Where Echoes Live

by Marcia Muller

  “Where are you going?”

  “Bathroom. If you like, help yourself to some more brandy.” She would, too. She’d developed some pretty fancy tastes since being with … him.

  I hurried down the hall and through my informal living room and kitchen to the bathroom. Shut the door and leaned against it.

  This can’t be happening, I thought. Mothers aren’t sup- posed to up and run off with men they meet in Laundromats. Not even if the man owns the whole goddamn chain.

  How could she do this to me?

  Tears flooded my eyes. I tried to blink them back, but they came anyway.

  Now look what she’d made me do!

  This whole thing was ludicrous, unseemly. Having an affair with this man. She just wasn’t acting her age!

  Damned if I was going to let her make me cry, though.

  I switched on the light, put my hands on either side of the washbasin, and leaned in toward the mirror. It was a trick Ma had taught each of us at an early age: seeing how ridiculous you look when crying always makes you stop.

  The face that looked back at me could have been that of a squally little baby. Except its hair had a long gray streak that had been there since its teens. And there were laugh lines around its eyes. And there was a wrinkle that I’d never noticed till now….

  How could she do this to me?

  Now look what she’d made me do!

  She just wasn’t acting her age!

  She wasn’t acting her age?

  My pout vanished as laughter bubbled up. The heretofore unnoticed wrinkle on my brow smoothed. The tears stopped.

  I chuckled. Put my head back and howled with laughter.

  The door opened. Ma said, “I thought I’d find you in front of the mirror. It works every time, doesn’t it?”

  Fourteen

  I was at my desk by eight-thirty the next morning. At home in my guest room my mother slept the sleep of the righteous—something I wasn’t at all certain she was entitled to. My first act was to try to reach my father in San Diego; the phone rang a dozen times before I realized he was probably out in the garage, where there wasn’t an extension. Next I called my brother John’s number in Chula Vista, but got only the machine for the housepainting company he runs out of his apartment. No one was home at Charlene’s, either, and Ma had forbidden me to speak with my other siblings.

  This is ridiculous, I thought. In the midst of the biggest family crisis ever, there isn’t a McCone available to discuss the problem.

  Still glowering, I sipped coffee and paged through my desk calendar. I had nothing on tap until one, when I was to meet with an assistant D.A. to go over my testimony for an upcoming murder trial. As I scanned my file on the case, my somber mood deepened; it was the one I’d been working when I met George, and the facts seemed as sordid and depressing today as they had many months before. I needed no real preparation for the conference, so I quickly turned my attention to more pressing business and dialed the number of the Coalition’s trailer in Vernon. There was no answer, so I called the one next door that housed the Friends of Tufa Lake.

  Ripinsky answered. He sounded sluggish and grouchy—he was clearly not a morning person—but brightened when I identified myself. “Hope you’re calling to report something positive.”

  “Actually, only to ask a question.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “The first night I was there you mentioned you’d taken a public relations tour of the mine site and spoken with Transpacific’s supervising geologist. Was he on their staff or a consultant?”

  “Consultant. I’ve got his card here someplace. Hold on.” There was a clunk as he set the receiver down. He came back on the line about half a minute later. “Got it. His name’s Alvin K. Knight. Address on Los Palmos Drive there in San Francisco.” He read it and the phone number off.

  “Is there a company name?”

  “No, the card just says ‘mining geologist.’ Probably a one-man operation.”

  “Odd—I’d have thought Transpacific would use a large firm for a project of this size.”

  “Maybe the guy’s good, McCone.”

  “Maybe.” I hesitated. “Hy, is everything okay there?”

  “Except for the fact that Ned’s still in Sacramento and Anne-Marie is mightily pissed at him, yes.”

  “No more break-ins or ...anything?”

  “Everything’s copacetic. In fact, I’ve got so little to do that I’m thinking of closing the office and taking the day off.”

  “Where’s Anne-Marie? I tried the Coalition’s trailer, but there wasn’t any answer.”

