Sleuthing Women

by Lois Winston

  I walked down a narrow hallway until I came to Richard’s unmarked door. I rapped loudly to make sure he heard me and turned the knob.

  There was no point in waiting for a response from inside his office. He never gave one and anybody who got this far knew they could barge right in without awaiting consent.

  As I opened the door, I could hear the strains of one of his favorite mariachi songs, “Alma, Corazon Y Vida” playing on the stereo.

  A flashback of when he first learned to play it himself came into my mind. He was barely eleven years old and almost too small for the guitar he held so lovingly in his hands. But he never gave up and practiced until he and the instrument were one; until together, they were magic.

  To this day, I can tell what mood Richard’s in by what’s playing on his stereo or by his own hand on his ever-present guitar. With mariachi music playing, I knew that Richard had good news for me.

  I pushed the door open, waiting for my eyes to adjust to the dark. The room was about thirty feet square with thick, curtained windows on the outside wall. In various stages of cannibalization, computers, monitors, keyboards, and little wiry things sat in piles on the floor, their importance known only to Richard.

  I focused on a computer station in the center of the room where Richard sat staring into a mammoth screen. The monitor alone, called something like Blue Jean C, had cost D.I. over forty thousand dollars. I knew because the Board had a big debate about the expense.

  Richard usually gets anything he wants, and he had his heart set on this prototype monitor once he found out NASA had ordered three. We were lucky he only wanted one.

  My brother stared intently at the screen, currently divided into six sections, with a different visual in each section. He worked his keyboard, froze several of the sections, and called out to me even though I hadn’t been sure he knew I was in the room.

  He lowered the music and swiveled around. “I’ve got her, Lee. Found her about an hour ago.” He chuckled with glee.

  I was confused. “Who?”

  “Your China Doll. She’s right here.” He swiveled in his chair to face me and leaned back with satisfaction awaiting my approval.

  “You’re kidding!” I exclaimed and turned my attention to the screen.

  Sure enough, a frozen frame of the Asian woman I saw yesterday matched five others on the screen. Out of the six, two of them were grainy and one was only a side shot of her neck and ear with lots of flowing black hair.

  “Who is she?”

  “You know, at first, Lee, I only wanted to know who she was because she’s such a babe. Then, as I got into it, I had this nagging feeling I’d seen this gal before.”

  I could tell by the way Richard talked this story was going to take awhile. I leaned on the edge of his desk and folded my arms.

  He noticed and began clearing off the closest of several chairs littered with parts of equipment and manuals. He never stopped his excited dissertation.

  “You know me, I never forget a face and what a face she has! And that body! I’m surprised you didn’t know who she was right off, Lee, ‘cause she’s a pretty well-known Bay Area dancer!”

  “A dancer!” I echoed, surprised despite my original assessment of the woman. I sat down on the edge of a now cleared chair, my body tense with excitement.

  “She did the Snowflake Queen in the Nutcracker Suite Christmas before last at the Civic Auditorium in San Francisco. We saw it together, remember?” His voice was teasing, as he beamed proudly at me.

  Of course! Once he told me who she was, I knew her immediately. It was one of those cases of somebody being where you didn’t expect them to be, so you didn’t recognize them. I’d seen her in two or three productions. She’d danced the second female lead, shining in whatever part she undertook.

  “Not only that, and this is where it gets good, guess where else we’ve seen her?”

  I could tell my brother was enjoying this game immensely. He waited patiently for a response.

  “Entertainment Tonight?” I queried, opening my eyes wide and feigning seriousness.

  “No! Guess again.” His eyes twinkled and he offered a bright smile.

  “Richard,” I said, “can we play Twenty Questions some other time? Just tell me who she is.”

  “Oh, all right.” He relented, his face clouding over.

  “She was front page news about a year ago when she was arrested for protesting against restricting the number of Chinese immigrants coming into the States. Seems she’s got nine sisters and brothers and most of them are still waiting in China to get to the States. She assaulted one of the lower city officials...what’s his name...”

