Double

When I woke up on Monday morning, there was no longer any question that I would be staying on for at least one more day. So first thing after I got out of the shower, even though it wasn’t eight yet, I called Kerry. She was always up by seven-thirty at the latest; and I missed her and wanted to hear her voice.

She sounded grouchy, and when I asked her how she was she said, “Crappy. That damn dog-food commercial.”

“It didn’t go well, huh?”

“No. We didn’t finish shooting until last night.”

“How come?”

“Trouble with the dogs.”

“What dogs?”

“The goddamn mutts they brought in to eat Bowzer Bits. Don’t be dense.”

“What happened?”

“One of them bit Al Douglas, the director. Then it bit me.”

“What? Are you all right?”

“I’ll live. It was just a nip. But it still hurts.”

“Where did you get nipped?”

“Never mind where.”

“Not on your—”

“I said never mind.”

“Poor baby. I’ll kiss it and make it better when I get home.”

“Like fun you will,” she said. “And how was your weekend?”

“Also crappy. But I’m going to stick around here another day or two, just the same.”

“What for?”

I told her what for. She didn’t like it; she never likes it when I get involved in homicide cases. Which is all right, because I don’t like it either.

“So you’re working with that McCone woman,” Kerry said. “She’s attractive, isn’t she.”

“So are you.”

“No fooling around?”

“Hell. She’s young enough to be my daughter.”

“So am I. That didn’t stop you with me.”

“Cut it out,” I said. “Desist. You can worry about my health, that’s okay. But you don’t have to worry about my virtue.”

“Mmm. Take care of yourself, will you?”

I said I would. Then I told her that I missed her, and told her some other things, and she said maybe she’d let me kiss her dog bite and make it better, after all. I was smiling when I rang off and I thought she probably was too.

It was after eight by then. I called the airline and canceled my one o’clock return flight and got an open reservation instead. While I had the directory out, I flipped open the Yellow Pages to “Investigators” to see if the Owens Detective Agency carried an ad. It did, a small one that said it opened for business “promptly at 9 a.m., Monday thru Friday.”

I had a quick cup of coffee in the coffee shop and then took my rental car across the Coronado Bridge and downtown. The building that housed the Owens Agency was on Sixth Avenue between Broadway and E Street, a block that just missed being shabby. It was flanked on one side by a transient hotel and on the other by an out-of-business Mexican café. The lobby was empty except for a couple of potted plants and a big sand-filled urn. The elevator was old and cranky and made grumbling noises to itself, but it got me to the third and top floor in under five minutes.

I went down a hallway past a door marked LAVATORY, another one marked DUTTON DESIGN & MANUFACTURING CO., a third that said K. M. ARDRY, ATTORNEY-AT-LAW — DIVORCE SPECIALIST. There didn’t seem to be much going on behind the last two doors. Most people probably hadn’t shown up for work yet.

The Owens Agency was at the far end. I tried the knob, half expecting to find it locked, but it turned under my hand and let me into an anteroom large enough for three cane-bottom chairs and two small tables. Nobody was in it. Opposite, bisecting the room, was a floor-to-ceiling partition made out of wallboard to waist level and old-fashioned pebbled glass the rest of the way up; a doorframe and a door were set in the middle of it, the door standing open, and on the other side I could see the rest of the office. I went over and poked my head through for a closer look. That part was empty too.

So maybe he’s down in the john, I thought. I backed up to one of the cane-bottom chairs and sat down to wait.

Ten minutes went by. There weren’t any magazines around; nothing at all on the tables except a lone ashtray. I sat there. But I don’t sit well without something to do with my hands or something to occupy my mind. I began to fidget, to cross and uncross my legs, to squirm my fanny around on the chair. I had quit smoking years ago and had no desire to start up again, but at times like this I found myself developing a vague hunger for a cigarette. At least smoking one would have been an activity.

From out in the hallway I heard footsteps, voices — but none of them came this far down. Other people arriving for work. And where the hell was Lauterbach? The air in the anteroom was warm and stuffy and smelled of stale cigarette smoke. You’d have thought the first thing anybody would do on a Monday morning would be to open a window, air the place out a little.

Well, maybe Lauterbach hadn’t come in yet. But then why was the door unlocked? Was he that careless — go off on Friday or Saturday and forget to secure his office? Could be. Lots of people are careless. And he might have been in a hurry, distracted — even drunk, given Lauterbach’s apparent taste for the sauce.