The whole trip was a waste of taxpayers’ gasoline. The two males were at work. It took us half the morning to learn where they worked, and they had nothing important to tell us about Lenny Tishkin when we finally tracked them down. The address for Patty Serano was the same address we had checked for Lenny, but we checked it again.

  She, too, had moved on.

  Vogel asked the manager, “How come you didn’t mention her when we were here Saturday?”

  “You didn’t ask,” the man said.

  Vogel studied him coldly. “You know they weren’t married, didn’t you?”

  “Are you for real? Half the kids living together today aren’t married. A cop should know that. They paid their rent on time and they didn’t throw loud parties. You get tenants like that, you don’t bug ʼem with dumb questions.”

  It had been a frustrating morning. Vogel continued to stare at the man.

  “Let’s go, Bernie,” I said quietly. “Faceless, nameless occupants, that’s all. Remember?”

  Back in the car, he said, “So much for Nowicki’s help.” He sat behind the wheel, staring out at the street ahead.

  “We could check Lund,” I kidded him. “He was over to my house yesterday with his new camper. Maybe you could nail him this time.”

  He said harshly, “You overlook a lot of opportunities to keep your mouth shut, Callahan. Put your brain to work for a change and think of a place to go next.”

  “That liquor store,” I suggested, “the one Gonzales and Tishkin were indicted for robbing. The way I read it in the file, the owner gave positive identification to the investigating officer, and then changed his story in court. Maybe by now he has his guts back.”

  “Maybe Nowicki bought him off. Maybe we ought to investigate Nowicki.”

  I kept my mouth shut.

  “All right,” he said, after a few seconds. “Do you remember the address?”

  “I remember the name. Trinity Liquors. It’s on Padilla Street.”

  We were halfway there when Vogel said, “What difference would it make if the man changed his mind? It wouldn’t have anything to do with Maude, would it?”

  “It could give us some leverage on Tishkin—if we ever find him.”

  “You’re not making sense. Tishkin’s already acquitted. What kind of leverage is that on a man we suspect of murder? Or the chief does.”

  “You suggested we follow the chief’s script. Let’s stick with it.”

  “You and the chief,” he said, “should move to Hollywood.”

  The liquor-store owner hadn’t changed his story; I had misread the file. His name was Moses Jones. He was black and short and thin and feisty.

  “It was Gonzales and it was Tishkin,” he told us. “You think those silly stockings over their heads fooled me? I know their builds, I know their voices. But that smart-ass lawyer of theirs made a monkey out of me in court. I’ll tell you something else, officer, I’m not the only one those punks robbed.”

  “I’m sure you’re not,” Vogel agreed wearily. “But you don’t have any evidence solid enough to stand up in court, do you?”

  “That’s for sure. What I got is two gutless competitors that know what I know. Manny Adler, over at A-l Beverages, and Barney Leeds at Padilla Grog Shop. They told me, privately, what I’m telling you about Tishkin and Gonzales. You talk to them and they’ll tell you I’m a liar.”

  Manny Adler, A-l Beverages: “The man’s crazy! I never told him anything.”

  Barney Leeds, Padilla Grog Shop: “Moses who? Don’t know the man.”

  “Did you know Gonzales?”

  “Half of my customers are named Gonzales. I don’t remember that one.”

  Back on the sidewalk, I said, “Liars, both of them. Moses’ place is only a block from here. And why would Moses lie about Adler?”

  Vogel shrugged. “Who knows? Hungry?”

  “I could eat. How about Chickie’s?”

  “Too hot for my ulcer. We’ll go kosher today. You buy. It’s your turn.”

  At Plotkin’s Pantry, Vogel had borscht, gefilte fish and herring in sour cream, guaranteed to assuage his ulcer. I stayed on the safe side with two corned beef sandwiches and a gargantuan kosher pickle.

  Over the best coffee I’d had in this town, Vogel lighted his ten-thousandth cigarette of the day and said, “You must be mental.”

  “Why?”

  “Riding around like this, getting nowhere, when you could be living the good life. At least, win or lose, I get paid for it.”

