Free One Grave Too Many by Ron Goulart Page A

wrong here?”
    “You go away. Maybe tonight you can read about it in the paper.”
    Behind the young cop was the living room. It was shadowy in there, drapes drawn. “I’m John Easy,” Easy said. “I’m a private investigator, working for Feller’s partner. Is Feller here?”
    “Nope.”
    “How about his wife?”
    “She is, sure enough.” A frown touched the young man’s flat face. “You got some IDs on you?”
    Easy got out his wallet, extracted his identification papers. “Who got killed?” he asked.
    Returning the IDs, the young cop said, “Maybe you ought, since you work for his partner, talk to Lt. Smith.” He went away, saying, “Wait right there.”
    The bald photographer yelled to Easy. “Want to give me your name in case I need it for a caption?”
    “James Oliver Curwood,” answered Easy.
    “Come on in,” said the young cop out of the shadows of the Feller living room.
    Lt. Smith was sitting in a tan armchair. A thickset man with black wavy hair. He wore rimless glasses. “John Easy,” he said, remaining slouched in the chair. “You shot somebody over in Beverly Hills yesterday, didn’t you?”
    “Yeah.”
    “Why was that? I forget the details.”
    “Couple guys were trying to kidnap my client’s sister,” said Easy. “What happened here?”
    “Go look in the bedroom.” Smith inclined his head slowly to the right.
    Easy went around him and down a hall.
    There were three men in the bedroom. None of them paying attention to the girl on the bed. Someone had cut her throat. The whole room seemed bloody.
    Another flashbulb went off and Easy turned away. Back in the living room he sat on the sofa across from the police lieutenant. “That’s Mrs. Feller?”
    “Can’t you tell?”
    “Never met her.”
    “It’s her,” said Lt. Smith. “Good thing they didn’t have any kids. You can’t explain things like this to kids.”
    “What about Feller?”
    “They found him a little bit after dawn this morning,” said Smith. “Sitting in his car, facing the Pacific. Throat cut, too.”
    “Where was that?”
    “He was down by the beach in San Amaro. We got the call to come up here and break the news to the wife, see what we could find out. The man I sent found the front door wide open and she was in there like you saw her.”
    “What time you figure she was killed?”
    “Not much later than six this morning. About three hours or so after he was.”
    From where he was sitting Easy could see into the dining room. He noticed all the drawers had been yanked out of a large bureau. “Somebody looking for something?”
    “They went through most of the closets and the larger chests and bureaus. Tore up the garage, too.”
    “Must be something big.” The books and the pictures in the living room hadn’t been touched.
    “Maybe you have a notion.”
    Easy said, “I’m working for Gary Marks. His father was Vincent Marquetti.”
    “I remember him.” The lieutenant sank further into the chair, watching Easy. “You think it’s money that’s behind this?”
    “Those guys in Beverly Hills,” Easy said, “had the idea Marquetti left a million bucks or so buried someplace around LA.”
    “Where does Feller come into it?”
    “He and Gary Marks were partners in an advertising agency, been friends since they were kids,” said Easy. “I don’t know.”
    “Think maybe Feller got hold of that dough?”
    “I think he found something,” said Easy.

CHAPTER 17
    T HERE WAS A HUGE G worked into the design of each of the wrought-iron gates. They stood open in the late afternoon.
    Easy, this time, had parked his Volkswagen across the road from the Goffman estate. As he approached the open gates in the red brick wall a warm inland wind began to blow. It had some of the hot dry feel of a Santa Ana wind, and it swirled grit and leaves.
    The windows of the red brick gatehouse looked black in the thinning sunlight. The wooden door of the small square house was shut.
    After watching the