Nightcrawlers nd-30

by Bill Pronzini

  “Where does amazing grace fit in? Or does it?”

  “One of the female leads is named Grace Cutter. Known as Amazing Grace to the male narrator.”

  “Patterned after you?”

  “Obviously, yes. And the narrator, Donovan-Russ himself, of course. There’s an ongoing and rather steamy affair between the two, graphically described. I wasn’t surprised and I don’t suppose you are, either.”

  “No. You think that’s why he wanted you to have the manuscript?”

  “A tribute to me and what might have been. So he said in a long, rambling cover letter.”

  “You going to let anybody else read the manuscript?”

  “No. I don’t know what I’m going to do with it. Destroy it, most likely-it’s worthless as fiction or nostalgia or memento.”

  “Your choice. What else did he put in the letter?”

  “Nothing to concern anyone but me,” Cybil said. “I’ve shared and discussed this matter as much as I’m going to. Russ Dancer is dead, the past is dead, from now on suppose we just let it stay that way.”

  “… Okay with me.”

  “And with Kerry. It’s settled then.”

  She didn’t have anything more to say, which saved me the trouble of having to prod her off the line. I put the receiver down, stood, went away from my desk a couple of paces, came back and sat down and picked the receiver up again and called Bates and Carpenter. Kerry was out of her office; her secretary went to find her. I got up and took a couple of turns around the desk until I heard her voice.

  “Did Cybil call you? About Dancer’s manuscript?”

  “Couple of minutes ago. Kerry-”

  “I don’t know about you, but I’m relieved. I kept imagining all sorts of nasty things he might’ve given her-that’s why I was so bothered. You know how weird Dancer could be-”

  “Kerry, listen, I don’t want to talk about that right now. That’s not why I called. There’s a problem here and I’m not going to be able to pick up Emily. Can you do it, or make arrangements with the Simpsons?”

  She caught the tension in my voice. “I can do it. What problem?”

  “It’s Tamara. She’s gone missing.”

  “Missing? For heaven’s sake, what-?”

  “No idea yet. She hasn’t come in or called in, she’s not home, her cell phone’s out of service, and nobody’s talked to her since last night. May or may not have something to do with a surveillance she’s been on in San Leandro the past couple of nights.”

  “Have you called the police yet?”

  “Not yet. Too soon. Jake Runyon and I are on it.”

  “You don’t think she-?”

  “Trying not to think anything yet. I don’t know when I’ll be home. I’ll call if I’m going to be late.”

  “Or if there’s any word.”

  “Soon as I can.”

  “Find her, you and Jake,” she said. “Find her safe.”

  Less than a minute after Runyon switched on Tamara’s computer, he said, “Yeah, I was afraid of that. I can’t get in. She never gave you any idea of the password?”

  “No. That kind of information is wasted on me.”

  “Write it down anywhere that you know of?”

  “I’ve been through her desk a couple of times. I didn’t see anything that looked like a password.”

  “She’s too security conscious to leave something like that in her desk,” Runyon said. “Probably didn’t write it down at all. A person her age doesn’t worry about forgetting things like that.”

  “Or about something unexpected happening to them.”

  “Yeah.”

  He looked through her desk anyway, didn’t find anything, and then we brainstormed a couple of dozen possible words, phrases, dates that she might’ve used for a password. None of them worked.

  “Dammit,” I said, “we could sit here all night and not come up with the right one. The only lead we’ve got, and it’s a dead end.”

  “Not necessarily. There’re other ways to get into a secured computer.”

  “What ways?”

  “Codebreaker program, for one. Runs every possible combination of letters and numbers until it hits on the right one. But that can take a long time. A better, faster way is to link up another computer and wipe her hard drive.”

  “You’re losing me, Jake.”

  “Computer forensics,” Runyon said. “Wiping the hard drive lets you access all the stored files. Also retrieve deleted material-what we need if Tamara dumped the research she told you about.”

  “How long does that take?”

