“All his business records, all his finances, his contracts, his whatever, were in those filing cabinets.”
“So he set fire to the whole shebang?”
Kitty shrugged. “Cheaper than renting a shredder, I suppose.”
Rosa nodded and looked at her watch. “Okay for now,” she said. “I have to write up my report. Can you two come to my office this afternoon at four? I want to get a statement from each of you.”
Kitty said, “We’re busy this afternoon.”
I said, “We’ll see you there.”
Before we got back in Kitty’s car I took a closer look at the Mercedes parked in front of it. I’d seen that car before. And I’d seen the clothes tossed in the back seat, too. Those jackass slacks.
“What’s that smell?” Kitty asked, standing behind the Mercedes. “Something stinks. Like, bad.”
“You don’t mean the smoke?”
“No. I don’t mean the smoke. Like gag me.”
I rushed back across the parking lot and walked right past the upright Buick into the building. Rose turned around and raised her eyebrow at me.
“You’d better come have a look in the trunk of the blue Mercedes parked on the street,” I told her. “And bring—”
My voice started to choke on a torrent of saliva.
“What?” Rosa snapped. “Guy, what? Bring what?”
“Bring along some of that mentholatum stuff for your nose.”
She nodded. “Let’s go,” she said. On our way out of the building she gestured to the cop, and he joined us as we trotted across the parking lot. When we got to the Mercedes Rosa wrinkled her nose and asked the cop, “Can you get that open for us, Clarence?”
“No prob. Be right back.” Clarence trotted across the lot to his squad car, then returned toting a tool kit. He squatted behind the car and got to work.
The trunk popped open and Rosa and Clarence peered inside, wearing expressions of curious revulsion. “What would you say, Clarence? A week?”
“Five days, at least.”
I turned away, holding my nose, in time to watch Kitty vomiting on the curb.
***
It took a lot of persuasion, but I finally got Kitty to change into long pants and a grown-up blouse and go with me to Rosa’s office at four. I convinced her to think of Rosa as an ally in our search for Herndon and Gracie. I wasn’t convinced myself of that, but it was the only straw I could see to grasp.
“Welcome,” Rosa said when we walked through her office door. “Thanks for coming. We have some stuff to discuss.”
“Marburger?” I asked. “In the trunk of his car?”
“Yes, that, for one. What was all that about? Don’t bullshit me now, Guy. I’m tired of secrets, and it seems to me you know more than I do. Let me repeat: I’m tired of secrets. What was Fritz Marburger doing in Ventura, outside Roger Herndon’s studio?”
“If I tell you—”
“Shut up and talk.”
“Marburger knew what Herndon was up to,” I said. “When I talked to Marburger in Rancho Mirage, he told me he was looking for Herndon, because Herndon owed him a lot of money. They were in bed together on a scam publishing operation, and Herndon had collected over half a million dollars. Marburger was afraid Herndon was skipping town with his share. Which, as it turns out, may have happened for all we know. In any case, Herndon doesn’t have to share with anybody, as of five days ago, at least.”
“Okay, tell me about this scam operation they had. What do you know about that? Were you involved?”
“How about you answer a question or two for us first?” I asked. “I think that’s fair.”
“Such as?”
Kitty walked right across the office, leaned forward, and put her fists on Rosa’s cluttered desk. “You know where they are? Roger and Gracie?”
Rosa smiled at her. “I don’t know where Roger Herndon is exactly,” she replied. “He was last seen—”
“Where’s Gracie?”
“Sit down, Miss Katz. You too, Guy. Just listen for a few minutes, okay?”
Kitty and I both sat on metal folding chairs and Rosa said, “Thank you.” She smiled again at Kitty. “Let me start with Herndon,” she said.
Kitty nodded.
“He flew out of LAX this morning at four twenty-two, American Airlines,” Rosa continued. “It was a nonstop flight for Miami, Florida, and it arrived on time. We don’t know his exact whereabouts at present, but we can assume he’s someplace in or near Miami. The local authorities have been informed, and we’ve got people checking hotels and car rentals. That’s the best I can give you on him.”
I could see that Kitty’s face was about to go Medusa on us, so I asked the question for her: “Was Grace Worth on the plane with Herndon?”
Rosa took her time, then answered, “No. Grace Worth is in the Los Angeles County Jail. She is being held without bail, awaiting arraignment, which is scheduled for Wednesday, October eighteenth.”
“What?” Kitty cried. “What are you talking about?”
“Miss Worth was apprehended at LAX. She was found to be traveling with an invalid United States passport, and she was carrying about five thousand dollars’ worth of cocaine. Her ticket was for Miami also.”
Kitty broke into tears. I rose from my chair and rushed to her side and put an arm about her shoulders, but she gave me a violent shrug that sent me back where I’d come from. I was stunned; she was clearly heartbroken.
When she regained her composure, she asked, “And that fucker Roger just got on the plane and left her there?”
Rosa shook her head. “They weren’t traveling together, Kitty. She was arrested yesterday about noon. I only just found out about it when I came back to the office and checked with Missing Persons. They had the arrest on the computer. Then I checked with the jail and found out she had intended to go to Florida, so I checked with the airlines and found out that Roger Herndon flew to Florida this morning, as I said. Grace has been in custody since early yesterday afternoon, which is lucky for her in one sense.”
