“Yes?”
I started. A dumpy little woman with demure gray curls had come to the door.
“Mrs. Williams? My name is—”
“I know who you are.” She gave me a quick once-over, then opened the door. “Come in.”
I hesitated. “I don’t want to intrude.”
“In my time of sorrow? You’re not.” She stood aside, and I edged past her, feeling acutely uncomfortable despite her matter-of-fact tone. I found myself in a dimly lit living room further darkened by drawn curtains and cheap wood-grain paneling on the walls. The furniture was upholstered in a rough wool tweed of olive and brown plaid; the carpet was a burnt-orange shag. I’d stepped into 1975.
Mrs. Williams suddenly brushed past me and tugged at the curtains, ripping them off their metal hooks until they landed in a heap on the floor. She turned to me. “I’ve been wanting to do that for years.”
I took a half step back. “Are you okay, Mrs. Williams?” In the swath of dusty light that poured in from the street, I realized that while her top half was sensibly clad in a soft gray cardigan sweater, she was wearing hot pink biker shorts below that revealed a good deal of varicose-veined leg.
“Call me Daphne, dear. Can I get you a cup of tea?”
When I shook my head, she said, “How about some gin?”
“Really, I’m fine. I just wanted to express my, uh, my condolences.” My eyes traveled from the crumpled curtains to a glass-topped coffee table in front of the couch. It was littered with travel brochures.
Mrs. Williams followed my glance. “I’m going on a cruise. Isn’t that exciting? My first. I’m leaning toward Cozumel. Or do you think it might be too touristy this time of year?”
I was saved from answering by the ring of the telephone. Mrs. Williams picked up the receiver. “Yes?”
She listened for a minute, then said, “That’s right. A sofa and love seat, twin bed, dresser, and recliner. Some old picture frames. Oh, and there are quite a few planters and pots that need to go. Quite heavy, I’m afraid. You’d better send a couple of strapping young men.” She tittered.
While she was talking, I took a closer look at the paneled wall above the television. It was bare except for a dozen or so empty hooks, each sitting in a rectangle of lighter wood. I spotted a stack of picture frames resting on the seat of an overstuffed recliner. Mrs. Williams seemed occupied for the moment, so I took a quick peek: “Northern California Begonia Grower of the Year, 2008”; “Best in Show, Yolo County Fair, 2011.”
“Leonard loved his begonias,” Mrs. Williams said from just behind me. “He had a real gift with them.”
I’d managed not to jump more than four or five inches when she spoke. “Sounds like you might be getting some new furniture.”
“I suppose you think it’s callous to redecorate so soon.”
“No, of course not, I—”
“He was a good man,” she said, her eyes fixed on me in a way that made my skin cold. “What you might call regular in his habits. On the fifth of the month, after his pension came in, he gave me the grocery money and always asked for my receipts. We paid our bills on the tenth and the twenty-fifth, like clockwork. And the third Saturday of every month we had intercourse. Oh yes, a very good, reliable man. Kept up with his life-insurance premiums, too. So considerate of him.”
She picked up the Grower of the Year certificate. “Perhaps he didn’t always remember to nurture our marriage the way he nurtured his begonias. But that’s only to be expected after more than forty years, don’t you think?” She dropped the frame facedown in the carpet and ground the cardboard backing under her shoe. I heard the tinkle of breaking glass.
“I guess I’d better be going,” I said.
“Are you sure, dear? Didn’t you want to ask me something?” She picked up the Yolo County Fair award.
I thought quickly. “Sure. I—I guess I was wondering why you didn’t call the police in to look for your husband. You must have noticed he was missing.”
“I suppose the day just flew by.” She twinkled at me. “May I ask who does your hair? It’s quite striking.”
“Uh, thanks.” I edged toward the door, then had a thought. “I heard Mr. Williams was pretty good at keeping an eye on things in the neighborhood. Why didn’t he notice the stuff that happened next door over the weekend? Somebody digging in the flower bed, that sort of thing?”
