“I’ll try for tomorrow.”
“Thankee, thankee.” He read off Evelyn Newsome’s number and an address on Ethel Street in Sherman Oaks. “She’s not in board-and-care anymore, moved out six months ago and is living in a real house. Maybe someone came up with a miracle cure for arthritis.”
“Anything in particular you want me to probe for?”
“The deep dark recesses of her daughter’s state of mind before she got killed and any boyfriends Flora had prior to Van Dyne. After that, go anywhere you see fit.”
“Sounds like a plan.”
“Or reasonable facsimile. That show Koppel was taping, guess what the topic was?”
“Communication.”
Silence. “How’d you know?”
“Lucky guess.”
“You scare me.”
CHAPTER
11
I phoned Evelyn Newsome at ten the next morning. A woman with a vigilant voice answered, “Yes?” When I told her who I was, she softened.
“The police were very very nice. Is there something new?”
“I’d like to stop by to chat, Mrs. Newsome. We’ll be reviewing old ground, but—”
“A psychologist?”
“We’re taking a look at Flora’s case from all angles.”
“Oh. That’s fine, sir. I can always talk about my Flora.”
*
Ethel Street just south of Magnolia was a twenty-minute ride over the Glen, past Ventura Boulevard, and into the heart of Sherman Oaks. This side of the mountains was ten degrees hotter than the city and dry enough to tickle my sinuses. The marine layer had burned off, endowing the Valley with blue skies.
Evelyn Newsome’s block was lined with modest, well-kept one-story houses, most of them nailed up posthaste for returning World War II vets. Old-growth orange and apricot trees rose above redwood fences. Huge, scarred elms, top-heavy pines, and untrimmed mulberry trees shaded some of the properties. Others flaunted themselves, naked, in relentless Valley light.
Evelyn Newsome’s new home was a pea green stucco bungalow with a fresh mock-shake roof. The lawn was flat, succotash-colored stubble. Birds-of-paradise flanked the front steps. A porch swing hung still in the baking, dormant air.
A screen door covered the entrance, but the wooden door had been left open, offering full view of a dark, low living room. Evelyn Newsome’s daughter had been murdered two years ago, and her default phone voice was wary, but on some level she still trusted.
Before I could ring the bell, a big, white-haired man in his seventies appeared and unlatched the screen.
“Doctor? Walt McKitchen, Evelyn’s out in back waiting for you.” He held his shoulders high, had a florid face built around a purple cabbage nose and a tiny mouth. Despite the heat, he wore a blue-and-gray flannel shirt buttoned to the neck over triple-pleated gray wool slacks.
We shook hands. His fingers were sausages breaded with callus. When he walked me to the back of the house he limped, and I noticed that one of his shoes was bottomed by a three-inch orthopedic sole.
We passed through a tiny, neat bedroom and entered an equally small add-on den paneled in knotty pine and set up with a fuzzy green couch, prefab bookshelves full of paperbacks and a wide-screen TV. The air conditioner in the window was silent. A couple of black-and-white photos hung on the walls. Group portrait of a military battalion. A young couple, standing in front of this very house, the trees saplings, the lawn just dirt. To the man’s right was a bubble-topped thirties Plymouth. The woman held a SOLD sign.
Evelyn Newsome sat on the fuzzy couch, rotund and hunched with cold-set white hair and kind blue eyes. On the redwood burl table in front of her was a teapot swaddled in a cozy and two cups on saucers.
“Doctor,” she said, half rising. “I hope you don’t prefer coffee.” She patted the sofa cushion to her right, and I sat down. She wore a white blouse with a Peter Pan collar over maroon stretch pants. She was top-heavy, with thin legs; more sag to the material than stretch.
“This is fine, thanks, Mrs. Newsome.”
She poured. The cups were silk-screened HARRAH’S CASINO, RENO, NEVADA.
“Sugar? Lemon or milk?”
“Plain, please.”
Walt McKitchen lingered near the doorway. Evelyn Newsome said, “I’m all right, hon.”
McKitchen looked me over, saluted and left.