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

by Julie Smith

  Jeff took my hands in both of his. “I don’t care what we drink, Rebecca. I just want to be with you.”

  I breathed a sigh of relief. “You mean the Italian roast’ll be okay?”

  Jeff made a face. “No. I meant I really don’t need anything.”

  I made some for myself, anyway. I feel that when you ask someone in for a cup of coffee, he is obligated to drink one, but if he declines to drink one, he is certainly obligated to leave when the time has elapsed that it would normally take him to drink one. I didn’t want Jeff to lose track of time.

  To tell the truth, I guess I was policing myself as well. When Jeff got started on my favorite subject—what a really sterling person I am and how lucky he was to have met me—he was at his most charming. I was learning that he was a little frightened of the world, a little picky—in short, a bit of a wimp, perhaps—but nonetheless I thought him a mensch.

  So. Did I kiss him good night? Of course.

  And I was glad I had when I saw the Chronicle the next morning—glad because it made me cross with Rob. The headlines screamed; the prose was pretty shrill, too. “Random Killer Targets S.F. Tourists,” said the banner, and underneath was Rob’s story, connecting the so-called gay murder of Jack Sanchez of Gallup, New Mexico, the man Rob and I had found nailed to the cross, with the poisonings of eleven people at Pier 39 that resulted in the death of Brewster Baskett of Winnemucca, Nevada. Photos of the Trapper’s notes were reproduced, but the last sentence was blocked out of the second note—the part about the mussels in the men’s room. That meant the Chron had made a deal with the cops to withhold it.

  Along with the main story were four sidebars. One contained opinions of selected psychiatrists as to the sort of person who would do such a thing. “An angry, vindictive person,” deduced one. “Someone with a grudge,” another proclaimed. “A fruitcake with half a dozen screws loose” wasn’t among the opinions. Maybe the shrinks thought it was self-evident, or maybe they were saving themselves to be expert witnesses.

  The second sidebar was about PSP—paralytic shellfish poisoning—which you get from quarantined mussels. The next was a gory little walk down Memory Lane, detailing the fearsome activities of yesteryear’s Zebra and Zodiac serial killers. And the fourth, headed, “S.F. Tourism Endangered,” outlined the chilling truth about what the Trapper’s work could actually do to the economy of the city. Explaining that tourism is San Francisco’s largest industry, it noted that approximately 2.5 million tourists visit the city each year, dropping over a billion dollars, supporting some 60,000 jobs and bringing in almost $60 million in local taxes. If the hordes stayed away even for a few weeks—especially now, in the peak spring and summer months—if, as the Trapper predicted, he “closed this hellhole down,” jobs would be lost, hotels and restaurants would get shaky, places like Pier 39 and companies like the one that gives boat rides on the bay would be history in no time at all. The story quoted the Trapper himself: “What would this crummy joint be without tourists?” Rob admitted in the story that no one really knew, but it wouldn’t be completely off-base to say that parts of it—Fisherman’s Wharf, for instance—would resemble a ghost town. And that the economic damage would be devastating.

  I had to give Rob credit for doing his homework. If the Trapper really was a serial killer—someone as dangerous as Zebra or Zodiac—the impact on the city’s economy was the real story, and the Trapper knew it. I certainly saw nothing to contradict the shrinks’ opinions that he was a very angry, vindictive person with a grudge, and that the grudge apparently was against the city. “Ever since I came here,” he had written, “I’ve had nothing but trouble and now the whole city is going to pay.” He might be a fruitcake, but there was a clean, taut logic about his current project.

  But I still wasn’t convinced that the Trapper was the person who had killed Sanchez and done the poisonings; he (or she) might be a person who read the newspapers and liked to write notes. The person who did the poisonings probably had written the notes, I admitted, because he knew where the Eastern mussels were. But how could we be sure he’d killed Sanchez? I thought Rob was making too much of the whole thing—terrifying people who could be going about their lives in blissful ignorance. And yet, I’d told him I myself would rather know than not know if there were a homicidal maniac about.

