Clutching at Straws

by J. L. Abramo

  “Do you know how early it is?” he asked when I was out of the car.

  “I’m taking a ride out to Folsom Reservoir.”

  “To do some fly-fishing?”

  “A little research.”

  “Want company?”

  “Why not.”

  We stayed long enough for me to catch up on the caffeine consumption and for Joey to sweet-talk his way out of whatever plans his wife had lined up for him that day. Thirty minutes later I backed the ’63 Impala out of the driveway. Joey hopped in, and we headed for the Bay Bridge. As we crossed the bridge I looked at the sign for Treasure Island and Joey asked me what the stupid grin was all about.

  “Just something I read last night,” I said.

  Folsom was a small village seventeen miles northeast of the state capital. The town sat on the American River, which ran between the Sacramento River and the reservoir. It was the small town where Lowell Ryder grew up wanting nothing less than to trade avocados for trial briefs. In less than two hours we were bent over pancakes in a small coffee shop directly across from the Folsom Town Library.

  The diner was nearly empty but nonetheless held more people than were out on the main street. You could count the cars driving past the window on the fingers of a mitten.

  “Strange place to come for research,” said Joey, “unless you’re interested in how long it takes a leaf to hit the ground.”

  “Actually we’re here to look into a Reagan-era homicide. With any luck this burg has a local newspaper that they’re so proud of, the library has it on film going all the way back to eighty-five.”

  “They probably have the hard copies,” Joey said, without sarcasm.

  The librarian who assisted us reminded me a lot of my kindergarten teacher; inasmuch as they both resembled Casey Stengel. The major difference being that Mrs. Warren also had a voice like Casey Stengel. Mrs. Dewey, the librarian, on the other hand, had a voice that convinced me she had never been west of Sacramento or east of Lake Tahoe.

  After explaining that I was interested in newspapers from 1985, not 1885, she set us in front of the hand-cranked viewing machine and brought over film from June and July of Ryder’s high school graduation year.

  “Do you need help threading it, young man?” she asked.

  “No thank you, ma’am,” I answered, unintentionally hurting her feelings.

  We found it on the front page of the Folsom Gazette dated the last Saturday in June. An eighteen-year-old boy, celebrating high school’s end at a teen hangout the night before, was found beaten to death outside the club. Folsom police chief William Gunderson was called to the scene by local farmer Calvin Ryder, and was met there by Ryder and Ryder’s oldest son. The boy, Chance, nineteen, had come to turn himself in to the police. Ryder and his son accompanied Gunderson to the police station to be interviewed.

  According to the boy, the dead teen had been attacking a young woman and Chance Ryder intervened. A struggled ensued, and Chance hit the other boy with a stone in self-defense.

  We followed the story into July and August. Chance Ryder was tried and convicted of voluntary manslaughter and sentenced to four years in prison.

  Ryder’s plea of self-defense depended on the girl in the parking lot coming forward. She never did.

  “Find what you were looking for?” asked Mrs. Dewey, sneaking up behind us.

  “Sort of,” I said.

  “Is Chief Gunderson still around these parts?” Joey asked.

  “About a half block from here at his office, I suppose.”

  We thanked Mrs. Dewey for her help and headed for the police station.

  When we walked in, the station was deserted except for a woman at the switchboard and a man at a large desk, reading. When we walked over to the desk, he looked up from the book and gave us a broad smirk. He looked like Luciano Pavarotti in a very tight cowboy costume.

  “I love this guy,” he said, holding out the book to display its cover.

  It was A Charge to Keep by George W. Bush.

  I swallowed hard and asked if he was Chief Gunderson. Of course he was.

  “Chief Gunderson, we were hoping you would talk to us about Chance Ryder,” I said tentatively. “We were curious about the incident on graduation night back in 1985.”

  “You know what they say about curiosity, young feller,” he said, “and why would I want to talk to you about anything?”

  “Because Doc Brady told us that you might be willing to help,” said Joey.

  “Well, why didn’t you say so? C’mon in boys, grab a chair. Just give me a minute here to drain the beast and I’ll be right with you.”

