Spit In The Ocean: A Laid-Back Bay Area Mystery (The Jake Samson & Rosie Vicente Detective Series Book 4)

by Shelley Singer

  Put it all together and what happens? What I came up with in that early morning clarity was an amoeba, constantly changing shape, shooting out its little pseudopodia and drawing them in again, but nevertheless an amoeba. One-celled. One case, after all.

  Rosie agreed with me, after an argument. Real life, she insisted, wasn’t neat. You could very well have a burglary here, an accident there, a crazed attack on a truck still farther over there, and a runaway boy. Maybe, she said, two of them were connected, maybe three, maybe all four. How could you know?

  “Wishing,” I said, “will make it so.”

  She chewed on that, along with her paprika-painted country fries.

  “What you’re saying, then, is that to create order out of chaos we need to pretend there is such a thing as order.”

  “In all the arts and sciences,” I replied, “including the art of detection.”

  “And do you have a theory that holds this mess together? A framework for your house of cards?”

  “There’s the unfortunate part,” I said. “Several different frameworks can be built.”

  “Then let’s build them. Let’s spend the morning seeing if we can’t tie up a few loose ends, and then let’s stop racing around for a few hours, go sit on the beach, and build them. Maybe when we’ve put up three or four, one or two will begin to look like they’ll stand.”

  Rosie was looking over my shoulder. “Look who’s coming our way.”

  I turned. It was Henry Linton.

  “How are you two doing this morning?” he asked. “How’s the arm?”

  “Better, thanks,” I said politely.

  “Good, good…”

  “Why’d you write that crap in the paper?” I said in the same polite tone of voice.

  “Because that’s how I feel. Nothing personal. But look what’s happened now— young Rollie’s disappeared.”

  “We didn’t do it,” Rosie said.

  “Not saying you did. Like I said, nothing personal. But we don’t need people from out of town getting in the way when there’s trouble.”

  “I hear you’re going to use some of your contacts to help find Rollie. Contacts out of town,” I said.

  He smiled. “Can’t be helped, now.”

  “Why don’t you want us to find out what’s going on?”

  He sighed. “I never said that. We need to find out. I just hope you give Clement the credit he deserves when this is all over.”

  So that was it. He didn’t want anyone showing up his sheriff. That really pissed me off. “You know something, Henry? You’re a patronizing son of a bitch. Clement’s a good lawman. He doesn’t need any credit from us. He’s doing a great job with no help.”

  Henry’s eyebrows went up. “Except from you.”

  “We’re doing what we can, yeah. But you don’t have to take care of Clement. He can take care of himself. So can all the other people you seem to think are your children.”

  “Well. I guess you told me.” He turned and walked out of the restaurant.

  We set to work. I called Melody and said I wanted to talk to her, and she invited me for dinner. We checked in with Clement, who had nothing new from San Francisco or San Rafael. He told us he and Perry had finally managed to track down all the summer residents of the spit and the permanent residents who had not been around the week before, and they’d all checked out.

  “What about the ones who were around?” Rosie asked. “Are you sure Henry’s covered?” He nodded. “What about Frank Wooster?”

  “He says he stayed late at the garage Friday, but all we’ve got is his word. Which reminds me— about Saturday? Henry’s got both Frank and Wolf covered for the afternoon. He took his car in to Frank’s right after lunch— right after he says he saw you at the restaurant. Then he spent the next three hours working on inventory with Wolf, except for the two or three times he walked over to the garage to check on how Frank was doing. Not much doubt that both Wolf and Frank were working when somebody did in your truck.”

  Rosie sighed.

  “Okay. Let’s get back to Friday night, then. What about Marty Spiegel? Have you seen any proof that he was in L.A. until Saturday?”

  “He was on the passenger list for an early morning PSA flight and he picked up his ticket, all right.”

  “What about Hackman?” I interjected. “Has he changed his story on Wolf being at his place?”

  “Nope. Of course, if he’d had enough to drink, he might not know if Wolf was there for an hour or fifteen minutes.”

