Point Deception

by Marcia Muller

  “Nothing distinctive about them,” Shepherd said.

  “Look closer at the left rear imprint. You’ll see a crescent-shaped nick in the tread. Once we have a suspect, that nick will help us nail him.”

  Grossman turned his attention to the next set of tracks. “This other vehicle pulled in behind the fence, turned, and exited north on the highway. That last photo shows footprints leading to the cliff that were probably made by work boots. Tire size indicates the vehicle was probably a light truck, maybe one of those foreign makes like Toyota. These’re really distinctive.”

  Rho stared at the photograph. She was picturing an old light Ford pickup with impossibly worn tires. In her mind she heard her own voice saying, “You can’t keep driving on those!” Heard the response, “The hell you say. They’re good for another ten thousand miles.”

  Her father’s voice. Her father’s truck.

  Guy rolled onto his back, acutely aware of his dry mouth and the pain above his right eyebrow. God, he’d really tied one on trying to keep up with Rhoda’s father. Jack Antolini’s system must process alcohol like most people’s process water; the man had been coherent and steady when Rhoda and he left the boat.

  The thought of Rhoda sent a stab of embarrassment through him, and he covered his eyes with his arm, trying to blot out the memories of the time they spent on the promontory. Impossible, though. Even his dreams had been filled with visions of her face in the moonlight. Her face, and those of the Women Who Wait.

  Rhoda, asking, “What is it that makes you so sad?” Rhoda and the stone women, waiting for his answer.

  He’d cried as he told her. No woman, not even Diana, had ever seen the adult Guy Newberry cry. But while Rhoda told him of over a decade of pain and loneliness, she hadn’t shed a tear. Meaning she’d suffered far more than even he could imagine.

  He lay still for a time, shielding his eyes from the light that streamed through the windows. After a while his headache eased and thirst drove him to the bathroom. He gulped a glass of water there, then took another to the turret window and drank more slowly, surveying the scene outside.

  A logging truck was pulled off on the shoulder opposite the inn, its driver checking a lopsided load. A kid on a skateboard performed expert turns on the cracked pavement of the subdivision. Offshore, fishing trawlers headed back to Calvert’s Landing Pier with the morning’s catch. Clouds hovered on the horizon.

  Life as usual in Signal Port, but abnormal currents moved beneath its surface today, the thirteenth anniversary of the Cascada Canyon murders.

  Abnormal currents beneath the surface of his life, too. Diana’s voice was stilled. Forever, he suspected. He was alone.

  As alone as Rhoda.

  As alone as all the victims, in the end.

  When she saw the Rhoda A buttoned up tight and Jack’s truck gone, Rho felt a clenching in her gut. Easy, she warned herself, he’s only gone to the store for his daily ration of Bushmills.

  She stepped on board and immediately noted something different. A gallon can of boat paint and a brush sat in the shadow of the transom, and an orange heavy-duty extension cord snaked from below deck to a belt sander near the portside rail.

  Not Irish, then. He’d gone to the hardware store for sandpaper.

  Everything’s changing for you. For me too… for the better, I think.

  You were right, Dad. Night before last you shaved and trimmed your hair and paid a call on your longtime lady friend. This morning you started working on the boat. If only I didn’t know about your truck having been at Quinley’s—

  She heard footsteps, turned and saw Guy walking along the access road to where they’d left his car the night before. He wore cords and a sweatshirt, and a baseball cap from under which the longish silver-gray hair at the nape of his neck curled.

  He waved to her and called, “Jack okay?”

  “More than okay. He’s started working on the boat.” She stepped onto the dock and walked toward him, feeling shy.

  “Your father’s got an iron constitution.” He was pale under his tan, but otherwise looked no worse for the wear.

  “You don’t look half as bad as you ought to,” she told him.

  “Thanks a lot. My secret is a quart of water and a handful of vitamin Cs before bed, more water and Cs in the morning. You sleep well?”

  “Yes. I was exhausted.”

  “No nightmares?”