“Why’s that?” I asked.
“It’s a pretty good alibi,” Rosa answered. “She obviously didn’t set that fire in Ventura.”
Kitty rose to her feet and started pacing. “When can I see her?” she asked. Her voice was loud and brittle.
“Visiting hours are two to four p.m. You can see her tomorrow.”
“And you don’t know where the asshole is, you say?”
“We’re working on that. Of course any tips you might have for us—”
“I got no idea,” Kitty said, once more. “No idea whatsoever. Guy, I’m out of here. See you back at my place.”
With that she left, and Rosa asked me, “Do you believe her? What’s she hiding?”
“She’s hiding a broken heart,” I said. “Not very well, either.”
“We’ll need more information from her when she calms down. Meanwhile, what’s this scam Herndon and Marburger were operating? Sit down, Guy. Let’s have it.”
So I sat and gave Rosa Macdonald a lesson in the business of Print On Demand.
Chapter Twenty
Late the next morning I took Kitty to Sambo’s on the beach for breakfast. We had been up long into the night, making huge plans. Plans for her, plans for me.
Then we had gone to bed together, but this time we were both more realistic about what we really wanted from each other, and after a brief hug that meant nothing more than good-night, we slept. At least I slept. Kitty twitched a lot, and once when I woke up to pee I found her sitting on the edge of the bed weeping. But she shrugged me away when I put a hand on her shoulder, and in the morning she was, or at least she appeared, alert and as ready as ever to keep her quest going.
We sat across the table from each other, sipping our coffee and waiting for our short stacks and tiger butter.
“So,” I said. “You still up for it? You’re really going to do this trip?”
&nbs
p; She nodded. “You?”
“I have to,” I answered. “Can’t just sit around Santa Barbara.”
Kitty said, “What’s taking them so long with our pancakes?”
I shrugged and said, “I guess I just want to take a trip. I’m out of work at the moment. How about you? Your trip is going to be a whole lot scarier. Why do you want to do it?”
“I don’t know yet. I’ll know better this afternoon. But I want to. Why won’t you come with me, Guy? Aren’t you supposed to take care of me?”
“I would if you’d wait till I get back from my own trip. It will only be a few days.”
“Forget it. I’m leaving tomorrow. I don’t need a bodyguard.”
“So you’re going down to L.A. this afternoon?”
“I’m going to have to haul ass. I want to be there at two sharp. I’ll leave here about eleven-thirty, if they ever bring us our food, and I’ll stop at In ’n Out for lunch. You want to come?”
“No. There’s a lot of stuff I have to do here. Why don’t you come pick me up at the office when you get back to town. I’ll get my travel agent to make all your arrangements.”
“You sure you can afford this?” she asked.
“What’s money for?”
“Here comes our breakfast.”
***
After breakfast I dropped Kitty off and drove over to Carol’s house, where a Halliday Realty sign was planted in the front yard. I parked my car in Carol’s garage. There was nothing left for me in the house. My suitcases were now at Kitty’s place, and my books and the remaining fragments of my business were at the office. I wouldn’t need the car for a while.
From there I walked to work, through the sweet flowered streets of Santa Barbara’s East Side. Amazing to live in a place where the streets are flowered even in October, even with the first nip of fall in the air. The air felt fresh and alive, with a hint of the ocean in its scent, and the sky beyond the glimmering fronds of the tall, dancing palms was dazzling blue. How could Carol want to leave a town like this, I wondered.
Unless of course you stopped to notice the condos going up on nearly every block. The price of the cars parked on the street. The For Sale signs. The renovations and reconstructions. More and more of them as I got closer and closer to State Street.
The traffic on State Street.
But still—the palm trees, the flowers!
***
When I got to the office I sat down at my desk and made a list. I wrote a check to my office landlord to pay for another month, and I put it in outgoing mail. Then I lifted the phone and called the police department and asked for Rosa Macdonald.
“Good morning, Guy. How’s Kitty doing?”
“She’s better, thanks. She’s going down to see Gracie this afternoon.”
“Good. If she learns anything about where the suspect is, I hope she’ll call me. Or come to the office.”
“So how are you, Rosa?”
“I’m okay. What can I do for you?”
“I’m going away for a few days, and I want to know if you think my office is going to be safe. I mean is it more or less likely to get broken into now that there’s a plywood door? I don’t think my landlord’s likely to get the door and lock replaced while I’m away. What do you think?”
“You’re probably less likely to get hit with a plywood door, is my guess,” she answered. “At least you can’t break plywood as easy as glass. Where are you going?”
“You don’t still have any surveillance on the building, I suppose?”
“No, Guy. Where are you going?”
“Well, I guess it’s not very likely Herndon would come all the way from Miami to break in again.”
“Herndon?” she answered. “Guy, it wasn’t Roger Herndon who broke into your office.”
“No? I’ve got two enemies?”
“I don’t know how many enemies you have,” she said. “But that wasn’t Herndon. Why would he do that?”
“Because he’s psycho?” I offered.