  Gunderson rose and headed through a door out back. “Drain the beast?” I said.

  “It’s a euphemism,” said Joey.

  “I’ll bet. Who the hell is Doc Brady?”

  “I’ll tell you later. Think about what you want to ask him. I doubt you’ll get more than five or six questions in before he starts itching to get back to that page-turner.”

  “That’s a great thing to say to a guy who can’t find out the time of day with less than three questions.”

  “How about I give it a shot?” Joey said.

  “I can live with that.”

  Gunderson walked back into the room, wiping his huge hands on a paper towel. It was a good omen.

  “So, what can I help you with?” he said, squeezing back into his seat.

  “The Chance Ryder case.”

  “Ah, yes. So you said. It was a very big deal around here, as you might imagine. Both boys, Chance Ryder and Davey King, the boy who was killed, were real well liked by everyone. Never gave anyone any trouble. It was difficult to imagine Davey pulling something like that, forcing himself on a young woman. Jesus, the kid was the team quarterback; he was batting the girls off like flies. But at the same time, no one could imagine Chance hurting a soul unless there was a damn good reason. It’s as puzzling today as it was the night it happened.”

  Gunderson went quiet and seemed to drift away. I had that uncomfortable feeling I sometimes got in the pit of my stomach, and it wasn’t the pancakes.

  For a moment I thought that the chief had fallen asleep. Suddenly his eyes popped open. Gunderson looked at us both and started up again as if he’d never stopped talking.

  “No one wanted Chance to go to jail—it only compounded the tragedy—but there was no way around it. There were no witnesses, no one could explain or understand how or why it happened. The court gave him a fairly light sentence, and we all moved on.”

  “And the girl never surfaced?”

  “Nope. Everyone wanted to believe that there was a girl involved, so we always figured it wasn’t a local kid. A local kid would have come forward to set things straight.”

  “What happened to Chance Ryder?” asked Joey.

  “He got out in three years; model prisoner we were told. We all expected him to come back here, to help his father on the farm. He never did. Chance finally went out to the coast. His younger brother was in law school down at Stanford, but Chance went south to L.A. He works in movies now. We haven’t seen him around here since he left to serve his jail term, except on the big screen at the Globe Movie Theater up the street once in a while. He goes by the name Chance Folsom. Took the name of the town.”

  “Sort of like Vito Andolini,” I said.

  “Don’t think I know him. What’s he been in?”

  “It’s not important,” I said. “Do you mind if I smoke?”

  “Knock yourself out,” said Gunderson.

  We were running out of time.

  “Is the father alive?” asked Joey.

  “Still farming, but his health isn’t too good.”

  “And you say that Chance Ryder never came back?”

  “Lowell comes to see his father. I’ve bumped into him a few times. He’s a big-shot assistant DA in San Francisco now. That kid wanted to be a lawyer since he was a tadpole. Chance never came back to visit Calvin. It surprises me, but so do a lot of things. L
owell says he hasn’t seen his brother since prison.”

  “Thanks for your help, Chief,” said Joey. “We’ll let you get back to your book.”

  “If you see Doc Brady, tell him that I said hey,” said Gunderson, not bothering to get up to see us off.

  “Sure will,” said Joey.

  Then we were back on the street.

  “Well, where does that leave us?” I asked, as we climbed into the Impala.

  “On a rustic if desolate Main Street in a small American hamlet,” said Joey. “Hopefully not for long.”

  “Who the hell is Doc Brady?”

  “Thomas Brady is a medical examiner in Oakland. I’ve run into him once or twice around town,” said Joey. “When we were in the library, I spotted him in a photograph, standing next to Chief Gunderson and some others in a news photo from the crime scene.”

  “Why would Lowell Ryder tell me the story?”

  “Because Chancellor somehow knew, and whoever clued the judge knew, and you threw the brother in Ryder’s face. Then again, he didn’t have to say anything, and experience tells me that unsolicited personal revelations are often attempts to keep the bulk of the iceberg underwater.”

