Our group was met at the landing by a guide who gave us a brief history of Alcatraz. He told us the island had a grim past but a bright future. He instructed us to “imagine yourself on a cold and windy morning. You are a prisoner headed for your final destination, Alcatraz, where no one has knowingly ever escaped from.” He paused to be sure he had our attention. He had mine, that was for sure. “It is a cold and foggy morning. Heavy steel shackles bind your ankles and wrists. You are shivering from the cold and the fear of incarceration.” I wasn’t a prisoner, but I was shivering anyway. “Your fellow prisoners on the “Rock,” as it’s called, are the most hardened criminals in the American prison system. Their crimes range from kidnapping to espionage, bank robbery and murder.” He paused and switched gears to a more pleasant subject—the history of the island. “It was used as a fort during the Civil War times to protect the San Francisco Bay and Harbor. After that it was a prison known as “the Rock” that housed some of the high-profile criminals of the day like Machine Gun Kelly, Al Capone and the Birdman of Alcatraz.
He listed the various escape attempts and said it wasn’t surprising that no one succeeded given the cold water, the waves and the high level of security.
“What about the sharks?” someone asked.
“No man-eating sharks in this water,” the guide answered.
“The water isn’t that cold,” Jonathan told me as we walked up the path to the prison gate. “Jack LaLanne swam it, and some triathletes make it every year, but the prisoners weren’t in very good shape.”
“A terrible diet and no exercise. Was that the problem?”
Jonathan nodded, and I vowed to reset my exercise program. Not that I was afraid of being incarcerated. I just wished the police would catch MarySue’s murderer before he struck again. Whoever he or she was, they wouldn’t be housed at Alcatraz. It was closed as a prison in the sixties. Whoever killed MarySue would have it easy compared to those times. “Nowadays prisoners can take classes,” the guide told us, “and work on-site jobs where they can earn money and play sports to keep in shape.”
They were probably in better shape than I was, I thought. I was determined to get serious about exercising. Tai chi was too tame, kung fu too strenuous. I turned for one last look at the city in the distance. Our tour boat was on its way back to pick up another group. What if they didn’t make it back for some reason? An earthquake, a tidal wave, or the boat ran out of gas? We’d be stuck on the island. For how long? What would we do? It would get cold at night and we had no food. At least the prisoners had shelter even if they were in solitary confinement.
Jonathan saw me shiver, and he put his jacket over my shoulders. I gave him a grateful smile.
“When we get a chance to look around the prison, we can actually go into the little dark cells in the place they call ‘the hole,’ ” he said.
“The hole?” I repeated. Now I was shivering despite the warmth of his jacket. I almost wished we hadn’t come here. There were so many other interesting places to visit on a Sunday afternoon, like the Palace of Fine Arts, that relic from the Pan Pacific Exposition of 1915 or the zoo or . . . I didn’t think this prison tour would freak me out if I weren’t up to my knees in the MarySue murder case. I knew prisons weren’t like Alcatraz anymore, but I still didn’t want to go to one for any length of time.
But determined to be a good sport with a positive attitude, I said, “How cool. I can hardly wait.”
A guide in a green uniform stepped forward to take over from the one who came on the boat with us. “Welcome home. Welcome to Alcatraz,” she said with a smile. “That’s the way the prisoners were greeted. We try to keep things as authentic for you as possible.”
“Excuse me.” A woman in the back of the crowd had raised her hand when the guide stopped. “Have there been any vampires incarcerated here?”
There was a smattering of light laughter, and the guide said not as far as she knew. I turned to see who’d asked the question, and there was Nick’s aunt, Meera, in her usual black outfit with black boots and a shawl over her shoulders.
I turned quickly, hoping she hadn’t seen me. That’s all I needed was for Meera to say hello and for Jonathan to think I hung out with vampire wannabes. Fortunately, at that moment we were all given earphones for the audio tour, which featured actual guards and prisoners speaking about their experiences. Now was the time we could proceed at our own pace, and hopefully I could avoid running into Meera.
