Cold Trail

by Janet Dawson

  It was cooler this morning, but the forecast was for more heat. I strolled around the plaza and located the café and bake shop where I was to meet Nancy Parsons at ten o’clock. It was a few minutes before ten, so I went to the counter to survey the yummy pastries she’d mentioned. They did indeed look enticing. Which one to have? It was a tough decision, but I finally narrowed it down to a pain au raisin, a spiral of flaky pastry liberally studded with plump raisins. When my turn came at the counter, I ordered a latte to go with the pastry and carried my purchases to a nearby table. With a fork, I cut a piece of the pastry and lifted it to my mouth. Mmm, good choice.

  As I sipped my latte, a woman of about forty walked into the café, wearing sandals, khaki capri pants and a blue T-shirt on her short, rounded frame, her salt-and-pepper hair brushing her shoulders. She glanced around the café as though looking for someone and I made eye contact. She crossed to the table where I sat. “Jeri Howard?”

  “Yes.” I waved a hand toward the counter. “Can I get you anything?”

  “Oh, thanks, I’d love a cappuccino. And a chocolate croissant. My weakness. Hey, there’s chocolate and there’s everything else.”

  I laughed. “My sentiments exactly. Although you see I got seduced by something else.”

  She examined my pastry. “Oh, that one’s good, too.”

  Nancy sat down at the table while I stepped up to the counter and ordered. I returned a moment later and set the cup and croissant in front of her.

  “I appreciate your meeting me,” I said, sitting down across from her.

  “Anything I can do to help. I was so shocked when you told me Brian was missing. What happened?”

  She ate a few bites of her croissant while I gave her an edited version of events. “I’m following up on something Brian told a friend. He also mentioned it to my father. Brian was upset over something that happened to one of his students, a boy who tried to kill himself after being bullied.”

  “Ah, that.” Nancy wiped chocolate from her fingers. Then she sipped her cappuccino and licked a bit of foam from her lips. “Anything I tell you is strictly off the record. I bet you hear that a lot, in your line of work.”

  “Yes, I do. And this would be for my use only. I’m interested in Brian’s state of mind. I’m not even sure this has anything to do with his disappearance, but I’m exploring every avenue.”

  “It may not have anything to do with Brian disappearing,” Nancy said, “but I’m sure it has something to do with him changing jobs. That asshole McManus.”

  “Who’s that? The principal?”

  “Yes.” She sighed, took another bite of her croissant, washing it down with more coffee. “It’s all been hushed up, you see. Never happened, not the school’s fault, et cetera. Just because McManus didn’t take the bullying seriously and he doesn’t want any record of anything happening on his watch. It didn’t happen at school or there would have been some official repercussions.”

  “So what did happen?” I cut off another wedge of my pastry and raised the fork to my lips.

  “A lot of what I know is hearsay, but I’ll tell you anyway. The kid’s an eighth-grader. I understand he comes from a very conservative, strict, religious family. I’m sure he’s gay and conflicted as hell about it.”

  “That spells trouble.” I sipped my latte.

  “You got that right. These kids are middle-schoolers, twelve and thirteen, and some of them are emotionally quite young. They pick up on any differences, any student who’s different from the herd. In this case, a bunch of boys were bullying this particular kid, calling him the usual names. It escalated during the school year. I don’t know when Brian first picked up on it, but sometime around the last part of April, he said something to the principal about the kid being hassled. McManus pretty much ignored it.”

  “Can he do that? I thought there were measures in place to deal with bullying in the schools.”

  “There are supposed to be. It’s a serious problem and it’s gotten lots of media coverage. But McManus blew it off. He should have his ass in the wringer for that, but it’s not gonna happen. His excuse is that he couldn’t really do anything because the complaint hadn’t come from the student himself. It was just Brian’s opinion, you see. I know Brian talked to the kid. But later that week, the kid got hit by a car.”

  “Traffic accident?” I reached for my coffee. “I thought it was a suicide attempt.”

