She nodded and said, “Clever.” She must not watch too much television otherwise she wouldn’t have been quite so impressed. “Actually, I don’t know all of his friends, though he spoke to a lot of people when he ate here. But I do know who can help you.”
“Who?”
“Tess Briggstone.”
The woman Rich saw coming in and out of Mr. Chandler’s house frequently. The lady who found him in his recliner. And, I guessed, the woman on the answering machine.
Eve glanced around the room which, now that it was nearing ten o’clock, had started emptying out. “Sometimes she eats breakfast here with one of her sons, but I haven’t seen her this morning.” She looked back at me. “She and Jake were pretty tight. As a matter of fact, she lives across the street from him, next to the Pelican Inn.”
I nodded, not wanting to give away anything I knew.
“She owns a gift shop down on the south end of the Embarcadero. Both her sons work the fishing boats sometimes. A couple of times a week they work in the store. And she subs for me once in a while in the summer. She also makes these little quilts to sell.” She pointed to one of the small, hand-quilted miniature quilts I’d noticed when I walked in. It was a tiny Pinwheel quilt with rust, gold, and black fabric. The stitching was expert and the piecing perfect on first inspection. That explained Mr. Chandler’s quilts.
“Beautiful,” I murmured. “She sounds like a busy lady.”
Eve looked over at the register, checking for anyone wanting to pay their bill. “Like most of the working people here on the Central Coast, one job isn’t enough to support you unless you’re working for the college or one of the oil companies. Most people have to juggle a couple of plates to keep the meals coming in.” She laughed, touching her chest with slender fingers sporting a wedding ring set with a large, tear-shaped diamond. “Listen to me, even my metaphors include food. Martin warned me that would happen. This restaurant is our dream. My husband’s from Kentucky, and I’m from New York. We met at a singles resort seven years ago, fell in love, quit our stockbroker jobs, and invested every penny we own in this place. We’ve never regretted it.” She gave me a curious look. “Pardon my boldness, but are you a relative of Jake’s? As far as we knew, he didn’t have any family.”
I shifted uncomfortably in my chair, trying to think of the best way to tell this bizarre story. “Actually, I have no idea who he is.”
“Are you saying he left everything he owned to a perfect stranger? Why in the world would he do that?”
“That’s what I’m trying to figure out, but right now it’s my responsibility to get his funeral planned. It’ll be one o’clock tomorrow at the Paso Robles Cemetery. Apparently he’d already bought a plot there.”
“I’ll post the information on the bulletin board up front right now,” she said, standing up. “Are you going to be in town long?”
“A couple of weeks,” I said. I didn’t tell her about the conditions of the will. Let everyone just think I was staying there to take care of the odds and ends of clearing up the estate.
“If there’s anything you need, give us a call here. Jake was a nice man. We’ll miss him.” She started to walk away, then turned back, her face concerned. “His dog ...”
“It’s okay. Scout and I took to one another right off. I’m going to keep him.”
Her face turned soft. “He loved that dog. Scout waited for him outside this restaurant every time he ate here.”
I smiled at her. “He’s out there now.”
She nodded approvingly. “You know, if anyone knows anything about Jake, it would be Tess. It might be good for you to talk to her.”
“I was thinking that myself.” I stood up and put a ten down on the table, figuring that more than covered my meal and the tip. “Tell your husband it was great.”
“We serve breakfast, lunch, and dinner. We open at six a.m. and close at nine p.m. Believe me, you haven’t eaten anything until you’ve tried one of Martin’s Kentucky Brown sandwiches.”
“Sounds intriguing. What is it?”
“Now, you’re just going to have to come back and find out, aren’t you?” she replied, still smiling. “Martin and I probably won’t be able to make the service since I’m sure Neely will want to go. She and Tess are very close.”