The narration was so good I got caught up listening to the voices of real people and was startled when Jonathan nudged me. I took off my earpiece.
“Have you noticed, there’s a woman who keeps staring at you,” he said.
“Oh no,” I muttered. But he was right. Meera in her flowing black dress had her gaze fixed on me. She smiled and waved to me, and I had to say hello, though I hoped Jonathan would resume the tour without me. Imagine trying to explain the presence of a one-hundred-twenty-seven-year-old vampire to your doctor.
“It’s good to see you again,” she said. “So we are both history buffs. Who is your handsome friend?” she asked, standing on tiptoe for a glimpse of Jonathan, who’d stopped to read an account of the Native American occupation of the island in the sixties.
I could just imagine her telling Nick that I had been seen with a man at Alcatraz. Would he care? Probably not. He was meeting plenty of admiring women at his gym, along with their au pairs. Even though I appreciated his friendship and the soup he brought me, I wasn’t ready to settle down with anyone.
I should have known someday there would be a clash of at least two of my several lives, and it happened there at the prison. Jonathan came up to tell me he’d found Al Capone’s cell, and I had to introduce him to Meera. I could tell she was just dying to meet him by the way she was staring at him and batting her extra-long eyelashes. If only she didn’t say anything about being a you-know-what.
We chatted briefly about the prison and the prisoners, and I was just about to break away when Meera mentioned her old friend Al Capone. “I’m the one who picked him up when he was released from prison in 1939. They got him on tax evasion, you know. How ironic.”
“How very interesting,” I said. “Well, we have to be moving along.”
“Wait,” Jonathan said to her before I could take a step toward the solitary cells. “Did you say you knew Al Capone?” I could tell by his puzzled expression he was trying to figure out how that could be.
“Oh yes, we go way back, the Capones and I. I didn’t always live in San Francisco, you know. I spent a few years in Chicago in the twenties. What a time that was.” She shook her head with a nostalgic smile. “But originally I am from Eastern Europe, and I know something about prisons. This place is a palace compared to some I’ve been to in my country.”
I sent Jonathan a silent message. Please don’t ask why or where she’s been imprisoned. Or how old she is or how she got here or how I know her.
“Do you know what happened to the missing and presumed drowned inmates who tried to swim their way to freedom?” she asked, putting her icy fingers on my shoulder. “I do.”
Before she could say they’d turned into vampires and were haunting the island, I said we were behind schedule and had to catch up. “Nice to see you, Meera,” I said and took Jonathan’s arm to nudge him along.
“Who was that?” he asked when we’d turned the corner to face the solitary cells.
“Just a friend of a friend. She leads tours of Nob Hill, which is how I met her.”
“How old is she?” he asked, looking puzzled.
Good question. I couldn’t say she was one hundred twenty-seven or he’d think I was crazy or naïve or both, so I just said I wasn’t sure but she looked younger than she was.
Just to get the complete Alcatraz experience, I had to go into one of the solitary cells; even though I didn’t really want to, I also didn’t want Jonathan to think I was neurotic. But when I pulled the door shut, I had a panic attack. Especially when Meera came by and l
ooked in at me like she was the warden and I was Public Enemy Number One.
“Why haven’t you called my nephew?” she asked, pressing her face against the narrow bars. “He is all alone, far from home. He needs a friend.” Her voice echoed off the concrete walls.
“I will,” I said, my heart pounding erratically. “Definitely. It’s just that I’ve been busy at work.” Where was Jonathan? Where was the tour guide? Where were the other visitors?
I looked through the bars at Meera. Her eyes were like deep black holes. Her face suddenly looked as old as she said she was. I knew she wasn’t really a vampire, but up close and personal, I could see the resemblance between her and the pictures of Vlad the Impaler. The same sharp cheekbones, the hooked nose, the same dark eyes and the same pointed chin. I decided there were worse things than being charged with murder. One of those things was being trapped by a crazy woman in an old prison.
