Swimming to Catalina

“Thanks very much,” he said, then drove on. He took his next right, figuring that the Lincoln was going around the block, and then he saw the Beverly Wilshire’s garage. He whipped into the entrance, took a ticket from the machine, made two quick rights and parked the car. He took the elevator to the lobby, walked to the front door, and looked outside. A singlecab was waiting out front. He checked up and down Wilshire, then ran to the cab and hopped in, waking the driver.
    “What?” the man said, sitting up.
    “Sorry to disturb you.” He gave the man Betty’s address, then hunkered down in the seat.
    “That’s only a few blocks from here,” the driver said wearily.
    “Let’s call it an airport run,” Stone replied.
    The cab pulled away from the curb and Stone watched as the Lincoln drove past in the opposite direction. This time he got a better look at the driver. He had last seen him standing at a neighboring urinal, he remembered.
    The cab was on Betty’s street in two minutes. “Drive slowly down to the next corner,” Stone said.
    “The address you gave me is in the middle of the block,” the driver said.
    “Just do it, okay?”
    “Yeah, yeah, sure.” He muttered something under his breath.
    “All right, stop here.” Stone looked up and down the street, gave the man twenty dollars, got out of the cab, and looked around again. He had the block to himself. He walked quickly to Betty’s house, half expecting the Lincoln to beat him there, let himself in, and went upstairs.
    “Stone?” Betty called from the bedroom.
    “Yeah, it’s me.” He walked down the hall, shucking his jacket, and into the bedroom. Betty was sitting up in bed, naked.
    “Where have you been?”
    “It took me longer than I thought to shake the other car.” He got out of his clothes and into bed.

    “You sure you don’t have another girl stashed someplace?”
    “Positive,” he said, kissing her.
    “I’ve been waiting up for you,” she said, running a finger up the inside of his thigh.
    “Why, whatever for?” he asked.
    She showed him.
     
    Betty was already dressed for work when Stone woke up. “Now,” she said, sitting on the edge of the bed. “What was all that about last night?”
    “Don’t you remember doing it?”
    “Notthat. I mean, that thing with the car following us.”
    “I don’t know, but I recognized the driver; he was with Ippolito at Grimaldi’s. I saw him up close, in the men’s room.”
    “Are you and I in any kind of trouble?” she asked.
    “What kind of trouble could we be in?”
    “Do you think the car followed us from here to the restaurant?”
    “No, it was still daylight then; I’d have noticed. They picked us up at the restaurant.”
    “How’d they know we were there?”
    “Did you see anybody you knew at dinner?”
    She shook her head. “No.”
    “Somebody saw us there.”
    “Somebody who knows Ippolito?”
    “Yeah.”
    “This is very creepy, Stone.”
    “I know. Look, we have to assume that if Ippolito knows, then probably Regenstein and Sturmack know, too.”
    “And that means that Vance knows.”

    “Maybe. I think you have to be ready for that.”
    “What can I say to him?”
    “Say that you dropped me at the airport, and that you thought I left. Then I turned up at your door last night and took you to dinner. It’s the only time we’ve been out together since I was supposed to have left town. Grimaldi’s was before that. And we never discussed Arrington.”
    “Then what, after dinner?”
    “That I dropped you at the Beverly Hills Hotel and told you to get a cab home, and you haven’t seen me since. I think you can be pissed off at having been treated that way.”
    “Okay.”
    “In fact, why don’t you spill that to Vance at the first opportunity; don’t wait for him to hear about it from somebody else. There’s no reason why you shouldn’t have gone out with me, after all.”
    “I guess not. So why didn’t you leave for New York when I thought you did? I’d better have a reason.”
    “Say that I said I had some personal business to take care of, and I said I was leaving L.A. today.”
    “Suppose he calls you in New York, and you’re not there?”
    “That won’t be your fault. I think I’d better move into a hotel today; it can’t be good for you to have me staying here, now that we’ve been seen together. Can you recommend someplace quiet?”
    “There’s a place in West Hollywood called Le Parc, a suite hotel. It’s the