A Grave Talent (6 page)

"Not so very chancy. Certainly this last one would have been found within a day or two. It's a relatively built-up part of the Road, and that patch of ground is pretty open. And the one they found along the creek, even that would have been discovered before too long. It's a public footpath, up from a public beach, and even at this time of year people use it regularly. I had to put in a fence along the creek to keep people out. She could have gone longer if the weather had been bad, I suppose." His face twisted in a parody of humor and he gave a short bark of desperate laughter. "Christ, what a macabre conversation."

"Yes. You were having a meeting that night, the night Amanda Bloom was left here, weren't you?"

"Yes, from eight until about one in the morning. It was impromptu, or anyway it wasn't supposed to be here, but the place we were supposed to meet, one of their kids came down with the chicken pox, so we met here instead."

"A political meeting, wasn't it?"

"Sort of. A group of us coastal landowners who oppose oil drilling off the coast. I gave their names to Trujillo at the time."

"And nobody saw anything."

"He must be invisible; nobody sees him anywhere."

It was an opinion that Kate had heard before.

"And the first one? Tina Merrill? It was quite some time before Tommy Chesler happened across her."

Tyler pushed himself abruptly away from the fireplace and went to pour a fresh glass of the smoky drink. Kate and Hawkin watched him patiently. It took two swallows and a circuit of the room before he spoke.

"I would have found her on the first of December if I'd been here. I always ride to the top of the Road on the first and then come back and put on a party for the residents, but I wasn't here. I had to fly to Seattle very suddenly on the thirtieth; my uncle was in an accident, and I didn't get back until the third."

"You told me that, yes," said Hawkin. "And you drove up the following day, was it?" Kate saw he was puzzled-- wondering why this should so trouble Tyler.

"Rode, on horseback. On the fourth. And she wasn't there. Not on the Road, anyway, though she must have been just over the edge. She didn't... it had been cold," he ended, and took another swallow.

Hawkin's face took on a look of polite incredulity, and after a moment Kate realized that in spite of the weeks of evidence and despite Hawkin's fairly explicit words to the general assembly downstairs, the man Tyler was only now allowing himself to face the inevitable conclusion: that someone on his Road was responsible for the deaths of the three girls.

"And everyone on the road knew it was your habit to be on that stretch of the Road on the first of December. So there's a fairly good chance that whoever put her there meant for you to find her."

"I... think so. Which means whoever is doing this didn't just pick the Road off a map."

"No, Mr. Tyler, I think that is a pretty safe bet." Hawkin drained the last drops from his glass into his mouth and set the glass lovingly on the table. It took just a few minutes to wrap up the interview, arrange for access keys and a room for Trujillo and one other for the night, and make a list from Kate's notebook of the information they needed. They walked down the stairs together, and Tyler left them on the second floor landing to survey his private obstetrical ward. Hawkin leaned against the wall and lit a cigarette.

"Give me your reactions so far."

"To Tyler?"

"To everything."

Kate thought for a moment.

"Did you notice that the only person here who wears a watch is Tyler's lady friend with the blond hausfrau braids?"

Hawkin looked surprised and then began softly to laugh. His face was transformed, and he looked considerably younger.

"Very good, Casey. No, I hadn't consciously seen it. The chatelaine with the watch and the keys to the storehouse, eh?"

"I only noticed it because I thought my watch was running slow, and when I went to check it I couldn't find anyone who had one. After that I began to study wrists. They may all have pocket watches, but no wristwatches."

"Interesting."

"About Tyler. He really was horrified that you connected him with the murders, but it didn't look like guilt or fear. His anger was real, too, though I wish I could have seen his face."

"Mmm," was Hawkin's only response. After a minute they descended from Tyler's ivory tower to rejoin the fray.

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Two hours and several residents later Kate pushed back her chair, scrubbed at her face with both hands, and went to join the line outside the toilet. As she walked back towards her desk, a hand from the kitchen thrust a steaming mug at her, and she buried her nose in the life-giving smell of fresh coffee. She carried it through the much-peopled living room and beyond to the long covered porch, where the clean air smelled of salt and trees and the rain that dribbled off the roof. A pile of wet dogs thumped their tails at her, and when she ignored them, tucked their noses back into each other's flanks.

Some thoughtful soul had draped a piece of canvas over the rose bower, and the guard, hearing the front door close, peered out at her, raised his own steaming cup in greeting, and stepped back under the shelter. Beyond his casual canopy she could see that the newsmen had arranged a series of more elaborate tents and marquees, some in bright colors, so that the space across the Road was beginning to resemble a high-class gypsy encampment. She could hear a mutter of voices and after a moment pushed her lethargy aside long enough to move to the far end of the veranda for an unobstructed view of the tent city.

