City of Secrets (24 page)

Allen's door was open about a foot. She was glad to skip the formal routine, the well-bred, well-moneyed Pinkerton front office, country club of private investigation, secretary drenched in Chanel No. 5 and answering the phone like Norma Shearer. Plush carpet, detailed files on everything except Pinkerton himself, and probably more dirt than even Hoover could vacuum up.

Knocked on Allen's door. Not protocol to see him this way, but he didn't give a rat's ass about protocol.

Gruff voice answered “Yeah?” to the knock.

“You know it's me.”

The door swung out. Allen was leaning back in his green leather office chair, leg still outstretched from kicking the door open. He grinned, shoved the cut-glass bowl of lemon drops toward the front of his desk.

“Have one. Helps the thinking process. How's the case coming? The papers make it sound not so good for your old friend Duggan.”

She fell into the opposite chair. “Hell of a lot going on, Allen. Maybe too much. I got shot at last night—”

The Pinkerton half rose, and she waved him back down. “I'm OK, just got grazed on my left arm.”

“Because of this Duggan case?” Allen's face rumpled into lines of concern that stretched all the way up to his bare, bald head, freckled and weathered like old leather.

Miranda crunched and swallowed the Life Savers. Plucked out two lemon drops.

“I don't know. Somebody doesn't want me nosing around. Or maybe just wants me dead. Martini's got a cousin from Chicago, Angelo Benedetti. No fucking angel, either, supposed to be splitting up from the Lanza mob.”

“Christ, Miranda, you make more enemies in a year than most gumshoes do in ten.”

She smiled. “It's a gift. I'm on a lead, though, a good one. You ever hear anything about Nance's Sanitarium up in Calistoga?”

Allen smoothed a hand over his scalp. “Doesn't ring a bell. Should it?”

Miranda frowned. “I don't know. It's a connection with Pandora Blake and Annie Learner.”

His thick eyebrows rose higher. “That's a hell of a coincidence. Calistoga, huh? Plenty of bootleggers up there a few years ago. Wine, mostly, squirreled away in Napa and the Alexander Valley. What the hell have you gotten your nose into, Miri?”

She laughed and stood up. “Nothing I can't handle, Old Mother Hubbard. If your encyclopedic files extend to any references on Nance's, I'd appreciate them.”

Miranda turned to leave when the Pinkerton called her back.

“You ever follow up that Musketeer tip?”

She shook her head. “My friend Bente's going out there tonight. Don't have enough time to do it myself, and wish I did. Goddamn case keeps sprouting legs.”

Allen grinned. Leaned back in his chair, hands behind his head. “Just cut 'em off at the knee, sister. But tell your friend to be careful. We got a tip that something's gonna pop around Memorial Day.”

Miranda's voice was quick. “That's the day after tomorrow.”

“Yeah, I know. I'm not workin' it, only feeding you what I hear. Stoolies are singing about Memorial Day and ‘Onward, Christian Soldiers.' Looks like the Musketeers might be trying to unite the other swastika boys. So be careful.”

“Thanks, Allen.”

Miranda plucked three lemon drops from his bowl and slipped back into the hall of the Monadnock.

 

Twenty-one

Angry horns screeching on Market outside, bass rumble of the trains. Ray Eberle and “The Nearness of You” drifting up from the Pig n' Whistle jukebox. Fragments of laughter, anger, anticipation. Low, soft cooing of pigeons.

No tan Ford. Just a gray white curtain. Bright white and fog blind.

Oh no, it's just the nearness of you …

Miranda's heel taps hit the floor with angry clicks. She started to pace.

Annie's abortion was anywhere from nine months to a year and a half ago, based on the scars, and that was a guess, the M.E. insisted. Meyer's note said he wasn't happy about being cornered, but fuck, they never were.

Tubal ligation at probably the same time, only possible if the pregnancy was early but still a bigger risk, especially since one of the operations was legal and the other one wasn't. Both were expensive. And both meant time in a hospital or at least a bed.

Miranda unwrapped two more Butter Rum Life Savers and picked up the M.E.'s report on Pandora. Read it twice.

