The Shape of Dread

by Marcia Muller

  “That’s different. Jack’s been through it.”

  “You think I haven’t? Just because Don and I weren’t married-”

  “Ah, Shar, I know that. But you handle things. You’re…in control.”

  His words brought a sense of déjà vu. I remembered my older brother John, just after his divorce, telling me I couldn’t understand what he was going through because I was a person who “played it safe.” At the time I’d wondered if I really presented such a cold, constrained façade to others; now I wondered again.

  “Yes,” I said, “I’m in control. That’s why it took me months to break it off with Don-months that I spent drinking too much and fussing over little things so I wouldn’t have to face the real issue. That’s why I’ve holed up and avoided another relationship ever since.” Until last night.

  Hank peered at me through his smudged lenses. “I didn’t know any of that.”

  “That’s only because I’m better at hiding my emotions than you. Talk to me, Hank.”

  He drank the rest of his scotch-courage, I supposed-then said, “What it all boils down to is that I can’t live with Anne-Marie. She wants order, I create chaos. I hate sharing household chores and entertaining graciously and going out for Sunday brunch. I want to let the flat go to hell and have old friends over for a pot of my chili and sleep till noon all weekend. We’re just different, and I should have realized that and never married her.”

  “Do you still love her?”

  “Yes.”

  “Does she still love you?”

  “If she still does after New Year’s Eve, she ought to be institutionalized.”

  “What happened-besides your going to the All Souls party without her?”

  He motioned for Brian to bring him another drink. Brian looked doubtful but poured it when I nodded at him.

  “Okay,” Hank said when the drink was in front of him. “What happened was Anne-Marie invited the Andersons-the people we rent the upstairs flat to-for dinner. I wanted to be at All Souls, where we’ve always spent New Years Eve, so I left. But then I couldn’t face people, so I drank in my office.”

  “Do you remember me coming in and talking with you?”

  “Oh, yes. I remember it quite clearly now. I’m not so bad off that I’m blacking out. And I remember the rest of the evening. In hideous detail.”

  “Go on.”

  “I gave up and went home a little after midnight. Took a cab-I’m not enough of an asshole to drive in that condition. The Andersons were still there. Anne-Marie had this made-of-porcelain look she gets when she’s pissed off but trying to remain civil. I’d hoped they’d be gone so we could talk. Just seeing them there…Are you sure you want to know what a swine I am?”

  “We all behave swinishly upon occasion.”

  “Some of us more than others. Well, I started yelling at her for letting ‘those people’ in our flat. Said I was sick of them, sick of hearing about their car phones and computers and their vacation condo with the view of some golf course fairway, and their stupid, boring jobs on Montgomery Street.”

  “Oh, Lord!”

  “It gets worse. Then she started yelling at me. Said that the only reason she ever had them down to dinner was so she wouldn’t have to spend the evening arguing with me. Said that she’d only asked them for New Year’s Eve so we wouldn’t go to the All Souls party and get drunk and scream at each other in front of our real friends. Said that she found car phones and computers and condos and Montgomery Street boring, too, and besides, Bob-he’s the husband-is an ass grabber. By that time the Andersons were on their way out the door.”

  Hank’s expression was woebegone in the extreme. I, on the other hand, felt a welling up of relief. For months now Anne-Marie had avoided me, not returning my phone calls. From what I’d heard of her behavior, I’d been afraid that my friend had turned into someone I wouldn’t even want to know. But her New Year’s Eve outburst in front of the dreadful Andersons proved that the candid, unpretentious Anne-Marie of yesterday still existed.

  I said, “Well, you won’t have to worry about having them to dinner again.”

  “It gets worse.”

  “How could it?”

  “Then we really got into it. I’m sure the Andersons were upstairs with a glass pressed to the floor. Hell, they wouldn’t even have needed one. I told her I couldn’t stand living her life-style. She told me I’m a slob with the social graces of a pit bull. Then she said my chili was awful.” Hank drew himself up indignantly. One elbow slipped off the bar, and I had to steady him.

