Clandestine

The following week I found out that Lorna had a lover. He was an older man, a senior partner in her law firm. I saw them holding hands and cooing at each other in a Beverly Hills restaurant. My peripheral vision blackened as I strode toward their booth. Unreasonable as it was, I pulled the man to the floor by his necktie, dumped a pitcher of water on his face and followed it with a plate of lobster thermidor.

"Sue me, counselor," I said to the shocked Lorna.

I moved my dog, my golf clubs and my few belongings to an apartment in West L.A. I paid for three months' rent in advance, and wondered what the hell I was going to do.

Lorna ferreted out my address and sent me a petition for divorce. I tore it up in the presence of the process server who had handed it to me. "Tell Mrs. Underhill never," I told him.

Lorna discovered my phone number and called me, threatening, then begging for release from our marriage.

"Never," I told her. "Tijuana marriages are lifetime contracts."

"Goddamn you, Freddy, it's over! Can't you see that?"

"Nothing's ever over," I screamed back, then threw the phone out my living room window.

I wasn't entirely under control, but I was right. It was a prophetic remark. Three days later was June 23, 1955. That was the day I heard about the dead nurse.

IV The Crime Against Marcella

17

The initial newspaper accounts were both lurid and disinterested. Just another murder, the reports seemed to be saying.

From the Los Angeles Herald Express, June 23, 1955: