Authors: Lynda La Plante
“Could you just tell me about February fifteenth, the day you left for New Orleans?”
“How do you mean?”
“Well, I know you and Anna Louise were together before your husband returned from his office and”
“Oh, I see, yes, well, I had to oversee all the packing, we had some engagements, cocktail parties, dinners… . Peters usually packs for Robert, but I am very particular, I always have special tissue paper; it avoids creases, you know, if you lay tissue sheets between each garment.”
“Did you pack for your daughter?”
“Good heavens, no. Anna Louise is dreadful, and you know how young girls dress these days, jeans and Tshirts, and more jeans and Tshirts, sneakers. I think whoever invented those awful things should be shot. She just hurls things into casesin fact, we had a little tiff about it because I asked Phyllis to make sure she had some of her nice things because we had a few formal engagements. Anyway, Phyllis oversaw her
packing, I think, and then we had brunch on the terrace and waited for Robert. We then went to the airport and …”
She frowned.
“Oh, yes, on the plane she sSw something in Vogue or Elk magazine, a little black cocktail dress, and I was surprised because she really liked it. So we called home to ask Phyllis to pick it up and arrange to have it delivered for when she returned.”
She frowned again, one long fingernail tapping the center of her forehead.
“Anna Louise was in high spirits, really looking forward to the trip and seeing her friends, especially Tilda Brown, an adorable girl. She often stayed here, we are all very fond of Tilda.”
“Tilda Brown was scheduled to travel with you to New Orleans but-“
“Oh, yes, yes, yes. She said she wanted to go earlier, so Phyllis arranged it. I’ve no idea why, but you know young girls, silly waste of money, I suppose. Anyway, we left, drove to the airport and …”
Lorraine listened as Elizabeth Caley repeated, as her husband had done, almost word for word her original statement given to the police, from the moment that they arrived at the hotel until the dinner.
“Can you think of anything, no matter how trivial it may seem, that you have not mentioned to anyone else?”
“My dear, I have gone over and over those hours, as if seeing them on a screen, trying to find some clue, but there is nothing, aothing at all that I can recall. And that is what makes it so horrible, because I cannot think of a single thing that would be of help. She was happy, cheerful and looking forward to Carnival. …”
m
“Had she ever gone off alone before?”
“
“Of course, but never without letting us know where she was going to, or who she was seeing. She is an intelligent girl, aware of the dangers of being out alone in the evenings, especially in the old French Quarter. I had even discussed with her the importance of always making sure we knew where she was. Obviously any young girl from Los Angeles is made very aware of the dangers of going off with strange men or accepting a ride, or drugs”
“Did she ever use drugs?”
“I’m sorry?”
“Did Anna Louise to your knowledge ever use drugssmoke marijuana, for example?”
“No, most definitely not, she doesn’t even smoke cigarettes. And very rarely drinksperhaps a glass of champagne, nothing more. She is, you see, very health-conscious, very athletic really. She loves sports and obviously any overindulgence in drugs or alcohol would be damaging to her.
I am not making her out to be a Goody Two-shoes, she is not perfect. She can throw tantrums and get angry, just like any other girl of her age.”
“Tantrums?”
“Well, I don’t know if that is the correct description. She is very spoiled, I know, more by Robert than myself, and she can twist him around her little finger, always has since she was a baby. He dotes on her, but he can also be very firm.”
“Is your daughter the main beneficiary of your will?”
“Why do you ask?”
Lorraine chose her words carefully.
“Well, there is no evidence that your daughter has been kidnapped, no ransom note, no contact. I am simply trying to find if there is a motive… .”
For a fleeting moment Lorraine saw Mrs. Caley hesitate.
“Yes, she does benefit from my will.”
“Your daughter is the main beneficiary?”
“Yes, but she is also the main beneficiary of my husband’s will. Did you ask him the same question?”
Lorraine kept her eyes down as if concentrating on her notes.
“Yes.”
“Ah, I see. Yes, well, if anything happened Anna Louise would automatically be the sole beneficiary. And if, God forbid, anything did happen to Anna, then Robert is obviously the next of kin, and vice versa.”
