by Sue Grafton
Nica perched on one of the stools lined up in a row along the length of the island while Crystal took cups and saucers from the nearest cabinet, saying, “She’s going to get her butt kicked. I swear she’s going to be grounded for months. What time did she take off?”
“Had to be nine-fifteen,” Nica said. “She reported to PE at nine o’clock, but she claimed she had cramps and was going to the nurse’s office. She had an appointment with me at ten. When she didn’t show for that, I tracked down her roommate, Amy, who told me she’d seen Leila leaving campus with her backpack.”
Crystal looked at her watch. “Where the hell could she be?”
“I just hope Amy has the good grace to keep quiet to the school authorities,” Nica said, exempting herself.
“Mind if I look in Leila’s room? Maybe I can pick up some clue about where she might be.”
Crystal said, “Go right ahead. It’s the second door to the right at the head of the stairs.”
I went up. Leila’s door was closed but unlocked, so I let myself in. I stood for a moment, surveying the space. The room was done in frilly pastels. Talk about wishful thinking. She was at that stage of maturity (or lack of it) where the half-nudie rock star posters ran neck and neck with the stuffed animals of her youth. Every surface was covered with knickknacks. Most looked like the sorts of items teenaged girls give each other: mugs with cute sayings, figurines, jewelry, bottles of cologne. Her bulletin board was a collage of ticket stubs, concert programs, and color snapshots: kids at pep rallies, girls acting goofy, guys engaged in drinking beer, smoking pot, and other wholesome pursuits. For someone who claimed to have no friends, she had an amazing collection of memorabilia. The floor was carpeted in discarded clothes, which were also draped over chairs, garments hanging on the closet door, the window seat, and two small upholstered chairs.
I did a quick but thorough search of her drawers. Most of her underwear was already out on the floor, which made my job simple. I went through her closet – jammed full of old board games, sporting equipment, and items from her summer wardrobe. I got down on my hands and knees and made a circuit of the room, checking under chairs, under the bed, under the chest of drawers. The only discovery of interest was the narrow metal lockbox hidden between the mattress and box spring. I shook it but heard only the softest of sounds in response. Probably her dope stash. I didn’t have time enough to pick the lock. I returned the box to its hiding place. I felt better for having searched, though the foraging netted me nothing.
Returning to the kitchen, I paused at the planning center to study the family calendar for November, which sat open on the desk. The calendar showed one full month for each page, which was also illustrated with a series of photographs of dogs dressed in children’s clothing. November was a cocker spaniel in a navy blue sailor suit. The dog had big brown eyes and appeared to be embarrassed half to death.
Each day was given its own block, an inch-and-a-half square. I could see that three different people had added notes about social events and other activities. Judging from handwriting and the nature of the events posted, I was guessing that Leila’s was the oversized printing – angled T’s, puffy I’s. Crystal’s was the elegant cursive in red ink. And Rand’s was the scrawl written with a blue ballpoint pen. The personal reminders ranged from meetings to tennis lessons, dental and doctor appointments, to a weekly play group for Griff. The Audi was serviced early in the month. Various telephone numbers had been written in the margins. Notes on alternate weekends indicated Leila’s return from school. She apparently wasn’t scheduled for this weekend, perhaps because she’d been with Crystal the previous one.
Behind me, Crystal and Nica were busy berating Leila in absentia. I leafed back three months to July and August, noting a fourth handwriting: bold block letters in black. This (I surmised) was Dr. Purcell, whose presence was visible up until Monday, September 8, four days before he vanished. He’d jotted in notes about two board meetings, a medical symposium at UCLA, and a golf date at the country club. None of the entries seemed significant and I assumed the police had followed up.
“I’ve had it with her,” Crystal was saying. “I don’t know why I even bother to get upset. That’s exactly what she wants.”
Nica said, “She’s probably on her way to Lloyd’s. It’d be like her to make a beeline straight for him.”
“Great. Let him deal with her. I’m sick of it. If she doesn’t show up soon, I’m calling the cops. All I have to do is declare her an out-of-control minor and she’s screwed for sure.”
“What good is that going to do?” Anica said. “I know you’re mad, but you turn her over to the courts and you’ll regret it.”
“She’s the one who’ll have regrets. This is about Paulie. I’ll bet you dollars to doughnuts.”
Anica said, “Quit with the Paulie stuff. It’s pointless.”
I picked up the calendar and moved over to the island where I claimed my coffee cup. “Mind if I ask about this?”
Crystal glanced over at me, distracted. “What do you need?”
I placed the calendar on the counter and tapped at the page. “I gather Leila doesn’t come home every weekend.”
“For the most part, she does. Lloyd and I usually alternate visits, but things do come up.”
“Like what?”
Crystal glanced at the page, pointing to the second weekend in July. “This was the weekend she had an invitation to go home with her friend, Sherry, in Malibu Colony. Her father’s in the movie business and he takes the girls to all the big premieres.”
I pointed to the weekend of September 12, when Dow Purcell disappeared. “And this?”