“He may be psycho, but he’s not stupid. No, that was a young man named, let’s see…Skip Webber. Transient. Talk about psycho. He was picked up two nights ago after he smashed in the front window of Earthling Books. He’d hit the Book Den the night before. Skip has a thing for books, it appears.”
“How do you know—”
“Prints match. And we have a signed confession. All three jobs.”
“You knew this and didn’t tell me?” I said. “Rosa, why?”
“I was going to call you today, as a matter of fact. You’re on my list. But this really isn’t my department. Skip Webber’s no arsonist, just a gentle soul practicing random chaos and senseless acts of violence. He’ll be all right if we can get him back on his meds.”
“I guess I’m relieved,” I said.
“Tell me something, Guy,” Rosa said. “Where are you off to for the next few days? You’re not going to do anything stupid, are you?”
“Maybe it’s stupid,” I said. “I don’t know if it’s stupid. I thought I’d go up to Jefferson City and try to patch things up with Carol. See if she can still stand me.”
“You sound conflicted.”
“My heart’s stuck in a Cuisinart,” I said. “I don’t know if she’ll be kind enough to turn it off, since I’m the one who turned it on. Does that make sense?”
“No, but I wish you luck,” Rosa said. “Tell Kitty to call me.”
***
I called my travel agent and made reservations for Kitty and reservations for myself. Then I went to the Sojourner for lunch, then over to the P.O., then back to the office.
I spent the entire afternoon typing into my Macintosh a complete list of my Post-War Western American poets. My first editions. Friends to the end, some of whom had been with me for twenty-five years. Each one had a story. I copied down all the information I had written on 3x5 index cards: title, author, publisher, date of publication, binding, edition number, limitation on the edition, present condition, and whether and how the book was autographed.
I set the list up in twelve-point Baskerville with fourteen-point leading. Then I designed a cover sheet:
Modern Poets of the American West
The Guy Mallon Collection
Guy Mallon Books
Santa Barbara, California
Contact:
I checked my watch: five-fifteen. Kitty would be back from Los Angeles soon. I held my breath and lifted the phone again.
“Scarecrow Books, may I help you?”
“Carol, is that you?”
“This is Carol, may I—Guy!”
“Hi, Carol. How’s the book business?”
“Guy, where are you?”
“I’m in my office,” I answered.
“Oh, Guy, I wish you were here. So much!”
“I know what you mean,” I answered.
“Now you’re trying to make me feel guilty,” she said.
“No, listen—”
“Guy, I’ve found my true home. I’m not going to give that up and go back to Santa Barbara just because I feel sorry for you.”
“Right. So how are you?” I asked.
“Good,” she answered. “A little lonely, I guess. But I still love it up here, Guy. More every day.”
“Well, your house in Santa Barbara is on the market,” I said.
“I know. Vance called me. Thanks for setting that up. Where are you staying?”
“And our business partnership is in the process of being dissolved. Channing will be sending you something to sign.”
“He already has,” Carol said. “It’s in the mail, back to him. I really appreciate your help, Guy, and be sure Channing sends his bill to me, not you.”
“Now I have a favor I want to ask of you,” I said.
“Anything, Guy. You know that. Anything.”
“You’re in the book business, right? The antiquarian book business?”
“Is th
is a trick question? You know I am.”
“Carol, I want you to see if you can find a buyer for my poetry collection. The Post-War Western—”
“Guy, no!”
“It should be pretty easy to move,” I said. “I’d like to keep the collection together, but if you have to sell the books off to cherry pickers, that would be okay I guess.”
“What the hell is this all about, Guy Mallon?”
“Carol Murphy, I need the money,” I answered. “That should be obvious.”
“What are you talking about?”
“The last time we had that collection appraised, back when we took out that loan, it was valued at sixty thousand. But that was a bank appraisal, so you should be able to do better. You should be able to move it for seventy, maybe seventy-five, keep a commission—”
“Don’t be a fool, Guy.”
“You won’t do it for me?”
“I will if you really want me to. I mean, don’t be a fool about me taking a commission. I’d never do that. But I wish you weren’t selling those wonderful books!”
“Yeah, well.”
“Really, Guy, isn’t there some other way we can—”
“It’s not a matter of we, Carol.”
“Okay.” Her voice was beginning to fall apart.
“I’ve written a complete list, annotated,” I told her. “I’ll bring it to you.”
“Bring it? Oh, Guy—”
“Mail it, I mean.” Just like that I changed my travel plans. If talking on the phone was so difficult, I knew I’d never be able to handle a face-to-face. “Make any deal that sounds good. Go ahead and finalize the best deal you can find. You don’t need me to okay the terms or the buyer. I’ll put that in my cover letter. You won’t be able to reach me anyway. I’ll be out of town for the next couple of weeks.”
“Where are you going?” she asked. Her voice was now soft and high-pitched, the voice of a sad little girl.
Plan B.
“Honduras,” I told her.
“Get serious.”
“I’m serious.”
“Skipping town?”
“You did.”
“Okay,” she said quietly. “I’ll sell your books. Don’t worry, I’ll get a good price. Have a nice trip. Bye.”
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