Outside, Scout stood up when I walked out the door. I gave him an absentminded pat and started walking south on the Embarcadero. A few blocks into my walk I realized I hadn’t asked Eve the name of Tess Briggstone’s gift shop. I didn’t turn back. If I couldn’t find it, I’d ask at one of the other local businesses. I passed the giant chessboard, the oversized anchor memorial honoring the Fishermen Lost at Sea, Joe and Leslie’s Seaside Books, a place I knew I’d eventually end up visiting. If it was anything like Elvia’s store, the people who worked there would know a lot about what went on in this town. My problem was solved when I passed the bookstore and next to a store called the Bay City Shirt Shack was a small building with grass-green awnings and the name Briggstone’s Fine Gifts across the top. I stopped in front of the shirt store for a moment and studied the window display of tropical-colored Flojos, surfboards, novelty T-shirts, and bumper stickers. One said—“Morro Bay Native—Tourist, Go Home.”
Sounded good to me right then.
I read all the bumper stickers until I couldn’t delay entering the gift store one more minute. At the open door I turned to Scout and said, “Stay.”
“No, that’s all right, honey,” a raspy, older female voice called out. “Scout’s an old friend of mine. He’s allowed in here.”
I stepped across the threshold. The woman speaking to me stood behind a glass case of silver jewelry. She walked around the case and held out her hand. Her long acrylic nails were painted a bright tangerine; small sparkly rings decorated almost every finger. “You’re my new neighbor,” the woman said. “I’m Tess Briggstone. Welcome to Morro Bay.”
She was about four inches taller than me with a narrow tanned face that had seen a lot of weather—both physically and emotionally. She wore stretchy blue jeans and a large shirt covered with orange and red orchids. Hair dyed the color of a Kansas sunset was piled on top of her head in a neat bun bisected by a thin black pencil.
“Thank you,” I said. Her handshake was firm and no-nonsense. “I’m Benni Harper.”
Scout walked over and nudged her leg, and she scratched underneath his chin. “Hey, old boy, how’re you holding up? Got a treat for you.” She walked behind the counter and tossed a rawhide chew stick at Scout, who trotted over to the corner of the store and settled down to work on it.
The woman looked back at me, her blue-shadowed eyes blank. “So ...”
Before she could continue, the door opened, and two young men in their twenties walked in. They were dressed in old flannel shirts, grime-encrusted jeans, and stained orange gimme caps advertising Union Oil. Both were strawberry blonds with reddish-brown skin that was already looking as coarse as beef jerky from the daily exposure to sun and wind. They were stocky with broad chests and the puffy features of heavy drinkers. One of them, the handsomer of the two, wore rubber boots. He was slightly broader in the chest and had a spoiled, mean expression around the mouth. The other man’s expression seemed more genial.
“Duane,” Tess complained, “I told you I didn’t want you wearing those smelly old boots in here.”
“Sorry, Ma.” He walked behind the counter and picked up her purse. “We need twenty bucks for breakfast.”
She gestured at the two men. “These are my boys, Cole and Duane.” Duane, pocketing the money he took from his mother’s purse, grunted without looking at me. Cole raised his thick blond eyebrows and gave me a slow once-over.
Tess folded her skinny arms over the colorful orchids spread across her chest. “So, you’re the young lady Jake left his things to. How do you know him? Far as I knew, he never had any family. Leastwise, none he spoke of.”
I felt my face turn warm, feelings of guilt irrationally sweeping over me. Then I st
raightened my spine. I hadn’t done anything wrong so I pushed those feelings aside. “To be truthful, Ms. Briggstone, I never knew Mr. Chandler and I have no idea why he left me his estate.”
A disgusted snort came from Duane. “Told you he was a jackass, Ma. He was just leading you on. What’re we going to do now? Huh?”
Tess turned around and said calmly; “Duane, you shut your mouth and go on and get your breakfast.”
He swore under his breath and pushed the front door open so hard the glass rattled. Cole came over and laid a hand on his mother’s shoulder. “Ma, he’s just letting off steam.”
“He’s got to learn some control.”
“Whatever,” he answered with a shrug. “I’d better catch up with him.”
After he left, Tess turned back to me, her face rigid with embarrassment. “I’m sorry, Miss Harper.”
