by Sue Grafton
"What time did you get to his place?"
"Nine. I was only there an hour. I was probably back in my hotel in SLO-town by eleven-thirty."
"By your account," I said. "Actually either one of you could have driven to Perdido in plenty of time to use Wendell and me as target practice."
"Either of us could have, but I didn't. I can't speak for him."
"You didn't see Wendell at all last night?"
"I already told you that."
"Carl, what you already did is called lying through your dentures. You swore you were out of town when you were here in Colgate. Why should I believe this?"
"I have no control over what you believe."
"What was the deal with Brown once you got there?"
"We talked and I came back."
"All you did was talk? About what? Why couldn't you talk on the phone?"
He looked away from me long enough to flick the ash off his cigarette. "He wanted his money back. I delivered it."
"His money."
'The pension monies he invested in CSL."
"How much?"
"A hundred grand."
"I don't get it," I said. "He lost that money five years ago. What made him think he could suddenly collect?"
"Because he found out Wendell was alive. Maybe he bad a conversation with him. How the hell do I know?"
"During which he learned what? That there were funds available?"
He stubbed out one cigarette and lit another, squinting at me stubbornly through the smoke. "You know, this is really none of your business."
"Oh, stop that already. I'm not a threat to you. I've been hired by California Fidelity to find Wendell Jaffe so we can prove he's alive. All I care about is the half million dollars we paid off on his life insurance. If you have a cache of money somewhere, that's really lilt my concern."
"Then why should I tell you anything?"
"So I can understand what's going on. That's all I care about. You had the money Harris Brown was demanding, so you drove down last night. What happened then?"
"I gave him the money and drove back to San Luis Obispo."
"You keep cash like that around?"
"Yes."
"How much? You don't have to answer. This is curiosity on my part."
"Altogether?"
"Just the ballpark," I said.
"About three million dollars."
I blinked. "You keep that kind of money around in cash?"
"What else can I do with it? I can't put it in the bank.
They'd report it to the government. We've got a judgment out against us. The minute anybody finds out about it, the litigants will swoop down on it like a bunch of vultures. Anything they don't get, the IRS will come after."
I could feel indignation rising up like acid indigestion. "Of course they'd swoop down. That's the money you cheated them out of."
The look he gave was pure cynicism. "You know why they invested in CSL? They wanted something for nothing. They expected to make a killing and got kill instead. Come on, use your head. Most of ' em knew was a crooked deal from the get-go, including Harris.
He was just hoping to collect his share before the whole scheme collapsed."
"I can see we're not talking the same language here. Let's skip past the rationale and get down to the facts. You kept three million in cash on the Lord?
"You don't have to take that tone with me."
"Excuse me, right. Let me try it again." I adjusted my tone, gearing down from judgmental to neutral.
"You kept three million dollars in cash hidden on the Lord."
"Right. Wendell and I were the only ones who knew about it. Now you," he said.
"And that's what he came back for?"
"Of course. After five years on the road, he was flat broke," Carl said. "He not only came back for it, that's t what he sailed away with when he stole that boat. Half of that belonged to me, which he bloody well knew."
"Oh, wow, babe. I got news for you. You got hosed."
"You're telling me? I can't believe he'd do such a thing to me."
"Well, he did it to everyone about equally," I said. "What about his kids? Did they figure into this, or was I it just the money he came back for?"
"I'm sure he was concerned about his sons," Carl said. "He was a very good father."
'The kind of parent every kid needs," I said. "I'll pass that on to them. It'll help with their therapy. What are you going to do now?" I got up from the chair.
His smile was bitter. "Get down on my knees and pray the Coast Guard catches up with him."
From the doorway, I turned. "One more thing. There was talk about Wendell turning himself in to the cops. Do you think he meant that?"
"It's hard to say. I think he was hoping to join with his family again. I'm just not sure there was any room for him."
