The Baxter Trust

not? Who wouldn’t, after all that?
    She went back and sat down on the couch.
    She reached an immediate decision. It was too much to take alone. She needed help. She needed reassurance. She needed Johnny.
    He’d told her he was staying at the Wilshire. She called information, got the phone number and dialed.
    There was no John Dutton registered there.
    Sheila hung up the phone in a cold sweat. Jesus Christ, hadn’t he said the Wilshire? She was sure he had. So why the hell wasn’t he there? And where the hell was he?
    She called information again, and told them to give her the phone numbers of all the hotels in Reno. The woman at information couldn’t believe it. Was she crazy? There were three whole pages of ’em. Sheila told her to forget it and hung up the phone.
    Sheila thought fleetingly of calling Johnny’s wife. Her name was Inez. Inez Dutton. She’d probably be listed. But Inez wasn’t supposed to know about her, of course. Well, Sheila could pretend she was a secretary or something, pretend it was a business call, couldn’t she?
    No, she realized, she couldn’t. She could never pull it off. Not in the shape she was in. She’d break down. She’d blow it. Inez would know she wasn’t a secretary. In fact, Inez might even know Johnny’s secretary.
    Shit. Of course. She was being stupid. Johnny’s secretary. Sheila didn’t know her name, but that didn’t matter.
    She picked up the phone, called the investment firm and spoke to a secretary who informed her that John Dutton was out of town and would be back tomorrow. She said it was urgent, and asked if there was any place he could be reached. The secretary said, sure, in Reno at the Hotel Wilshire.
    Sheila hung up the phone as if in a fog. What was happening? Was it a conspiracy? Was everyone against her?
    She shook her head to clear it, and got control of herself. Okay, she had to think. Her biggest problem right now was, sooner or later she was going to be arrested for murder. She was sure of it. The D.A. hadn’t bought her story, there were no other candidates and they were going to get her. She couldn’t reach Johnny, and she needed help.
    A certain kind of help was immediately available, Sheila knew. All she had to do was call Uncle Max, and he’d take care of everything. He’d swing into action, hire teams of lawyers, call the commissioner, maybe even buy the cops off, if such a thing were possible in a murder case.
    But that was just the trouble. He’d take care of everything. He’d be in complete control, doing everything, telling everyone what to do. She’d have no say in anything. In fact, he probably wouldn’t even let her know what he was doing. He’d keep her in the dark, treat her like a child. And his stranglehold over her life would tighten and tighten.
    Even so, this was murder, and she was so scared she probably would have called him if it hadn’t been for one thing. The coke. If Max hired lawyers for her, she’d have to tell them about the coke. Or even if she didn’t tell them, they’d find out. They’d question her, and she’d have to pretend to be cooperating with them, so she’d have to answer, and eventually they’d catch her in a lie and break her, and they’d find out.
    And then Uncle Max would know. Sheila shuddered at the thought. Uncle Max. Her trustee. Uncle Max would know.
    And that would cost her her inheritance.
    No, damn it. Bad as the situation was, scared as Sheila was, Uncle Max was out. If anything was going to be done, she would have to do it.
    Sheila got up, went in the kitchen alcove, and got out the Yellow Pages. Hell, which was it? Lawyers or attorneys? A damn stupid way to go about it, but at the moment she couldn’t think of anything else to do.

9.
    S TEVE W INSLOW WAS DREAMING.
    He was in a play, but the thing was, he hadn’t rehearsed it. He hadn’t rehearsed it, and he didn’t know the lines. He wasn’t even sure what the play was. It seemed to be a Chekhov, but he didn’t know which one. Uncle Vanya? The Cherry Orchard? The Sea Gull? No. Damn.
    He wasn’t on stage. He was in the wings, waiting to go on. Waiting and watching the action. There was a girl on stage, and he was listening to her dialogue, trying to get a clue. Christ, if she’d just say she wanted to go to Moscow, she’d be Irina, and the play would be Three Sisters. But she wasn’t saying that.
    But what she was saying was right there in the script he was holding, the script he had now, but could not take on