  But all those screaming headlines were so needlessly fear-inducing! So tacky. And all the doomsaying could very well be creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. I knew Rob had considered all that. Had spent a horrible day in meetings with cops and editors and city officials who were all very seriously considering all that; who had arrived, probably, at a mutual decision to break the Trapper story. But knowing that didn’t make me like it any better.

  The phone rang. “Your boyfriend,” said Jeff Simon, “went a little overboard, didn’t he?”

  My first impulse was to protect Rob. “Jeff, you’ve got to remember, San Francisco is different from New York. We don’t have the good gray Times.”

  “Just the San Francisco Chronicle.”

  I was starting to feel crummy for associating with someone on such a rag—an absolutely disloyal attitude. I wished I weren’t so ambivalent; I could hardly defend Rob, feeling the way I did.

  “Miss Schwartz, you need some fresh air. Let me take you out for a walk tonight.”

  “A walk?”

  “Dinner and a walk. To clear your head.” If I understood him correctly, he was saying that no one in her right mind would dream of going out with such a churl as Rob. It made me mad, but I had the nagging feeling he might be right. Really, what I needed to clear my head was an evening at home playing Scarlatti.

  “Sorry, I’m booked,” I said. “And you’re going back to L.A. tomorrow, aren’t you? Listen, I really had a terrific time last night. I’d love to see you again, but maybe next time you’re here.”

  “I could stay over an extra day.”

  “You could?

  “Sure. I’ll pick you up at seven tomorrow.”

  I had certainly outsmarted myself, but having dinner with Jeff Simon wasn’t the worst way in the world to spend an evening—and it looked as if my evenings were all mine for the time being, anyway. I wished Rob had taken time for a hello call, at the very least.

  Since I had a hearing at nine, I didn’t get to the office until the noon recess. No calls from Rob. Being a modern woman who wouldn’t dream of playing the passive role in a relationship—certainly not!—I picked up the phone. And promptly put it down again. First, I’d have a sandwich.

  When I got back from the deli, Kruzick was there, eating his own sandwich. “Hey, Rob’s rockin’ out, huh? Reeeeal tasteful. Did you love it the way they ran photos of the notes and everything? Mickey was so scared she almost lost the baby.”

  “What?”

  “Hey. Little joke, you know? She’s fine, honest. The baby’s fine. But listen, I’ll tell you one thing—that newshawk yellow-journalist boyfriend of yours really did scare the bejezus out of her.”

  I hadn’t thought of being afraid for Mickey before. But she was as likely a target as anyone else. My stomach turned over as I stared out my office window, gnawing with no great interest at my sandwich. Was it my imagination or were there fewer people out than usual? An odd thing—I hadn’t had to wait in line at the deli where I usually waited fifteen minutes. Was the Trapper already terrorizing the city? Or was Rob the one doing the terrorizing?

  Okay, no more excuses; I called him. And ended up leaving a message, naturally, because naturally he wasn’t there. Is anyone ever there when you have to work up the nerve to call?

  I continued to call throughout the day and continued not getting him. “ ‘Night,” Alan said as I left. “Don’t get Trapped.” Driving home, I thought the streets looked a little empty, as if people expected to be picked off by snipers. That was the way the Zebra had worked; the Trapper, I thought, was a lot more subtle.

  Scarlatti got me through the night and if I ever needed him, it was then. Because Rob did
n’t call.

  His story Wednesday morning was a collage of interviews with members of the terrified public. The headline: “Fear Stalks the City’s Streets!”

  9

  “Darling! Thank God you’re all right.”

  “Mom—how was Israel? Aren’t you back early?”

  “Early! Of course I’m back early—how could I stay away knowing the kind of danger you and your sister were in?”

  “Mom, I think you’re exaggerating—how’s Dad?”

  “Exaggerating! You’re a fine person to talk about exaggerating.”

  “I exaggerate?”

  “No, not you, darling. Rob. That Rob of yours.”

  “Oh. You mean in the paper.”

  “Of course in the paper, darling. Haven’t you read yours this morning?”

  “But, Mom, if Rob’s exaggerating, you could have stayed in Israel.”

