Chocolate Quake

by Nancy Fairbanks

  Jason jostled me awake to inform me that he wouldn’t be dining with me that night. It seems that by selecting an interesting place to eat and inviting an interesting couple to join us, I had undermined the purpose of the evening, business and science. Therefore, he’d have to meet tonight without me.

  Wasn’t that mean? To reproach me when I was half-asleep and unable to defend myself. It served him right when I burst into tears. I was very hurt, although not repentant. I thought it had been a delightful evening, and I sniffled into my pillow that I was sure Mr. Straub would agree. Jason did apologize, but he didn’t change his mind about excluding me from his plans or retract his objections to my association with Sam Flamboise. Now I’d have to cancel tonight’s reservation, because I couldn’t go by myself.

  I had another good cry before getting up to dress, eat breakfast, and wait for Sam’s call. And what did Sam have to say? That he had a crisis to deal with. Dumped twice. At least Sam had the good grace to suggest ways that I could carry on the investigation in his absence.

  That cheered me up. However, I wouldn’t be wearing my motorcycle outfit, which I had become quite fond of, having received so many compliments on it yesterday. Forty-plus and still cool. Even Mrs. Croker had liked it, not that I considered her a paragon of good taste. Perhaps it was just as well to wear regular clothes. I did have to meet the eminent Mrs. Hollis at the museum.

  While I was debating wardrobe choices, Sam told me what he wanted me to do. “First, find out what that sashimi knife looks like. Maybe they’ve got a picture at the center or you can find it in a department store and take your own picture. I want you to show it to Harry Yu. He’ll know, or the medical examiner can tell him, whether it could have been the murder weapon. That’s the second thing. It’s time we brought Harry up to date, so you’ll be our police liaison. We’ve got good suspects now, and we can use his help.”

  “We’ve done better than he did,” I objected. “He just arrested my mother-in-law without looking any further.”

  “Listen, Carolyn. I’m a private detective. I like to keep my relations with the cops amicable, and Harry’s a good guy. Tell him about Faulk, who wasn’t at his office the night his stepmother was killed, although a few people there thought he might have been at a poker game. You could call his wife and see if she knows who he plays poker with. And tell Yu about Freddie. Spider called late last night with an address on the little mutt. They can send some uniforms after Senor Piñon.” He dictated the address. “But don’t mention Croker. That might piss Harry off since they’re both cops. Like I said, I’ll see what Croker’s doing from 8:00 to 9:00 tonight.”

  “I’ll go with you,” I offered. “Jason didn’t like last night’s restaurant. It was too noisy to talk chemistry, so I’m not invited to dinner tonight. You can pick me up at the center at 7:30 when my cake class ends.”

  “Look, Carolyn, what with that class and all the other stuff you’ve got to do today, why don’t you let me follow up on Croker.”

  “Absolutely not. I’ll expect you at 7:30.” I hung up and looked for Raymond Faulk’s number in the telephone book. When I dialed, the telephone rang until I couldn’t stand to listen anymore. Why didn’t she answer? Had he come back? What had he done to her? And the children. Well, they should be in school. She’d mentioned the name, so I looked up the number and dialed.

  At first, because I hadn’t claimed family status, they wouldn’t tell me if the children were in school. “I’m their aunt,” I objected, “and I can’t get hold of my sister-in-law. I’m worried about her. And the children. I don’t see why you can’t just tell me whether they’re there. Then at least I’ll know they’re safe. My half brother is a dangerous man. If you don’t help me, I’ll have to call the police, and think how embarrassing that will be if nothing’s wrong. He’ll be furious, and since he doesn’t like her to leave the house, he’ll be furious with her and—”

  I either convinced the secretary that I was the children’s hysterical aunt, or she got tired of listening because she agreed to check the attendance rolls. The Faulk children were not in class, and no one had called to explain their absence. “Oh dear, oh dear,” I said. “I’ll have to find their father.” And I hung up. But someone else, preferably Inspector Yu, would have to find Raymond Faulk. I was afraid of him. I was, after all, the police liaison, not an armed officer.

