Fadeout: A Dave Brandstetter Mystery

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Jr~ !) The Kincaid house was frame, a big shingle place with cupolas and with fretwork porches all around. It tried to be yellow and managed a sick pale brown. Its unwashed windows stared at the muddy surf across a broken boardwalk and a belt of dirty brown beach. The front door gaped like a senile mouth. Down the steep porch steps came Hale MeNeil , portable-typewriter case in one hand, guitar in the other. The rear of the station wagon was open. Thorne Olson laid clothes inside. Not many. An armload. New sweatshirts, candystriped swim trunks, chinos, a bright new pair of red tennis shoes. Dave had left his car at the comer and come walking. She didn't see him until she straightened and stepped aside to let McNeil set what he'd brought inside. Her face was even tighter now, her movements jerkier. Her heels sank in the sand, which didn't help. Then she saw Dave, and before McNeil could stop her, she flared: 133 "Are you following us? Why don't you leave us alone?" "Easy," McNeil said, and to Dave, "She's upset." "I'm not following you," Dave told her. "Remember me? I've been trying to find him. I've got questions. Now he can't answer them. I thought I'd talk to Mrs. Kincaid." He looked hard at them both. "Or do I have to? Maybe you've got the answers. Why did he leave? Why did he come here? Why was he killed?" "I don't know, I don't know, I don't know." Shrill, from the raveled edge of hysteria. McNeil's arm went around her. Understandably. She was a widow. He was an old friend. Nothing out of keeping about the gesture. Except that he thought so. He turned color and started to jerk his arm away. No need. She twisted aside, ran for the front of the car, flung herself in and slammed the door. "It's the sheriff's job," McNeil said. "Why not let him get the answers?" "Because I don't think he knows the questions," Dave said, and climbed the steps. Mrs. Kincaid looked like a line backer. Not one who had scrimmaged lately, but still muscular. She wore a onepiece knit swimsuit that looked as if she'd always worn it. The sun had faded it and tanned her until they were the same color. The effect was arresting. She was about sixtyfive . She came out of the back of her tousled apartment carrying a battered aluminum coffeepot, and when she saw Dave standing in the doorway of her front room-it was one of those old-fashioned sliding doors and standing open _. she gave him a grin that couldn't have been friendlier if 134 she'd had teeth. As a matter of fact, she did have teeth. In a glass someplace. She went and got them. "There," she said. "Hello. Looking for a room? I got a dandy. Great big. Upstairs at the front. Just vacant though. I haven't had a chance to clean it up yet." "Fox Olson's room?" Dave asked. "Oh." She was disappointed. But disappointments weren't new to her. She didn't give this one much time. She was curious. "Who are you?" Dave told her. "I'd like to see the room." "I guess it's all right. But look here. . . ." She sat on a humpy old sofa. Books and papers were strewn on the coffee table. She poked among them, hunting something. "His wife just left. She gave me his birth data. I'm an astrologer." She found dime-store reading glasses and began making jottings with a stub of pencil. Her free hand waved toward a banner on the wall. It was about six feet square and appeared to be painted on heavy oilcloth. MADAME VERA, it said, SEES PAST, PRESENT, FUTURE IN YOUR STARS. The lettering was fancy. It encircled a zodiac chart that held bad drawings of crabs, scorpions, goats and the like. Sometime the banner must have hung outside one of those ruined booths on the pier. "Look at that," she said. "I'm looking," Dave said. "No, no. I mean here. Come on." She slapped the sofa and he sat beside her and bent to look at the paper. Another zodiac chart. No animals this time. Symbols and numbers. "See that? Born with...