From the sour expression on his face, LAPD detective second grade Manfred (Manny) Hatch came into the Elysian Room with a chip on his shoulder so big I saw it half a ballroom away, just from observing his arrogant manner with the hotel’s uniformed employees. He glowered at them as though he was the head of the INS and they-even the blond Norwegian waiter and the African American security guard-were illegal aliens he’d like to ship back across California ’s southern border.
Detective Hatch behaved only marginally better to the prosperous guests in the ballroom, but he had enough sense of self-preservation not to go too far in trying to intimidate them. Hatch’s type was by far a minority in the LAPD, but I’d seen such behavior before. John called them “little Napoleons,” even though, like Hatch, some of them were close to six feet tall.
Hatch’s manner improved when Eugene Long approached him. Unlike Hugh Weaver, Hatch must have recognized Long, and realized that Long’s immense wealth could be a more powerful cudgel than was Hatch’s badge. Hatch’s facial expression relaxed from a scowl into something approximating a collegial smile. But I imagined that secretly he’d be one happy detective if he found Long-or one of LA’s other power brokers-standing over a murder victim with the weapon in his hand.
My attention was diverted to a man at the entrance to the ballroom, standing beside the police officer guarding the door. Dressed casually, in a brown tweed jacket over a moss green turtleneck sweater and tan slacks, he had a ruddy complexion and light, curly hair, cut short. I noticed him because he was waving in my direction, but he wasn’t anyone I knew. Then I realized that the man was signaling to Roland Gray, who was standing next to me.
“A man at the door is trying to get your attention,” I said.
Gray glanced toward the entrance and gave the stranger an answering wave.
“That’s Will Parker,” Gray said. “He drove me here tonight.”
“Your chauffeur?”
“My assistant, actually. Helps with research, but he drives me occasionally. I’d better go tell him we’ll be a while.”
I watched Gray cross the room, speak first to the police officer and then to Parker. Gray’s assistant was shorter than his employer, and seemed to be a few years younger. He reminded me of someone… As I was turning away, I realized who it was-the British actor, Trevor Howard, when he was about forty and starred in the classic ill-fated romance that played often on cable: Brief Encounter.
The “encounter” between Gray and Parker was brief, too. Parker turned away from the entrance and Gray started back in my direction.
“The officer at the door has no idea when we’ll be released, so I told Will to go get himself some dinner and come back.” Gesturing toward the police, Gray asked, “Anything happening?”
“It looks like Detective Hatch has finished talking to Eugene Long. Now he’s heading toward Hugh Weaver.”
As we watched, John joined Weaver and Hatch. The three detectives spoke quietly to each other. Even though I couldn’t hear the words, it seemed from their body language that it wasn’t a pleasant chat. John’s posture stiffened and I saw his jaw muscles tighten. Down at his side, Weaver’s hands balled into fists. Weaver must have been told to turn over his notes, because one hand uncurled enough for him to reach into his jacket pocket to retrieve his investigator’s notebook. Clearly fuming, he shoved it at Hatch.
Finally, the last of us present during the time of the murder were told we could go home, but admonished to keep ourselves available for further interviews.
Eileen left her mother and father standing with Liddy and Bill and hurried over to me. She was trembling. “What are we going to do? I’ve never been so scared.”
“Honey, stay calm. Don’t panic.”
She took a breath and steadied her voice. “Daddy doesn’t know what Keith was using to blackmail me, but that’s bound to come out as soon as the police search Keith’s house and find the tape. Daddy’ll never be able to prove he didn’t know about it. I don’t care for myself anymore, but what Keith did to me could make them charge Daddy with murder-and it’s all my fault.”
“It is not your fault. I have an idea, but I’m going to need you thinking clearly. First, what else in the house might link you to Ingram?”
“What do you mean?”
“Are there pictures of the two of you together?”
“No. We never went out in public, except sometimes to an out-of-the-way restaurant. Keith said we should be discreet, so people wouldn’t think he’d praised our fudge business because of…” She blushed.
“Forget about that, honey. Think hard now. Did you leave clothing at his place? Jewelry? Anything at all that could be traced back to you?”
“No. Not a thing. There’s just that that awful video. Why are you asking?”
“I’m going to keep you out of this, but I need your help.”
I saw a glimmer of hope in her eyes. “What can I do?”
On the corner of a display table to my left there was a pile of program sheets, listing the celebrity contestants and the location of each of their stoves. I picked one up, turned it over to the blank side, and handed it and the pen from the top of my clipboard to Eileen.
“Go into the bathroom and lock yourself in a stall. Sketch out a floor plan of Ingram’s house. As many details as you can remember. And where the doors and windows are in the back.”
“What are you-?”
I shook my head to silence her. “If you don’t know you won’t have to lie. Does Ingram’s house have an alarm system?”
“Yes.”
It would have been too good to be true, but I asked the next question anyway. “Do you know the code?”
“No. I was never in the house when he wasn’t there.”
“Do you know if his alarm system has interior motion detectors?”
“It did have, but he told me he got rid of them because his maid kept setting them off accidentally.”
Bless that maid, I thought.
I saw Liddy heading toward me and gave Eileen a nudge. “Go. Put down every detail you can remember.”
Liddy came over to where I was standing by the door.
“Eileen’s going to stay at John and Shannon ’s house tonight,” Liddy said. “John’s going to take them home. Why don’t you stay over with Bill and me?”
