Day One
July 21, 1952
Monday Afternoon
Wilde knocked on Michelle Day’s door, trying with all his might to put the image of this morning out of his head. The harder he tried the more vivid it got. He could see her hips wiggling with all the clarity of the movie screen down at the Zaza Theatre. He could feel her passion and taste her breath.
Suddenly the door opened.
It was Michelle Day, dressed now and brightly awake, wondering who he was.
She was short, not much more than five feet, built in shades of brown-brown hair, brown eyebrows, brown eyes and brown skin. The hair matched up and down, a fact Wilde shouldn’t know but did. She wore shorts, brown, and a T, brown.
Her feet were bare.
Wilde pulled the photo of Charley-Anna Blackridge out of his pocket and handed it to her.
After she studied it, he said, “My name’s Bryson Wilde. I’m a private investigator. The woman in the photograph was killed Friday night. Before she got killed she was at the El Ray Club where you were bartending. I’m trying to find out if you saw who she left with.”
The woman processed it.
“How’d she die?”
“She fell from a roof.”
“Fell from a roof. Was she pushed?”
“The theory is that she was pushed or dropped,” he said. “Same landing either way.”
The woman nodded.
“Right, I suppose so.” She turned and headed for the kitchen. “Come on in. I remember her.”
“You do?”
“Yeah, she tipped me.”
“Good.”
“Not everyone does,” she said. “You’d be surprised.”
“I probably would.”
“There are a lot of cheapies out there. They can rot in hell as far as I’m concerned. Do you ever get stiffed by your clients?”
He did; not often, but on occasion.
“Then you know what I’m talking about,” she said.
He did.
He did indeed.
The kitchen wasn’t much more than a closet with faded appliances, but it was large enough to hold a newly made pot of coffee that got poured into two cups.
“Sorry, no cream,” she said.
“This is fine.”
Wilde tapped out a Camel, lit it and held it out to see if she wanted it, which she did. He fixed a second for himself and they ended up outside on the front steps.
“I remember her, but I didn’t see who she left with,” the woman said. “When I’m working my world’s pretty much the three feet that’s in front of me. Everything else is a blur.”
“Understood.”
“Sorry.”
Wilde blew smoke.
“According to a friend she was with that night, the woman was hanging around to maybe take a run at some guy who looked like Robert Mitchum. Do you remember him?”
Her face brightened.
“I do,” she said. “He was one of those cheapskates I was talking about. He came over and flashed his smile and said, What’s your name baby? I told him and he shook my hand. He said, I’m Robert. He ordered a beer but didn’t tip. I guess he thought that telling me his name and flashing me his teeth was going to help me pay the electric bill. Three more times after that he ordered but didn’t tip, not once. He had money though, you could tell by his clothes.”
“Did you ever see him there before?”
She shook her head.
“No, never,” she said. “I hope I never see him again, too.”
“Who’d he leave with?”
“I don’t know. I’m just glad he did.”
Wilde asked more questions but the woman didn’t have any more answers. He said his thanks, tipped her a five and was headed down the driveway when the woman called after him and said, “I just remembered one more thing.”
He walked back.
“What?”
“He had a tattoo on his left arm, up high,” she said. “It was a war plane.”
“How big?”
“I don’t know, average? It wasn’t flying. It was sitting on the ground. A woman was standing in front of it posing. She was one of those pinup girls with the big smile and the big tits.”
Two minutes later he fired up Blondie and headed for Larimer. Halfway there he remembered something bad. He’d left London’s map sitting on the top of his desk.
The window was open.
The fan was blowing.
He wasn’t sure he locked the door.
Suddenly police lights appeared in his rearview mirror.
He looked at the speedometer to find he was fifteen over.