Except for the Bones (23 page)

“My God,” Hastings repeated, “I wonder whether she had it right? I wonder whether Kane came to kill her?”

Bernhardt made no response. He’d been talking for almost an hour, and he’d only had two hours’ sleep.

“Have you tried to locate this guy?” Hastings asked.

“Not really. I called the airports, looking for the airplane. But that’s about it. I mean—” Resigned, he spread his hands, shook his head. “I mean, I’ve got other clients. And they’ve got bigger checkbooks, if you want the truth. Mostly, what I was doing with Diane Cutler was holding her hand.”

Hastings turned away from the window, returned to his desk, sat down. Outside the window the city’s chronic summer fog still clouded the sky, blotting out Hastings’s slivered view of the Bay Bridge and a wedge of the Berkeley hills beyond.

“Hand-holding can be important. Maybe very important in this case. She was obviously a very unhappy kid.”

Wordlessly, Bernhardt nodded, dropped his eyes. Hastings watched the other man for a moment, considering. Then: “Come on, Alan. Give yourself a break. You did what you could. My God, you got paid two hundred dollars. What more could you do?”

As if to protest, Bernhardt sharply shook his head. “They’re just kids, Frank. Eighteen years old. For Carley, two hundred has to be a lot of money.”

Studying Bernhardt, Hastings made no response. Then, quietly, he said, “Did you come for some help—or to bleed all over my office?”

It was the right remark, expertly timed. Result: Bernhardt’s expressive face began to clear, a smile began twitching at the corners of his mouth. He drew a long, resigned breath, then said, “Shit happens. Is that what you’re saying?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

Another deep breath. Finally: “I guess I came for advice, most of all.”

“Fine.”

“I figure,” Bernhardt said, “that I have a responsibility to find out what happened on Cape Cod.”

Hastings nodded. “I agree. But to do it, you’ll almost certainly have to go to Cape Cod. That’ll take time. And money, too. Are you ready to swallow that?”

“I’m sure as hell willing to go to her father, and ask for the money.”

“Good luck.”

“He’s rich. Her mother’s rich, too.”

“Her mother’s also married to Preston Daniels. The villain.”

Ruefully, Bernhardt smiled. Then, speculating: “My God, Frank—just imagine, if it’s all true. Preston Daniels kills his girlfriend. Preston Daniels hires his personal pilot to kill his stepdaughter’s boyfriend, because he saw Daniels burying his victim. Then Preston Daniels tells the villainous pilot to track down Daniels’s stepdaughter and kill her. Jesus—” Awed, Bernhardt shook his head. “This is a goddamn soap opera.”

Indulgently, Hastings smiled. “That’s one scenario. But how about if—” He glanced at the notes he’d taken while Bernhardt had told his story. “How about if it’s all a string of coincidences? It happens, you know. It happens all the time. Or what if Diane Cutler was conning you? What if she dreamed everything up—opium dreams? That happens, too. What if Kane came out here to persuade her to go back to her mom, no hard feelings? What if Daniels’s girlfriend just disappeared for reasons unknown? And the kid—Jeff Weston—he could’ve got killed the way a lot of people get killed, for the money in his pockets.”

Bernhardt nodded. “I’ve thought about all that.”

“Do you have the name of the missing girlfriend? Do you have an address?”

“No. Maybe Diane knew her name. But she didn’t tell me.”

“Pity. A name would help.”

“Could you …?” Bernhardt let it go unfinished.

“I can try. I’ll call this place”—another glance at his notes—“Carter’s Landing. I’ll see what I can find out. But that’s all I can do, Alan. You understand.”

“Sure …” Resigned, Bernhardt nodded.

“For God’s sake, don’t take it so hard.”

“She died while I was parked outside, on guard, Frank. I gave her one of the drinks that killed her. I owe somebody for that.”

“She died because she was a very unhappy kid. She was on drugs. She freaked out because she thought Kane came to kill her. But she could’ve been wrong. It’s as simple as that. Like I said, Kane could have—”

“He had a club. Both of them saw it. Diane and Paula, they both saw the club.”

“Listen, Alan.” Earnestly, Hastings leaned across his desk. “These things happen in seconds. And it was dark. Diane already had it fixed in her mind that someone, maybe Kane, was going to kill her. There’s a name for that. It’s called paranoia. And when she saw what she was afraid she’d see, she went over the edge, and OD’d. It happens, Alan. God knows, it happens. And this girl seems to fit the profile. Completely. If she hadn’t OD’d last night, then it’d just be another time, another place. And soon, probably. Very soon.”