  That was certainly true. “Thanks, Clement,” I said, and started to leave.

  “Wait a second, now. I’ve been thinking… You still interested in working with me on some detective stories?”

  “You sure you want to do that? It seems like you’ve got more than enough to do as it is.”

  “Oh, no. Not most of the time. Things aren’t always this busy. And in a couple of years I’ll not be working at all.” He sounded scared. “I’m going to need to do something.” Suddenly, he raised his head and smiled at me. “Otherwise I might wind up getting married.”

  I laughed, just to show him that I understood he wasn’t scared at all. “I think maybe you should do both.”

  On our way to Frank’s garage Rosie attacked. “When are you going to tell that old man the truth?”

  “Just as soon as I find someone who would be interested in helping him write those stories.”

  “Like who?”

  “I’m going to talk to Chloe and Artie at Probe, see what they come up with.”

  “And what if Clement really has nothing to say, or can’t say it even with help, or what if no one wants to bother to find out whether he can or not?”

  “I don’t know. But if someone who really knows talks to him, it might work out okay. Meanwhile, I think we ought to encourage him to make a pass at his office help.”

  “Angie?”

  “I don’t mean Perry. Yeah, he likes her.”

  “I never noticed.”

  “That’s the trouble with women. No romance. No sensitivity.”

  Frank was sitting in his chair again, but a skinny man with red hair was working on the truck.

  “Body man,” he grunted. “Maybe found a fender too. Not sure yet.”

  “Great,” Rosie said.

  “Read the piece about you in the Weekly. Going to take the hint?” We didn’t say anything. “Don’t like you pestering Hilda. You got no right to bother decent people.”

  “We’ll remember that,” Rosie said. “When will the truck be finished?”

  “Soon, I hope.”

  “Clement says you were here when Gracie died,” I said. “Is that true?”

  He got out of his chair and joined the body man inside the garage.

  I decided against hitting him over the head and dragging him back out into the daylight. Instead, we walked away, down to the main cross street, Cellini Avenue, that led to the beach. And kept walking, both silent, thinking, along the sand. We had passed the Spicer Street access and were on our way to the spit before Rosie spoke.

  “Why are we walking so far?”

  “Subconscious. Our minds are telling us Gracie’s death is the key to the whole thing.”

  “Don’t start going mystical on me.” She took off her shoes and socks. “Besides, I think the burglary is the key.”

  She sat down on the damp sand and began scooping it into a pile in front of her. I took off my shoes and socks, too, rolled up my pants, and sat down beside her. The sun was almost warm, the sand was cold. I helped her scoop sand. Alice, who had chased enough sea gulls, went to sleep.

  “Let’s start with both,” I said. “Gracie and the bank. Let’s start with Gracie going through the donor profiles but not following up.”

  “And she has a fiancé, or at least a boyfriend. Say he’s become sterile. She wants a kid anyway. The idea enrages him, or at least insults him.”

  “So he trashes the place, does a symbolic dumping of his rivals. But she says she’s g
oing to do it anyway. He can’t stand the thought. He kills her. He sets up an alibi with a drunken friend.”

  Rosie held up a sand-caked hand. “That leaves out Rollie.”

  “He was on the beach that morning. He saw something. After he saw what happened to Gracie and to us, he got scared and took off.”

  She had collected a big pile of sand by now, and was shaping it into a two-by-two-by-one-foot-tall block. “Except for one thing.” She was smoothing the top of her block, evening it out. Then she began scooping sand up and piling it into a second level. “It doesn’t explain why Wolf, as the vandal, would go through the donor files.”

  “Why would anyone?”

  “Curiosity,” she said doubtfully. “Or whoever did it was looking for something specific. I lean toward that second alternative.”

  She had found an ice cream stick and was cutting crenellations along the lower wall of her castle. She must have gotten bored, because she dropped the stick and returned to shaping the second-level tower. I picked up the stick and continued, for a while, the tedious and repetitive work she had begun on the lower wall.