I was breathing hard, she was leering at me. I wasn’t locked in, but suddenly I wished I was. A moment later our tour guide came around the corner. Meera disappeared down the hall in the other direction.
“The last ferry leaves in one half hour,” she said. “You don’t want to be stuck here overnight.”
Not with a weirdo on the loose, I thought. The guide smiled, but I didn’t. My face felt frozen. Before I could say, “Wait for me,” he’d hurried on by on his way to round up the rest of the tour group. I pushed on the cell door. It wouldn’t budge. Where was everyone? Even Meera had gone. I tried to scream, but my throat was clogged and I couldn’t speak. I was a prisoner inside a solitary cell even though I had done nothing wrong. I’d be here at least overnight and God only knew how long until someone found me.
Fourteen
I took several deep calming breaths and told myself Jonathan wouldn’t leave without me. But I couldn’t hear a sound. No voices, nothing but the voices in my head from the prisoners and their guards who were all dead and gone. Is this how they felt when visiting hours were over? Or were there no visiting hours? I’d forgotten to ask. If I got out of here alive, there were a lot of questions I’d ask.
I’d ask Jim Jensen if he killed his wife. I’d tell him she said he would if he found out about the shoes. So, did he? I’d ask everyone I knew what the fortune meant—“You cannot step in the same river twice without getting your feet twice as wet.”
Did that message have something to do with MarySue’s death? Or was it meant for me especially?
Another question I’d ask everyone involved in the MarySue affair was, “Did you put the shoe box in my garbage? And if so, why?”
After about two minutes I gathered up all my strength and pushed against the cell door. It swung open, and I almost laughed with relief. I hadn’t been locked in at all. My rabid imagination was running away with me. I ran down the corridor and out the front door into the fresh air where Jonathan was waiting for me.
“There you are,” he said. “I was asking everyone if they’d seen you.”
“I was getting the complete prison experience,” I said breathlessly. “I’m glad I don’t have to stay here.”
As we boarded the last ferry, I looked around but didn’t see Meera. Was she still on the island by choice? I didn’t know and I didn’t care.
Jonathan and I stood outside on the deck as shadows fell across the city. He put his arm around my shoulders, and I was grateful for the warmth of the arm and his jacket, which I was still wearing.
He said he’d made reservations at the Cliff House, and I almost swooned. The place was historic. Perched on the cliffs above Ocean Beach, it was once a bathhouse but now housed one of the most famous and expensive restaurants in the city. We had a table at the floor-to-ceiling windows. It was still light enough to see the seals on the rocks below and hear the waves crashing. I couldn’t believe little me from Columbus, Ohio, was here watching the sun set over the Pacific with one of the city’s most eligible bachelors—or maybe the most eligible.
We ordered baby spinach salad with citrus and candied pecans, then crab cakes and filet mignon with truffled potatoes. We seemed to have the exact same taste in food and maybe lots of other things, like fashion. And what a relief to be with a man who didn’t constantly tell me to butt out of his business. Jonathan seemed to enjoy talking about his job and didn’t mind when I chimed in and asked questions. My kind of man.
He picked up the menu and read the back cover. “There’s been a cliff house at this location since 1863,” he said. I didn’t bother to do the math, but I wondered, if Meera were here with us, would she tell us she’d been around then? She’d probably have some interesting stories to share of how she met the Stanfords, the Crockers and the Hearsts, who would drive their carriages out to the beach for horse racing and kite flying. Sometimes the life of an ageless, undead vampire pretender sounded downright glamorous. I just didn’t want to hear about it or even worse, hear her threaten me. Isn’t that what she’d done in the prison? Or was I being too sensitive?
I forced myself to stop thinking about Meera or my other obsession, which was the murder of MarySue. When Jonathan brought me home, I told him it was the most perfect day I’d had since I’d arrived over six months ago. Of course it would have been more perfect without Meera, but I put her face out of my mind.