  “I feel like I’m going around in circles,” I said as we merged into the westbound traffic on Route 50.

  It was a common complaint of mine.

  “Did you ever hear the story of the guy who was having trouble pleasing his wife in bed?” asked Joey.

  “Is this a joke?”

  “Have you ever known me to tell a joke, Jake?” Joey said. “So this guy goes to the doctor and the sawbones takes one look at the guy and knows exactly what the problem is. You’re in terrible shape says the doctor. I can see that you have no physical stamina. How can you expect to provide pleasure to your wife when you look as if you can hardly stay awake? You need regimented exercise. I want you to walk ten miles a day for two weeks. I absolutely guarantee that it will do the trick. Call me and let me know how it goes.”

  Joey stopped long enough for me to light up a Camel.

  “Two weeks later the doctor answers his phone and it’s his patient. So, how do you feel the doctor asks? Like a million bucks, never better, the guy says. And how’s your sex life? How should I know, the guy says, I’m a hundred forty miles from home? Don’t worry about going in circles Jake, just keep moving and closing in.

  I dropped Joey Russo and the Chevy back at his place. I moved toward the Toyota to head over to my office. “You know where I am if you need me,” called Joey, opening his front door.

  “Thanks.”

  “Ever wonder what I do to make ends meet, Jake?”

  “I’ve thought about it.”

  “Think about why you’ve never asked,” he said, disappearing into the house.

  Eighteen

  “Darlene,” I said, walking into the office, not giving her a chance to ask where I’d been all day, “do you know what Joey Russo really does for a living?”

  “Sure,” she said, filling Tug McGraw’s food bowl. I’d forgotten all about the dog again.

  “Are you going to tell me or what?”

  “No. If you’re so interested, why won’t you ask him?”

  “I’ll have to think about that. What did I miss?”

  “Your cousin Bobby called. He’s up from L.A. visiting his mother and wanted to know if you were free for dinner.”

  “Great, dinner with Mom and Aunt Rosalie. Lately they’ve been getting along like Tyson and Holyfield.”

  “Bobby said not to sweat it; he said he wants to take you out for steak. He knows your poison.”

  “Yeah right, like his mother is going to let him eat somewhere else.”

  “She has a date,” Darlene said.

  McGraw had ignored the food and lay curled at her feet under the desk.

  I grabbed a cup of coffee and walked back to my office to call my cousin.

  Of course my mother answered the phone.

  “Jacob, I’ve been worried sick. I tried calling you all weekend.”

  “I had the phone unplugged, Mom. Why didn’t you call last night?”

  “I have my pride, Jacob. Are you all right?”

  “Fine, Mom. Is Bobby there?”

  “Yes. The poor boy comes all the way up here to see his mother and my thankless sister has other plans.”

  “He’ll survive, Mom. Could you put him on the phone?”

  “Are you coming for dinner tonight?”

  “I don’t think so, Mom.”

  “Very well,” she said, and called Bobby to the telephone. “Hey, Bobby, how’s it going?”

  “Great, I just landed a part in Jurassic III.”

  “Do you get eaten by a dinosaur?”

  “I don’t know yet. Anyway, how about celebrating over a couple of T-bones?”

  “I thought you were on the Bugs Bunny diet. Do you happen to know an actor named Chance Folsom?”

  “Sure, I know him. Did you see Gladiator? Folsom had a pretty good part in it. Remember the big fight about halfway into the film?”

  “I didn’t see it, Bobby. You think you can get me a picture of the guy?”

  “I’m sure I can find one on the Internet.”

  “Could you do that for me, have a copy for me when I see you tonight?”

  “I’ll do better. I can probably download a photo and e-mail it to you. You can print it out there.”

  “You can do that?”

  “A six-year-old could do it. You do have a computer and printer, don’t you?”

  “What do you think, Bobby? Hold on—I have another call.” I buzzed Darlene.

  “Do we have e-mail and a printer for that computer out there?”

  “Yes, Mr. Flintstone. Would you like the e-mail address?”

  I wrote it down.