  “I certainly couldn’t have. It’s just because he’s exaggerating that your father and I had to come back. Because you’re close to him, darling. Everyone who’s close to him will be in the worst danger of all.”

  “Why would the Trapper want to hurt Rob? Rob’s making him famous.” The minute I said it I knew I shouldn’t have.

  Sure enough, Mom said: “Rebecca, do you really think you should be going out with that sort of person?”

  That was far too tough a question at the moment, so I asked again, “How’s Dad?”

  “Tired. Very tired. And I’m not sure he’s over the shock—”

  Dad came on the line then. “I’m certainly not, Beck. The minute we leave town you start going to Christian services.” He was teasing me, but he took me off-guard.

  “You know about that?”

  “Sure. You’re famous in Tel Aviv.”

  “Oh, Dad, come on. You just went through your back Chronicles and found the Easter sunrise story.” (It had to be. Because if I were famous in Tel Aviv for discovering bodies at Easter services, Mom would have mentioned that first.)

  “It must have been pretty awful.”

  “The worst part was getting the usual VIP treatment from Martinez and Curry.”

  “I can’t understand it. I always get along fine with the cops.”

  “Listen, Dad. I’m going to be late if I don’t get going. Maybe I could come over this weekend and see your slides.”

  “Okay, Beck. You take care.”

  Dad was definitely jumpy. He had twice called me “Beck,” which he knows I tolerate only from him and only at times of stress. Well, why shouldn’t he be jumpy? After all, fear stalked the city’s streets.

  I could have walked to work, but I didn’t. I certainly didn’t want to be out there with fear rampaging. I wasn’t the only one. Hardly anyone was jogging. A few people were walking, but they were mostly men. So far, of course, the Trapper had killed only men, but women were used to feeling vulnerable, I supposed. It was funny how odd the streets looked without the usual floods of women in jogging shoes and business suits. And traffic? Like a snarl of barbed wire.

  “His nibs would like you to call,” said my properly respectful secretary when I walked in.

  “Surely you don’t mean the mayor; you would have said her nibs.”

  “Very good, Ms. Boss. Maybe you should have been a detective.”

  “Alan. Who wants me to call?”

  “Why, our town’s man of the moment, unless you count Mr. Trapper himself. Mr. Rob Burns of the Chronicle actually dialed the humble number of drab, insignificant Rebecca Schwartz.”

  I drew back my right foot, thinking not of a simple toe-in-the-shin, but something along the lines of the moves you see in kung fu films. But then I noticed I was wearing my new red Joan and David shoes (purchased, needless to say, for half the usual $120). If they’d been black or gray, I would have gone ahead with it, but Kruzick wasn’t worth wrecking a pair of red shoes over.

  “Hardly drab,” said Chris, breezing in. “Nice shoes.”

  “Thank you.” I turned back to Kruzick. “I’d like to go on record as saying I don’t care to be insulted first thing in the morning.”

  “Okay, okay. Maybe not drab. Just a shade on the unexciting side.”

  “Thanks a lot.”

  He shrugged. “Hey, boss, you gotta remember—the competition’s a multiple murderer.”

  He had a point. I was certainly a bore compared to the Trapper. I was cross at the notion of having to compete with a psychotic killer; and annoyed with Rob for going overboard on the Trapper stories; and for ignoring me; and for putting me in the position of having to defend him when I didn’t really feel I could support him. And I was annoyed at myself for being ambivalent. Thus, I may not have been in the best of moods when I called him back.

  “Hi, babe,” he said. “How’d you like the stories?”

  “Frankly, I think they’re a bit much.”

  “Rebecca, the guy’s killing people.”

  “Maybe I spoke harshly. I’m sorry, but you asked for my opinion. I find them upsetting.”

  “Upsetting how?”

  “Scary.”

  “The Trapper’s scary.”

  “The stories were needlessly scary. Nightmarish.”

  “You’ve got to remember the guy poisoned eleven people at a restaurant. As it happened, only one person died, but he didn’t care how many he killed. It is a nightmare.”

