Blood Hunt by Lee Killough Page A

he lay relaxed, listening to the hooting and bellowing of the foghorns reverberate through the night. The rhythmic chorus lulled him to sleep.
     
    6
     
    The woman inside the protective grille across the doorway wore a bathrobe and slippers. She blinked through the grille at Garreth’s identification. “Police? This early?”
    “ I’m sorry about the hour, Mrs. Armour, but I need to ask a few questions about a tenant of yours.” He himself had been up for hours, finding out who owned the house where Lane Barber lived.
    Mrs. Armour opened the grille with a frown and led the way up a steep flight of stairs to a sunny kitchen looking out over the fog that shrouded the lower marina and bay. “Which one, and what have they done?”
    “ I don’t know Lane Barber has done anything. She merely knows someone involved in a case I’m investigating.”
    The frown faded. She sat down at the table, returning to the toast and coffee that Garreth’s ring had obviously interrupted. “Coffee, Inspector?” When he accepted with a nod, she poured a cup for him. “I’m glad Miss Barber isn’t in trouble. Actually, I would have been surprised if you’d said she was.”
    Mrs. Armour, too? Garreth added cream and sugar. “You know her well?”
    “ Not personally, but she’s one of my best tenants. I have a number of properties in that area and most of them are rented by restless young people who are here this year and gone the next. I wish you could see the state they leave their apartments in. It’s appalling. But Miss Barber pays her rent on time every month and when I have her apartment repainted, as I feel ought to be done every few years, her place is always spotless. She takes beautiful care of it.”
    Garreth stopped stirring his coffee. “Every few years? How long has she been a tenant?”
    Mrs. Armour pursed her lips. “Let’s see. I think I’ve had her apartment done twice. She must have been with me about ten years. No...I’ve painted three times. She’s been there fourteen years. She’s my oldest tenant.”
    Fourteen years? Garreth blinked. “How old was she when she moved in?”
    “ Very young, but at least twenty-one. I remember she told me she was singing in a club.”
    Garreth stared at her. The singer was twenty-one fourteen years ago? That face above the candle had not belonged to a woman in her thirties. Although her level of sophistication seemed more commensurate with that age than with twenty-one. Had she had a face-lift, perhaps?
    “ What has her friend done?” Mrs. Armour asked.
    For a moment, Garreth struggled to think what the woman was talking about. “Oh...he died. In the time Miss Barber has been your tenant, have you ever had any trouble with her? Has the apartment smelled...strange, or have neighbors complained of strange people coming and going?”
    Cult types. It occurred to him that if she lived in the middle of a shifting population, former neighbors may have seen things present ones could not know about.
    “ Smelled strange? Like marijuana?” Mrs. Armour sat bolt upright in indignation. “Certainly not! I’ve never had a single word of complaint about her.”
    Garreth could not believe in this paragon. It was obvious, however, that Mrs. Armour was not going to add any clay to the lady’s feet, so he thanked her for her help and headed for the Hall.
    As he came into the office, Harry said, “You’re supposed to call Narcotics.”
    Garreth peeled out of his coat. “I hope it’s about Chiarelli.”
    It was about Chiarelli. An Inspector Woodhue said, “It’s arranged for you to meet him. Join us in the garage at twelve-thirty.”
    Garreth hung up. “Let’s hope Chiarelli can help us.”
    “ Maybe. But your hexagram this morning said, ‘ Success in small matters. At the beginning good fortune; at the end, disorder .’”
    Garreth grimaced. “Thanks. I really needed to hear that.”
    He thought about his conversation with the landlady on the Barber girl’s age. A strange