  “No. Why—?” And then she remembered what today was. “You know, I hadn’t given a thought to it being the anniversary of the murders.”

  “Then you have come to terms with them.”

  “Guess so.” They began moving toward their vehicles. “About last night—” she said.

  “Last night I was—” he said simultaneously.

  They both smiled wryly.

  “Couple of emotional recluses, aren’t we?” he commented. “Venture out, drop our baggage for each other to examine, then collect it and scurry back to our respective lairs.”

  “I don’t want to do that anymore—retreat, I mean.”

  “Neither do I. We’ll have to help each other stay out in the open.” He took her hand. “So what’s the news from the substation?”

  She explained about Wayne, adding, “I hate the prospect of sitting across the table and interrogating him as if he were a criminal.”

  “You’ll be just fine. Keep in mind that he may have a good explanation of why he ran.”

  She shrugged, unwilling to discuss it further. “There’s something new from the lab on Ackerman.”

  Guy’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully as she told him about the directions and the motor oil residue. “I think I know where it came from,” he said. “Are you up to another trip to the canyon?”

  Her pulse quickened. “Yes. Let’s go.”

  “It’s over here.” Guy stepped off the driveway and walked toward the old car under the pines. “Unfortunately, I disturbed the evidence when I found it. The manhole cover was off, and, seeing what the contents were, I thought I should replace it.”

  He squatted down beside the makeshift oil sump, tugged off the cover, and motioned for Rhoda to have a look. She knelt beside him, thrusting her hand into the viscous liquid and feeling its consistency. Then she raised her fingers to her nose, sniffed and made a face.

  She said, “There’s a fair amount of oil splashed on the ground. And this stick is coated with it, as if someone used it to poke around in there. You notice that the other day?”

  “I don’t recall seeing it, but the light was bad. I took some photos, and they’re supposed to be ready today. Maybe they’ll show.”

  She stood and picked up a tree branch. After probing the sump with it, she propped it against the car’s bumper. “Nothing in there but waste matter. Ackerman must’ve gotten the money.”

  “Then what happened to it?”

  “When we find that out, we’ll know who killed her.” She took a tissue from her pocket and scrubbed her fingers. “I’m going to call in, get a photographer and technician here.”

  “I’ll wait for you.”

  He watched as she walked away, admiring the trim lines of her small body and her strong, economical gait. Last night had put an awkwardness between them, but their earlier conversation had begun to bridge it.

  Something moved in the tree above him. He looked up and saw a jay hopping about. Through the branches the sky was gray and gravid clouds blew across it from the west. Rain predicted, the first since he’d come here. He went back to the drive and walked along until he spotted the downed utility wire. One snip with insulated cutters and nine lives had been held hostage. One snip, and eight lives had ended.

  Evil in the canyon, then and now.

  “You’ve got one more day, Grossman, and then we’re bringing in the FBI.” Assistant Sheriff Pete Stedman’s jowls were set and his small eyes glared out of their fleshy pockets. The department’s second-in-command had made a special trip from Santa Carla to issue his ultimatum.

  Rho glanced
at Grossman and Shepherd to see how they were receiving it. The senior detective seemed relaxed, almost indifferent, and his fingers toyed idly with a pencil on the table in front of him. In contrast, Shepherd’s face was red, his eyes stormy.

  Grossman said, “We’re very close to a break in the case.”

  “Where’ve I heard that before? You’re down to, what? One deputy to assist now.” His gesture toward Rho indicated he found her a poor one at best. “The other… Christ knows what went on there, and I think you’re making a mistake allowing him to come in voluntarily. You got a woman dead, he’s your only lead. And on top of that today’s the anniversary of your other unsolved case, and now you tell me the Ackerman girl had a connection to those victims.”

  Rho expected Grossman to point out that he hadn’t been with the department at the time of the canyon murders, but he said nothing.

  Stedman added, “The former sheriff should have brought the feds in on that one a lot earlier than he did. We’re not making the same mistake twice.”

  Grossman’s expression remained neutral, but his fingers tensed on the pencil.

