My burly guide took up a position out of sight of the limo behind the thrust of a loading platform. I, in turn, knelt out of sight of both of them, behind a van with the hotel logo on the side, wondering what the hell I was doing. When I looked his way again, I started wondering the same thing about my guide. He had pulled a red notebook from his pocket and was making a quick notation—though he seemed a little old for it, he was apparently going to try for an autograph, of Clarissa or Sands or both.
I heard a noise and looked back at the limo. The front door—passenger side—fanned open, and a well-dressed corporate type, as old as I am or worse, sporting the mandatory three-piece blue suit of the species, got out of the limo and walked toward the hotel. It wasn’t Richard Sands, but it was undoubtedly his emissary.
The blue suit left the limo door ajar as he hurried toward the rear entrance, and when the driver leaned over to close it I got a glimpse of him—a bodybuilding bodyguard type, natty in blue blazer and gray slacks, his disarming eyes as active as a lizard’s tongue. Given his job, he was doubtlessly a graduate of a karate academy and the Bondurant school and a survival course that featured familiarization with rapid-fire weapons and defensive maneuvers against both hand-tossed and remote-controlled explosives. It’s not all upside for the rich these days.
When I looked to see how my guide had reacted to all this, he was gone. I looked back down the alley just in time to catch one last glimpse before he turned the corner and started up the hill toward the front entrance, which was back the way we’d come.
His behavior was odd enough to make me want to talk to him. Before I could set off in pursuit, the rear door of the hotel swung open once again, and Clarissa Crandall appeared, back in the cocktail dress that had scandalized the funeral, escorted with silent but efficient gallantry by the three-piece suit who’d gone to fetch her. The suit stood beside the rear door of the limo, and Clarissa climbed in with the ease that comes from practice; then he followed after.
The driver cranked the engine, and the limo slid down the alley as silently as a skiff. Uncertain of what I should do or if I should do anything at all, I got in my car and waited till the limo had maneuvered itself into the street and headed down the hill toward Union Square. When it was out of sight, I drove to the alley entrance, debating the merits of following the leader.
I was still undecided when my path was crossed by a small gray Escort driven by the guy with the hair the length and color of cheap carpet, who occupied the tiny car the way gin occupies a martini. Since he was hurrying after the limo like a terrier after a Toyota, he must have been expecting a treat of some sort, so when the parade was a block away, I made a right and joined it.
The trip was leisurely but purposeful. Obeying the speed limits, taking the most direct route, our file of three descended Nob Hill, crossed the lengthy bias of Market Street, and entered the revived reaches of SoMa. After a couple of graceful turns and a double-back on Seventh, the limo turned into what amounted to little more than an alley and glided to a stop.
I stayed on the far side of Seventh while the limo disgorged its passengers, who turned out to number only Clarissa and the blue suit. The suit knocked on a door a single time, which was enough to get it opened in a hurry. The two of them went inside, the door closed, the limo sailed to the end of the alley then took a right and disappeared. Moments later, the guy in the Escort swam by like a shark and took the first turn he came to. I stayed where I was for a minute more, then backed to the middle of the block and parked. After sticking the Press sign back in my window, I reconnoitered on foot.
Cleveland Street was a mixture of decaying warehouses and reclaimed office space. The building I was interested in was an elegantly refurbished town house that sported carriage lamps beside the door, a red awning to the street, and a brass plaque on what had once been a gatepost. The cornerstone indicated its origin was pre-1906. There was no name on the awning or the door, but the light from the lamps was enough for me to read the plaque—SANDSTONE CLUB—PRIVATE. I lingered and looked and listened, but could detect no sign the place was occupied even though I’d just seen two people go inside. When I tried the door, it was locked.
My prying must have activated a sensor, because a moment later the door swung open and a bruiser who could have been a twin to the one who had piloted the limo looked out at me and scowled. “You have business here, pal?”
When I scrambled for an entrée, I didn’t come up with much. “I’d like to see Mr. Sands.”
“He expecting you?”
“Indubitably not.”
“So beat it. He don’t do business here, anyway.”
“It’s not for business, it’s for pleasure. I know he likes the torchers, so tell him I can get him some early Julie London if the price is right.”
The gambit puzzled him even more than it puzzled me. “What are you, her manager or something?”
“Why don’t you just deliver the message?”
The door closed, but only long enough for me to glance up and down the street to make sure I was still alone. “Fuck you and her both,” the bruiser said when he returned. “You’re here when I check back, I call the law for trespass.”
I waved away the rout. “Regards to Mrs. Crandall.”
“Don’t know the individual,” the bruiser said, then disappeared behind the heavy door.
In the chill of evening, I looked up and down the narrow street. The thump of noise from a bar a block away was the only thing keeping me from believing they were remaking On the Beach. When I got back to Seventh, I took two steps toward my car, then turned on a well-worn heel and went the other way.