  Still fretting about Teresa Faulk, I went downstairs to consult Mr. Valetti on what bus to take to Union Street. I doubted that Calvin was planning to pay for my expenses as well as Sam’s, although maybe he should have. No, that wasn’t fair. Calvin had been quite gracious last night and interested in my discoveries.

  Mr. Valetti was on his way to play bocce and gave me a ride to the center, fascinated by the information Sam and I had collected. “My professora, she gonna be real proud of you, Bellissima. You’re a good daughter to her. I’m-a be proud when you my daughter, too.”

  As if that’s likely to happen, I thought as I climbed the steps to the front door. What a beautiful day it was. Every day had been. I couldn’t believe that Anthony Trollope had grumbled about “rain falling in torrents” and sudden changes from “heat to cold” in one day. But then he had been a grumpy traveler.

  Once inside, my first thought was to ask Penny Widdister in Battered Women for the records on Teresa Faulk. If I could get copies, Inspector Yu would be more likely to look for her and go after her husband. No one was at the sign-in desk, so I simply went upstairs and knocked. In a quavery voice, Penny asked who was there. Still frightened that batterers would come in and attack her. When I identified myself, she unlocked the door and let me in. I noticed for the first time that she was pregnant, probably about four months, and I felt sorry for my unkind thoughts. No wonder she was afraid. At first, she said she couldn’t give me the record, but when I explained the whole situation, she began to cry.

  “I hate those awful men,” she sobbed. With shaking hands, she unlocked and shuffled through file cabinets. “I hope the police find him and beat him up.” She plucked a manila file from the drawer and thrust it into my hand. “You take it right down there and make them help her.”

  I hadn’t really anticipated that she’d give me the original, but I wasn’t going to quarrel. “You’re a good woman, Penny, and I’m sure Teresa Faulk will be forever grateful to you.”

  “Oh, don’t mention me,” she cried, alarmed. “I don’t want him—Mr. Faulk—to know I . . . well, actually maybe I shouldn’t . . .”

  “I won’t say a word. It’s our secret. And thank you.” I headed for the stairs before she could snatch the dangerous file back. It was safely in my shoulder bag before I reached the first floor.

  “Oh, Mrs. Blue. There you are.”

  Marina Chavez-Timberlite. I hadn’t thought much about that couple recently. Had Sam found out anything about her husband? What if they were running the scams mentioned in Denise’s notes, and Denise had discovered it, and they had hired someone to kill her?

  When I tuned in on Mrs. Timberlite, she was reminding me that I had volunteered to teach a class at 6:00 on the anniversary dessert. She hoped that I, being a culinary expert, had a wonderful recipe chosen. “Who’s providing the ingredients?” I asked, nettled to be called a volunteer when I’d been blackmailed into the project. “No one’s even called to ask what we’ll need.” Maybe she’d be too stingy to come up with the money and someone to shop. “I certainly don’t have time for grocery shopping. I don’t even have a car. I’m a visitor.”

  “Well . . . well . . .” She looked nonplused. “Perhaps you could dictate what you’ll need to my secretary. Nutrition Central can arrange to have the materials delivered.”

  Phooey! I allowed myself to be shepherded into the secretary’s closet, interrupted the nursing of the new baby, dictated the list, told Kelani to multiply it by ten, and went off to Nutrition Central to see if I could get a description or picture of the missing sashimi knife. Alicia Rovere didn’t have a picture, but she did provide the m
anufacturer’s name and the model number. “They sell them at Macy’s. I don’t know why Bebe made such a fuss. You’d think Japan was going to declare war because someone stole the Consulate’s knife.”

  “If it was the knife that killed Denise, it’s important.”

  “You think she was stabbed with one of our knives?” Alicia gasped.

  “Maybe. At least it’s something the police need to know.”

  “My goodness, Carolyn, have you been investigating all week? Vera owes you a big vote of thanks.”

  Alicia went off to oversee some other dreadful dish being cooked by the Food Stamp/Government Surplus cooks, while one young woman sidled over and advised me, if I was going to Macy’s, to try the Tipper Gore cookies in the cafeteria. Then I returned to the secretary’s office and asked her to call me a cab. I had to get to the Hall of Justice before Inspector Yu left to investigate another murder.

