Little Dog Laughed (7 page)

“Didn’t the dog hear them first?” Dave set the little snifters on the table and sat down. “He raved at me.”

“He doesn’t bark when I’m there,” Hunsinger said. “His ears were up. He heard them all right. My light was on, but the blinds were closed. I switched off the light and opened the blinds. But I didn’t see them. Light’s bad out there at two in the morning. Trees, shrubs, vines. They’d gone on past—gone on toward the back, toward Underhill’s house.”

“Was he home?” Dave said.

“His car was out front on the street,” Hunsinger said. “Street’s always parked up. It was a few doors along. A big old Cougar he paid about two hundred dollars for when he got out of jail. He had to be home. It was after the bars close. Where would he be? See, I went out the front door. I mean—I didn’t want to confront whoever was sneaking around. But I wanted a look at them if I could get it.”

“Why didn’t you phone the police?” Cecil said.

Hunsinger’s mournful horse face pitied Cecil’s ignorance. He said patiently, “The police are not my friends. They keep claiming I deal drugs. They don’t like the company I keep. They wish I wouldn’t bring drunks and addicts to my house. They want me to buy a business license. They want me to move. I leave them alone, in the hope they’ll leave me alone.”

“Right,” Cecil said. “Sorry.”

“And here,” Hunsinger told Dave, “out in the middle of the street with its motor idling is this big four-wheel-drive vehicle up high on its tires, you know? With smoked glass windows. Was somebody inside? I bet on it, but the lights were out in my house so I don’t think he saw me. I stepped down and waited in the yard, and it wasn’t two minutes before these figures came down the driveway, jumped the gate, climbed into the four-wheel and drove off.”

“What kind of figures?” Dave said. “How many?”

“Two,” Hunsinger said. “You’re not going to believe this. In camouflage suits, combat boots, berets. Disorienting. I thought I was back in Saigon. I thought it was 1969.”

“You mean they were Orientals?” Dave said.

Hunsinger shook his head. “At a guess, Latinos.”

“Did you go check with Underhill?” Cecil said.

“I rang his bell. Nobody came. I used my key. I thought they’d done something to him. Went through the whole house, but he wasn’t there.”

Cecil said, “That’s bad for your idea that Underhill is innocent. It was near that time that Streeter was murdered.”

“He wouldn’t walk to the marina,” Hunsinger said.

“It’s possible,” Dave said. “It’s not all that far.”

“Why would he? The Cougar was there. It runs. It burns a hell of a lot of gas, but it runs.”

Dave said, “What did the commandos want? Had they searched? Had they taken anything?”

“They’d been inside. Through the bathroom window. The screen was leaning against the wall under it. But nothing was missing—not that I could see. Certainly nothing big. Anything big—I’d have seen them carry it out, right?”

“Underhill was home in the morning,” Dave said. He got the cigarette pack this time. Cecil was staring at Hunsinger, absorbed. He didn’t even notice. Dave got the lighter and lit a cigarette. He laid the lighter down with a click. “You didn’t see him? He didn’t say anything?”

“I didn’t wake up in time,” Hunsinger said. “I go to sleep around sunup and catch three, maybe four hours. The police woke me, running under my window, with rifles, for God’s sake, surrounding Underhill’s, pounding on his door. I got the hell out of there. I haven’t been back.” He shifted on the chair, dug from a tight pocket a strapless wristwatch with a scratched crystal. “Have to go back soon, though. Have to feed Snowy, let him out in the yard.”

“If they didn’t take anything,” Cecil said, “then what did they come for? A social call? By the bathroom window?”

“They knew he was out, probably telephoned and lured him out. Maybe he did have the papers. Maybe that was what they took.” Dave looked at Hunsinger. “Were Fleur and Underhill having an affair?”

Hunsinger gaped. “Jesus, you ask funny questions. No. I don’t think so. Not at his place. She never came there. And I never saw him at her place.”

“The flower shop,” Dave said. “You go there often?”

“Pretty often. It’s a nursery too. I help her out with the heavy work.” A flush appeared under Hunsinger’s very white skin. “Wouldn’t you? She’s a lovely young lady.”

“But she never gave you any encouragement?”

“Streeter was a god to her,” Hunsinger said. “I’m a mere mortal. I didn’t stand a chance.”

Dave smoked for a moment. “What about that Blazer, Bronco, whatever it was—did you get the license number?”

“It was too dark. But one thing I can tell you”—Hunsinger scraped back his chair, rose, tucked the watch away—“there was a pintle mount bolted to the roof.”

