management contract. Right away. It obligates her to nothing — except not to sign with anyone else for a period of seven days. It obligates us to star her in our first production.”

“Well—” Victor Budlong began.

“We Easterners like to move fast,” Bingo went on, whipping up his own enthusiasm. “So our lawyer, Mr. Arthur Schlee” — he paused just long enough for that to sink in — “is sending the contract over to us, by messenger, with a notary, within the hour. And your lovely, talented daughter Janesse will be here to sign it. But since you’re her father, I really thought—”

“Janesse is over twenty-one,” Victor Budlong said, and added hastily, “But not much over.”

“Maybe you’d like to have Mr. Schlee read it to you?” Bingo suggested.

It seemed to Bingo that Victor Budlong was counting ten. “Oh,” he said at last, “I don’t think it’s necessary—”

They parted on a note of high mutual esteem.

Bingo tottered out into the kitchen, poured himself a half cup of stone-cold coffee, came back to the phone and told himself, “The bigger you think—” He dialed Leo Henkin.

“And what can old Leo Henkin do for you this late afternoon, h’m?” the mellow voice came over the phone.

Suddenly Bingo found himself at a loss for words. He thought very fast about the carnival agent he’d known in New York, reminded himself how much Leo Henkin resembled him, armed himself with the thought that he was president of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America, and tried to speak.

“So you’re going to build your own office building,” Leo Henkin’s voice boomed. “Well, before you decide on the location, let old Leo Henkin advise you. And when you start looking for studio space—”

“How did you know we’re planning to build?” Bingo said.

The warm and friendly laugh came over the wire. “Oh, Leo Henkin knows everything.”

“Not always, he knows everything,” Bingo said. He felt that same warm rush of triumph he’d felt the time he’d taken a swing at the carnival agent. “We’ve got our star. Mr. Schlee’s office is sending over a personal management contract, by messenger. She’ll be here within the hour, to sign.”

There was a heavy silence at the other end of the line before Leo Henkin said heavily, “My dear boy. You are new in Hollywood. Perhaps you should have my advice—” There was another pause. “A personal management contract is a tricky thing, my dear young man.”

“Not if Arthur Schlee draws it up,” Bingo said.

Obviously Leo Henkin could have no answer to that one. After a third and this time longish pause, he said simply, “Who is she?”

Bingo sat up very straight and said, “Janesse Budlong.”

The fourth pause just sounded stunned. Then, “That little girl?”

“That little girl,” Bingo said back at him. “Victor Budlong’s little girl. That’s what everyone here has thought of her, all this time. But we took some pictures of her. We know she can act.”

“Old Leo Henkin would like to see those pictures,” the great agent said.

“Why not?” Bingo plunged on recklessly. “In fact, if you have the time free, why don’t you stop by within the hour? She’ll be here, and the contracts.” This, he reminded himself, was the town of “Don’t call us, we’ll call you,” the town of great protocol among secretaries as to which party should be put on the line first, the town where men like Leo Henkin kept visitors waiting in anterooms.

“Leo Henkin will be there in half an hour,” the agent said.

Bingo hung up and realized he was dripping with sweat. He wished Handsome would get back with the money.

He made another attempt to reach Adelle Lattimer and then Mariposa DeLee, again with no success. He wondered if he ought to call Hendenfelder and confide that Adelle Lattimer might be in danger.

He realized, with a sudden start, that he’d been sleeping all day in his clothes and that it had been a long time since his last shave.

He moved fast. By the time Handsome returned, he had shaved, showered, dressed in the avocado-green slacks with their matching shirt, and the plain saffron tie. This, he felt, was an occasion for informal garb. He’d just finished slicking down his sandy hair when Handsome came in.

“Two hundred and fifty dollars,” Handsome said, handing it over. He had the expression of someone who’s just sold his mother into slavery.

Bingo put the bills in his wallet and said gently, “Handsome, we’ve had to hock cameras before. We’ve always gotten them back. Believe me, I know what I’m doing.” He managed to smile with a confidence he didn’t really feel, and said, “Everything’s going to be all right.”

The partners exchanged a long, silent look. It would have been nice, Bingo thought, it would have been pleasant and peaceful, just to go along like this, living in the April Robin house, taking sidewalk pictures just the way they’d done in the past, and letting the future do its own worrying. But it wasn’t going to be that way. It wasn’t a matter of his own doing, it was just the way things had happened.

“And anyway,” he said at last, “we came to Hollywood to get rich. And famous.”

Handsome said, “Sure, Bingo, and anyway those weren’t the best cameras, just the ones that cost the most money. We can get along fine until we get them back.”

The doorbell rang. It was not a messenger from Arthur Schlee’s office. It was Arthur Schlee himself, accompanied by a secretary who was also a notary. She looked as much like a lawyer’s secretary as Arthur Schlee looked like a lawyer. She was that young Hollywood age which stretches anywhere from eighteen to fifty-five. Her brownish hair had evidently been done by one of the better hairdressers. She wore a neatly tailored outfit which was exactly what the best-dressed lawyer’s secretary should wear and yet still hinted that she would look better in a strapless bathing suit. Her expression said that, as Arthur Schlee’s secretary, she had drawn many contracts, heard many secrets, seen many things, told nothing and was incapable of being awed, but there was still a gleam in her eye. She carried a professional-looking manila envelope under her arm.

Arthur Schlee introduced her as Joyce Grimstead.

She sat down on the sofa, smiled at Bingo, looked interestedly at Handsome, drew a handful of papers from the envelope and said, “I hope these are satisfactory.”

Arthur Schlee said, “As I told you. You must understand. This sort of thing is a little unusual.”

“Where we come from,” Bingo said, “nothing is unusual.” He drew a long breath. “There will, of course, be many papers to draw up later. This is just, shall we say, staking a claim.”

He detected a faintly sordid glint in Arthur Schlee’s ice-blue eyes, and added hastily, “Let’s get your fee out of the way first.” He reached for his wallet. “Two hundred and fifty. Plus, of course, the notary fee.”

“We can skip that,” Arthur Schlee said, getting his hands on the bills. “I’ll submit an expense account later.”

“But something,” Bingo said graciously, “for the young lady — her overtime — her extra work—” He smiled at her. “Flowers? Candy? Theatre tickets?”

To his surprise, she smiled back at him. “Nothing. It’s worth it to see the inside of this house.”

“Now, now,” Bingo said, in mock reproof. “You’re not old enough to have been an April Robin fan!”

“That doesn’t mean I haven’t heard of her,” Joyce Grimstead said. She glanced around the enormous room. “Funny. This isn’t the sort of house I’d have thought she’d have had.”

“It was a considerable house for those days,” Arthur Schlee said, and then, remembering who his clients were, added, “Or for any day.”

She nodded and said, “But somehow — you’d think of something more delicate. More birdlike—” Her voice faded into a thoughtful silence.

Arthur Schlee cleared his throat and said, “Well, you’d better look over those papers—”

Bingo looked them over, wishing he knew what their legal terminology meant. He nodded gravely and handed them to Handsome.

Handsome looked them over even more gravely. “Look perfectly all right,” he said, and handed them back.

Suddenly Bingo said, “If you’ll excuse me — I’d like to have a word with my partner—”

He led Handsome out into the front entryway, while Arthur Schlee and his secretary sat gazing at the magnificence of what had been the April Robin house.

“Listen, Handsome,” Bingo hissed. “We’ve got to do this big or not at all.” He handed over what was nearly half of the remaining bankroll. “Just a few blocks up the street — and make it fast—”

Handsome made the “okay” sign and said, “I’ll bring it in the back way.”

Bingo came back, sat down, smiled and said, “Nothing to do with this. Can’t think of everything, though. Just some important chemicals to be picked up.”

Arthur Schlee said, “I’ve been giving considerable thought to our problem. Regarding the ownership of the house—”

“Please,” Bingo said. “Let’s talk about it later. It’s going to be an easy problem to settle, one way or another.” He turned on his warmest smile and said, “And I know you’re the man to settle it for us. As my good friend Leo Henkin said, we couldn’t have a better lawyer.”

