The Phantom Photographer: Murder in Marin Mystery - Book 3 (Murder in Marin Mysteries)

by Martin Brown

  Milton’s reaction only reinforced what Michael always believed; Cook was a kind and thoughtful man.

  One day, Michael had no doubt, he would certainly leave the nest Milton had made for him, but not right now. In fact, not until he had proven his strong suspicion that there was a wealth of new “clients” waiting for him in Mill Valley.

  The following Sunday, resolved to keep his job, but find a new home in Mill Valley, Michael drove down to Mill Valley and went to see several rentals he had circled from classified ads in the Marin Independent Journal. After a couple of disappointments, he headed up Hazel Avenue to a possible rental he was most interested in, principally because it sat on one of those view corridors that so fascinated him. In some respects, it was similar in appearance to his current residence in Novato, but in other ways notably different. To begin with, it was in a heavily wooded area, and below, above, and across one of the many turns in Cascade Canyon, he could see numerous other homes when gazing up and down the hillside.

  The entire house clung precariously to its own side of the hill. It was not a good choice for anyone who was easily unnerved by heights, and this home, sitting upon a set of wooden trestles, certainly would have raised the concerns of those ever fearful of the next earthquake. But for Michael, it was exactly the location he had dreamed of during the past week. The one-bedroom unit had an ample kitchen with older but seemingly reliable appliances. It had a comfortable living room and a small bedroom with an adjacent bathroom. Best of all, there was a porch that received dappled sunlight directly overhead in the spring and summer, and was mostly hidden in deep shadows during late fall and winter. It was probably snug for two people, but ideal for Michael’s purposes. Best of all, his porch was out of the sightline of the main house.

  His only remaining doubt was the home’s owner, Mrs. Fitzsimmons. She was certainly pleasant, but having mentioned that she was widowed, and living alone, would she be coming by uninvited and observing his activities a little too closely?

  The only way to learn more was to engage her in conversation, as he so often did when selling equipment to camera enthusiasts. “Talk them up, find out their needs and interests,” Milton had told him frequently in his first months at the camera shop.

  “You have a lovely home. How long have you lived here?” Michael asked, while casually admiring the view from the porch.

  “My husband and I moved here many years ago. Not long after his service in the navy, we were so young then. He was an engineer and helped to design much of this house.”

  “Did he enjoy his work?”

  “He really did. He worked in design and construction all over the Bay Area. There was a lot of building everywhere, particularly with the interstate highway systems. Doesn’t seem that long ago he was working on construction of the Nimitz Freeway over in Oakland. I lost him three years ago to lung cancer. Poor thing, he was only fifty-six. Damn cigarettes!” She seemed lost in thought for a brief time; looking up, she suddenly said, “I hope you’re not a smoker.”

  “No, thank God. I think it’s a terrible habit.”

  “You’re so right.”

  “Did you raise your children here?”

  “Yes, a boy and a girl. My son lives in Chicago; he’s in banking. My daughter lives in Seattle. She works for one of those new computer companies. Micro-something?”

  “Microsoft?”

  “Yes, that’s it. She’s always saying how successful they’re going to be one day. I wish they both lived closer. But I’m thankful that they are both happily married now and have children of their own. I just wish Walter was still here to see them and his grandkids.”

  “My folks broke up when my brother and I were kids. It was very messy. I guess life is a mixed bag. The good and the bad.”

  “That’s so true, Michael.”

  All the time he spoke with her, Michael kept wondering if somehow they had met before, then he realized the connection. Mrs. Fitzsimmons was the kind woman with the soft blue eyes.

  “My gosh,” Michael said. “I met you recently.”

  “Really, how?”

  “You were behind the desk at the Mill Valley history room. I asked you a question.”

  “Now I know where I thought I saw you,” she said with a laugh. “Well, isn’t this a small world?”

  Michael felt certain he had made his first friend in his newly adopted hometown.

  “Well, I love the space. What do you need from me?”

  “Well, my son is always telling me that I need to get a credit report, but I think that’s just a lot of nonsense. You look like a nice young man. Could you give me the name and contact information for your current landlord? The unit is four-hundred dollars per month. Give me that plus a two-hundred-dollar deposit, and I’ll call your landlord, and we should be good to go.”

  “No problem. And when can I move in?”

  “Actually the young couple that was here left two-weeks early, so I’m fine with you moving in before the first of the month.”

  “I’m still working at my job up in Novato, so I won’t be able to move in until next week, but I might come by one evening and bring some things down.”

  “Whatever you like; you seem like a fine young man. I’m delighted you found me.”

  As she hurried off, Michael breathed deeply of the fresh air. He was greatly pleased with his new surroundings.

  When Mrs. Fitzsimmons came back a moment later and saw Michael standing at the edge of the deck, admiring the view from his soon to be new home, she said, “It’s lovely, isn’t it? You just don’t appreciate it as much when you’ve been here awhile.”

  “I don’t think I’ll ever get over the quiet and this wooded view. It’s like the whole world is at your feet.”

  “Well, not quite, but it is lovely.”

  “Would you mind if I got my camera and took some photos to send to my mom and dad?”

