‘It does.’
‘A white Toyota Cressida. Old.’
Gratelli stood. ‘Can you guys be a little less visible in your work?’
‘We will.’
‘You hear anything about a William Blake?’
Carly couldn’t tell if there was something other than kindness in Gratelli’s eyes. Did he know something?
‘A poet,’ Carly said.
‘Not that William Blake,’ Gratelli said.
‘I’m sure I heard the name somewhere. Wasn’t he with Warfield the night he died?’ She answered a question with a question.
Gratelli didn’t answer. His face was stone.
Lang understood Gratelli’s concerns. If the circumstances were better for the police department, the pragmatic investigator would force Paladino and Lang to back off completely. But the timing couldn’t be worse. Murder rates continued to bounce at all-time highs and the future was unclear, not to mention the additional bodies popping up. Gratelli, pragmatic and professional but short on staff and under pressure from superiors, needed the help.
Lang’s money was still on Mickey Warfield’s involvement though the guy’s alibi for the night of Wiley’s death was ironclad. Mickey hung around questionable women and down-and-out private eyes – Lang mentally acknowledged he was the pot picking on the kettle. Mickey was likely to be having an affair with his father’s mistress. Some sort of strange Oedipal notion that Lang didn’t want to understand, except that he bore no similarity to Mickey on that one.
Lang stopped off at his place, showered off the jailhouse stink and climbed up to his loft bed for a nap, or at least a restful way to contemplate next steps. Though Paladino was still the lead in this case and he would respect it, he now felt like he owned some of it. Being framed for murder tended to do that. The blow to Paladino’s head had already made it personal for him. Sleeping with a corpse made it even more personal.
And back to Mickey, it was obvious. Mickey knew the girl, contributed to the rent, had a key to her place, and might very well have had motive to get her out of the picture. Maybe it was macho revenge for Lang sleeping with her. Maybe he had an inkling she was going to turn on him in the witness box. That was a twofer.
Buddha appeared at the edge of the loft. Lang had put down food, changed the water and freshened the litter box before climbing up. In the small space, Lang talked with him for a few minutes. The dark brown cat blinked his golden eyes and went to sleep, face looking out over the room. It wouldn’t take much to awaken the sleeping sentry.
Things were in motion, Lang thought. He had instructed Thanh to find and stay close to Mickey. Paladino said she had some follow-up to do, but was vague about it. What was Lang’s next step? Sleep, apparently. When he awoke, it was dark.
It was Thanh’s call that woke him. Bike repaired, Thanh had looked around. No sign of Mickey. Marlene’s garage housed an old, Navy blue Volvo. No Jaguar. Nor was the sleek sports car parked anywhere near Elena Warfield’s place. Thanh also cruised North Beach. Nothing.
Getting around on a motorcycle was easier than scouting from behind the wheel of a car. Lang suggested Thanh scan the neighborhoods surrounding the strip clubs beyond North Beach. There were a few on Market and over on Jones. Look in the areas where there are massage parlors. Long shots, all of them, but it wouldn’t surprise Lang if these kinds of places were the man’s regular stomping grounds. And if nothing else, he lost Angel. Obviously, he needed something more than the attractive, but mature Marlene Berensen to keep him happy.
As long as he was conjecturing, he could build a case that Mickey Warfield, whose vocation was unknown at the moment, worked with the Chinese underground. That would explain his connection to Angel and her ambiguous feelings for him.
Lang shook his head. Get something solid, he told himself.
And that went for food. Lang was hungry. He climbed down from the loft, slipped on a robe and after a visit to the bathroom, headed toward the kitchen. Not a lot there. He’d have to improvise.
He had a can of crabmeat, a couple of slices of stale bread and some old pretzels. OK, he thought, checking the refrigerator. A couple of eggs. Some mustard. Half an onion. A bit of ginger. He had what he needed. Crab cakes and a little pasta. Something green? He had some basil outside. That would have to do.
He looked at his watch. A few minutes before midnight.
Carly had gone home early. By six, she had talked to the Fog City Voice publisher about gangs in Chinatown. He gave pretty much the same response as Gratelli. She asked about Chiu. He knew nothing, but was interested in knowing something. She begged him to wait. She was sure of nothing at the moment. Too many pieces of the puzzle and very few of them in place.
