“Not really. I didn’t keep track of the guys in her life.”
“She must have mentioned this guy if he was causing such a fuss.”
“Look. She and I were not close. We were roommates and that was it. She went her way and I went mine. If some guy was bugging her, she didn’t say a word to me.”
“She wasn’t in any trouble that you knew about?”
“No.”
Her manner seemed sullen and it was getting on my nerves. I stared at her. “Judy, I could use a little help. People get murdered for a reason. It might seem stupid or insignificant to the rest of us, but there was something going on. What gives?”
“You don’t know it was murder. The policeman I talked to said it might have been some bozo in a passing car.”
“Her mother disagrees.”
“Well, I can’t help you. I already told you everything I know.”
I nailed her with a look and let a silence fall, hoping her discomfort would generate further comment. No such luck. If she knew more, she was determined to keep it to herself. I left a business card, asking her to phone me if she remembered anything.
I spent the next two days talking to Caroline Spurrier’s professors and friends. From the portrait that emerged, she seemed like a likable kid—funny, good-natured, popular, and sweet. She’d complained of the harassment to a couple of classmates without giving any indication who the fellow was. I went back to the list of witnesses at the scene of the accident, talking to each in turn. I was still tantalized by the guy in the pickup. What reason could he have to falsify his identity?
I’d clipped out the news account of Caroline Spurrier’s death, pinning her picture on the bulletin board above my desk. She looked down at me with a smile that seemed more enigmatic with the passing days. I couldn’t bear the idea of having to tell her mother my investigation was at an impasse, but I knew I owed her a report.
I was sitting at my typewriter when an idea came to me, quite literally, in a flash. I was staring at the newspaper picture of the wreckage when I spotted the photo credit. I suddenly remembered John Birkett at the scene, his flash going off as he shot pictures of the wreck. If he’d inadvertently snapped one of the guy in the pickup, at least I’d have something to show the cops. Maybe we could get a lead on the fellow that way. I gave Birkett a call. Twenty minutes later, I was in his cubbyhole at the Santa Teresa Dispatch, our heads bent together while we scanned the contact sheets.
“No good,” John said. “This one’s not bad, but the focus is off. Damn. I never really got a clear shot of him.”
“What about the truck?”
John pulled out another contact sheet that showed various views of the wrecked compact, the pickup visible on the berm behind. “Well, you can see it in the background, if that’s any help.”
“Can we get an enlargement?”
“You looking for anything in particular?”
“The license plate,” I said.
The California plate bore a seven-place combination of numbers and letters that we finally discerned in the grainy haze of two blowups. I should have called Lieutenant Dolan and had him run the license number, but I confess to an egotistical streak that sometimes overrides common sense. I didn’t want to give the lead back to him just yet. I called a pal of mine at the Department of Motor Vehicles and asked him to check it out instead.
The license plate was registered to a 1984 Toyota pickup, navy blue, the owner listed as Ron Cagle with an address on McClatchy Way.
The house was stucco, dark gray, with the trim done in white. My heart was pounding as I rang the bell. The fellow’s face was printed so indelibly in memory that when the door was finally opened, I just stood there and stared. Wrong man. This guy was probably six-foot-seven, over two hundred pounds, with a strong chin, ruddy complexion, blue eyes, auburn hair, red mustache. “Yes?”
“I’m looking for Ron Cagle.”
“I’m Ron Cagle.”
“You are?” My voice broke in astonishment like a kid reaching puberty. “You’re the owner of a navy blue Toyota pickup?” I read off the number of the license plate.
He looked at me quizzically. “Yes. Is something wrong?”
“Well, I don’t know. Has someone else been driving it?”
“Not for the last six months.”
“Are you sure?”
He half laughed. “See for yourself. It’s sitting on the parking pad just behind the house.”
He pulled the door shut behind him, leading the way as the two of us moved off the porch and down the driveway to the rear. There sat the navy blue Toyota pickup, without wheels, up on blocks. The hood was open and there was empty space where the engine should have been. “What’s going on?” he asked.