  “Well, no, of course not. I wish my son or daughter would send their mother a picture now and then. They’re too busy, I suppose, with their own lives. Well, take all the time you want.”

  Alone in his new nest for the first time, he took his camera, telephoto lens, and tripod from the car and set up on the deck to snap a few photos of the area. In every direction, the trees, mostly redwoods, stood like silent sentries surrounding him. The visibility was perfect and the canyon was silent. From his perch, Michael swept his camera up and down the streets, paths, and lanes in the lower section of the canyon.

  He focused in on a family preparing for a backyard cookout. They appeared to be happy, but were they really, he wondered. There was a man working patiently practicing with his putter on a perfect patch of grass in his backyard. An older couple were both busy weeding their garden. And on a higher lane, in a home surrounded by redwoods, he peeked at an attractive young couple sunbathing on the deck in the nude. He guessed them both to be in their late twenties with trim athletic bodies. What mischief might they get themselves into, he wondered?

  It was life in a fish bowl lying there above and below his shutter: all private, raw, and unforgiving. A world that was just waiting to be discovered.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Michael made a simple promise to himself: Get to work on finding a new target, this time one in his new hometown. Going up to work at Milton’s camera store in Novato, for someone who never liked spending much time in a car, had in short order become a drag on the better life that he now felt destined to live. His love affair with Mill Valley was growing by the day; therefore, he reasoned, it was time to put Novato in his past.

  In his quiet moments, and like most retail salespeople, he had many of those, he filled a small notebook with the Mill Valley discoveries he had made. Various intersections or specific street addresses near where he had found that perfect combination of a wonderful view blessed with the perfect nook in which to hide.

  Discovery of his activities by a random passerby was never of great concern; he could claim to be a nature photographer, or assembling a coll
ection of photos highlighting the unique architecture of so many of Mill Valley’s homes. In fact, residents had grown so familiar with visitors exploring unique local environments and architectural design that photographers were most often ignored.

  Of greater importance, was moving ahead with his plan to become part of the fabric of the community. To that end, he decided to move forward with looking for work with one of the local camera shops. He knew Milton was prepared to give him a sterling recommendation.

  At Walt’s Cameras on Miller Avenue, he interviewed with Walt Douglas, who looked like an escapee from a 1960’s Berkeley hippie commune.

  “I’d be very interested in bringing you on, but all I can offer you is a late afternoon early evening shift, generally from four to seven, probably six days a week, if that works for you.”

  “I’d prefer longer hours and fewer days, but it’s fine for a start. Here’s Milton Cook’s number in Novato, so you can give him a call.”

  “Sure, I’ll do that a little later today and then give you a call.”

  The two men shook hands, with both appearing to be satisfied. Just before leaving the shop, Michael turned to Walt and said, “Are you active in the local chamber and or the Rotary?”

  “Yeah, absolutely. As a small town merchant, you’ve got to be.”

  “That’s what I think. Milton wanted me to get involved. I was a little hesitant at first, just out of college and all. I was usually the youngest guy at the meetings. But it all turned out to be great. I met a lot of people, and made a lot of new friends. Now I really believe in it. Making a better community is up to each one of us.”

  With those parting words, Michael smiled, thanked Walt for his time, and left the store, feeling quite certain he had left a favorable impression.

  Walt contacted Michael the next day to ask him when he could start. Michael offered to stay with Milton for two weeks and leave sooner if he found someone to take his place.

  Milton’s parting words to Michael were to remind him to visit whenever he was up in the area, and that he, “wished there were more honest, hardworking young men like you.”

  Michael had largely avoided the few feeble attempts that Barbara had made to contact him. One when she asked about the upcoming holiday season suggesting that, “Fred would be happy to see you.” He laughed to himself over how blind she had been regarding Fred, probably from the first day she had left his father. Michael deflected the few holiday invitations that came his way, saying that he was, “going to be down at Dad’s place.” He wasn’t, of course, but Barbara would never know that.

  Caleb reached out to him as well. More often than Barbara, but not as often as Michael thought he should. When he asked about Michael coming down to see him, he’d say that he was committed to working that weekend or on a holiday that he had made a commitment to be with his mom and Fred. That certainly wasn’t true, but Michael was quite certain they would never communicate, so his duplicity would never be realized. At least he held on to a good relationship with Christopher, who was by then a sophomore at Fresno State.

  One evening, sitting contently in his new home, he thought about his life without a mother or a father, and resolved that part of his life was now behind him. People, as a rule, were untrustworthy, and his parents were excellent examples of that. I’m on my own, he thought, and that’s how life is better for me.

  Michael quickly learned that, while no one could be kinder than Milton, Walt was much more entertaining. To begin with, Milton had a serious demeanor regarding virtually every aspect of his work, family, and his community life. He was the kind of person people would think of as a, “sober individual.”

  Walt had none of that. He was thankful for the business he had, but he viewed most of his clients as having an over inflated sense of self. He played along with the chamber members, attending requisite meetings and mixers, but considered it all to be quite silly. The local Rotary, however, drew most of his ire.