Jonathan said he’d had a great time too. I felt I had to reciprocate after he’d spent a fortune on me, so I said I’d invite him over for brunch on my patio where I had a not-so-shabby view of the Bay. I decided I’d worry about what a non-cook like myself would serve later. And I didn’t say anything about MarySue’s upcoming memorial. Surely he wouldn’t want to attend. He couldn’t possibly attend the funeral of every patient he’d lost. I wouldn’t go either if I didn’t have an interest in studying the crowd to see who looked sad, who looked relieved and who got hysterical.
I said good night to Jonathan and told him I’d see him soon. Then I checked my messages. There was one from Detective Jack Wall asking me to come down to the station to identify the silver shoes Marsha had worn at the fashion show. “If it isn’t too much trouble.”
He sounded slightly sarcastic, but with him you never knew. In any case I was eager to ID the shoes. I knew it was wrong to make up my mind too early, but I just knew they weren’t the shoes I’d brought back from Florida.
The next day I phoned Dolce to tell her I’d be late because I was heading for the police station to ID the silver shoes. She seemed nervous, but I didn’t know why. Money problems? Was she going to ask me to cut back on my hours? Was she going to close the shop? I couldn’t bear to think about it.
I dressed carefully in an easy-fitting double-breasted jacket, high-waisted fluid harem pants and my brogues. Then I took the bus, transferring once, to the small station in the same neighborhood where I’d volunteered at the church and I’d eaten Vietnamese food with Jack. No wonder he knew his way around, where to eat and where to volunteer. This was his beat. One not many others would want, but definitely where the action was if that’s what you were interested in.
He was sitting at a desk behind a glass partition, which I assumed was bulletproof. He stood and gave me a long look as if he couldn’t remember who I was or why I was there. Or maybe he was just trying to decide if I was wearing Tahari or Jil Sander, both known for exceptional pantsuits. Finally he pressed a buzzer that allowed me to walk in. He thanked me for coming. I said I was always glad to help the police. He didn’t mention my hiding behind a mask, and I didn’t say anything about his lack of a social life. We went into a small room lined with files and boxes. He took a box from a shelf and lifted the lid. There they were, a pair of silver stilettos gleaming in the rays of the overhead light. For a moment I wasn’t sure. Were they or weren’t they? What was wrong with me? Had I lost my keen sense of real versus fake?
“Can I touch them?”
He held out a pair of rubber gloves. I put them on. Then I picked up the shoes one at a time and looked at them, ran my fingers over the leather and tapped the heels lightly with
my knuckles. All the while Jack was watching me. What he thought, I had no idea. Maybe he thought I was faking it. That I didn’t know anything. But I did. My confidence was returning. I knew my shoes and I knew I knew them.
“Well,” he said after I’d done the same with both shoes and put them back in their box.
“Fake,” I said.
“How can you be sure?” he said.
I picked up a shoe and held it up to the light. “A slanted, easily breakable heel, faux leather, and studs instead of diamonds,” I said.
“Can anyone tell the difference?” he asked. “Or just you?”
I didn’t want to brag, but I had to be honest. “No, they can’t and even if they can, it may be worth it to buy the fake for forty-six dollars if the real thing is over a thousand or many thousands.”
He whistled softly.
“I don’t mean to put down Harrington’s work,” I said. “If he made these. It can’t be easy to make a pair of shoes. Marsha looked stunning in them, didn’t you think?”
He shrugged. “I’m not big on orange dresses and silver shoes.”
“Tangerine,” I corrected. “I still don’t understand where that dress came from. It was not Dolce’s. So now what? Will you give the shoes back to Marsha?”
“I will, but I’d like to find the originals,” he said.
“Because they will lead you to the killer, am I right?” I held my breath. If he was true to form, he wouldn’t tell me anything.
Instead of answering my question, he asked, “If you wanted to buy a pair of knockoffs, where would you look?”
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