  I’d been having difficulty controlling the laughter that was building inside me. Now it rose and spilled over. The more I laughed, the more indignant Hank looked, and his expression only gave fuel to my hilarity. Finally-gasping and wiping my eyes-I said, “Hank, I don’t know about all the rest, but she’s right on one point-your chili is horrible!”

  “…You always ate it.”

  “That’s because the company was always so good.”

  He thought about that for a moment. “Anne-Marie always ate it, too. Guess my company isn’t good anymore.”

  “For the time being, probably not.”

  He knocked back half the fresh drink and said, “Do you want to hear the rest of it?”

  “There’s more?”

  “It still gets worse. She stomped off and locked me out of the bedroom. Then I threw up and passed out on the bathroom floor, sort of wrapped around the toilet. And in the morning there was an envelope from the Andersons shoved under the door. They gave thirty days’ notice. That’s when I decided I’d better stay at All Souls.”

  I leaned my forehead on my hand and groaned. Finally I said, “A nice flat like that’ll be easy to rent.”

  “It’s not keeping the flat occupied that worries me,” he said. “It’s the prospect of sleeping on the All Souls couch for the rest of my life.”

  I knew what he meant; the couch was a maroon relic of the 1930s with badly sprung springs.

  Before I could offer any optimistic comments, however, Brian signaled that I had a phone call. “We’ll talk more later,” I said to Hank and went to the end of the bar to take it.

  George’s voice came over the line-high and shaky, infused with an element that I wouldn’t have expected. As he said, “Sharon? Your assistant told me to call you here,” I heard joy-no, elation.

  “What’s happened?”

  “I just spoke with Detective Gurski. About the identification from Tracy’s dental records.”

  “I’ve been trying to get in touch-”

  “Sharon,” he said, “it wasn’t her! The body you found wasn’t Tracy’s!”

  15

  For a moment I couldn’t speak. The implications of this new development were staggering, that much I knew. But I couldn’t quite grasp them yet, couldn’t put them into words.

  “Sharon?” George said.

  “Yes, I’m here.”

  “Do you realize what this means? Tracy may be alive after all!”

  Not necessarily, I thought. And if she was, we’d be back to the monstrous thing he feared.

  George interpreted my silence correctly. “Yes, I know,” he said. “But at least there’s hope. After believing her dead-really believing, the way I did last night-I know I can handle anything.”

  “I hope so.” I thought of the pitiful collection of bones I’d found, and the tattered remnants of Tracy’s clothing. The obvious had already occurred to me, and it was extremely unpleasant.

  “Well,” I added, “this certainly changes things. I hardly know how to proceed.”

  “I wish you’d come over here, or let me come there. I’m so hyper that I feel as though I’ll come apart if I don’t see you.”

  The need and desire in his voice cut through my confusion. I glanced up and saw Jack come through the door, probably looking for Hank. He and I would have to talk right away.

  “Let me come there,” I said. “But first I have to talk this over with Bobby Foster’s attorney.
That may take a while. I’ll be there as soon as I can.”

  “I’ll be waiting.”

  I hung up the receiver and waved at Jack. He changed course and came to the end of the bar. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

  “It’s that obvious?”

  “You should see your face.”

  “Well, what’s wrong is this: the body up at the river wasn’t Tracy Kostakos.” Quickly I explained about George’s call.

  Jack’s craggy features went blank as he shifted mental gears and assimilated the news. Then he rubbed his chin and said, “Of course they have no idea who the bones do belong to.”

  “No, and the ID on that is going to be a tough one-if not impossible.”

  “Meanwhile, we’re back to square one.”

  “Not quite. We have proof that Kostakos was alive at two-ten in the morning-well after Foster confessed to killing her. And we have Barbour’s story about the car being at the cottage a week later.”

