Death by Pantyhose (14 page)

My God, that was just what Dorcas had said.
What sort of spell had Vic cast over these
women?

The sooner I could break that spell, the better.

"Did you know," I said, "that Dorcas was once
married to Vic?"

Her eyes widened in disbelief.

"You can't be serious."

I nodded. "Dead serious."

"Omigod," she said, stunned. "The poor thing.
How could Vic have been so cruel to her?"

For the first time, I saw a look of disgust in
her eyes.

I thanked her for her time and headed down
to the picket fence, feeling quite pleased with
myself. If I'd shortened her mourning period by
even one minute, I'd done my good deed for
the day.

I spent the next hour or so questioning Allison's neighbors, hoping one of them saw somebody other than Dorcas show up at the bungalow
the night of the murder. But nobody saw anything, except the neighbor across the streetthe one who called the cops.

A harried young mother with sleep-deprived
eyes, she answered the door with an infant slung
over her shoulder and a little boy in a Batman
suit clinging to her jeans. Her T-shirt was
splotched with what looked like dried oatmeal.
(At least I hoped it was oatmeal.) And I thought
I could see a few flecks of the stuff in her hair,
too.

Somebody was having a rough morning.

"You with the police?" she asked when -I told
her I was investigating Vic's murder.

"No, private eye," I said, flashing her my library card before she could get a good look at
it.

I don't know what it is about laminated cards,
but they tend to make people take you seriously.
Any inhibitions she had about talking to a
stranger disappeared.

"Like I told the police, all I saw was a tall, skinny
girl banging on the door, drunk as a skunk. She woke up the baby. At four A.M! It took me hours to
get her back down again." She raked her fingers
through her oatmeal-encrusted hair. "Dwayne,
stop pulling at Mommy's jeans."

The little boy stopped tugging at her jeans
and threw his arms around her thigh instead.

"Dwayne, you're cutting off my circulation."

"I woke up, too," he informed me solemnly.

I smiled at him and turned back to his mom.
"Are you certain you didn't see anybody else
show up that night?"

"No, nobody else. Just the drunk."

"I saw Batman!" Dwayne released his death
grip on his mother's thigh. "In his Batmobile!"

He whirled around in his Batman cape, for
dramatic effect.

"I saw Batman!" he repeated, in case I hadn't
caught it the first time. "In his Batmobile."

"He's seen Batman, all right," his mom said.
"About 67 times. We bought the video. Worst
mistake we ever made. If I hear that theme song
one more time, I may hurl myself off a cliff."

All traces of shyness vanished, Dwayne was
now spinning around in a frenzy, yelling, "I saw
Batman! I saw Batman!"

No doubt thrilled that her older brother had
spotted a world-famous action hero, the baby
joined in the fun and began wailing at the top
of her lungs.

Their mother groaned.

"Sorry, gotta go."

And she shut the door not so gently in my
face.

As I made my way back to Wheezy, I could still
hear Dwayne shrieking, "I saw Batman! I saw Batman!"

Great. Another expert eyewitness joins the
Jaine Austen investigative team.

After a quick pit stop at McDonald's for a
restorative Quarter Pounder, I headed over to
pay a call on Vic's writer, Hank.

As those of you paying attention may recall,
Dorcas wasn't the only one who'd attacked Vic
at the Laff Palace. Hank had lunged at him, too,
furious at the way he'd so callously dumped Allison. True, Vic had brushed him aside like a
pesky gnat. But who's to say Hank didn't show
up at the bungalow later that night and have
better luck with a pair of pantyhose?

It was a short hop to Hank's place in Culver
City, one of those spit and cardboard singles
buildings that seem to spring up overnight like
weeds in L.A.

Hank opened the door to his apartment in
shorts and a sweatshirt. Without his jeans and
blazer, he was skinny as a runway model, with a
waist I'd kill for and knees as knobby as golf
balls.

Not exactly the portrait of an assassin.

"Hi," I said. "I'm Jaine Austen."

"Love your books."

I forced a smile, as if I hadn't heard that one
a gazillion times.

"Actually," I started to explain, "I'm investigating Vic's murder."

"I Know. Allison called and told me you'd be
stopping by."

He ushered me into his apartment, a no-frills bachelor pad decorated with mismatched furniture and Laurel & Hardy movie posters. The
only expensive object in the room was a fancy
exercise machine, draped with clothing.

"I spent hundreds of dollars on that damn
machine," he said, following my gaze, "and used
it maybe three times. Now it's a coat rack."

"I can relate," I said, thinking of all the gym
memberships I'd let lapse in my lifetime. "Anyhow, I really appreciate your talking with me."

"No problem" I was just about to take a break."
He pointed to a laptop computer on a card
table in the far corner of the room. "Like everybody else in town," he grinned, "I'm writing a
movie."

And he was not exaggerating. Nine out of ten
Angelenos are writing movies. (The tenth is writing a sitcom.)

"You want a Coke?" he asked.

"Sure."

He walked past the counter separating his
tiny dining area from his tiny kitchen and got us
two Cokes from the refrigerator.

"Grab a seat," he called out to me.

I sat down at his dinette set and watched him
struggle to open the pop-tops on the Cokes. Not
exactly Mr. Universe, was he? No wonder he'd
backed down from his confrontation with Vic at
the Laff Palace.

"Anyhow," he said, coming back with the
Cokes, "the answer is no."

I blinked, puzzled.

"Allison told me you'd be asking me if I saw
anybody go near Dorcas's bag the night of the
murder. Well, I didn't. Just thought I'd save you some time. I didn't see anybody lift a pair of
pantyhose from her bag."

"Even if you didn't see anyone, can you think
of anyone, other than Dorcas, who might've
killed Vic?"

