1949 - You're Lonely When You Dead Read Online Free

away from the swank district where Cerf or Anita’s friends would be unlikely to run into them.
    Dana had got Barclay’s name and address from his car’s registration card. He lived on Wiltshire Avenue in a small chalet-style house set in its own grounds. He was the playboy type, looked and dressed like a film star, ran a Chrysler convertible and seemed to have plenty of money. He was lead number one.
    Lead number two was Ralph Bannister, the owner of a swank nightclub, L’Etoile, out at Fairview. Anita had gone out there around six o’clock the previous evening and Dana had overheard her asking the commissionaire who guarded the entrance if she could talk to Bannister on urgent business. She had been admitted, and had remained in the club die best part of an hour, then had driven back to the Santa Rosa Estate in time for dinner.
    I knew Bannister by reputation, although I had never met him. He was a smart crook who had made a big success of the nightclub, catering for millionaires and running a couple of roulette wheels that must have cost him a lot of money in police protection.
    I was deciding to turn Benny and Kerman loose on these two leads when I saw the headlights of a car coming slowly along the beach road. The time was ten-fifteen, and it was a hot night, and quiet. I wasn’t expecting visitors, and I thought the car would go on past, but it didn’t. It pulled up outside the wooden gate and the headlights went out.
    It was too dark out there to see much. The car looked as big as a battleship, but I couldn’t see the driver. I slipped Dana’s report into my pocket and waited. I thought someone had got the wrong house.
    The latch of the gate clicked up and I could just make out a shadowy figure that looked like a woman. The sitting room light was on and the verandah doors open, but not much light spilled into the garden.
    It wasn’t until she was right on top of me that I saw my visitor was Anita Cerf. She came slowly up the three wooden steps that led to the verandah, her full red lips parted in that half-smile that had fooled me before. She was wearing a flame-coloured evening dress, cut low to show plenty of cleavage, and an impressive collar of diamonds encircled her throat like a ribbon of fire. There was something in the way she looked at me that had that thing: it came across like an invisible ray and was strong enough to lean against.
    ‘Hello,’ she said in a low, husky voice. ‘Where’s everyone, or are you alone?’
    I was on my feet now, just a little rattled, as she was the last person I expected to see. I looked past her, wondering if Dana Lewis was out there, watching, and she was quick to read my thoughts.
    ‘It’s all right,’ she said. ‘I gave Miss Sherlock the slip,’ and before I could stop her she walked into the sitting room and sat in one of the easy chairs. I followed her in, and to be on the safe side, pulled the curtains across the windows.
    Up to now I hadn’t opened my mouth. I was too busy trying to make up my mind how to handle this visit to bother to be polite. There would be trouble if Cerf heard about it. She knew that, of course; that was why she had come out here alone, and when she knew I would be alone.
    ‘What do you want, Mrs. Cerf?’ I asked, walking around her chair and standing before her.
    We looked at each other. There was a jeering expression in her wide grey eyes.
    ‘I don’t like being spied on,’ she said. ‘I want to know why.’
    I was surprised she had spotted Dana, who was as near a thing to the invisible woman when on a job as makes no difference. But there’s always the risk when only one operator is put on the job, and I blamed myself for not teaming Benny up with Dana.
    ‘That’s something you’ll have to ask Mr. Cerf,’ I said, ‘and incidentally, speaking of Mr. Cerf, he wouldn’t approve of you coming here.’
    She laughed. She had good, strong, white teeth and wasn’t ashamed of showing them.
    ‘Oh, there are lots and lots of