Lorraine looked up, concerned, because Elizabeth Caley was shaking, and now it was not just her hands, her whole body visibly trembled.
“Are you all right?”
“What has happened to my daughter?”
“I don’t know, Mrs. Caley, but I will do everything I can to find out.”
“Do you think she is dead?”
“Until I have more details I really can’t answer that question.”
Elizabeth slowly rose to her feet, holding on to the edge of the chaise longue. Lorraine watched as she used the furniture to cross the room, grasping the back of a chair for a moment, then the edge of a cabinet.
“Excuse me, just a … Please help yourself to more coffee.”
Lorraine stood up, ready to assist her, but Elizabeth supported herself against the door leading into her bedroom and, before Lorraine could help her, had walked out, the door banging shut behind her.
Lorraine poured herself a cup of fresh coffee and then noticed a dark wet stain on the chaise longue where Elizabeth Caley had been reclining. Was she incontinent? She tried to recall the moment when she had noticed Mrs. Caley shaking or tremblingwas it when she asked about who was to be the main beneficiary?
Phyllis entered, nodded curtly at Lorraine and uttered a quiet
“Excuse me”
before she slipped into the bedroom. .
Lorraine waited about ten minutes. Phyllis came out of the bedroom and gave a brittle smile.
“I’ll just get some fresh tea. Would you care for more coffee?”^*
“No, thank you, I’m fine. Is Mrs. Caley all right?”
“Yes, she just gets tired very easily, so I hope you won’t keep her much longer.”
Phyllis quickly slipped one of the scatter pillows over the stained chaise longue and then began wheeling out the trolley. As she got to the door a shrill, high-pitched voice from the bedroom called out her name.
“Phyllis… Phyllis!”
Lorraine watched as the woman scuttled back to the bedroom and disappeared from view. She could hear her whispered voice but was unable to make out what she was saying. Then Peters walked in, and before Lorraine could say a word he had wheeled the trolley out. She saw the intercorn on the telephone flashing and again heard Phyllis’s low voice. This time she crept closer to the bedroom door.
“I think you should. I can ask her to leave. Fine, yes, I’ll tell her.”
Lorraine only just made it back to her chair when Phyllis walked in from the bedroom.
“Peters took out the trolley.”
“I think, Mrs. Page, you had better leave because
“
“Get out, Phyllis.”
Elizabeth Caley now wore a different kimono and was tying the silk sash tightly around her waist.
“I’ll tall Mrs. Page when she can go, not you. Go on, get out. And I want some fresh tea and she
wants whatever she was having.”
^^
“No, I’m fine, thank you. And if it is incWVenient for me to stay”
“It isn’t. Go on, Phyllis, go away.”
^
Phyllis sighed and walked out.
“She can be so damn interfering.”
Elizabeth crossed to a glass-topped table crammed with photographs and ornaments. She opened a cigarette box and took out a long, thin cigarette. She flicked an onyx lighter, shaking it.
Lorraine took out her own and was just about to light Mrs. Caley’s cigarette when the onyx lighter caught. She sucked in the smoke and tossed the lighter down onto a chair.
The beauty had gone, her perfectly made-up face like some kind of mask.
“I don’t want you interfering!”
Her voice was shrill, and her hands, with the clawlike nails, tightened the kimono sash. Like a cheap whore, she let the cigarette dangle from her fuchsia-colored lips.
“Mrs. Page, you do what I paid you for. And I will withdraw my offer of a bonus if you see Mrs. Juda Salina again. She knows nothing about my daughter.”
Elizabeth held up a sheet of her private notepaper. Scrawled in her own handwriting was her agreement to pay the bonus.
“As I said, one million if you
find my daughter. But if you talk with Juda Salina, I will not pay you a cent. Do you understand what I am saying? You won’t get one more payment.”
Elizabeth Caley’s voice had changed. The elongated vowels were creeping in, as if she was reverting to her Louisiana accent. It fascinated Lorraine, and she knew that whatever Elizabeth Caley had taken in her bedroom was either cocaine, speed or some kind of stimulant because she was hypersmoking, pacing, clutching continually at the belt of her kimono.