  “At her cabin, working on the project that was interrupted when she came down here.”

  “So what you’re both doing is waiting for me.”

  “That’s about it.”

  “Well, I’ll try to come up with something soon.”

  “Do that. And keep in touch.”

  I hung up, then dialed the number of Alvin K. Knight, mining geologist. Another machine answered and took my message; sometimes I hate the cheerful efficiency of answering machines.

  There were routine tasks that had to be done—the record keeping and correspondence that are the downside of a private investigator’s job. By eleven-thirty I’d fielded five phone calls and waded through most of the paperwork. Since the calls had all been vaguely annoying, I glanced irritably at the flashing light when the sixth came through, and hit the intercom button rather than just picking up.

  “What?” I demanded.

  “And top o’ the morning to you,” Ted said.

  “Sorry. I wasn’t here for the usual Monday hassles, and Tuesday went all right, so I guess Wednesday’s out to get me.”

  “Apology accepted. It’s George—that should perk you up.”

  “Thanks.” I punched the flashing button. “Hi. Have you recovered from Ma’s visit yet?”

  “What’s to recover from? She was charming. In fact, she just called and suggested we have lunch so we can get to know each other better.”

  “What? Are you going?”

  “Sure. I don’t teach today, and I was at loose ends.”

  “Well, good. Maybe you can talk some sense into her. You know what she sprang on me last night after we got home?” I went on to tell him in considerable detail about Ma’s plans.

  When I finished he was silent for a moment. “Well, I can see where that comes as a shock.”

  “A shock? It rivaled the big quake! She’s making an awful mistake.”

  “Are you sure? From what you’ve told me about your parents, they haven’t had much of a marriage for some time now. And if she’s been seeing this Melvin for a year, it’s not a snap decision.”

  “That’s not the point, George.”

  “What is, then?”

  “… I don’t know. It’s just … Oh, hell, I don’t want to discuss it now. Where are you taking her?”

  “She hinted that she’s never been to Top of the Mark.”

  “God! I never should have told her you’ve got money.”

  “I’ve got nothing better to do with it than spend it.”

  Was that his way of telling me he had no child to leave his considerable fortune to? Or was I merely being paranoid? Quickly I said, “Well, I’ll let you go now so you won’t be late for your big date.”

  “Wish me luck.”

  “I think you’ll need it.”

  I hung up and swiveled around to stare out the bay window behind me. In spite of the sunlight and the fall color on the trees, the triangular park in front of All Souls looked drab and uninviting. Across it, the facing houses looked shabbier than usual and abandoned. Sometimes when I contemplated the view from my office window I had the eerie feeling that I was the only person left on Bernal Heights, everyone else having fled some imminent danger whose warning signs I’d failed to notice.

  Although I knew the delusion was only the product of a momentary mood, it wasn’t an isolated instance, and it seemed to come more frequently of late. Was I still
suffering from posttraumatic shock induced by the events of last summer? Or by the big earthquake? Neither seemed likely, but if one or the other wasn’t the cause, I didn’t want to speculate….

  I turned back to the desk and buzzed Rae to remind her I was buying lunch today. Her reaction to my mother’s bombshell was certain to be more satisfying than George’s, and perhaps my family crisis would further help us to bridge the chasm between us, just as laughter had the day before.

  Much of San Francisco is laid out in a grid pattern—the Avenues in the western part of the city are a good example of this—but when one ascends to the hills, all semblance of orderliness vanishes. Here the prime objective is to gain as much of a view as possible; the streets meander precipitously close to sheer drop-offs, and the precarious positioning of the houses is testimony to the marvels of modern engineering, or to man’s foolishness. It’s easy to get lost in the tangles of lanes and cul-de-sacs that crown our hills—which is exactly what I did when I went looking for Lionel Ong’s home late that afternoon.

