Take a Step to Murder. Day Keene
dollar fawn-colored spreads mono-grammed with famous Western ranch brands that he had bought to attract the luxury tourist trade that was still nine months distant.
Sprawled on the big double bed she looked pathetically tiny and young, more like a child than a woman. Her face was smudged with oil and grease and blood. Bits of leaves and twigs and powdered rock were embedded in her hair. If she’d had a coat, she’d lost it. There were runs in both of her stockings. One of her shoes was still in the car that had gone over the cliff. There was a hole in the sole of the other.
Doctor Flanders sat on the bed beside her and took her pulse and listened to her heart. Seemingly satisfied with what he found, he turned her head this way then that on the pillow and examined her cranial structure with deft fingers.
Flanders shrugged. “So far so good. I imagine it’s mostly shock. But you never can tell about these things.”
Sheriff Prichard said dryly, “Speaking of these things, the dead man’s zipper was open. So while you are at it, as Medical Examiner for the county, you’d better make it a thorough examination. If the dead guy raped her she has a good suit against his estate.”
Flanders was short with him. “I know my business.”
He pulled up Tamara’s sweater to examine her upper body then turned his head quickly and as he did a flake of hot ash dropped from his freshly lighted cigar and fell on the deep purple aureole of one of the girl’s exposed breasts.
Tamara winced but her eyes remained closed.
You damn butcher, Renner thought, then turned his head to see what Flanders was looking at. They weren’t alone in the unit. Kelcey Anders and four curious paisanos and Marie and her escort had made almost as good time getting back to the court and were jostling for vantage points in the doorway.
Flanders brushed the flake of ash from where it had fallen, then took his cigar from his mouth. “You know,” he said dryly, “there are times when the entire human race disgusts me. And this is one of the times. If you men don’t know what the unclothed female body looks like by now, you haven’t been trying. Now get out of here, all of you.” He singled out Marie. “With the exception of Sheriff Prichard and that girl.” He pointed with the wet end of his cigar. “And that includes you, Renner.”
“Whatever you say,” Renner said. It was no hardship on him. He knew what Tamara looked like. He added for her benefit, so she wouldn’t be too frightened, “I’ll be right outside if you need me.”
Four
THE MORNING WAS older and colder than it had been. Streamers of steam were rising from the heated pool. The men standing in front of the unit milled uncertainly for a few moments then walked slowly down the drive toward the front of the court and the cocktail lounge. Renner hoped they were on their way to buy a last drink to Angel.
He hoped the paisanos bought a lot of drinks to Angel. In the spot he was in every dollar counted. Right now best friend was a cash register.
Kelcey lingered behind the others. “Do you think she is going to be all right?”
Renner lived in Unit One. He unlocked the door. “Just why should you be concerned?”
“Because I could go for that babe.”
“That’s right,” Renner said. “I remember. You told me back on the cliff. You’d like to get your hands on her. I knew how you meant.”
Kelcey turned sullen. “So what’s wrong with that? The kid looks like she could use a few dollars. And what with her skirt up around her neck like it was and him with his zipper open, I’ll bet she and that old guy in the car were doing plenty when they went off the road.”
“At ninety miles an hour?”
“Well anyway, getting ready.”
Renner leaned against the jamb of the door he’d just unlocked. He’d skinned the knuckles of both of his hands. One knee was showing through a ragged tear in his right pants’ leg. In crawling past the broken steering post to get at Tamara, he’d not only ripped off one patch pocket of his best gray flannel suit, he’d also wiped the bloody leather clean. Every bone in his body ached. His muscles felt as if they had been systematically beaten with a hammer.
Not that any of that really mattered. Thanks to chance or fete or whatever one wanted to call it, the accident on the cliff had called Tamara to Kelcey’s attention far better than the little scene he had intended to stage. Kelcey was hooked but good. But now that he had what he wanted, now that he had the stage set, the thought of allowing Kelcey to force himself on Tamara, even for the one moment of intimacy necessary to file a rape charge against him, sickened Renner. Even if Tamara was willing to go all out to help him, and he still had that to discuss with her, he didn’t know if he wanted to go through with this thing, if he could go through with it and keep any semblance of self-respect.
There was a name for men who allowed other men to use their women’s bodies.
Maybe it was better to let the court go.
Right now all he wanted was a hot shower and a change of clothes. And, even more important, to be left alone.
“Look. Be a good fellow,” he told Kelcey. “Take some of your god-damn money and go up and lay it on my bar. Your sobriety is showing.”
He slammed the door behind him but before he could even take off his ruined coat someone knocked on the door he’d just slammed.
It was old man Manners.
“What now?” Renner asked him.
The old man was apologetic. “Some fellow in the bar wants to cash a personal check. And Tony says will you please come okay it?”
“Why not?” Renner shrugged. “Why should I be able to take a shower? I only own the joint.”
He walked up the drive with Manners. The old man was concerned. “That was a brave thing you done, Kurt. But what are we going to do without a tow truck?”
Renner told him. “Without After all, it was the first time we’d used it.”
“It was insured?”
“Everything I have is insured.”
The old man persisted. “But even if the truck is insured, what about personal liability? Does your policy cover Angel? What if his widow sues you? So he was only a Mex. Them having six kids and him being their only source of support, there is no telling how big a judgment a jury might bring in against you.”
It was an angle Renner hadn’t considered. If his policy didn’t cover Angel and Angel’s widow should sue him, she could take him for every dime he had. And even if he managed to save the court she could take that, too. He stopped feeling sorry for Tamara and was angry with her. If she had followed his instructions and made connections with the local bus none of this would have happened. Still, Tamara couldn’t help it if Angel had left early. Angel had left early to go a long way. And all Tamara had been trying to do was reach the court on schedule.
Always something.
There were four cars parked in front of the pumps and five times that many in the parking strip in front of the cocktail lounge. Renner was wryly amused. Death and sex and taxes. The court hadn’t done so much business since the day he’d opened and the good people of Mission Bay had driven out to buy a beer and use the toilets while they inspected the luxury tourist court that old Max Renner’s boy had built.
The check looked good to him. He okayed it and walked on into the office of the court to see if the insurance policy on the truck was in the files. It wasn’t. It was probably with the rest of his legal papers in his safety deposit box. He turned, startled, as a flash bulb popped to see Tom Sourira, the local I.N.S. correspondent, pointing a camera at him.
“What’s the idea?” Renner asked him.
Sourira grinned. “You’re news. Big news. Don’t tell me you don’t know