Hawkin was there, talking with the newsmen. He looked every bit the proper police investigator, in a belted trench coat with the requisite crumpled fedora in his hand. He was facing away from her, but she could see that his feet were planted squarely, his back was straight, his gestures few and controlled. He turned his head slightly to listen to a question, and Kate saw him respond with a sharp shake and could see his mouth move in a "no" before he turned away again for the next question. There was the slightest sag to his shoulders now as they moved with a gesture of his unseen hands. In another few seconds the hat was clapped onto his head, and he turned back to the house with an air of getting back to his job. The reporters lingered until he reached the gate and then began to disperse.

The sag to his shoulders was more pronounced when he appeared on the stone walk. He reached the shelter of the porch and fumbled with belt and buttons until he extracted a large, limp handkerchief, which he proceeded to rub like a towel over face and hands. He shoved it back into its pocket and began to shrug off the wet coat when he saw Kate in her silent corner and grinned.

"I hope to God that's coffee and not some herbal concoction that tastes like dirty straw," he said.

"Coffee, just made, and strong enough to bite back. Want me to get you a cup?"

"No, it's too cold out here to stand around in wet shoes, thanks." Still, he made no immediate move for the door. "How's it going?"

"Nothing yet, if that's what you're asking."

"It's early still."

"Can I ask you something, Al?"

"Of course."

"How much of your method of talking to the media is deliberate?"

"Deliberate? A performance, you mean? Oh, it's all a game. They want the truth, but more than that they want a good story; you want them to shove off, but not completely-- they can be useful. And they're not a bad bunch, most of them, just doing their jobs. If you keep them fed, make them feel included, put on a show from time to time, they're not too much trouble. Especially in weather like this. I go out every hour or two and churn out all kinds of exciting nonsense they can work up into a story--keeps them happy. They're having loads of fun with that Cadena woman and her baby. One of them wanted me to tell her that if she could make his deadline there'd be a hundred dollars in it for her."

"What did you say?"

"I told him that she was trying her best. I also said that you'd come out and talk to them in a while. It'll give my shoes a chance to dry out."

"Throwing me to the wolves?"

"Propitiating the gods, Tyler would say."

"How do you feel, really? About the case?"

"It's too early to feel anything, but I don't feel good. And my feet are damned cold. Back to work, Martinelli."

At four thirty-seven the midwife guided little Amanda Samantha Christina Cadena-Panopoulos into the world, and all the honorary aunts, uncles, and cousins downstairs cheered and kissed and clapped one another's backs when the short, indignant yell trickled down to their ears. At four-fifty Kate and Bob Fischer went out to present a grainy photograph of mother and daughter to the waiting reporters (and collect the new mother's hundred-dollar check), and two sets of grandparents saw their newest granddaughter's wet, squashed features on the six o'clock news. At six-thirty the last question was asked of the last resident. At nine-thirty Kate dropped Hawkin at the station and drove on to the pool for twenty minutes' hard swim. At ten-thirty she walked back into the office, clearheaded, and they worked for two hours at sorting out the mountain of papers. At one o'clock Kate finally fell into bed, and at five forty-five the telephone rang.

She hit the receiver, fumbled and dropped it, retrieved it from the floor, and squinted to see the luminous hands of the bedside clock. She had to clear her throat before any intelligible sound would come.

"Yeah."

"Casey, pick up some doughnuts on your way in this morning, would you? I've got the coffee on, but the place wasn't open when I came by."

"Doughnuts."

"Chocolate glazed, if they have them."

"God."

"What?"

"Chocolate glazed doughnuts."

"Yes, or whatever looks good. See you," he said cheerily, and the line went dead.

Kate replaced the telephone with the gentle care of a hangover victim, turned to the single eye that scowled up at her from the next pillow, and pronounced the words again.

"Chocolate. Glazed. Doughnuts."

The eye cringed, closed, and retreated beneath the blankets. Kate made her own toast that morning.

It was a day given over to the computers, those electronic busybodies into whose impersonal clutches fall the bits and pieces of the personal histories of criminal, victim, and Jane Q. Public. Kate's feet echoed in the still quiet hallways, and a thick fug of cigarettes and rancid coffee greeted her when she entered Hawkin's office. She dumped the greasy white bag on the desk next to him, pushed open a window, and went over to inspect the coffeepot. It held a strangely greenish liquid that seemed an inauspicious start to the day, so she started another pot, politely refused the kind offer of a doughnut, and sat at the console. Her mind itself felt not unlike a cold, greasy wad of cooked dough when she looked at the stack of yesterday's papers.

"Where do you want me to begin?" she asked.

"Up to you," he said around a mouthful of crumbs. "Alphabetical, geographical, the pin-prick approach, or you can follow hunches. They're all equally bad."

"In that case I'll proceed with some semblance of logic-- start from Tyler's place and work my way up the Road."

"Why not the other way around?"

"From the far end down? Why?"

He shrugged. "Look at the farthest point from civilization to find the biggest misfit?"

Kate looked at him closely, but she couldn't tell if he was joking.

"I'll compromise, five from the top, five from the bottom."

Throughout the long day Kate worked to pull together the information contained in the electronic network on the fifty-seven adults and nineteen (now twenty) minors who lived on Tyler's Road.