She threw some cocktail shrimp into a bowl with some fresh spinach, created a quick dressing with olive oil, vinegar and garlic and sat in front of the Lehrer News Hour on PBS. A glass of water to drink. No wine tonight. She was still worried about her concussion and wasn’t sure what alcohol would do to her brain. She was proud of her restraint, but disappointed in the progress she made on the case. She also felt a slight and foreign hollowness being alone. She blamed William. She recanted. Blamed herself. Reconsidered. Forget the guilt. It didn’t matter who was to blame, she had to be more cautious with William Blake – for many reasons, the least of which was that he was not a keeper. He would admit to that without apology. And so?
Carly was not at all tired. In fact she had an abundance of energy and nothing to do with it. It wasn’t until just past midnight that she climbed in bed after hours of reading. Her body, she thought, had not re-keyed itself to the unregimented routine of her new career. What sleep finally came did so after two in the morning, and even then it was spasmodic. Surrealistic dreams were scattered here and there between bouts of unwelcomed consciousness.
During her waking hours, Mickey Warfield occupied her thoughts for the most part. He was still in hiding. And that fact, in itself, was an indictment – unless of course he fell victim as well. No one else on the list carried as much freight. She wanted to talk to Lang, but she’d wait until morning. They needed to move on Mickey Warfield. They needed to push the police and conduct their own search for the bad father’s bad son.
Thanh met Lang at the coffee shop at Central and Hayes. They sat outside in the cool, clean morning air.
‘You owe me tip money,’ Thanh said. He smiled slyly.
‘Because?’ Lang played along. He sipped his coffee, nibbled at a blueberry muffin. He hadn’t slept after waking up at midnight. Looked as if Thanh was a little sleep-deprived as well.
‘Girls, girls, girls,’ he said, smiling. ‘At the clubs. Tried to get information on Mickey Warfield. I couldn’t find his Jag anywhere near the massage parlors or strip clubs. I stopped in at a couple of the independent clubs. One of the girls said she recognized his photo but not sure if he had been a customer or had stopped in to talk with management. I’m not charging you for the massage. It was nice.’
‘You learn anything?’
‘I know most of that already.’
‘No, about Mickey Warfield.’
‘Oh. No. But that doesn’t mean anything. There are a hundred parlors here, it seems. Who knows how many parlors there are in the Bay Area.’
Lang nodded. Thanh was right. While San Francisco was a big little town, the Bay Area was huge – more than four million people. Counting all of the El and La and San Somethings, there was room for a lot of individually owned as well as organized massage parlor enterprises. Some of these towns, contrary to tourist brochures, are not cute little wholesome wine and cheese communities. Some of them, like Vallejo, Oakland and Richmond, while having their good side, are tough enough.
‘You need to get some sleep?’ Lang asked.
‘I’m fine. Anything else you want me to do?’
‘Check Marlene Berensen’s place from time to time. Let me know if the car shows up. The man has to sleep some place.’
As he spoke, it occurred to him that Mickey pr
obably had another girl. A guy like Mickey, a guy who strings along an older woman and then stashes a sexier version in an apartment he pays for might have another stashed somewhere else. But finding the girlfriend of a guy he can’t find doesn’t make things any easier.
He looked at Thanh, shrugged. A guy walked by with two dogs, one half limping, half hopping on three legs. Lang must have had a sad look on his face because Thanh sought to cheer him up.
‘Look at it this way,’ Thanh said, ‘he’s got one more than you do.’
The dog seemed happy enough.
As Gratelli set his coffee cup down on his desk in his office, he noticed a file had been placed against the phone so he couldn’t miss it. On the file was a Post-it. ‘You can thank me later,’ it said. It was signed ‘Ted’. Ted was a cop who worked out of the Taraval Station, which handled the far west of the city – out to the Pacific Ocean.