  Nancy waved a piece of croissant at me. “Officially, it’s a traffic accident. Unofficially—well, make that the school grapevine—the boy deliberately ran out in front of the car that hit him. The driver said he never saw the kid until he was in front of the car. Another witness said it looked like the kid did it on purpose. So who knows?”

  “That muddles it,” I said. “If the boy had taken a fistful of sleeping pills, there would have been an investigation, some official record.”

  Nancy nodded. “But in this case, the police called it an accident. Kid versus car and the kid was seriously injured. Brian was sure it was a suicide attempt, due to the bullying. He told me so and confronted McManus about it. I gather there was quite an argument in the principal’s office. It wasn’t long after that Brian confided in me that he was looking for another job. I didn’t think he’d find one this soon, but when that position opened up in Petaluma, he jumped on it.”

  After Nancy left, I finished my pastry and coffee and thought about what she had told me. It was interesting and it certainly gave evidence of Brian’s state of mind at the end of the last school year.

  But did it have anything to do with my brother’s disappearance? I didn’t think so. Nor did I think there was any point in talking with the principal. From what Nancy had told me, he was in denial that anything had happened.

  Twenty-Five

  I left Sonoma and headed north on Highway 12, past the small town of Glen Ellen, where Oakland-born writer Jack London had a ranch here in his beloved Valley of the Moon. The ranch is now the site of the Jack London State Historical Park. Farther north, the highway begins a slow curve to the west, passing Annadel State Park and heading into Santa Rosa. I drove through the city and continued west on Guerneville Road.

  I located Vann’s Motorcycle Shop on the north side of the two-lane road, where the urban landscape began to give way to the country. I slowed and pulled into the paved parking lot. A bronze Hyundai hatchback was parked in front. I pulled up behind the hatchback and parked, reaching for my stainless steel water bottle. Today was shaping up to be as hot as yesterday, and it wasn’t even noon yet.

  Then I got out of the car and walked toward the one-story building. It was painted a utilitarian gray. As I approached it, the small office was on the left side and a single service bay on the right. The metal door that closed off the bay had been raised and I could see inside. The far wall held a collection of large red metal toolboxes and several workbenches. A small microwave oven perched on the end of one of the workbenches, and next to this was a small refrigerator. Inside the bay were three motorcycles in various stages of repair, but I didn’t see a mechanic at work.

  I walked into the office. A plastic fan attached to the wall stirred the air around, but it wasn’t doing much to alleviate the heat. The walls were green, decorated with posters of motorcycles tacked to the walls with nails. A calendar featured a blonde in a bikini stretched out on a Harley. A door to my right went through to the service bay.

  The office had a short counter, covered with an untidy pile of magazines and parts catalogs. To one side of this, in the middle of the room, was a scarred wooden desk with a tattered desk blotter. At one corner of the desk was a glass ashtray containing several cigarette butts. It looked as though whoever had smoked them was rolling his own. The butts were unfiltered.

  A woman in denim shorts and a bright pink tank top leaned against the desk, her back to me. Her dark brown hair was caught up in an untidy bun secured with a pink plastic clip. She was talking on a cell phone, holding it to her ear with her right hand.r />
  “I don’t know where he is. How many times do I have to say it?” Her voice sounded angry as she punctuated the air with her left hand. “Yes, I’ll call you. I said I would, and I will.” She listened to whoever was on the other end of the line. Then she held out the phone and thumbed a button, ending the call.

  “Son of a bitch,” she said.

  “Problems?”

  She straightened and turned, startled to see me. She was in her late twenties or early thirties, I guessed, tanned and well muscled, with a round, full-lipped face and multiple earrings in both ear lobes. A pink rosebud tattoo decorated her right shoulder. Her long fingernails were the same shade of pink, decorated with something glittery.

  “You could say that.” She gave me a rueful smile as she tucked the cell phone into the pocket of her shorts. Then she reached across the desk for a can of Diet Coke, tipped it to her mouth, and swallowed. “Can I help you?”

  “I’m looking for Harry Vann.”

