Clandestine

Finally I found it. Marcella Harris had rented apartment number 102 at 9619 Hibiscus Canyon from June, 1950, to September, 1951. She had been a resident there at the time of Maggie Cadwallader's murder. Next to the listing there were comments in a minute hand: "Mrs. Groberg's bro. to sublet 7/2/51—?" Next to that, a check mark in a different color ink and the letters "O.K.-J.V."

I put down the file and knelt beside the quaking Janet Valupeyk. Stabbing again, I asked, "Who told you to rent to Marcella Harris, Janet?" She shook her head violently. I raised my hand to hit her, then hesitated and shook her shoulders instead. "Tell me, goddamnit, or I'll get the heat!"

Janet Valupeyk began to tremble from head to toe. "Eddie," she said. "Eddie, Eddie, Eddie." Her voice was very soft.

So was mine as I said, "Eddie who?"

Janet looked at me carefully for the first time. "I . . . I know you," she said.

"Eddie who?" I screamed, shaking her by her shoulders again.

"Eddie Engels. I . . . I know you. You—"

"But you broke up with him."

"He still had me. Oh, God, he still had me!"

"Who's Mrs. Groberg?"

"I don't know. I don't remember—"

"Don't lie to me. Marcella Harris is dead! Who killed her?"

"I don't know! You killed Eddie!"

"Shut up! Who's Mrs. Groberg?"

"She lives at 9619. She's a good tenant. She wouldn't hurt any—"

I didn't hear her finish. I left her sobbing for her past as I ran to my car and rushed headlong back into mine.

Five minutes later I was parked crossways at the end of the Hibiscus Canyon cul-de-sac. I ran down the street to the Moorish apartment house, flung open the leaded glass door, and scanned the mailboxes in the foyer. Mrs. John Groberg lived in number 419. I took the stairs two at a time to the fourth floor. I listened through the door to a TV blasting out a game program. I knocked. There was no answer. I knocked again, this time louder, and heard mild cursing and the volume on the TV diminished.

Through the door a cranky voice called out, "Who is it?"

"Police officer, ma'am," I called out, consciously imitating Jack Webb of "Dragnet" fame.

Giggles answered my announcement. The door was flung open a moment later, and I was confronted by the adoring gaze of a gasbag matron. I quickly sized her up as a crime buff and took my act from there.

Before the woman could ask me for my nonexistent badge I said forcefully, "Ma'am, I need your help."

She fidgeted with her housecoat and the curlers in her hair. She was on the far side of fifty. "Y-yes, Officer," she said.

"Ma'am, a former tenant here was murdered recently. Maybe you've heard about it; you look like a woman who keeps abreast of the news."

"Well, I—"

"Her name was Marcella Harris."

The woman's hands flew up to her throat. She was shaken, and I compounded her fear: "That's right, Mrs. Groberg, she was strangled."

"Oh, no!"

"Oh, yes, ma'am."

"Well, I—"

"Ma'am, could I come in?"

"Oh, yes, Officer."

The apartment was hot, stuffy, and overfurnished. I took a seat on the couch next to Mrs. Groberg, the better to bore in quickly.

"Poor Marcella," she said.

"Yes, indeed, ma'am. Did you know her well?"

"No. To tell you the truth, I didn't like her, really. I think she drank. But I doted on her little boy. He was such a sweetheart."

I tossed her a ray of hope: "The boy is doing fine, Mrs. Groberg. He's living with his father."

"Thank God for that."

"I understand that Marcella sublet her apartment to your brother in the summer of '51. Do you recall that?"

The Groberg woman laughed. "Yes, I do! I set it up, and what a mistake it was. My brother Morton had a drinking problem, just like Marcella. He came out from Omaha to go to work at Lockheed and dry out. I lent him the money to come out here, and the money to rent the apartment. But he found Marcella's liquor and drank it all! He was swacked for three weeks."

"How long was Morton in the apartment?"

"For two months! He was on a bender, and he ended up in the hospital. I—"

"Marcella was gone that long?"

"Yes."

"Did she tell you where she was going?"

"No, but when she got back she said, 'You can't go home again.' That's the name of a book, isn't it?"

"Yes, ma'am. Had Marcella taken her son with her?"

"No . . . I don't . . . no, I know she didn't. She left the tot with friends. I remember talking with the child when Marcella came back. He didn't like the people he stayed with."

"Marcella moved out after that, didn't she?"

"Yes."

"Do you know where she went?"

"No."

"Did she seem upset when she returned from her trip?"

"I couldn't tell. That woman was a mystery to me! Who . . . who killed her, Officer?"

"I don't know, but I'm going to find out," I said by way of farewell.

Barely controlling my exultation, I drove with shaky hands over the Cahuenga Pass into Hollywood. I found a pay phone and called Doc Harris. He answered on the third ring: "Speak, it's your dime."

"Doc, this is Fred Walker."

"Fred, how are you? How's the insurance game?" The bluff heartiness of his tone told me that he knew the game wasn't insurance, but that he wanted to play anyway.