  “One day,” the assistant sheriff said. “Is that clear?”

  The detective nodded, and Stedman heaved his considerable bulk from the chair. “Good.”

  Grossman watched him leave the interrogation room, moving only his eyes. Then he looked from Rho to Shepherd. “You heard the man.”

  “Shit!” Denny exclaimed. “Stedman’s been sitting behind a desk for so long he’s lost touch with what it’s like in the field! Did he even read our latest reports? No. He’s got his mind made up.”

  “He’s afraid,” Grossman said, “and if you had any sense, you would be too.” He flopped a newspaper on the desk so they could see the front page.

  The San Francisco Chronicle. NEW MURDER AWAKENS OLD FEARS ON SOLEDAD COAST.

  “Shit,” Shepherd said again.

  “Yeah, it’s hitting the fan for sure. By tonight the Sea Stacks’ll be full of media people from all over. So let’s get moving on this. You’ve got the list of people we’ve interviewed. We’ll divide it up, interview each of them again. And again, if necessary.”

  Rho said, “That’s not possible, in one day.”

  “Make it possible, Swift.”

  The sidewalks of Signal Port were deserted, except for some rowdy kids cutting school and a few adults that Guy instinctively recognized as journalists. He drove past houses with their curtains drawn and closed-up businesses. The pharmacy where he’d left his film to be developed was open, but there were no other customers. The man behind the counter located the packet and made change wordlessly.

  In the parking lot a reporter and camerawoman from a Sacramento TV station stopped him. What did he think of this new rash of murders? the man asked. He brushed by them with a curt “No comment” and went to the newspaper racks in front of the supermarket. The San Francisco Chronicle’s headline and photograph of the entrance to the canyon told him that Signal Port had once again been caught in the glare of publicity, and the citizens were barricading themselves against the sudden influx of media people.

  At the Sea Stacks the parking lot was full of vehicles, and those who had been turned away had already found the B&B. Inside, a harried Kevin Jacoby was contending with a complaint from a writer for the L.A. Times whom Guy knew slightly and disliked heartily: He’d specifically asked for a king-size bed, but his room only had a queen. As Guy slunk up the stairs in order to avoid an encounter, Jacoby patiently explained that all the beds were queen-size.

  Apparently Becca Campos hadn’t come to work yet; Guy’s room wasn’t made up, and when he went to get a fresh towel from the linen closet he found it locked. The previously quiet Victorian echoed with noise. A woman in the opposite room was talking loudly on the phone, and Guy shut his door against her. The town had been taken over, and he resented it as much as if he were a long-term resident.

  He unfolded the newspaper on the desk, skimmed the first few paragraphs of the story, then turned to the continuation inside. There was a full-page spread of all the victims, including Ackerman, and a final paragraph mentioned the Lindsay and Scurlock deaths as “strange coincidences.” While the article was well enough researched, he sensed it had been hurriedly put together after the Santa Carla TV station had first aired news of the tragedies.

  He refolded the paper, uncovering a message slip that had been left on the desk. Dunbar Harrison had called; Oriana was willing to talk with Guy at three o’clock, Pacific time. She would call him. He looked at the clock. Nearly three hours till then. He’d use the interval to bring his notes up to date, perhaps get a bite to eat, provided he could find a restaurant that was not swarming with press people.

  The packet of photos caught his attention. He picked it up and tore it open. Removed the prints and shuffled through them.

  They were blank, as if the film had passed through an X-ray machine.

  “Rho, we’ve been over this before.” Will Scurlock sat in his recliner chair, big hands dangling loose over its arms. His face was deeply lined and he looked as if he hadn’t slept in days.

  “I know, and I’m sorry to bother you. We’re reinterviewing everybody we talked with.”

  “I don’t think I can do this. Forty-eight hours ago I was making arrangements with the Neptune Society for my wife to be cremated. Burned up, like a hunk of dead wood. Her wishes. Me, I would’ve liked a nice casket for her, flowers, friends at the graveside. But Virge always said no, she didn’t want a lot of fuss…”

  After a moment he went on. “Yesterday I picked up the ashes in Santa Carla. That’s them in the cheap brass box on the coffee table. Pick the least expensive, Virge said, I’ll only be in there a little while. I couldn’t go against her. Tomorrow a buddy of mine’s taking me up in his plane, and I’ll scatter her at sea.”

