The Lonesome Badger

14

The dining room was amazingly small for such a popular restaurant, containing not more than twelve or fourteen tables in the main room and a half-dozen smaller, two-place tables in an adjoining barroom.

Peel got a glimpse of Smallwood and Linda in the main room as the proprietress accosted him. “You have a reservation, sir?”

“My secretary phoned,” Peel said. “Peel, P-e-e-l...”

The woman consulted a pad. “There’s no Peel here.”

“Well, how do you like that!” exclaimed Peel. “I’ll fire that girl. And I’m meeting an important client here.”

The woman hesitated. “I can give you a small table in the bar.”

“Well, that’ll do.”

He followed her into the bar, from where he could just glimpse Smallwood by craning his neck to the left. A waiter came up. “Will you have a drink while waiting?”

“Ham and eggs,” said Peel.

“And a drink?”

“Just ham and eggs.”

The waiter shrugged at the peculiarity of customers and went off.

By leaning to the right, Peel managed to watch Smallwood. The promoter was leaning across the table, talking earnestly to Linda in a manner that indicated a typical employer-beautiful secretary relationship.

Peel’s ham and eggs came ten minutes later and he did full justice to them. He was just finishing when a man stopped at the table beside him.

“Mr. Peel!” exclaimed Charlton Temple.

Peel looked up. “So he wasn’t Seymour Case, but you followed him.”

“Oh, no,” replied Temple. “This is as much a surprise to me as it is to you. I eat here frequently.” He pulled out the chair opposite Peel. “Mind if I join you? They’re rather crowded.”

“Give me the five hundred and you can sit down.”

Temple didn’t give Peel the five hundred but he seated himself. “Let’s not talk nonsense, Mr. Peel,” he said pleasantly. “After all, you’re still working for me.”

“Wait a minute,” said Peel. He got up and strode to the side of the bar, where there was a telephone booth. From it he could see both Temple and Thaddeus Smallwood. He dropped a dime into the slot and dialed a number.

The voice of Otis Beagle boomed in his car. “Beagle Detective Agency, Otis Beagle talking.”

“Temple welshed,” Peel said angrily. “He claims Smallwood isn’t Case, but he followed him here to the Denmark Club where Smallwood is having lunch with Linda Meadows.”

“Why, the dirty chiseler!” cried Otis Beagle. “I get my hands on him I’ll squeeze the money out of him.”

“Are we still working for Temple?”

“After he reneged?” Then Beagle cried, “Wait, what made you ask that?”

“Because he brought it up. He’s sitting outside the booth now, watching Smallwood and — now he’s looking at me.”

Beagle groaned. “I don’t like it, Joe. We’ve been retained by Smallwood to... to protect him.”

“What do you mean, protect?”

“He’s afraid somebody’s going to do something to him. I guess murder comes under that heading, so you’d better string Temple along. You’ve got to watch Smallwood.”

“I just had a four-dollar lunch watching him,” Peel snapped. “You’ll find it on the expense account.”

He slammed the receiver on the hook and stepped out of the phone booth. Temple looked at him inquiringly.

“I’m to string you along.”

“You have a sense of humor, Mr. Peel. Although it’s a little hard to understand at times.”

“Beagle’s the lad with the sense of humor,” Peel retorted. “He laughed himself silly when I told him you’d welshed on the five hundred. Beagle doesn’t think any more of five hundred dollars than the average person does of sitting on an atom bomb.”

“Droll,” said Temple. “Very droll.”

In the main dining room, Thaddeus Smallwood got to his feet and drew back Linda Meadows’ chair so she could rise. Peel whirled, signaled to his waiter.

“My check — quick!”

“Oh, that’s all right, I’ll take care of it,” said Charlton Temple.

“What?” Peel shot a quick glance into the other room. “Aren’t you going to follow them?”

“I haven’t had my lunch. Run along, Mr. Pee!”

Peel looked sharply at Temple a moment, while Smallwood and Linda left. Then he strode to the door. Through the triangular window he watched the attendant bring out Smallwood’s car. As they climbed in and drove out of the parking lot, Peel whipped open the door and followed.

He darted out to the sidewalk and exclaimed in relief as he saw a taxicab parked only fifty feet away. He ran to it, got in.

“Follow the Cadillac!”

The driver shrugged and started the taxi.

Smallwood’s car rolled easily to Doheny and turned south to Wilshire. Ten minutes later, the Cadillac drew up before the office building on Wilshire. Peel fished out some bills, was about to pay the fare, when he exclaimed. Linda Meadows had got out of the car but Smallwood remained at the wheel. He waved jauntily to Linda, then took off again.

“Keep following,” Peel cried.

The driver muttered, “Keep following.”

Smallwood drove to Highland Avenue, then turned left. As he crossed Hollywood Boulevard, the meter of Peel’s cab clicked to four dollars and the driver shot an uneasy glance at it.

“Keep following,” said Peel.

The man shrugged and closed up to within a half block as Smallwood’s Cadillac picked up speed after crossing Franklin. When it turned into Cahuenga Pass he looked over his shoulder.

“Keep following?”

“I’ll tell you when to stop.”

When they turned into Ventura Boulevard, the meter passed the six-dollar mark. In Encino it read eight dollars and the driver kept shooting sullen glances at it. In Callabasas he suddenly drew up to the side of the road.

“Ten bucks!” he cried. “It’ll cost me two dollars in gas to get back.”

“I’ll pay for the gas,” snapped Peel.

“I’ll take it now,” retorted the cabby. “I’m not running up any twenty-dollar meter then finding out you can’t pay for it.”

Peel whisked out a fistful of bills, sorted out a twenty and thrust it at the driver. “Keep following!”

“Keep following!” cried the cabdriver and sent his cab shooting forward.