Inside the folder were several copies of photographs of a late-model Jaguar. The license plate indicated it was registered to Marlene Berensen. Police noticed it parked all night by itself in one of the lots at Ocean Beach. Though technically the Beach was the responsibility of the National Park Service, the car nonetheless aroused suspicion. Gratelli had put out an alert on two people – William Blake and Mickey Warfield – both MIA. Lang had provided Gratelli with the fact that Mickey was driving Marlene’s Jag and had also given him the license number. Gratelli had put that info out there as well. And now it came back.
Here was the car. Where was the driver?
Gratelli called Marlene Berensen and judging by her incoherence figured he had awakened her not just from a late night but also from an alcohol-soaked late night.
Did she know where her Jaguar was? No, she didn’t. Why didn’t she? It was stolen. Did she report it? She did. He’d check that. We have reason to believe that Mickey Warfield used the car regularly. She mumbled something Gratelli didn’t understand, but after more prodding said that yes, he did, but he had returned it. And it was stolen. Where was Mickey now? She had no idea. He wasn’t with her. She was by herself, she said, launching into a long complaint about men and the horrors of a woman growing old alone.
A sad drunk, he thought. His conversations with her earlier had suggested a different sort of person – someone who respected herself perhaps a little too much. She had a cold-hearted and unapologetic diva personality. If he could choose for her, he’d much prefer the self-confident narcissist to the whiny one.
Gratelli verified her statement that she called to report her car was stolen. It was true. The inspector leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes. It had been a difficult night. He had come to terms with his wife’s death years ago. But there were times – and he wasn’t always sure what triggered it – he’d suddenly miss her, deeply miss her. Sometimes he was able to distract himself. Last night nothing worked. This morning there seemed to be a residue of the mood, lighter in intensity, but a sad feeling of futility nonetheless.
Talking to a drunk this early in the morning did little to lift his spirits. Three murders, he thought, shaking his head. He called Lang and caught the PI as he walked back to where he lived.
‘We found the Jaguar but not Mickey,’ Gratelli said.
‘Where?’
‘Ocean Beach. I’ve got guys out there now looking around, looking for a body. The wind has swept any footprints away. The Feds let us take the car and we’ll put a microscope on it.’
‘What do you think?’ Lang asked.
‘Could be Mickey realized the car was identified and therefore too hot to be driving around in. Met someone, dumped the Jaguar at the Beach. Easy to go north or south from there. Since he has a DUI in San Mateo, maybe there’s a connection down there. I’ll make some calls, but I don’t expect anything.’
‘I appreciate your letting me know,’ Lang said.
‘I want to work together. We just need to keep it as invisible as possible.’
‘You talk with Marlene?’
‘Drunk as a skunk. Didn’t know where Mickey was. Reported the car stolen. Who knows?’
‘A perfect time to pay her a visit,’ Lang said. ‘I’m not sure whether to bring her coffee or a gin and tonic.’
Twenty-Five
At Carly’s invitation, her friend Nadia dropped by. Carly wanted to show her arts-oriented friend the photographs Thanh sent to her computer. They sat with coffee and toast on the sofa, the laptop on the cocktail table and Nadia clicking through the images.
‘Goodness,’ Nadia said. ‘I think we should have looked at these after breakfast.’ She was kidding. She found them fascinating. ‘Wiley did these?’
‘They were in his studio. He was preparing an exhibition, had them framed. He had proof sheets of these people and releases.’
‘So what’s your problem?’
‘I think one is missing.’
‘And you think . . .?’
‘I do. The intruder wanted something from Wiley’s place and didn’t want anyone to see who he was. I think the subject of the missing photograph is the person who whacked me. I think he . . . or she . . . was smart enough to not only take the photograph but all the negatives, proof sheets, and personal releases.’
‘Someone who knows the business then,’ Nadia said.
‘Another artist or writer . . .’
‘Or agent, publicist, gallery owner, publisher.’
‘The list goes on,’ Carly said.
Nadia nodded her agreement. ‘So how does the list of the subjects match up with the list of murder suspects?’ A bite of toast, a sip of coffee, she scooted forward to watch the slideshow.