I finally crawled into bed at 2:15, brain buzzing with information. I thought what Eckert said was probably true, that there was no longer room for Wendell in the family he'd left. In some curious way we were in the same position, Wendell Jaffe and me: trying to understand what our lives might have been if we could have enjoyed the benefits of family life, looking at the mislaid years and wondering how much we'd missed. At least, I assumed that was some of what was running through his mind. There were obvious differences. He had voluntarily surrendered his family, while I'd never known mine existed. More telling was the fact that he wanted his family back and I wasn't sure I did. I couldn't understand why my aunt had never told me. Maybe she'd tried to spare me the pain of Grand's rejection, but all she'd really done was postpone the revelation. Here I was, ten years after her death, having sort it all out for myself. Ah, well. She wasn't very good at that stuff, anyway. I drifted in and out of sleep.
My alarm went off at 6:00, but I didn't have to get up and jog three miles. I turned off the buzzer and squirmed down in the sheets, sinking back in sleep. I was awakened by a phone call at 9:22. I reached for the receiver, brushing hair from my eyes. "What."
"This is Mac. Sorry if I woke you. I know it's Saturday, but I thought this was important."
His voice sounded odd, and I could feel caution flashing in me like a yellow traffic light. I pulled the sheet around me and sat up in bed. "Don't worry about it That's okay. I was up till all hours and decided to sleep in. What's happening?"
"The Lord was found this morning about six miles offshore," he said. "It looks like Wendell pulled off another disappearing act. Gordon and I are down here at the office. He'd like to have you come in as soon as possible."
Chapter 24
* * *
I parked in the lot behind the office and went up the back stairs to the second floor. Most of the businesses in the building were shut down, which gave the premises a curious air of abandonment. I'd brought along my steno book, hoping to impress Gordon Titus with my professionalism. The notebook was empty except for an entry that read "Find Wendell." Back to that again. I couldn't believe it. We were so close to reeling him in. What was gnawing at me was the fact that I'd seen him with his grandson. I'd heard him talk to Michael, ostensibly making amends. As big a shit as he was, I had a hard time believing it was all a front. I was willing to imagine him changing his mind about surrendering to the cops. I could picture him stealing the Lord so he could sail down the coast and rescue Brian from a jail sentence. What I couldn't accept was the idea that he'd betray his family allover again. Even Wendell, God bless him, wasn't that mean-spirited.
The CF offices were officially closed, but there was a big jumble of keys in the lock, visible through the glass. Darcy's desk was unoccupied, but I caught a glimpse of Gordon Titus in Mac's glass-enclosed office, which was the only one showing any lights. Mac passed with two mugs of coffee in hand. I tapped on the glass. He set the mugs on Darcy's desk and unlocked the door for me. "We're in my office."
"So I see. Let me grab a cup of coffee and I'll be right there."
He picked up the mugs and moved on without comment. He seemed depr
essed, not a reaction I'd anticipated. I'd half expected fireworks. He'd seen the case as his way of going out in a blaze of glory, retiring from CF with a big gold star pasted to the front of his personnel file. He wore a pair of red-and-green-plaid pants and a red golfing shirt, and I wondered if his current emotional state was generated by the forfeiture of his weekend tee time.
All the workstations were empty, phones silent. Gordon Titus sat at Mac's desk, immaculately dressed, hands folded, his facial expression bland. I have a hard time trusting anyone so unflappable. While he appeared to be levelheaded, I suspected that he truly didn't care about most things. Poise and indifference so often look the same. I poured myself a mug of coffee and added nonfat milk before I opened Mac's office door and braved the chill effect of Titus's personality.
Mac was now seated on one of his two upholstered visitors' chairs, apparently unaware of how neatly Titus bad displaced him. "I tell you one thing," Mac was saying, "and Kinsey can pass this on to Mrs. Jaffe for a fact. I'll have a lock on that money till Wendell dies of old age. If she has any hopes of seeing even one red cent, she'll have to drag his dead body up the steps and lay it across my desk."