She smiled sweetly, then smashed the picture frame against the corner of the mantel. “It was Saturday, dear.”
“Saturday?”
“The third Saturday this month, to be specific. Leonard was always dead to the world after we—”
“So sorry for your loss,” I gasped. Then I escaped out the door.
—
I steered down through Campus Heights and turned south, vowing to leave the investigation to the professionals. I wanted to forget Mrs. Williams, her husband’s prized begonias dying in a heap, her eyes burning with fervor as she smashed frame after frame of his achievements. Was that what forty years of marriage amounted to?
A City of Arlinda road crew was trimming trees by the side of the road. My good intentions went to the curb, and so did I.
A burly crew boss in a hard hat strolled over, taking his time. “Lady, you can’t park here.”
“I’m looking for Cole Woods. Is he working today?”
He gave me a level stare. “You a lawyer or something?”
“Hell, no. Do I look like one?”
He shrugged. “Hard to tell these days. Last person who just happened to be looking for Cole served him with papers.”
“That’s pretty low.”
He pulled out a cigarette and tapped it on the clipboard he was holding. “You might find him up on Bertoli Lane or thereabouts. Street crew.”
I thanked him and drove off, thinking that it seemed too soon for Woods to be back at work, even though he and Marian were on the outs. It didn’t speak of overwhelming grief.
I took West Road past the shell of the particleboard plant, a decaying warehouse covered in peeling yellow paint. West ran through the watershed of Jennings Creek, crossing under the 101 and curving around to the north end of town, where the fast-food joints and the big-name hotels were relegated. Arlinda liked to keep things local.
I turned left on Bertoli and started watching for the street-maintenance truck. Just past the shopping center, I spotted it, a white Chevy with the city logo on the door and stacks of orange traffic cones in the bed. A man in a yellow safety vest was tamping down a sticky mound of asphalt, while a second man sat in the truck with the driver’s door hanging open, talking on his cell. I pulled in behind them and hopped out.
“Are you Cole?” I asked the man in the truck.
He pointed silently to his partner, who had ceased work and was leaning on the tamping tool. He was a big guy, over six feet and heavyset, wearing canvas work pants and a short-sleeved tan shirt. His face was ruddy from exposure, and as I approached he wiped moisture from his upper lip. “What can I do for you?” he said.
“My name’s Sam Turner. I’m the one who found your—who found Marian.”
“You’re the real estate agent?”
“That’s right. Home Sweet Home Realty.”
He pointed a finger at me. “Sweet. That’s the guy they arrested. I saw it in today’s paper.”
“They’ve made a mistake.”
“Not from my point of view.” He left the tamper where it was and strolled to the truck. I followed on his heels. “You mind if I ask you a couple questions?”
“I get paid by the hour. Shoot.” He filled a shovel with crumbly black asphalt and carried it back to the pothole, which was two feet across and shaped like Montana.
“Were you and Marian splitting up?”
He dropped the asphalt into the hole and spread it around with the tip of the shovel. “Doesn’t take a genius to figure that out. We’d lived apart for more than a year.”
“She left you?”
He gave me a lev
el stare. “I guess five years was her limit. She cleaned out our accounts and didn’t leave a forwarding address.”
I watched as he tamped down his work with the flat face of the tool. “You must have been pretty angry.”
“Not really. I believe in karma. What goes around comes around.”
I felt a little chilled. “I met your son yesterday.”
The whisper of menace vanished and he smiled. “You know Neville? He’s the one who taught me about karma. Good kid.” He did a little more tamping, then said idly, “In case you’re wondering, I was out of town last weekend. Didn’t get back until late Sunday. So I guess Marian did leave me something in the end.”
“What’s that?”
He smiled again. “An alibi.” He hoisted the two tools over his shoulder and called to his partner, “Let’s break for lunch.”
