Death Is a Lonely Business (Crumley Mysteries 1)

Annie Oakley sat up in bed, huddled in her sheets like an abandoned manatee.

“Don’t hang up that telephone,” I said.

Not until I reach the far end, I thought, and save a life.

“Dumb,” said Annie Oakley, “that’s why you’re going. Dumb.”

It took a lot of guts to run the night shore toward Constance Rattigan’s. I imagined some terrible dead man rushing the other way.

“Jesus!” I gasped. “What happens if I meet him?

“Gah!” I shrieked.

“And ran full-tilt into a solid shadow.

“Thank God, it’s you!” someone yelled.

“No, Constance,” I said. “Thank God, it’s you.”

“What’s so damn funny?”

“This.” I slapped the big bright pillows on all sides of me. “This is the second bed I’ve been in tonight.”

“Hilarious,” said Constance. “Mind if I bust your nose?”

“Constance. Peg’s my girl. I was just lonely. You haven’t called in days. Annie asked me for pillow talk, and that’s all it was. I can’t lie. It shows in my face. Look.”

Constance looked and laughed.

“Christ, fresh apple pie. Okay, okay.” She sank back. “I scare the hell out of you just now?”

“You should’ve yelled ahead as you ran.”

“I was glad to see you, son. Sorry I haven’t phoned. Once I forgot funerals in a few hours. Now, it takes days.”

She touched a switch. The lights dimmed and the sixteen-millimeter projector flashed on. Two cowboys knocked each other down on the white wall.

“How can you watch films at a time like this?” I said.

“To rev me up so I can go out and knock Mr. Naked’s block off if he shows again tomorrow night.”

“Don’t even joke about it.” I looked out the French windows at the empty shore where only white waves sounded on the edge of night. “Do you think he telephoned you to tell you where I was, with Annie, and then walked up the beach to stand out there?”

“No. His voice wasn’t right. It’s got to be two different guys. Christ, I can’t figure it, but the one guy, the one with no clothes, he’s got to be some sort of exhibitionist, a flasher, right? Or why doesn’t he just run up in here and ruin the old lady or kill her or both? It’s the other one, me guy on the phone, that gives me the willies.’’

I know, I thought, I’ve heard his breathing.

“He sounds like a real monster,” said Constance.

Yes, I thought. A long way off I heard the big red trolley shriek around an iron curve in the rain, with the voice behind me, chanting the words of a title for Crumley’s book.

“Constance,” I said, and stopped. I was going to tell her I had seen the stranger on the shore many nights ago.

“I’ve got some real estate south of here,” said Constance. “I’m going to go check it tomorrow. Call me, late, yes? And meantime, you want to look into something for me?”

“Anything. Well, almost anything.”

Constance watched William Farnum knock his brother Dustin down, pick him up, knock him down again.