Deadly Weapon by Wade Miller Read Free Book Online

corner of El Cajon Boulevard and 45th Street. Above it a half-story rudder of tin proclaimed in blue and white: J. A. GILBERT REALTOR.
    “That’s it,” announced the girl. Walter James wheeled the Buick in a U turn and pulled it up in front of the office. A flagged walk ran past the corner building to the back of the lot where another white stucco building huddled ineffectively behind two skeletal palms. “My home,” said Laura Gilbert flatly.
    Walter James snapped off the lights. “What’s that big job across the street?”
    “Hoover High. I used to go there. The college is about five miles on out.” She wiggled her fingers east toward the Laguna mountains and El Centro and Yuma.
    “Studying to be anything?”
    “No. What is there to be?”
    “You’re bitter — even for three A.M.”
    “I mean it,” the girl said, looking straight ahead. “I want to be something but I don’t know what. Liberal Arts isn’t any great adventure, but there isn’t anything I’d rather take. Oh, I don’t know what I want.”
    “It’s not uncommon,” he agreed. “How about getting married?”
    “Most of the girls are looking high and low for husbands. I’ve never seen a husband I wanted.” She blew smoke viciously at the windshield. “I’d hate to cook steak and potatoes seven nights a week.”
    “Who is so fond of steak and potatoes?”
    “Bob,” she said, and stopped short to regard him curiously. “You know your business, don’t you?”
    Walter James laughed. “Really, I didn’t mean it as business. I’m interested.”
    “Why?” Two freight vans roared by in quick succession, filling the silent boulevard with savage sound. After it had melted away, she said, “Never mind. As you say, that’s a poor question. Bob Newcomb is editor of
The Aztec
— that’s the college paper — and I work on
The Aztec
quite a bit. He’s a very sweet boy with what is known as a fine mind. He has an odd taste for taking me to dances. Why, I don’t know because frankly I don’t dance very well. But I guess he really is pretty smart.”
    After a pause she added, “Brains aren’t everything. Sometimes you like brains
and
speed. Or just speed. You said that, didn’t you?”
    A light came on in the house, an orange rectangle that silhouetted one slim palm tree. “It is pretty late,” said the girl. “You better take me in.”
    “I want you to remember something about the man who sat on the other side of the Filipino.”
    “But I can’t. Am I in trouble if I can’t?”
    “No — you’re not in trouble. But so far there aren’t so many leads in this case that I can afford to pass any up. Keep trying — please.”
    “I bet you don’t say please very often.”
    Walter James laughed again. “You know your business, don’t you?”
    “I hope I didn’t sound rude. I just happened to think of it.” She smiled demurely. “I got a busy little mind, too.” Her face sobered. She half-turned on the seat to face him. “I shouldn’t be laughing. That poor little guy — ”
    Walter James said, “Death’s never pleasant to see.”
    “But to go that way — in the dark and — and — ”
    “Don’t think about it,” Walter James told her gently. “There’s nothing you can do. Brooding’s not going to help.”
    She looked up at him and tried a pale smile. “I’m sorry, Mr. James. But I wish that I could do something to help. What do you think about tonight?”
    Walter James smiled. “That’s a big question. Clapp seems to be handling the routine work as well as anyone can.”
    “You sound as if you’re holding something back.”
    “Well,” Walter James said, his blue eyes thoughtful, “The thing that interests me most in this mess so far is that card they found in the Filipino’s coat.”
    “Oh,” she breathed her disappointment. He raised an eyebrow quizzically.
    “And you, Sherlock, what do you make of it all?”
    Laura Gilbert made a negative gesture with one hand. “I don’t know anything.