Spider’s Cage (9 page)

Bdeniowitz didn't expect an answer. He drummed his fingers on his desk and smoldered. The highway patrolman, who had finally allowed Windrow to convince him to come upstairs and talk to the chief of homicide, cleared his throat. His aviation sunglasses made his visage opaque, but his intent was clear. That Windrow might be on a case mol
lified the CHP's view of the incident to a certain extent, but Mad Bruce's dealer plates were out of date, there had been two phone calls to the CHP from terrified motorists, Windrow had in fact broken several laws, and the CHP, being a tidy outfit, would like to write these two clowns up for these things. Bdeniowitz waved his hand at the patrolman.

“Throw the book at him,” he growled. The telephone at his elbow whimpered. “Wait a minute.” He picked up the receiver. “What,” he barked.

Seated next to Windrow, Mad Bruce whined and fidgeted. Windrow squinted. The fluorescent light buzzed on the ceiling. Through the window behind Bdeniowitz, Windrow could see the tops of several eastbound trucks stalled on the freeway. They inched forward, they stopped, they inched forward some more. He mused on the irony of the coincidence. Either the stalled traffic was less than twenty minutes late, or he and the Chevy Wagonaire had arrived twenty minutes early. Had they encountered this snarl he might have walked up to Jodie's window, tapped on it with a fingernail and politely asked her what the hell was going on, and what sort of trouble would she be in exactly?

But already the previous coincidence had seemed, after all, a great deal to ask of the huge number of possibilities available. Spotting the Ryan girl on the freeway? Ridiculous. But running out of gas had evened that one out, alright. Coinciding with a traffic jam would have been too much. Having the links of fate and randomness shape a chain of events like that, a man could just sit back and let things happen. But they'd missed the traffic jam, and the Ford had run out of gas, and the Chevy wagon was gone. It was like two boats separated and helplessly tossed in the unheeding surf of random events; in spite of all the rowing anyone might do, at one moment the
boats are separated, the next they're about to crash into each other, then they lose sight of one another completely.

Windrow ground his teeth. You don't get a chance like that every day, and the appearance of one lucky shot made it even more unlikely another would turn up. Still, he'd nearly turned it to his advantage. Oddly enough, without the Ford he would not have been able to so much as make the attempt. The Toyota would have been incapable of a chase like that. The Toyota had never been able to get out of third gear on that particular grade above Army street. He looked at the check Mad Bruce held in his hand and idly wondered if he would be able to cover it. In any case, Windrow decided, he was going to like this Ford, it would give him a new edge on coincidence.

Bdeniowitz got off the phone.

“GUSH is registered to the O'Ryan Petroleum Co., care of a P.O. Box in Taft, California,” he said.

“Do tell.”

Bdeniowitz scowled. “I don't have to tell you a damn thing, apple.”

“You need to be looking for another cowgirl in this case, Max,” Windrow said. “Dresses like a high priced cowboy: ten gallon hat, suit, fancy boots, packs a gun and rolls of quarters. Goes by the name of Sal, acts like a man, but he's a she.”

Bdeniowitz raised an eyebrow. The highway patrolman cleared his throat. Windrow gestured at him. “Now can we put out an APB?”

“You're the one broke the law,” the highway patrolman observed softly.

Windrow rolled his eyes, tapped his foot four times, and sighed loudly.

“For what?” Bdeniowitz said. “APB for what? What're the charges?”

Windrow shrugged. “Murder one?”

“There's not a shred of—.” The phone interrupted Bdeniowitz. He picked up the receiver and shouted, “What?!”

Windrow felt a damp hand on his arm.

“I want mi madre,” Mad Bruce whimpered. “Madre mía.” Windrow looked at him and noticed for the first time that Mad Bruce's eyes were tremendously dilated. “She got me into this,” Mad Bruce said distractedly, addressing a point on Windrow's shoulder. The check slipped from Mad Bruce's fingers and fluttered to the floor. Windrow pursed his lips: it didn't bounce.

The highway patrol cleared his throat politely. “You dropped your check, sir.”

Mad Bruce smiled faintly. “Sir,” he said, with a trace of wonder in his voice. “He called me Sir… .”

Bdeniowitz hung up the telephone. His face was changed. He arched an eyebrow as made a few notes on a yellow legal pad. Then he picked up the telephone again and pushed a button.

