Chocolate Quake

by Nancy Fairbanks

  “Do you think—” Sam gave me such a quelling look that I didn’t pursue it. After we became better acquainted, and he realized that I wasn’t a wimp, I’d ask again.

  “Yasmin Atta. I’m seeing her Wednesday.”

  “Lucky you. Suspect or witness?”

  “Witness, if she saw anything. Next, Denise’s family. She was a widow, but Mrs. Rovere said that she inherited a lot of money from her husband and that there was bad blood between her and her stepson because he abused his wife. That might be worth looking into. We could talk to the wife about the abuse. Another possibility: the son might be angry because Denise got a lot of his father’s money. Maybe he wanted to get it back by killing her.”

  “OK. I’ll follow up.” He wrote Faulk in his notebook.

  “I could talk to the wife. Or both of us could if you’re worried that he might come in while I’m questioning her.” I hoped that I was being cooperative enough to ingratiate myself into his investigation.

  He didn’t reply, so I didn’t push it. “Then there’s Dr. Tagalong, who was angry when Denise wouldn’t fund a mammogram machine for the center. She actually said she had a better reason for killing Denise than my mother-in-law did. Still, I don’t consider her a good suspect. She was at a meeting on sexually transmitted diseases while Denise was being killed.” I paused for comment. He said nothing, so I went on. “There’s an elderly woman named Yolanda Minarez who is suing the center over the unisex toilets. She was there that night to talk to O’Finn, and she wasn’t on the sign-in list. I could call her.”

  “You trying to save your father-in-law money by doing all the work yourself for free because I bill by the hour?”

  “Not at all, Mr. Flamboise. I’d be happy to have your company for any call or visit I make, and I’ll certainly turn the information I get over to you, so you can bill lots of hours studying it.” I wanted to ask him how much he charged per hour, but decided that wouldn’t endear me to him as a prospective fellow investigator. “In fact, this conversation will go on your bill, I presume.”

  Sam chuckled. “Sweetie, you are one prissy, smart-ass woman. But cute.”

  Since I couldn’t afford to take offense, I opted for a playful approach. “Mr. Flamboise, are you flirting with me?”

  “Well, I sure would be, honeybunch, but the fact is I’m gay.”

  He didn’t look like my idea of a gay man. He looked like—a street fighter? I guess I showed my surprise because he felt the need to enlarge on the subject.

  “They call me the Sam Spade of the Castro,” he added and gave me his card, which actually did say that. Even I know that the Castro is the gay enclave.

  “You really give out this card?” I stammered, not, I’m afraid, a very tactful question.

  “Only to special friends, chickie. So. Now that we’ve eliminated sexual tension as a barrier to good detective work, you got any more suspects?”

  “One,” I replied, wishing I could fall through the floor. That is absolutely the last time I try my hand at flirting. “There’s a mental patient named Bad Girl or Martina L. King, which no one believes is her real name. She paints pictures of knives no matter what the assignment is. Dr. Tagalong put her in an art class for therapy. Then Denise said she’d have to be dropped because of the insurance, and Bad Girl took it amiss. Because of the knives and the psychosis and the bad blood between them, I thought she might be a good prospect.”

  “Got an address?”

  “She sometimes lives in a homeless shelter in Haight-Asbury and gets her medication from a free clinic, although I’m told she doesn’t always take the medication. She’s my last suspect.”

  “OK.” He closed his book.

  Curiosity overcame me. “Since you’re gay, did you take part in the riots in 1979? When the Twinkie man got a light sentence for killing Harvey Milk?”

  “I know what riots you mean, and no, I was just a kid playing high school football then. My parents didn’t let me take part in riots.”

  “Oh.” I wondered how old he was.

  “So now I’ll give you that ride home.”

  He looked so amused about the offer that I felt a bit uneasy. We left and walked along Eighteenth Street for about a block. “Here we are.” He stopped by a black motorcycle, buckled a helmet on his head, and handed one to me.

  “I—I can’t ride on a motorcycle,” I stammered.

  “Well, I can get you a cab, but if you’re too chicken to ride on the bike with me, I don’t see how we can team up on the investigation.”

