Tourist Trap (Rebecca Schwartz #3) (A Rebecca Schwartz Mystery) (The Rebecca Schwartz Series)

by Julie Smith

  “This is a citizen’s arrest,” said the ragamuffin. Only it came out something like, “Thish ish a shitizens arresht.”

  I giggled. Disrespectful, perhaps, in the presence of a corpse, but I couldn’t help it. Thish was ridiculous.

  The woman waggled the thing in her pocket. Somewhere not far away, I heard a car start up.

  “Come on,” I said, and put my hands down by my side. “Let’s talk it over.” I reached out my right hand, palm up, like cops do on TV when they’ve cowed the bad guy and he’s ready to release his hostages. The woman should have put her beer bottle or gun or whatever it was peacefully in my paw, but instead she whapped my hand with her weighted pocket. Maybe it really was a gun. It certainly hurt enough.

  Without thinking, I drew back the injured member and used it to bash her. It is true about those primitive instincts. I bashed her and then I got her in a sort of half bear hug with the other arm. And then I found out how frail she was. She grabbed me with her free hand, kneed me in the stomach, and jerked me down to the ground.

  I pulled her hair. That gave her the idea of pulling mine. My face was very close to hers and she positively stank of booze. If I didn’t wet my pants, I was certainly going to throw up. And that made me mad.

  I started kicking, not really aiming, just flailing out. She started kicking, too, and we were banging up each other’s shins pretty well. My right arm was under her body, which felt a lot heavier than it looked. I tugged, trying to get it out, thinking I could use it to push her away. But she wasn’t budging. All of a sudden her grubby hand slammed down over my face, grinding hard.

  “Ladies! Ladies, please!” said a gentle, rather cultured male voice. Through the ragamuffin’s fingers, I saw another hand cover hers, a black one, and suddenly she was off me, standing up, writhing to get away, but firmly held by an elderly gent in a cream-colored suit.

  “Thanks,” I said, and sat up, getting my breath back.

  “Easy. Easy now,” said the black man, and the woman relaxed. I didn’t blame her. He was a very reassuring sort of chap.

  “Her pocket,” I gasped. “She may have a gun.”

  “I don’t have no gun.” The woman’s voice was sulky. She pulled out a beer can. (I’d been partly right, anyhow.)

  Heavy steps pounded toward us. “Rebecca—what’s going on?” yelled Rob. I got up and fell into his arms.

  “Did you catch him?”

  He shook his head. “He had a car. I heard him leave, but didn’t get a glimpse of him or the car.”

  “People, people, will someone help me get to that poor man?”

  The well-dressed black man, apparently undaunted at coming upon three maniacs and a probable corpse, was trying to jockey the ladder back into place. The minute his back was turned, the ragamuffin started to run. I tripped her. Not a civilized act, but I was still in my primitive state. She hit the ground cursing. I tried to help her up, but she flailed out at me.

  “Rebecca!” Rob was shocked.

  “She claimed she had a gun—”

  I stopped in mid-explanation, the sound of sirens drowning me out. I looked up again at the man on the cross. The sun wasn’t up yet, but the fog had lifted enough so that the corpse must now be visible—perhaps some newspaper carrier or other early riser had called the police.

  “Young woman,” said the black man, “your fly is open.”

  “Who are you?” asked Rob, as I pulled my sweater back down.

  “I am the Reverend Ovid Robinson of the Third Baptist Church. I am to give the sermon this morning. Who might you be, sir?” He didn’t extend his hand and I didn’t blame him.

  But the opening was all Rob needed. He took over immediately, suddenly the reporter on a story, the self-appointed authority in charge. Quickly, he introduced himself and me, explained our presence, ran down the discovery of what was almost certainly a body, and was about to turn to the ragamuffin when the Reverend Mr. Robinson interrupted. “Very well, Mr. Burns. Now will you please help me do something for that poor man?” He pointed up at the cross. He practically had to yell to be heard above the approaching sirens.

  “He’s dead,” said the ragamuffin. “Look at him.”