He spotted Arthur Schlee casting a surreptitious glance at his watch, and said, “In fact, old Leo Henkin himself should be dropping in any minute. And, of course, our—” He hesitated. Somehow he didn’t want to use the word “property” — “The young lady.”

There was a slight but awkward silence. Joyce Grimstead broke it, glancing again around the room and saying, “This place must be huge! Rooms and rooms and rooms and rooms! And all the murders—” She paused and said, “I guess I shouldn’t have mentioned those.”

“Why not?” Bingo said. “They happened. Would you like me to show you the room where the housekeeper was murdered?”

She said, “Oh!” and, for a Hollywood lawyer’s secretary, turned a little pale.

“I can’t show you where Mr. Julien Lattimer was murdered,” Bingo went on amiably, “because no one seems to know.”

Arthur Schlee opened his mouth, drew in a breath, and shut it again.

“Or,” Bingo said, finishing it for him, “if he was.”

He felt a little relieved at hearing Handsome stirring around in the kitchenette. The front doorbell rang, and Handsome came in through the kitchen door and said, “I’ll get it.”

“Well,” Leo Henkin’s voice boomed from the doorway. “So this is the house itself!” He came on into the living room, taking up an amazing amount of space for so small a man. “And Leo Henkin’s good friend Art Schlee, looking after my good friends of the International Foto, Motion Picture and Television Corporation of America!” He beamed at everybody, sat down in the center of one of the davenports, and said, “Well, where’s the young lady?”

“She’ll be here any minute,” Bingo said. “Maybe you’d like to see some of the pictures—?”

Leo Henkin would indeed like to see some of the pictures. So would Arthur Schlee. Even Joyce Grimstead showed a faint interest.

Handsome displayed the prints with an artist’s pride. Leo Henkin examined them as though they were uranium samples. When he reached the last in the stack, Janesse Budlong in the demure little navy blue sheath, with the tiny white collar, his mouth formed into a silent “Oh.” He handed the prints on to Arthur Schlee and his secretary, looked at Bingo and sighed.

“This has been around Hollywood all this time,” he said. “And Leo Henkin never discovered her. Nobody” — he waved a hand indicating what he thought of those nobodies — “discovered her.”

“America was around for a long time, too,” Bingo said. “Until Columbus.” The unhappy look on Leo Henkin’s face hurt him. He went on quickly, “The American Indians didn’t discover it because they lived there. It took someone from out of town.”

Leo Henkin’s round face brightened. “That’s it,” he said, “it took two smart boys from out of town! Do you wonder, Arthur, why I’m so happy to do business with them? They’ve discovered a whole new continent!”

Handsome coughed and said, “She’s only a little over five three, and doesn’t weigh very much—”

“All right, all right,” Leo Henkin said. “We won’t call her a continent. Let’s say a jewel, a rare jewel. Who was it discovered the diamond fields in Africa—?”

Handsome started to answer, but Leo Henkin waved him down and went on. “Whoever it was, it probably wasn’t an African. Leo Henkin isn’t interested in history.” He flashed his most ingratiating smile and said, “Now, don’t you think you ought to tell your old friend Leo Henkin just what you plan to do with this rare jewel?”

“In a day or two,” Bingo said as nonchalantly as he could. In a few days any number of things could happen, but he didn’t want to think about them now. He searched his mind for a quick quote and said, “A rare jewel deserves a perfect setting.”

“When you’re ready,” Leo Henkin said, beaming. “When you’re ready. Remember, there’s nothing old Leo Henkin can’t do for you.”

There was another little silence. Joyce Grimstead cleared her throat and said, “I keep thinking of April Robin, here in this house—”

“That was a long time ago,” Bingo said. “Long, long before your time.”

“I know,” Joyce Grimstead said. “I never saw her on the screen. But whatever did happen to her? Doesn’t anyone know?”

In that next silence a pale, grayish ghost of April Robin seemed to move lightly through the room. Bingo closed his eyes for a moment.

It was Arthur Schlee who broke the spell. “My dear girl, in those days a lot of things were hushed up. April Robin—”

Arthur Schlee’s sentence was broken by the doorbell, by a light and silvery voice as Handsome opened the door.

“I’m so sorry to be late,” Janesse Budlong said. “I had to stop and change my dress and run a comb through my hair.”

From her appearance as she came into the room, she’d had the comb run through her hair at Westmore’s, and changed her dress at Magnin’s. But it was a simple hairdo, soft around her face, the mane of magnificently red hair simply knotted at the back and caught with a lime-green ribbon. The dress, of a soft shade of green Bingo couldn’t even try to identify, was so plain, so exquisite and so becoming, that he didn’t want to hazard a guess at its cost. The small fur she carried over her arm had probably cost the lives of an untold number of valuable little animals. She dropped it on the arm of the davenport as though it were an empty popcorn bag.

She looked delicate, she looked gentle, she looked simple and friendly, she looked expensive, she looked, by some magic of pose and smile, like a great actress.

“I don’t believe you know all these people—” Bingo began.

“Oh, but I do!” she said, with an all-embracing smile. “Mr. Schlee, how nice to see you again! Why, I don’t believe I’ve seen you since — some of those papers from my grandmother’s trust fund! I’ve never really thanked you for being so helpful! And Joyce, darling! We were always going to have lunch together and we just never did!” She turned to Bingo and said, “You know, Joyce was always so wonderful to me whenever I was in Mr. Schlee’s office! She was just a little kid, then—” Her smile implied that Joyce Grimstead had been about sixteen then, and couldn’t possibly be much more than twenty-one now.

Janesse turned slightly toward the other corner of the davenport and said, “Mr. Henkin! Oh, please sit down! If you knew — if I could just tell you — what it means meeting you! You have no idea how long I’ve admired you! I’ve always wished I had the nerve to call on you!”

“I wish you had,” Leo Henkin said. “Old Leo Henkin might not have made a star out of you, but he might have run you for president.”

Arthur Schlee said, “And now if you’ll just glance over these papers—” She sat down between him and Joyce Grimstead, took them and said, “I know if you drew them up, they’re all right,” but she looked at them just the same.

In the moment while she examined them, an echo of Bingo’s dream returned. The shadowy figures who blended into other shadowy figures, and all became the April Robin whose picture he had never seen, whose voice he had never heard, whose face, he felt sure now, he would never see, but whom everyone remembered, and no one would ever, ever forget. Then Janesse Budlong looked up, that sweet, half-tremulous little smile on her face.

“I don’t know,” she said softly. “This doesn’t seem to commit me to anything. And it does commit you to a lot.”

“If there are any changes—” Arthur Schlee began, in his lawyer’s voice.

She shook her lovely head. “No. Only it doesn’t seem fair. I just promise not to pose for photographs, or consider any picture jobs for a period of seven days. In return they agree to star me in their forthcoming production.” Her smile became even prettier and more modest. “I mean, it just doesn’t seem fair to them—”

Arthur Schlee, remembering fast who his clients were, said, “If this is agreeable to them—”

“Oh, sure,” she said, with that endearing lift of the lip. “Only it says here, ‘in consideration of one dollar’ — can we write in a phrase or something, that if anything goes wrong, I give them the dollar back?”

Leo Henkin took over. “Little Miss Janesse,” he said. “Old Leo Henkin knows this business. These boys are not gambling one dollar, they’re gambling” — he gave Bingo a questioning glance — “a fortune. Take old Leo Henkin’s advice. Sign it.”

She took the pen Bingo handed her, poised it daintily over the paper for a moment and then said, “I don’t know. Do you think the trade papers should be notified?”

Bingo said quickly, “Maybe a picture of you signing. Handsome can take it. Make some fast prints. And maybe our friend Leo Henkin can help out—”

Leo Henkin said, “Make the picture. Leo Henkin will see to it that the story gets out. Leo Henkin will make sure it’s a better story than Romulus and Remus running out of milk.”

Handsome set up the small camera, fast. Bingo said, “Wait a minute. Handsome—”

Handsome nodded, whipped into the kitchen and whipped back again with a tray of glasses, two bottles of champagne and two orchids.

“For you,” Bingo said softly, pinning one corsage on Janesse Budlong. “For a great future. And for you, my dear” — with a smile for Joyce Grimstead — “for being so helpful.”