“Say what?” Cecil looked blank.

“A mount for a medium-weight machine gun.” Hunsinger walked to get his hat, the heels of the cowboy boots noisy. “That was a combat-ready vehicle.”

“Go to the police,” Dave said.

Hunsinger winced.

“You want to help Underhill, don’t you?” Cecil said.

“That’s why I came here.” Hunsinger took down his hat and put it on. He said to Dave, “You’ve got a big reputation. Fleur said you also care about people, and I guess you do.” Hunsinger pushed the screen door, stepped out, held the door. “Someone set Underhill up for that murder. He’s a creep, but they’re worse. Someone has to help him. It can’t be me—not the way I stand with the police. They’d laugh at me, if they didn’t lock me up.” Hunsinger walked away. The screen door wheezed closed on its patent piston. The latch clicked. Hunsinger’s voice drifted back out of the darkness. “You help him. Only don’t send me a bill, okay? All the mail I ever get is bills.”

L
EPPARD WAS THIRTY-FIVE AND
black, bulky and muscular. White streaked his clipped hair from front to back above his left ear. Someone made his clothes to measure, someone gifted. He stood at his desk, watching Dave uneasily. “I saw the flowerpots,” he said. “I saw a lot of things, mostly a dead man on the floor in his own blood, mostly that, and this gun with the silencer on it, and this young blind girl with a coffee stain down the front of her blouse, standing there so quiet she could be dead too. I forgot about the flowerpots.”

“And you also forgot that she hadn’t heard anyone come into the house except her father,” Dave said.

“Hadn’t heard the gun go off, either,” Leppard said, and sat down. “Teenagers sleep hard, Mr. Brandstetter. I didn’t think it meant much what she heard and didn’t hear.”

“It did, because whoever killed him came over the roofs, swung down to the balcony, knocking over the flowerpots on his way, and walked in through the open French doors.”

“That’s television cop-show stuff,” Leppard said.

“The guard is no teenager. The guard didn’t see Underhill.”

“Didn’t need to. Underhill could have been in that house waiting all the time. Hours. The girl is blind. No one can verify that he was home or where he was. Why wasn’t it him kicked over the flowerpots, leaving afterward?”

“How did you come to arrest him?” Dave said.

“We got a telephone tip,” Leppard said. A uniformed officer with blond hair and rosy cheeks came in with mugs of coffee on a brown tray, little envelopes of sugar and powdered creamer, a rattle of white plastic stirring sticks. He set the tray on Leppard’s paper-strewn desk and went away, closing the door. “Said Underhill did it for a hundred thousand bills Streeter had lying around, and we better move on him because he was fixing to fly away to Africa and disappear. Sure enough—”

“Sure enough, you found the airline ticket for Algiers,” Dave said, “lying right there in plain sight beside his typewriter on the dining room table.”

“Sure enough,” Leppard said with a smile. He reached across the desk and set one of the steaming mugs close to Dave. “Sugar? Cream?” With beautiful pink nails he tore open little packets and emptied them into his mug. “But mostly, sure enough, we found the hundred thou in a brown envelope. And sure enough, the bank confirmed they had given it to Streeter in exchange for a cashier’s check from some TV producer.”

Dave fixed his own coffee. “A setup,” he said. And told Leppard what Hunsinger had told him. “They didn’t break in to steal anything,” he finished, and sat down, holding the mug. Pigeons cooed and strutted on the windowsill. He watched them. “They broke in to leave something. That airline ticket.”

Leppard took a Dunhill cigarette from a dark red box. He lit it with a Dunhill lighter. Smoke trickled through his smile. He shook his head. “The ticket clerk at the airline counter at LAX saw his picture and gave us a positive ID. The man even showed his passport. Mike Underhill bought that ticket.”

Dave tried the coffee. “And his passport was lying there on the table by the typewriter with the ticket—am I right?”

“You’re right,” Leppard said.

“So a slender man in his forties, five eleven, brown eyes, thinning black hair, and olive skin, flashing Underhill’s passport—unnecessary, but so he’d be remembered—bought a ticket to Algiers, climbed through Underhill’s window, left both items in his house, and then phoned you to come arrest Underhill.”

“Underhill worked for Streeter.” Leppard studied Dave across the desk, across the coffee mugs, through the cigarette smoke. “You know associates kill associates far more often than strangers. Who told you about the camouflaged dudes?”

“A witness I’m inclined to believe,” Dave said.

“Underhill claims Streeter gave him all that cash to—”

“Buy an aircraft from a man named McGregor down the coast,” Dave said. “It’s not a bad story. McGregor will confirm it.”