  She laughed, but there wasn’t much humor in it. “You too? So am I. So’s that guy that just called. I don’t know where Harry is. I haven’t seen him since Saturday. And when I do, I’m gonna give him a piece of my mind.”

  “That’s interesting,” I said, thinking of the fire at Newman’s Marina early Sunday morning.

  “Interesting, hell. It’s a pain in the ass.” She fiddled with an errant strand of hair. “Harry’s supposed to open up the shop at eight o’clock Monday morning. He didn’t show up. I haven’t seen him all week, and it’s Thursday now. That’s four freaking days. And the customers are freaking out. They can’t get Harry on his phone here, or his cell phone. He must have it turned off or it needs a charge. So now they’re calling me, like that jerk on the phone just now, wanting to know when his bike’s gonna be done. I don’t know what to tell people.”

  “Why are they calling you?”

  “I’m a partner.” She grimaced. “My name’s on the lease anyway. I’m Carla Vann, Harry’s sister. Anyway, since Harry did his disappearing act, I’ve been coming down here every day, fielding phone calls and dealing with paperwork. Around here, I do everything except fix bikes. Harry and Scott do that.”

  “I didn’t see anyone in the shop when I drove up,” I said.

  “Scott went to pick up some parts we ordered.” She looked past me as a blue-and-white Chevy Tahoe drove up and parked outside the service bay. A slender, dark-haired young man got out of the driver’s seat. “There he is now.”

  Scott walked into the office, looking like a choir boy gone bad. He was in his mid-twenties, I guessed, with a sulky expression on his face and hard brown eyes. He wore heavy work boots, faded jeans decorated with grease stains, and a yellow sleeveless T-shirt that showed an array of tattoos on both arms. His brown hair was long and curly. He gave me a once-over, as though wondering who I was and what I was doing there.

  “Did you get everything?” Carla asked.

  “Yeah. Here’s the paperwork.” He handed her several sheets of paper. Then he turned and went outside, without waiting for a reply.

  Carla looked at the top sheet of paper he handed her, then set it on the desk. Reading upside down, I could see that the young man had signed the bottom with the name “Scott Cruz.”

  Scott had opened the back of the Tahoe. Now he removed several large cardboard cartons from the truck bed, stacking them on the concrete floor near the door that led from the office to the service bay.

  “Have you reported Harry missing?” I asked.

  Carla looked at me as though she hadn’t considered it. “No. I figure Harry’s just gone off somewhere. I checked his house. It looks like he packed some things. So he’s taking a break. He’s done it before. He usually tells me, though. Calls me up and says, hey, sis, I’m going away for a few days, can you handle the shop? You know, that kind of thing.”

  “But not this time?”

  Carla shook her head. “Not a word. Anyway, that’s my problem, not yours. How can I help you? Are you a customer?” I shook my head. “Didn’t think so. You don’t look like the motorcycle-riding type.”

  “No, I’m not. I want to talk with Harry about another matter. My name’s Jeri Howard. I’m a private investigator.” I handed over one of my business cards.

  I glanced to my right. Scott was just the other side of the door that separated the office from the service bay. He had a pocket knife in his right hand, using it to slit open one of the cartons. But he didn’t seem to be focused on unpacking the supplies. I suspected he was listening to my conversation with Carla, with more than casual interest.

  She looked at my card and frowned. “A private eye? Really?”

  “I have some questions about an accident that happened the last week in June. A man named Rick Newman was killed. I understand Harry was a witness.”

  “What’s this about, insurance?” Carla flicked her fingernails against my business card. Then she propped the card against the rim of the glass ashtray.

  “I’m just tying up some loose ends.” It suited me to let her think my interest was due to an insurance matter.

  My words seemed to bother Scott, though. His right hand, holding the knife, stopped briefly. Then he closed the knife, tucked it in his back pocket, and began taking parts out of the cartons.

  “All I can tell you is what Harry told me.” Carla took another swallow of her Diet Coke. “He and Rick had been up to Fort Ross.”