  The sirens stopped suddenly and we could hear running. Mr. Robinson must have realized the belated rescue was better left to the cops. He stepped away, relinquishing authority to the resident newshawk.

  “What’s your name?” Rob asked the ragamuffin.

  “Miranda.”

  “Miranda what?”

  “Miranda Warning.” She cackled as if she’d just delivered the punch line of a knock-knock joke.

  Rob let it go. I knew what he was thinking. He could get her name from the cops, but maybe not her story. He had to work fast. He went for shock tactics, nodding, hard-boiled fashion, toward the cross: “Did you kill him?”

  “Hell, no. I hid in the car; on the floor in the back seat. You know where that two-timing sucker went? The Yellow Parrot. You know it?”

  Rob nodded. “Gay bar.”

  “The sucker was a faggot, all this time. I should have known, the way he treated me.”

  “He went to the Yellow Parrot and then what?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know? What do you mean you don’t know?” She shrugged. “I fell asleep. I brought a six-pack along just in case. I drank it up, waiting for him, and then got another one. When I woke up, I was still in the car, parked down the hill. I heard a noise and came up here. I thought she killed him”—pointing at me—“so I tried to make a citizen’s arrest.”

  “What’s his name?”

  She didn’t answer.

  “Come on, the cops are going to know in a few minutes, anyway.”

  He was being too hard on her, I thought. I put a hand on his arm, but he shook it off. He walked down the path a little way, trying to get a glimpse of the first cops, hoping to figure out how much time he had, I guess, and then he walked back toward us. “Miss Warning. Why not tell us his name?” He was staring straight at her, trying to fix her with what passed for a steely gaze, but was really sort of a cobalt one, and he was paying no attention to where he was going. Which was how he came to twist his ankle and fall flat on his face.

  I took a step to help him, but caught movement out of the corner of my eye. Miranda was off—off to the side, crashing through the brush. I forgot about Rob and went after her.

  She was better at it than I was and seemed to know a few paths hidden in the bushes. But I was aided by a fall on my tuchus that resulted in a prolonged slide of twenty feet or more. Back on my feet, I dusted myself off and went after her again. I could just see her now. I was definitely gaining.

  “Freeze!” The voice came over a megaphone. “Police! Freeze or we’ll blow your head off!”

  Heads. They should have said heads, I thought. Or could they see only me? Miranda didn’t freeze and neither did I.

  And then there was an awful noise. A noise like a hundred-cannon volley.

  I hit the dirt so fast I got a mouthful of it.

  I heard Rob yelling, “Don’t shoot! Don’t shoot—it’s Rebecca! Martinez, you jackass—that’s Rebecca down there!” Martinez. Oh, no. My least favorite cop. And now Rob had called him a jackass. Martinez would probably take him in for assaulting an officer—good thing he had his lawyer with him.

  “If you’re down there, Miss Schwartz, stand up and put your hands over your head.”

  Put my hands over my head! Martinez was a jackass. Why did he have to treat someone he knew to be an officer of the court like a common criminal? But this was no time to give him a lesson in manners. I stood up and put my hands over my head.

  “Now walk back up the hill.”

  He was doing it just to be a jerk. He could plainly see who I was and now he was making me walk back up the hill with my hands over my head. I wasn’t going to do it, that was all. I lowered my hands.

  “Hands up, dammit!”

  It’s a national disgrace that our criminal
justice system can’t attract a better class of public servant. I take that back—it does, of course—I have every idea there are literally thousands of fine, dedicated, very intelligent police officers abroad in this great country of ours. I don’t know why I have the bad luck to keep running into Martinez and his lackluster sidekick, Inspector Curry. I put my hands back up and shouted, “She’s getting away!”

  “Who, Miss Schwartz?” Martinez yelled in a tired voice. “Exactly who is getting away?”

  What was I going to say? Miranda Warning? Did I want the entire San Francisco Police Department laughing in my face? I kept my mouth shut and marched; at least I did for about ten steps and, as I marched, a meditative state came over me.

  That and something else. And then a third thing—a really foolproof idea for getting the best of Martinez.

  I dropped back down in the bushes.

  “Miss Schwartz, what are you doing?”