Handsome poured the champagne. The contracts were signed in a flourish of flashbulbs and flowers. Bingo tried to sit back and relax. This was why they’d come to Hollywood, to sign a forthcoming star, to own — live in — a mansion, to be surrounded by agents, lawyers and flashbulbs.

This was the great occasion, this was what they had been working toward. It was all so wonderful, and yet — he wondered what had happened to April Robin; he even wondered for one wild moment if April Robin’s body was buried somewhere underneath her house.

He looked across the room, smiled as best he could at Janesse Budlong, and said quietly, “What was your mother’s maiden name?”

She looked straight back at him and mouthed the words, “Damned if I’ll tell.” He knew from the look in her eyes that he didn’t dare ask more.

Finally it was all over. The contracts signed, the champagne drunk, the last picture taken.

Joyce Grimstead said, “Good luck, kids. Not that you’ll need it, but I always think it’s polite to offer it.”

Janesse Budlong said, almost tearfully, “I don’t know what to say — I don’t know what to say—” and didn’t say it.

Leo Henkin said warmly, “Remember now, when you need studio space, writers, anything, call on old Leo Henkin. Just because you fell into a gold mine doesn’t mean you may not need a digger.”

The big house seemed very, very still, and very, very empty after they had all gone. Bingo sat silently on the davenport while Handsome did a fast darkroom job on the pictures of Janesse Budlong signing the contracts, of the future new star toasting the deal with champagne.

Once Bingo reached for the phone and started to call Vital Statistics. No, if whatever had happened to April Robin had been hushed up, there would be no good in asking.

On a momentary impulse he dialed Victor Budlong and said gaily, “Well, I signed your daughter—”

Victor Budlong’s voice came back softly. “I’m glad. I feel she can get somewhere with you managing her. Well, well, well. My little girl is going to get somewhere, at last.” There was the kind of pause it usually took someone to light a cigar. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

“Oh no,” Bingo said bravely. “Just wanted to tell you. But since you’re on the wire. There is one question—!”

“Whatever you want to know,” Victor Budlong said.

“Good,” Bingo said. “Now.” He braced himself. “Whatever did happen to April Robin?”

The silence sounded as though it had, been dropped from outer space.

“If you don’t know,” Victor Budlong said at last, “I don’t want to be the one to tell you.” And that seemed to be that.

Twenty

“I’m getting very confused, Handsome,” Bingo confided as he sank down on the davenport. He wished for a moment that he were caught in a traffic jam at the entrance to the Midtown Tunnel. He wished he were trying to work out a theory in nuclear physics. “There seem to be so many things I know, and yet so many things I don’t know. How are we ever going to get rich and famous if all these problems keep popping up?”

“Murder is a problem,” Handsome agreed, nodding solemnly.

“I have to make a few more phone calls,” Bingo said. He looked at Handsome apologetically. “I realize I’m running up the phone bill—”

“The telephone is our cheapest luxury,” Handsome said. “I once read a pamphlet on it put out by the New York Telephone Company. It gave a comparison list of prices in the rising cost of living. And whereas the price of wire and plastic and labor had gone up—”

But Bingo was already dialing.

“Hello?” he said into the phone. “William Willis?”

“Yes,” Willis said. “Who’s this?”

“Bingo Riggs.”

“Oh, yes. Hello.”

“Mr. Willis, I wonder if I may ask you a few questions. If you don’t mind, that is.”

“Is it about my sister?” Willis asked.

“Yes. Your stepsister. You did say she was your stepsister, didn’t you?”

“Yes.”

“And her name, before she married Julien Lattimer, was Lois DeLee. Is that also right?”

“Yes.”

“And she was a slack-wire performer?”

“Yes, and a darned good one,” Willis said.

“Did you ever see her act?”

“Of course I did. You might say, in fact, that I first met her while she was doing her act.”

Bingo blinked. “How was that again?” he said.

“Lois. I first met her in 1947. We were booked together on the same bill. Me and my birds, and her and her slack wire.”

Bingo blinked again. “If I understand you correctly,” he said, “you’re saying you first met your sister in 1947? Is that what you’re saying?”

“If you want to be technical about it,” Willis said, “I first met her in 1922. That was when my father married her mother. He was a widower, and Lois’ mother was a widow. They met, fell in love, and got married. Lois had an older brother, Frank. He’s dead now. Died young.”

“Then if you really met Lois in 1922, why did you say—?”

“Well, when our folks got married, we all moved into the same house, naturally,” Willis said.

“Naturally,” Bingo replied.

“I was about twenty-one years old then. This was in 1924. Lois was just a little kid.”

“Go on.”

“Well, I left home. Not right away, but about a year after the marriage. Figured I was about ready to step out into the world on my own. The family moved away from Hollywood soon after that. To Colorado. So the last time I saw Lois, until 1947 when we booked on the same bill, was when she was eleven years old. And meeting her in 1947 was like meeting an entirely different person, if you know what I mean. It was quite a reunion.”

“I can imagine,” Bingo said. “Had she changed much?”

“Well, after all,” Willis said, “quite a few years had gone by. She was in her early thirties in 1947. Sure, she’d changed. She was a young woman and not a little girl any more. But she was still delicate... and fragile... and blond, and with this enormous spirit of gentility. I loved my sister very much.”

“When did she marry Lattimer?” Bingo asked.

“Several years later. Must have been 1949 or 1950. Yes, that’s right. That was when they bought your—” He corrected himself. “The house you’re living in now. That’s right. About three years before they both disappeared.”

“Thank you, sir,” Bingo said, and he hung up.

“Well?” Handsome asked.

Bingo was already thumbing through the directory. “I have another call to make,” he said. “Do you know what the whole trouble with this setup is, Handsome?”

“What?”

“The dead won’t stay dead,” he answered, and he began dialing. “He ought to be home by now, don’t you think?”

“Who?” Handsome asked.

Bingo didn’t get a chance to answer. A voice on the other end of the line said, “The Henkin residence.”

“Let me talk to Leo Henkin, please,” Bingo said.

“Who shall I say is calling?”

“Bingo Riggs.”

“One moment please, sir.”

Bingo waited. Handsome watched him.

Henkin’s voice came onto the line. “Well, well, how’s the discoverer from New York?” he said. “What can old Leo Henkin do for you?”

“I want to know about April Robin,” Bingo said.

There was a long pause on the line.

“Do you know about her?” Bingo asked.

“Leo Henkin knows everything,” Henkin said, but the brass had gone out of his voice.

“Then I want you to tell me what you know.”

“It’s a sad story. And a long one.”

“I’ve got plenty of time and plenty of sympathy,” Bingo said. “Where do you want to meet?”

“Come over here,” Henkin said. “To my house.” And he gave Bingo the address.

The Beverly Hills home of Leo Henkin did not resemble his office at all. Whereas the office had looked like an extension of Santa Anita Raceway, with horses cluttering up each wall and surface, his home was a clean low modern house which seemed to be built chiefly of flagstone and glass. And curiously, the Leo Henkin who lived in this house did not very much resemble the Leo Henkin from the horsy office. A servant met Bingo and Handsome at the front door, led them through a slate-paved entrance hallway and then into a lanai which overlooked Henkin’s large swimming pool. Henkin was wearing chino pants and a sports shirt. The shirt was neither loud nor particularly Californian, Bingo noticed, and he wondered if the twinkling little man in the horse-bestrewn office was simply an act for the industry. As Leo Henkin advanced with his hand outstretched, he seemed somehow taller than his five feet three inches, somehow more relaxed than he would ever look in his private office. “Come in,” he said, “come in. Can I get you something to drink?”

“If you don’t mind, Mr. Henkin,” Bingo said, “we’d like to get straight to the point. We’d like to know about April Robin.”

Leo Henkin heaved a particularly forlorn little sigh. He gestured to two Saarinen chairs and then sat in another chair facing the pool. Darkness had come with its customary suddenness. The flagstones surrounding the pool were black and shadowy, but the underwater lights cast a reflected glow into the lanai, tinting Henkin’s thin white hair with amber.