“It’s okay.” When she didn’t answer, I figured the ball was now in my court. I cleared my throat. “The reason I’m here is because Eve Palais said that you and Mr. Chandler were good friends and that you’d know who would probably want to come to his service tomorrow.”
She nodded. “Yes, I would. Where and when?”
“Paso Robles Cemetery at one o’clock. It’ll be a graveside service. Is there ... would you or anyone like to...” I paused, willing myself to talk calmly. “What I’d like to know is if you’d like to say anything, or perhaps his other friends ...”
“That’s all right,” she said, her face unemotional. “I’m sure whatever you plan will be fine. We’ll be there.”
“Okay... thanks.” I turned to leave, then stopped and faced her again, deciding it was probably better just to state my intentions. “I’ll be staying in his house for the next two weeks, and one of the things I’ll be doing is trying to figure out why he made me his heir. If you have any idea, if he ever said anything that might shed some light on it, could you tell me?”
Her weathered face remained neutral. “I’ll think about it, but offhand I have to tell you he never mentioned you once in all the years I knew him.”
I left the store quickly and stood on the street, my heart beating fast as a bird’s. Obviously Jacob Chandler and Tess Briggstone had meant something to each other, so why didn’t he leave his estate to her? Why had he dragged me into his life like this? This guy was really starting to piss me off. A few blocks from Tess’s store, I sat down on a bench and watched white egrets float across the bay, their impossibly long legs stretched out like tree limbs, as I tried to figure out what I should do. After an hour or so, the sun started peeking out from behind the gray clouds and Gabe’s heavy leather jacket started getting warm, so I decided to drop it by the house before tackling the other things on my list.
On the way back to the house, I passed by a one-hour photo shop so I dropped off the roll of film. Their technician was out at lunch, but I was told the film would be ready by two.
“No problem,” I said, glancing at my watch. After dropping off Gabe’s jacket, maybe I’d head back down to the Embarcadero and talk to some of the other shop owners about Mr. Chandler.
I walked down Grove Street toward Pelican. Grove was actually an alleylike street consisting only of garages. The fronts of the accompanying houses on the west side faced the ocean, those on the east side Gull Street. Rich was in front of his garage in cutoff jeans and a green and blue Hawaiian shirt, washing his white, crewcab pickup. True to Gabe’s assertion, it was equipped with a contractor’s toolbox. A faded bumper sticker read, “I Got Hot at the Phoenix Fire Department Chili Cook-off.”
“Buenos dias, kid,” he said.
“Hi,” I replied, slowing down.
He turned off the hose and wiped his hands on his tattered shorts. “You can tell me to take a flying leap if I’m out of line here, but can I ask you why your husband staked out your house last night?”
I didn’t answer, certain my face revealed what I thought of his question.
“I know, I know.” He held up his damp hands in apology. “I have to confess to you that firemen are the nosiest people in the world. I’ll tell you a trade secret. Half of us are hooked on soap operas. It just seemed mysterious to me, you inheriting this stranger’s house and your husband not staying with you. Especially curious since he’s a cop, and cops aren’t known for being the most trusting people on earth.”
“How did you know he was a cop?” I asked, surprised.
He laughed. “I bet he flipped when he heard your neighbor was a fireman, didn’t he? Made the comment about it being the best part-time job in the world. Said we’re all pretty good contractors to boot.”
I couldn’t help laughing with him. “Are you psychic, too?”
He picked up the garden hose and started rolling it. “No, but I’ve been a fireman for thirty-nine years and I’ve known lots of cops. Most of ’em I’ve liked, but I’ve never met one that wasn’t always looking over his shoulder or was sure everyone he met was up to something. You know that old cop saying, don’t you?”
“Which one?”
“There are cops and there are assholes. If you’re not a cop, you’re an asshole.”
I shook my head in amazement. He did know cops.
“I’ll bet you a fish dinner he’s already in the process of having me checked out through the Phoenix PD. Don’t worry, my buddies there will vouch for the fact that I’m an upright if slightly immature individual. Hope he doesn’t call my daughters. They might not be so generous in their recommendations. So, what’s on your agenda today?”