  “They’re mostly drunks and ninnies. They do some good; I realize that,” he said, “But it all comes at the cost of endless meetings and senseless chatter. Mostly, they’re retired or semi-retired people with way too much time on their hands.”

  Best of all, Walt, in his sardonic manner, thought so little of his longtime fellow neighbors that he was always generous with sharing even the slightest hint of impropriety. Walt had grown up back east, but as Michael suspected, he had arrived in San Francisco in the early days of flower power.

  “In 1967,” he told Michael, just a month after they had started working together, “I used to hang out in that little park, Vina del Mar, in the center of Sausalito. We were this crazy bunch of kids, all about my age, twenty-three. We’d strip down, and jump into their fountain. That really pissed off the old timers. One of my old playmates just got herself elected to the Sausalito City Council. I wish they could have seen her back then. Talk about a free spirit.

  Walt never married. Unlike Milton, he was the opposite of a steady family man. “I’m fifty, still single, and I’m likely to stay that way. I like women too much to ever commit myself to just one.”

  What Michael liked best was that Walt was a bottomless well of gossip: much of it of little use, but some of it potentially valuable.

  One bit of information that made Michael sit up and take notice was his comment that Herb Fancher, Jr., a local businessman and member of the Mill Valley Planning Commission, who had just announced his candidacy for the Marin County Board of Supervisors was, “a nasty piece of work.”

  “How so?” Michael asked, as he feigned casual interest.

  “Well, I’m pretty sure that he’s a player. You know, fools around behind his wife’s back, but even worse, I think he pushes her around.”

  “What do you mean, pushes her around?”

  “You know, smacks her now and then.”

  “Really? Wow! If that’s true, it wouldn’t go down very well with the voters.”

  “Yeah, you think?” Walt snorted in response.

  “How do you know about this?” Michael asked.

  “There’s just something about him that makes me think he could be an abuser. I noticed when he thought she was getting too comfortable talking with me at a chamber mixer that he almost pulled her arm out when he said, ‘Let’s get going; we’ll be late for our dinner.’ If that guy thinks I’m a threat, an overweight photography nerd with a walrus mustache, he must have some real issues.”

  “Sounds like a weird dude,” Michael responded with the casual indifference he had perfected while working Milton for information on potential targets. But a few hours later, when his shift ended, he went over to the Mill Valley Library, which offered extended evening hours several nights each week. Michael sat close to the library’s oversized fireplace, which was lit, and reviewed articles in the county newspaper from the past two months about Fancher’s Board of Supervisors race.

  The first thing that he learned was that Herb senior had started the family construction firm. Herb, Jr. was apparently an only child and was now the firm’s president. His primary school was Stuart Hall, which sits up on one of the highest points of San Francisco’s Pacific Heights Neighborhood. And for high school, he attended St. Ignatius, followed by the Jesuit institution, University of San Francisco, all the choices often made by Bay Area residents who were sober minded, devout, and well connected.

  One story had a picture of both Fancher, Jr. and his wife, Suzette, taken two months earlier during a party to celebrate their third wedding anniversary. Fancher referred to Suzette as, “his rock.” Then added, “I know she’ll be there to support me throughout this race. No man could ask for a better life partner.”

  Jeez, Michael thought. This guy could be ripe for the picking if just a small part of what Walt suspects turns out to be correct. He smiled when he saw that the Fanchers lived on Marion Road, the next narrow roadway just below Hazel.

  Before leaving the library, he stopped in the town’s history room, where Mrs. Fitzsimmons was keeping her
self busy working a late shift.

  “Michael, it’s wonderful that you take such an interest in the town’s history.”

  “I’m just loving learning about the town and its people.”

  Excusing himself, he went over and looked at a book of land plats that gave him a very good idea of exactly where Fancher’s property aligned with the nearest property on Hazel.

  The next day, Michael was up several hours before he needed to report to work. He walked down Hazel and doubled back onto Marion until he was standing in front of Fancher’s property. He looked up behind Herb and Suzette’s home toward Hazel, attempting to make mental notes of various geographic markers along the hillside. Now his only question was to locate a place where, below Hazel and above Marion, he could best look in on the private lives of the candidate, the suspected abuser, and his wife, the likely victim.

  Walking along the narrow shoulder of Hazel, which often disappeared, leaving nothing but a fairly steep drop-off; Michael walked slowly, looking down on a target that he reasoned was thirty to forty feet below him. He stopped at the address that appeared on the property plats to be best aligned with the Fancher home and its distinctive thatched roof that he noticed on his previous walk.

  Now he could confirm his suspicion that the home had a back deck, and if he was fortunate, perhaps some of the unpleasantness between Herb and Suzette might occur out there. But, most importantly, was there a way to look into the back of the house: the living room, their bedroom or hopefully both?

  Michael stepped off the edge of Hazel road and walked carefully down the slope. He had instant flashbacks of Caleb, Christopher, and himself wandering down a wooded hillside on one of their many deer hunting trips.

  About twenty feet down, he came along a small dugout, possibly created by children at some time in the past. He knew instantly that the spot offered an ideal hideout. With the surrounding trees and ground vegetation, there was an abundance of decaying leaves and wind-snapped branches that he could use to create his own little nest.