  He got up and looked intently at some writing below one of the frozen segments on his screen. “Oh, yeah. A Leonardo Falariccia….”

  “Well, who wouldn’t slug somebody with that name?” I interrupted, but I did remember the incident and how it shocked the artistic community. I remember thinking at the time she had an unusual temperament for a ballet dancer, hot and fiery. More like a rock star.

  “…but he decided not to press charges,” Richard continued, ignoring my interruption. Richard remained standing, his slender frame stretching out the kinks that came from sitting in one position too long.

  I shifted in the chair and forced my mind back to the Christmas before last. Now I knew who the woman was, I reflected on the beautiful Snowflake Queen, graceful and trim, with such perfectly precise and yet passionate movements.

  She hadn’t worked her way up to performing the Sugar Plum Fairy but it was only a matter of time; she had the talent. I remembered the awe I’d felt as I watched her; the way I always feel when a dancer can accomplish the impossible.

  That ephemeral ability of a dancer to make complicated and highly rehearsed steps look natural and easy, as she glides effortlessly across the stage. It was something I had never and would never be able to do.

  “What’s her name?” I finally asked, coming out of my reverie.

  “Grace Wong. And believe me, there are about forty of them in San Francisco alone. After I matched her face from newspaper microfilms, it took me nearly two hours to track down which Grace Wong she was. God bless the online library service. I not only have her address and phone number, I know she reads only non-fiction, just like me. She lives in San Francisco, typical single life, but there are a couple of things that are kind of odd.” Richard reflected, sitting back down.

  “The first thing I did was to check her DMV record and credit card charges. Now, she has the job with the San Francisco Ballet Company, which is evenings, right? But she’s driving down to Princeton-by-the-Sea, hereafter known as PBS, at least two or three times a month, and always at night, which is one heck of a commute. For the past four or five months she’s been gassing up at the same service station down there, almost a full tank each time.

  “Maybe she has a boyfriend or something.”

  “Maybe, but what’s strange is, I don’t think she spends more than an hour there, and then she’s back up to the City. Got two tickets for speeding in San Francisco around one o’clock in the morning on two of those nights. Let’s see…” he said, as he closed his eyes and searched his memory. "One on Nineteenth Avenue and Noriega in the Sunset district and one on Geary.”

  Richard continued, doing what he does best, expounding knowledge. “Then she got a parking ticket a couple of weeks ago in PBS shortly before midnight, even though she had a special dress rehearsal the next morning starting at eight a.m. My God, this girl gets around. Everything’s on the printout.”

  He pointed to a stack of eight-by-eleven-inch paper piled on his desk. Taking a stick of gum out of his shirt pocket, he unwrapped it, and popped it into his mouth with a great sense of accomplishment.

  I vaguely knew the area he was talking about. Some twenty or twenty-five miles south of San Francisco, Princeton-by-the-Sea, or PBS as Richard called it, is a small port town of less than four hundred people.

  Thousands of tourists visit each y
ear to check out the “New England” type harbor and eat at one of the great seafood restaurants that litter the coastline, but that’s pretty much it. I’d driven by it several times on Highway One, as I was heading to Half Moon Bay, Monterey, or Carmel, but never stopped.

  As far as I was concerned, it was probably a pleasant enough little town but just how much charm could a harbor or a fishing boat hold in the middle of the night for a ballet dancer with a six-day a week job in San Francisco?

  Maybe Grace Wong did have a boyfriend in Princeton-by-the-Sea, but it somehow seemed a little off, like a lot of things lately. I decided to think about it later. At that moment, I was worried about D.I.’s involvement with the police.

  “How much of this information are we giving to the police? They expect our full cooperation, Richard.”

  This murder business was new to me, and I was a little nervous about intermingling with the San Francisco Homicide Department, especially as I was, ever so slightly, a suspect.