  “Not long for the wipe job. Rest of it depends on how many files and deletions need sorting through to get what you’re after. Probably no more than a couple of hours.”

  “Can you do that kind of thing?”

  “Christ, no. Takes an expert.”

  “Where do we find one?”

  “Some of the bigger investigative agencies have computer forensics departments now. Caldwell was just putting one together in Seattle when I left them.”

  “McCone Investigations,” I said. “They handle computer-related cases. And Sharon’s nephew, Mick, is an expert hacker.”

  “He’ll know how to do a wipe job then.”

  I called over there, got Ted Smalley, McCone Investigations’ office manager, on the line. “Sharon’s up at Touchstone with Hy,” he said when I asked for her. Touchstone was a getaway home McCone and her signifcant other, Hy Ripinsky, owned-in Mendocino County, a couple of hundred miles from the city. “Is there anything I can do for you?”

  I said, “I hope so, Ted,” and explained the situation.

  “Of course we’ll do whatever we can to help,” he said in his crisp way. “Mick has done that kind of work before. In fact, he’s so good at it Sharon is thinking of establishing a computer forensics department and putting him in charge.”

  “Is Mick in?”

  “No, but I think I can reach him. Let me make a call or two and I’ll get back to you.”

  He called back in six minutes. “I just spoke to Mick,” he said. “He’s eager to help, but he’s caught up on a case in San Jose. The earliest he can be back in the city is seven-thirty.”

  “Seven-thirty. Okay. I’d rather not wait around here that long, so how about I drop off a key to our office?”

  “I have a better suggestion. Why not bring Tamara’s computer here? I can have it hooked up and ready when Mick arrives. It’ll save time.”

  “Done. Thanks, Ted. I’ll bring it right over.”

  Runyon and I unhooked Tamara’s Mac G-4, and a good thing he was there because I might’ve fouled up the job on my own: it was a big machine with a lot of wires and connections that didn’t mean anything to me. Together we carried it downstairs and around the corner and down to the garage where the agency rented space.

  “You going back to San Leandro after you drop it off?” he asked.

  “Yeah. See what I can find out from the people on Willard Street. You mind hanging around here until five-thirty or so, just in case?”

  “No problem. If you need me later tonight, I’ll be available.”

  “Right. Where’ll you be? Home?”

  “No. Out keeping busy. My cell’ll be on wherever I am.”

  McCone Investigations was not far away, in Pier 24-1/2 next to the SFFD fireboat station on the Embarcadero. There were several businesses inhabiting the cavernous interior; Sharon’s was the largest. She’d expanded her operations considerably in the past few years, adding office space and employees-five now, with more in the offing-and her agency now occupied the entire north side of the upper level. I drove onto the pier floor, where there was tenant parking and at the moment no empty spaces, double-parked, and lugged the computer upstairs to Ted’s office.

  He was a slender, compact man in his forties, with a neatly trimmed goatee and a recent predilection for gaudy Hawaiian shirts. A small smile widened his mouth when he saw the machine. “A G-4. I’m trying to talk Sharon into buy
ing me one. They’re among the best on the market.”

  “Mick won’t have any trouble with it?”

  “I’m sure not. Exactly what is it he’s to look for?”

  “Anything pertaining to a male of mixed race-half black, half white. There may or may not be a San Leandro or other East Bay connection. And/or a connection to a split-fee case we’re working for the Ballard Agency in Portland-the reason Tamara was in San Leandro the last couple of nights. The subject’s name is George DeBrissac.”

  Ted wrote all of that down. “Anything else?”

  “Not that I know of right now,” I said. “Will Mick be able to tell recent from older stuff?”

  “Yes. Everything on the hard drive is dated.”

  “Should be from yesterday. Either a new file, or she might’ve printed out her research and then deleted it.”

  “Mick can find it either way. And I’ll have him check all her entries and searches for the past week or so, just in case.”

  “How long do you think it’ll take him?”

