Where Echoes Live

by Marcia Muller

  For a while I just lay there, canted downward on the steps. Oddly enough, nothing had changed around me: the party on the roof went on; a TV muttered in the cottage; a bird called high overhead. Then there was the squeal of tires on pavement—someone driving up a ramp from the garage under one of these buildings. Margot Erickson.

  Why hadn’t she gone up to the apartment through the inside entrance from the garage? Why go all the way down the boardwalk to the front door? The keys ...it looked as if she’d misplaced her keys. She’d have had an automatic garage-door opener in the car, but without keys she couldn’t gain entry to the building proper.

  And whose keys were they? Hers? A friend’s? Whose apartment was that?

  I thought I knew.

  After a while I eased into a sitting position. Began moving my arms and legs slowly, feeling for broken bones. Everything seemed to be intact. I flexed my limbs again, then felt the more superficial injuries: bump on my forehead where I’d slammed it into the wall, swelling on the side of my face where she’d smacked me, a sore shinbone, and scrapes on my legs and knees where my panty hose hung in shreds. Palms lacerated. Teeth and jaw aching. Cut in mouth still leaking blood. Headache about to become full-blown.

  Damn her, I thought angrily. Where does she get off, doing this to me when I was only trying to talk to her?

  She’s scared, scared crazy.

  Of what?

  You mean of whom. Who beat her up?

  No answer to that one.

  Finally I struggled to my feet. Dragged myself up the steps by clinging to the railing, and located my shoulder bag where I’d dropped it. Then I tottered down the boardwalk to the entry of the middle building.

  The nameplates beside the three bell pushes were all blank. The windows on each floor were still unlighted. For a moment I contemplated ringing the bells anyway, then decided against it. No one home, no point in bothering. I could attempt to canvass the neighbors, but in my condition, I’d only scare them.

  Besides, I’d had it for the night. I made a note of the building’s address and hauled my aching body up the hill to my car.

  Seventeen

  Ma was sitting in the rocking chair in my parlor when I arrived home, a fire going and both Ralphie and Allie on her lap. When she saw the condition I was in she half rose, dumping the cats on the floor. Allie let out an indignant mowl.

  I said, “Ma, I’m okay.”

  “You don’t look okay.”

  “Well, it’s nothing that won’t heal. I’ve got to clean up and make a phone call; then I’ll tell you about it.”

  She nodded skeptically and sat back down. The cats immediately jumped onto her lap and huddled against her, instinctively aware something was wrong.

  I went to my bedroom, stripping off my ruined clothing on the way. Thank God, I thought, that the suit was an old gray Pendleton—one that I was thoroughly sick of. After I’d dumped everything on the floor, I put on my white terry robe and sat down on the bed to call Rae at All Souls.

  “Hey,” she said, sounding somewhat high, “we had a great time with your mom—”

  “Save it, Rae—I can’t talk long. Will you do something for me right now?”

  “Sure.”

  “Check the reverse directory and see who lives in the apartments at this address.” I read off the street and unit numbers of the building on Telegraph Hill.

  She went to the law library where the spare phone books were kept and returned a minute later. “Shar, there’re no listings.”

  No phone service there, then. Strange—the building hadn’t looked unoccupied. Perhaps the numbers were unlisted. “Okay,” I said, “then you’ll need to go to City Hall first thing in the morning and find out who owns the property.”

  “Will do. I planned to run by Vital Statistics anyway, to see if I can get a line on that Peggy Hopwood.”

  “Good. I have to deliver Ma to the bus station at eight. Then I’ll probably be in my office. If I’m not, try me here as soon as you know.”

  Rae said she would, and I hung up and doctored my wounds as best I could. Then I filled an ice bag for my swollen cheek, poured myself a glass of heavy red wine, and went back to the parlor.

  Ma looked me over carefully as I sat down in my favorite armchair. “Well?” she said.

  I told her a half-truth. “Nobody did this to me. I fell.”

  “And?”

