Free Buried Caesars by Stuart M. Kaminsky Page A

tomorrow night, Cindy, and discuss feline futures,” Hammett said softly, looking at her with great sincerity.
    “Maybe,” she said, blushing. “Might be fun. I’ve got to go. Bye, kitty.”
    And off she went. We both watched her head across the lobby and out into the night.
    “Hooker,” I said.
    “No doubt,” he agreed. “But I’ve learned it doesn’t hurt to indulge a young girl’s fantasies. The cat and I will do our best to entertain Cindy when we get back tomorrow.”
    Hammett got up, handed me the cat, picked up his overnight case and started across the lobby.
    “Don’t you want to know why I’m late?” I asked.
    “The police or a woman,” he said.
    “Both,” I acknowledged, cradling the cat as we walked. “Someone called saying I’d killed Hower.”
    “And the police didn’t buy it?” he asked as we followed Cindy the Hooker into the night. “Do they know about my being with you?”
    “Not yet,” I said.
    “Right. Then let’s go find a killer.”
    We got into my car and headed east. Hammett went quiet as the Crosley bumped through the Los Angeles evening traffic. He sat with the sleeping cat on his lap and looked out of the window, dreaming. He was wearing a tweed jacket a little too warm for the Southern California afternoon but just right for the desert evening. I had on my Windbreaker and a grim expression.
    By the time we hit the highway outside the city, it was getting dark and Hammett was still looking out of the window, rocking with the roll of the road and petting die cat.
    “Stop for something?” I asked.
    “If you like,” he said.
    I grunted and found a truck stop with a diner. We sat at the counter and Hammett put the cat in front of us. I ordered a couple of burgers and a Pepsi. Hammett had some soup and a Green River. The cat had his own bowl of artichoke soup and a lot of attention from a small bull of a waitress in a faded orange uniform, who went mushy over him.
    “Cute cat,” she said.
    Hammett agreed. The place wasn’t too crowded. A lone craggy-looking trucker with a gut sat in a corner, eating silently and reading the newspaper. A couple of guys in overalls and boots came in right after us and sat together at the end of the counter. The radio, a little white Arvin, belted out the news. The waitress cooed at the cat.
    “A communiqué issued by General MacArthur’s headquarters in Australia indicates that a Japanese landing force of seven hundred has now been practically destroyed at Milne Bay in southeastern New Guinea,” came the rapid-fire voice of the newscaster.
    “You have a friend in Angel Springs,” I reminded Hammett.
    “I have a friend,” he confirmed, drinking his beer. “The trouble with beer is that it is near enough to drinking to keep the memory alive and far enough from it to be a little dissatisfying.”
    “… said the Japanese still were held on the north side of the Owen Stanley mountain range about two thousand feet below ‘the gap,’ which is virtually the only pass trail through the rugged mountains,” the newscaster went on.
    “Beer is fine with me,” I said. “Your buddy in Angel Springs …”
    “We’ll stop and see him,” Hammett agreed, watching the plump waitress whisper to the cat. The waitress’s name, according to the little name tag on her uniform, was SHEILA.
    “I had a cat when I was a kid,” she said, looking up at us. “His name was Greenbaum on account of my sister thought he had a Jew nose. You know what I mean?”
    “I know exactly what you mean,” Hammett said. “You think Jews have funny noses.”
    “I didn’t mean …” she said, taking a new interest in our faces in case we had Jew noses. My unaltered nose might have caused her confusion, but the mashed flesh between my eyes and over my mouth had no shape to give an ethnic clue. Hammett’s nose was movie-star perfect.
    “You didn’t think,” Hammett corrected her.
    “No need to get highbrow on me, mister,” the box of a waitress said,