Murder on the Aisle

21

7:17 P.M.

She moved out of the shadows of his apartment house doorway.

“Hi.”

“God, how long you been standing here?”

“Not long.”

“How long is not long?”

“Half an hour.”

“Half an hour? Christ.”

“Some men would take that as flattery. You seem angry about it.”

He realized she was right. He was still back there at the Emory party. All the people. All the crap.

“Maybe we should start again,” Tobin said.

“Huh?”

“You say ‘hi’ again and this time I’ll try not to be such a big jerk.”

“That sounds like fun. ‘Hi.’ ”

It was exactly the kind of lovemaking Tobin needed. Passionate at first to work off some energy and rid himself of his anger, then slower and more gentle with those half-words that are more tones than meanings, soothing tones as he worshiped in her grotto once again, and then she took him inside and cradled him when he was finished, stroking him, whispering more half-words, then saying, “There isn’t anything more beautiful, is there?”

“What?”

“A Christmas tree in the darkness.”

“I wish it were a bigger tree. For your sake, I mean.”

“It’s a fine tree, Tobin.”

He was coming out of her anyway (the Little Sizzler had sizzled its last for a time) and then he lay beside her and watched the shadows cast in the bedroom by the tree lights.

“Did you ever want a present and not get it?” Marcie asked.

“Sure.”

“What was it?”

“Cowboy boots. I was a real Roy Rogers fan when I was six. So I wrote Santa Claus a letter and said, ‘Look you son of a bitch, I really mean business about this, I want ’em or you’re dead meat.’ And so, naturally, in that playful way of his, he told me to get stuffed. He brought me a truck, a homely little red truck, and I’d hardly gotten it unwrapped when my baby brother came along and sat on it and broke the hell out of it.”

Her laughter was wonderful there in the bedroom.

“How about you?” he said. “What did you want especially that you never got?”

“A bra. When I was thirteen. Except I got it.”

“And you were still unhappy?”

“Yeah, because as soon as I got it I put it on but it wouldn’t stay up. I didn’t have any breasts.”

“You’ve got nice ones now.”

“Not big ones, though.”

“Nice ones. Beautiful ones.”

“Gee, I wish I could stay longer and listen to all this praise.”

“You serious? You have to go?”

“I wish I could stay longer.” She sighed. “I have to. Tomorrow’s Christmas Eve, and my mother always gets pretty bad — her melancholy over my father, I mean.”

He knew, given the circumstances, there was nothing he could say that wouldn’t just be selfish. He said, “Maybe you could stay just another hour or so.”

“I wish I could.”

“I have no pride. I’ll get down and beg.”

She laughed again and again it was wonderful. “You’re a strange guy, Tobin, you really are. Half of you is so nice.”

“And the other half?”

She kissed him on the nose. “Well, not as nice as the other half.”

The phone rang and he looked at it first as an interruption, then decided he’d better answer it. He reached across her for the receiver, kissing her on the way.

“Tobin?”

“Yes.”

Pause. “This is Harold Ebsen.”

Tobin frowned. “I talked to Jane Dunphy. I don’t think you’re going to get your money.” He paused. Ebsen was a sleazy bastard, no doubt about that, but given Sarah Nichols’s comments earlier, maybe Dunphy really had lifted a part of Ebsen’s screenplay. So he decided to give Ebsen a Christmas gift of some good advice. “Quit threatening people. Contact a lawyer, a good one, and institute a lawsuit. If you’ve got any kind of proof at all, Dunphy’s estate will probably make an out-of-court settlement. Happens all the time.”

There was traffic noise in the background. Horns especially. Ebsen said something but obviously he was calling from a phone booth outdoors. Tobin couldn’t hear him.

“Can you speak up?”

“I said I’ve got something for you.”

“What?”

“Some interesting information.”

“Like what?”

“Like maybe I know who really killed Dunphy.”

“Who would that be?”

“Well, he had a wife, a mistress, and an agent who was screwing him. For just three people.”

Tobin thought of being followed around by a creep with a shotgun microphone. A creep gathering data on your life. By now Ebsen probably knew as much about Dunphy as anybody did.

“So how do I get this information?”

“I’ll bring it to you around ten o’clock tonight. For three thousand dollars.”

“That’s a long way from what you were asking before.”

“Maybe I’d better split town. I need cash.”

“I can’t get three thousand dollars cash tonight.”

“I can get your check cashed.”

Tobin sighed. “If you know something, you should go to the police. Ask for a Detective Huggins.”

Ebsen said, “You think he’d give me three grand?”

“Ebsen, look, I—”

“See you tonight.”

He hung up.

“That was Harold Ebsen?” she said. She was over by the chair where she’d laid her jeans and sweater, getting dressed. In the Christmas tree lights, her young body was more lovely than ever. “The creep?”

“He sure seems to have a lot of fans.”

“He doesn’t deserve any fans. Not after what he did to Dunphy.”

“I heard. About the shotgun microphone?”

“Oh, not just that, Tobin. Not just that. He even started following Dunphy’s friends around. He sent several of them cassette tapes that read ‘With compliments of Richard Dunphy.’ ”

“Why would he start taping people?”

“Power.”

“Power?”

“When you start following people around — and he followed a lot of people and audio-taped them — then you have power. Or you think you do. Sometimes he’d just tape people indiscriminately.”

Tobin sat up in bed. “How do you know all this stuff?”

“I heard Dunphy and him arguing in Dunphy’s office one night. Dunphy sounded ready to punch him out.”

“Why didn’t Dunphy go to the police?”

She shrugged. “I guess I couldn’t help you there.”

“I guess I’ll find out tonight.”

“He wants money from you, doesn’t he?”

“Three thousand dollars.”

“That creep. He really is.” She glanced at her watch. “Well, I’d really better be going. Mom’s baking cookies tonight. She likes having me sit in the kitchen with her and smell them bake. She says it reminds her of when I was a little girl.” She smiled. “Sometimes it makes me smile.”

“Your red mittens make me smile,” Tobin said, going over in his underwear and kissing her tenderly.

“My red mittens?”

“Red knit mittens. Little-girl red knit mittens. They’re sweet.”

She held them up for inspection. “This is what my mom does when she’s not baking cookies.”

Then she returned his kiss. “I’ll call you tomorrow, Tobin. Just be careful with Ebsen. I wouldn’t trust him at all.”

“Funny,” Tobin said, “I got the same impression for some reason.”