“That’s what I’m about to ask you. This truck was at the scene of a recent accident where a girl was killed.”
“Not this one,” he said. “This has been right here.”
Without another word, I pulled out the photographs. “Isn’t that your license plate?”
He studied the photos with a frown. “Well, yes, but the truck isn’t mine. It couldn’t be.” He glanced back at his pickup, spotting the discrepancy. “There’s the problem. . . .” He pointed to the license. The plate on the truck was an altogether different set of numbers.
It took me about thirty seconds before the light finally dawned. “Somebody must have lifted your plates and substituted these.”
“What would be the point?”
I shrugged. “Maybe someone stole a navy blue Toyota truck and wanted plates that would clear a license check if he was stopped by the cops. Can I use your telephone?”
I called Lieutenant Dolan and told him what I’d found. He ran a check on the plates for the pickup sitting in the drive, which turned out to match the numbers on a vehicle reported stolen two weeks before. An APB was issued for the truck with Cagle’s plates. Dolan’s guess was that the guy had left the state, or abandoned the pickup shortly after the accident. It was also possible that even if we found the guy, he might not have any real connection with the shooting death. Somehow I doubted it.
A week passed with no results. The silence was discouraging. I was right back where I started from with no appreciable progress. If a case is going to break, it usually happens fast and the chances of cracking this one were diminishing with every passing day. Caroline Spurrier’s photograph was still pinned to the bulletin board above my desk, her smile nearly mocking. In situations like this, all I know to do is go back to the beginning and start again.
Doggedly, I went through the list of witnesses, calling everybody in turn. Most tried to be helpful, but there was really nothing new to add. I drove back to the campus to look for Caroline’s roommate. Judy Layton had to know something more than she’d told me at first. Maybe I could find a way to worm some information out of her.
The apartment was locked and a quick peek in the front window showed that all the furniture was gone. I picked up her forwarding address from the manager on the premises and headed over to her parents’ house in Colgate, the little suburb to the north.
The house was pleasant, a story and a half of stucco and frame, an attached three-car garage visible at the right. I rang the bell and waited, idly scanning the neighborhood from my vantage point on the porch. It was a nice street, wide and tree-lined, with a grassy divider down the center planted with pink and white flowering shrubs. I rang the bell again. Apparently, no one was home.
I went down the porch steps and paused in the driveway, intending to return to my car, which was parked at the curb. I hesitated where I stood. There are times in this business when a hunch is a hunch—when a little voice in your gut tells you something’s amiss. I turned with curiosity toward the three-car garage at the rear. I cupped my hands, shading my eyes so I could peer through the side window. In the shadowy interior, I saw a pickup, stripped of paint.
I tried the garage’s side entrance. The door was unlocked and I pushed my way in. The space smelled of
dust, motor oil, and primer. The pickup’s license plates were gone. This had to be the same truck, though I couldn’t think why it hadn’t been dumped. Maybe it was too perilous to attempt at this point. Heart thumping, I did a quick search of the cab’s interior. Under the front seat, on the driver’s side, I saw a handgun, a .45. I left it where it was, eased the cab door shut, and backed away from the truck. Clearly, someone in the Layton household had been at the murder scene.
I left the garage at a quick clip, trotting toward the street. I had to find a telephone and call the cops. I had just started my car, shoving it into gear, when I saw a dark green VW van pass on the far side of the divider and circle back in my direction, headed toward the Laytons’ drive. The fellow driving was the man I’d seen at the accident. Judy’s brother? The similarities were obvious now that I thought of it. No wonder she’d been unwilling to tell me what was going on! He slowed for the turn and that’s when he spotted me.
If I’d had any doubts about his guilt, they vanished the minute he and I locked eyes. His surprise was replaced by panic and he gunned his engine, taking off. I peeled after him, flooring it. At the corner, he skidded sideways and recovered, speeding out of sight. I went after him, zigzagging crazily through a residential area that was laid out like a maze. Ahead of me, I could almost chart his course by the whine of his transmission. He was heading toward the freeway.