Walked toward the window and back to the door, sucking on the Life Savers, siren screaming somewhere by Battery or Front, pigeons still cooing, sound of wings.

Dropped the papers on the desk, pages fluttering apart. Sank in the chair, holding the postcard addressed to Annie.

I wanted to let you know that I'm back to work.… We are more than sisters.… But if you ever need to talk, Annie, you know where to find me.

Woman, young enough to be Annie's sister, back to work and presumably on Treasure Island, since the card's from the Hollywood Show, happy fucking endings on the hour.

I know we agreed never to tell anyone and to try to forget, and I want to do that more than anything now.

Only thing you try to forget is pain. Happy memories are too goddamn hard to come by. Pain, misery, loss. Secrets and shame. Keep secret what you're ashamed of, what can get you in trouble. Deeper the pain, more quiet, more secrecy. More guilt.

Miranda took a deep breath, fought the urge to stick a Chesterfield in her mouth. Postcard was shaking in her hand.

No one will know about what happened, not even my mother.

Girl has a mother, evidently close to her, “even” my mother. Promise, not a threat, a pledge, an oath, and she's making Annie a sister, more than a sister. Depth of trust, sacred pact.

I don't think I could have come back without your help.

Goddamn it.

Miranda set the card on the desk, closed her eyes. Come back physically, come back to work, come back home, come back from some fucking prison of an abortion clinic run out of Calistoga and hiding behind bubbling mud baths and massages and physiotherapy? “Results in Health,” the postcard claimed. What kind of fucking results for Pandora Blake?

She flipped quickly through the papers on the desk until she found Annie's other postcard, the one from Nance's. Never sent.

So different from this one. No escape necessary.

Don't want you to worry. You're always so sorry after you get mad.

Edwina said Duggan smacked Annie around. And Miranda knew what he was capable of.

She closed her eyes again, saw Duggan with the sad monkey face scrunched up tight, red rage, red remorse.

Sorry, so sorry, he'd sniffle, and maybe mean it, maybe she was different from the whore that killed his brother, from the women he arrested down on Turk Street or Hyde, the whores that serviced him in Chinatown alleys, blow job if you keep me out of the can, mister, and sometimes he'd take them up on it, confession afterward, three Hail Marys, Gerald, and you're done.

Maybe Annie was different.

P.S. Don't lose your license again, you might need to come get me. Love always, your Annie

Miranda shoved a newspaper aside and stared down at the souvenir matchbook from Annie's apartment.

Happy Dreams, Annie.

Same man? Same Duggan? Same dirty bastard who tried to break her last year? Same man squatting in a San Quentin prison cell for murdering Annie Learner?

Back to the card.

Just need a few days off to think about everything. I'll write soon.

Not the words of a woman looking for an abortion.

Not the words of a woman who'd never be able to have kids.

Miranda shook her head and held the card up in the daylight from the window, examining the writing. No sign of a hurry, no evidence of dictation. Just a postcard Annie kept but never sent, preserving a memory.

Why? Why didn't she mail it to Duggan if it was an innocent vacation, time away from a lovers' quarrel? And why fucking preserve it if it memorialized the loss of a child, loss of all potential children? What the two women shared was something not to be spoken of, not to be told.

Sisters in pain. Nothing to be remembered.

Miranda passed a shaking hand over her forehead. Gave in and opened her desk drawer, found a half-empty package, and shook out a stick. Lit it with the desk lighter, drawing deep. Stared straight ahead, unblinking.

Reached for the phone.

*   *   *

“I don't give a fuck whether he's the head M.E. or not, Meyer. If Fortescue autopsied Pandora Blake, he either overlooked something or neglected to add it to the report. Something like an abortion. Lucky for us he wasn't the M.E. on Annie.”

Her attorney grunted. “Annie Learner and Pandora Blake, both missing from work for the same period, proven to know each other, both sharing a painful event, both murdered. We'll need more than postcards, Miranda.”

“I'm driving up to Calistoga this afternoon. What I need from you are bank receipts and phone records and some goddamn information about whether Pandora's body showed signs of an abortion.”

Meyer sounded tired, usual jaunty verve conspicuous in its absence. “I'll see what I can do. Mr. Duggan's arraignment is next week. Brady won't entertain a plea bargain of any kind.”