  “When it comes to computers, he’s even more efficient than I am. I’d say no more than an hour at the most. He’ll call you as soon as he has anything to report. Do you have a cell number?”

  I did now, thanks to Kerry; her Christmas present had been a cell phone. I read it off to him. “I really appreciate this, Ted.”

  “Friends as well as business associates-you’d do the same for us. And I like Tamara, I hate the thought of anything happening to her. Not that anything has or will. I’m sure she’s all right.”

  He wasn’t sure, any more than I was. Just trying to be upbeat, reassuring. But the truth was in his eyes, in the grave set of his features. No one who deals with crime and criminals on a daily basis can fool anybody else in the business on a thing like this.

  18

  JAKE RUNYON

  He waited at the office until 5:35. Dead time, but necessary; until close of business there was always a chance, however small, that Tamara or somebody who knew her whereabouts might call. Then he switched on the answering machine, locked up, went down to the garage for his car.

  On his own time now. Ready to jump when Bill called, but until then the priority flag was down. He let himself think again about Troy and Tommy Douglass. Keep moving, keep busy, pick up where he’d left off earlier.

  South San Francisco, sprawled out in a little valley under San Bruno Mountain, was an industrial city that billed itself that way in huge white letters cut into one of the flanking hillsides. Nearly half of it was given over to factories, steel mills, maintenance shops for the airlines at SFO, meat-packing plants, paint and chemical and plastics companies. The other half was largely blue-collar and lower-income, white-collar residential-housing that was crazily overpriced, like all Bay Area real estate these days, but given its proximity to San Francisco, still affordable and desirable. Runyon knew all this because he’d driven around and familiarized himself with South San Francisco, as he’d taken the time to do with all the cities and towns within a hundred-mile radius. You couldn’t operate effectively in a metropolitan area as large as this one unless you built up a good working knowledge of its component parts. Besides which, it had given him a purpose during his off-duty hours.

  The usual commuter snarl on 101 turned a twenty-minute trip into thirty-five. He left the freeway on Grand Avenue, the main South City exit, and then had to make three stops, two service stations, and a convenience store, before he found a phone directory that hadn’t been vandalized or stolen. Phone booths and phone books-vanishing breeds in this age of cell phones and widespread disrespect for public property. Common courtesy: another vanishing breed.

  There were a pair of listings for Douglass, two esses. One was residential, G. Douglass, no address to go with the number. The other was commercial: Douglass Auto Body, on Victory Avenue. In the car he tapped out the residential number on his cell. Nine rings, no answer. He located the South San Francisco map among the pile in the glove box, found Victory Avenue. It intersected with South Linden over near the Bayshore Freeway.

  Douglass Auto Body turned out to be a tumbledown frame garage, its barbed-wire-fenced side yard cluttered with junker cars. Still open for business even though the time was nearly six-thirty. Railroad tracks ran a couple of blocks away; he could hear an engine whistle and the clatter of rolling stock as he drove slowly past the garage. None of the handful of older pickups parked in the vicinity had a Confederate flag in its rear window. But parked near the set of double doors facing the street was a sporty white Chevy Camaro, vintage 1980.

  Runyon parked next to the Camaro, walked inside. The overhead lighting, high up on the rafters, was dim enough to create pockets of shadow along the walls. One man was working in there, fiftyish, gray-haired and gray-bearded, the upper part of his face obscured by goggles, using a hissing acetylene torch on a Jeep Ranger’s rear fender. To the left, just inside the double doors, brighter lighting illuminated a glass-partitioned office cubicle. The office had one occupant shuffling papers at a desk-a young guy with curly blond hair, lean and muscular in a blue shirt.

  Runyon veered over into the cubicle’s doorway. The blond kid looked up, an unsmiling look that catalogued him briefly and without much interest. The eyes were blue and innocent, the face smooth and beardless. Angelic wasn’t a term Runyon would’ve used to describe it. More apt was clean-cut All-American College Boy, circa 1960. He could pass for twenty-one, all right.

  “Yessir?” he said. Deep, soft voice. “Help you?”