“Same thing, different friend. Emily’s family owns horses. They have a ranch at Point Dume. Leila loves to ride. Actually that weekend was canceled – I think Emily got sick – and Leila ended up over at Lloyd’s. Why do you ask?”
I shrugged, checking back through the months. Leila’s schedule seemed to vary, but it looked like she went off with her school friends on an average of once a month. “I’m thinking she might have left campus with one of her classmates from Fitch.”
“I guess it’s possible, but I doubt it. Most of her friends are college prep. They’d never risk expulsion.” She turned to Nica. “What do you think?”
“It wouldn’t hurt to check. It crossed my mind as well, so I brought along the school roster in case we needed to phone any of the other parents.” She reached down into the large navy bag near her feet and removed a spiral-bound directory with the school logo on the front. “You want me to go through these and see what I come up with?”
Crystal said, “Hold on a second and let me try Lloyd again.” She crossed to the planning center and picked up the phone. She punched in seven numbers and listened for a moment, and then replaced the handset. “He’s still not answering. Leila’s stepfather,” she added by way of explanation.
“I know. I saw him at the beach house the day I met you.”
“I’ve been calling him since Nica arrived. He’s there, if I know him. He’s always got collection agencies on his case so he refuses to pick up. I’ve left six messages so he knows this is serious. You’d think he could manage to call back.”
I said, “Look, I need an excuse to talk to him, anyway. Why don’t you let me go over to his place and see if Leila’s there? If she’s not, I can start scouring the roads.”
“That’s not a bad idea. Nica and I can stay here in case she decides to make an appearance.” Crystal reached for a pen and scribbled down some numbers on a scratch pad, tearing off the sheet. “These are my numbers and Lloyd’s address and phone.”
“You have two lines?”
“That’s right. This one’s personal. The other’s business.”
I pointed to the first. “Why don’t you leave this one free? You can use the other to check with some of Leila’s friends.”
“If you find Lloyd, you can tell him I’m tired of doing this alone. It’s time he took his fair share of the loa
d.”
Walking out to my car, I had to wonder how kids of divorced parents survive all the bickering.
Chapter 14
*
Lloyd lived on a street called Gramercy Lane, which looped along the foothills, one of those roads that proceeded by fits and starts. I checked my street map of Santa Teresa, looking up the coordinates. I’d have to intercept Gramercy at some point and then check house numbers to see where I was in relation to Lloyd’s address. I left the map open on the passenger seat while I turned the key in the ignition. The rain was picking up again, oversized drops that popped on my hood like gravel being flung up from a roadbed. I flipped on my windshield wipers and glanced at my watch. It was currently 3:15. Between the short November days and the gloom of the rain, twilight seemed to start gathering by 4:00 in the afternoon. At the moment, I felt more like heading for home than cruising the town in search of a runaway teen.
I sailed through the stone gate that marked the front entrance to Horton Ravine and followed the road as it curved around to the right. At the first red light, I glanced at the map again, tilting my head.
Gramercy Lane, or parts of it at any rate, were within a two-mile radius of the Purcell house in the Ravine. If Leila had thumbed a ride from Malibu traveling north on the 101, she’d probably have asked to be let off at Little Pony Road, which was one off-ramp south. The light changed and I eased into the stream of southbound traffic, hugging the outside lane. Little Pony Road was less than a mile away.
The notion of Leila thumbing a ride made my stomach churn. Odds were some decent citizen would offer her a lift, but there was also that freakish chance that she’d miscalculate. Not every soul on the road had her best interests at heart. At fourteen, she still felt invincible. For her, assault, rape, mayhem, and murder were events she read about in the papers, if she read them at all. Perversion and deviance were words on a high school vocabulary list, not vicious behaviors with any relevance to her. I hoped her guardian angels were hovering.
I took the Little Pony off-ramp. At the top, I turned left and headed toward the mountains, scanning both sides of the four-lane road. My windshield wipers were thunking merrily, smearing a swipe of dirt back and forth across the glass. I passed a couple huddled under an umbrella. They were walking on my side of the road with their backs to me. I was looking for Leila on her own so I dismissed them at first. I could tell the two were young. It wasn’t until I passed them, catching a second glimpse in my sideview mirror, that I identified Leila’s cottony white-blond hair and her long, coltish legs. The boy at her side was tall and lean, toting a backpack with the straps arranged awkwardly across the shoulders of his black leather jacket. Both of them wore tight jeans and hiking boots, and their heads were bowed against the rain. I could have sworn the two were sharing a joint. I slowed and pulled in at the curb just ahead of them. In the sideview mirror, I saw Leila hesitate, then drop something on the ground and step on it. As they walked by my car, I leaned over and rolled down the window on the passenger side.
“Can I give you a ride?”
Leila leaned forward, looking across her companion. When she saw me, her expression registered a look of confusion that signaled recognition without context. She knew she knew me, but she didn’t remember how. The kid with her leveled a gaze at me filled with hostility and disdain. I took in the smooth complexion, the rain-bedraggled lank brown hair, the plain white T-shirt visible under the open leather jacket. I was startled by the boobs, since I’d assumed the kid was a male. This had to be Paulie. I could see she was destined to be beautiful even though, at the moment, she was unkempt and had defiance written into every inch of her slender frame. She wasn’t conventionally pretty, but she had a fierce, worldly air: big dark eyes, cheekbones sharpened by poor nutrition. A photographer with the right instincts could make a fortune from the image of belligerent sexuality she projected.