  In the front hall a small group clustered around a young Hispanic woman. Dr. Tagalong called, “Hello there, Mrs. Blue. You’ll want to meet Jesusita. Jesusita, this is Mrs. Carolyn Blue. She’s the daughter-in-law of your mentor.”

  The girl actually threw her arms around me, saying, “Gracias, gracias.” When she recovered from her avalanche of thanks, she said, “Guess what I just got?”

  “A job?”

  “A tubal legation.” She beamed at me.

  “Ligation,” said the doctor.

  “I never have no more children. Even I get raped like my sister’s boyfriend did to me, I have no more children. I get a job. I get my two kids back. Two’s enough. I love Señora Vera. She is so good woman. You wanna see my scar? Jus’ two little cuts. So easy I could almos’ do it myself, no?”

  “No,” said Dr. Tagalong, “although the procedure has become less invasive.”

  Jesusita pulled up her blouse and tugged at the waistline of her jeans to reveal two BAND-AIDS. “Pretty cool, no?”

  “Congratulations,” I murmured. “Oh, that’s my cab. So nice to meet you. Good luck.”

  38

  Liaising with Harry and Cammie

  Carolyn

  I found the sashimiknife in the Macy’s kitchenware department, displayed in a box with Japanese characters. It cost eighty-six dollars. Surely the Consul and Bebe’s father wouldn’t be that upset about eighty-six dollars. The knife was made of brushed molybdenum-vanadium steel and had handles with black holes in slanting lines, very contemporary. The attributes that impressed me most were the ten-inch length and the wide blade base. No wonder there had been so much blood. I took a picture with my digital camera, looked at it on the little screen, and received a suspicious stare from a saleswoman. “I’m investigating a murder,” I explained.

  “Well, it wasn’t done with one of our knives,” she retorted.

  Then I located the cafeteria and bought two cookies: the Tipper Gore, as recommended (it had soft chocolate chips in it), and the M&M’s. I remember hearing, as a preteen, that red M&M’s were carcinogenic, but another rumor had it that they promoted breast development. I ate as many red M&M’s as I could get my hands on in those days, but I’m still cancer-free and small-breasted.

  I tried the cookies in the cab to the Hall of Justice. They were very rich, and I saved half of each for later. Both Inspectors Yu and Camron Cheever, to whom I was introduced for the first time, were in their shared Homicide cubicle. “You’re the woman who set my daughter against me,” said Harry Yu. “Until you told her, Ginger didn’t know that Cammie and I had arrested the old lady. Now my own kid will hardly speak to me. She thinks the arrest was my way of keeping her from living in the dorms at Berkeley. So thanks a lot, lady. Oh, and my grandmother is now at that center teaching welfare mothers to make pot stickers.”

  “Is she?” If I’d had the time, I’d have taken her class. “I had pot stickers at the restaurant you recommended. They were wonderful.”

  “And I suppose you got my grandmother interested in organizing a Tai Chi class in the backyard over there.”

  “I had nothing to do with that. I’m here with information about your case. Sam Flamboise asked me to act as liaison between your investigation and ours.”

  “How do you know Sam?” Harry frowned. “Believe me, Mrs. Blue, he is not your sort of person. He’s one tough cookie.”

  “Nonsense,” said his partner. “Sammie’s a sweet cookie. Not at all bitchy like some gays.”

  “I’d have to agree with you, Inspector Cheever,” I said. “Except for bouts of unacceptable language, which he seems to be overcoming, at least in my presence—”

  “You’ve been criticizing Sam’s language?” Inspector Yu hooted with laughter. “How did he take that?”

  “Very politely,” I replied. “Do you want to hear what we’ve discovered?”

  “I don’t know. Do we, Cammie? Here we’ve got a good, solid case, and this lady wants to pin the Faulk murder on someone other than her mother-in-law.”

  “Family’s family,” said Inspector Cheever. “What have you got?”

  She didn’t look that fashion-impaired to me. She was wearing a perfectly respectable, tailored pants suit. It then occurred to me that Yasmin Atta had probably thought me fashion-impaired. But then she hadn’t seen me in my leathers. “We have information on two suspects for you,” I said and opened my notebook. “First is Frederico Piñon, an abuser of women. He’s out on parole, which he has broken by failing to stay in his halfway house. He was seen at the center both the night before and the night of the murder, trying to frighten someone into telling him where his wife was. Since Denise Faulk originally arranged space in a shelter for the wife, we think it possible that he killed her when she refused to tell him.