“Her real name was Abigail Ross,” Henkin said. “They changed it to April Robin when she began working for Metro in 1926. Her first movie was one of those Ruritanian romance things. The movie stank, but April Robin... ahhhhh!” Leo Henkin kissed his fingers. “She was only fifteen at the time, but God, what an actress! Have you ever seen her? Have you ever seen any of her pictures?”

“No,” Bingo admitted.

“A beauty, a beauty,” he said. “Like a bird, like a bird on the wing.”

“What did she look like?” Handsome asked, and his brow was furrowed and Bingo knew he was teasing his memory, coaxing it to come up with a photo of April Robin.

“Brown hair,” Henkin said, “as soft as mink. And big brown eyes. A delicate profile, high cheekbones, a rosebud mouth. Small-boned, she was, small all over, but with a beautiful figure. She was like a sister on the screen, do you know what I mean? But a sister with whom you wanted to commit incest. I’ll tell you what her secret was. Would you like to know what April Robin’s secret was?”

“Yes,” Bingo said.

“She was youth. She was fifteen and a star, both parents dead, most of her money going into a trust fund. Fifteen! Youth! And youth was in her face and her eyes and her body, and I’ll tell you something. She’d still be young today. She had that kind of beauty. If she was still alive today, she’d be forty-seven years old, and I’ll bet my house and my business and my life that she wouldn’t look a day over thirty-two. Unchangeable. The beauty that never grows old, a few have it, and they last forever. She’d be young always. You’d look at her and automatically think of her as a young girl.” Henkin shook his head. “If she’d lived. But she’s dead, isn’t she? A shame. A real shame.”

“How did she die, Mr. Henkin?” Handsome asked. His brow was still furrowed.

Henkin shook his head. “Oh, what a story,” he said, “what a terrible story. Do you know what happened in October of 1927?”

“Yes,” Handsome said. “The Jazz Singer opened at the Warner Theatre in New York.”

“The Jazz Singer,” Henkin said, nodding soberly. “And, of course, the revolution of the film industry. April Robin was working on a silent movie when the news broke. Somebody read the writing on the wall and immediately began reshooting it. It was a good thing, too. By the middle of 1928 the lousiest sound movies were outdrawing the best silent films all over the country. April Robin’s first sound film was released in December of 1928. She was just seventeen, I remember. She was one of the first silent stars to take the plunge.”

“What happened?” Bingo asked.

“I remember the opening,” Henkin said. He sighed. “It opened at the Pantages. There were signs all over the place.” He gestured with his hands. “Robin Speaks.” He paused. “Well, she spoke. And they laughed. Oh God, they laughed. They laughed because the voice wasn’t fragile April Robin. The voice was Abigail Ross of Brooklyn, New York. It didn’t fit the concept the movie public had of their star, and so they laughed. They laughed fit to bust. She ran out of the theatre, I remember. She grabbed the nearest car, and drove away. They said later that she really wasn’t a good driver, didn’t even have a license, in fact. They said that was what caused the accident.”

“She had an accident that night?”

“No, no,” Henkin said. “The next day. Nobody saw or heard from her that night. The next day the newspapers made a shambles of her career. One critic said she sounded like a millhand with laryngitis. She must have seen the papers. She was a very sensitive girl, and also a kid, don’t forget that. Only seventeen years old with a whole life ahead of her. In any case, for reasons nobody yet understands, she went to her Hollywood bank the next day and withdrew seventy-five thousand dollars — her entire savings. She was earning fabulous money, you know, but most of it went into a trust fund. Close to a million dollars at the time of the accident. But all she had in cash was seventy-five thousand dollars, and she withdrew that and drove off again. And then—”

Henkin paused. Except for the lights from the pool, the lanai was very dark. He switched on a lamp and then sat again, heavily, like and old, old man who had seen everything the movie colony could offer, the quick successes and the quicker failures, the overnight stardom, the exorbitant salary demands, the movies made and the movies remade, the cycles returning and vanishing, all of it.

“They found her at the bottom of a cliff the next day in the car she’d stolen. The car was a wreck, destroyed, completely burned — terrible, terrible. April Robin — the most beautiful and tender thing on the screen — she... she couldn’t be described, it was that bad. They... they also found a few charred hundred-dollar bills in the wreckage. They identified them as part of the money she’d withdrawn from the bank that afternoon. And they found her purse, of course, with identification. And that was the end. The press hushed it up. They didn’t like the idea that maybe their reviews had caused what looked like a suicide.”

Henkin stopped talking. The room was very silent.

Bingo waited for what seemed like a very long time. Then he said, “You knew her personally?”

“Yes. I knew her personally.”

“Would you say that Janesse Budlong resembles her?”

“I would,” Henkin said.

“Resembles her very much?”

“A little,” Henkin said. “Actually, she resembles her mother more. That flaming red hair. Exactly like her mother’s.”

Bingo felt a slight twinge of disappointment.

“And her mother?” he said. “What was her maiden name?”

Henkin chuckled a bit. “Victor would kill me if I told you this, and so would Alexandria. That’s her name. Janesse’s mother. Alexandria.”

“Alexandria what?”

Henkin chuckled again. “Alexandria Breckenfoote, and for God’s sake, don’t tell Victor I told you.”

“There isn’t then,” Bingo said morosely, “the slightest possibility that Janesse Budlong is April Robin’s daughter.”

Henkin’s eyebrows went up onto his forehead. “Not the slightest possibility,” he said. “Even if April Robin hadn’t died in 1928, why, for God’s sake, I know people who were at the hospital when Janesse was born. Alexandria’s her mother all right, no question.” He paused. “What gave you the idea—?”

“I don’t know,” Bingo said. “I guess I’ve been thinking of ghosts too much. May I use your phone, Mr. Henkin?”

“Please,” Henkin said.

He put a call through to the Skylight Motel. A woman answered the phone and said that Mariposa DeLee had not yet returned. Bingo went back into the lanai, thanked Henkin for his time and information, and then started out with Handsome.

At the door, some of Henkin’s flamboyancy seemed to come back. “Remember,” he said. “When you need studio space, actors, scripts, anything, just call on old Leo Henkin.”

“We’ll be sure to,” Bingo promised, “and thanks again, Mr. Henkin.”

As they walked toward the car, Handsome said, “Maybe that’s why I couldn’t remember about her, Bingo. Because the newspapers hushed it up. Maybe my memory’s all right, after all.”

“I’m sure it is, Handsome,” Bingo said.

“Where are we going now?”

“To Kimballsville,” Bingo said.

“What for?”

“To look up a ghost, Handsome.”

The Kimballsville cemetery was not a large one, but it was a scary one nonetheless. As Bingo and Handsome threaded their way through the tombstones with the assistance of a flashlight, Bingo had the distinct urge to whistle or something. Instead, he began talking.

“You’ll remember,” he said, “that Mariposa DeLee told us her sister-in-law died in Kimballsville and was buried here. Am I right, Handsome?”

“You’re right,” Handsome said. “She also said that Charlie Browne was married to this Miss DeLee.”

“Mmmm,” Bingo said. He flashed the light onto a tombstone. “Parker Atchison,” he read. “That’s not what we’re looking for.”

He flashed the light onto another tombstone. Then he stepped closer to the grave. “I think this is it,” he said. Together, they studied the chiseled inscription:

LOIS DELEE

1913–1928

“What I’d like to know,” Bingo said, “is how Lois DeLee managed to get buried in 1928 and then marry Julien Lattimer in 1950.”

Handsome nodded soberly. “Maybe her sister-in-law Mariposa can tell us,” he said. “It should make interesting listening.”

Bingo was not willing to speculate on whether or not Mariposa DeLee was actually at the Skylight Motel all day long and simply refusing telephone calls. Such an observation would have been ungentlemanly, and he liked to think of himself as possessing at least some of the social graces. The fact remained, however, that Mariposa was very much in evidence when he and Handsome arrived at the motel. Sitting in front of the office under an amber-colored bug light, she started from the chair when she spotted the convertible and then apparently decided to brave it through.

“We’ve been trying to reach you,” Bingo said.

“I’ve been out,” she answered. In the soft amber light, she looked younger than she did in natural sunshine. She wore a white sweater and black tapered slacks, and the yellow light concealed the wrinkles on her face, so that she might have been a young matron.