  “We need to find out why Gracie was looking for a donor,” I said. “I wonder, do you think Lou and Wolf are friends?”

  She was having trouble with the tower. The sand kept crumbling away. I cut a doorway in the lower wall. “You mean Lou wouldn’t tell on a friend if he saw him breaking into the sperm bank?”

  “Right.” I was smoothing a road from the castle to somewhere else. “They broke in here. Then they packed the stuff into a box and carried it off to there.” I ran my hand down the beach a way, and then toward the water.

  “But why didn’t they just carry it down to here?” Rosie cut a direct route from the castle to the water. “Why not take it down Cellini to the first, closest beach?”

  “Because they thought they’d be more likely to be seen closer to downtown?”

  “I guess.” She didn’t look convinced.

  “I wonder where Frank Wooster was when Gracie died, and why he doesn’t want us talking to Hilda.”

  “I wonder,” Rosie said, “what Rollie knows.” She got the tower to stay in one piece. I finished the crenellations, although the last dozen or so got pretty sloppy. We sat back and looked at it. “Do we still have that map Clement drew?” she asked. “With the streets and the beaches on it?”

  I nodded. “Yeah. Somewhere.” I could see where she was going—where we were both going. We began to plan our next moves.

  – 26 –

  Rosie wanted to talk to the Hackmans again. I volunteered for another Fredda detail.

  We walked back along the beach as far as Spicer, up Spicer into the town, and separated with a promise to meet at the tavern.

  Fredda was sitting on the ramp, in the sun, with her eyes closed. She didn’t know I was there until I said hello. She jumped, and glared at me.

  “Scared me half to death,” she muttered.

  I apologized and told her I wanted to talk about Gracie again.

  “Well, Jesus,” she whined, “I can’t imagine why.”

  “If you’re working, I’d be happy to sit in the kitchen with you.”

  “No. I’m taking a break. Fire away.” I sat down beside her.

  “I keep thinking about Gracie going through those donor profiles over at the bank.”

  “Why?”

  “Because there must have been a reason. Something wrong between her and Wolf maybe? Something wrong with him? She must have said something, sometime.”

  “Well…” She was being coy, and it wasn’t attractive.

  “I’m sure you want to know what really happened to your cousin.”

  She shrugged. “I think she fell, but okay, there is something I can tell you, just to get you off my back for a while.” Suddenly, she did something really ghastly. She slid her rear end over a few inches and rubbed her shoulder against mine. She laughed. “Off my back. Pretty funny, right?”

  I did my best to ignore her heavy-handed overture, while at the same time continuing to appear friendly, even concerned. “Wonderful.” I smiled. “I knew you’d want to help.”

  “Where’s your girlfriend?”

  That stopped me for a second, until I realized she meant Rosie.

  “My friend”— I underscored the word— “is busy elsewhere.” I try to make a habit of laying no claim to Rosie as anything but a friend, partly, maybe, so I can keep our relationship clear to myself. This was one of those times, though, when I probably should have kept my mouth shut.

  “That’s nice. Now, you want to know about Gracie and Wolf. It’s true. They were having arguments. Not in public or anything, but she did say they were having problems. She didn’t say what kind and I didn’t ask. Just problems, and she wasn’t real happy, and I don’t think she knew what she was going to do. Is that what you wanted to hear?”

  “Only if it’s so.” She performed another ghastly act by favoring me with her giggle.

  “About children,” I said. “Was she particularly eager to have a child? She was in her thirties, and I know some women get strong feelings around then about children.”

  “Oh, yes. She always said she wanted children.”

  “Now, once again, something I’ve asked you about before. Wolf has had a child, so, as far as we know, he doesn’t have any sterility problems, or didn’t have—”

  “Do you?”

  “What?”

  “I’ll bet you don’t.”

  Oh, Christ, I thought. “He’s had a child—” I caught myself. I’d already said that. “If he’s okay, and they were still considering marriage, why was she looking through those files?”