  “An informant named Araña Morales, who is covered with tattooed spiders, reported to Sam that Mr. Piñon is hoping to flee to Los Angeles but is presently residing in an abandoned building.” I fished through my purse, forced to put my napkin-wrapped cookie halves on the desk in order to produce the card on which I had written the address.

  “Are those Macy’s cookies?” asked Inspector Cheever. “What kind are they?”

  “Tipper Gore and M&M’s, but I’ve already eaten half of each.”

  “I love the Tipper Gores. If you don’t want the other half, I’ll take it.”

  What could I say? I handed the chocolate chip half to Camron Cheever. Then Inspector Yu said he wouldn’t mind trying the other one, so I gave it to him, reluctantly, hoping lunch at the museum would be tasty and substantial.

  As Harry Yu munched my cookie, he stared at the address I’d given him. “I’ll pass this on. You wouldn’t know if he’s armed, would you?”

  “I think so. He asked a cousin to get him a gun and some gang friends to find him a car. If you don’t hurry, he could escape.”

  “We’ll get on it, not that I’m saying he killed anyone, but he’s breaking parole, going around scaring women. That’s enough to pick him up.”

  “Our second suspect is Raymond Faulk, the stepson of the victim. He had two motives to murder Mrs. Faulk. She had control of two-thirds of his late father’s estate during her lifetime, and she forced the younger Faulk to stop beating his wife, Teresa. Most frightening, Mrs. Teresa Faulk threw him out, and now she’s disappeared with both children, and he didn’t go to work today. A very dangerous situation, don’t you think? He needs to be picked up immediately, even if he didn’t kill his stepmother. We haven’t been able to establish an alibi for him. He says he was at his office, but people there say he wasn’t.”

  “Jeez, Harry, we’re being shown up by a gay private eye and a professor’s daughter-in-law,” said Cammie Cheever. “I told you no way did a little old lady inflict those big stab wounds on Denise Faulk.”

  “Oh, that reminds me,” I exclaimed, “I may know what knife killed her. I pulled out my digital camera and turned on the screen. “It’s a Japanese-made sashimi knife. A center volunteer discovered its absence last night.”

  They both stared at the two-inch screen. “How big
is it?” asked Harry Yu. “I sure can’t tell from that postage-stamp image.”

  “Ten inches long, and two inches wide, maybe less, at the widest part. It costs eighty-six dollars at Macy’s. And I might add that my mother-in-law has no interest in cooking or cooking utensils.”

  “If someone stole the knife from the center kitchen and took it away after the murder,” said Cammie, “that sort of makes it a crime of opportunity, doesn’t it?”

  “Oh, hell,” grumbled Harry Yu. “I knew you were going to be a pain in the neck the first time I saw you.” This to me. “We’ll send a S.W.A.T. team after Piñon and put out a bulletin on Faulk. OK?”

  I beamed at him. “Thank you so much. And could you keep me informed?”

  “I’ll call Sam. He’s got a cell. I didn’t see one in your purse when you were dumping it on my desk.”

  “There are places you can rent one by the day,” said Cammie helpfully. “You could call Harry with the number.”

  Harry gave her a disgruntled look, but I was delighted. “I’ll do that. Thank you again. And if you have no questions for me, could you tell me how to get to the Legion of Honor? It’s a museum.”

  “Take a cab,” Cammie advised.

  “Well, I was hoping to take a bus so that I could inquire about a young schizophrenic who likes that bus and might be a suspect. She’s obsessed with knives and was angry at Denise because Denise suggested that having someone like that at the center could run their liability insurance up.”

  “What’s her name?” asked Inspector Yu.

  “Bad Girl. Or possibly Martina L. King. She isn’t black, but she has a—what do you call it?—cornrow hair-style. It’s so dusty I’m not sure of the color.”

  “This investigation must have been a real eye-opener for you,” said Inspector Yu. “How’d you hook up with Sam?”

  “My father-in-law hired him.”

  “The old woman’s married?” He looked astonished.

  “Divorced. Many years ago.”