“If I find that Kane was in San Francisco last night, though …”

“It might not prove a thing. If he denies that he was here, and if you can prove he
was
here, that’s something else. Otherwise, if he says he was here on an errand of mercy—trying to help Diane with her demons—who’s to contradict him? Now—” Hastings dropped his voice, deepening the emphasis. “Now, if you find the girlfriend’s body in that landfill, and if you find her blood type in Daniels’s car, or his house, that’s something else. A tire tread matching Kane’s car at the scene of the Jeff Weston killing, that wouldn’t hurt, either.”

Morosely, Bernhardt made no response.

“You knew I was going to say all this, Alan.”

“Sure I did. But, Jesus—” He shook his head. “But it was just a few hours ago that—”

Hastings rose, put his hands flat on the desk, sympathetically shook his head. “It’s no fun, seeing them dead. Some cops say they get used to it. I suppose some do. But I’d rather work with the ones who don’t.”

“Yeah …” Bernhardt, too, rose to his feet. “Well, thanks, Frank. Thanks a lot.”

Ruefully, Hastings smiled. “What you really mean is ‘thanks for nothing.’ But the truth is, there isn’t a damn thing I can do about this. Absolutely nothing, officially. There’s been no crime committed in my jurisdiction, not even a reasonable suspicion. I’ll make a phone call to Carter’s Landing, but it could do more harm than good. Rural cops, as you may discover, can get pretty territorial. And if they decide to stick it to a big-city cop—well—they can do it.”

“I’m not a cop, though.”

“Even worse.”

“T
HERE YOU ARE, MR
. Foster.” The airline clerk handed over the ticket envelope with a practiced flourish and a mechanical smile. “That flight will be boarding in exactly an hour, gate thirty-three.”

“Thank you.” Kane pocketed the envelope, turned away from the sales counter, glanced up at the overhead display of gate numbers. Yes, gate thirty-three, concourse C. There would be a snack bar on the concourse. He would have doughnuts and coffee. On the airplane, they would certainly serve lunch.

At a souvenir shop he’d bought a flimsy nylon flight bag, for carry-on luggage. “Protective coloration” was the phrase. A man traveling without luggage from San Francisco to New York would surely be remembered. Then he’d bought two newspapers and two paperback books, to give the flight bag bulk. Now he walked to the security scanner, put the flight bag on the conveyor belt and stepped through the scanner, no buzzers, no alarms.

No alarms …

“Kane,”
the woman had shouted.

Over and over, the words had reverberated:
“Kane,”
followed by
“Drop it, you bastard.”

And he’d run. He’d turned his back, run to the car, driven away. His hands on the steering wheel had been shaking. He’d hardly turned the corner before the images had begun to flash: the woman, standing in the middle of the street, watching him drive away. The woman, surely a policewoman, surely copying down the rental car’s license number. Then the green-on-black computer screen, displaying the name of the car-rental agency.

Followed by his name, his address, his New York driver’s license number.

Ahead, he saw the snack bar sign. There was no line. He placed the nylon flight bag beside a small table facing out across the airport. He bought a cup of overpriced coffee and an overpriced butterhorn. Carrying the coffee cup, almost full, his hands were steady. Seated at the table, biting into the butterhorn without tasting it, he turned his attention to the runway far beyond the snack bar’s window, where a DC-10 was about to touch down.

But the images persisted: Diane and the policewoman, at police headquarters. Constable Joe Farnsworth, his pig eyes studying a printout: Bruce Kane, current address. Occupation.

Current employer: Preston Daniels.

Preston Daniels, questioned by the police. Preston Daniels, consulting with his lawyers. Pompous, bloated lawyers, the rich protecting the rich. Making the deals. Paying off the politicians who paid off the police who took the money and smiled.

Take the money and smile.

Take the money and run.

Buy an airplane. A Beechcraft single, or a Mooney. Fly up to Canada, and disappear.

Fly down to Texas, then into Mexico. Fly low, turn off the transponder, get down below the radar. Southbound, no one cared. A vacationing Americano with an inoperative transponder, flying his own airplane into Mexico.

Olé.

“M
R. BERNHARDT?” THE MAN’S
voice on the phone was ragged, close to breaking.