  “I just don’t think the stories are in very good taste, that’s all.”

  “Rebecca, sometimes you are the most amazing sushi-eating, Volvo-driving, New York Times-reading, Saks-shopping, foreign-movie-going Yuppie prig. Would it be good taste to report the antics of a maniac who wanted to wipe out every Jew in Germany and damn near did?”

  “It’s not the same thing.”

  “Okay, what’s different about it?”

  “It’s not important to the whole world—it only matters in San Francisco.”

  “Sweetheart, have you noticed that the Chronicle is a local San Francisco paper?”

  “Rob, I can’t talk to you when you’re in this mood.”

  “When I’m in this mood! Rebecca, do you have any idea how hard I’ve been working lately? How do you think it makes me feel when you of all people don’t support me in my work? Instead, I haven’t talked to you in days, and finally when I do you tell me I’m in bad taste.”

  “It was your choice not to talk to me for days.”

  “I couldn’t, don’t you understand? I literally didn’t have a spare second.”

  “People always find time for what’s important to them.”

  “Listen, it’s no good trying to talk on the phone. Let’s have dinner tonight, okay?”

  “I have a date with someone else.”

  For a moment he didn’t speak. Then he said, “Another man?”

  “Yes.” I wondered why my voice sounded like a croak. “Another man.”

  “I see.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “How about tomorrow then? Or lunch—today or tomorrow; you name it.”

  “I think maybe we shouldn’t see each other for a while.”

  I didn’t realize I thought that before I said it, but as soon as it was out, I knew it was true. Jeff had helped to distract me, but actually talking with Rob, I realized how deeply hurt I felt about his temporary abandonment—and how very much my brain felt like scrambled eggs when I tried to sort out my feelings about the Trapper stories. I really did need some time away from him to try to figure things out.

  * * *

  Jeff brought flowers—purple irises that were perfect for my apartment. The first time Rob and I had gone out—gone to lunch, actually—he’d brought daisies. If Rob and I were really breaking up, I realized that similar scenes would be played out hundreds and thousands and tens of thousands of times in the next few months or maybe even the next couple of years. No matter what happened, no matter how insignificant or how seemingly happiness-producing, it would remind me of Rob and would sting. The thought was profoundly depressing.


  I wanted to go someplace loud and cheerful, someplace with pasta, and Jeff had asked me to name the spot, so I picked Little Italy in Noe Valley.

  Since I knew the city better, we took my old gray Volvo instead of Jeff’s rented car. And practically had the streets to ourselves. If fear stalked, he was doing it in solitary splendor. And he was certainly stalking—or it was, I should say. Fear was nearly palpable on those not normally mean streets. The few people who were out walked close to the buildings, glancing around far too frequently.

  Even Castro Street, the liveliest in the city, looked deserted. Funny, I thought, that was probably one of two safe places left in town—the other being Pier 39. I guess I was too quiet, because Jeff offered me a penny for my meager mental processes.

  “I was thinking about the Trapper.”

  “Kind of a depressing topic, isn’t it?”

  “Jeff, I know you can’t really tell, since you don’t live here, but the city just isn’t itself.”

  “It does seem a little gloomy out.”

  “I was trying to think what he might do next—I think he’ll go for something different every time. So the Castro’s probably safe, and Pier 39, wouldn’t you think?”

  “You certainly think about funny things on a date.”

  “It doesn’t interest you?”

  He shrugged. “Not really. I don’t go in much for mass murder.”

  I started to get nervous because it was time to look for a parking place, then realized I could have my pick. That gave me a frisson.

  Jeff put a not entirely unwelcome arm around my shoulders. “What is it, Rebecca?”

  “The town’s so weird, that’s all.”

  “Hey, look—aren’t those Chicanos?”

  “Mm-hmm. Why?”

  “Are you sure this neighborhood’s okay?”

  “Pretty sure. It’s not a tourist area.”

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  I laughed, even tousled his hair. I was beginning to get a kick out of his big-city naiveté. “You’re hopeless, you know that?”

  He looked back at me in a puzzled way, as if I’d spoken in Venusian.