I focused on Leila. “Hi. I’m Kinsey Millhone. We met last Friday at the beach house. I just came from your mom’s. She’s worried about you. You should have let her know you were leaving school.”
“I’m fine, but tell her thanks for her concern.” Leila’s tone was sarcastic. Her flippancy was intended to impress her friend, but the insolence was hard to sustain with rainwater dripping down her face. Two strands of hair were plastered to her cheek and the mascara on her lashes had turned to a watery ink.
“I think you should tell her yourself. She needs to know you’re okay.”
Leila and Paulie exchanged a look. Paulie said something to Leila under her breath; coconspirators, trying to make the best of the fact they’d been caught. Paulie eased the backpack from her shoulders and passed it to Leila. After a few murmured words, Paulie took off toward the highway at a pace meant to convey nonchalance.
Leila leaned closer to the half-opened window. Her eyes were heavily lined, the lids shadowed with turquoise blue. Her lipstick was dark brown, too harsh a shade for her fragile blond coloring. “You can’t make me go home.”
“I’m not here to make you do anything,” I said. “You might consider getting out of the rain.”
“I will if you promise not to tell Mom who was with me.”
“I’m assuming that’s Paulie.” Leila said nothing, which I took as assent. “Come on. Get in. I’ll drop you off at your dad’s.” , She thought about it briefly, then opened the car door and slid into the passenger seat, shoving her backpack into the cramped space at her feet. Her hair had been bleached so many times it looked synthetic, still arranged in the odd mix of dreadlocks and tufts that must have made the boarding school authorities wring their hands in dismay. Or maybe Fitch was progressive, a school where students were allowed to “express themselves” through outlandish appearances and oddball behaviors. In the body-heated confines of the car, I could smell eau-de-marijuana and the feminine musk of undergarments worn several days too long.
I glanced over my shoulder, checking the flow of traffic behind me, and pulled onto the road once the passing cars had cleared. In my rearview mirror, I could see Paulie’s departing figure, reduced by now to the size of a toy soldier. “How old is Paulie?”
“Sixteen.”
“I take it your mom’s not that fond of her. What’s the problem?”
“Mom doesn’t like anything I do.”
“Why’d you leave school without permission?”
“How’d you know where I was going?” she asked, bypassing the issue of truancy.
“Your mother figured it out. When we get to a phone, I want you to call and tell her where you are. She’s been worried sick.” I didn’t mention royally pissed off as well.
“Why don’t you do it? You’ll turn around and talk to her, anyway.”
“Of course I will. You’re a minor. I’m not going to contribute to your bad behavior.” We drove for a block in silence. Then I said, “I don’t get what’s bugging you.”
“I hate Fitch. That’s what’s bugging me, if it’s any of your business.”
“I thought you got sent to Fitch because you screwed up in public school.”
“I hated it up here, too. Bunch of goof-offs and retards. Everybody was so dumb – I was bored to death. Classes were a joke. I’ve got better things to do.”
We crossed State at the intersection and headed into a residential area called South Rockingham. “What’s wrong with Fitch?”
“The girls are such snobs. All they care about is how much money their fat-ass daddies make.”
“I thought you had friends.”
“Well, I don’t.”
“What about Sherry?”
Leila stole a look at me. “What about her?”
“I’m just wondering how you enjoyed yourself in Malibu.”
“Fine. It was fun.”
“What about Emily?”
“Why are you asking me all these questions?”
“Your mom said you liked riding horses at her place.”
“Emily’s okay. She’s not as bad as some.”
“What else did you do?”
“Nothing. We made grilled cheese sandwiches.”
The arrow on my bullshit meter zinged up into the red zone. I was much better at lying when I was Leila’s age. “Here’s my best guess. I’ll bet you skipped both those visits and spent the weekend with Paulie.”
She said, “Ha ha ha.”
“Come on. ‘Fess up. What difference does it make?”
“I don’t have to respond if I don’t want to.”
“Leila, you asked me to keep my mouth shut. The least you could do is tell me the truth.”
“So what if I saw Paulie? What’s the big deal about that?”
“What about all the other weekends you were supposed to be off visiting classmates?”
Another sullen silence. I tried another tack. “How’d you two meet?”
“In Juvie.”
“You were in Juvenile Hall? When was this?”
“A year ago July. Bunch of us got picked up.”
“Doing what?”
“The cops said loitering and trespass, which is crap. We weren’t doing anything, just hanging around.”
“Where was this?”
“I don’t know,” she said, crossly. “Just some boarded-up old house.”
“What time of day?”
“What are you, a district attorney? It was late, like two o’clock in the morning. Half the kids ran. Cops were all bent out of shape and took the rest of us in. Mom and Dow came and picked me up and they were pissed.”