  “Sure, and it’s enough to move for a new trial, but then we’ve got the proof of Foster’s whereabouts to worry about. The parking attendants who alibied him were easily the weakest defense witnesses at his first trial. Neither presents himself in a way that exactly inspires belief. Ah, shit!” Jack slapped a hand on the bar so hard that it made the man sitting around its corner jerk.

  “Look,” I said, “why don’t we go up the hill and kick this around in private?”

  “Fine by me.” He glanced the length of the bar, to where Hank still hunched over his drink. “Is he okay?”

  “Going to be, I think.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  I waved good-bye to Hank and followed Jack outside.

  Winter darkness had settled over Mission Street. Cars, their headlights ablaze, jammed the pavement; buses and jitneys pulled up to the curb and disgorged commuters. Some hurried into the warm shelter of bars and restaurants, others went toward the nearby Safeway to pick up things for dinner. Still others trudged uphill with us, to the hodgepodge of dwellings that line Bernal Heights’ steep streets. I watched them, feeling the beginnings of the depression that often settles over me at that hour of the evening.

  At times it seems as if I’m always out of step with the world-set apart by both my temperament and my habits. On nights when people are rushing home to their families or lovers, I’m often at loose ends or about to go to work on an interview or a stakeout. While others round out their days with cocktails and dinner, TV and helping the kids with their homework, I’m likely to be chasing an elusive witness all over the city, or sitting cramped and cold in my MG in front of somebody’s apartment building.

  It isn’t that I mind my erratic schedule; it’s the only way of life that will ever really suit me. And I live for those cut-crystal moments when a difficult case finally begins to come together. But in the early evening, with the lights of other people’s residences glowing warm around me, I’m more often than not reminded of what a lonely life I’ve made for myself, and sometimes I wonder what it would have been like had I made other, more traditional choices.

  On this night, however, I was able to banish the depression quickly. I had George to think of, the touch of his hands and lips and body to anticipate. Because of the new, fragile thing between us, I had no reason to feel lonely. No reason not to expect it would grow stronger and prosper, unless this new development…

  I pushed the thought aside and followed Jack into the big brown Victorian.

  Rae and one of the attorneys sat on the couch in the living room watching the TV news; the half-denuded Christmas tree hulked in the bay window behind them. A lone industrious soul perched on a stool in the law library, the trestle table covered with books and crumpled sheets of yellow paper. Oddly enough, the kitchen was deserted. Jack and I got glasses of wine and sat down at the round oak table in front of the window. I kicked off my shoes, propped my feet on one of the extra chairs, and waited to hear his thoughts on the matter at hand.

  He began to discuss the impact of this latest development on Foster’s legal situation, weighing each factor carefully, speaking slowly and precisely. After his initial frustrated outburst at the Remedy, he had settled into a calm, professional mood, displaying the sharp insight and cool logic I’d come to expect of him. Hard to believe that this was the same man who two nights before had mooned around the New Year’s Eve party like a lovesick teenager.

  Unfortunately, what Jack concluded was that the discovery of the body had even less impact on the status of his case, now that we knew it wasn’t Tracy’s. while he still had enough evidence to move for a new trial, to bring the case before a jury in its present unresolved state would only invite another conviction. “As I’ve said before,” he added, “what we need is to find out what happened that night. And now we seem to be further than ever from that.”

  “Well, let’s look at what we’ve got, item by item,” I said. “Tracy: a pretty cold user, if we accept what she told Foster about sleeping with him for the exotic experience.”

  “Do we?”

  “I do. The sketchbook backs it up. She may have had qualms about her behavior, but they didn’t prevent her from throwing it in his face.” I made mental apologies to George for my harsh assessment of his daughter. But then, as he admitted, he hadn’t really known the woman his little girl had grown into. “Next,” I said, “we have a stolen car. That’s something that bothers me: why steal a car? I’m going to have Rae find out more about the car’s owner.”

  Jack nodded in agreement.

  “All right,” I went on, “now we have Foster’s claim that Kostakos was on her way to Emmons’s apartment that night. Truth or excuse, so she could get away from him? No way to know until the police locate Emmons.”