  “And that’s it.”

  “Sharon, you’re not telling me anything.”

  I sighed, thought, What the hell, and went into a lengthy explanation of my investigation. When I finished, Ma remained silent for a minute.

  Eventually she said, “I wonder why that poor woman was so afraid of you?”

  “Well, somebody had beaten her up pretty badly.”

  “That’s not enough. From what you tell me, she had no reason to think you meant to harm her. Maybe if you go see her tomorrow she’ll have calmed down and be able to talk about it.”

  I waited. When she didn’t go on, I said, “That’s it? You’re not going to lecture me about how I should get a nice, safe job?”

  “No, I am not. I can’t say I’m happy about the danger you’re always getting into, but nothing I tell you is going to make a difference. You’ll go on doing exactly what you want to, with or without my approval.”

  “This is a switch.”

  She shrugged. “I’ve decided to let you grow up.” After a pause she added, “You know, someday you’re going to have to do the same for me.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I know you’re unhappy about the divorce—and Melvin. I’m sorry you feel that way, but it’s my life and, like you, I intend to start leading it—with or without your approval.”

  She was right, of course; it was time I let go. Baby birds aren’t the only ones who leave the nest. The mother bird does, too, and eventually the nest deteriorates and is borne away on the wind. But if that happened to my own family nest, it would mean that I would have to create a more permanent one of my own—or admit that I was incapable or unwilling to do so….

  ‘‘Ma,’’ I said, “what do you really think of George?”

  She didn’t seem at all surprised by the non sequitur. “I’ve already told you I like him very much.”

  “But you also told me to be careful about marriage. That wasn’t just because of your leaving Pa and your future plans with Melvin.”

  She sighed and adjusted the end of Ralphie’s collar where it had slipped from the buckle loop. “Not entirely, no.”

  “What is it, then?”

  “George is a simple man, Sharon. Maybe too simple for you.”

  “Simple? Ma, the man’s a Stanford professor! He’s written a ground-breaking book—”

  “I didn’t say he isn’t intelligent. But think about that book: the man has classified personalities and stuffed them into little circles. Then he’s divided them up according to whether they’re healthy or sick, and tried to tell the sick ones how to get better.”

  It was a fairly basic description of the work George had told her about at dinner the night before, but hearing it in my mother’s uncomplicated words made it sound somewhat silly. I hurried to defend it. “What’s wrong with that? We could use a whole lot fewer pathological personalities.”

  “Sure, but the fact is the world just doesn’t work the way George wants it to. People don’t fit into little circles. Not everyone is going to be able to get healthy—or even want to.”

  “… Well, I know that.”

  “George doesn’t.”

  “So he’s an optimist.”

  “Yes, he’s an optimist. And he wants to be happy.”

  “And you don’t think I can make him happy?”

  “Sharon, don’t get your feathers ruffled. I don’t know if you can or not, but I think in the end he would make you miserable. You definitely will not fit into one of his circles.”

  “Are you trying to say I’m emotionally unstable?”

  Ma sho
ok her head, amused. “Other than the fact that you have your father’s hair-trigger temper, you’re perfectly healthy. But there’s also another side to you, something … wild that can’t be contained. That side of you will never permit you to live a comfortable life in one of those circles—not even with a good man you love. But it will make you feel guilty and unhappy because you can’t.”

  1 couldn’t speak—shocked not only by what she’d said but also by the fact that for the first time in my life I was having a meaningful, adult conversation with my own mother. After a moment I asked, “How do you know all that about me?”

  “I haven’t observed you your whole life for nothing. I wasn’t just joking when I said you’re like your father. What do you think he’s been doing out there in that garage but giving in to his darker side?”

  I nodded, thinking about Pa: his sudden shifts from his customary cheeriness to black depression; his compulsive need for solitude. And I thought of the confidence I’d unwisely imparted to Hy Ripinsky—that revelation of the side of myself that I’d only hinted at to George. And of how I took pains to protect my lover from all but the most routine or amusing aspects of my work.

