Hondo said, “So you’ve got forty-two hundred dollars here-”
“Hey, there’s five thousand.”
“G
otcha. What are we being paid to investigate?”
I filled him in as he restacked the money and put a rubber band around it.
Hondo said, “We’ll take my car.”
“What’s wrong with mine?”
“I’m not going through that neighborhood in Shamu.” Hondo insisted we take his vehicle since he’d washed it and it would blend in better than my pickup, which is a two-year old four-wheel-drive Ford 250 pickup with oversized tires and front and rear bumpers made of welded six-inch iron pipe painted black. The windows are tinted black and the pickup is painted black except for white teardrop shapes along the headlights and white along the bottom third of the side panels and doors. That’s why Hondo calls it Shamu. I’d taken it as payment on a case and he hasn’t let me live it down. Hondo on the other hand drives a prissy looking gold Mercedes convertible. He denies its prissy looking, but it is.
We’d used a Map To The Stars’ Homes in a case last year and I had it with me as we drove through Pacific Palisades. I pointed ahead, “Look, that’s Arnold’s old house.”
Hondo used one finger to pull the Ray Bans down on his nose and look at me.
“Hey, I like his movies.” Landman’s residence was several houses further down, and Hondo eased by the driveway and iron gate, stopping just beyond. I walked back and looked through the bars.
The house was a combination of Spanish Mediterranean and Early Love Boat. A red tile roof above white stucco walls three stories high made up a house that must have contained forty thousand square feet. Round windows the size of whiskey barrel lids ran in regular intervals around each story like portholes, and the arched double front doors were massive white marble slabs inscribed with black lines and runes. Each door was about ten feet high and five feet wide, looking like something you would open to enter The Mines of Moria.
A Lincoln sat in the circular drive and as I watched, one of the home’s massive doors swung open and a slender woman with blond, spiky hair, wearing a lime green blouse and Capri pants the color of walnuts walked around the car and stopped at the driver’s door. On a hunch I pulled Bond’s folded paper out of my jacket, located the number for Landman’s personal assistant and dialed it on my cell. As it rang in my ear, I watched the slender woman reach into her purse. She pulled out a cell phone and put it to her ear.
I heard, “Hello?”
“Miss Haile, Mickey Haile?”
“Yes, who is this?”
“My name is Ronald Baca. I’m a private investigator who’s been hired by someone close to Mr. Landman.” Mickey Haile moved around, taking two or three little steps, then turning and doing it again, like a windup toy soldier that bumps into things and only goes a few steps before changing direction.
“What? What do you want?”
“I want to locate Robert Landman.”
More turning, walking, turning, and a little hair tugging. “I don’t...I can relay your message to Mr. Landman. If you’d like to leave your number...”
“Can I come by and give it to you personally?”
“Yes, yes, sure-”
“You’re sure it’s okay to give it to you person-to-person?”
More hair tugging, “Yes! You can come by the off-”
“How about right now? I’m at the gate.” She looked at the gate and I waved a big, side-to-side Howdy-Do at her. From her reaction, it was a good thing she was wearing brown slacks.
**
After Mickey opened the gate, Hondo parked the Mercedes by the Lincoln and we walked to the marble doors where she held one side open. Hondo left on his sunglasses, going for the mysterious effect.
Mickey was a nervous wreck, with shaking, jerky hands and dark circles under her eyes that makeup didn’t quite cover. Her short hair looked like it had been savaged by an attacking squirrel, and I could smell that she hadn’t bathed in several days.
Hondo can’t stand bad smells, and I was surprised he didn’t run onto the lawn and rub his face in the grass like a skunk-sprayed dog. Instead, he smiled and walked beside her into an enormous den with floor to ceiling bookcases, a huge black marble fireplace that could hold a small tree, several comfortable chairs and one desk with a black marble top as big as a sheet of plywood.
One thing about Bob Landman, he kept the marble industry healthy. The odd thing about the bookcases was the absence of books. There was room for five thousand volumes, and nothing was there but empty space.