‘Let’s see,’ Carly said, clicking again through the photographs as they appeared on the screen. Of the fifteen, there were the truly famous naked and now dead subjects who wouldn’t likely object. There were a couple of nudes Carly didn’t recognize, but Nadia did. They were poets of the Beat and Hippie era and of North Beach. Of those on the suspect list were Nathan Malone at maybe thirty, collegiate, handsome and athletic; Agnes DeWitt looking very much like an educated lady though like the others very much naked; Richard Sumaoang, fierce and sexy: Bart Brozynski, bearish and not the least intimidated; Lili D. Young, sensuous, though slightly frightened and half her current weight; and Whitney Warfield himself, not especially photogenic, but seemingly proud of what he was able to show the world.
With the exception of Marshall Hawkes, those on the list who were missing were not surprising. Wife and son were not among the nudes, but weren’t even minor celebrities. Ralph Chiu and Samuel McFarland were not artists or poets. To Wiley they would have been uninteresting subjects. Hawkes’s omission presented a small concern. But did it really surprise Carly? From what she’d heard about him from Lang and Nadia, the painter was uptight, controlling. He was someone who would never have let his guard down, would never have consented to something so intimate and so revealing as a nude photograph.
‘Well, what have we done?’ Nadia asked, falling back on the sofa, taking a deep breath. Do we have more now than we did ten minutes ago?’
Carly admitted they didn’t.
‘I’d like to do the exhibition,’ Nadia said.
‘What?’ Carly said. The word was accompanied by a look of near incomprehension.
‘What an incredible draw,’ Nadia said. ‘Murderer’s Row.’
‘Isn’t that a little lurid?’
‘Oh, yes,’ Nadia said, sitting forward again, excited. ‘Exactly. Those photographs would go for ten times, maybe more, what they would have fetched. Poor Mr Wiley. We need to find out about your Mr Wiley’s estate.’
It was a flicker, a quick hop and a skip across Carly’s mind. But did someone want to improve the value of Wiley’s work? It seemed the longest of long shots. There were others involved. And whoever carried all this out was taking a gigantic risk. To somehow collect at the end would put that person right at the top of the suspect list.
‘I’m serious,’ Nadia said.
‘I don’t doubt it.’
‘The greatest San Francisco photography exhibition ever. I mean it’s lurid, yes. And naked . . . that adds a lot. Involved in murders. Maybe the murderer is right here,’ she said, tapping the computer screen. That’s what you think, right? We could tour the show.’
‘Calm down, calm down,’ Carly said. ‘And slow down.’
Carly saw the greed, understood that’s how it always worked. Nadia was quick to pick up on the opportunity. Had Wiley made the same decision? Was Wiley documenting history or was he making a buck on the foolish decisions of these folks in their trusting youth? Carly thought how we all feed on others – herself included, she supposed – and how people are still feeding and feeding on the legend that was North Beach.
Lang found a very different Marlene Berensen than he had seen before. Gone was the haughty, threatening and elegant creature. Instead, the woman at the door was frazzled, dowdy and disoriented. Hair mussed, she wore a misshapen, gauzy gown much too apparent beneath a wrinkled robe.
She saw him, recognized him through a blinking, unfocused stare and moved out of the way in a clumsy attempt at a sweeping welcome. He entered, passing by her brewery breath.
‘Would you like a drink?’ she asked, shutting the door behind her. There were cigarettes and cigarette butts on the coffee table. ‘Or . . .’ she continued, ‘more appropriately, a cup of coffee?’
‘I’m fine, thanks.’
She smiled an odd smile. ‘He’s gone,’ she said.
‘Who is gone, Marlene?’
‘Oh, “Marlene”, is it?’ She sat down with less grace than she expected and seemed to surprise herself.
‘Who’s gone?’
‘Everybody,’ she said, shaking her head.
‘Mickey,’ Lang said a little louder than usual and looking directly into Marlene’s unfocused eyes. ‘You know Mickey, right?’
‘Right.’ She looked confused. ‘He’s gone.’
‘Where did he go?’ Lang asked.
‘Whitney’s gone,’ she said. ‘Everybody’s gone.’
He and Marlene might be sharing the same room, Lang thought, but they were in slightly different realities. Hers was, no doubt, slower, thicker.
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