I found the Escort down the first side street I came to, its nose pushed past the corner building so the driver was in position to keep his eye on the club. I stayed in the shadow of a lamppost for several minutes before approaching the crew cut, who was so fixated on getting the lid off his thermos he didn’t hear me till I tapped on the window.
“Daily or hourly?” I asked.
He spilled hot coffee on his pants. “Who the fuck?… get the hell out of here, buddy.”
“I hope the retainer was five figures.”
“What the hell are you talking about?”
“Mrs. Sands. What kind of arrangement does she have with you—hourly or daily? Or maybe she went for a flat fee.”
His sneer made his teeth look as yellow as custard in the streetlight. “Who said anything about Mrs. Sands?”
“I believe that was me.”
“What the hell business is she of yours?”
“Just trading war stories with a colleague.”
He frowned. “You’re a P.I.?”
I nodded. “I’ve even got one of those.” I pointed to the Press sign in his window.
He scooted to where the light was better. “I know you. Tanner. The Kottle case.”
“Among others.”
“I’m Standish.”
“Miles?”
He scowled. “I only heard that a million times. Garth Standish. Office in Laurel Village. Used to be with the San Jose PD. How’d you know I was working for Mrs. Sands?”
“Because the only other person who’d be interested in what her husband and Mrs. Crandall are up to is dead.”
He shrugged. “I don’t know nothing about a stiff. Domestic is all I do.”
“She going to file on him?”
“Who knows? Maybe she’s just keeping score.”
“She got a lawyer involved?”
He shook his head. “She came direct.”
“You look beat,” I said after a moment.
He glanced at the thermos. “Yeah.”
“You probably got other cases backing up on you.”
“So?”
“So if you fill me in, maybe I can relieve you. Just for tonight. You look like you could use some sleep.”
“What’s in it for you?”
I shrugged. “Nothing. But I’m going to be here anyway. There’s no point in both of us going
without.”
The deal began to bake. Standish glanced toward Cleveland Street. “The club thing is standard procedure. They come here after the show, have a few drinks or sniff some blow or whatever, he takes her home about three, three-thirty.”
“Easy gig. Except for the hour.”
Standish nodded. “I get three, maybe four hours’ sleep a night.”
“Not enough for a man your size.”
He yawned. “So who you working for, anyway?”
“Can’t say. You know how it is.”
He reviewed his ethic; it didn’t take long. “Like you said, you’re going to stake it out anyway. I could get some decent sack time for once, and you could call me in the morning and tell me what time they left and I could put it in my report and no one would be the wiser.” His look suddenly darkened. “She didn’t double up on me, did she? Hire you to check my methodology?” He made the word sound Slovakian.
I shook my head. “I’m working for the dead man.”
Standish was too tired to pursue it. His head bent forward until it rested on top of the steering wheel. “I don’t get some rest, I’ll fall over in a fit.”
“You ever get inside the club?”
“Naw. Sands has more security than Quayle.”
“You always pick them up at the hotel?”
He nodded. “She’s got someone else on him when the sun shines.”
“You ever see Sands with a guy who looks like this?” I described Tom Crandall.
Standish shook his head. “I only see him with broads.”
“Anyone besides the singer?”
He shook his head. “Not regular.”
“You got pictures?”
“Nothing racy. The only place they go is the club, and it don’t even got windows. I could get glossies of Trump and Maples easier than I could this guy.” His yawn was the size of Chicago.
“Go get your beauty sleep. I’ll call you tomorrow with the times.”
He regarded me with surprising dignity. “Don’t fuck me up on this, Tanner. I’m only doing it ’cause you got a reputation. You mess me up, I’ll return the favor.”
“I’ll keep it in mind,” I said as he goosed his little car to life and puttered off down Seventh Street.
I went back to my car, pulled to where I could see the Sandstone entrance, and waited. For more than an hour. I was waging a major war with sleep myself when not one but three limos showed up from wherever they’d been grazing and took three different couples off to other destinations. The men were expensively dressed and powerfully poised, the women seemed present more for adornment than edification. The man who left with Clarissa wasn’t Richard Sands, he was the three-piece suit.
Whatever the truth of the whole thing was, I decided they could all get along without me. As my Buick and I climbed the hill toward home, I wondered what Sands did at the club after all the rest had left, just him and his millions and the guy who guarded his body—wondered if he ever doubted it was worth it.
TWELVE
When I got back to the apartment, there was a message on my machine from Ellen: She’d thought of something else to tell me about Tom. I should call her but not after ten—her father went to bed then, and the slightest sound would wake him. If she didn’t hear from me tonight, she’d call tomorrow after work. I decided I didn’t want to wait that long.
Just before noon the next day, I entered the Grand Avenue branch of the East Bay Bank in the heart of downtown Oakland. Ellen Simmons wasn’t in sight in the rococo main room. When I asked to see her, the customer-service woman pointed downward. For a moment, I thought the gesture constituted yet another obituary, but I quickly recovered my reason and took the stairs to the lower level, where I found Ellen reviewing some checks in a cubicle near the vault that contained the safe-deposit boxes.
