by Jack Lynch
“No, I don’t have a recorder,” I told him, sitting back down. “There’s probably one over in one of the other offices, but I have a poor track record with them. I’m apt to connect them wrong or hit the wrong button and erase everything.”
The caller chuckled. “And you a detective? Well, probably it doesn’t matter that much. I heard your name mentioned by a guy on the Six O’Clock News.”
“How was that?”
“They showed some sort of press conference a guy gave up in Santa Rosa, to do with those bodies they’re finding.”
“Was it a man named Pershing?”
“I don’t remember, don’t know if I heard his name even. He was somebody out of Sacramento.”
“And what did he have to say?”
“He had quite a lot to say. In fact I was a little surprised the cops would release some of the stuff they did.”
“Like what?”
“Like that the mother of the young boy they dug up committed suicide last night. Talk about tacky. I could have gone the rest of the week without learning that, thanks.”
“The man actually said that?”
“Yeah, it was a part of some big speech he was making about how gung ho the governor was to catch the fiend behind all this killing, et cetera, et cetera. I should have thought he would have found it all pretty embarrassing, to tell you the truth. But about you, he said you were a private detective from San Francisco and that you’d first approached the Sonoma sheriff with information you’d gotten from some woman psychic.”
“Wonderful. Did he mention the psychic’s name?”
The caller hesitated. “I don’t think so. He said he’d interviewed the two of you this afternoon, you and the woman psychic. He said the story you and she told was still under investigation. None of this really has anything to do with what I called about, Mr. Bragg, but I’d say he came within about a breath of giving you good cause to sue for libel. Or slander, whatever it is on TV. But I’m glad he did it because it gave me a name. Yours. Somebody I can talk to besides the cops.”
“Why not talk to the cops?”
“I just don’t like to talk to cops. Besides, this is all kind of thin. But I figured somebody like you, if you were any good at all, if you were willing to go to the cops with something a woman who claims to be a psychic tells you, then you might at least consider what I have to offer.”
I sat back in the chair. “Look, if it’s important maybe it would be better if we could meet somewhere and talk it over. Pick a place.”
“No, that would be a little too much like going to the cops. I’m not even going to give you my name. I just want to tell you about a conversation I had with a fellow, two, maybe three months back.”
I waited, but the caller had fallen silent. “So what about it?”
“Oh, I don’t know. Hearing myself say it, it sounds so damned dumb.”
“Don’t let it stop you. You’ve got my attention. I really want to hear about it.”
“Well, this guy and me, we’d both been drinking, but thinking back on it as best I can, and in the light of what’s been happening, I think maybe he just might be responsible for all those bodies you’re finding up there in Sonoma.”
I pulled over a lined yellow pad and ballpoint pen. “I’m beginning to wish I had a tape recorder. How about if I go looking for one?”
“No, I’ve already spent longer on the phone than I told myself I was going to. Turns out you’re pretty easy to talk to. I really don’t want to be involved in this thing one little bit. But you know, I’ve read about those people they’re digging up, women, the youngster, most all of them just normal people, you know, and I said to myself, hey, that isn’t right. Somebody has to stop this. And so I figure the least I can do is tell you about the conversation I had.”
“Okay, where did you run into him?”
“In this bar I go into once in a while. I’m not going to tell you the name of that either, because I like it and want to continue going in there from time to time. But it’s in the Marina District. There’s enough bars around there so you could spend the rest of your life trying to find the right one. I was in there pretty late, well, late for me, around ten thirty one night, and I got into a conversation with this guy who’d been sitting there by himself sipping whiskey and staring into the backbar mirror.
“I don’t remember what all we were talking about. The Giants some, I guess, but all of a sudden he turned to me and he said, ‘Well, time doesn’t heal all things, that’s all there is to it.’
“I just sat there waiting for him to go on, wondering if maybe he was still talking about the Giants or maybe something else we might have been talking about. I knew I’d been drinking some. I didn’t know how much he might have poured down. But then he asked me if I knew what grief was. Right out of left field like that he asked it. And I made some crack like, sure I knew what grief was. Grief was having to get up the next morning with the hang-over I was going to have, or some such. But he was serious. And I sat there and listened to him ramble on about how time can eat away at a man when people die.”
“Was he at all specific about any of this? Did he say who had died, or when, or what of? Where, maybe?”
“No, he didn’t go into any of that. But while he was talking about it, well, the man was showing some pain on his face. I’m positive he was talking about some awful thing that had happened, and not so long ago. Either that, or the whiskey was eating holes in his brain.
“I sat there trying to be sympathetic, but frankly I was getting a little depressed listening to him rattle on like that, and I was thinking maybe it was about time I lifted up and went home or found somewhere else to drink or something, but then he really got my attention when he turned to me like we’d just been sitting there carrying on a reasonable two-way conversation, and said, ‘I could kill them all, but where would that leave me?’ Then he sort of smiled to himself. ‘What?’ I asked him, wondering if I’d heard right, but he just said, ‘It’s been staring me in the mirror all along.’