  “We’re giving them exactly what they asked for. No more, no less.”

  “So what did you give me?”

  “Dupes of everything you recorded the first three days of your surveillance. They’re sending someone over this afternoon to pick up the ones you turned in last night. But what they don’t have is the Richard Alvarez brain.”

  He nonchalantly tapped the side of his head with his forefinger before going on.

  “The rest of this stuff on China Doll is just supposition on my part, and I don’t share suppositions with anybody, except maybe you. Gets you a bad rep.”

  He wrinkled his nose as if he smelled something decaying in the room.

  “Besides, SFPD has resources. Let them draw their own conclusions from all of this. Like I did,” he added with a wink.

  “I’ll try to play it the same way,” I promised.

  “Okay, I’ve got to get back to work, so here’s the rest of the results,” Richard said, changing the subject abruptly, as usual.

  “All the license plates you recorded during those four days have been accounted for. Take the rentals. Nothing there. Mr. and Mrs. Somebody or other vacationing from somewhere out of state, in for a week or two, blah, blah, blah.”

  “Blah, blah, blah? Is that like yada yada?”

  I smiled. My brother ignored me.

  “Most of them parked their rentals, went sightseeing and then took the Red and White Fleet to Sausalito or Tiburon. The remainders are either locals who work in that area or out of town visitors but not out of state. Like this couple from Napa,” he added pointing to a name on the list.

  “Now remember, I’m only giving each person a cursory look. If everything seems normal on the surface, I leave it alone.” He stressed the last part of his statement and then picked up the printout.

  “Uh huh,” I replied, nodding my head. “Unless they happen be as good looking as Grace Wong.”

  Richard went on as if I hadn’t spoken.

  “For instance, here’s a local from Oakland who was parked on that street all day and most of the night. Strange, so I checked him out. He wound up being a dentist who played hooky and took a day tour to Alcatraz. Then he gave himself a birthday party at a local bar that night. I don’t think it’s him, but on the other hand, if he managed to kill somebody while getting drunk with about sixty people watching, then he’s too smart for me.”

  He stopped his oration and spit his gum out in the wastepaper basket before continuing.

  “The only other car that was within a two block radius that day, and was there the day before, as well…” Richard raised a forefinger in the air for emphasis. “Is Grace Wong’s. I don’t know what she’s doing there unless she’s giving longshoremen ballet lessons. Maybe that’s what she’s doing in PBS, too, ballet lessons.”

  I could tell Richard was immensely pleased with himself.

  “This check was simple, Lee. They should all be as easy as this. Here you go.”

  He flung about ten sheets of paper onto my lap. All the information was printed in a painfully small font and I sighed. Richard believed in saving money, at least on paper products, so he used the smallest font possible.

  A couple of more years of straining my eyes like this, and I’d need a seeing-eye dog. I got up, ready to leave him to his work.

  “By the way,” he added with much less bravado, as he jabbed at the keyboard and made sections on the monitor disappear. “I got some news that might make you happy.”

  He looked up at me with anxious eyes.

  “Nick got married a couple of weeks ago in Las Vegas.”

  I took in a sharp breath. How did I feel about that, I wondered instantly? Relieved. Simply relieved.

  Maybe an unhappy and embarrassing episode of my life might go away. I opened wide eyes at Richard, who was staring at me nervously.

  “Richard, have you been keeping tabs on him all this time?”

  “It didn’t take much. I just periodically checked out a few things. You know, driver’s license, W2 forms, any legal papers he might have filed. That’s how I found out about the nuptials. Easy as one-two-three.”

  “W2 forms? Why, that’s illegal, Richard!” I said, more out of shock than chastisement.

  “Hey, it’s only illegal if you use the information for gain or profit. I don’t do anything with it except, on rare occasions, let certain people know things they might be happier knowing. As far as I’m concerned, I’m happier knowing he’s somebody else’s problem and not my sister’s.”

  Laughing, I leaned down and hugged my baby brother.