  I’m sure his wide smile was smug rather than good-humored. I took a deep breath, wondered whether he’d really pursue the exoneration of my mother-in-law if I weren’t there to see that he did, thought about my children, and then ruined my hair by pulling on his rotten helmet. “What next?” I asked, trying to sound courageous and cheerful when I was really furious and scared to death.

  21

  Sleuths: Day Two

  Carolyn

  All the way from Eliza to the apartment, I clung to the substantial bulk of “the Sam Spade of the Castro.” As the motorcycle vibrated and roared, I pictured my husband, sitting on the steps, his luggage beside him, waiting for me to return and let him in, little knowing that I would arrive on a Harley, wearing a black helmet.

  Lucky me. Jason had lingered to discuss the exciting research presented at the meeting. I’d been home a half hour, typing culinary notes into my computer, when he rang the bell downstairs and I buzzed him in. He was so eager to tell me about the amazing discoveries made at Ohio State that he completely forgot to ask about my conversation with Sam. Which was fine with me. We went to bed, happy with one another once again. He kissed me before he left this morning and asked if I had exciting plans for the day.

  “Ethiopian food,” I mumbled.

  “Good for you. I should be back by 6:30.” With that he was gone, and I didn’t feel obliged to tell him that I would be eating Ethiopian food with Sam while we interviewed Kebra Zenawi, proprietor of the restaurant and possible witness to murder.

  Now wide-awake and ready to begin a day of investigation, I jumped out of bed, showered and dressed, and left to buy breakfast supplies for Vera’s empty fridge. Over fresh croissants, coffee, and a cup of mixed fruit that came peeled, chopped, and enclosed in plastic, I looked over my list of people. Whatever Sam was doing this morning—riding in motorcycle races, spying on adulterers, marching in gay pride parades—I intended to get on with the exoneration of Vera.

  First, I called Patrick Baker O’Finn and introduced myself as an acquaintance of Margaret Hanrahan. Because Margaret’s husband was the senior partner, O’Finn took my call. Yes, he had been at the center the night of the murder, using Margaret’s office to negotiate a settlement with one Yolanda Minarez, a very successful negotiation, he added in a self-congratulatory tone.

  “Did she agree to share the toilets with men?” I asked.

  “No, the center will put up a Women Only sign on the first-floor toilet, directing men upstairs, and Mrs. Minarez will stay away from facilities on the top floors.”

  “She probably can’t get upstairs anyway,” I remarked.

  “Not easily,” said Mr. O’Finn, “but the point is that no money changed hands. Was that what you wanted to know?”

  “No, I’m interested in anything you might have seen relative to the murder, someone lurking around, someone who shouldn’t have been there, someone escaping.”

  “With bloody knife in hand?” Mr. O’Finn asked sarcastically. “I was on the second floor, Mrs. Blue. I saw no one in the front section of the building, except your mother-in-law, who was coming down from an upper floor about 7:15 when I arrived.”

  “Didn’t you see the guard?”

  “You mean the teenager at the desk? I signed in there. Then I nodded to Professor Blue and went upstairs, where I stayed to meet Minarez. She arrived perhaps five minutes later. When we heard the screams and ruckus downstairs, Mrs. Minarez became hysterical and wanted to back away from t
he agreement. I suggested that she sign and then I would drive her home. She did, we went down the stairs in the middle section and exited by the outside ramp, where we climbed into my car and left.”

  “You left the scene of a crime? As an officer of the court, shouldn’t you have waited for the police?”

  “I didn’t know there had been a crime. I assume, since my name is on the sign-in list, the police will contact me if they want my input. In the meantime, I had an elderly, hysterical woman on my hands. She could have had a heart attack. I felt that it was my duty as a gentleman and a pro bono lawyer for the center to see to her welfare.”

  I thanked him for his time. One interesting fact stood out: the presence of a high school boy at the sign-in desk. Timatovich had claimed he was on duty that night. Had both of them been there, or just the son? Or was the high school boy someone else posing as a security guard until he could murder Denise? He might have been Denise Faulk’s stepgrandson.