"Good morning," I murmured to Titus. I took the other chair, which at least lined me up on the same side of the desk as Mac. He shook his head and sent me a dark look. "The son of a bitch has done it to us again."
"I gathered as much. What's the story?" I asked.
"You tell her," Mac said.
Titus pulled a ledger over in front of him. He opened it and leafed through, looking for a blank page. "What do we owe you to date?"
"Twenty-five hundred. That's ten days on a flat. You're lucky I didn't charge you for the mileage. I'm making two and three trips to Perdido every day, and that adds up."
"Twenty-five hundred dollars and for what?" Mac said. "We're right back where we started. We've got nothing but air."
Titus ran his finger down a column and penciled in a figure before he turned to another part of the book. "Actually, I don't think this is as bad as it seems. We have enough witnesses who'll testify that Jaffe was alive and well as recently as this week. We'll never see a dime of the money Mrs. Jaffe's already spent-we might as well write that off-but we can settle for the balance, thus cutting our losses." He glanced up. "That should be the end of it. She's hardly going to wait five years and make another claim."
"Where'd they find the boat?"
He began to write, not looking up. "A southbound tanker saw it as a radar blip right in the middle of a shipping lane last night. The guy on watch flashed a warning light, but there was no response. The tanker notified the Coast Guard, who went out at first light."
"The Lord was still in the area? That's interesting."
"It looks like Wendell sailed the boat as far as Winterset and then headed out toward the islands. He left the sails up. There was no big sea running, but with the storms coming through, the normal northwesterlies were countered by the hurricane effect. The Lord probably has a seven-knot hull speed, and with the right puff of wind it should have gone much farther. When they found the boat, it was stalled and drifting. The jib was backwinded, sheeted to the windward side, in effect, blowing the bow down off the wind while the main and the mizzen were trying to put it up wind. The boat must have lay hove to until discovery."
"I didn't know you sailed."
"I don't anymore. I did once upon a time." Brief smile, the most I'd ever gotten from him.
"Now what?"
"They'll tow it to the closest harbor."
"Which is what, Perdido?"
"Probably. I'm not certain where jurisdiction lies. Some crime scene unit will go over it. I don't think they'll find much, and frankly, I don't see that it's any longer our concern."
I looked over at Mac. "I take it there's no trace of Wendell."
"All his personal possessions were on the boat, including four thousand in cash and a Mexican passport, which doesn't prove a thing. He could have half a dozen passports."
"So we're supposed to think, what... that he's dead or gone?"
Mac gestured his irritation, showing the first signs of his usual impatience. "The guy's gone. There's no suicide note, but this is exactly what he pulled last time."
"God, Mac. How can you be so sure about that? Maybe it's a cover. Something to divert our attention."
"From what?"
"From what's really going on."
"Which is what?"
"Beats me," I said. "I'm just telling you what occurs to me. Last time he did this he abandoned the Lord off the coast of Baja and set off in a dinghy. Renata Huff intercepted him, and the two sailed away on the Fugitive. This time she was sitting in my office within an hour of his disappearance. This was noon yesterday."
Mac wasn't buying it. "She was under surveillance from the time she left your office. Lieutenant Whiteside decided it made sense to keep .an eye on her. All she did was go home. She's been there, off and on, ever since."
"My point exactly. Last time he made a run for it, he had a coconspirator. This time, assuming that's what he's up to, who's he got on his side? Carl Eckert and Dana Jaffe surely wouldn't come to his rescue, and who else is there? Actually, now that I think about it, his son, Brian was still free yesterday, and there's always Michael. Wendell might have had other friends. It's also possible he tried the gig alone this time, but it just doesn't feel right."
Titus spoke up. "Kinsey thinks he's actually dead," he said to Mac, his mouth turning up with amusement. He tore along the line of perforation, removing a check from the ledger.
"We're supposed to think he's dead!" Mac said. "That's what he did the last time, and we fell for it like a ton of bricks. He's probably on a boat right this minute, sailing off to Fiji, laughing up his ass at us."
