by April Smith
“Sharp knife.”
“I don’t have any sharp knives.”
We were sitting at the glass dining table. Glass wasn’t such a good idea, but I liked the bamboo legs. He pulled a ring of keys out of his pocket, including a contraption that fanned out like a geometric puzzle into screwdrivers and ice picks, featuring an impressive blade.
“Surgical steel.”
He then folded each tool back with a meticulousness that reminded me of the way he ordered the pruning shears. Andrew had a talent for mechanical things.
“What’s the program?” he asked.
“Rick thinks it’s time to polygraph the parents.”
“Cool. I’m going to walk the Promenade. Canvas the merchants again.”
“I’ve assigned an agent to do that,” I told him.
“My job.”
“I think it should be one of our guys.”
He looked up from mixing salsa with the eggs. “What is this, pulling rank?”
“I just know Rick is going to want it covered.”
“Do what you need to do. I’m going to look for the transient, Willie John Black.”
“What for?”
“Take him in for a composite.”
“Good idea. If you want to know what they look like on Mars.”
“He’s been helpful to me in the past. You can’t discount everything he says. A social services guy told me they can be lucid. Their delusions are a defense.”
“Against what?”
“Whatever their personal terror might be.”
We were picking up the dishes. “Andrew, why? I need you at the Meyer-Murphys’. You know they’re going to freak about the polygraph.”
“You can handle the M&Ms,” Andrew said, “and besides”—he leaned back against the sink and drew me close—“I have to ask you something. Do I have safe passage?”
“You have safe passage.”
“It’s a favor.”
Sighing hugely, “Okay, what do you need?”
He laughed. “You sound like my lieutenant. Only he’s nicer.”
“I’m nice.”
We were nuzzling.
“Yes, you are.”
“What kind of favor?”
“I’m a little short right now, and some unexpected things came up. Do you think you could loan me nine hundred bucks?” Then before I could answer he winced self-consciously and added, “It’s for the Harley.”
He might as well have said it was for a poor starving child in India since that is how he felt about the stupid bike. He worked on it every weekend; he did the Love Ride to Lake Castaic every year.
I knew all that, and yet sometimes you see a vision of the person as he was or will become. In Andrew’s pleading eyes there begged a young boy in the shade garden of the home of his adoptive parents, a pretty place, and yet he is unsure about the ground on which he stands. Something is unstable in his world, something he cannot trust, as basic as his name. He wants this thing so desperately, whatever it is, a little toy car, so he can hold it in his fist and it will tell him who he is. Worthy. Powerful. Comforted. Strong. And loved. Oh give it to him. I know how it feels to ask.
Lynn Meyer-Murphy was sitting cross-legged on the kitchen floor, wearing the same track pants and sweater she had on since Day One, surrounded by pots and everything else she had taken out of the lower cabinets. Grocery bags were stuffed with mismatched plastic containers and grimy shelf paper.
“Good morning, ma’am.”
She turned and I almost flinched. Bright half-moons of scaly pink skin had popped up at the sides of her mouth like a horrible clown grin.
“Any news?”
I shook my head. “But we need to talk. I asked Special Agent Shaw to get your husband.”
Eunice Shaw was one of the most grounded people I have known. She had a light about her and spoke and moved in her own time. She was a churchgoing Baptist from Georgia, and even though her hair was straightened and rolled under, circa the civil rights movement, and even though she always wore a dress, even the bad guys wouldn’t dis Miss Eunice. She had iron poise. Because of this, she was a born negotiator and an almost religious presence for those, like the Meyer-Murphys, whose suffering had brought them to their knees.
Lynn’s fingers were massaging the inflammation. It looked itchy and mean. “Stress,” she explained. “Last time I had it this bad was my wedding day. What does that tell you?”
I smiled empathetically while rehearsing how to best inform the parents that they were now under suspicion in the disappearance of their child. Juliana had vanished too completely, with too few leads, for too long a time not to suspect foul play close to home; to consider the case a possible homicide.