“I need to trust you.”
Lorraine folded the note.
“You can, Mrs. Caley, you can trust me.”
“Okay, okay, that’s fine, that’s good. Yes, that’s good, I need to trust, I need to, understand me? You understand me?”
“Yes, I understand.”
She didn’t, she still didn’t know what was going on, but just as she might have found out, the doors opened and Robert Caley walked in. He ignored Lorraine and went straight to his wife, seeming to wrap her in his arms.
“Come on, come and lie down now, sweetheart. Say good-bye to Mrs. Page.”
He kept his arms around her, steering her toward the bedroom.
“I think you had better leave, Mrs. Page.”
Lorraine was getting into her car when Robert Caley hurried out of the house.
“Mrs. Page.”
He had a vivid scratch mark down his right cheek.
“Yes,”
she said innocently.
“A moment, please, er, perhaps I was not as, er … honest as I should have been when we spoke yesterday.”
“I’m sorry?”
“I told you my wife could not speak to you, that she was indisposed, as a good PR agent would say. Well, you just saw what my wife’s indisposition is… .”
Lorraine didn’t let him off the hook but looked at him with as much innocence as she could muster.
“I’m sorry?”
He turned away, rubbing his head.
“My daughter’s disappearance has obviously affected my wife deeply. I don’t know what she has said to you but I think you should be aware that she can be very irrational and … Elizabeth has had, over the past few years, a drug-related problem mainly due to an old injury…. During the filming of Santa Maria a gallery collapsed on her and she suffered extensive injuries. The studio doctors made sure she would be on the set the following day by prescribing heavy painkillers and … er … well, she still suffers a great deal of pain, and over the years…”
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CHAPTER
I Rooney lolled in Lorraine’s chair behind her desk. The door
\| buzzer went off, and both he and Rosie looked toward the door.
Nick Bartello lounged in the doorway, gazing down at the doormat. He
wore his thick black and unruly curly hair almost to his collar and he
needed a shave.
He limped into the office. His crumpled denim shirt and torn jeans didn’t detract from his immediate attraction. He was one of those guys you knew just by looking at him had a big case history. His limp wasn’t bad; it just made his walk a bit lopsided.
“Hey, Nick, how you doin’?”
bellowed Rooney.
“I’m fucked, I feel it an’ look it. You got some coffee brewing?”
“Sure. Nick, this is Rosie, by the way.”
“Hi, Rosie.”
Bartello slumped into her vacated chair.
“Hey, man, did we tie one on last night or didn’t we?”
“We did, Nick, we did.”
Rosie started to brew some coffee as Nick pulled a crumpled note pad and bits of paper out of his pocket.
“Okay, this is how the land lies. I know I only got handed the case when our top dicks gave it the thumbs down, maybe because they’d like to stick one up my ass. Like I said last night, I get fired if I don’t get a result an’ to date I got diddly-squat. And today, like ten minutes ago, Robert Caley is threatening the agency to get screwed unless we get somfffesults.”
Rosie returned to her desk.
“Coffee is on.”
She hovered, and he gave her a marvelous smile.
“Thanks, sweetheart, make it strong and black.”
He turned back to Rooney, who grinned.
“Nick’s being paid a grand a week plus expenses, Agnew is getting about five grand. They probably put out to Caley they got three of you workin’, right, Nick?”
“Yeah, but in reality the main guys are on a new gig finding some bitch’s ex-husband. They’ll drag it out as long as possible, so basically I got the Caley case solo. Company don’t wanna lose their five g’s per week, I don’t wanna lose my job.”
Rooney cocked his head at Nick.
“You tell ‘em about us?”
Nick shrugged.
“I didn’t say nothin’. They know you’re on the Caley payroll and, hey, Rosie, what about that coffee? This is a desperate man you’re looking at.”
Rooney snorted as Rosie checked the coffeemaker; it was just bubbling. She liked Nick Bartello, crude maybe but there was a lovable quality to him. That smile he had was a killer.