I glanced down at the pothole. It was still inches deep in places, and seemed like it could use a few more shovelfuls of goop. “Aren’t you going to top this one off?” I asked, thinking of my shocks.
“Job security,” he said. “Gives us something to do next year.”
—
I stopped at the hipster grocery for a tub of blueberry yogurt and a diet soda, passing up the array of luscious confections in aisle three. Talk about willpower. That, at least, would impress Stacy—not that it was my goal in life to impress her. I thought about my hair, and wondered how soon Steve could undo the damage. Maybe I could swing by after my trip to Grovedale. I wasn’t sure what kept me coming back to Steve’s. It certainly wasn’t his professional skill, or his peculiar brand of weed-infused wisdom. At least, I didn’t think so.
As I stood in line wondering if I should add a bag of chips to my glorious repast, the customer in front of me half turned, and I realized I’d been staring at the broad shoulders of Russell Wellburn, Liberty Financial. I tapped him on the back, and he looked around. “Hey, Russell.”
“Sam. Nice to see you again. How’s the real estate business?”
“I suppose it’s been better.”
Was it possible he hadn’t heard that Home Sweet Home had lost its license? If so, he was the only one in town who hadn’t. Then again, he looked dazed, as if he were going through the motions of day-to-day life without truly living them.
As I searched for something neutral to say that wouldn’t cause him to burst into tears, I suddenly remembered Russell’s name scrawled in the guest book at Distant Horizons. Coupled with that was a fragment of our conversation at the seminar. A little bell went off in my head.
“What was your great-grandmother’s last name?” I asked abruptly.
I might have asked him to strip off all his clothes right there at the register, so shocked was his expression. “What did you say?”
I plowed on, disregarding his finer feelings. “Your great-grandmother. Was she a Wellburn, too? Amelia, right?”
“Aurora.” He edged away from me, placing his purchases on the conveyor belt.
“Russell, come on. This is important.”
“I don’t have to talk to you.” He drew out his wallet and handed a bill to the cashier.
“I’m not trying to steal your security information or anything. I just really need to know. Can we talk a minute?”
“I need to get back to the office.” He snatched up his bag of groceries and prepared to flee.
I grabbed his sleeve. “How about later today?”
“I’m busy. All day. And I’m meeting a client for drinks after work.”
He shook off my hand and hurried away, leaving me baffled and frustrated. The clerk cleared her throat, and I hastily paid for my items. When I got to the parking lot, there was no sign of Russell.
I climbed aboard the VW, sensing I’d missed something important. As I balanced my yogurt on the dashboard, my phone rang. A Grovedale number. I punched a button and said, “Hello?”
“Sam, don’t hang up.”
“You son of a bitch.” My fingers curled tight around the phone. “I told you—”
“Sam, I’m in jail.”
I held the phone away from my ear and took a few deep breaths. When I brought it back, Wayne was still talking.
“—raided the house and arrested everyone. It wasn’t my fault.”
“It never is. Listen, I have to be somewhere.”
“Wait! This is the only chance I got to talk to you. I need you to bail me out.”
I gave a bark of laughter. “You’ve got to be kidding.”
“Sam, listen. They knocked the charges down from intent to sell to misdemeanor possession. I got it all worked out with a bail bondsman on Fifth Street. But I was short on cash. He needs ten percent.”
“How short?”
“Two hundred.”
“Screw that. Enjoy your stay. Hope you make lots of burly new friends.”
“If I don’t get out today, I can’t get my rent to Mama Jean. She’ll put my shit on the curb and I’ll lose my place. I got another job lined up. No more trimming, I swear. But I need a place to live in order to get it together.”
“There’s no way I’m giving you a dime.”
“You know I’m good for it.”
“I don’t know any such thing.”
“C’mon, Sam. Give me chance. I need to get things straight with Max. So he doesn’t think—”
“That you blew him off? Like you did all his life? Why would he think that?”
There was a long silence. Finally I said, “For God’s sake. Which bondsman?”