“We can’t find him,” Leppard said. “He’s disappeared.”

“Which ought to suggest something to you,” Dave said. “A boy who lives in a condominium near Streeter’s, Dan’l Chapman, told me Streeter was planning to buy a plane.”

“He’ll make a good witness for Underhill,” Leppard said.

“Unless he disappears too. The couple whose apartment faces Streeter’s across the patio with the swimming pool—people name of Gernsbach—they’ve disappeared. Did you know that? Within hours of the time Streeter was killed. Don’t you find that interesting? I do.”

Leppard sighed impatiently. “The DA likes Underhill for this, a con man with a record of outsmarting himself.”

“A man can be a lot of bad things,” Dave said, “and still not be a murderer.” He swallowed coffee again, grimaced, set the mug on the desk. “Find Gernsbach, sergeant. His windows look straight across at the room where Streeter died. Maybe he saw who did it and ran away in fear. Find him.”

Leppard’s big hand came to rest on a stack of manila file folders on the desk. “With all this to do? We have a lock on Underhill. No need to look further, no time for it.”

Dave took a deep breath and told Leppard about Streeter’s hot story. “I think he learned the identity of the people who snatched Cortez-Ortiz, and they killed him before he could write it—or broadcast it.” He told about Streeter at the television station. “He knew they were after him. That was why he was packing his bags.”

“If you were a terrorist”—Leppard delicately scratched his head—“and made that kind of coup, wouldn’t you tell the world instead of keeping it secret? Ask for an exchange of prisoners for him? Or money to run your revolution?”

“No one has,” Dave said. “That seems to answer that.”

“It still doesn’t make plausible the idea that Central American terrorists are climbing condominiums at the L.A. marina and prowling the streets of shacky old Venice beach in combat boots and berets, breaking into bungalows—now does it?”

“Before they broke in,” Dave said, “they rang Underhill and asked him to meet them somewhere, didn’t they?”

“Down at the fishing pier. That’s what he says. But nobody saw him there that we can find. As an alibi, it stinks. He was down at Streeter’s, shooting him.”

“The Desert Eagle .357 Magnum was his, then?”

Leppard shrugged. “We’re checking, but anybody with loose change can buy a gun in Venice. Look, Captain Barker says you are the best in your business. So why can’t we get back to reality—simple murder for money? Underhill owes his publisher a mint. A hundred thousand in one easy grab—wouldn’t that be hard for a type like Underhill to resist?”

“And for terrorists too.” Dave rose. “But they resisted, didn’t they?” He gave Leppard a tight smile. “Which suggests that you’re right about one thing—money is back of it. But a whole hell of a lot more than a hundred thousand dollars.” He moved to the door. “Simple, sergeant? I guess not.” He pulled open the door and noise from the detectives’ room hit him, laughter, arguments, typewriters, telephones. “Thanks for your time.” He let the door fall shut behind him.

The place stood on a narrow street two blocks from the beach in Santa Monica, varnished planks and plate glass glaring in the sun. Angled roofs, skylights, plank-walled outside staircases. The only doors at street level were for cars. Dave locked the Jaguar at the curb, fed a parking meter, dodged a bare-chested boy in shorts and hightop shoes weaving down the sidewalk on a skateboard and wearing bright yellow headphones.

Dave climbed stairs and looked in at an open second-story door. Women in smocks worked at long tables inside. The room was wide as the building. Machines showed glints of metal under fluorescent lights. The women worked the machines by hand. He couldn’t make out what material they were die-cutting, embossing, and stapling. It shone like metal in reds, greens, blues, gold. No one noticed him, so he stepped inside.

When his eyes adjusted from the day-glare, he saw Sarah Winger on a high stool at a drafting table, pushing around T-squares, triangles, pencils. He went to her, edging between the women, young, middle-aged, old, assembling slices of coated paper into festive shapes. Only one or two gave him a glance. A fat girl in short-shorts bustled past with a red plastic basket of finished work. She bumped him with a wide hip, and didn’t apologize, or seem to hear his apology or want it. She looked as if there simply wasn’t time. Everybody here looked as if there wasn’t time.

“Christmas tree ornaments?” he said to Sarah Winger.

She looked up, surprised. A green plastic triangle slid down the tilt of the drafting table. She caught it. “Do I know you?” She peered up between false eyelashes from under very blue eye shadow, which intensified the blue of her eyes. “No, I don’t. But I saw you yesterday. At the marina. The brown Jaguar. Who are you? What do you want? I’m very busy.”