Devil's Waltz Part 23

I went to the library and fetched the notes I'd taken on Ca.s.sie's medical history. Milo had sat down at the table and I joined him, turning pages.

"Here we are," I said. "February 10. Four days before Herbert pulled Chad's chart. It was Ca.s.sie's second hospitalization for stomach problems. The diagnosis was gastric distress of unknown origin, possible sepsis-the main symptom was b.l.o.o.d.y diarrhea. Which could have made Ashmore think of some specific kind of poisoning. Maybe his toxicology training overcame his apathy."

"Not enough for him to talk to Stephanie."

"True."

"So maybe he looked and didn't find anything."

"Then why not return the chart?" I said.

"Sloppy housekeeping. Herbert was supposed to but didn't. Knew she was leaving and didn't give a d.a.m.n about her paperwork."

"When I see her I'll ask her."

"Yeah. Who knows, maybe she'll give you a ride in her Miata."

"Zoom zoom," I said. "Anything new on Reginald Bottomley?"

"Not yet. Fordebrand-the Foothill guy-is on vacation, so I've got a call in to the guy who's catching for him. Let's hope he cooperates."

He put the c.o.ke down. Tension wounded his face and I thought I knew why. He was wondering if the other detective knew who he was. Would bother to return his call.

"Thanks," I said. "For everything."

"De nada." He shook the can. Empty. Leaning on the counter with both elbows, he faced me.

"What's the matter?" I said.

"You sound low. Beaten down."

"Guess I am-all this theorizing and Ca.s.sie's no safer."

"Know what you mean," he said. "Best thing's to stay focused, not drift too far afield. It's a risk on cases with bad solve-prospects-G.o.d knows I've had plenty of them. You feel powerless, start throwing wild punches and end up no wiser and a h.e.l.luva lot older."

He left shortly after that and I called Ca.s.sie's hospital room. It was after nine and direct access to patients had been cut off. I identified myself to the hospital operator and was put through. Vicki answered.

"Hi, it's Dr. Delaware."

"Oh . . . what can I do for you?"

"How's everything?"

"Fine."

"Are you in Ca.s.sie's room?"

"No-out here."

"At the desk?"

"Yes."

"How's Ca.s.sie doing?"

"Fine."

"Sleeping?"

"Uh-huh."

"What about Cindy?"

"Her too."

"Busy day for everyone, huh?"

"Uh-huh."

"Has Dr. Eves been by recently?"

"Around eight-you want the exact time?"

"No, thanks. Anything new, in terms of the hypoglycemia?"

"You'd have to ask Dr. Eves that."

"No new seizures?"

"Nope."

"All right," I said. "Tell Cindy I called. I'll be by tomorrow."

She hung up. Despite her hostility, I felt a strange-almost corrupt-sense of power. Because I knew about her unhappy past and she was unaware of it. Then I realized that what I knew put me no closer to the truth.

Far afield, Milo said.

I sat there, feeling the power diminish.

13.

The next morning I woke up to clean spring light. I jogged a couple of miles, ignoring the pain in my knees and fixing my thoughts on the evening with Robin.

Afterward I showered, fed the fish, and read the paper while eating breakfast. Nothing more on the Ashmore homicide.

I called Information, trying to match a phone number to the address Milo had given me for Dawn Herbert. None was listed and neither of the two other Herberts residing in Culver City knew any Dawn.

I hung up, not sure it made much of a difference. Even if I located her, what explanation would I use to ask her about Chad's file?

I decided to concentrate on the job I'd been trained to do. Dressing and clipping my hospital badge to my lapel, I left the house, turned east on Sunset, and headed for Hollywood.

I reached Beverly Hills within minutes and pa.s.sed Whittier Drive without slowing. Something on the opposite side of the boulevard caught my eye: White Cutla.s.s, coming from the east. It turned onto Whittier and headed up the 900 block.

At the first break in the median, I hung a U. By the time I reached the big Georgian house, the Olds was parked in the same place I'd seen it yesterday and a black woman was stepping out on the driver's side.

She was young-late twenties or early thirties-short and slim. She had on a gray cotton turtleneck, black ankle-length skirt, and black flats. In one hand was a Bullock's bag; in the other, a brown leather purse.

Probably the housekeeper. Out doing a department store errand for Ashmore's grieving widow.

As she turned toward the house she saw me. I smiled. She gave me a quizzical look and began walking over slowly, with a short, light step. As she got closer I saw she was very pretty, her skin so dark it was almost blue. Her face was round, bottomed by a square chin; her features clean and broad like those of a Nubian mask. Large, searching eyes focused straight at me.