  When I reached the street that borders Sutro Forest, an urban wilderness at the base of the rust-red futuristic communications tower, I realized I’d gone wrong, so I retraced my route and found I’d overshot Saint Germain Avenue a block below. It was narrow and short, ending in a brick retaining wall beyond which tall conifers and cypresses framed a panoramic view. The houses to the right were built high on the slope so their windows could look out over the roofs of their neighbors; those on the left—Ong’s side—were low and sprawled down the hillside.

  The Ong house was light gray, surrounded by a high wall that was actually an extension of the three-car garage. Above it I could see the spiky leaves of yucca trees and part of the house itself: a series of angular protrusions containing skylights and small windows that glinted in the late-afternoon sun. The gate was of heavy crosshatched timbers; an intercom was set into the wall next to it.

  I pressed the buzzer and identified myself to the male voice that answered. Within a few seconds the gate swung open, and I stepped into a stylized courtyard full of yucca and citrus trees; the entrance to the house was directly across it. As I approached, a man appeared, stood framed in the doorway.

  He was of medium height and slender, with thick black hair and cool appraising eyes. They sized me up as I moved toward him, then became properly welcoming and polite, as if some internal switch had kicked on, storing whatever information he’d gleaned from observing me and shifting him into a more sociable demeanor.

  “Ms. McCone.” He came forward, hand extended. “I’m Lionel Ong.”

  I shook the offered hand and followed him into a stark black marble-floored foyer. Its walls were winter white and devoid of ornamentation; the rays that fell from the central skylight did nothing to warm them. Wide sliding doors bisected the wall directly ahead of us, but they were shut.

  In attire, Ong matched the room: he wore black suit trousers; his black silk tie was loosened; the sleeves of his white shirt were rolled up a couple of turns to expose a watch with a heavy gold-link band that seemed too massive for his fine-boned wrist. The look was casual—and calculated. I sensed Ong did nothing, not even roll up his shirtsleeves, without considering what the visual effect would be.

  “You had no difficulty finding me?” he asked.

  “Some,” I admitted. “I’m not overly familiar with this area.”

  “Not many people are—that’s one of the reasons I chose it. It’s quiet, and a good place to raise my family.”

  It certainly was quiet; I couldn’t hear a sound, and none that would indicate the household contained five children.

  Ong seemed to realize what I was thinking; he smiled. “My family is in Hong Kong visiting relatives, and I’ve given my help the time off. We’ll talk in my den.” He gestured toward a wrought-iron spiral staircase that descended to the lower level.

  The room down there had a wall of plate glass opening onto a terrace that overlooked the northern sprawl of the city and the distant bay. Two other walls were covered with built-in bookcases that appeared to be constructed of white pipe trusses; more trusses with an ornamental zigzag motif supported the ceiling and railed off a balcony that looked down from the room above. The den was sparsely furnished with glass-and-chromium tables and low-slung chairs upholstered in black-and-white stripes. What struck me immediately was the absence of anything reflecting Ong’s Chinese heritage.

  He motioned for me to be seated and went to a wet bar opposite the glass wall. “Cognac?” he asked.

  I’d heard that the affluent Chinese were partial to cognac; one of the big liquor distributors had recently begun pitching a super-premium French brand especially to the Asian market. But it was something I couldn’t drink on a near-empty stomach. “Do you have anything lighter?”

  Ong nodded and produced an iced Napa Valley chardonnay from the small refrigerator. I gave it the nod and began removing my tape recorder and Cheung’s file from my briefcase. After toasting the success of our interview, Ong and I got down to business.

  Cheung’s first questions were commonplace, and Ong answered them smoothly, as if they’d been put to him many a time before. On his boyhood in Hong Kong: “I’m ashamed to admit how fortunate I was; we had servants, went to private school. My brothers and I were spoiled rotten.” On his arrival in the U.S.: “As soon as I saw San Francisco, I knew this was where I wanted to settle. It’s a lot like Hong Kong, you know—a port city built on hills. But the freedoms we enjoy here, those were the real appeal.” On his schooling at Stanford and Harvard: “Top drawer all the way. Chinese families view their offspring’s education as an investment in everyone’s future, and they invest wisely.” On the family moving the major portion of its assets out of Hong Kong: “The nineteen ninety-seven deadline hung over us like a sword. Tiananmen Square proved our fears were justified.”