  “What’s the status on that?”

  “He and Barbour are missing. My fault, I’m afraid. I panicked them. But they’ll turn up. Anyway, the next thing we know is that Kostakos was driving the car in the vicinity of the Barbour cottage at two-ten the next morning. Driving badly, so perhaps she was nervous or frightened. We can safely assume that the cottage was her destination. We don’t know if anyone was with her, and it’s unlikely the officer who issued the citation will remember. We do know that the car was at the cottage a week later but that Kostakos was not.”

  “How did she leave there? From what you’ve told me, it’s a long way from the main road.”

  “It is. There aren’t too many options.” I began ticking them off on my fingers. “She hitchhiked or got a ride with someone from a neighboring cottage. But in that case, when all the publicity started, someone probably would have recognized her picture in the papers or on the news and come forward.”

  “Unless they didn’t read the papers or watch the news. Or just didn’t want to get involved.”

  “That’s possible, too. Another possibility is that someone she knew came to get her. She could have prearranged that or called from a neighbor’s. And here’s another possibility: that the person whose bones I found arrived at the cottage in a car which Kostakos later left in.”

  I paused, sipped wine, all too aware of what neither of us had yet put into words. Finally I said, “The clothing remnants I found with those bones were what Kostakos was wearing when she left Café Comedie. What they suggest to me is that the body was dressed in them after death, in an attempt to make it look like hers. The killer must have realized that the chances of it being discovered in the near future were slim, but if it ever was, the clothing would indicate that Kostakos was the one who died.”

  “Naïve, considering identification techniques.”

  “Well, Kostakos probably didn’t have too much knowledge of forensic science.”

  “You think she was the killer? Or an accessory?”

  I nodded, feeling a different kind of depression than I had earlier. For a while there I’d been caught up in the process of reasoning; now I couldn’t help but personalize the facts. If my theory was correct, the aftermath of my investigation would inflict pain and suffer
ing on the man I was beginning to care for a great deal.

  “And the victim?” Jack asked.

  “Well, someone who hasn’t been missed or had no one who cared enough to mount a full-scale search. Someone who might be expected to just pull up stakes and go.”

  “Any specific ideas?”

  “One. A waitress named Lisa McIntyre who worked at the club. She disappeared at roughly the same time Kostakos did. Larkey was concerned enough when she didn’t come to work that he sent his partner’s wife to check on her. McIntyre had moved out without notice. Larkey didn’t pursue it, because in his mind she was something of a drifter.

  “Coincidence?”

  “Could be, but I don’t like the things. Let me call Larkey.”

  I got up and followed the phone cord across the floor to where the instrument sat on the drainboard of the sink, and grabbed it up irritably. The long cords on the All Souls’s phones had annoyed me for years-both because of their tendency to tangle and the staff members’ tendency to abandon the instruments wherever they were when they hung up. Since the introduction of cordless phones, I’d been lobbying for us to buy some for our restless talkers, but so far no one had listened to me. I supposed I would indefinitely continue to follow cords, like trails of crumbs in the woods, to some highly peculiar places.

  Larkey answered the phone at Café Comedie, sounding down. “I heard about you going up to Napa to assist in the identification,” I said.

  “The least I could do. And it was a relief to know the body wasn’t Tracy’s. But Jesus, what a depressing experience. Somehow in my spotty career I’d missed out on having to do that. I hope I never have to again.”

  “I don’t blame you. Jay, I know my assistant questioned you about Lisa McIntyre earlier today, but I’d like to ask a few more things.”

  “Sure, go ahead.”

  “Did anyone come around asking about her after she left town-family or friends, for instance?”

  “Not that I know of. She hadn’t been here long enough to make close friends, and as for family, she mentioned something about having been on her own since she was fifteen. She was from Oklahoma, but I gathered she’d drifted around the country for the past ten years-Boston, New York, L.A. The usual places would-be comedians gravitate to.”