  I wrote down my thoughts and called Yolanda Minarez, who said, “Eef the lawyer din’ get me outa there, I could be dead like Denise, who was very mean to me about my lawsuit. She should have known I deedn’t want no money, just a safe bathroom to pee in. That lawyer, he talk an’ talk about money, when all I want is a toilet por las damas, no por los hombres. Eef he let me talk, maybe I could be home in my house before anyone get keelled. My husband, he no like strange Anglo man breeng me home at night. He no like I go out at night. An’ he really don’ like I want damas toilet instead of money.”

  Mrs. Minarez hadn’t seen anyone on the first floor or the first-floor ramp to the street or on her way up the stairs to the second floor, a hard climb for an old lady. And she hadn’t seen anyone when she and Mr. O’Finn escaped out the side exit.

  O’Finn and Minarez alibied each other. What else could I find out while waiting for Sam Flamboise to pick me up? Dr. Tagalong. Had she really been at a meeting? I booted up Vera’s computer and looked through August meeting calendars on a San Francisco Internet site, mar veling that I had become computer literate enough to do an Internet investigation.

  Three meetings on sexually transmitted diseases had been held last Thursday, only one for health professionals. I called that number and identified myself as a writer doing a story on the meeting and looking for comments from attendees. The person who answered the phone couldn’t have been more helpful. I will never again naively trust any stranger who telephones me. After she had suggested several people I could interview, I thanked her and said I also had a Dr. Rosamunda Tagalong on my list.

  My informant responded enthusiastically that Dr. Rosa had been one of the panelists, a wonderful source. She was very active in organizations seeking to stem the tide of sexually transmitted diseases in the Bay area. How long a meeting had it been? I asked. The panel had talked from 7:00 to 9:00, then thrown the discussion open to questions from the audience.

  Well, that takes care of Dr. Tagalong, I thought. Denise had died while the doctor was talking about STDs in front of, according to my source, fifty people.

  My next thought was to research the Timberlite organization. If Denise had been blackmailing Mr. Timberlite for a big contribution, who would know about that? His wife wasn’t likely to tell me that they had, in fact, arranged for Denise’s murder. I looked up his company arranged for Denise’s murder. I looked up his company and asked to be connected with their Public Relations Department, where I inquired about rumors of a “large contribution by Timberlite to the Union Street Women’s Center.” The director believed me to be a volunteer looking for a contribution to Bay Area Women at Risk, my own invention.

  “Just between us,” she said, chuckling, “I don’t think Mr. Timberlite will be making more contributions of that sort this year. One of his charities has organized a protest against one of his projects.” I thanked her and said we at Bay Area Women would try again when Mr. Timberlite was feeling more tolerant of women’s groups.

  Having investigated O’Finn, Minarez, Tagalong, and Timberlite, I was left with Bad Girl. That was a tough one. She might not be back at the center until next Monday, and I had no idea where to find her. Without much hope, I called some free clinics. Two weren’t even in Haight-Asbury, and the two that were weren’t impressed with my story that Bad Girl, otherwise known as Martina L. King, had won the hundred-dollar food lottery at the center. I was told that they didn’t give out information of any kind on their patients, even a yes or no as to whether the person in question was one of theirs.

  Here I’d told all those lies, and I hadn’t learned anything from the people I’d lied to. Just what I deserved. I gave up and went to dress for my Ethiopian lunch. How formal would an Ethiopian restaurant be? When in doubt, err on the side of conservative but attractive clothes the mother of a high school friend used to tell me. Of course, I had to wear slacks since Sam might show up on his motorcycle.

  22

  Morning of a Professional Sleuth

  Sam

  Tuesday, and I had some big-profit clients to see to, but what I couldn’t stop poking at in my mind was the murder of Denise Faulk and the oddball list of suspects and wit nesses turned up by the amusing Mrs. Blue, the last person you’d expect to find seriously hunting a murderer. At breakfast, after I described the events of the evening and my plan to pick her up for lunch at Kebra’s, Paul accused me of having a crush on Carolyn. I assured him that I wasn’t changing my sexual orientation, just having fun luring a sedate lady onto the back of a Harley. She was game. I’ll have to give her that.