She wore a simple blue frock and a plain red sweater draped across her shoulders to ward off the subterranean chill. The expression on her face was even less lively than when she’d entered the funeral chapel, and I didn’t improve the situation by materializing without warning in front of her desk.
When she saw me, she blanched. “I can’t talk to you now,” she whispered. “You shouldn’t have come here.”
“Maybe I need a safe-deposit box. To safeguard my valuables.”
“I don’t have anything to do with that. I don’t have anything to do with people,” she added when it looked like I was about to suggest another full-service option.
“You get a lunch break, don’t you?”
She looked at her watch. “Only half an hour. At twelve-thirty.”
“I’ll go get sandwiches and meet you on a bench at Lake Merritt.”
“I—”
“Ham or tuna?”
“… Tuna.”
“White or wheat?”
“White.”
“Coke or Sprite?”
“Milk, please.”
“Chips or slaw?”
“Neither.” She reddened. “But maybe a cookie. Chocolate chip?”
“See you in twenty minutes.” I smiled. “Chocolate chips are seditious, you know.”
She went from crimson to scarlet or maybe the other way around—I’m not good with colors—then went back to her stack of checks.
She was prompt, of course, and hungry—we devoured everything but the drinks in a matter of seconds. Content, even conceivably thrilled, by the alfresco lark, after the food had gone, Ellen took in our environment as though we were afoot in a foreign land: the trees, the lake, the rowboats, the carefree people strolling hand in hand in the noonday sun, the joggers enthusiastically punishing themselves, the children on their way to Fairyland. Nothing extraordinary, except that to Ellen Simmons it seemed a revelation.
“I never come down here,” she murmured, more to herself than to me. “I wonder why.”
I knew why: She hadn’t done anything self-indulgent since she’d awarded her Bible and her virginity to Tom Crandall and seen her hopes dashed in the aftermath. “What did you think of to tell me?” I asked, after giving her more time to luxuriate in the view.
She licked a smear of mayonnaise from her lip. “I wasn’t quite honest with you when we talked yesterday,” she said with grave precision.
“You told a lie?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“Shame, shame. What about?”
“Nicky.”
“The brother.”
“Yes.”
“The one you didn’t know Tom had.”
She blushed for the hundredth time since I’d met her. “That was just me being cryptic. Nicky Crandall is very much alive.”
“So I hear.”
The response disappointed her. “So you knew that already.”
“That he exists, yes. And that Tom was in touch with him before he died. But that’s about all I know. How old is he, for example?”
“He’s a year younger than me. Than I, rather.”
“Which makes him …?”
“Thirty-five.”
“Where does he live?”
“I don’t know, exactly.”
“Here in the East Bay?”
She shook her head. “In San Francisco, somewhere near the Civic Center. He’s living with a woman, I know that. Tom talked to her as well. I think he said her name was Jan.”
“Tom’s body was found near the Civic Center.”
“Was it?” Her eyes were glazed and unreactive. In thrall to the serenity of the lake, she found coincidence and conspiracy incomprehensible. “The last time I saw him, Tom talked about Nicky quite a bit,” she said after a minute.
“So how is that important, do you think?”
“I don’t know if it is. But Nicky was like me—one of Tom’s failures. Nicky might have been the biggest failure of them all.”
“When’s the last time you saw Nicky?”
She blinked. “Nineteen Seventy-two.”
“You seem certain of that.”
She hesitated. “I have excellent re
call.”
“Still, it must have been a memorable occasion.”
“Yes, it was.”
A tear came to her eye. She dabbed at it but didn’t smear her makeup because she wasn’t wearing any. “Darn it. I’ve been crying so much lately. My boss can tell, and he’s getting sick of it. He told me the next time it happened, he’d send me home.”
Ellen took a mirror out of her purse and looked at herself. She didn’t seem pleased with what she saw. Which made her standards the converse of mine—I liked what she saw in her mirror just fine.
“Let’s back up a minute,” I said. “How was Nicky a failure for Tom?”
She paused to consider her answer. “Nicky is sick. He has been for a long time. Tom—”
“Sick how?” I interrupted.
“Mentally. Schizophrenia is what everyone always said it was. He started acting odd in junior high school, and over the years it got worse and worse—wandering the streets at all hours, talking to himself, popping up in the middle of stores and churches and even people’s homes to deliver some strange message that no one understood—by the time he was eighteen, Nicky had become an entirely different person from the one he’d been a few years earlier. It was awful for their mother, and very hard for Tom.”
“I understand that over the last several years Tom and Nicky were only in touch periodically.”
She nodded. “It’s been that way since Tom came back from the war, pretty much.”
“But they’d gotten together recently.”
“Yes.”
“So what did Tom have to say about his brother the last time you talked to him?”
She frowned in concentration. “Tom was worried about him, that was the gist of it. More so than normally, I mean. He implied something bad was going to happen to Nicky.”
“You mean something other than his mental problems?”
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