Dead Midnight

by Marcia Muller

  “ ’Chelle’s got the cats and house secured,” she added. “And she’s having fun being rude to the reporters. What do you need?”

  “Nothing, tonight. But I’ll be in touch tomorrow. Tell Michelle thank you.”

  I replaced the receiver, and when I turned saw Bette Silver coming across the room—a slim figure with a luxuriant fall of white-blond hair, wearing a brilliant purple kimono. A similar robe in shades of green hung over her arm.

  She said, “Let me show you to our guest room, dear.”

  Sunday

  APRIL 22

  “… As a further twist to the story, this channel’s news team has learned that the individual who discovered Smith’s body was San Francisco private investigator Sharon McCone. A high-profile detective whose cases have often been chronicled in both the local and national press, McCone has not been available for comment. There is some speculation that she may have been working with Smith on an investigation relating to the death cottage’s owner, San Francisco graphic designer Jody Houston, but what separately led them to the isolated community of Eagle Rock—”

  “Garbage!” Glenn shut off the TV. “ ‘Death cottage!’ ‘Speculation!’ Whatever became of who, what, when, where, and how?”

  I didn’t answer, staring glumly down at the French toast Bette had set in front of me. I’d been looking forward to it, but now I didn’t feel I could eat a single bite.

  Glenn dug into his food with a gusto fueled by indignation. “If they can’t find news, they create it—that’s the rule of thumb today. Look at the way they’ve blown the power crisis out of proportion. I’ve had people calling me from all over the globe asking if I’m reading by candlelight like Abe Lincoln. I tell them the only people in the dark here are those who believe this isn’t a conspiracy by the utility companies and their suppliers to drive rates up and line their own pockets.”

  “Calm down, dear,” Bette said. “The effects of deregulation—”

  “Bah!”

  I said, “Well, I’ve tried to conserve energy.”

  “That’s because you, like Bette and I, have a sense of community. But for every one like us, there’re a dozen who simply don’t give a shit. And the lights’re still on now, aren’t they?”

  “The rolling blackouts—” Bette began.

  “Only happen when the utilities are under fire and afraid they won’t get their way. A conspiracy, pure and simple.”

  Bette rolled her eyes at me. Glenn was still waiting for the truth to come out about the Kennedy assassinations, as well as any number of other events, and she was accustomed to his rants.

  Instead of allowing him to continue along those lines, I said, “Given the media interest in me, how the hell am I supposed to carry on with this investigation? By now there’ll be reporters staking out the pier, as well as my house.”

  “Set up a temporary headquarters elsewhere. You’re welcome to stay here. Right, Bette? We’ve got plenty of room, a fax machine, computer—”

  “No. I’ve been talking with a lot of people about Roger. It won’t take the press long to ferret that out, as well as my affiliation with you.”

  “Then go to a friend. How about Ricky Savage and his wife? Big star like him, he must have good security.”

  “I don’t involve people I care about in my investigations. Even people with top-notch security.”

  “Understandable. A hotel? No, too much chance of being spotted. What about your other house—Touchstone?”

  “Glenn, Touchstone’s over three hours away, in Mendocino County. I’d have to fly back and forth—”

  “Right. Where, then?”

  “I have an idea.”

  For a number of years Renshaw and Kessell International had kept a guest suite in their Green Street building, to be used by clients who for one reason or another felt their safety to be in jeopardy. Since Hy had joined the firm he’d worked mainly out of the San Francisco offices, rather than world headquarters in LaJolla, and he’d made security at the converted warehouse at the base of Telegraph Hill a top priority. After a drive-by shooting the previous fall, that claimed no lives but seriously shook up its target, the then-resident of the suite, as well as RKI’s staff, he’d decided to move the accommodations for at-risk clients to a less obvious location.

  As I left my MG in the garage at RKI’s apartment building at Twenty-eighth Avenue and Balboa and went through the door to the lobby, I thought how clever Hy had been to choose this neighborhood. It was definitely not a place where one would expect to find residing in seclusion the CEO of a multinational corporation who had been targeted by kidnappers, or the deposed president of a third-world nation and his entourage.