  I knew the place, located about twelve miles north of Jenner. Fort Ross was the site of a Russian settlement on the California coast. The fort had been established in 1812, a distant outpost of the czar’s empire, home to a number of Russians and California Indians, until abandoned in 1842. It is now a state park, with displays in the historic old buildings.

  The motorcycle accident had occurred on a Thursday afternoon. I had wondered about the timing, on a weekday. It had seemed odd to me that Harry, who with his sister owned this motorcycle repair business, would take time off on a Thursday go to Fort Ross with his buddy Rick. However, Carla had just told me that Harry was in the habit of taking off from time to time.

  That was a plus about being self-employed, I knew, since I was a sole practitioner with my own business. I could leave the office whenever I liked—as long as the work got done. If the work didn’t get done, the bills didn’t get paid.

  As for Rick, it appeared he hadn’t had a steady job. Instead he’d worked at times for his father at the marina, and sometimes here at the motorcycle shop.

  “So Harry and Rick were on their way back from Fort Ross,” I said, prompting her to continue. “And Rick went off the road. But it was June, no rain, no fog, or so I heard. Were they going too fast?”

  “Probably. Rick did like to push that Harley to the limit.” Carla finished her Diet Coke and tossed the can into a cardboard carton on the floor next to the desk. “Harry said Rick was in front. They went around a curve. Rick’s bike slid and kept going, off the cliff. Harry tried to get down to Rick, but he couldn’t. He said it was way too steep and he couldn’t see a way down. So he got on his bike and went to Jenner for help. When he got back with some deputies, Rick was gone. I mean, his body was gone. Washed out to sea.”

  “What kind of car does Harry drive?” I asked. “And what color is it?”

  “A silver Ford Escape,” Carla said. “Why?”

  I glanced to my right. Scott was still hovering near the door that led to the shop. He had a frown on his face. Was it due to my question about Harry’s vehicle?

  He saw me looking at him and dropped his gaze. He took his knife from his pocket and broke down the empty cardboard cartons, stacking them against the wall near the door. Then he disappeared from view.

  I was suspicious of Scott Cruz. It was the way he looked at me. The way he pretended indifference but listened in on my conversations with Carla Vann waved a red flag.

  “Tell me about Scott,” I said.

  Carla shrugged. “He’s just a kid that works for us. Mechanics come and go. Rick used to
work here, too. Scott’s been here, oh, I guess Harry hired him right before Christmas. I think he met Scott at the roadhouse, you know, that place Rick’s dad owns. He lives right here, in that little green house the other side of the shop. We own that, and we give him a break on the rent.”

  I reached into my bag, looking for the artist’s sketch of the dead man found on the boat. I didn’t know what Harry Vann looked like. But the fact that his sister hadn’t seen him since Saturday had set off alarm bells.

  Before I could get the sketch out of my bag, a loud rumble heralded the arrival of two Harleys, ridden by two men in motorcycle leathers. Carla walked into the service bay to greet them as they parked their bikes. I followed, watching from the doorway. Scott was kneeling on the concrete floor at the back of the shop, working on a torn-down Harley, various parts scattered around him. He set down a wrench and reached for a nearby plastic liter of Pepsi. He uncapped it and took a drink.

  “Hey, Duke,” Carla said, addressing the larger of the two men, a burly fellow with a graying ponytail. She turned to the smaller man. “Good to see you, Robbie. How’s it going?”

  Duke enveloped Carla in a hug. “Yo, Carla. Where the hell’s Harry? I been calling his cell phone and he don’t pick up. Call goes straight to voice mail.”

  Carla shrugged, spreading her arms, palms up. “Your guess is as good as mine. You find out where Harry is, you tell me.”

  “He take off again?” Robbie laughed. “I remember that time he went up to Laytonville for a few days, didn’t tell anybody. You were mad at him.”

  “Well, I’m not too happy with him now,” Carla said. “I’ve been holding the fort all week and I sure wish he’d show up, or at least call.”