Chapter Thirteen
It was almost eight o’clock when Ellery pulled up before a small stucco house tinted cobalt blue on Clybourn Avenue off Riverside Drive.
A handcolored wooden cutout resembling Dopey, the Walt Disney dwarf, was stuck into the lawn on a stake, and on it a flowery artist had lettered the name Henderson.
The uniformly closed Venetian blinds did not look promising.
As Ellery went up the walk a woman’s voice said, “If you’re lookin’ for Henderson, he’s not home.”
A stout woman in an orange wrapper was leaning far over the railing of her red cement stoop next door, groping with ringed fingers for something hidden in a violet patch.
“Do you know where I can reach him?”
Something swooshed, and six sprinklers sent up watery bouquets over the woman’s lawn. She straightened, red-faced and triumphant.
“You can’t,” she said, panting. “Henderson’s a picture actor. He’s being a pirate mascot on location around Catalina or somewhere. He expected a few weeks’ work. You a press agent?”
“Heaven forbid,” muttered Ellery. “Did you know Mr. Henderson’s dog?”