“End of quote, and end of phone conversation, Mr. Bragg.”
“Wait! Give me that last quote again. I’m writing it down and I’m slow at it.” The man repeated it and I scribbled. “And don’t hang up on me. This could be very important. You might remember something more.”
“No, I don’t think so. See, I thought about this quite a bit, after I began reading about the bodies they’re finding. I wrote down everything I could remember from the conversation I had with this guy. You’ve got it all.”
“What did the man look like? How old was he?”
“I’m lousy about things like that. I’d say he was probably approaching middle age, whatever the hell that means. Somewhere from his mid-twenties to mid-forties.”
“That’s the best you can do?”
“I’m afraid so. He had a couple days’ growth of beard, I seem to recall.”
“How was he dressed?”
“Don’t remember.”
“What did his hair look like?”
“He had on a hat of some kind.”
“Did you see the color of his eyes?”
“Are you kidding? Right then I couldn’t have seen the color of my own eyes if somebody had held up a mirror.”
“What about his ears? Sometimes people remember ears, whether they flapped out, or were high on his head, or low?”
“By now I couldn’t even remember if he had ears. Really, Mr. Bragg, you’ll have to take my word for it. I just can’t remember anything much about him. Except for that weird conversation. And hell, I could even be all wrong about this, you know? I don’t personally think I was. There was something about the guy, and those things he said. If you’d been there you’d know what I’m talking about. The man was serious, whatever he was talking about. And he left, right after.
“Now I couldn’t go to the cops with something like this, but like I said, after I heard your name mentioned on the news, I figured if you had the balls to go to the cops with something a psychic
told you, and if you were any good…”
I couldn’t hold him any longer. Maybe the caller was afraid somebody else in the office might be trying to get a trace on where he was calling from. Just before he hung up I asked him to phone back in a day or so, even giving the man my home tele-phone number. I told him that maybe by then we would learn something that would make it important to talk to him again, that maybe we’d learn something that would trigger another memory to do with the conversation he’d had in the bar that night, or to do with the person’s appearance.
The man told me he’d think it over, but he didn’t think he’d call again, without something more to offer. He said he would be following the TV news and reading the papers and if he saw something that might seem important he would give me a call.
I sat staring at the wall a good ten minutes before I put in a call to Sergeant Barry Smith at the Hall of Justice in Santa Rosa. I figured the chances were better than even that Smith would still be in the office, and I was right.
THIRTEEN
“Hello, Bragg. Sorry about what happened this afternoon. How’s the psychic friend?”
“She was in pretty bad shape when I dropped her off. Pershing’s going to need an arrest warrant the next time he wants to talk to her. Or try to talk to her.”
“I don’t blame you for feeling that way. He gave his little press conference, you know.”
“I just heard about some of it. Sounds as if he’s really gumming up things.”
“No, actually it might have been the best thing he could have done for us. I didn’t see it myself, but I heard the sheriff is extremely upset at some of the things Pershing let out. The sheriff’s been on the phone to the mayor and chairman of the county Board of Supervisors and the mayor and board chairman have been talking to our State Assembly people and the governor’s office. Since then the governor’s office put in a call to Pershing. It will be interesting to see what tomorrow brings. What’s happening with you?”
“I had a phone call myself a few minutes ago. It so happens it also came about because of the press conference. The caller wouldn’t give me his name, but he did have an interesting story to tell.”
I passed it on to Barry Smith as concisely as I could, and after I had finished the sergeant was quiet for a few moments then sighed deeply. “If only he could have told you something more.”
“That’s how I felt.”
“What do you think of it?”
“If you were standing in front of me I’d shrug my shoulders. I think the caller believes what he was telling me, the same as the Robbins woman believed what she was telling me. But then I know less about the caller than I did about Robbins. I’m sure the caller thought the man he talked to in the bar could be the one doing all this.”
“Okay, listen. When we hang up I want you to recreate that conversation you had with the guy right away. Write down anything and everything you can remember about it. When that’s done I want you to phone back. There’ll be somebody here ready to record what you have. Fair enough?”
“Fair enough.”
I hung up and spent the next twenty minutes trying to recreate the phone conversation I’d had, then called Santa Rosa again and fed it all into a recorder. By the time I had finished it was after nine o’clock and my stomach was growling. I stretched and yawned and considered walking over to a nearby restaurant that served hearty pasta and honest red wine. The phone rang again.
“It’s Cliff Welch, Mr. Bragg, wondering if you’ve had a chance to talk to the psychic lady about the taping session I’d like to set up.”
“Hi, Welch. Yeah, I asked her about it and she said no. She’s worried that the exposure could lose her some business. Some of her clients are skittish and she’s afraid the publicity might panic them. Tell me something, though, were you at that news conference up in Santa Rosa late this afternoon?”
“I sure was.”
“Given by a man named Pershing?”
“Yes, sir.”
“I understand he mentioned me and the psychic woman.”
“That’s right.”
“Did he identify the woman?”
“No. But I figure I know who she is.”