  “Well, it’s obvious, isn’t it?” Fredda said. “She must have decided she wasn’t going to marry him at all.”

  “So you think she might decide, then, to go ahead and have a child more or less on her own?”

  “Why not? Lots of people do that. Lots of people have children even though they’re not married. Sometimes it’s by accident, but sometimes it’s on purpose.”

  I told her I understood all that.

  She stood up. Her mood had changed again. “I need to go back to work. Is that all you need?”

  It wasn’t. Far from it. But there was just so much of this woman I could take, especially without Rosie there as a buffer. I let Fredda go back to her cookies.

  Despite the depression Fredda had washed over me, my spirits rose as I walked back through town. Maybe it was true that Gracie and Wolf were having problems. That Gracie wanted to have a child by means of the sperm bank. So what if she hadn’t followed up on it? She hadn’t really had the time, had she?

  ***

  Wolf wasn’t looking so good. He was sitting on a stool behind the bar, slumped over with misery and weariness. No one else was there.

  “How you doing?” I asked cheerily.

  “Okay. What’ll you have?”

  “Draft.”

  He filled a glass, placed it carefully on the bar in front of me. Before I had a chance to say anything more to him, he walked to the other end of the bar.

  Rosie walked in. She said hello politely to Wolf, he said hello politely to her. She ordered a beer and we took them over to a table far enough away so we could whisper without being overheard by the man behind the bar.

  Hackman had been home alone, she said, and he’d been reasonably sober. Depressed about Rollie, but sober.

  “Maybe his kid running away will get to him, make him change,” I said.

  “I doubt it, but maybe. Anyway, he insists that Wolf spent his entire dinner hour with him. That he was at his house from a couple of minutes after five to just before six. He says he remembers it clearly.”

  “Hmmph,” I said.

  “I talked to him about Overman, too, and his relationship with the boy. He says Rollie worshipped the man. Would do anything for him.”

  “What else?”

  “Henry. I ran into him on the street. He absolutely, positively, and definiti
vely denied that Wolf and Gracie were anything but perfectly happy and planning their marriage. He says it was wonderful, how happy Wolf was.” I told her what Fredda had said. She shook her head. “Not according to Henry. He also says it’s a damned shame you and I don’t leave ‘the boy’ alone. That’s what he called him. Loves him like a son, he said.”

  “Christ.” I told her about the rest of my visit with Fredda. “That woman wears me down,” I said. “I’m taking the night off. Got a date with Melody.”

  “I’ve got a date too.”

  “With who, Nora?” I sincerely hoped not.

  She laughed. “Hardly. It’s Dr. Reid.”

  “The medical consultant at the bank?” She nodded. “Well, how about that.”

  “Since you’re seeing Melody tonight, why don’t you ask her if she killed Gracie in a fit of jealousy— you know, just to get her out of the way as a suspect.”

  “Shut up. There are a couple of things I want to ask Wolf, though. Want another beer?”

  “Sure.”

  I ambled up to the bar. “Two more, Wolf.” He began to draw the beer. “Mind if I ask you something?”

  He turned off the tap. “Yes.”

  “Great. Seems Gracie was checking out the donor profiles over at the sperm bank a couple of weeks ago. Any idea why she might have done that?”

  He stared at me. “I don’t know. She worked there.”

  “It didn’t have anything to do with work as far as we can tell. Was she really going to marry you?”

  His face was getting red. “Yes.” Were those tears in his eyes?

  “Then maybe there’s some problem? With you, I mean?”

  His face was nearly purple. He slammed a half-filled stein down on the bar, splashing beer on both of us. “I’m going to rip your balls off.” He vaulted over the bar, right into me, knocking me to the floor. I scrambled to my feet. Rosie was suddenly beside me. I saw the punch coming barely in time to jerk my head aside. He missed my face but sideswiped my neck, and the blow was hard enough just glancing by to make me see a few flashing lights. While I was watching the fireworks, he was getting his hands around my neck, trying to force me back and down, choking me.