Gordon closed the ledger and pushed the check in my direction.
"Wait a minute, Mac. Someone took some shots at us Thursday night. Wendell made it home, but suppose they flushed him out the next day? Maybe they caught up with him and killed him." I picked up the check and glanced at it casually. The amount was twenty-five hundred dollars, made out to me. "Oh, thanks. This is nice. I usually don't bill until the end of the month."
"This is final payment," he said. He folded his hands in front of him on the desk. "I have to admit I wasn't in favor of hiring you, but you've done a very nice job. I don't imagine Mrs. Jaffe will give us any more trouble. As soon as you submit your report, we'll turn the matter over to our attorney and he can see to the affidavits. We probably won't need to take the matter to court. She can return any remaining monies and that will be the end of it. In the meantime, I see no reason we can't do business together in the future, on a case-by-case basis, of course."
I stared at him. "This can't be the end of it. We don't have any idea where Wendell is."
"Wendell's current whereabouts are immaterial. We hired you to find him and you did that... quite handily, I might add. All we needed to do was show that he was alive, which we've now done."
"But what if he's dead?" I said. "Dana would be entitled to the money, wouldn't she?"
"Ah, but she'd have to prove it first. And what's she have? Nothing."
I looked over at Mac, feeling dissatisfied and confused.
He was avoiding my gaze. He shifted on his chair, clearly uncomfortable, probably hoping I wouldn't make a fuss. I got a quick flash of his complaints about CF in my office that first day. "Does this seem right to you? This seems weird. If it turns out something's happened to Wendell, the benefits would be hers. She wouldn't have to give back any money."
"Well, yes, but she'd have to refile," Mac said.
"But aren't we in business to see that claims are settled fairly?" I looked from one to the other. Titus's face was blank, his way of disguising his perpetual dislike, not just of me, but of the world in general. Mac's expression was tinged with guilt. He was never going to stand up to Gordon Titus. He was never going to complain. He was never going to take a stand. "Isn't anybody intereste
d in the truth?" I asked.
Titus stood up and, put on his jacket. "I'll leave this to you," he said to Mac. And to me, "We appreciate the fact that you're so conscientious, Kinsey. If we're ever interested in having someone go out and establish the company's liability to the tune of half a million dollars, you'd be the first investigator we'd think of, I'm sure. Thank you for coming in. We'll look for your report first thing Monday morning."
After he left, Mac and I sat in silence for a moment, not looking at each other. Then I got up and walked out myself.
I hopped in my car and headed for Perdido. I had to know. There was no way in the world I was going to let this one go. Maybe they were right. Maybe he'd run off. Maybe he'd been faking every shred of concern for his ex-wife and his kids, for his grandson. He was not a tower of strength. As a man, he possessed neither scruples nor a sense of moral purpose, but I couldn't make my peace with events as they stood. I had to know where he was. I had to understand what had happened to him. He was a man with far more enemies than friends, which didn't bode well for him, which seemed ominous and unsettling. Suppose somebody had killed him. Suppose the whole thing was a setup. I'd al- ready been paid off with a check and a handshake. My time was my own, and I could do as I pleased. Before this day was over, I was going to have some answers.
Perdido's population is roughly ninety-two thousand. Happily, some small percentage of the citizens had called Dana Jaffe the minute news about the finding of the Lord came to light. Everybody likes to share the misery of others. There's a breathless curiosity, mixed with dread and gratitude that allows us to experience misfortune at a satisfying distance. I gathered Dana's phone had been ringing steadily for more than an hour by the time I arrived. I hadn't wanted to be the one to tell her about Wendell's possible defection. News of his death would have cheered her no end, but I thought it unfair to share my suspicions when I had no proof. Without Wendell's body, what good would it do her? Unless she killed him herself, of course, in which case she already knew more than I did.
Michael's yellow VW was parked in the driveway. I knocked on the front door, and Juliet let me in. Brendan slept heavily against her shoulder, too tired to protest the discomfort of a vertical rest.