“Why should he? He's got Duggan where he wants him—and the bastard's cooperating in his own destruction.” She tapped the Chesterfield in the ashtray, frowning at the postcards.

“Pandora and Annie were in contact recently, or why else would Duggan go to Artists and Models? He was trying to see Annie—and probably approached Pandora because he found out about what was between them, what they shared.” The cigarette wasn't helping her hands or her arm or her goddamn nerves. She rubbed it out on the tarnished spot and left it in the tray.

“I'll arrange for any records to be sent over. But why not visit Mr. Duggan and speak with him first?”

“Not until I know more. Duggan's in a frame and he doesn't want out. I think he blames himself for Annie.”

Meyer made a noise. “The charges make no sense. Where is the second murder weapon? He admits to picking up the ice pick and dropping it in a trash can. And if it's a
drame de la jalousie,
as the papers would like us to believe, then how did Mr. Duggan happen to find another ice pick and where is it now? The elements of spontaneity and premeditation are too mixed, and the district attorney wants it both ways.”

Miranda's lips curved in half a smile. “I could've told you that, Meyer. Listen, I've gotta go. Get me that information, and anything else you can find out about Nance's Sanitarium.”

“Of course, my dear. But what about Mr. Sanders? You can't drive to Calistoga one-handed.”

Shit. She looked at her left arm, scowl on her face.

“I'll let you know. I'll leave a message.”

“Miranda…” Voice was serious. “Please be careful.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I will.”

Her left arm twitched, pain stabbing down to her fingers. Miranda reached across the desk, poured another shot of Old Taylor.

She studied the long, low building with the red tile roof,
NANCE'S HOT SPRINGS
sign a stark black and white against palm trees.

Annie and Pandora shared something. As women—as sisters. Something they didn't expect. Something they had to escape.

Something at Nance's Sanitarium.

*   *   *

Miranda jumped when the phone rang. Finally lifted the receiver, expecting cold silence, colder threat.

“Miranda? Thank God—I left you a goddamn message, tried to get you at home—are you all right?”

She sank into the desk chair, deep breath.

“I'm OK, Rick. Haven't called the service yet—sorry I missed you.”

“You could've called me last night.”

She reached for the roll of Life Savers on her desk, shoved two of them in her mouth.

“Gillespie drove me home. It's just a graze. And you walked out last night, remember?”

His voice was heavy. “Yeah. 'Cause I didn't want to see you get yourself killed. Guess I'm too goddamn late for that, aren't I? Killed yourself three years ago, and keep killing yourself, over and over. You just haven't made it formal yet.”

Her right hand clenched the arm of her desk chair, knuckles white.

“I'll try one more time to get this through your thick half-Irish skull. This is who I am. This is who I'm going to be. Either be my friend or don't, Sanders—but don't fucking playact Ivanhoe. You don't have the goddamn armor for it.”

Heard his intake of breath. Goddamn it. The Irish bastard always drove her to this. Fucking when Irish eyes are smiling, and they only smiled when dreaming about her, shoving her in a corner, making her something she wasn't and never could be, not his fucking wild Irish rose or anyone else's.

She glanced at the clock: 1:37
P.M.
Lowered her voice, tried to make it businesslike.

“I've got a lead. I think Pandora and Annie were at Nance's Sanitarium together. I'm hiring a driver and heading up there around four. From my office. If you want to come, meet me here.”

Silence on the other end, machine-gun beat of typewriters in the background.

She said it evenly. “Or not. Your choice. Take care of yourself, Rick.”

The phone clanged when she dropped the receiver in the cradle.

*   *   *

Miranda stood at the window, smoke curling into Market Street from the Chesterfield in her hand. Ran her fingers through her hair, glad not to be wearing a hat.

She remembered how they smelled, furtive eyes, sweat on their necks and in their palms when they looked at her. She your best escort, Mrs. Laroche? Want the best, gotta look good to the board, don't you know, and please make the bill out to my business address only.

Lick of the lips, quick breaths in and out. Anticipation. Send her up to the Ritz, to the Huntington, to the Top of the Mark.