“Find Charlie Browne?” Bingo asked.

“No.”

“That’s a shame,” Bingo said. “There were a few things, Mrs. DeLee...”

“Yes?”

“... which we know you won’t mind discussing since we’re such old friends.”

“What is it?” she asked.

“You said that your sister-in-law died in Kimballsville a couple of years back. You did say that, didn’t you?”

“Yes, I did.” Nervously Mariposa DeLee lighted a cigarette and blew out a cloud of smoke.

“What did you mean by a couple of years back?”

“Just what it sounded like.”

“A couple is usually defined as two,” Bingo said. “Now, you didn’t mean two years back, did you?”

“I meant a couple. Two, three, four — who remembers?”

“Her tombstone remembers,” Handsome said.

“What?”

“She died in 1928,” Bingo amplified. “Unless you’re counting by fifteens, that’s not a couple of years ago.”

“All right, I forgot the date,” Mariposa said.

“Did you forget her name, too?”

“Of course not.”

“What was her name?”

Mariposa paused. “Lois,” she said at last.

“Lois what?”

Again Mariposa paused. This time the pause assumed rather lengthy proportions. Bingo and Handsome waited. It seemed as if Mariposa was not going to answer.

“Lois what?” Bingo repeated.

Mariposa maintained her silence.

“You said she was married to Charlie Browne, didn’t you? You said he took care of her while she was sick. You said he was more like a mother to her than a husband. Didn’t you say that, Mrs. DeLee?”

“Yes, I did,” Mariposa answered. She puffed on the cigarette, let out a quick nervous ball of smoke, and then puffed on it again.

“Then her name would be Lois Browne, wouldn’t it?” Bingo asked.

“Yes.”

“Then why is the name Lois DeLee on her tombstone?”

“I... I don’t know. Perhaps it was a mistake.”

“Perhaps,” Bingo said. “Or perhaps she wasn’t married to Charlie Browne at all. Since she was only fifteen when she died—”

“Who says she was only—”

“The tombstone,” Handsome said. “1913 to 1928.”

“Since she was only fifteen,” Bingo continued, “it’s unlikely that she was married, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know,” Mariposa said. “I don’t have to answer your questions. I don’t have to—”

“Naturally you don’t,” Bingo said. “But we’re all friends and all trying to work this thing out together, aren’t we? Sure we are. Like for example, your husband’s name was Frank, isn’t that right? Frank DeLee?”

“Yes, that’s right.”

“And he died young, isn’t that right?”

“He died shortly after we were married.”

“And Lois DeLee was his sister, isn’t that right?”

“Yes.”

“How did she happen to be in Kimballsville, Mrs. DeLee? And how did she die?”

“She came to visit me, as I told you.”

“And the dying?”

“She was very sick.”

“With what?”

“Pneumonia.”

“And she died of pneumonia?”

“Yes.”

“Did you have a doctor?”

“Not until it was too late.”

“Was a death certificate issued?”

“Yes. Of course.”

“By a doctor?”

“Yes.”

“Which doctor?”

“A... a doctor Charlie knew.”

Bingo nodded. “Do you still maintain, Mrs. DeLee, that Charlie Browne was married to young Lois? Isn’t it more likely that he was a... ah... a friend of yours?”

“Why don’t you ask him?” Mariposa said.

“I suppose we’ll have to,” Bingo answered, sighing. “Come on, Handsome.” He turned on his heel and then stopped. “Mrs. DeLee, I hope you realize that permission is often granted for the exhumation of bodies.”

“What are you talking about?” Mariposa said.

“Only this. I’m not a betting man, but I’m willing to wager that the coffin of Lois DeLee is, and always was, empty!”

Twenty-one

The Owl’s Roost would have been called, in New York, a very sleazy dump. In California, it was called a very sleazy dump. The upholstered booths had been done in imitation zebra, which had peeled and cracked long ago and which now resembled vertical interference on a television screen. The people lounging about the roost might very well have been owls. They observed each newcomer with the wide-open stare of a night bird.

Bingo and Handsome had been so observed when they entered the bar at ten minutes past ten. It was now twenty minutes past midnight, and the observation had slackened off somewhat during the last two hours and ten minutes, but Bingo nonetheless felt the bar’s clientele were wondering what he and his partner were doing here. Matthew, the bartender, had no such moments of speculation. He knew exactly what they were doing there. They were looking for Charlie Browne.

Eying the clock, he said now, “It don’t look like he’s coming. Maybe he’s been tipped to stay away.”

“Maybe so,” Bingo said.

“I’ve always wondered,” Handsome said to Matthew, “how to get foam on a whiskey sour. I once read an article in Esquire which told how to make the six most-ordered cocktails in the United States, but it didn’t mention the way to get the foam. An article on Anita Ekberg started on the next page. She was almost naked, as I recall.”

“Egg white,” Matthew said.

“I don’t understand,” Handsome said.

“You separate an egg white from the rest of the egg, dump it in the mixer with the other ingredients, and whammo! Foam!”

“Thank you,” Handsome said.

“Do you think he’ll come?” Bingo asked.

“Not if Mrs. DeLee phoned him,” Handsome said. “She’s a nice old lady but I wouldn’t put it past her. Especially if something funny happened back in Kimballsville in 1928.”

“I think something very funny happened, Handsome.”

“I think so, too, Bingo.”

“It still doesn’t explain, though—” Bingo started, and then clamped his mouth shut. “The window!” he said, and he was off his stool immediately, bolting for the door. Behind him, Handsome said, “Browne?”

“Yes, but he’s seen us,” Bingo said, and he threw open the door.

They heard his footsteps instantly. The Owl’s Roost boasted a blacktop parking lot, and Browne’s shoes clattered noisily on the asphalt surface now as he raced across the deserted space toward his car. It was beautiful, Bingo mused, to see Handsome in motion, his long legs chewing up the asphalt, his wide shoulders pushing against the California night. It was beautiful to watch him catch Charlie Browne by the shoulder just as he opened the door to the car, beautiful to watch him spin the con man around, release the shoulder, and recapture the man by the lapels of his suit.

“What is this?” Browne shouted.

“Hello, Mr. Budlong,” Handsome said. “Haven’t seen you in a long time.”

“Budlong? What the hell are you talking about?” Browne said. “My name’s Carlyle Buchanan.”

“And also Courtney Budlong, and Clifford Bradbury, and Charlie Browne.”

“I never saw either of you before in my entire life,” Browne said, but without much conviction.

Bingo cocked his head to one side and looked at Browne with paternal exasperation. Handsome clucked his tongue. Browne sighed heavily.

“Okay,” he said.

“There now, that’s better,” Bingo said.

“Since you were about to enter your car anyway,” Handsome said, “why don’t we all go inside and have a chat?”

“I have nothing to talk about,” Browne said. “I sold you that house legally.”

“Let’s sit, anyway,” Bingo said.

They went into the car, Browne sitting on the front seat between Bingo and Handsome. “If you sold us the April Robin house legally,” Bingo said, “that means the Julien Lattimer signature is bona fide. Where’d you get it?”

Charlie Browne did not answer.

“He’s very much like Mrs. DeLee,” Handsome said. “She didn’t have much to say, either.” He paused. “At first.”

“Did you talk to Mari—?” Browne started, and then stopped himself. The mild California night air pushed its way through the window on the driver’s side, worked its way across the serious faces of the three men on the front seat, and then moved past Handsome and through the window on his side, bound for Japan.

“She told us all about how Lois DeLee died,” Handsome said.

And then Bingo, thinking bigger than he’d ever thought since he’d come to Hollywood, said, “All about the car accident.”

To say that Charlie Browne’s mouth fell open would have been complete understatement, Bingo thought. Not only did it fall open, but it appeared ready to drop from his face. At any moment, Bingo expected Browne’s jawbone to fall free and topple down the front of Browne’s sports shirt.

“Yes,” Bingo said, in simple reiteration. “The car accident.”

Browne closed his mouth, and then he closed his eyes, and Bingo imagined he was listening to the music of a heavenly choir as the Judgment Day rolls were read. He nodded then and said, “It wasn’t my idea. It was April Robin’s.”