At the overpass, I caught a glimpse of him in the southbound lane. He wasn’t hard to track, the boxy shape of the van clearly visible as we tore toward town. The traffic began to slow, massing in one of those inexplicable logjams on the road. I couldn’t tell if the problem was a fender bender in the northbound lane or a bottleneck in ours, but it gave me the advantage I needed. I was catching him.
As I eased up on his left, I saw him lean on the accelerator, cutting to his right. He hit the shoulder of the road, his tires spewing out gravel as he widened the gap between us. He was bypassing stalled cars, hugging the shrubbery as he flew down the berm. I was right behind him, keeping as close to him as I dared. My car wasn’t very swift, but then neither was his van. I jammed my accelerator to the floor and pinned myself to his tail. He was watching me steadily in his rearview mirror, our eyes meeting in a deadlock of determination and grit.
I spotted the maintenance crew just seconds before he did; guys in bright orange vests working with a crane, which was parked squarely in his path. There was no way for him to slow in time and no place else to go. His van plowed into the rear of the crane with a crash that made my blood freeze as I slammed on my brakes. I was luckier than he. My VW came to a stop just a kiss away from death.
Like a nightmare, we repeated all the horror of the first wreck. Police and paramedics, the wailing of the ambulance. When I finally stopped shaking, I realized where I was. The road crew was replacing the big green highway sign sheared in half when Caroline Spurrier’s car had smashed into it. Terry Layton died at the very spot where he killed her.
Caroline’s smile has shifted back to impishness in the photograph above my desk. I keep it there as a reminder, but of what I couldn’t say. The brevity of life perhaps, the finality of death—the irony of events that sometimes connect the two.
a little missionary work
SOMETIMES YOU HAVE to take on a job that constitutes pure missionary work. You accept an assignment not for pay, or for any hope of tangible reward, but simply to help another human being in distress. My name is Kinsey Millhone. I’m a licensed private eye, in business for myself, so I can’t really afford professional charity, but now and then somebody gets into trouble and I just can’t turn my back.
I was standing in line one Friday at the bank, waiting to make a deposit. It was almost lunchtime and there were eleven people in front of me, so I had some time to kill. As usual, in the teller’s line, I was thinking about Harry Hovey, my bank-robber friend, who’d once been arrested for holding up this very branch. I’d met him when I was investigating a bad-check case. He was introduced to me by another crook as an unofficial “expert” and ended up giving me a crash course in the methods and practices of passing bad paper. Poor Harry. I couldn’t remember how many times he’d been in the can. He was skilled enough for a life of crime, but given to self-sabotage. Harry was always trying to go straight, always trying to clean up his act, but honest employment never seemed to have much appeal. He’d get out of prison, find a job, and be doing pretty well for himself. Then, something would come along and he’d succumb to temptation—forge a check, rob a bank, God only knows what. Harry was hooked on crime the way some people are addicted to cocaine, alcohol, chocolate, and unrequited love. He was currently doing time in the Federal Correctional Institution in Lompoc, California, with all the other racketeers, bank robbers, counterfeiters, and former White House staff bad boys.
I had reached the teller’s window and was finishing my transaction when Lacy Alisal, the assistant bank manager, approached. “Miss Millhone? I wonder if you could step this way. Mr. Chamberlain would like a word with you.”
“Who?”
“The branch vice president,” she said. “It shouldn’t take long.”
“Oh. Sure.”
I followed the woman toward Mr. Chamberlain’s glass-walled enclosure, wondering the whole time what I’d done to deserve this. Well, okay. Let’s be honest. I’d been thinking about switching my account to First Interstate for the free checking privileges, but I didn’t see how he could have found out about that. As for my balances, I’d only been overdrawn by the teensiest amount and what’s a line of credit for?