  At the office I delegated the security jobs, signed some papers, and turned a couple of my computer geeks loose on Eric Timberlite and the Faulk son. I wanted probate information on the Faulk family and rumors of criminal association or activity on Timberlite. I called Freddie Piñon’s parole officer myself. Like you might expect, Freddie was in the wind. He hadn’t reported in yesterday like he was supposed to, and he hadn’t been seen at his halfway house since Thursday. It looked bad for Freddie.

  “You think he’d kill anyone?” I asked Burl Kalton.

  “Hasn’t yet, but he’s gone after his old lady a couple of times. He even took a crack at this woman who runs a shelter.” Burl laughed. “She shot him in the ass. Missed the first shot an’ got him when he tried to run. That’s how he ended up in jail this last time. Got his sentence plea-bargained down for ratting out some mutt who was running meth labs in the basements of day care facilities.”

  “Lucky none of the labs blew up a bunch of kids,” I remarked. “So if I wanted to get hold of Freddie, where would I look?”

  “If I knew, I’d pick him up myself,” Burl retorted.

  “Yeah, right. How many parolees you got on your list right now?”

  “Point taken. You could ask Araña Morales at the Tres Hermanos pool hall. He used to hang with Freddie.”

  “Thanks, Kalton. I owe you one.” Should I take the neatly turned out Mrs. Blue to Tres Hermanos with me? I’d give it some thought.

  Next I called the cell phone of a contact in the Russian community, hanger-on to better-connected criminal types. “Boris, my friend, it’s Sam Flamboise. How’re they hangin’? You sellin’ lots of rock to kids on street corners?” Boris wasn’t amused, although I could tell by the background noise that he was on a street corner. “Listen, tovarish, you wanna do a little job for me?” Boris was interested. “Ask around about a guy named Alexi Timatovich, immigrant from Siberia, works security for a women’s center on Union, might have something going there. I wanna know if he’s killed anyone lately, or ever. If he knows anyone who would. If he’s been drinking too much and telling stories about illegal activities. . . . Yeah, call me back. There’s a couple a hundred in it if you find me anything good.”

  Then I dialed our architecturally challenged Hall of Justice. What can you say about a city that builds a jail that’s better looking than its courthouse? “Harry Yu in?” I was transferred. “Harry, it’s Sam Flamboise. I’ve been hired to prove you made a mistake in hanging
that old lady out to dry for the Faulk killing. . . . Yeah, well, I would too if I saw that much blood on someone kneeling over the body, but a job is a job, and this one was wished on me by a client with deep pockets. . . . No, he never met your alleged murderer. He’s old buddies with the lady’s ex, who doesn’t want his grandkids embarrassed by a killer grandma. You know how it goes.

  “How about I come down and take a look at the evidence? Or have you really got a hard-on over sending the old girl up for the rest of her golden years? . . . Hell, you know me, Harry. I find it’s someone else did the crime, you’ll get the credit. I’m only in this for the money. . . . So I’ll see you in fifteen, OK?”

  Five minutes, and I was heading out, enjoying the nice weather and the rumble of my Harley. I parked in back where the cops do and went through the open grassed area to the hall and an elevator up to Homicide. While I was there, I’d see what Harry knew about Marcus Croker. What I knew wasn’t that great, like some brutality complaints in the past, but not against women as far as I knew.

  I’ll swear Harry was chunkier than ever. “Hey, man, how’re they hanging?”

  “No use asking a guy my age that question, Sam. Here, take a quick look.” He handed me a folder of photos. “My partner wouldn’t approve, but she’s out on a case with Kliner, arm in a Dumpster. No body attached.”

  “Better her than you.” I flipped through the photos. “Jesus, Harry, this poor woman was cut to pieces. You really think an old lady could have done this?”

  “Take a look at the pictures of the old lady,” Harry advised.

  He had a point. She was not only bloody, but she had a mean look to her. Carolyn Blue would be disappointed if I proved her mother-in-law really was the murderer.

  “Coroner thinks Faulk was down for some of the wounds,” Harry added.

  “I guess the old lady could have inflicted that much damage if she managed to knock the victim down first, but how’d she do that?” I asked.