  “I’ll be along in a minute, Inspector.”

  “What are you doing, Miss Schwartz? Answer me!” Good. He couldn’t see what I was doing, which was fiddling with my zipper.

  I answered in my sweetest voice: “Relieving my bladder, Inspector.”

  I took my time about it, too. And then I sauntered up the hill, arms swinging casually by my sides. Martinez seemed to have lost his train of thought about my keeping my hands up. Short attention span, I suppose.

  3

  Martinez and Curry took us to the Hall of Justice, of course, or rather, they let us go in our borrowed van, which meant that we had a few minutes alone, of which Rob took full advantage to rib me about resorting to bathroom jokes. I was the least bit sheepish about it, but the truth was, it had worked. I’d nonplussed that creep Martinez, and I could tell Rob was proud of me, whatever my tactics.

  I had another great moment after I got up the hill, too. Martinez said again, “Who is getting away, Miss Schwartz?”

  Since I’d turned the advantage to myself, when I answered, “Miranda Warning,” he was the one everyone laughed at, not me.

  He got me back at the Hall, though. He made me wait hours while he interviewed the Reverend Mr. Robinson and Rob. (Miranda, of course, had gotten clean away.)

  The man on the cross was definitely dead. He had no identification on him, we learned, and he had been shot in the chest, probably fatally, before he was hoisted up by the rope and nailed to the cross. Martinez deduced the part about the timing because a live person would hardly have stood still for it.

  Martinez managed to keep us around, what with one thing and another, until about the time church was letting out for most Easter worshipers. I was all for falling asleep in the car on the way home, but Rob wanted to talk. What did I make of Miranda Warning? he wanted to know.

  I summoned my meager resources. “From her outfit, I’d guess she lives in the Tenderloin. She was about half drunk—slurring her words some of the time, but not always, which probably meant she could control her speech when she thought about it. Which argues she’s had a lot of practice at it. Which, along with her emaciated appearance and, once again, style of dress, indicates she’s probably an alcoholic and pretty much of a derelict. If I had to look for her, I think I might try a Tenderloin doorway.”

  “Your basic bag lady?”

  I reconsidered. “One step up from that, I think. Maybe not a doorway. A flophouse, perhaps. But here’s something funny—the dead man didn’t look at all like a derelict.”

  “And she said he was her lover.”

  “She didn’t actually say that, but she certainly implied it. Maybe he was a john. Maybe she’s a prostitute.”

  “She wasn’t dressed like one.”

  “No, and the way she talked, the guy didn’t really sound like a john. So scratch that. And me. I’m dead.” I yawned.

  Rob stopped the van in front of my house.

  “I’m setting my alarm for Tuesday,” I said. “Give me a call about then.”

  I went in and fed my fish, silently thanking the God of my people, whom I sometimes invoked when it was really necessary, that Mom and Dad were in Israel. Otherwise, my phone would ring the instant Mom heard about the murder on the radio.

  Instead it rang three hours later, about a day and a half before I felt up to answering it. I reached for it and got a dial tone. The door. It didn’t even sound like the telephone—I must have been in a coma. I staggered to the intercom: “This better be good.”

  “My name is Michael Anthony and I have a check for you—for one million dollars.”

  I sighed and pressed the downstairs buzzer. It was Rob’s voice. “I lied,” he said, as he came in. “Really I represent the William Morris Agency. I’m on a nationwide talent hunt and…”

  “Don’t tell me. They’re remaking Gone with the Wind and want me to play Scarlett.”

  “Inherit the Wind, actually. We thought, what with the feminist movement and all, we’d get a woman to play Clarence Darrow. One of our people caught your act in court.”

  “Oh? What did he see? My opening statement? Perhaps my final summation?”

  “He didn’t say.”

  “What did he say?”

  “Said you had great tits.”

  “Oh, hell. I’m tired.” I plopped down on one of my white sofas, hoping Rob would join me. Instead, he went in the kitchen and put on water for coffee. “Listen, I need help.”

  “Mmf.” My eyes were closing.