  “Well, at least you’re doing what she wanted. Will…” Rho hesitated. Virge’s death wasn’t the reason for her visit, but she wanted to clear up an issue that was bothering her. “Mimi Griggs told me about the life insurance policy on Virge.”

  “Policy? Oh, that. Mimi’s idea. I was gonna cancel it, but when I told her, she gave me a sob story about needing the commission. I guess that makes me look bad, Virge dying like she did.”

  “That’s not my concern at the moment. As I said, we only have today to close the Ackerman case, and I can’t get it out of my head that Virge’s death is connected with hers somehow.”

  “I told you what I know. We only saw her the one time.”

  “And that was around six on Friday evening?”

  “I’m not sure. Maybe it was later. I brought Virge home, changed clothes, and drove back into town for a meeting at the hotel with Alan Lindsay.”

  “When was your meeting?”

  “Seven thirty? Eight?” He shook his head.

  “Don’t you keep a calendar? Or a work diary showing the hours you put in?”

  “Yeah, yeah I do. I’ll get it.” He stood up and shuffled off to the wing where he had his office.

  Rho got up and moved to the front window. The sky had turned dark; the first storm of the season was predicted for this evening. Will’s new Dodge Ram stood outside the garage, the passenger-side window rolled down. She’d close it so the interior wouldn’t be soaked in the expected downpour.

  She approached the truck from the rear, nothing a faint blue mark on the side of the right tire—a mark placed there by a meter maid in Santa Carla, the only city in Soledad County that had parking restrictions. The tire was new, but there was—

  A nick. A distinctive crescent-shaped nick in the tread of a top-of-the line Firestone tire.

  “I’d like to know what happened to this film,” Guy said to the clerk at the pharmacy. He was a little man, bent and humpbacked, and his head thrust forward like a turtle’s protruding from its shell. At the moment he looked as if he wished he could withdraw into it.

  He said, “Maybe you overexposed it?”

  “The enti
re roll?”

  “It might’ve been bad film.”

  “I doubt that. It’s high-quality film, and the photo supply store where I bought it is very conscientious about its stock.”

  “Well, I wouldn’t know what happened.”

  “Who develops your film? Do you send it to a lab like Kodak, or is it done locally?”

  “Locally. There’s this freelancer here in town. Dave Moretti. Unless you specify Kodak, he’s the one processes our orders.”

  Guy remembered Moretti from the canyon. He hadn’t seemed to be the sort of amateur who would destroy an entire roll of film by accident.

  Rho had squatted down and was examining the crescent shape on Will Scurlock’s tire when he came up behind her.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked. “Do I have a puncture?”

  She stood and faced him, trying to decide how to proceed. From this point forward Will should be considered a suspect in Chrystal Ackerman’s murder, and she should read him his rights and take him to the substation for questioning. Recently California had seen a great increase in Miranda warning violations; the department had sent a memo urging deputies to exercise special caution. She didn’t want to jeopardize the case when it eventually went to court, but on the other hand, Will was a friend, a neighbor. She’d known him her whole life.

  “Not a puncture,” she said. “A nick.”

  Will went closer, squinting at the tire. “Damn! That wasn’t there last time I looked.”

  “When was that?”

  “A week? Ten days? Whenever I last checked the pressure.”

  “You been driving on rough terrain since then?”

  “Just up and down the highway to my job sites. Why’re you so interested in it, anyway?”

  Again she considered, and decided to go with her gut instinct. “We located the place where Ackerman’s body went into the water—Quinley’s old burger stand. There was a set of tire imprints. Firestone heavy-truck series. One of them had a nick that’s an exact match with this.”

  Will’s expression froze as he absorbed the information and its implications. “You think I killed that woman, Rho?”