“Gleason. I want an APB out for a Miss Jodie Ryan. Yeah. That's the one. Last seen about an hour ago, on Interstate 80 just beyond the Seventh St. exit, heading East. Late model Chevy Wagonaire, two-tone white on grey, Cal license plate Gamma Uptown Sigma Howdy…. Hang on,” he looked at Windrow, “Windrow has the make.” He extended the telephone receiver across the desk toward Windrow and looked him in the eye.

Windrow balked. He'd wanted to find Jodie Ryan, and the police could help him do it, but something had changed. Now they had reasons of their own for finding her.

“What's up?” he asked.

Bdeniowitz wagged the phone once at him.

Windrow took the telephone. “Steve?”

Gleason's voice came from the other end.

“Hey yuh hey yuh, it's Fireball Windrow hisself. He's a comin' round the third turn and he's neck and neck with—what's this? The California Highway Patrol, folks! It's a Plymouth and a Ford, folks, fender to fender. MoPar and FoMoCo. Fireball cuts in the afterburner and scorches a trench in the blacktop. The CHP fingers the stud that fires the photon speeding citation. He—”

“Blonde,” said Windrow, “she's a blonde. Twenty-eight years old, about five-eight, one-fifteen, green eyes, plays music for a living. She's got an agent, name of Lobe…”

“Lobe,” said Gleason on the phone.

“Lobe?” said Bdeniowitz.

“Hooker, eh?” said Gleason

“Poor kid,” said Bdeniowitz.

“And her granddaddy was Sweet Jesus O'Ryan, the oilman. Recently deceased.”

Windrow hung up the phone.

“What happened, Max? Why the sudden help?”

“We got some hard evidence,” Bdeniowitz smiled. “The lab matched a dent in the Neil woman's skull with a corner on that broken guitar neck.”

Mad Bruce shuddered and his teeth chattered. He hugged himself and rocked in his chair.

Windrow shrugged. “Yeah, well we all knew that the splinters matched, too. But the instrument was wiped clean, right?”

Bdeniowitz smiled larger. “Yes, it was. But on one end of this guitar neck there is this little screw-on plate that covers a gadget you adjust the neck with.”

“The truss rod,” the highway patrolman interjected politely. Windrow and Bdeniowitz looked at him. The patrolman stood just as he'd been standing since they'd arrived at Bdeniowitz's office, erect, hands clasped behind his back, feet spread slightly apart. At ease.

“The plate's on the peghead, right above the nut,” he added helpfully.

“Yeah,” said Bdeniowitz. “So anyway, somebody downstairs thought to unscrew this little plate and check the back of it for prints. They found a perfect thumb, left hand. It mates with the left hand of one Jodie O'Ryan. She managed a DUI about nine or ten years ago in Bakersfield.”

“Right. That was before she dropped the O from her name. Nice work. But that just means she'd had her hands on the guitar once. She might own it—seems likely any guitar around that house would be hers—but it doesn't mean she killed anybody with it. I mean, you don't think she adjusted the truss rod just in order to kill somebody with the thing…. Do you?”

Bdeniowitz nodded. “No. But it's a fact. It gives us a reason to go looking for her, and that might turn up something else.”

Windrow frowned. He stood up and paced a circle.

“What's the matter, apple? It's what you wanted, isn't it?”

“Not exactly,” Windrow muttered.

Bdeniowitz sighed. “Well here's another curveball for you.”

“What,” said Windrow, only half listening, still pacing.

“You'll recall the Neil woman had sex before she was dumped over the cliff.”

Windrow thought about it for a minute, but said nothing.

“It was a little bit rough,” Bdeniowitz added, quietly. “More like assault. She was… torn up.”

Windrow stopped pacing. “Wouldn't that indicate a man…?”

Bdeniowitz chewed his lip and shook his head. “Mere brutality. There's no direct evidence one way or the other. No semen, no hair, but assault to the sexual parts.” Bdeniowitz cleared his throat. He was obviously uncomfortable, and that annoyed him. “Forced penetration, perpetrated before death.” He spoke quietly. “They can't say what did the penetrating, just yet.”

Windrow hissed. “Jesus.”

Mad Bruce breathed deeply and noisily. He clutched Windrow's arm. Windrow saw that Mad Bruce had turned a bad shade of gray.

“One more thing.”

“Now what?”

“Mrs. Neil wasn't Mrs. Neil when she died. She married a guy called,” he read from his notepad, “Thurman Woodruff, in Las Vegas, on Monday last.”

Windrow raised an eyebrow.