“Why do I need this?” Lynn pushed a muffin tin into one of the garbage bags. “But Juliana likes popovers.” She pulled it out again. “Not that I ever make popovers.”
She sat there with the muffin tin on her lap.
Eunice appeared in the doorway with Ross Murphy. He looked like an eighty-year-old man who just had open-heart surgery.
“Did you get that bastard David Yi?”
“I told you, Mr. Yi is no longer a suspect.”
“He has friends,” Ross insisted. “Friends in prison, have you ever heard of that? It’s that bastard Yi. He calls again, you better not let me on the phone!”
An eighty-year-old man waving small weak fists. All puffed up because he was helpless.
I took a breath. “Folks, my supervisor has asked me to bring you in for a polygraph today.” When they looked blank I added, “A lie detector test.”
“Us?”
Eunice left the room to answer her Nextel.
“Standard operating procedure for anyone who might have come in contact with Juliana in the days before she went missing.”
“Bullshit,” said Ross, “and I resent the implication.”
“Oh Ross,” snapped his wife, “it’s the real world.”
“Don’t I know it. Doesn’t get realer than this. We’re her parents,” he exploded. “We love her! Okay, yes, people chop up their children and put them in concrete. Did we? No. Are we dying here? What the hell do you think?”
Lynn was staring at the muffin tin.
“I know you’ve been through it. But we have to ask the tough questions and there is no question we will not ask, and nobody who will not be scrutinized.”
“We have no problemo taking your test,” Ross hissed, “because we have nothing to hide, but what really pisses me off is the fact that I gave you the guy. David Yi. Why doesn’t anyone listen to me?”
“You’re a broken record,” murmured his wife in a monotone.
“Hold it,” I said. “Everybody take a deep breath.”
Lynn had covered her ears with her hands. They were trembling. Then, in slow motion, she keeled over.
“Lynn?”
Sitting cross-legged, she had folded forward until her forehead pressed the floor, as if assuming some kind of yoga position.
Her husband said, “Are you all right?”
“No test.”
“What?”
“No reason,” she mumbled.
I had to get down on my hands and knees to hear. We looked like two mental patients with ears to the ground, listening for Indian hoofbeats.
“Can you speak a little more clearly?”
Her nose was squashed against the oak flooring. “I should have told you before. I’m sorry I was not forthcoming, but I tried to believe it wasn’t true. I didn’t want it to be true, but now I’m so afraid because Juliana’s still not home.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Ross cried impatiently. He was bent over in a squat, hands on kneecaps, head cocked toward his wife.
“Eunice!” I wanted a witness. “Take it easy, Mrs. Meyer-Murphy—”
“I had an affair!” Lynn sobbed quietly. “I had an affair in Milan, with a buyer from Nordstrom.”
Ross closed his eyes and shook his head with a look of perverse
satisfaction, as if he had always known this punishment would come to him.
“He took my baby!” Lynn was now convulsed with tears. “Oh my God,” she kept saying. “Oh my God, oh my God.”
Eunice was back, hooking the cell phone on her belt. She took in the scene with a knowing sigh.
“Why would this man kidnap Juliana?” I was asking.
“He was very, very angry with me—”
“Why, honey?” Eunice crooned. “How could he be that angry he would take your child?”
“Because he’s mean, and possessive, and I ended the relationship.”
“You ended the relationship?”
“I sent his underwear to his wife.”
“Who is this?” demanded Ross. “Who are you talking about? Is this Ed Hobart?”
Lynn’s whole face went crimson, and she was making coughing, barking sounds. Eunice and I were kneeling beside her and speaking soothingly, but it was impossible to unfold her from that repentant pose. Her body was like locked steel. Where was Andrew with his melting embrace?
“It’s Hobart,” said Ross with a tight, tight smile. “Head of the whole wonderful overseas Nordstrom operation. Good. Good choice. Go fuck Hobart. I guess there’s no need for the loser anymore.”