They were now on the divided highway without any stops and the Cadillac was almost out of sight. The cabby pressed his foot to the floor and the taxicab vibrated as the motor roared to its limit. They began to gain on the Cadillac again and were within comfortable distance when they zoomed along the outskirts of Agoura.

“Take a look behind you,” the taxicab driver called out suddenly.

Peel twisted in the seat. A hundred yards behind was a green Ford.

“It isn’t a cop.”

“I know it isn’t, but watch...”

The driver took his foot off the gas and the taxi slowed to a mere thirty miles per hour. The green Ford slackened speed. After a moment the cabby gave his car the gas. The Ford behind quickened.

“They been doin’ that since we left Hollywood,” exclaimed the cabdriver. “They stopped when we did. We re following the Caddy, but the Fords following us.”

“Be damned,” Peel said, under his breath. “Close in on the Cadillac.”

And at that moment the Cadillac suddenly braked and swung off the highway onto a narrow paved road. The taxi brakes squealed and tires screeched as the cab followed.

Peel whirled, kept his eyes on the rear window. Behind them the green Ford also turned.

“See what I mean?” cried the cabdriver. “I’m a hackie, remember. I drive the car, that’s all. If there’s a fight, I’m neutral.” Then he began to brake his machine.

Ahead, a hundred yards, the Cadillac had turned left on a dirt road.

“Keep following,” snapped Peel.

“It’s your funeral!”

The cab turned into the dirt road, crested a small rise and coasted to a halt a dozen yards behind the Cadillac. The big convertible had halted at the edge of an open field in which a picnic of some sort was going on.

Smallwood climbed out of his car and started across the field toward a long table that had been set up under a live oak tree. A woman saw him coming and moved forward to meet him.

Peel looked past Smallwood at the woman. It was Iowa Lee.

“I’m a monkey’s uncle!” he muttered.

“What’d you say?” asked the cabdriver.

Peel turned, looked through the rear window. The green Ford was pulling up twenty yards away. Peel opened the cab door and stepped out.

“The meter reads sixteen bucks,” the cabby said.

“Wait and you’ll get another sixteen bucks for taking me back to town.”

The driver hesitated. He looked back toward the green Ford, then at the picnic grove. “It’s a picnic,” Peel said.

“How long you figure on stayin’?”

“Maybe five minutes, maybe an hour.”

“And you’ll pay the meter all the way back?”

“I said I would, didn’t I?”

The taxicab man sighed. “I’ll wait.”

Peel shot another look at the green Ford. Two men had climbed out, but they stood beside the little car, talking. Peel drew a deep breath and started out across the field.

Iowa Lee saw him coming. She said a word to Smallwood and started toward Peel, but then Smallwood turned. He saw Peel and cried out:

“You... you’re the man who...”

“Harya,” Peel said casually.

“What are you doing here?” Iowa Lee demanded.

In his advance toward Iowa, Peel had looked past her and noted three or four faces that he had seen before. He said, “This is a club picnic, isn’t it?”

“It is, but it’s for members only.”

“But I’m a member,” Peel said. “You’ve had me on the books for quite a while.”

Smallwood was trying desperately to control himself. “Iowa, I must speak to you. About this man...”

“You’ve met him?”

“If you want to call it that. He came to my office yesterday and...” He grimaced and his face darkened two shades. “I must talk to you about him.”

“You got me wrong, mister,” Peel said easily. “I work for Otis Beagle.”

Smallwood took a quick step back. “What’s that you say?”

“Beagle. B-e-a...”

“He’s a private detective,” Iowa Lee offered helpfully.

Smallwood stood suddenly as though he were turning to stone. Then suddenly a violent shudder shook him. “I... I don’t understand. You’re the man who came to my office yesterday and...”

Peel stepped forward and clapped Smallwood on the shoulder. “Don’t try to understand it, pal. That’s the way us detectives work. We’re on the job — always. Relax. You haven’t got a thing to worry about, Smallwood. Not as long as I’m on the job.”

“I think,” Iowa Lee said, “I would like to have a little talk with you, Mr. Peel.”

“Sure, baby.”

He winked at the still flabbergasted Smallwood and followed Iowa Lee about twenty yards to the left. Iowa stopped then and her eyes glinted as she faced Peel.

“Just what are you and that employer of yours up to?”

Peel looked at her innocent-eyed. “We’re doing the job we’re being paid for. You hired the agency this morning and—”

“Now wait a minute,” Iowa said grimly. “I employed your agency to keep it out of my affairs. That was the understanding I had with Mr. Beagle.”

“That isn’t what he told me,” Peel protested. “He said we’d been retained to look after your interests. You were worried about the club getting involved in the murder of—”

“Don’t!” cried Iowa. “Don’t say it. Neither Susan Sawyer nor David Corey was a member of my club.”

Peel grinned. “Not if you say they weren’t.”

“They weren’t!”

“All right, baby, all right. Relax. You haven’t got a thing to worry about.”

“I’m beginning to think that I’ve got a lot to worry about.” Iowa gestured toward Thaddeus Smallwood. “You’re also working for Mr. Smallwood. Why?”

“Uh-uh,” Peel said, shaking his head. “We’re like lawyers, we can’t tell one client another client’s business.”

“I see. And aren’t private detectives — like lawyers — forbidden from representing two clients in the same case?”

Peel grimaced. “Not the same case.”

“Smallwood’s involved in the Susan Sawyer-David Corey mess, isn’t he?”

“But you’re not!” Peel shot at her. Then he chuckled. “See? Your interests don’t conflict, so it’s perfectly all right.”

Iowa Lee hesitated. She was not appeased, but didn’t know how far to press Peel. And while she was debating the matter, a woman’s voice shrieked:

“Joey!”

Peel whirled. “Oh, no!”