“How do you figure that?”
“I heard somewhere she’s from San Francisco. I went to the Yellow Pages and I think I found her. Not under psychics, it was something else. But if her name isn’t M. Robbins, I’ll eat my hat.”
“I’m not going to tell you whether you’re right or not. I just wanted to know how much Pershing released.”
“He blabbed quite a bit, but not about her beyond mentioning it was something she told you that got everybody started on all this.”
“I’m glad to hear it. The woman’s having a rocky time these days.”
“Oh? How so?”
“She’s not at all happy about her role in it. She’s a woman of deep feeling. It’s very depressing for her to turn on the news and see what you people have been shooting up there in the park, or to hear about the suicide of that boy’s mother.”
“That’s understandable, I guess. Still, news is news. How about that niece of hers you were talking about? Could I get a session with her do you think?”
“I don’t know. I completely forgot about that as an alternative. I’ll try to talk to them tomorrow about it and leave a message on your machine.”
“I’m much obliged.”
I disconnected, then dialed Maribeth’s number. Bobbie answered. “How are things with you and your aunt?”
“I think things are fine with Maribeth. She had some warm milk about an hour ago. I looked in on her a few minutes ago and she seemed to be really zonked. I think she’s down for the night.”
“And you?”
“I, Mr. Bragg, am clutching the walls about a foot from the ceiling. I feel like I could jump out the window. Where are you?”
“I’m at the office. I was just about to duck out for a bite to eat. You could join me, if you felt Maribeth was safely tucked in for the night.”
“I think she’s safely tucked in, and I’d love to join you. I’ve already eaten, but if you find a place that sells vodka, I’ll be able to amuse myself while you dine.”
“I’ll be there in about twenty-five minutes. Leave her a note telling her you’re with me and include the number of my answering service.”
I gave her the information then closed up the office and got my car. I hadn’t heard a weather forecast that day, but on my way to the parking garage I felt a little spritzing from out of the sky. It was a little late in the season to get rain in San Francisco, but it had been a funny weather year.
Bobbie was waiting for me in the lobby of the apartment building when I drove up. She came out and practically ran to the car. She was wearing a tan pair of Levis this time, but they fit her just as tightly as her dark blue ones. I leaned over and opened the door. She got in quickly, closed the door and put her head back on the seat.
“Get me away from here.”
I drove on up to the intersection and started down the hill toward Lombard. “Maybe your aunt had a good idea this afternoon. Maybe she should take a vacation. Down to Carmel with you, maybe.”
“I already suggested that. She said no, she’d thought better of it. It’s as if she’s committed to sitting in that apartment being morose.”
“She’s a complicated woman. If she were anybody else I think I could help her ride out all this. But I don’t know what it’s like inside her mind with all these impressions or whatever they are that she has. Did she talk any more about whatever it was she experienced up at the Wolf House today?”
“She just repeated what she said up there. That something is wrong. She’s confused by it.”
“I know the feeling.”
“You don’t show it. Where are we going?”
“I haven’t decided yet. Somewhere that has food and vodka, I suppose.”
It turned out she knew a little bit about my part of the world.
“Why don’t
we drive over to the Jam Spot in Sausalito. You can eat a cheeseburger and I can let the music shake out my head.”
So that’s what we did. On the way over I told her about the interview Cliff Welch wanted, and it didn’t seem to bother her any. She said she would check with Maribeth in the morning.
The Jam Spot was a restaurant and dance joint looking out over the water just north of the business district. I used to patronize the place regularly in earlier days. As Bobbie had suggested they served a good cheeseburger, but with their new music policy these days I felt I risked loss of hearing every time I walked into the place. When I’d finished the meal I told Bobbie I’d had enough loud music for the night and we left to go back down Bridgeway to the No Name bar where I’d met Welch.
We sat inside at a table again toward the rear. I ordered a bourbon and water and Bobbie had another vodka martini. She’d had more than a couple since leaving Maribeth’s apartment. I myself hadn’t had much to drink that evening, but the glow and bubbly spirit that all that vodka sloshing around inside Bobbie brought out spread to me as well and the two of us had a pretty silly conversation, at least that was how I thought of it later. She prattled on about the bar and restaurant business down in quaint and rich Carmel, and she asked me in turn, as they always did, about my own work. And as I always did in turn I put some English on the conversation to get it onto a different part of the table.
My work, for the most part, was either too dull and routine or too gritty and bleak to be the stuff of social conversation. What I did was tell her about some of the screwball vacations I’d had. Not screwball by design, or at least not by my design. They did seem to have a sort of comic logic to them, though, so they turned out screwball and made acceptable social conversation.
Like the time the priest from Seattle apparently had listened to one confession too many and tried to hijack the airliner flying us from San Francisco to Albuquerque, New Mexico. He said he wanted to go directly to Mars. Or the time one of the little people—midgets, they used to call them—won the ballroom dancing contest two nights running on the cruise ship to Mazatlán before somebody broke into his stateroom and threw all his trousers overboard. That sort of thing.