He straightened up and left. A door slammed. Eunice and I exchanged a look and she darted after him.
“Tell us about this man and we will check him out.”
“He lives in Seattle,” Lynn gasped, “but he comes down here all the time. Oh, what if he has Juliana? All I can think about are terrible, awful, horrible things—”
“Ana!” Eunice interrupted sharply. “We have a situation. Dad locked himself in the powder room.”
“You must think we’re a bunch of lunatics,” sniffled Lynn.
I dragged her to her feet and into the foyer with the hat rack and the pile of Rollerblades beneath it and a small Oriental rug.
“Is there a window? What’s in there?”
“I don’t know,” she whimpered. “Bathroom stuff.”
“Ross.” I banged on the door. “What’s going on?”
“Ross!” called Lynn hoarsely. “Come out.”
I heard the toilet flushing.
“You all right, buddy?”
No answer.
“Talk to me, Ross. Or I’m going to have to come in there to make sure you’re all right.”
“Screw you!”
“Listen to me. We’re making progress—”
“You don’t know what the fuck is going on. You don’t know if my daughter is alive.”
“We don’t have anything that says she’s not alive.”
Silence.
“Let’s come out and talk about it, Ross.” Nothing. “You’ll work this through with your wife. You’re both under a lot of stress right now—”
“I’m sorry, Ross!” Lynn cried. “I love you. I’m sorry! I never meant to hurt you, but I had to tell. I had to tell to get Juliana back. She’s the only thing that matters, please—”
“I’m tired of this bullshit. Nobody listens to me.”
“I’m listening to you,” I answered boldly. “What is bullshit, Ross? Your definition. Tell me what that is.”
“Bullshit is not getting anywhere. Bullshit is farting around and dicking around when I told you to go after Yi.”
“I hear you about Yi. What else is bullshit?”
Silence.
“Are you thinking of doing something to yourself in there, Ross? Are you thinking of committing suicide?”
“Fuck you. Fuck everybody!”
“You haven’t answered my question. Do you want to kill yourself?”
Eunice said, “I think we should call for backup. Get the guys outside—”
“I know,” I said, “but I’d rather—”
Suddenly the door flew open. My hand went to my weapon.
Eunice yelled, “Watch out!”
Lynn screamed, “Don’t shoot my husband!”
We ducked and rolled.
Ross was standing in the doorway of the bathroom, holding a gun.
“Easy! Easy!” he cried. “Don’t shoot! Jesus Christ!”
“Put the weapon down on the ground. Now.”
He put it on the ground. It was not a gun. Worse. A cell phone.
Six.
An emergency briefing was called for 5 p.m.
The Santa Monica Police Department was housed in back of City Hall, in a white Moderne building with blue trim that suggested sand and sea. The police department was in the lee of the building, away from sand and sea, looking at an overpass. If you narrowed your vision to exclude the high-rise hotels, condominiums and gangland ghettos, you might get an idea of what they saw when they built this public works project in the thirties: a sleepy little beach town sparkling with optimism in which all that would be required of the local police would be the management of drunks and theft of the occasional Packard.
They built it small and it stayed small—quaint, by today’s antiseptic standards. The vintage sixties station in Long Beach, where my grandfather, Poppy, served, looks hip by comparison, and the Bureau downright millennial, I thought, quickening my pace across the Civic Center plaza. It was four-thirty and already several Bu-cars were lined up in the lot.
The entryway held a couple of metal chairs and drawings on the wall by schoolchildren. Turn right and a brown arrow led to the holding cells. The hallway to the left was short and dully lit, lined with cases of patches and awards. Over a doorway swung the kind of lacquered wooden sign they used to have in Western movies over the saloon, only this one read Licenses. I hoped they never remodeled the place. I hoped they turned it into a museum.
As I hurried up the staircase leading to Investigations, a woman clattered right into my arms.
“Ana! All the computers went down!”