“Right now, getting rid of this jacket and then who knows?”
He tossed the bucket of rags into the garage and said, “Hey, you up for some leftovers? I made tomatillo and green chile enchiladas last night, and since I’m used to cooking for a bunch of hungry firefighters, I made way too much. It tastes better the second day, I swear. Especially with lots of sour cream and guacamole.”
I hesitated, Gabe’s suspicions ringing through my head.
“You can have it to go if you prefer,” he said, amused by my reluctance. “But honestly, you don’t want to miss this. I won the best main dish award ten years in a row at my station. I was taught by an expert—my late wife, Maria.”
My instincts told me this guy was all right, so I said, “I’ll be over as soon as I get rid of this jacket.”
He wasn’t lying about his cooking. The enchiladas were the best I’d ever eaten and I wasn’t even hungry when I sat down. “You could open your own restaurant,” I said.
“I’ve been told that before. The problem is, I only like to cook what appeals to me at the moment so I couldn’t have a set menu. People would have to take their chances.”
“Believe me, they wouldn’t regret it. So, tell me about your daughters.”
“Twenty-seven, twenty-nine, and thirty-two. A teacher, an attorney, and a social worker. Smart as whips and so beautiful I threatened every young buck in the Phoenix Fire Department with a slow, torturous death if they even looked cross-eyed at them.”
“So you’ve cautioned your daughters not to date firemen.”
“You bet. I’m nothing else if not a good and caring father.”
Maybe it was the easiness with which he talked about his daughters or the softness that came over his face when he said his wife’s name, or maybe it was just how the intimate act of eating often puts people in a more familiar frame of mind, but before I realized it, I’d told him everything—the strange conditions of the will, the scrapbook I’d found, the film, and the wood carving message.
“This gets stranger every time I talk to you,” he said, resting his elbows on the kitchen table, his dark eyes interested. “It would make a great plot on One Life to Live though. What does your husband think?”
“He doesn’t like it, naturally,” I said much too quickly, irritated at myself for telling him about the scrapbook before Gabe. And for spilling my guts so easily to a virtual stranger, albeit a charming one, just like Gabe said I would.
“So what are you
going to do?”
“Try to figure out why he left his estate to me. It doesn’t make sense, because I’ve found out he had relationships with other people. Close ones. As a matter of fact, I met the woman you told me about.”
“The redhead I saw going in and out of his house.”
“Tess Briggstone is her name. She owns a gift shop down on the Embarcadero. She has two sons.”
His dark face was thoughtful. “I’ve seen them around. To be honest, they look like a couple of losers to me.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Just the fact that two men that age shouldn’t still be living with their mother. They sit around on weekends drinking beer and playing music loud enough to broil steaks. They screech up and down the alley at three in the morning in trucks that need mufflers more than I need new knees.”
I nodded, taking in the information, though I wasn’t sure if it would be of any use to me.
“Maybe I’m just an old fuddy-duddy, as I’m often accused of by my daughters, but a couple of men pushing thirty ought to be living on their own, raising their own families.” He stood up and started clearing the table. “Sometimes I sound so much like my own father, it scares me. Pollo ruidoso, my daughters call me. Noisy chicken.”
I carried my plate over to the sink and started running the hot water.
“Leave those,” Rich said. “I’ll do them later.”
“Okay. Thanks for lunch. Your awards were absolutely deserved. Well, I’d better go pick up my film. See you later.”
“You bet.”
My film was ready, and I eagerly sat on the brick planter out front, flipping through the twelve photos. They were typical tourist shots of Morro Rock, the bay, and the marina down by the PG & E plant. Only one was different.
It was the James Dean monument at the intersection of Highways 41 and 46 near the town of Cholame—a name from the Salinan or Yokut Indians meaning either “the enchanted valley” or “beautiful one” depending on which county historian you believed. I’d been to the spot many times with my friends as a teenager, attracted by what we thought was the romantic way James Dean had died. Now, the thought of his young body mangled in a fiery automobile accident only made me sick at heart for the ridiculous and never changing stupidity of youth.
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