“No, thank you. I can’t leave Tuffy alone all night. Just drop me off at home.”
“We’ll pick Tuffy up, and get a change of clothes for you.”
“I can’t.” I drew Liddy a few feet away from the person nearest to us and lowered my voice. “Ingram had something that I can’t let anyone find. The police are going to be searching his house for clues to his murder, probably as soon as tomorrow morning, so I’ve got to go there tonight.”
Liddy’s eyes widened with excitement. “If you’re going to break into somebody’s house, I’m not letting you go alone.”
The first thing I did when I got home, after greeting Tuffy and Emma, and assuring Tuffy that we’d go for a walk shortly, was to take off my once-beautiful gown and get a good look at the damage.
It was awful. While I was wearing it, I could tell that it was bad, but studying it on the hanger I knew that it was hopeless. Beyond even the best dry cleaner’s art. The stains on the front of the delicate peach chiffon fabric had hardened, and turned from the vivid red of fresh blood to a dull shade of old rust.
Even though he was a disgusting human being, the fact was that a man had died a violent death tonight; that was far more serious than the loss of a designer gown. I wasn’t sure Phil Logan would see it that way. I dreaded calling him, but I knew that I had to. After putting on a sweater and slacks, I sat down on the edge of my bed and picked up the receiver.
Instead of dialing Phil’s cell phone, which I knew he answered twenty-four hours a day, I did the cowardly thing and punched in his office number, to get his voice mail.
One ring.
“Hello,” Phil said.
Ooops. “What are you doing at the office so late, Phil?”
“Working. I heard about Ingram’s murder.”
“How did you know? It couldn’t have been on the news yet.”
“There’s no such thing as a secret-if you’ve got friends who are cops,” Phil said. “I’m writing a press release that mentions your name, but doesn’t make it sound as though I’m using somebody’s death for publicity. It’s a delicate balancing act.”
“Must you do that? It makes me uncomfortable.”
“Sometimes effective PR is like making sausages-you shouldn’t see how it’s done,” Phil said.
“I make my own sausages, and there’s nothing to hide.”
“Talking about food is making me hungry. Listen, the story I’m writing says that you ruined a six-thousand-dollar Jorge Allesandro gown trying to save Keith Ingram’s life.”
Six thousand dollars!
“Two security men worked on him. You can’t give me credit for-”
“My hotel source said you were the first to try to administer aid. Right or wrong?”
“Well, I tried to stop the bleeding from his wound, but it was just for a second or two until the security men-”
“But you tried. Right? And in thinking about Ingram, your dress was ruined.”
It was useless to try to talk Phil out of doing his job as he saw it. I gave up and moved on to the subject I feared. “You said the dress cost six thousand dollars. Will Mr. Allesandro let me make partial payments over time?”
I heard Phil chuckle. “Are you worried about that? Don’t be. Jorge won’t ask you for money. He’ll get many thousands of dollars of free publicity out of the fact that you were wearing his gown at the scene of a murder. Luckily, my photographer got pictures.”
“When?”
“Tonight. There was so much going on, you probably didn’t notice.”
“No, I didn’t.” A new thought occurred to me; it was about Phil’s boss and mine, Mickey Jordan. “Does Mickey know what happened tonight?”
“No. He and Iva are sailing around the Greek Islands, and Greece is nine hours ahead of us. He makes his daily check in call at six PM his time, which is nine AM ours. I’ll tell him about it then.”
“The trip is their second honeymoon. I hope this won’t make him cut it short.”
“No reason for him to do that. You were just on the scene of a crime-you didn’t commit one.”
Not yet, anyway.
“Get some sleep,” Phil said. “You’ve got a live show to do tomorrow night. Actually, you’ll be going on the air about nineteen hours from now.”
I agreed-but with my fingers crossed. Phil told me he would have the dress picked up sometime tomorrow, and we said good night.
My second call was to Nicholas D’Martino’s cell phone. He answered in two rings, but sounded sleepy. When he heard my voice, he said, “Hi, Slugger. How’d the judging go?”
“The contest was interrupted. Somebody threw a smoke bomb, and when everybody could see again we found that Keith Ingram had been stabbed to death.”
“Details.” His tone was brisk, professional. All trace of sleepiness was gone from his voice.
I told Nicholas everything I knew, including the fact that John had hit Ingram close to an hour before the murder. There was no way to keep that a secret to protect John because there had been too many witnesses. Because John was a decorated lieutenant in the LAPD, that detail was sure to be in every report of the crime.
“Do you think O’Hara killed Ingram?”
“No! And I’m not saying that because he’s my friend. John is not a murderer. In fact, he’s never even killed anyone in the line of duty.”
“Okay, okay. Don’t get mad at me. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt, but socking Ingram looks bad. It had something to do with Eileen, didn’t it?”
I didn’t want to lie to Nicholas, but I wasn’t going to betray Eileen. Taking a middle course, I said, “Maybe John heard bad things about Ingram and women. Look, I can’t talk about this anymore right now. I have a live show to do tonight. When are you coming back?”
“Friday morning. I’m going to call the paper now, see who’s on the Ingram story and work with him on follow-ups.”
“See you Friday?”
“Without fail.” His voice took on a caring tone. “Sleep well. I know it won’t be easy.” He added something sweet and we said good night.