  The Richmond district, as the area is called, has long been a place bypassed by mainstream San Francisco. Originally home to the city’s Russian community—and boasting of a number of Orthodox churches—it has undergone influxes of various groups over time, the largest being Asian. But with the collapse of the USSR, the tide of Russian immigrants swelled anew, as families exiting eastern Europe were reunited with their California relatives.

  Despite its diverse cultures, the neighborhood is generally thought of as a dull, fogbound place where old men and women go about bundled in coats, hats, and scarves in the middle of summer. Coffeehouses, clubs, and chic restaurants fail to take hold there. Shops cater only to basic needs. No sightseeing buses detour out that way. It—whatever “it” currently is—simply doesn’t happen there, making the Richmond a perfect place for a safe house.

  I’d called Green Street from Glenn’s condo to inquire if all three apartments were occupied. No, I was told, a client was using the first-floor unit, but the second story was vacant. I said Mr. Ripinsky had authorized me to stay there if space was available, and the switchboard operator didn’t question me further. He was aware of Hy’s and my relationship; I came and went frequently at their offices and often used the firm’s operatives for jobs that they were better suited to than my own people.

  The building was thirties vintage, and the lobby— cracked beige plaster walls, threadbare carpeting, scarred woodwork—hadn’t been redecorated since the sixties. The aura of genteel neglect was deliberate, and most people wouldn’t notice the well-concealed surveillance cameras and bullet-proof glass. Only the installers would be able to trace the web of wiring that supported the alarms, motion sensors, and listening devices. A glass-paned door in the wall opposite the garage entry was curtained on the inside in faded flowered chintz, but when I pushed through I was confronted by a bank of monitors worthy of a minimum-security prison.

  Allen Lu, supervisor of the site, looked up and nodded to me. Here in the safe house, he was more casually attired than he would have been at Green Street, but his maroon-and-gray blazer—uniform of RKI’s rank-and-file personnel—hung over a chair in readiness for high-level visitors.

  “Hey, Ms. McCone,” he said. “Downtown told me you’d be coming.” Lu’s eyes flicked back to one of the screens, where a portly, shaggy-haired man paced, drawing deeply on a cigarette. Normally Allen would have blacked out the picture when someone entered, but to RKI staff, I was almost family. I said, “Nervous guest, huh?”

  “Mr. Jones has a severe case of the twitches. I wish he’d settle down; he’s making me antsy.”

  It wouldn’t do any good to ask who “Mr. Jones” was or why he was there. Allen would be aware only of the potential sources of threat to him; with RKI, information was dispensed on a strict need-to-know basis. I said, “Which apartment may I use?”

  “Either on floor two. Don’t smoke, do you?”

  “No.”

  “Front’s nonsmoking. You’ll get some noise from the bus line, but it’s better than breathing the old secondhand.”

  “Then I’ll take it.”

  “You need full surveillance?”

  “No.” I didn’t want him and his subordinates monitoring my every move. “I’m here to avoid newspaper and TV people.”

  “Oh, right. I saw the mornin
g broadcast. Just the entrances and the hallways, then. If somebody comes around, how d’you want us to deal with them?”

  “Find out who they are, warn them off. I’ll take it from there.”

  “Will do.” He turned back to his screen. “Mr. Jones” was now pouring himself a glass of whiskey. “Easy, guy,” Allen muttered. “It’s only one-twenty.”

  While the exterior and the common areas of the Twenty-eighth Avenue building were deliberately shabby, the apartments themselves had been remodeled luxuriously. Usually the temporary residents were high-powered and wealthy individuals; discomfort on top of restricted freedom of movement could make them difficult to deal with. RKI’s theory was that the clients were better off satiated and comfortable than hungry and on the attack.