“You’re a peach. ABC Bonds, across from the courthouse. Ask for Mort.”
I hung up, pulling at my striped hair and chastising myself for giving Wayne the benefit of the doubt. I had business at the courthouse anyway. But I had a feeling I could kiss that two hundred bucks goodbye.
Chapter 28
I made a stop at the bank, then rolled on to Grovedale, figuring I’d take care of the bond business before attending Everett’s bail hearing. Maybe I could testify as a character witness, extolling his upstanding qualities and low flight risk. Not to mention the fact that he was my employer and I needed my job back.
I was halfway between Arlinda and Grovedale when my phone rang again. Well, wasn’t I Ms. Popularity today. I yanked on the wheel and rattled into the breakdown lane, picking up just before the call went to voicemail. “Hello?”
“Miss Turner?” The voice was faintly familiar, but I couldn’t place it.
“Yes? Can I help you?”
There was a pause. “This is Harold. Harold Hilstrom from Distant Horizons Family Cremation. We met—”
“Yesterday. Of course. How are you?” A thin tenor had taken the place of his sepulchral undertaker’s voice. No wonder it hadn’t registered.
“Do you have a moment?”
“Sure.” With one hand on the wheel, I steered the bus forward until I could turn into the eucalyptus-lined entrance of the Baywater Industrial Park, where I pulled onto the gravel and shut off the engine. Then I waited.
“I may have some information for you,” he said at last. “But I’m hoping you can…can give me some in return.”
“About the—”
“That woman. The one you inquired about the other day.”
“The redhead?”
A pause. “She was here.”
I took a fresh grip on the phone. “When?”
“I don’t recall, exactly.” Something in his intonation told me he did recall, right down to the second. “A few weeks ago, I suppose. I saw her picture in yesterday’s Dispatch. She’s—”
“Dead. I know.” Only too well.
There was another uncomfortable silence. “I didn’t see any harm in it.”
I blinked. “Harm in what?”
“Showing her around. You have to understand, Miss Turner, that my work, while deeply gratifying, can be lonely. Very lonely. Most days I work in isolation, with limited human contact. Except for my customers.”
“And they’re not very talkative.”
“I was referring to the families. But even then I have to maintain a proper professional reserve. Martha—Marian, I suppose I should say—took such an interest. She was fascinated by what I was able to tell her about funerary customs throughout the ages.”
I bet. “Let me guess. You gave her the backstage tour. Including the Easy-Bake oven.”
“I don’t appreciate your facetiousness.”
“Sorry. Go on. Tell me what happened.”
He breathed heavily into the phone. “She said she’d always wanted to see in person how a premier facility operated. I found her open-mindedness most refreshing.” His voice fell several decibels, into undertaker range. “You might be surprised to learn, Miss Turner, that many people regard the necessary and, yes, even noble functions of my profession with a degree of distaste. Miss Watts was different. She was altogether a fascinating creature.”
I rolled my eyes. “How’d she talk you into leaving her alone in the back?”
“It wasn’t like that at all. I would certainly never leave a—a layperson unsupervised in the furnace area, except under the most extraordinary circumstances.”
“Such as…”
I could sense him fumbling for words that didn’t make him look like a patsy. “I was scarcely gone a minute. The heat of the work area can be quite distressing for those not accustomed to its intensity. In fact, she had to take my arm, she felt so faint. I escorted her to a chair and went out front to get a glass of water.”
“Oh, for God’s sake.”
“She was so pretty,” he said.
I pulled at my hair. “Harold, you should be talking to the police, not to me.”
“You don’t understand. It isn’t a police matter.”
“Of course it is! The woman’s been murdered, for crying out loud.”
“That has nothing to do with my, er, situation.”
“Okay. So what makes you think I can help with your situation?”
Silence again, though I could hear his labored breathing over the airwaves. “I formed the impression during your visit that you might know the whereabouts of a…certain item. One that disappeared from my workroom. I need to recover it.”
A Killer Location Page 17