“Maybe we ought to listen to his side of the story,” Handsome suggested.

“Sure,” Bingo said. “Certainly. His side of the story begins like this. First, you were not married to Lois DeLee, isn’t that right? You only used that gimmick as an extra sort of pressure.”

“Yes,” Browne admitted.

“Second, you were staying at the cabins with Mariposa DeLee on the night Lois died. You’d probably never met Lois before that night.”

“I’d seen her before,” Browne said. “She’d come to stay with Mariposa about two weeks before the accident. I’d seen her around.”

“Now let’s have your version of the accident.”

“We were sitting outside, Mariposa and me,” Browne said. His brow wrinkled but not with the effort of recall. Bingo was more than certain that the events of that December night in 1928 were indelibly stamped into the memory of Charlie Browne and would never be removed. “Lois had gone for a walk. She was just a teen-age kid, you know, fifteen, but well developed for a kid. But she went for walks a lot, a dreamy kind of kid. She was crossing the highway when this Stutz Bearcat came tooling down the road. It was going, man! Not like today’s high-powered cars, but this baby had power of its own, and it hugged the road, and it came roaring out of the darkness like the Twentieth Century Limited. It must have knocked Lois ten feet in the air and then sent her sprawling another thirty feet onto the highway. Mariposa and I came running out of the motel. The car stopped. I don’t know why, but the driver pulled up and got out. I recognized her right away. There wasn’t a person in America, no less California, who didn’t know that face. It was April Robin.”

“Go on,” Bingo said tensely. He could, through Browne’s voice and words, visualize the fragile seventeen-year-old stepping from the long, low-slung roadster, fresh from the laughter that had greeted her voice at the Pantages, perhaps trembling a little, her hair bobbed, her dress short and straight-lined in the style of the twenties, a long strand of pearls around her throat perhaps, dropping to the middle of the waistless garment.

“Lois was dead,” Browne said, and Bingo heard the words as if he were young April Robin, and he could feel the sudden knowledge of the highway death, and he almost began shivering as April Robin must have done that night some thirty years ago. “I told this to Miss Robin. I told her she was in serious trouble. I—”

“You told her Lois was your wife,” Handsome interrupted.

“Yes. Because... well, I’d already made a plan. The minute I saw who was driving that car, I began thinking in dollar signs. And I knew my case would be stronger if she thought I was Lois’ husband. I told her we would keep it quiet... if she paid us. I asked her how much she had in the bank. She wasn’t sure. Most of her money was in trust funds she couldn’t touch. She said it was something above fifty thousand. I told her I wanted all of it. We took Lois off the highway and left the car at the motel that night. I called a friend of mine, a doctor in San Diego, and he came up and was willing to say the kid had died of pneumonia... for a slice of the dough. The next morning Miss Robin went to her bank in Hollywood to get the money.”

“And she came back with it,” Bingo said.

“Yes. And she also came back with the reviews of her picture which had opened the night before. And she also came back with an idea.”

“What was the idea?”

“She wanted to get away from Hollywood. After what they’d done to her the night before, she wanted to get away, never see them again, never hear of them again, never give them a chance to laugh at April Robin as long as she lived. Her idea was a simple one. She wanted to change places with Lois DeLee. She wanted April Robin to die.”

“But she thought Lois was your wife, didn’t she? Wouldn’t she imagine there were complications to—”

“As far as she was concerned, Lois Browne was dead, my wife was dead. She wanted to assume the name of Lois DeLee, as if the marriage had never existed. This was fine with me because, actually, there’d never been a damn marriage. She still doesn’t know what the tombstone in Kimballsville says. She probably thinks it’s inscribed ‘Lois Browne.’ But the doctor and I couldn’t take any chances. We had to put her real name on the stone.”

“But first you put April’s clothes on the young girl, put April’s purse in the car with her, together with a few bills from the bank, and then shoved the car over a cliff,” Bingo said.

“And then we set fire to it later,” Browne said. “We threw gasoline on the wreckage. And... and the girl. Miss Robin touched the match. I remember that very clearly. It was her who touched the match.”

“And then what?”

“Then she left. In the papers the next day, after the accident was reported, after everyone thought April Robin was dead, I found out she’d withdrawn seventy-five thousand dollars from the bank. She’d sold us short by twenty-five grand.”

“How’d you split the money?”

“We got fifty all told. Twenty to me, twenty to Mariposa, and ten to the doctor who made out the death certificate.”

“And the grave?”

“Nothing but an empty box in Lois’ grave,” Browne said. He paused. “I didn’t commit any crime. April Robin was driving that car.”

“You’re an accessory to manslaughter,” Handsome said flatly.

“Okay,” Bingo said, “let’s say that April Robin, now Lois DeLee, learned her slack-wire act and got into show business again, far from Hollywood. Let’s say the twenty-five grand she withheld from you didn’t last very long and that she was damned anxious to marry Julien Lattimer when he came along. By this time, she’d bleached her hair blond and possibly had a nose-bob done on that famous profile. So she marries him and becomes the fifth Mrs. Julien Lattimer. All right, why does her husband disappear? Why does she vanish immediately after him?”

“I’m sure I don’t know,” Browne said.

“No? Then how’d you get Lattimer’s signature for us?”

Browne clamped his mouth shut.

“Did you kill Chester Baxter?” Bingo asked.

“Me? Are you crazy? I never killed anyone in my life!”

“How about Pearl Durzy?”

“I had nothing to do with her death,” Browne said.

“How’d you get that Budlong and Dollinger stuff from Janesse?”

Browne smiled thinly. “I needed the stuff, and I figured out where the weakest link was. Janesse, naturally. A kid who wanted to get into the movies and who’d be impressed by a producer. So I made it my business to meet her, gave her a whirl until I got the stationery and receipt, and then dropped her.”

“Did Lattimer ask you to sell that house for him?”

Browne clamped his mouth shut again, and this time it was clamped shut to stay. Bingo nodded soberly.

“I don’t think you ought to try leaving the city,” he said. “I think the police may be looking you up soon, and they might feel your running away was a clear indication of guilt. Far in excess of simple manslaughter.” He opened the door on his side of the car. “Come on, Handsome. Let’s go home.”

In the convertible, Handsome said, “I don’t think April Robin was very bright.”

“Bright or not, Handsome, she was in a pretty tough spot. There wasn’t much she could do but pay the man.”

“Sure. But she threw away all that money in the trust funds.”

“She also threw away her life.”

“On the other hand,” Handsome said, “she later married a very wealthy man, so maybe she knew what she was doing after all.”

“To my way of thinking, she didn’t learn very much over the years,” Bingo said.

“How so?”

“Well, she ran away again, didn’t she? This time as Mrs. Julien Lattimer. And this time leaving an estate of half a million dollars behind her.”

“Maybe she just doesn’t like money,” Handsome said.

“Maybe not. Or maybe she just didn’t like Julien. Maybe she put him in a car and set fire to him, too.”

“I would buy that, Bingo,” Handsome said seriously, “except that he signed those papers for our house. It would be hard to be dead and signing papers.”

Bingo was silently reflective for a moment. Then he said, “It figures, doesn’t it?”

“What?”

“Everyone referring to Lois Lattimer as a young woman. Remember what Leo Henkin said about April Robin? She’d always look young, he said. A timeless beauty. Well, at least we’ve solved one of those problems, Handsome. We know who April Robin is.”

“Yes,” Handsome agreed. “But we don’t know where she is, or even why she went.”

“Do you think we should call Hendenfelder to tell him what we know?”

“Yes,” Handsome said. “As soon as we get home.”

They drove the rest of the way to Damascus Drive in complete though shared silence. As they pulled up to the house, Handsome said, “I think we’ve got company, Bingo.”

And then Bingo saw the light burning in the living room.

Twenty-two

The man sitting in the living room did not mince words.

“My name is Rex Strober,” he said, “and I don’t mince words. We’ve met before, briefly. I’m now an independent producer, used to be head of production at Columbia, but there’s more money in it for me this way. Leo Henkin tells me you’ve got a hot property, an actress. Okay, I’ve got a hot property, too. A story. Want to get married?”

“I don’t wish to seem impolite,” Bingo said, “but how’d you get in here?”