“Yes, sir.”

“This is Paul Cutler, Mr. Bernhardt.”

The father of the dead girl—the girl who had killed herself while Bernhardt stood guard in the street below her window.

“Ah …” It was an inarticulate response, a mere monosyllable that bore an impossible burden: sympathy, remorse—

—and, yes, guilt.

“I—Carley Hanks—she told me, of course, about Diane. Carley phoned me right—right after it happened, last night. And then they—they took me to the—the—” Helplessly, Cutler broke off.

The morgue,
Bernhardt knew, would have been the next words.

How long had it been since the police had knocked on Bernhardt’s door, told him that Jennie had been killed when her head struck a curb during a random mugging?

A final cough. Then, painfully self-controlled: “I identified her, after the police came to tell me. And then I—of course—I called Diane’s mother, in New York.” Another pause, this one longer, more painful.

“If there’s anything I can do …”

“Well, of course, that’s why I’m calling. I mean, just a little while ago—an hour, maybe—Carley called again. And she—she said that she hired you, because she was so very worried about Diane.”

“Yes, sir, that’s true.”

“Carley says she thought Diane trusted you—that Diane told you things. She—Carley—she thought that, whatever was bothering her, Diane talked to you about it.”

“Yes, sir, she did.”

“I see …” Two words that said it all: father and daughter, always at arm’s length.

“I wonder, Mr. Bernhardt …” The words were hesitant. “I wonder whether you’d mind coming over here, to my home? Can you do that?”

“Yes, of course.”

“In an hour or two, would that be convenient?”

“An hour or two …” Speculatively, Bernhardt broke off, to consider. It was no time to mention consulting fees, hourly rates, not with Diane’s body in the morgue, awaiting the coroner’s scalpel. But when would there be a better time? Now, or when—

“I’m a lawyer, Mr. Bernhardt.”

“Yes, sir. Diane told me.”

“And we hire private investigators. All the time. So I know about fees—about your time. It’s the same with me. All I’ve got to sell is my expertise, and my time.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you. I—ah—I charge fifty dollars an hour.”

“That’ll be fine. Can we say two o’clock?”

“Two o’clock.”

“M
Y GOD.” STUNNED, INCREDULOUS
, Paul Cutler shook his head. “It’s—it’s unbelievable. Preston Daniels—all that money, all that power.”

“It happens,” Bernhardt said. “These people make mistakes, too. Usually, though, there’s a cover-up.”

“Yes …” Apparently dazed, Cutler nodded, then rose to his feet, paced the small, book-lined study to the far wall, where he stood for a moment motionless, staring out through French doors on a meticulously maintained garden. Finally: “That bastard. She’d be alive now, except for Daniels.”

But the real damage was done years ago,
Bernhardt responded in his thoughts.
A girl doesn’t OD because someone scares her. She ODs because she’s too unhappy to go on living.

“Will the San Francisco police do anything?” As Cutler asked the question he turned from the window and sat behind a small leather-topped writing desk. His movements were wooden. His face was naked, a mask of stark, hollow-eyed grief.

“They’ll make inquiries back on Cape Cod, but that’s about it.”

“No crime was committed here, after all.” Staring down at the desk, Cutler spoke slowly, tonelessly. Bernhardt decided not to respond, and the silence lengthened until Cutler spoke again:

“Today’s Saturday. The funeral’s going to be here. In San Francisco, that is. Millicent—Diane’s mother—will be here. I don’t know whether Daniels will come. Considering the circumstances, I doubt that he will.” Cutler let a long, thoughtful moment pass. Then: “I think it’d be useful for you to be here, for the funeral. Then, the next day, I want you to leave for Cape Cod.” Cutler opened the center drawer of his desk and took out a checkbook. He put it on the leather top of the desk and pulled the drawer open farther, searching inside. Now he shook his head with sudden vexation.

“Damn. No pen.”

“Here …” Bernhardt unclipped a pen from an inside pocket. “Use mine.”

Y
ES, IT WAS ELEMENTAL: WAVES
, an eternity of waves, crashing down on the seaside sand. Receding, gathering strength, rolling in again. Once there had been rocks on this beach. Now there was sand.

How many millions of years did it take, to pound boulders into pebbles, and pebbles into sand? At Palm Beach, the sand was white and fine; on the Riviera, the sand was dark and coarse: pebbles still being ground down.