  “The cops found a wallet in a wastebasket near the edge of the park, and it belonged to the man on the cross. Driver’s license identifies him as Jack Sanchez. A tourist from Gallup, New Mexico.”

  “Tourist! He didn’t live here?” My eyes opened.

  “Tourist: a person who makes a tour. Not a person who lives here.”

  “Miranda made it sound like she lived with him.”

  “Maybe she’s a tourist, too. Sanchez arrived day before yesterday.”

  “She’s not a tourist. She must have lied.”

  “I think we should check her story out. Drink this.” He curled my fingers around the handle of a coffee cup.

  Resigned, I sat up and took a swig. “You think we should check her story out. You’ve been a reporter for ten years, right?”

  “Eleven.”

  “And suddenly you need me to help you. Now which of my many talents is suddenly indispensable?”

  “Like I said, you’ve got great tits.”

  “Tits.” I was mystified. “You need something to stare at while you type? A little inspiration, maybe?”

  “I need a date for the Yellow Parrot.”

  I burst out laughing. “Wait till I tell Chris. Intrepid reporter for a metropolitan daily won’t go to a gay bar without an escort. Forget Chris—I’m telling your boss.”

  “I thought you might want to come, that’s all.”

  He looked so hurt I laughed again. “Okay, pussycat. Let me get dressed.”

  He followed me into the bedroom. Emboldened by recent flattery, I pulled off the football jersey in which I’d been napping and gave him a look. But he just looked at his watch: “Come on, kid. I’ve got to make the first edition.”

  I should have known. A reporter on a story is like a teenage boy on a date: after Only One Thing. Except it’s not the same thing. So much for my alleged attributes—some guys will say anything to get what they want.

  But as I dressed, he nuzzled my neck a little. “I shouldn’t have waked you up.”

  “It’s okay.”

  “You wouldn’t have been up all night if it hadn’t been for me.”

  “Really, it’s fine.”

  “And wouldn’t have gotten into a fight, and wouldn’t have found a body, and wouldn’t have ended up spending the morning at the Hall with your least favorite cop.”

  “To tell the truth, the worst part was finding out about Mickey.”

  “You need a little relaxation. How about a mud bath?”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Let’s go up to Calistoga and have a mud ba
th. Or maybe a mineral bath and a massage.”

  “I don’t get it—I thought you were on deadline.”

  “Not now. Next Saturday—we can even spend most of the day there and go wine-tasting on the way back.”

  “Really?” It sounded like the best idea since portable hair dryers. Maybe it would cleanse the psyche as well as the pores.

  “Really. We’ll leave first thing Saturday morning.”

  I gave him another kiss, then slipped on a purple sweater and a pair of black leather pants—if the Yellow Parrot was a leather bar, I wanted to look right.

  It wasn’t, though. It was just a dark, sad-sack sort of place where a few guys were having a few beers. The bartender had short brown hair with one long curl in the back, punk style. It would have been cute on a twenty-year-old; he was forty-odd. “You folks tourists? There’s something I’ve got to tell you about this place…” He looked as if he was trying to find a way to break it gently.

  “We’re from the Chronicle,” said Rob, and explained our mission. I hadn’t been sure exactly how he’d do it—whether he’d pretend he was somebody else or what. As well as I knew him, I’d never thought to ask exactly how reporters worked. As it turned out, it was simple—he just laid it all out for the guy: A tourist had been murdered, found nailed to the cross on top of Mount Davidson, and a witness had said he’d been at the Yellow Parrot the night before.

  The reaction was similar to what you’d get if you turned a TV camera on a bunch of kids; people practically jumped up and down trying to get in the act. And we were in luck—the bartender (Jake Nestor—“with an o, not an e”) had been on duty the night before.

  “He was wearing a green cowboy shirt,” said Rob.

  “Older guy? Gray hair?”

  Rob nodded.

  “Yeah, sure. I saw him. He was here for a couple of hours. Amaretto artist.”

  “Beg pardon?”

  “That was his drink. Amaretto and cream.”

  “Oh. Did you notice—”

  “Man, what an outfit. Strictly Gallup, New Mexico.”