"h.e.l.lo. Are you from the hospital?" British accent, public-school refined.

"Yes," I said, surprised, then realized she was looking at the badge on my lapel.

Her eyes blinked, then opened. Irises in two shades of brown-mahogany in the center, walnut rims.

Pink at the periphery. She'd been crying. Her mouth quivered a bit.

"It's very kind of you to come," she said.

"Alex Delaware," I said, extending my hand out the driver's window. She put the shopping bag on the gra.s.s and took it. Her hand was narrow and dry and very cold.

"Anna Ashmore. I didn't expect anyone so soon."

Feeling stupid about my a.s.sumptions, I said, "I didn't know Dr. Ashmore personally, but I did want to pay my respects."

She let her hand drop. Somewhere in the distance a lawn mower belched. "There's no formal service. My husband wasn't religious." She turned toward the big house. "Would you like to come in?"

The entry hall was two stories of cream plaster floored with black marble. A beautiful bra.s.s banister and marble stairs twisted upward to the second story. To the right, a large yellow dining room gleamed with dark, fluid Art Nouveau furniture that the real housekeeper was polis.h.i.+ng. Art filled the wall behind the stairs, too-a mix of contemporary paintings and African batiks. Past the staircase, a short foyer led to gla.s.s doors that framed a California postcard: green lawn, blue pool sun-splashed silver, white cabanas behind a trellised colonnade, hedges and flower beds under the fluctuating shade of more specimen trees. Scrambling over the tiles of the cabana roof was a splash of scarlet-the bougainvillea I'd seen from the street.

The maid came out of the dining room and took Mrs. Ashmore's bag. Anna Ashmore thanked her, then pointed left, to a living room twice the size of the dining room, sunk two steps down.

"Please," she said, descending, and flipping a switch that ignited several floor lamps.

A black grand piano claimed one corner. The east wall was mostly tall, shuttered windows that let in knife-blades of light. The floors were blond planks under black-and-rust Persian rugs. A coffered white ceiling hovered over apricot plaster walls. More art: the same mix of oils and fabric. I thought I spotted a Hockney over the granite mantel.

The room was chilly and filled with furniture that looked straight out of the Design Center. White Italian suede sofas, a black Breuer chair, big, pockmarked post-Neanderthal stone tables, and a few smaller ones fas.h.i.+oned of convoluted bra.s.s rods and topped with blue-tinted gla.s.s. One of the stone tables fronted the largest of the sofas. Centered on it was a rosewood bowl filled with apples and oranges.

Mrs. Ashmore said, "Please," again, and I sat down directly behind the fruit.

"Can I offer you something to drink?"

"No, thank you."

She settled directly in front of me, straight and silent.

In the time it had taken to walk from the entry, her eyes had filled with tears.

"I'm sorry for your loss," I said.

She wiped her eyes with a finger and sat even straighter. "Thank you for coming."

Silence filled the room and made it seem even colder. She wiped her eyes again and laced her fingers.

I said, "You have a beautiful home."

She lifted her hands and made a helpless gesture. "I don't know what I'll do with it."

"Have you lived here long?"

"Just one year. Larry owned it long before that, but we never lived in it together. When we came to California, Larry said this should be our place."

She shrugged, raised her hands again, and let them drop back to her knees.

"Too big, it's really ridiculous. . . . We talked about selling it. . . ." Shaking her head. "Please-have something."

I took an apple from the bowl and nibbled. Watching me eat seemed to comfort her.

"Where did you move from?" I said.

"New York."

"Had Dr. Ashmore ever lived in Los Angeles before?"

"No, but he'd been here on buying trips-he had many houses. All over the country. That was his . . . thing."

"Buying real estate?"

"Buying and selling. Investing. He even had a house in France for a short while. Very old-a chateau. A duke bought it and told everyone it had been in his family for hundreds of years. Larry laughed at that-he hated pretentiousness. But he did love the buying and selling. The freedom it brought him."

I understood that, having achieved some financial independence myself by riding the land boom of the mid-seventies. But I'd operated on a far less exalted level.

"Upstairs," she said, "is all empty."

"Do you live here by yourself?"

"Yes. No children. Please-have an orange. They're from the tree in back, quite easy to peel."

I picked up an orange, removed its rind, and ate a segment. The sound of my jaws working seemed deafening.

"Larry and I don't know many people," she said, reverting to the present-tense denial of the brand-new mourner.