  “There are other jobs that pay more with less work and less danger. How come you didn’t choose one of those?”

  “I don’t know. But I guarantee you I wouldn’t have gone to work for the department if they didn’t pay.”

  “Your pa’s delicatessen would have paid more. Your friend Plotkin, who runs this place, just bought the city a park.”

  “So we’re both fools.”

  I finished my coffee. “Was Maude, too? She could have moved in with Si and lived like a queen.”

  “That’s different,” he said. “She helped people. I put them in the can. I think maybe I’m a vindictive type.”

  “Me, too,” I said. “Let’s look up Locum. Do you know where he hangs out?”

  “I know a few of the places. And I know where he lives. We’ll try his house first.”

  He lived high on a bluff above the sea, at the northern edge of town, as close to the exclusive Slope Ranch section as a black man was likely to get. The house was low and large, mostly antiqued redwood, with a fieldstone facing. The Maserati was parked in the concrete driveway.

  Vogel parked behind it. “This could constitute harassment, I guess you know. And he’s got an expensive lawyer.”

  “I know. I could ask the questions. The chief can’t demote me.”

  “That’s the way we’ll play it. You’re the concerned citizen. I’m only here because you insisted on it.”

  The door chimes went through their sequence twice, some tune I’d never heard before. Then the big man stood there, filling the doorway. He was arrayed in yellow flared slacks and a black and yellow striped tennis shirt.

  His smile was broad and patronizing. “Well, Lieutenant Vogel! What have I done wrong now?”

  “Nothing I know of,” Vogel said. “This is Mr. Callahan, one of our local citizens. He has a complaint.”

  “We’ve met,” Locum said curtly.

  “Saturday night,” I agreed. “You stood in the middle of Rivera Street and blocked my passage.”

  He frowned. “You must have been drunk, Mr. Callahan. I didn’t block no passage. You almost ran me down, man!”

  He looked at Vogel. “I stopped in at Chickie’s for a drink. One drink, that’s all, Lieutenant. When I went back to my car, this tourist, some cat in a camper, asked me how to get to Mission Drive. I told him, and started to walk back to my car—and whammo, this car of Mr. Callahan’s is burning rubber and aiming right at me! Shakes a man up, thing like that, and maybe I got a little lippy. But hell, if anybody’s got a beef, it’s me, not him.”

  “I see. Could you describe the man in the camper?”

  Locum scowled and shook his big head slowly. “It was dark, Lieutenant. He was white, I can tell you that much. Weighed maybe a hundred and forty, hundred and fifty. Is he important or something?”

  “He could be involved in prostitution,” Vogel said blandly. “We don’t want that kind of scum in our town, do we, Mr. Locum?”

  Locum matched his blandness. “Hell, no. But I can’t tell you much. It was a camper, don’t know what make. All American cars look the same to me. The color was light, maybe gray. Wait, he had a little moustache. You know, one of those waxed kind, like a foreigner.”

  Vogel had his notebook out. “Light-colored camper. A male Caucasian. Small mustache. Was there anybody else in the cab or in the rear?”

  “Nobody I saw or heard.”

  “Did the man ask for any particular address on Mission Drive?”

  “Just Mission Drive, that’s all.”

  A silence. Locum looked at Vogel and then at me. “Anything else, gentlemen?”

  Vogel said, “Not unless you have something more to tell us.”

  “Nothing, Lieutenant. See you around.”

  Vogel smiled. “You can make book on it.”

  The door closed. We walked back along the driveway to our car. Vogel was still smiling. “That man writes a better script than you or the chief. His story made sense, right?”

  “Maybe to you. But I was there.”

  We climbed into the hot car. Vogel sat quietly, staring at the big house.

  I said, “I’ll give you another script, on the weird side. You remember that first day, that day we became instant buddies? You said how silly it would look for a man in a gas mask to drive Maude around town in her car.”

  “That wasn’t the first day. That was the second.”

  “How sweet of you to remember! But how about a man in a camper? He could put her in the back and run his exhaust in there and drive around forever.”