  “So,” I said after a moment, “do you think I should stop seeing him?”

  “Not necessarily. But you should go carefully and slowly.”

  Ralphie grunted and scrambled off Ma’s lap, heading for the corner by the sofa that—this week, anyway—was his sleeping place. Allie sat up and shook her head in bewilderment, tags jingling. Ma looked at her watch and stood, bundle of calico fur in her arms. “I’d better get some sleep,” she told me. “It’s a long bus ride to Ukiah, and I expect I’m going to have trouble with Patsy. Although she’s led a very disordered life, your sister is even more of a prude than you are.” But she smiled to take the sting out of the comment and patted me on the cheek as she passed.

  When she reached the door, I said, “Ma?”

  “Yes?”

  “I’ve decided to let you grow up.”

  “Thank you, Sharon. Thank you very much.”

  I set the ice bag down on the hearth and moved to the rocker, cradling my wineglass in both hands and staring into the guttering flames. While what Ma had said had surprised me, I now realized I’d known it all along, had refused to recognize it and pushed it deep beneath the surface of my awareness. I would heed her warning and go slowly—not because it was my mother who had cautioned me, but because in various ways I’d already begun cautioning myself.

  But dammit—why were so many people telling me things lately that I didn’t want to hear?

  Eighteen

  I was in a foul mood the next morning, so after I saw Ma off on her bus, I went home to await the information I’d requested from Rae. The house seemed strangely empty. Ralphie and Allie noticed it, too; they prowled in and out through their cat door, periodically padding down the hall to stick their noses into the guest room. Finally I went to strip the bed, on the premise that brisk activity and returning one’s surroundings to normal are the best way to get over missing somebody, but ended up staring at myself in the mirror over the bureau instead.

  There was a bruise on my left cheekbone where Margot Erickson had hit me, and a purplish knot on my forehead. My lower lip was split and slightly swollen. Under my jeans was a further assortment of bruises, cuts, and scrapes. My muscles ached, particularly my lower back, and I had to hold myself stiff when I moved.

  I sighed, envisioning a day of answering or evading unwelcome questions about what had happened to me.

  And why had it happened, anyway? Ma thought that the beating Margot had received wasn’t enough explanation for her violent attack on me, and in a way I agreed. She had reacted out of fear—a fear that had been present before she’d been beaten. But there had been anger in her attack on me, too, a deliberate and savage lashing-out, and some of my injuries duplicated hers; it was as if she’d set out to pay me back for what had been done to her.

  By whom? And why?

  I turned from the mirror, finished stripping the sheets, and tossed them down the chute to the laundry area in the garage. Then I went into the bathroom where the light was more direct and applied extra makeup, hoping to minimize the worst of my facial injuries. All it did was make them more lurid. Finally I washed my face and made up as usual.

  Back in the kitchen, I shooed the cats outside, poured myself a cup of coffee, and took all three volumes of the city phone directory to the table. There was no listing for geologists under Professional Associations in the Yellow Pages, but in the State of California section of the White Pages I found a Sacramento number for the Board of Registration for Geologists and Geophysicists.

  I called the number, explained that my firm was considering hiring Alvin K. Knight for a consulting job, and asked if they could supply any information about him. The man who had answered said the employee who could help me with that would not be in until afternoon; could she return my call? I left All Souls’ number.

  After that I dialed Lionel Ong’s home; as I’d expected, the phone rang repeatedly. I called Transpacific Corporation and was put through to his secretary; she said Ong hadn’t come in yet. When I explained I was a journalist working on a partially completed interview for the Sino-American Alliance’s magazine and urgently needed to speak with Mr. Ong, she was vague about the time he would arrive in the office. I thought I heard an undertone of confusion and tension in the woman’s voice.

  Finally I called the Erickson condominium in Barbary Park. A brief recorded message in a male voice told me that Mick and Margot were unavailable at the moment but would get back to me as soon as possible.

