The one-storied stucco complex of the La Paloma was almost as close to the freeway as a filling station. Once I had stepped inside and closed the heavy front door, the noises of late-night traffic dwindled to a far-off irregular sound like that of distant surf. I could hear the more immediate sounds of the place, snores and sighs and vague indecipherable demands.

A nurse's muted footsteps came up behind me. She was young and black and pretty.

"It's too late for visiting," she said. "We're all closed down for the night."

"I want to see a member of the staff-Mrs. Johnson?"

"I'll see if I can find her. She's getting very sought after. You're the second visitor she's had tonight."

"Who was the other one?"

She paused, then said, "Would you be Mr. Johnson?"

"No. I'm just a friend."

"Well, the other one was her son-dude with a red mustache. He stirred up quite a hassle before I got him out of here." She gave me a hard but not unfriendly look. "I hope you're not planning to stir up another hassle."

"Nothing could be further from my thoughts. I want to stir one down."

"All right, I'll get her. But keep it quiet, eh? People are sleeping."

"Sure. What was the hassle about?"

"Money. Isn't it always?"

"Not always," I said. "Sometimes it's love."

"That_ comes into it, too. He had a blonde in the car."

"Not all of us are so lucky."

She hardened her look a little in order to deflect a pass, if that was what I had offered her. "I'll get Sarah."

Mrs. Johnson came unwillingly. She had been crying, and her eyes were swollen.

"What do you want?" She made it sound as if she had very little left to give.

"I'd like to talk to you for a couple of minutes."

"I'm behind in my work already. Are you trying to get me fired?"

"No. I do happen to be a private detective, though."

Her gaze veered around the dark little anteroom and rested on the outside door. Her thick body tensed as if she were getting ready to run out onto the highway.

I stepped between her and the door. "Is there someplace we can sit down in private for a few minutes?"

"I guess so. But if I lose my job it's on your head."

She led me into a visiting room that was crowded with mismatched furniture, and turned on a dim standing lamp. We sat down facing each other under the lamp, our knees almost touching. As though the touch of mine might contaminate hers, she pulled down her white nylon skirt.

"What do you want with me? And don't give me any more guff about being a newspaperman. I thought you were a policeman from the beginning."

"I want your son, Fred."

"So do I." She lifted her heavy shoulders and dropped them. "I'm getting worried about Fred. I haven't heard from him all day."

"He was here tonight. What was he after?"

She was silent for a moment, but not inactive. Her face worked as if she were swallowing her lie and possibly planning another.

"He needed money. That's nothing new. And it's no crime to ask your own mother for money. This isn't the first time that I've helped him out. He always pays me back as soon as he can."

I cut through her smoke screen of words. "Come off it, Mrs. Johnson. Fred's in trouble. A stolen picture is bad enough. A stolen girl compounds the felony."

"He didn't steal the girl. That's a lie, a sniveling lie. She went along with him of her own free will. In fact, it was probably her idea in the first place-she's been after Fred for some time. And if that little spade said something different, she's lying." The woman shook her fist at the door where the black nurse had disappeared.

"What about the picture, Mrs. Johnson?"

"What picture?"

"The painting that Fred stole from the Biemeyers' house."

"He didn't steal it. He simply borrowed it to make some tests on it. He took it down to the art museum, and it was stolen from there."

"Fred told me it was taken from your house."

She shook her head. "You must have misunderstood him. It was taken from the basement of the art museum. They're responsible."

"Is that the story you and Fred have agreed on?"

"It's the truth, so naturally we agree on it. Fred is as honest as the day is long. If you can't see that, it's because your own mind is twisted. You've had too much to do with dishonest people."

"That's true enough," I said. "I think you're one of them."

"I don't have to sit here and listen to your insults."

She tried to evoke her own anger but somehow it wouldn't come. The day had been too much for her, and the night hung over her like a slowly gathering wave. She looked down into her cupped and empty hands, then put her face into them. She didn't sob or cry or say a word. But her silence in the midst of the muffled freeway noises sounded like desolation itself.

After a time she sat up and looked at me quite calmly. "It's time I got back to work."

"Nobody's watching you."

"Maybe not, but they'll blame me if things are in a mess in the morning. There are only the two of us on in this crummy place."

"I thought you worked at the hospital."

"I used to. I had a misunderstanding with one of the supervisors there."

"Do you want to tell me about it?"

"It wasn't important."

"Then tell me about it, Mrs. Johnson."

"Why should I? I've got enough on my mind without you bullying me."

"And enough on your conscience?"

"That's between me and my conscience. I don't need any help from you in straightening out my conscience."

She sat as still as stone. I admired her as I might have admired a statue without concern for its history. But I wasn't content to let her stay silent. The case, which had begun with a not very serious theft, was beginning to draw human lives into its vortex. Two men were dead, and the Biemeyers' girl had been spun off into the darkness.

"Mrs. Johnson, where is Fred going with Miss Biemeyer?"

"I don't know."

"Didn't you ask him? You wouldn't give him money without finding out what he intended to do with it."

"I did, though."

"I think you're lying."

"Think away," she said almost cheerfully.

"Not for the first time, either. You've lied to me already more than once."

Her eyes brightened with interest, and with the superiority that liars feel toward the people they lie to.

"For instance, you left the hospital because they caught you stealing drugs. You told me you left because you had a misunderstanding with a supervisor."

"Over drugs," she added quickly. "There was a discrepancy in the count. They blamed me."

"You weren't responsible?"

"Certainly not. What do you think I am?"

"A liar."

She stirred threateningly, but didn't get up. "Go ahead and call me names. I'm used to it. You can't prove anything."

"Are you on drugs now?"

"I don't take drugs."

"Not of any kind?"

"Not of any kind."

"Then who did you steal them for? Fred?"

She mimed laughter, and managed to produce a high toneless giggle. If I had heard the giggle without seeing its source, I might have taken her for a wild young girl. And I wondered if this was how she felt in relationship to her son.

"Why did Fred take the picture, Mrs. Johnson? To sell it and buy drugs?"

"He doesn't use drugs."

"To buy drugs for Miss Biemeyer?"

"That's a silly idea. She's independently wealthy."

"Is that why Fred is interested in her?"

She leaned forward with her hands on her knees, sober and dead serious. The woman who had giggled a moment ago had been swallowed up like a ghostly emanation by her body.

"You don't know Fred. You never will-you don't have the understanding. He's a good man. The way he feels about the Biemeyer girl is like a brother, an older brother."

"Where is the older brother taking his little sister?"