“Too bad.”
They both looked at me. I didn’t say anything more and didn’t give them any facial expression to read.
“The girl he was living with seems to have skipped out,” Chief Laster went on.
“Was he living with her?”
“Well, he was there a lot.”
“There’s quite a difference,” I said.
“A very few minutes before he was killed — sometime within two hours let us say of the time of his death — you called on this girl. Beegan entered the picture. You had an argument. You left. Beegan accused the girl of having fallen for you. He was jealous. He accused her of going out to meet you. She swore she wasn’t going to do anything of the sort. She went out. She met you. Beegan followed. You had a fight over the girl. I think it’s fair to surmise that you arranged with her to run away from Beegan and meet you in Los Angeles. She left to keep that rendezvous.”
“I don’t follow your reasoning.”
“You were working on a case. Your employer was here. You had planned to stay here for two or three days.”
“Who says so?”