“Norah—are you certain?”
“When it comes to Hollywood, you’re talking to a walking encyclopedia, love. Teri was living with the head of Con tinental Studios but she was keeping an assistant director on the side. She caught him cheating on her one night and she stabbed him to death. The head of the studio pulled a lot of strings and paid off a lot of people and it was hushed up and called an accident. Part of the arrangement was that she get out of Hollywood and never come back. And she never has.”
Judd stared at the phone numbly.
“Judd, are you there?”
“I’m here.”
“You sound funny.”
“Where did you hear all this?”
“Hear it? It was in all the newspapers and fan magazines. Everybody knew about it.”
Except him. “Thanks, Norah,” he said. “Say hello to Pe ter.” He hung up.
So that was the “casual incident.” Teri Washburn had murdered a man and had never mentioned it to him. And if she had murdered once…
Thoughtfully he picked up a pad and wrote down “Teri Washburn.”
The phone rang. Judd picked it up. “Dr. Stevens…”
“Just checking to see if you’re all right.” It was Detective Angeli. His voice was still hoarse with a cold.
A feeling of gratitude filled Judd. Someone was on his side.
“Anything new?”
Judd hesitated. He could see no point to keeping quiet about the bomb.
“They tried again.” Judd told Angeli about Moody and the bomb that had been planted in his car. “That should convince McGreavy,” he concluded.
“Where’s the bomb?” Angeli’s voice was excited.
Judd hesitated. “It’s been dismantled.”
“Its been what?” Angeli asked incredulously. “Who did that?”
“Moody. He didn’t think it mattered.”
“Didn’t matter! What does he think the Police Depart ment is for? We might have been able to tell who planted that bomb just by looking at it. We keep a file of M.O.s.”
“M.O.s?”
“Modus operandi. People fall into habit patterns. If they do something one way the first time, chances are they’ll keep doing it the same—I don’t have to tell you.”
“No,” said Judd thoughtfully. Surely Moody had known that. Had he some reason for not wanting to show the bomb to McGreavy?
“Dr. Stevens—how did you hire Moody?”
“I found him in the yellow pages.” It sounded ridiculous even as he said it.
He could hear Angeli swallow. “Oh. Then you really don’t know a damn thing about him.”
“I know I trust him. Why?“
“Right now,” Angeli said, “I don’t think you should trust anybody.”
“But Moody couldn’t possibly be connected with any of this. My God! I picked him out of the phone book, at ran dom.”
“I don’t care where you got him. Something smells fishy. Moody says he set a trap to catch whoever’s after you, but he doesn’t close the trap until the bait’s already been taken, so we can’t pin it on anyone. Then he shows you a bomb in your car that he could have put there himself. And wins your confidence. Right?”
“I suppose you could look at it that way,” Judd said. “But—”
“Maybe your friend Moody is on the level, and maybe he’s setting you up. I want you to play it nice and cool until we find out.”
Moody against him? It was difficult to believe. And yet, he remembered his earlier doubts when he had thought Moody was sending him into an ambush.
“What do you want me to do?” asked Judd.
“How would you feel about leaving town? I mean really leaving town.”
“I can’t leave my patients.”
“Dr. Stevens—”
“Besides,” Judd added, “it really wouldn’t solve anything, would it? I wouldn’t even know what I’m running away from. When I came back, it would just start all over again.”
There was a moment’s silence. “You have a point.” Angeli gave a sigh, and it turned into a wheeze. He sounded terrible. “When do you expect to hear from Moody again?”
“I don’t know. He thinks he has some idea of who’s be hind all this.”
“Has it occurred to you that whoever’s behind this can pay Moody a lot more than you can?” There was an urgency in Angeli’s voice. “If he asks you to meet him, call me. I’ll be home in bed for the next day or two. Whatever you do, Doc tor, don’t meet him alone!”