  Only one of Cheung’s initial questions elicited any strong response from Ong, and its intensity startled me. I asked, “Do you attribute your family’s success to the hardships your people endured before you left China?”

  His face tensed, eyes becoming shiny black stones. He said, “I would say that the adversities my family encountered in China and elsewhere are the driving force behind our successes. They have certainly caused me to strive for greater heights.” And then he smiled ironically, as if mocking the emotion he’d allowed to crack his well-constructed facade.

  As the interview proceeded, Ong explained how Transpacific Corporation had come to diversify. “The Port of Oakland did not seem receptive to another major home-based ocean carrier at the time we looked into moving our shipping line there. San Francisco was hopeless: the port’s declined and never was suited to container cargo, since its geography prohibits a major rail network. We had to get out of shipping.”

  “So you liquidated the shipping line and moved your assets into real estate?”

  “Yes, and that was extremely lucrative for a time. But San Francisco has a problem in the commercial sector: because of rising costs we’ve had to price ourselves out of the market; companies are moving out of the city, to areas like north Marin or Contra Costa County. Again, we’ve had to diversify—to hotels and, ultimately, to resort development.”

  “The hotels came first, then.”

  “Yes. They’re still profitable, but again San Francisco has a problem: a lot of hotel rooms are sitting vacant.”

  “Why?”

  “We—local hoteliers—overbuilt in the eighties. Then there was bad press that caused tourism to decline: the AIDS epidemic, the eighty-nine quake, the severity of the homeless problem.”

  “So now you’re into resorts. Carmel Valley, and soon Palm Desert?”

  Ong nodded and went into an enthusiastic description of the resorts and their amenities. The golf courses and discos and world-class restaurants and group activities might have thrilled a habitué of Club Med, but they left me cold. A good book and a largely uninhabited beach—or even my backyard deck, if finances didn’
t permit—were greatly preferable to me.

  “And now,” I said when he finished, “you’ve diversified further—into gold mining.”

  Ong’s brow furrowed at this question that I’d slipped into Cheung’s prepared list. Reaching for his glass of cognac, he asked, “How did you come upon that information?”

  “I thought it was common knowledge.”

  “It’s not. We haven’t made an announcement yet about the Golden Hills project because our sampling process isn’t complete. How did you hear about it?”

  I improvised. “A relative of mine lives in Mono County; the prospect of the Promiseville mine being worked again is big news there.”

  He nodded, seeming satisfied with the explanation. “I prefer not to go into the subject for purposes of this article. As I said, the sampling process has barely begun. We’re not sure how much gold is left in the mesa—if it’s enough to justify a full mining operation.”

  But according to what Lily Nickles had observed, the sampling process had begun and abruptly been aborted. And Transpacific’s consulting geologist, Alvin K. Knight, had told Ripinsky that the company expected to take a minimum of half a million ounces of gold out of the mine. I said, “Off the record, then: how did Transpacific learn of the gold-mining potential in Stone Valley?”

  Ong smiled thinly. “We have our fingers on the pulse of opportunity, Ms. McCone. If profit potential exists, Transpacific is aware of it.”

  “Even if it’s in an area of investment that’s so far removed from your typical ventures?”

  “Even then.”

  “How do you go about assessing the feasibility of such a project?”

  He got up, took both glasses, and went to the wet bar. In the mirror that backed it I could see his face; it was tensed, eyes vigilant. I was reminded of Ripinsky’s description of Frank Tarbeaux, the gambler: “Ice cold and totally focused.”

  Ong played for time, rinsing the glasses before refilling them. When he carried them back to where we were sitting, he asked, “Would you repeat your last question?”