  “You might sell it to some private-eye boob-tube show,” he said. “But I think it’s too farfetched even for that.”

  I was tired and I was hot and I was angry. It was a time not to overlook an opportunity to keep my mouth shut. I kept it shut.

  Along Bluff Drive, down Ridge Road, back to Main Street, in silence.

  As we pulled into the police parking lot, Vogel said, “How would he run the exhaust gases into the back?”

  “By drilling a two-inch hole into the floor of the camper and running a hose through it from the tail pipe. I thought of it first, remember. The TV money is all mine.”

  14

  HELMS HAD SEEN US drive in; he met us in the hall. “Mrs. Gonzales,” he told me, “has been waiting for over an hour. You’re the only one she wants to talk with. What goes on?”

  “I sent her some money through a friend,” I explained. “She probably wants to thank me. Where is she?”

  “In the interrogation room.”

  The room was small and hot. There were beads of perspiration on Mrs. Gonzales’s face. She said, “Juanita gave me the money only this morning. I am with my mother now and have no need for it.”

  “Neither have I,” I said. “Why not save it until Christmas, and buy those cute babies something extra?”

  “You are a good man,” she said. “Do you work here?”

  “Temporarily. Why?”

  She looked doubtfully around the room.

  “You might have a point,” I said. “It could be bugged. Why don’t we go outside? That afternoon breeze is starting.”

  We sat on a shopper’s bench, in the shade of the San Valdesto Savings and Loan building. She said, “I’m not sure I should tell this to the police, Jesus had trouble with them, and they don’t forget. But Juanita said you can be trusted.”

  “I can be trusted. But I’m working with the police right now.”

  She paused for a moment, watching the traffic on the street. Then, “I’ll tell you what I know. You decide how much should be private. I keep hearing how Mrs. Marner was such a wonderful woman, winning that Good Samaritan medal, and all. I don’t know. …”

  It was obvious she didn’t want to go on. Prompting her might only harden the attitude. I said nothing.

  “I don’t know …” she said again.

  I said, “I’ve learned a few things about Mrs. Marner that surprised me. Nobody’s perfect, Mrs. Gonzales.”

  She nodded, still looking out at the street. “She and Jesus were working together on something, something they wouldn’t talk to me about.” Now, she looked at me. “If it was honest, why should it be secret?”

  “Mrs. Marner,” I explained, “was a very inquisitive woman.”

  She frowned. “Inquisitive? You think they were investigating something?”

  “Probably. Did Jesus seem unhappy? Were you surprised when he left?”

  “At first I was.” Her gaze went away again. “He seemed happy. But three little children? Jesus loved parties and fun. I was seven months pregnant when he married me. I can understand now why he’d leave.”

  “Weren’t you surprised that Lenny Tishkin would bring you the news? Jesus and Lenny were no longer friends, were they?”

  “I didn’t think so, not in the last year. But Lenny is the kind of man who likes to tell people bad news.”

  We sat there quietly for a few seconds. I asked, “Do you know a man named Otis Locum? Did Jesus ever mention him?”

  She shook her head. “Never. I’ve never heard the name.”

  I stood up. “Thank you for your help. Remember, you’re still young and pretty. There are a lot of good men to choose from.”

  “I don’t need men. I have my babies. My mother will watch them during the day and I can go back to work. That welfare makes me ashamed.”

  Strange society we lived in. Those who couldn’t learn to steal had to live in shame. I went back to the station with a troubling pattern stirring in my unconscious, some combination of incidents and attitudes that refused to emerge.

  Helms and Vogel were still in Helms’s office. “Well?” Vogel asked.

  “Nothing important. She wanted to give me my money back. She had a feeling that her husband and Maude were involved in something illegal, but she didn’t come up with a single fact.”

  “Who has?” Vogel said. “We got a report from San Jose that Tishkin spent a night in a motel there last week. Under his real name. That doesn’t look like he’s on the lam, does it?”

  “Was he alone?”

  “He registered as a single. Are you thinking Patty Serano?”