  “Your name Troy? Troy Douglass?”

  “That’s right. Do I know you?”

  “No. I’m looking for your brother.”

  “Tommy?” The name didn’t seem to taste right; his mouth quirked a little when he said it. “He’s not here.”

  “Where can I find him?”

  “You a friend of his?”

  “No.”

  “He owe you money or something?”

  “Does he owe a lot of people money?”

  “Well…”

  “I’m not one of them.”

  “Why’re you looking for him then?”

  “Personal matter.”

  Furrows marred the flawless complexion. Troy pushed his chair back, got to his feet. “Maybe you better talk to my father. He’s right out there.”

  “It’s your brother I’m interested in. What kind of car does he drive?”

  “… Why do you want to know that?”

  “Older model pickup, Confederate flag in the rear window?”

  “No, that’s Bix’s wheels.”

  “Bix. Red hair, freckles? Tommy’s buddy?”

  “Yeah. Why’re you asking all these questions?”

  “The two of them are in trouble, that’s why.”

  “Trouble? What kind of trouble?”

  “They’ve been on a rampage the past couple of weeks, beating up gay men in the Castro district. Gene Zalesky, Larry Exeter, Kenneth Hitchcock.”

  Shock turned Troy’s face the noncolor of Crisco. He said, “Oh, Jesus!” and sat down hard enough to make the chair squawk loudly.

  “You didn’t know?”

  “No. I had no idea.”

  “Put all three of them in the hospital,” Runyon said. “Hitchcock’s still there, still in critical condition.”

  “Because of me, of what I…?”

  “Looks that way.”

  “But it’s not their fault! How can he blame them?”

  “Easier than blaming you, hating you, beating you up. This way, you’re just a victim and he feels justified.”

  “I knew he was a homophobe, but a basher…”

  “How’d he get their names? You tell him?”

  “He made me tell him. Wasn’t enough he had to come looking for me, force me to move back home… he wanted names, addresses, everything about the men I… but I never thought… Goddamn him and that speed freak Bix!”

  “What’s Bix’s last name?”

  “Sullivan.”

  �
�Does Tommy use drugs, too?”

  Brief nod. “I don’t, I never hurt anybody, and he thinks what I do is sick!”

  “Where can I find him and Bix Sullivan?”

  “Why? What’re you going to do to them?”

  “Stop them from attacking anybody else, maybe killing the next man they go after.”

  “Put them in jail? Are you a cop?”

  “Don’t you think they belong in jail?”

  “Yes, but-” Troy’s face warped again, this time showing fear. “Oh, shit!”

  The kid was staring past him, out into the garage. Runyon realized that the hissing sound had stopped, and when he half turned he saw that the gray-haired man had shed the acetylene torch, removed his goggles, and was approaching the office.

  “He doesn’t know about me,” in a tense whisper. “That’s why I came home, Tommy promised not to tell him about me. Please don’t say anything. Not here, not now!”

  The elder Douglass wore a quizzical smile as he came into the office, but he lost it when he got a look at his son’s pale, sweaty face. “What’s the matter? What’s going on here?”

  “Nothing, Dad, nothing, this guy’s just… he’s looking for Tommy.”

  Douglass transferred his gaze to Runyon. “Who’re you? What do you want with my son?”

  “Tommy owes him money, that’s all.”

  “Yeah? Another damn bill collector. He stays out all hours, can’t manage his finances, and you run off to Christ knows where for three weeks. Some pair of kids I got.”

  Runyon said, “Where can I find Tommy, Mr. Douglass?”

  “Well, you won’t find him at home. Come back tomorrow.”

  “He lives with you?”

  “Both my sons, one big happy family. You’re a bill collector and you don’t know that?”

  “It’s important that I locate him right away.”

  “Yeah, well, you’re out of luck,” Douglass said. “He left about five o’clock, went up to the city with a buddy of his. Spend more money he doesn’t have, make another big night of it in the friggin’ city.”