  I hadn’t visited the building since the interior designers had been given carte blanche, so I took a few minutes to explore the unit. Two large bedrooms with a bath off the hallway, the former in restful shades of blue and green, the latter sparkling white marble with a Jacuzzi tub and stall shower. Michelle Curley had packed a bag, and her mother had delivered it to me at a rendezvous point near the Portals of the Past in Golden Gate Park; I dropped it on the bed in the blue room and proceeded along the hallway toward the front of the apartment.

  Beige walls in the living and dining rooms, with warm burnt umber trim and deep piled carpeting to match. Large entertainment center and comfortable leather furnishings to curl up on in front of the brick fireplace; refectory table that could easily seat ten. The kitchen was small but well equipped and stocked. I snooped through the fridge, noting with approval several bottles of sauvignon blanc from Annapolis Winery, on the coastal ridge some forty-five miles south of Touchstone. All the comforts of home… .

  As I was passing through the dining room again, voices outside drew me to the window. A group of thirty to forty Asians in dark suits and pastel dresses milled about on the opposite sidewalk balancing plates of cake and cups of coffee. I peered at the sign on the building, made out the words CHINESE GRACE BAPTIST CHURCH. Although San Francisco— with its provincialism, poor public transit, dirty streets, and often childishly squabbling politicians—can drive me crazy at least once a day, I’m always entranced at the way it manages to defy the stereotypical. J.D. would love this scene—

  J.D. He’d reveled in the city’s nonconformity and diversity. He had friends and acquaintances and sources from the Golden Gate to the Daly City line and beyond: people of all age groups and ethnic backgrounds, of all professions and circumstances. Yesterday one of them had told him something that sent him to Eagle Rock, Oregon. Drawing on my memories of our conversations, I made a list of people to call. But before I began my search, I dialed Adah Joslyn.

  “The Department’s not assisting on the Smith case,” Adah said. “Tillamook County Sheriff’s Department contacted SFSD.”

  “I suspected they had, but I hoped you would know who—”

  “ ‘I don’t ask for many favors.’ ” It was a surprisingly accurate imitation of what I’d said to her on Thursday night, but I wasn’t in the mood for even good-natured jibes. When I didn’t respond, Adah said soberly, “I’ll call over there, find out who’s in charge, tell them they’ll be hearing from you. After all, this is about J.D. I liked him. Everybody did.”

  “Thanks, Adah. By the way, how did Craig’s evening with Ted go?”

  “Neither of them told you?”

  “I didn’t think to ask Craig, and Ted’s been kind of remote.”

  “Well, Ted got smashed and puked all over the side of Craig’s new Explorer.”

  “Better outside than inside, I guess.”

  “Marginally better. But it gets worse. After he got him cleaned up some and in the Explorer, Craig decided he shouldn’t take him home and risk grossing out Neal, so he brought him here. Grossing me out instead. We doctored him with aspirin, tucked him in on the couch, and he would’ve been all right, except Charley took a fondness to him and curled up on the pillow. As you know, Ted’s developed an allergy to cats. So the next morning he felt even shittier than he deserved to, and I had to listen to him kvetch all through my breakfast. And now, it seems, Neal doesn’t want him back, so we’re stuck with him, and he’s driving us both crazy.”

  No wonder Ted hadn’t wanted to talk much recently. “This is my fault. I gave Ted the go-ahead to hire Neal.”

  “You didn’t give him the go-ahead to puke on Craig’s SUV or move in with us, though—which is the only reason I’m still talking to you.”

  I ended the call on that quasi–high note and began phoning J.D.’s friends and sources.

  Thom Lynds, J.D.’s former editor at the Chronicle, sounded subdued. “He stopped in here to use my computer Friday afternoon. He did that sometimes when he didn’t have time to go home and use his. God, I can’t believe somebody killed him!”

  “What time was that?”

  “Probably between three and four. I don’t remember the time. How could I know it would be important?”

  “He was on the Internet?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “You see what kind of information he accessed?”

  “Nope. I went for coffee and by the time I came back he was on his way out. Said he had to catch a plane. You know, when he went over to the electronic side, I bet him he’d be back within two years. I lost.”

