I got back to the office, and decided that if I was going country club I had better get into something more sportif, maybe the cream number, and was half undressed when the phone rang.

"Bette Monroe --"

"Bette, its Kiki. They're on their way to you. I did what I could."

"Kiki, you know I owe you big time."

"They're going to close me down, Bette." She sounded like she was about to cry.

"What, Kiki, for good?"

"No, probably six months, they've been trying to get something on the club for a long time. But six months will finish me. I got nothing but my savings, Bette."

"Look, Kiki, when this dies down a bit, go to Tony. He'll give you the money."

"Tony?"

"He may be scum, but he still carried a torch for her, god knows why, Kiki."

"I can't go to him, Bette, you know how hard I've worked to keep clean."

"Kiki, you go to him and you tell him to give you the money, no strings, or I tell Homicide where he was about 1:03 this afternoon. "

There was a sigh of relief at the other end. "Thanks, Bette, really."

"No bouquets yet, Kiki, we are not out of this."

At that moment, there was a hammering at the outside door. Oh good.

"Gotta go, Kiki. Girls together. Thanks for everything." I put the phone back down, and yelled: "Hang on a second, I'm dressing."

A familiar voice behind the door ordered: "Homicide, open up."

I picked up the crumpled dress and took a look at me in my slip in the mirror. Well, God gave me these weapons for use in an emergency, and this was an emergency. I arranged the coverage for maximum exposure and headed for the door.

I opened it a crack, modestly. "Why, Lieutenant Michaels, what an honour."

"Come on, Bette, let me in."

"Can you wait a few seconds while I get my dress on?" and then I shrugged, and casually opened the door wide. "What the hell, I guess you have seen pictures of women before. I hear they are putting them in cereal boxes now." And I walked in leisurely fashion into the other room, wondering if Gypsy Rose Lee was watching from heaven.

Lieutenant Michaels, not bad looking in a cop sort of way, came in, his face beetred, his eyes taking it all in. "Er." he said deftly.

I slowly put the rest of my dress on.

"O.K. Bette," He said, when a line became available from his brain to his lungs again, and he breathed. "O.K., what were you doing in the Haunt about one this afternoon?"

"Looking for someone. Someone who didn't show up. I cruise there, you know."

"Was that someone Connie Mack?"

I had a thin line to walk. "Yes. An old girlfriend of mine -- Platonic, rather than Aristotelian, if you get my drift."

"She turned up dead about an hour ago in a car parked about a mile away from the Haunt up the Canyon."

"Oh God, "I said, I hoped convincingly. I turned my head aside so that he could get a good look at the neckline of a woman in shock and grief.

"Cut the theatre, Bette. We got reports of shots fired in the alley behind the Haunt just about the time you were there. We got a couple of witnesses that said you talked to the owner and went into the back. We even got a witness that said that Connie Mack had gone to the toilet, and never came back. " I stared at him. The only hope I had was that the couple of druggies in the powder room were too stoned to notice anything. Or that Kiki had fixed them somehow.

"All true."I replied. "I was there, I was looking for her, I asked Kiki where she was, and we went back looking for her, and she had taken a powder -- I mean out. She had gone. I never saw her."

Lieutenant Michaels hardened his expression. "You know that if we find that she was still there, and you saw her, you are looking at 5-10 years for everything, obstruction, leaving the scene of a crime, maybe accessory." I smiled as best I could.

He went on. "O.K. What about this client?"

"Can't tell you, Lieutenant, part of the rules."

"Suppose I take you down to talk to the Captain?" It was no use, I was going to have to give him that.

"Suppose you lay off. O.K., the client is Johnny Thorn." I said reluctantly.

His eyebrows went up. "What would Johnny Thorn want with a broken-down druggie?"

"He doesn't, Lieutenant. He's hot for Agnetta von Trosch, the tennis star, and he thinks she is cheating on him. Connie is an old pal of hers. I wanted to find out if she knew anything." I decided to keep it as straight as I could. He would probably find out anyway.

"I still don't get it. What would she know?"

"I figure it like this, Lieutenant." I sat down on the edge of my desk, honing the legs in his general direction. You never can tell. "Connie is -- was -- hooked big time, and Agnetta used to peel off a few bills for old times sake. I never found out who the pipeline was, but I would bet that she had a fight with him over something, or who knows what, and she got killed. Who knows when you are crawling around down there."

Michaels wasn't buying it, but he was eying the merchandise. Always Be Closing, as they say in the trade. "Yeah", he said, "but what about Tony?"

"You got me there, Lieutenant. That's what makes me think it had to be something cheesy. Can you imagine anyone taking on Tony -- offing his ex-wife? You would have to be nuts."

I got to him with that one. "You are right there, Bette. Doesn't figure, does it?"

He looked at me officially, but longer than was necessary. "Don't go anywhere, Bette. You are in deep trouble."

I looked back at him, a smidgen longer than was necessary. "Sure, Lieutenant. But I would hate to be whoever did this. He is in much bigger trouble than I am. Tony really loved her, still. Romantic in a murderous sort of way." He nodded, and went to leave. At the door, he turned and said: "Nice dress, going somewhere?"

"Policeman's ball," I said. He laughed. He had a nice laugh, when it was on your side. "Actually, Lieutenant, I am going to play some tennis."

He frowned and said: "You find anything, anything, and you don't tell me first ---" And he went out.

I exhaled. Thank you, genetic code. I now had three men with first call on what I found, and at this point all I knew was zero. Or as they say in tennis, love-love. Love was a big double zero in this back alley, that was for sure. I picked up my purse, reached into a drawer, and got the Smith & Wesson .38 out, stuffed it in, and headed for the car. Oh, I was just bristling with weapons today.