I was introduced to Jack Chamberlain, who turned out to be someone I recognized from the gym, a tall, lanky fellow in his early forties, whose workouts overlapped mine three mornings a week. We’d exchange occasional small talk if we happened to be doing reps on adjacent machines. It was odd to see him here in a conservative business suit after months of sweat-darkened shorts and T-shirts. His hair was cropped close, the color a wiry mixture of copper and silver. He wore steel-rimmed glasses and his teeth were endearingly crooked in front. Somehow, he looked more like a high school basketball coach than a banking exec. A trophy sitting on his desk attested to his athletic achievements, but the engraving was small and I couldn’t quite make out the print. He caught my look and a smile creased his face. “Varsity basketball. We were state champs,” he said, as he shook my hand formally and invited me to take a seat.
He sat down himself and picked up a fountain pen, which he capped and recapped as he talked. “I appreciate your time. I know you do your banking on Fridays and I took the liberty,” he said. “Someone told me at the gym that you’re a private investigator.”
“That’s right. Are you in the market for one?”
“This is for an old friend of mine. My former high school sweetheart, if you want the truth,” he said. “I probably could have called you at your office, but the circumstances are unusual and this seemed more discreet. Are you free tonight by any chance?”
“Tonight? That depends,” I said. “What’s going on?”
“I’d rather have her explain it. This is probably going to seem paranoid, but she insists on secrecy, which is why she didn’t want to make contact herself. She has reason to believe her phone is tapped. I hope you can bear with us. Believe me, I don’t ordinarily do business this way.”
“Glad to hear that,” I said. “Can you be a bit more specific? So far, I haven’t really heard what I’m being asked to do.”
Jack set the pen aside. “She’ll explain the situation as soon as it seems wise. She and her husband are having a big party tonight and she asked me to bring you. They don’t want you appearing in any professional capacity. Time is of the essence, or we might go about this some other way. You’ll understand when you meet her.”
I studied him briefly, trying to figure out what was going on. If this was a dating ploy, it was the weirdest one I’d ever heard. “Are you married?”
He smiled slightly. “Divorced. I understand you are, too
. I assure you, this is not a hustle.”
“What kind of party?”
“Oh, yes. Glad you reminded me.” He removed an envelope from his top drawer and pushed it across the desk. “Cocktails. Five to seven. Black tie, I’m afraid. This check should cover your expenses in the way of formal dress. If you try the rental shop around the corner, Roberta Linderman will see that you’re outfitted properly. She knows these people well.”
“What people? You haven’t even told me their names.”
“Karen Waterston and Kevin McCall. They have a little weekend retreat up here.”
“Ah,” I said, nodding. This was beginning to make more sense. Karen Waterston and Kevin McCall were actors who’d just experienced a resurgence in their careers, starring in a new television series called Shamus, P.I., an hour-long spoof of every detective series that’s ever aired. I don’t watch much TV, but I’d heard about the show and after seeing it once, I’d found myself hooked. The stories were fresh, the writing was superb, and the format was perfect for their considerable acting talents. Possibly because they were married in “real” life, the two brought a wicked chemistry to the screen. As with many new shows, the ratings hadn’t yet caught up with the rave reviews, but things looked promising. Whatever their problem, I could understand the desire to keep their difficulties hidden from public scrutiny.
Jack was saying, “You’re in no way obligated, but I hope you’ll say yes. She really needs your help.”
“Well. I guess I’ve had stranger requests in my day. I better give you my address.”
He held up the signature card I’d completed when I opened my account. “I have that.”
I soon learned what “cocktails five to seven” means to the very rich. Everybody showed up at seven and stayed until they were dead drunk. Jack Chamberlain, in a tux, picked me up at my apartment at six forty-five. I was decked out in a slinky beaded black dress with long sleeves, a high collar, and no back—not my usual apparel of choice. When Jack helped me into the front seat of his Mercedes, I shrieked at the shock of cold leather against my bare skin.