  “I’m not thinking anything very well. Thinking isn’t my strong point. I have to rely on hunches.”

  Vogel nodded. “I’ve noticed that.” He rubbed his stomach. “Damnit!”

  “Frustration?” I asked. “Or the gelfilte fish?”

  He looked at me sourly. Helms said, “The chief had his theory and nothing’s come of it. What could we expect? He’s administrative, not investigative.”

  He’s administrative, not investigative. … Gilbert and Sullivan could have made a winner out of that title if they had still been above ground. A bluebottle fly buzzed around the hot and smoky office. A siren wailed somewhere in the distance.

  “We’ve got two facts,” Helms said. “Maude’s dead and there ain’t nothing that will bring her back.”

  Vogel nodded.

  I said, “Now if the chief will agree, he can issue his statement and we can drop the case.”

  “The only thing more obnoxious than an indignant citizen,” Vogel said, “is a big-mouth indignant citizen. You and Stan Nowicki are blood brothers.”

  Helms smiled. “At least he puts in his time, Bernie. The man could be drinking good booze and playing bad golf now. But here he stands, sweating with us.”

  “No longer,” I said. “See you later, gentlemen.”

  “Where you going?” Vogel asked.

  “I’m going home. I’m not on the clock.” I waited. “Unless you two have a better idea?”

  “So long,” Vogel said.

  I went out into the hot day and into my hotter car. I opened all the windows and sat there in the police parking lot, staring through the windshield. Static contemplation; I must have caught it from Vogel.

  The pattern still rumbled around in my mind. I had the uncomfortable feeling that I was overlooking the obvious. That had always been one of my strengths, recognizing the obvious.

  How much time could they give it? New crimes were committed every day, new investigations started. They were understaffed and claimed to be underpaid and the paper kept piling up at headquarters. Some wino found dead in an alley could be written off quickly enough. Maude’s prominence had commanded more time, work and attention to detail.

  But there were always more crimes than cops. No investigation could go on forever. On this one they had the convenient out—apparent suicide.

  I drove down Main Street, heading for home. Then, deciding it was still too early to go home, I turned left on Rivera Street and parked near Kelly’s Kourt.

  At the far end of the court some black kids were rolling an old tire around in a circle. At this end, country music was coming from the open window of the manager’s mobile home.

  I walked over to the angle street. It formed the triangle with Rivera where it dead-ended at Avalon Avenue, the minority Main Street. It didn’t actually dead-end; another street, Chapparal Road, began on the far side of Avalon and wound its way up into the hills.

  That was the road I had taken to Villwock’s hermit retreat. It would be a long walk up to his place.

  There were only two houses that fronted on the street across from the vacant lot. The occupants had been questioned; nobody had seen a car parked there the night of the murder. That didn’t mean there hadn’t been one. The residents of both houses had been asleep long before midnight.

  I came back to my car just as a gleaming new Chevy Citation two-door came out of Kelly’s Kourt. All-American Al Pilot was on his way to work. Either he was early or my watch was slow. My watch read 3:44.

  Jan wasn’t home when I got there. I debated with Satan for about twelve seconds, and Satan won. I poured a big measure of bourbon into a glass and went back to all my papers.

  The pattern in my unconscious had partially emerged, a pattern that traced back to what Pontius had told me. These papers wouldn’t help me much with that, but I had nothing else to do. The twice-a-week gardener took care of the lawn and shrubs.

  I was on Einlicher when Jan came home. “Nothing?” she asked.

  “Nothing. Have a good day?”

  “Not quite. Three golden hours at Phyllis Pontius’s pool. Gad, that woman is dumb!”

  “Her looks will carry her. Who else was there?”

  “June and Julie and some woman named Norah Sullivan, a widow. She mentioned a Danning Villwock whom you’re supposed to know. Do you?”

  “I’ve met him. He’s a retired police officer. Does the widow have plans for Villwock?”

  “That’s the impression I got.”

  “Tell her to stay with the service he’s probably giving her now. She’ll never hook him. The man’s a dedicated hermit.”