  Deb Schiller, J.D.’s woman friend for the past year, had been crying. “It’s bad, Shar. I can’t imagine my life without him. And what makes it worse is that we fought Friday night. I had tickets for The Vagina Monologues and reservations at Aqua, and then he called me from an airplane to say he couldn’t make it, he was on his way to Portland. So I yelled at him like I always do. He got defensive like he always does. And I hung up on him.”

  “Don’t be too hard on yourself, Deb. You couldn’t’ve known what was going to happen.”

  “That’s what I keep telling myself, but it doesn’t help.”

  “He say why he was going to Portland?”

  “A lead on a hot story—what else?”

  “But he didn’t tell you what the story was about?”

  “I didn’t give him time to. Now I wish I had.”

  Dave Lesser, urban activist and J.D.’s frequent source of information on who was about to act up and why, was full of himself as usual and didn’t seem all that broken up over his death. “Yeah, he called in the middle of the afternoon on Friday, asked how he could get hold of somebody on the Coalition for Wireless Privacy. I gave him the phone number of their director, Alana Andrews.”

  “What does this coalition do, exactly?”

  “Lobbies for legislation against electronic eavesdropping, that kind of stuff. Me, I don’t worry about it. I don’t put anything in e-mails that I don’t want the world to hear. I got one credit card, don’t buy off the Internet, guard my Social Security number like it was Fort Knox.”

  “Did J.D. say why he was interested in the coalition?”

  “Nope. He guarded his stories like I do my SSN. I’d pass on info to him, he’d give one of my causes a plug, and we were both satisfied. Say, did you see his piece on the Hapless League putting the dead rats in the mayor’s office?”

  The Hapless League was an organization Lesser and his cohorts had formed to play practical jokes on city officials. “No, but I think I saw something about it in the Chron.”

  “Well, you should check out J.D.’s version in Salon. You can say stuff on the Internet that you can’t in a so-called family newspaper. He reprinted the text of our note. Way cool. You wanta know what it said?”

  Do I have a choice?

  “ ‘We saved your life today. Killed a bunch of shit-eating rats.’ ”

  Such eloquence.

  Alana Andrews’s machine picked up. The message said she would be out of town for the next ten days. I didn’t bother to leave a message.

  Jane Harris, J.D.’s landlady, sounded depressed. “I didn’t see him at all on Friday, but I heard him upstairs in the late afterno
on, rumbling around like he was in a hurry. Then he rushed down the stairs, banged the door on the way out, and was gone.”

  “Has the sheriff’s department been here?”

  “First thing this morning. They searched the apartment and took a box of his things away with them.”

  “So the apartment’s sealed now?”

  “If you consider a little bit of plastic tape a seal.”

  “Do you?”

  “Look, Sharon, you’re talking to a seventy-three-year-old hippie. At my age I’ve learned to trust people over thirty, but I’ve still got my reservations about authority. You want to come over and have a look around, I’ll let you in.”

  On my way to J.D.’s building on Waller Street in the Cole Valley district near U.C. Med Center, my cell phone rang. Although I’d had the phone for upwards of a year and a half, I still wasn’t sold on—or proficient at—using it while driving, so I pulled into a bus zone to answer.

  “Sharon?” Jody Houston’s shaky voice.

  I couldn’t mask my anger as I demanded, “Jody, where are you?”

  “I didn’t do it. I didn’t kill J.D.”

  “Where are you?”

  “I came home from the grocery store and there was a strange car in the driveway. So I parked down the block and snuck back to the cottage and went around it looking in the windows. He was on the living room floor.”

  “Why didn’t you call nine-eleven?”

  “At first I was scared the person who killed him might still be in the house. Then when I realized they weren’t, I was scared the police wouldn’t believe me. I mean, it was my house, and I knew him.”

  “You could’ve told me. I’d’ve handled it.” But would I have believed her?

  “I know I should’ve, but when I went upstairs I looked out the window—”

  Sudden silence.

  “Jody? Jody?”