“The day of O'Ryan's funeral.” “You find him yet? You talked to him?”

Bdeniowitz shook his head. “Gallery's closed. No sign of Woodruff. Little card in the window says, ‘By Appointment Only.' Antique dealer next door says that's brand-new policy, since about Tuesday, and nobody's been around since the card appeared. We're looking for him.”

“Funny he should disappear like that,” Windrow mused. “He's in line for a lot of dough.” He shook his head. He had a feeling, as if there were ants crawling up his sternum. “Don't know. It would seem like Pamela Neil's health wouldn't be his most pressing interest, but on the other hand it could be ok—if he's in the clear.”

“Could be the guy's stiff himself.”

“You think?”

Bdeniowitz made a face. “Why think when there's all this action to watch?” he grumbled. “The way things are going, pretty soon there won't be any principals left. Either way, apple, there's big money swamping these people. Anything could happen. People die every day for a lot less.” Bdeniowitz twirled his chair so that he faced the freeway, his back to the room.

“Gilbert,” said Bdeniowitz, after a pause.

“Yessir,” said the highway patrolman.

“I don't think we need to press charges on these gentlemen. It would seem that they might actually have been in the process of attempting to perform a public service when you apprehended them. Expunge the record, or something.”

“Yessir,” said Gilbert.

“If there's any problem, have your office call my office.”

“Yessir.”

“You got anything to add, apple?”

Windrow helped Mad Bruce to his feet. The man looked terrible. “Nothing,” said Windrow.

Bdeniowitz didn't turn around. “Keep in touch,” he muttered.

Windrow retrieved his check from the floor and led Mad Bruce through the door.

On the street, the highway patrolman took a can out of the trunk of the CHP car and put a gallon of gas into the red Fairlane, while Mad Bruce threw up behind the pyrochanthus next to the front steps of the police station. Windrow leaned against the fender of the Ford with his hands in his pockets and watched the fill up. After a while, he asked Officer Gilbert if he played music.

Officer Gilbert grinned over the gas can. “Every Friday
and Saturday night. Lounge in Walnut Creek called the Flank and Tankard.” He pulled the filler spout out of the gas tank and screwed the cap on.

“Really,” said Windrow. “What sort of music?”

“C & W mostly, some pop stuff.”

“Ever heard of Jodie Ryan?”

“Sure,” said Gilbert. “We do a tune of hers called “Stealin' Eyes.” You know it?”

Windrow squinted his sore peeper. “Fancy that. Ever meet her?”

“No sir, never have.” Gilbert let the hinged license plate snap back over the gas cap and stood up. “She's a real talent, she is.”

“Yeah,” said Windrow. He scratched the bruised crow's foot behind his eye. Gilbert said goodbye and left. A few minutes later Mad Bruce limped out of the bushes. His voice was weak, but his complexion was much healthier, more like its natural pasty white color. They got in the Ford.

“Jesus,” Mad Bruce said. He leaned back against the seat and exhaled loudly. As Windrow ground the starter, he glanced at the empty plastic bag. It was under the severed armrest between Mad Bruce's feet.

“How much did you eat?” he said. The motor caught once and died.

“Oh, compadre,” Mad Bruce groaned. “I ate the whole fuckin' stash. I had sopors, like, you know, a couple quaaludes and some valiums…”

The motor caught. Windrow revved it a couple of times. Blue smoke filled the rear-view mirror. He pulled the column lever into drive and eased the Ford into the sporadic traffic on Bryant Street, to his right.

“ … and some cross-tops, man,” Mad Bruce continued, counting on his fingers and shaking his head, “yeah, fuckin'

good cross-tops and I think some yellow jackets, and some of that gooood colombo man, two or three joints, and goddamit, there was a couple
poppers
in there Martín…” He looked at Windrow with wide eyes and an appalled, open mouth. “You ever
eat
amyl nitrite, man?” He belched loudly and covered his mouth. “Oh, hombre don't let get around no open flame… .”

“S'
WHAT, S'WHAT AREADY?”

The two inch speaker in the intercom made Harry Lobe's gravelly voice sound worse than usual. Beer trucks and buses lumbered up and down the lower Turk Street, their fumes mixed with the stench of Lysol that wafted from the peep show next door. Old newspapers huddled against the vertical bars that completely covered the entrance to Lobe's building, but the mesh couldn't keep out the urine and spit and any other fluid ephemera that cared to penetrate it enough to stain the walls and steps beyond.