Hawkin spent much of the day with the telephone tucked under his chin, and when that failed he read through the assembled reports and printouts with a fierce concentration, made notes, and stared blankly out the window. He disappeared in the early afternoon and came back three hours later looking rested and shaven, and wearing a clean shirt.

At five-thirty Trujillo called in with the statements from three of the residents who had not been at Tyler's and names of the remaining eight. Hawkin shouted at him.

"What the hell have you been doing down there? You should have had all eleven before noon, even if you had to walk up the road to get them! You've got what? Oh, Christ, yes I did hear about it, but I didn't know they'd called you in on it. All right, sorry for shouting. Yes, give them to me now, the rough outlines anyway." For ten minutes Hawkin grunted and scribbled notes; he finally dropped the phone and sat back.

"Half of Trujillo's men are down in San Benito county with that gunman who wants his kids." An irate father with a rifle was holed up in an office building demanding that his ex-wife give him their two sons--the kind of situation that eats up a lot of hours and manpower. "Well, at least it's put off that damn meeting with the FBI and half the cops in northern California. Throw these names into the machine and go home." Hawkin picked up a stack of papers and settled down at his desk with his nineteenth cup of coffee that day. "Go home, Martinelli. We'll go down ourselves tomorrow."

Thursday morning the telephone allowed her to sleep until after six before jerking her from a luxurious dream in which she was sitting on the deck of a cruise ship eating spaghetti and watching a child play with a windmill. The child began suddenly to wail, and it took a long moment for Kate to realize that the wail was the telephone.

"Yes!"

"Martinelli, I need you down here. Ten minutes ago."

"Piss off," she snarled, but he had already hung up.

"I knew we should have gone to bed rather than watching the late show." The muffled voice was not even accompanied by an eye this morning; it was simply an untidy lump in the blankets.

"See you on TV," Kate replied.

"You did look cute."

"Scared stiff."

"So adorable, showing off that baby's picture."

"Shut up."

"What is it, Al? What happened?" she asked as she walked into his office.

"Nothing happened. I'm going home for two hours, and I need you to sit on the phone in case something comes up. If Trujillo calls, we'll be there by noon." He stood up and reached for his jacket.

For that you woke me up and made me run down here? she wanted to say. Why couldn't you sleep ordinary hours? Haven't you heard that telephone calls can be forwarded, for God's sake? But she bit it back, and asked simply, "Don't you ever go home?"

"When I don't have this kind of case, yes."

Kate squashed her own guilt feelings at having gotten six whole hours of sleep and turned resentfully to the console. She worked away for slightly over an hour and a quarter before a series of words came onto the screen that made her back go straight and her heart thump. She looked at the telephone and couldn't help the malicious grin that spread onto her face.

At the fifth ring the telephone was taken off the hook. Long seconds passed before the sound of heavy breath told of the passage up to his ear. His voice was coarse with sleep, but Kate pushed away another twinge of guilt.

"Hawkin here."

"Al? This is Casey. Something's come up I think you should see. Right away." She hung up gently. Revenge was sweet.

She was on the phone when he came in. He had stopped to shave, she noted. She handed him the thick sheaf of computer printout. Out of the corner of her eye she saw him pour a cup of coffee and settle to the continuous pages, eyes moving swiftly. She hung up and turned in her chair.

"Sorry to wake you."

"S'okay. Bunch of misfits, aren't they? Marijuana, LSD, peyote possession, arrest at Diablo Canyon, defacing a public building, army desertion and dishonorable discharge, mental hospital. What a place."

"Very few violent crimes, though. Number fourteen, there, six months as a juvenile for assulting a teacher, and number twenty-seven, who shot up a billboard while under the influence. But it's number fifty-four I called you about; it just came in."

He flipped over the pages until he reached the name of Siobhan Adams, unmarried Caucasian female; he skimmed the first few lines, and then his eyes slowed abruptly. Kate watched his lips move slightly as he read the words. He closed his eyes.

"God in heaven, why didn't we have this twenty-four hours ago?"

"It was one of the names Trujillo gave us last night. There was some confusion over it, and I got the correct name from Tyler's lawyer only an hour ago. Everyone knows her as Vaun, but I drew a blank on that."

"Vaun. Vaun Adams. Detweiler mentioned her. An artist, he said. Maidens in castles and metaphysical trees, no doubt. How do you get Vaun from Siobhan?" He gave it three syllables.

"It's pronounced Zhi-von, an old Irish name. I told Trujillo to have his people stop her if she tries to leave, but not to approach her otherwise. Was that okay?"

"On the nose. Let's get out of here."

He threw the printout onto his desk, and Kate snatched up her gun and her jacket and hurried down the hall after him. The paper lay face up, the lines of impersonal dot-matrix print telling of one Siobhan Adams, age thirty-six, unmarried Caucasian female, arrested at the age of eighteen and charged with the murder by strangulation of six-year-old Jemima Brand. She was convicted, served nine and a half years, and had been paroled seven years before. Her house was less than two miles from where Samantha Donaldson had been found.