“You really aren’t very good at your work, are you?”
“I get a lot of help from the office.”
“The second order is that you get out of town before noon. And not come back. Ever. Is that clear?”
“What are you afraid of?”
“We’re not afraid of you.”
“Seems like it.”
“We are conducting our own investigation of the drugs on the beach, Mr. Fletcher. This is police work. These investigations have been ongoing for some time.”
“Two or three years.”
“We’re looking for a break sometime in the next few months. This is a difficult, complicated business. A private investigation, even by your newspaper, could ruin all our work to date. I think I’ve made myself clear: get out of town, or we’ll run you through a course that will begin immediately with jail, and will end with your suffering a very long and very expensive legal battle. Possession of heroin and assault upon three separate officers while in performance of their duties should be enough to convince you.”
“I’m convinced.”
“You will leave town immediately?”
“Never to darken your dungeon again.”
21
It was a quarter to nine, and the sidewalks were as full as they ever got in the business district of The Beach. Traffic on Main Street was bumper to bumper.
A block and a half from the police station, an approaching gray Jaguar XKE slid against the curb. License number 440-001. The car Fletch was to steal after murdering Alan Stanwyk in sixty hours. The horn honked.
Fletch got into the front seat.
Stanwyk moved the car back into the line of traffic.
“What were you doing at the police station?”
“Being questioned.”
“About what?”
“A kid I know disappeared. A girl named Bobbi.”
“Are you involved in her disappearance?”
“No, but I sure want to get out of town soon. How did you know I was at the police station?”
“I asked at the beer stand. Which was open at eight o’clock in the morning. Some life you lead. A kid with jug ears said he saw you this morning in the back of a patrol car.”
“French fries are good for breakfast.”
Again Stanwyk lit a cigarette without using the dashboard lighter. He used a gold lighter from his pocket. He was wearing sunglasses.
Fletch said, “What do you want?”
“To see how everything’s going. Do you have your passport?”
“I should have it tomorrow.”
“And the gloves?”
“I’ll get a pair.”
“You have applied for the passport?”
“Oh, yes, I even had my picture taken.”
“Fine. Are you clear in your mind about what you are going to do?”
“Perfectly. You still want it done?”
Stanwyk blew out a stream of smoke. “Yes.”
“Are you sure you’re dying of cancer?”
“Yes. Why do you ask?”
“You look fine.”
“It takes a while for it to show. I want to be gone by then.”
They were sitting at a red light.
“I remember reading that you fly airplanes.” Fletch said. “Test airplanes. Whatever you call them.”
“What about it?”
The car crossed the intersection.
“So why don’t you kill yourself in an airplane?”
The shoulders of Stanwyk’s suit jacket moved more than another man’s would when he shrugged. He had powerful shoulders.
“Call it pride, if you like. If you spend your life trying to keep airplanes in the air, it’s sort of difficult to aim one for the ground.”
“An expensive pride.”
“People have spent more than fifty thousand dollars on pride before.”
“I guess so.”
“You remember where the house is?”
“At the end of Berman Street.”
“That’s right. And how are you going to get there?”
“I’m going to take a taxi to the corner of Hawthorne and Main and walk from there. It’s a different district, but only about two miles away.”
“Good for you. And you remember the flight number?”
“No. You never gave it to me.”
Stanwyk was looking at him through the sunglasses. “It’s the eleven o’clock TWA flight to Buenos Aires.”
“I know that,” Fletch said. “But I don’t know the number.”
Stanwyk said, “Neither do I.”
He glided the car against the curb.
“I don’t believe you and I should know each other too well,” he said. “I’m trying not to know you. What I mean is, I think you should forget what you read about me in the newspapers.”
Fletch said, “I just happened to remember that.”