  “Sorry, Bobby. Sure, send it,” I said, reading him the address.

  “How about I pick you up at eight? If I don’t stop in to see Mom, I’ll never hear the end of it.”

  “See you then,” he said, and rang off.

  I called Sonny to find out how Vic Vigoda’s girl was holding up in New York.

  “Brenda’s getting real itchy, Jake,” Sonny said, and gave me the phone number.

  Sonny’s cousin Sal answered the telephone.

  “Sal, Jake Diamond. Let me speak to Brenda.”

  “How do I know you’re who you say you are?” Brenda Bionda asked after I told her who I was.

  “Brenda, you want to get out of there, don’t you?”

  “Yesterday.”

  “Then trust me. If we wanted to hurt you, it would’ve been done already. Answer a few questions, and I’ll have Sal cut you lose. I’ll even ask him to take you to the airport.”

  “What?”

  “Was Vic involved in the Chancellor murder?”

  “All he did was accept an offer of thirty grand to get into Chancellor’s safe. Vic couldn’t open a box of Cracker Jacks, so he brought Lefty Wright in for half. He had no idea about what was going to happen to the judge.”

  “And you don’t know who hired him?”

  “I don’t know who was paying the bills. Victor wouldn’t tell me. But he told me after Lefty was arrested that the cop was in on the deal.”

  “Katt?”

  “Yeah. Tom Katt. What a fucking creep. Katt was holding a burglary rap over Vic’s head, and making Vic dance all over town like a puppet. Lefty was supposed to get an envelope from the judge’s safe and leave it out for Katt to collect the balance of the payment. Which, apparently, was all bullshit. When Vic heard that Katt had busted Lefty at the scene, that the judge was dead, and that the envelope hadn’t turned up, Vic sent me here to wait. He said he was going to try to squeeze a little more cash out of Katt, and then we’d better take the money and run.”

  “Did Vic know what the envelope was?”

  “If he did, he didn’t say. But Vic knew something; it wasn’t a recreational swim he was taking in McCovey Cove. And that’s all I know, Diamond. What do I have
to do, swear on my mother’s grave?”

  “No thanks, I believe you.”

  “That’s great, especially since my mother is alive and kicking. The trouble is, maybe someone else thinks I know more and wants to see me do the dog paddle. I gotta get out of the country,” she said.

  Another dead end.

  “Are you done with me, Diamond?”

  “Yes. Put Sal back on. Have fun in Brazil,” I said.

  “I’d like to hire you to find out who killed Vic,” she said. It was almost funny.

  “Sure, Brenda, I’ll let you know and send you a bill.”

  I asked Sal to deposit Brenda at the airport and went back out front.

  Darlene had printed a headshot of Chance Ryder from the e-mail attachment.

  “Nice-looking guy,” said Darlene. “Looks like a movie star.”

  “Sure does,” I said. “What time is it?”

  “Almost four.”

  “I’m going home to convalesce for a while. Then I’ll be at my mom’s at eight if anyone needs me. I’ll let her know where Bobby and I are going for dinner.”

  “You’re not taking your mom?”

  “She won’t go out. She’ll wait home all night to make sure that her baby sister gets back safe from her date.”

  I left the dog with Darlene. She didn’t protest.

  On my way home I stopped at Mara’s Italian Pastry. I could at least tell Mom that we’d be back for dessert after dinner.

  When I reached my apartment building I found Lieutenant Lopez waiting for me out front.

  “I called your office, and your assistant told me that you were on your way home. Do you have a few minutes to talk?”

  “Sure.”

  “Are those cannoli?” she asked, spotting the pastry box from Mara’s.

  “Come on up. I’ll make coffee.”

  “Place hasn’t changed much,” she said when we walked into the flat.

  “Why mess with perfection,” I said, walking back to the kitchen to put up a pot of espresso. “Have a seat, and I’ll be right with you.”

  When I carried the pastry out to the living room, Lopez was turning the pages of the Dumas novel.

  “Good book?”

  “Entertaining. It’s about a guy who goes to prison for something he didn’t do. Funny how some things never change.”