Margaret Forrester, the police liaison working with the Bureau on the kidnap, had a flair for the dramatic, but as she gripped my elbows, eyes wide, it was clear she was not kidding.
“I am in such trouble!” she stuttered. “Where is your guy?”
She was a beautiful woman, about thirty years old, with layers of glossy brown hair and a face too decorative, too perfectly formed, with its strong dark eyebrows, squarish cheekbones and egg-white skin, to belong in a police station. You had to wonder at the natural selection that produced such a striking girl from a pair of alcoholic dirt-poor Oklahoma drifters, who, according to her, literally lived in the dirt, picking apricots and peaches in the San Joaquin Valley. Nobody at the station looked like Margaret, nobody dressed like Margaret, in a well-cut camel sheath with a shawl collar, low-slung belt and suede boots. Her usual accessories were an ID tag and a water bottle. There was a tinkle about her I would later identify as seashells. She had a business on the side: fashioning natural objects into “body adornments” that she sold to stores. She often wore her own creations. That day it might have been a concoction of abalones, or Native American bracelet charms with feathers.
“Which guy are you talking about?”
“The tech. There he is—Ramon!” she called up the stairs. “Come down here, sweetheart, I’ll show you where the circuit breaker is!”
Ramon’s work boots thundered out of the dimness and he appeared, holding a flashlight.
“I think it might be under there.” Margaret indicated an unlikely hatch beneath the staircase. “But your computers are what’s causing the problem.”
“It ain’t our computers, Chiquita,” Ramon said disdainfully. “It’s your freaking wiring,” grimacing as he pried at the warped door.
“Hope you like spiders,” I called humorously.
Ramon answered with a Spanish phrase he knew I would not understand. Margaret’s hands were still somehow all over me as we chugged upstairs. But then she was all over everyone, shouting, “Congratulations! I heard Brian made the soccer team!” to a busy secretary, or giving the thumbs-up to a baffled cadet behind the desk. The waiting area was basically a wooden pew undern
eath a pot of fake begonias furry with mold, the yellowing walls smudged with finger marks, as if people had been crawling up them for decades.
Lean bicycle cops and sour overweight detectives were going in and out and Margaret had a word or a touch or a hug for each. Following in her wake was like looking through a camera in which smiling fish-eye faces loomed and fell away. The smiles were tolerant, and I wondered why. She had no experience and was no help to me. Working with the locals was tricky enough—they already resented the Feds. You hoped your contact person would be a professional, but here was an individual better suited to hostessing a martini bar.
When I said something like, “What’s with that Margaret Forrester?” Andrew responded with a sharp rebuke that Margaret Forrester was a police widow. Her husband (they called him “the Hat” because he shaved his head) had been one of Andrew’s closest buddies, an undercover narcotics detective murdered by a gang; but he had been assaulted and killed while off-duty, and therefore his pension benefits were denied. Out of compassion, and because the Forresters had two young children, the department gave Margaret this job.
“I hate spiders!” she confided. “They eat my cashmere sweaters.”
I have never owned a cashmere sweater or a new gold Lexus sedan, but Margaret Forrester had these things. They lived in a tiny cottage in the wrong part of Venice, but she would throw birthday parties for the police chief at the swank Loew’s Hotel, only the select people invited. She had been, according to the careless scuttlebutt you pick up at two in the morning, stunningly ambitious for her husband, to the point of leaking stories about his cases to the press so reporters would call and include his name. But now, according to the blue code of sacrifice, we were all supposed to cut Margaret Forrester a lot of slack.
We entered a single space where twenty investigators were jammed together. A lot of them wore telephone headpieces to block out the noise. Since they redesigned our offices I missed the camaraderie of our old bull pen, but in this arrangement you had to smell your neighbor’s aftershave all day and look at the ass end of his computer monitor slopped over your desk. In fact it was hard to see where one desk ended and another began, as they seemed to work on one square surface billowing with papers and personal clutter. The walls were brick and the window blinds maroon. It felt like we had walked into a bad TV crime show from the seventies.