  “I have to admit I feel better knowing that chapter of my life is finally closed. Thanks a lot, Richard. I’m really grateful.”

  I touched his hand with mine and looked solemnly into his lean, trusting face. He flustered and swiveled his chair back to his computer screen.

  “Hey, what’s a computer for?” he questioned, with a dismissive wave of his hand.

  “Now, get going,” my kid brother said. “I’ve got a lot of work to do. I take it Our Lady didn’t say no on you following up on this murder thing?” he asked, as he reached for a small tower with attached cables and began hooking them up to his mainframe.

  “No, she didn’t say no,” I uttered.

  I was glad the room was dark and he was concentrating on other things. I don’t lie well and Richard knows me as few people do. I could never have deceived him if he had seen my face. I turned and walked across the room to the door.

  “Grace Wong. What’s up with this Grace Wong?” I asked aloud. I closed his door quietly and started back for my office, my mind whirling.

  The woman parks her car, for no apparent reason, two days in a row near a warehouse where a man gets himself killed. There’s no record of shopping, sightseeing, or dining for her on either day. She could, of course, be using cash but people rarely do these days. And why has she spent several nights a month—correction, several hours of several nights a month—in Princeton-by-the-Sea?

  For the past five months, she’s been filling her gas tank there, too. What, if anything, does that mean? Maybe it was time to have a closer look at Grace Wong.

  NINE

  A Visit To The Widow

  When I got back to my office, it was not quite two o’clock. I decided to return Yvette Wyler’s call. I felt slightly guilty about the way I talked to Mom and thought a visit to her old high school chum might act as atonement.

  As I dialed, I crossed my fingers that the grieving widow wouldn’t be home but luck wasn’t with me. It seldom is.

  The housekeeper, Mrs. Malchesky, answered on the third ring and asked me to wait a moment while she went to fetch the lady of the house. As I sat with a silent phone in my hand, I hoped against hope the woman didn’t feel like company.

  After all, she’d only lost her husband the day before yesterday. I certainly wouldn’t want to talk to anybody so soon, especially the person who found his body.

  Unfortunately, the housekeeper returned and said the recently widowed
asked if it was convenient for me to drop by sometime today. I said a few silent curses and then one loud “yes.” I was familiar with the house in Woodside and knew it was only a few minutes away from the office.

  Might as well get it over with, I thought. I said I would be there in fifteen minutes.

  I remembered the Mr. Everett phone call I promised to make, as well, and dialed the number after searching through my card index. I got lucky with him.

  He wasn’t in and wasn’t expected for the rest of the day. I left a message with his secretary that I had called, hung up, and felt the clear conscience of the not so young and not so innocent.

  Lastly, I called Patti and asked her to relay the Wyler meeting to Lila when she came in. Might as well start mending fences as soon as possible.

  I grabbed my handbag and umbrella and ran out the door. After all, the sooner I got to Mrs. Wyler’s, the sooner I could leave.

  The Wyler Estate was a twelve-acre job directly off Woodside Avenue. Dubbed by the locals as “Flanders’ Folly” years ago, the original owner, a wealthy robber baron from Ohio, had used several different architectural styles before the house was completed to his satisfaction.

  Captain Flanders moved his wife and seventeen children into the house and lived very happily there for over forty years. After the death of both parents within three months of one another, the surviving children sold it to Portor Wyler for a ridiculously low price just to get rid of it.

  Aside from the seventy-five hundred square foot little starter-upper, there were the standard stables, tennis courts, indoor and outdoor pools, and of course, the grounds.

  The house itself was a monstrous red, four-story brick job with dozens of gables, columns, chimneys and Corinthian arches that would have given Scarlett O’Hara nightmares.

  Oleander bushes grew around the entire perimeter of the grounds, most over twenty feet high, in various flowering colors. I read once that oleander is poisonous and a woman was hung for giving a brewed version of it to her husband, who died a pretty painful death.