“I walked in,” Strober answered.

“That’s impossible. We locked the door when we left.”

“It was open when I got here,” Strober said. He waved his hand in a gesture of dismissal. “Besides, wherever I want to get in, I get in. When I was a kid, I lived on the Lower East Side in New York. I made up my mind when I was seven years old that wherever I wanted to get in, I would. And I have. And I still do. Do you want to get married?”

“That depends,” Bingo said.

“On what?”

“On your dowry.”

“Don’t play games with me,” Strober said. “You’ve got a big empty house that needs furniture. You’re not going to fill that house with a one-week option on an unknown redhead. I’ve got an original screenplay by the hottest novelist on the scene. Stick your Janesse Budlong into it and she’s a star overnight. I guarantee it. I’ve made more stars than there are in the heavens, believe me.”

“What’s your deal?”

“Eight hundred a week for your redhead while we’re shooting the picture. Option for her services on the next two feature films we make at terms to be discussed.”

“What about us?”

“Twenty-five percent of the producer’s profits. After double-negative.”

“We’ll want an advance,” Bingo said.

“In addition or against?”

“Against our share of the profits.”

“How much?” Strober said.

“Ten thousand.”

“I’ll give you five.”

“We’ll take seventy-five hundred,” Bingo said.

“Six thousand, and not a penny more,” Strober said.

“Seven thousand,” Bingo said, “and that’s final.”

“Six thousand, two hundred and fifty is my absolute last offer,” Strober said.

“Let’s settle for sixty-five hundred,” Bingo offered.

“It’s a deal.”

He rose and shook hands with Bingo.

“My partner,” Bingo said. “Handsome Kusak.”

“Pleased to meet you,” Handsome said warmly, and he took Strober’s hand.

“Nice knowing you, young man,” Strober said, and he eyed Handsome speculatively, as if weighing his potential box-office appeal. He nodded slightly, making a secret inner judgment, and then said, “My lawyer will draw up the contracts at once. Standard forms, and I’m sure there’ll be no problem. You’ll have your check tomorrow morning. Do you gentlemen want some advice?”

Bingo was smiling from ear lobe to ear lobe. “We’re always willing to accept advice, Mr. Strober,” he said.

“Make it Rex,” Strober answered, “since we are practically partners on this new venture. My advice is this. Sign your Janesse Budlong to a long-term contract immediately.”

“That’s good advice,” Bingo said. “I’ll call my attorney.”

“And who might that be?”

“Arthur Schlee,” Bingo said with some pomposity, but not much, because he somehow felt he didn’t need the distinction of the lawyer’s name any more.

“A good man,” Strober said, nodding. “Shall I have the contracts and check sent to his office?”

“Yes, he’ll want to look them over,” Bingo said.

“Gentlemen,” Strober said, “it’s been a pleasure doing business with you. I hope you’re happy with the deal.”

“We are.”

“You couldn’t get a better deal off a pushcart on Mott Street,” Strober said, “and I am an expert on those. Good night to you both. I’m very content.” He rose. “If you should have any questions later” — and here he grinned for the first time — “I live right next door.” He shook hands all around once more and then went out. Handsome and Bingo were silent for several moments. Quite curiously, Bingo almost felt like crying.

“You did it, Bingo,” Handsome said at last, very gently.

“We did it,” Bingo corrected.

The partners fell silent again.

“I wish I could be happier, Bingo,” Handsome said, “but I keep thinking of other things.”

“Like what, Handsome?”

“Like how did Charlie Browne get Julien Lattimer’s signature on those house papers? Nobody else could find Julien. And also, why would Julien let Charlie sell this house for peanuts?”

Bingo stared at Handsome thoughtfully. There was a look of rapt concentration on his partner’s even-featured face. For an instant Bingo had the distinct impression he could hear gears clicking and wheels turning.

“Maybe, Bingo, he had something on Julien and was blackmailing him just like he blackmailed April Robin. Or maybe—” Handsome stopped, and then he snapped his fingers and said, “Sure, Bingo! Charlie blackmailed April Robin once, so why wouldn’t he do it again? Only now she’s Lois Lattimer and she’s married to a rich guy. So Charlie blackmailed both of them!”

“That’s it, Handsome!” Bingo said, and then his face fell. “But how did he find her again? How did he know she was Mrs. Julien Lattimer?”

“That wouldn’t be too hard,” Handsome said. “After Lois married Julien, she moved back into this house. Maybe for sentimental reasons. Can we say that, Bingo?”

“We can certainly say that, Handsome.”

“Okay. The house was well known, and there probably were some newspaper stories about Mr. and Mrs. Julien Lattimer buying it. Stories with pictures. And maybe somebody saw those pictures and right away recognized that Lois Lattimer was April Robin.”

“Somebody like Charlie Browne, who knew she was alive,” Bingo said, nodding. “And maybe he came back and asked her for more money. A lot more money.”

“Probably all her money,” Handsome said. “We got to remember, Bingo, that this Browne wanted everything on the highway in 1928. And also that he cheated Mrs. DeLee out of the two hundred dollars he promised her on the sale of this house. I think he is a man who would take all he can possibly get.”

“And all he can get,” Bingo said, “is everything.”

“Only maybe Lois doesn’t have anything. Maybe it’s all in her husband’s name.”

“But Browne doesn’t care,” Bingo said. He was beginning to get excited now. He could feel excitement starting way down in his toes and working its way up his legs to settle in the pit of his stomach. “He wants the money, period. So she and Julien had to figure a way to get loose of Charlie. This Julien is a guy who loves money — Adelle told us that, remember?”

“I remember,” Handsome said, taking no offense. “But if Browne had them over a barrel, wouldn’t they have maybe killed him? I mean, Bingo, instead of running away and all?”

“Well, murder is carrying things pretty far, Handsome.”

“That’s true.”

Bingo shrugged. “They ran away instead. What else could they do? If they refused to pay him, he’d go to the police, and Lois would go to jail.”

“So would Charlie,” Handsome said. “He was a party to manslaughter.”

“That might not have stopped him. He might have been angry enough to go to the police and take his chances that they couldn’t prove he’d helped conceal the highway death.”

“Okay,” Handsome said, “if they couldn’t refuse to pay him, why didn’t they simply pay him?”

“What he was demanding?” Bingo said. “Everything Julien had worked for all his life? I don’t think Julien would have liked that very much.”

“No, I don’t think so either.”

“They had to get away from Browne and keep that money at the same time,” Bingo said thoughtfully.

“That’s it!” Handsome said.

“What’s it?”

“If Julien disappeared for seven years, he’d be declared legally dead at the end of that time, and then Lois would inherit the largest part of his estate.”

“Of course,” Bingo said. “With Adelle Lattimer getting only a quarter of it.”

“Which is a lot cheaper than handing Browne all of it.”

“And that’s why Julien disappeared first. It couldn’t seem to Browne or the police or anyone that there was any collusion.” Bingo paused. “They probably planned for Lois to join Julien later, and then they’d wait out the seven years together.”

“Bingo,” Handsome said, and there was the glow of excitement in his eyes also now. “Bingo, I know why Lois took off in such a rush.”

“Why?”

“Because the cops accused her of murdering her own husband. They hadn’t figured on something like that happening. So maybe she wired him and asked him what to do, and he said Clear out fast, honey. That was when she began cashing in everything she could cash, and forging his name to checks besides.”

“Sure,” Bingo said. “They were going to need every cent they could gather. It would have to carry them for seven years. At the end of that time, Julien would be legally dead, and there’d be no proof that he was ever murdered, so Lois could safely claim the inheritance. She could do that through a lawyer so Charlie Browne would never find her again.”

“Then why did they come back now, Bingo?”

“Because they ran out of money, I’ll bet. And I’ll bet Charlie Browne found out they were in town and went to see them again.”

“Bingo, you are pacing the floor.”

“I know I am.”

“All right, Bingo.”

“And by now, Browne was willing to be reasonable. He’d settle for only a part of their money, once they inherited it. In fact, he was willing to help them wait out the seven years by trying for a quick sale on their house while they remained in hiding.”

“But if Browne was willing to co-operate now,” Handsome said, “why wait out the seven years? Why not simply reappear right away and claim what’s rightfully theirs?”