  I hung up before the beep, certain Margot wouldn’t return a call, but the voice—which had to be Mick’s—haunted me. After a moment I took my coffee outside to the deck and wandered aimlessly, contemplating the tangle of rosebushes next to it. Their late bloom was nearly over; what blossoms remained were stunted and shriveled. Once again I heard Mick Erickson saying “unavailable” and “as soon as possible.”

  Permanently unavailable, I thought, and what had seemed possible when he’d made the recording was now and for all time beyond his grasp. Perhaps someday my own taped voice would outlive me, speak to my friends and relatives as if from the grave….

  It was unwise to dwell on such thoughts, even in the bright morning sunlight. I went back inside, glancing impatiently at the kitchen clock. Ten-seventeen. Why the hell hadn’t Rae called yet? She’d said she’d go to City Hall and check the ownership of the Telegraph Hill building first thing.

  My briefcase and the recorder containing the tape of the Ong interview were still in the car. I went down to the garage and fetched them, then replayed the tape. Nothing there that had any real bearing on my investigation; I’d only gotten to the questions I’d added to the prepared interview when Ong’s phone rang. Next I went through my notes on the case, scribbled at random in the small loose-leaf notebook I keep in my purse. Facts, impressions, suppositions, theories. Some I starred or underlined; others I drew big Xs through. But this was just busywork. What I really wanted was to hear from Rae.

  After fifteen more minutes I called All Souls, thinking she might have forgotten I’d said to call here if I wasn’t in the office. No message from her, but there were two others: from Marcy Cheung, asking how the interview had gone, and from Kristen Lark in Mono County, inquiring as to my progress with the case.

  “Hank also wants to talk with you about …” Ted paused. I could hear him riffling through message slips. “About that business you discussed with him late yesterday afternoon. He’s taking a deposition now, will be free around noon.”

  “Tell him I’ll check in there later.”

  I broke the connection and called the Sino-American Alliance. Cheung’s line was busy. The receptionist put me on hold, came back a few minutes later. “Still busy.”

  “Are you sure she hasn’t just taken it off the hook?”

  A sigh. “I did hear some cursing back there a w
hile ago.”

  “Would you mind checking? I really need to speak with her.”

  “Hold, please.”

  About half a minute later Cheung’s voice said, “Sharon— sorry. The idiot printer … but you don’t want to hear about that. How did it go with Ong?”

  “He cut the interview short, but I think I’ve got enough that you can run it.”

  “You get what you needed, too?”

  “Not exactly. Look, are you going to be there over the noon hour? I’d like to drop the tape off and ask you a few additional questions.”

  “I’ll probably be here the rest of my life, the way things are going. Why don’t you pick up a couple of sandwiches and come by around twelve-thirty? There’s some Tsing Tsao beer in the office fridge, left over from one of our receptions.”

  “Will do. See you then.”

  Now the question was what to do about Kristen Lark’s call. I didn’t really want to talk with the deputy until I had a firmer handle on what was going on. Meaning a better idea of what had happened to Lionel Ong … and why Alvin Knight was so nervous about talking with me without Ong’s okay … and what Ripinsky’s connection with both men was … and why he and Knight assumed Ong would eventually turn up in Mono County … and who had beaten up Margot Erickson….

  I decided to ignore Lark’s message for now.

  When Rae called, it was close to eleven-thirty, and I’d scoured the kitchen sink and accomplished the distasteful task of cleaning out the vegetable drawer. “What have you got for me?” I demanded before she could engage in any pleasantries.

  “The building on Tel Hill belongs to Transpacific Corporation.”

  I’d suspected as much, and it dovetailed with something Marcy Cheung had told me—that Ong kept a Caucasian mistress in a company-owned condominium on Telegraph Hill. But Margot Erickson, the wife of his business associate? The woman I’d rated as a truth-teller, who had claimed she and her husband had not known Ong well, had seen him socially only a few times in the past five years? My abilities at sizing up people really seemed to be slipping.