D Is for Deadbeat

which was Friday."
    "The night he died."
    "Right. I was working that night, and I was sup posed to keep an eye on him, which I did. Billy decided to come late, just to make him sweat, and before I knew what was happening this woman showed up and started buying him drinks. You know the rest."
    "Billy told me you took some kind of cold cap and crashed in the back room. Was that true?"
    "I was just laying low," she said. "When I saw Daggett leave, I knew Billy'd have a fit. I already felt bad enough without putting up with his bullshit."
    "And Billy finally figured out who she was?"
    "I don't know. I guess. I wasn't here this morning, so I don't know what he was up to."
    "Look. I have to go down to the police station and tell Lieutenant Dolan what's been going on. If Lovella comes back, please tell her it's urgent that she get in touch. Will you do that?"
    Coral wedged the last clean dish against the pile in the rack. She filled a glass with water and poured it over the lot of them, rinsing off the few remaining suds. She turned to look at me with a gaze that chilled. "Do you think she killed Billy?"
    "I don't know."
    "Will you tell me if you find out it's her?"
    "Coral, if she did it, she's dangerous. I don't want you in the middle of this."
    "But will you tell me?"
    I hesitated. "Yes."
    "Thank you."

Chapter 25
    I had a brief chat with the manager of the trailer park. I gave him my card and asked him to call me if Lovella came back. I didn't really trust Coral to do it. The last I saw of him, he was tapping at her door. I got in my car and headed over to the police station. I asked for Lieutenant Dolan at the desk, but he and Feldman were in a section meeting. The clerk buzzed Jonah for me and he came as far as the locked door, admitting me into the corridor beyond. Both of us were circumspect- pleasant, noncommittal. No one observing us could have guessed that mere hours ago, we'd been cavorting stark naked on my Wonder Woman sheets.
    "What happened when you got home?" I asked.
    "Nothing. Everybody was asleep," he said. "We have something in the lab you might want to see." He moved down the hall to the right and I followed. He looked back at me. "Feldman had the guys check the trash bins at your suggestion. We think we found the silencer."
    "You did?" I said, startled.
    He opened the half-door into the crime lab, holding it for me as I passed in front of him. The lab tech was out, but I could see Billy's bloody shirt, tagged, on the counter, along with an object I couldn't at first identify.
    "What's that," I said. "Is that it?" What I was looking at was a large plastic soft drink bottle, painted black, lying on its side with a hole visible in the bottom.
    "A disposable silencer. Handmade. A sound suppressor, in effect. It's been wiped clean of prints," Jonah said.
    "I don't understand how it works."
    "I had to have Krueger explain it to me. The bottle's filled with rags. Take a look. The barrel of the gun is usually wrapped with tape and the bottle affixed to it with a one-inch hose clamp. The soda bottle has a reinforced bottom, but it's only effective for a few shots because the noise level increases each time as the exit hole gets larger. Obviously, the device works best at close range."
    "God, Jonah. How do people know about these things? I never heard of it."
    He picked up a paperbound booklet from the counter behind me, flipping through it carelessly so I could see. Every page was filled with diagrams and photographs, illustrating how disposable silencers could be made out of common household objects. "This is from a gun shop down in Los Angeles," he said. "You ought to see what you can do with a length of window screen or a pile of old bottle caps."
    "Jesus."
    Lieutenant Becker stuck his head in the door. "Line one for you," he said to Jonah and then disappeared. Jonah glanced at the lab phone, but the call hadn't been transferred.
    "Let me take this and I'll be right back," Jonah said. "Hang on."
    "Right," I murmured. I leaned toward the silencer, trying to remember where I'd seen something similar. Through the hole in the bottom, I caught a glimpse of the blue terrycloth filling the interior. When I realized what it was, my mental process clicked in, and the interior machinery fired up. I knew.
    I straightened up and crossed to the door, checking the corridor, which was empty. I headed for my car. I could still see Ramona Westfall coming up the basement stairs with an armload of ragged blue bath towels,