“Because they didn’t want new police curiosity. They didn’t want the cops maybe digging all the way back to 1928.”

“You’re very smart, Bingo,” Handsome said.

“Thank you.”

“Do you think the Lattimers killed poor Chester Baxter?”

“Well, it kind of figures. The Owl’s Roost was probably where they met with Browne. It was Charlie’s hangout, you know. And Chester must have seen them there and followed them when they left. They couldn’t take a chance on anyone else knowing Julien was still alive and hiding out in Hollywood. They’d waited too long to get at the estate. They couldn’t afford to start all over again, not when they were so close.”

“So they killed him.”

“Yes.”

“And Pearl Durzy, too?”

“I don’t know, Handsome.”

“Gee, Bingo,” Handsome said. “Do you think we’re right?”

“You’re right,” a voice behind them answered, “but it won’t do you a damn bit of good.”

The first person they saw when they turned was Lois Lattimer alias Lois DeLee alias April Robin alias Abigail Ross. She was blond and slender and delicate-looking and extremely gorgeous and she didn’t look a day over thirty-two. The pearl-handled revolver in the fist of the gentleman with her didn’t look a caliber over .32.

The gentleman with her was dark and small, with graying hair and gloomy eyes and a poetic mouth. Bingo imagined he was Julien Lattimer. He didn’t have to ask them how they’d got in, because he assumed as past owners of the house they both possessed keys. He knew now why Rex Strober had found the front door unlocked. He didn’t have to ask why they were there, either; the .32 in Julien Lattimer’s hand was unwavering and made the mission absolutely crystal-clear.

“Well,” Bingo said, and he had to admit to himself that the sight of the steady pistol aimed at his midsection was somewhat unnerving.

Handsome said, “April Robin.”

It was amazing how beautiful she was, Bingo thought. Even with the nose-bob — which was an expert job, but which gave her face a slightly Irish cast that didn’t quite fit with the rest of it — even with that, she was an incredibly gorgeous woman. He had to keep reminding himself that she was really forty-seven years old. He also had to keep reminding himself that there was a pistol in Julien’s hand.

Quickly he said, “If you’re worried about our idle speculations—” and then shut his mouth when Julien gestured at him with the pistol.

“Let’s get this over with,” Julien said. His voice, in keeping with his gloomy eyes, was low and sepulchral. But, despite his words, he did not seem in a particular hurry to squeeze the trigger.

“You’re not really going to kill us, are you?” Bingo said hopefully. “After all, you didn’t kill Charlie Browne, and you had more reason—”

“They should have killed him, Bingo,” Handsome said. “They were just stupid, that’s all.” Bingo blinked. Handsome’s tone had been completely surprising, and besides, this was certainly no time to be insulting these people. To Bingo’s horror, Handsome added, “Plain stupid!” in as jeering a voice as he’d ever heard. He braced himself for the gun explosion he was sure would come. Oddly, the pistol remained silent. It was April Robin who exploded instead.

“We didn’t kill him because he’d prepared a letter telling of the highway accident!” she said heatedly. “If Browne died, the letter would be delivered to the police. That’s why we didn’t kill him when he first made his exorbitant demands. And that’s why we don’t kill him now. That letter is still around. There was nothing stupid about—”

“Of course not,” Bingo said quickly, trying to placate the rising anger. “But it would be stupid to kill two people who really don’t know anything at all.” He tried a feeble grin. “We don’t know that you really killed Chester Baxter or Pearl Durzy. We simply don’t—”

“We did kill them!” April snapped. Her eyes remained on Handsome, as if she was intent on proving something to him. “Baxter, because he followed us; and Pearl, because she got panicky when Browne was showing you through the house.”

“I don’t understand,” Handsome said.

“Then maybe you’re the stupid one,” April said triumphantly. “Pearl Durzy knew who I was. She kept quiet only because we promised her ownership of this house once Julien was declared legally dead.”

“So naturally,” Bingo said, turning to Handsome, “when she saw Browne leading clients through it, she got very upset and she tried to find out what was going on. Browne calmed her down temporarily. And Miss Robin made it permanent. That was very natural, Handsome. It wasn’t—”

“It was a dumb risk,” Handsome said, that same unexpected sneer in his voice.

“Now, Handsome—” Bingo started.

“It wasn’t dumb!” April said angrily. “I tried to explain to her, but she wouldn’t listen to reason. And it wasn’t risky. We were drinking together. I put the knockout drops in her glass. And then I left her with the carbon tetrachloride and took her money. We needed it. Seven years is a long and expensive time to wait.”

Handsome nodded silently. If he had any desire to comment further, he certainly was restraining himself admirably, Bingo thought. And of course Handsome had very nicely led April Robin into saying a lot of things she might not have said except in anger. Unfortunately, though, the pistol was still there. And if Julien was waiting for the word from April, she seemed ready to hurl it instantaneously.

“Well, let’s not be too hasty,” Bingo said hastily. “Let’s talk a deal. We’re all businessmen and all friends.”

“We’ve got no money for further deals!” April snapped.

“The neighbors,” Bingo said desperately. “The shots’ll be heard all over the neighborhood—”

Julien reached into his pocket and snapped the silencer into place on the end of the pistol. Long and menacing, the pistol swung back toward Bingo again.

“You won’t gain anything by killing us,” Bingo said. “The police already know—”

“The police know nothing,” Julien said, leveling the pistol.

In a very quiet voice, April Robin said, “The big one first.”

The front door swung open. Mrs. Waldo Hibbing burst into the room, shouting, “Mr. Riggs! Mr. Riggs!” and then froze in her tracks when she saw the gun in Julien Lattimer’s hand. Julien whirled on her and Handsome leaped in the same instant, knocking him to the floor. The pistol clattered noisily across the bare room. April’s eyes followed its dizzying progress, and then she started to sprint after it. Bingo tripped her.

The forty-seven-year-old star, who’d disappeared twice in a single lifetime, went tumbling to the floor in a bundle of skirt and petticoat and still-superb legs. And then Handsome picked up the pistol, and April Robin suddenly looked as old as time, despite the years of slack-wire work which had preserved her youthful body; suddenly, she looked as old as Methuselah. She didn’t say a word as she got to her feet. She didn’t have to. She’d said it all when answering Handsome’s challenge.

“Oh, my goodness!” Mrs. Waldo Hibbing said. “I didn’t mean to interfere with your rehearsal. All I wanted was to...”

“Yes, Mrs. Hibbing?” Bingo said kindly.

“... was to tell you how lucky I am! Mr. Kusak arranged for me to go to the Fox studios day after tomorrow, remember?”

“Yes?”

“Well, I was just driving home in my car, and I happened to have the radio on, and guess who’s going to start filming a movie at Fox day after tomorrow? Just guess who I’ll get a chance to see on the set?”

“Who?” Bingo asked.

“Gregory Peck!” Mrs. Hibbing said ecstatically. “Why, he’s one of the biggest stars in Hollywood. I just had to come in and tell you. When I saw your light burning... I was so excited, you see... why, he’s just one of the biggest stars in Hollywood!”

April Robin looked at Mrs. Hibbing somewhat curiously, somewhat regretfully. Perhaps she was remembering, Bingo thought, perhaps she was remembering.

“I’ll call Hendenfelder,” Handsome said, handing the gun to Bingo.

“Yes,” Bingo answered. “And then we’d better call Janesse Budlong to get that long-term contract. And Adelle Lattimer about our cut; she’ll get her back alimony now.” He smiled at Handsome. “You all right?”

“I’m fine,” Handsome said, walking to the phone. “You?”

Bingo’s smile widened. “I’m fine, too. Just fine. But—”

“Yes, Bingo?”

For a fleeting moment, Bingo thought of New York City and sidewalk pictures, of tourists posing near the skating rink at Rockefeller Center, and carriages waiting outside the Plaza, of July heat and October brilliance and January snow. Then he grinned at his partner and said, “Nothing, Handsome. Everything’s just fine,” and Handsome began dialing the police.

Content

Craig Rice and Ed McBain
The April Robin Murders

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen

Nineteen

Twenty

Twenty-one

Twenty-two