Bud pointed to the house. “I got her address. You get this address running call girls?”
“I’m a financier. I have an advanced degree in chemistry, I worked as a pharmacist for several years and invested wisely. ‘Entrepreneur’ sums me up best, I think. And don’t tweak me with criminal slang, Mr. White. Don’t make me regret I leveled with you.”
Bud scoped him. Two to one he _was_ leveling, thought cops were bugs that leveling worked with sometimes. “Okay, then I’ll wrap it up.”
“Please do.”
Notebook out. “You said Gilette was pimping Lynn Bracken, right?”
“I dislike the word ‘pimp,’ but yes.”
“Okay, were any of your other girls street-pimped, callpimped?”
“No, all my girls are either models or girls that I saved from general Hollywood heartbreak.”
Switcheroo. “You don’t read the papers too good, right?”
“Correct. I try to avoid bad news.”
“But you heard of the Nite Owl Massacre.”
“Yes, because I do not dwell in a cave.”
“That guy Duke Cathcart was one of the victims. He was a pimp, and lately a guy’s been asking around about him, trying to get girls to do call jobs for him. Now Gilette street-pimped Kathy Janeway, and you know him. I’m thinking maybe you might do business with some other people who might give me a line on this guy.”
Patchett crossed his legs, stretched. “So you think ‘this guy’ might have killed Kathy Janeway?”
“No, I don’t think that.”
“Or you think he’s behind that Nite Owl thing. I thought Negro youths were supposed to be the killers. What crime are you investigating, Mr. White?”
Bud gripped the chair–fabric ripped. Patchett put his hands up, palms out. “The answer to your questions is no. Dwight Gilette is the only person of that breed I’ve ever dealt with. Low-level prostitution is not my field of expertise.”
“What about B&E?”
“B and E?”
“Breaking and entering. Cathcart’s apartment was tossed, and the walls were wiped.”
Patchett shrugged. “Mr. White, you’re speaking in Sanskrit now. I simply don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yeah? Then what about smut? You know Gilette, Gilette sold you Lynn Bracken, Gilette sold Kathy Janeway to Cathcart. Cathcart was supposed to be starting up a smut biz.”
“Smut” buzzed him–little eye flickers. Bud said, “Ring a bell?”
Patchett picked up a glass, swirled ice cubes. “No bells, and your questions are getting further and further afield. Your approach has been novel, so I’ve tolerated it. But you’re wearing me thin and I’m beginning to think that your motives for being here are quite muddled.”
Bud stood up pissed, no handle on the man. Patchett said, “One of your tangents is personal with you, isn’t it?”
“Yeah.”
“If it’s the Janeway girl, I meant what I said. I may suborn women into ifficit activities, but they’re handsomely compensated, I treat them very well and make sure the men they deal with show them every due respect. Good night, Mr. White.”
o o o
Thoughts for the ride: how did Patchett get his number so quick, did his evidence suppression bit backfire–Dudley suspicious, wise to how far he’d go to hurt Exley. Lynn Bracken lived on Nottingham off Los Feliz; he found the address easy–a modern-style triplex. Colored lights beamed out the windows– he looked before he rang.
Red, blue, yellow–figures cut through the beams. Bud watched his very own stag show.
A Veronica Lake dead ringer, nude on her tiptoes: slender, full breasted. Blond–hair in a perfect pageboy cut. A man moving inside her, straining, crouching for the fit.
Bud watched; street sounds faded. He blotted out the man, studied the woman: every inch of her body in every shade of light. He drove home tunnel-vision–nothing but her.
Inez Soto on his doorstep.
Bud walked over. She said, “I was at Exley’s place in Lake Arrowhead. He said there was no strings, then he showed up and told me I had to take this drug to make me remember. I told him no. Did you know you’re the only Wendell White in the Central Directory?”
Bud straightened her hat, tucked a loose piece of veil under the crown. “How’d you get down here?”
“I took a cab. A hundred of Exley’s dollars, so at least he’s good for something. Officer White, I don’t want to remember.”