"Take a number. Everybody hated the guy."

"Did you?"

Of course, I already knew the answer to that
one.

"Sure. You saw the way I told him off at the
club. He treated me like crap. But what I really
hated was the way he treated Allison. The creep
was ready to hop into bed with anyone without a
Y chromosome."

Hank had hated Vic, all right. Enough, I wondered, to have summoned up the strength to
kill him?

"Allison says she slept here that night."

"She did. So in case you're thinking she killed
Vic, forget it. She was here all night and I'm prepared to swear to it.,,

"She said you slept in the living room and she
slept in the bedroom."

"That's true."

"How do you know she didn't sneak out in the
middle of the night while you were sleeping?"

"I'm a light sleeper. I would've heard her."

I wasn't so sure about that. I was convinced
Hank would perjure himself up his yingyang to
save his beloved. Either one of them could've
slipped out past the other in the middle of the
night and killed Vic.

"And I didn't do it, either," he said, "if that's
what you're wondering. I hated the guy, but I
didn't kill him."

And I believed him. Hank couldn't open a
pop-top without a struggle, let alone wring the
life out of someone.

Besides, I thought as I got up to leave, anybody who used an exercise machine as a coat
rack was A -OK in my book.

- t was a little before three when I left Hank's
. -place. Which gave me just enough time to zip
over to Santa Monica for my appointment at
Gustavo's. (That is, if you call crawling along in
Wheezy at twenty-five miles an hour "zipping. ")

The salon was on Montana Avenue, one of
the toniest streets in Santa Monica, or as I like
to think of it, Bi- Bucks-By-The-Sea.

A valet parker stood out front, but I'd be
darned if I'd spend money I didn't have for a
valet. So I parked three long blocks away on a
residential street and sprinted back to the salon.

It wasn't until I got there and saw my reflection in Gustavo's plate glass window that I realized I was wearing my usual elastic-waist jeans
and T-shirt ensemble. I looked around at the
toney Montana Avenue crowd. Not an elastic
waist in sight. And all the T-shirts were the tight
spandex midriff-exposing kind, not the big
baggy Hanes Men's Underwear kind.

Drat. Why hadn't I planned ahead and worn something decent? Oh, well. It was too late to
do anything about it now. I took a deep breath,
sucked in my gut, and headed inside.

The place was a haven of pale peach walls
and recessed lighting guaranteed to shave years
off a woman's face. Soft music played in the background as pretty ladies lounged around getting
prettier.

I'd worried that Gustavo's would be full of
avant garde stylists with purple hair and nostril
rings, but to my relief the staff sported impeccable cuts and no discernible facial jewelry.

I walked up to a doll-like brunette at the reception desk. She looked up at me with enormous blue eyes, which lingered on my T-shirt. I
glanced down and cringed to see a large ketchup
stain, a souvenir, no doubt, from my Quarter
Pounder.

"Deliveries around the back," she said.

"Actually, I'm here for an appointment with
Gustavo. I'm Jaine Austen."

She jumped up from her chair, oozing apologies.

"I'm so sorry, Ms. Austen. I had no idea! I'm
Deedee. Come right this way, and we'll get you
into a styling robe."

Well, that was good news. The sooner I got out
of my wrong-side-of-the-tracks outfit, the better.

I followed her to the rear of the salon, trying
to ignore the curious glances I was attracting.
Needless to say, I did not fit Gustavo's typical demographic.

Deedee showed me to a softly lit dressing
room, where I changed into a black wraparound smock and matching scuff slippers.

"They're for your pedicure," Deedee explained, when I asked about the slippers.

"I'm getting a pedicure, too?"

"You're getting the works," she said, with a
wide smile, and led me to Gustavo's station.

All the other stylists worked out in the open,
but Gustavo had a private sanctuary, shut off
from the rest of the salon by silk moire curtains.

Deedee deposited me in a plush leather salon
chair.

"Gustavo will be right with you. Can I get you
anything while you're waiting? A latte?"

"That sounds great."

"How about a warm croissant with homemade raspberry preserves?"

Absolutely not. No croissants. Not after that
Quarter Pounder. Not if I wanted to look good
for my date with Andrew.

"Sure. Why not?"

(You didn't really think I was going to say no,
did you?)

Seconds later she brought me my latte and
croissant, which I managed to polish off just as
Gustavo came sailing into the room.

Tall and dark, with a long shiny ponytail, he
wore skin-tight black jeans and a spandex top. I
could see every muscle in his six-pack abs.

"Ms. Austen," he said, kissing my hand. (I
only hoped it didn't smell of onions from my
Quarter Pounder.) "What a pleasure to meet
you! I love your work!"

I had no idea who he thought I was, but whoever it was had to be somebody important. For a
fleeting instant I wondered if he thought I was
the real Jane Austen. Was it possible he didn't realize she'd been dead and buried for nearly
200 years?

"Let me take a good look at you."

He began circling the chair, eyeing my hair
much like I imagine Michelangelo checked out
the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

"You've got awesome hair. You know that,
don't you?"

"But it's so curly," I moaned.

"That's why it's great. Curls are in."

"Actually, I was hoping you could straighten it
out."

"Oh, no!" He looked horrified." It would be
criminal to straighten this fabulous hair. I think
we should go with a cloud of soft curls. The Kate
Winslet Titanic look."

"It won't be frizzy?" I asked.

"Oh, no. Just soft, beautiful curls. And let's
add some auburn highlights."

I swallowed, hesitant. I'd been hoping for
sleek, shiny straight hair, the kind of straight
hair I can get only at a hair salon.

"Trust me," he said. "You're going to look
spectacular."

Then I thought of all the ladies I saw out in
the salon and how wonderful they looked.

"Okay," I said, "let's do it."