O Is for Outlaw

by Sue Grafton

  “On second thought, why don’t I take the application home with me? I can fill it out and send it back. It’ll be simpler that way.”

  “Suit yourself. Have a seat.”

  I pulled out a chair and sat down across from Belmira, who was shuffling a tarot deck. Cordia went to the kitchen sink and let the faucet water run cold before she filled a glass. She handed me the water and then crossed to a kitchen drawer, where she extracted an application. She returned to her seat, handed me the paper, and picked up a length of multicolored knitting, six inches wide and at least fifteen inches long.

  I took my time with the water. I made a study of the application, trying to compose myself. What was wrong with me? My career as a liar was being seriously undermined. Meanwhile, neither sister questioned my lingering presence.

  Cordia said, “Belmira claims she’s a witch, though you couldn’t prove it by me.” She peered toward the dining room. “Dorothy’s around here someplace. Where’d she go, Bel? I haven’t seen her for an hour.”

  “She’s in the bathroom,” Bel said, and turned to me. “I didn’t catch your name, dear.”

  “Oh, sorry. I’m Kinsey. Nice meeting you.”

  “Nice to meet you, too.” Her hair was sparse, a flyaway white with lots of pink scalp showing through. Under her dark print housedress, her shoulders were narrow and bony, her wrists as flat and thin as the handles on two soup ladles. “How’re you today?” she asked shyly, as she pulled the tarot deck together. Four of her teeth were gold.

  “I’m fine. What about yourself?”

  “I’m real good.” She plucked a card from the deck and held it up, showing me the face. “The Page of Swords. That’s you.”

  Cordia said, “Bel.”

  “Well, it’s true. This is the second time I pulled it. I shuffled the deck and drew this as soon as she stepped in, and then I drew it again.”

  “Well, draw something else. She’s not interested.”

  I said, “Tell me about your names. Those are new to me.”

  Bel said, “Mother made ours up. There were six of us girls and she named us in alphabetical order: Amelia, Belmira, Cordia, Dorothy, Edith, and Faye. Cordi and I are the last two left.”

  “What about Dorothy?”

  “She’ll be along soon. She loves company.”

  Cordia said, “Bel will start telling your fortune any minute now. I’m warning you, once she gets on it, it’s hard to get her off. Just ignore her. That’s what I do. You don’t have to worry about hurting her feelings.”

  “Yes, she does,” Bel said feebly.

  “Are you good at telling fortunes?”

  Cordia cut in. “Not especially, but even a blind hog comes across an acorn now and then.” She had taken up her knitting, which she held to the light, her head tilted slightly as the needles tucked in and out. The narrow piece of knitting trailed halfway down her front. “I’m making a knee wrap, in case you’re wondering.”

  My Aunt Gin taught me to knit when I was six years old, probably to distract me in the early evening hours. She claimed it was a skill that fostered patience and eye—hand coordination. Now, as I watched, I could see that Cordia had dropped a few stitches about six rows back. The loops, like tiny sailors washed overboard, were receding in the wake of the knitting as each new row was added. I was about to mention it when a large white cat appeared in the doorway. She had a flat Persian face. She stopped when she saw me and stared in apparent wonderment. I’d seen a cat like that once before: long-haired, pure white, one green eye and one blue.

  Bel smiled at the sight of her. “Here she is.”

  “That’s Dorothy,” Cordia said. “We call her Dort for short. Do you believe in reincarnation?”

  “I’ve never sorted that one through.”

  “We hadn’t either till this kitty came along. Dorothy always swore she’d be in touch with us from the Other Side. Told us for years, she’d find a way to come back. Then, lo and behold, the neighbor’s cat had a litter the very day she passed on. This was the only female, and she looks just like Dort. The white hair, the one blue eye, the one green. Same personality, same behavior. Sociable, pushy, independent.”

  Bel chimed in. “The cat even passes wind the way Dorothy did. Silent but deadly. Sometimes we have to get up and leave the room.”

  I pointed to the knitting. “It looks like you dropped some stitches.” I leaned forward and touched a finger to the errant loops. “If you have a crochet hook, I can coax them up the line for you.”

  “Would you? I’d like that. Your eyes are bound to be better than mine.” Cordia bent over and reached into her knitting bag. “Let’s see what I’ve got here. Will this do?” She offered me a J hook.

  “That’s perfect.” While I began the slow task of working the dropped stitches up through the rows, the cat picked her way across the floor and jumped up in my lap. I jerked the knitting up and said, “Whoa!” Dorothy must have weighed twenty pounds. She turned her backside to me and stuck her tail in the air like a pump handle, exhibiting her little spigot while she marched in place.

  “She never does that. I don’t know what’s got into her. She must like you,” Belmira said, turning up cards as she spoke.

  “I’m thrilled.”

  “Well, would you look at this? The Ten of Wands, reversed.” Bel was laying out a reading. She placed the Ten of Wands with the other cards on the table in some mysterious configuration. The card she’d assigned me, the Page of Swords, had now been covered by the Moon.

  I freed one hand and cranked Dorothy’s tail down, securing it with my right arm as I pointed to the cards. “What’s that one mean?” I thought the Moon might be good, but the sisters exchanged a look that made me think otherwise.

  Cordia said, “I told you she’d do this.”

  “The Moon stands for hidden enemies, dear. Danger, darkness, and terror. Not too good.”

  “No kidding.”

  She pointed to a card. “The Ten of Wands, reversed, represents obstacles, difficulties, and intrigues. And this one, the Hanged Man, represents the best you can hope for.”

  “She doesn’t want to hear that, Bel.”

  “I do. I can handle it.”

  “This card crowns you.”

  “What’s that? I’m afraid to ask,” I said.

  “Oh, the Hanged Man is good. He represents wisdom, trials, sacrifice, intuition, divination, prophecy. This is what you want, but it isn’t yours at present.”

  “She’s trying to help with my knitting. You might at least leave her be until she finishes.”

  “I can do both,” I said. Though, truthfully, Dorothy’s presence was making the task difficult. The cat had rotated in my lap and now seemed intent on smelling my breath. She extended her nose daintily. I paused and breathed through my mouth for her. “What’s that card?” I asked, while she butted my chin with her head.

  “The Knight of Swords, which is placed at your feet. This is your own, what you have to work with. Skill, bravery, capacity, enmity, wrath, war, destruction.”

  “The wrath part sounds good.”

  “Not overall,” Bel corrected. “Overall, you’re screwed. You see this one? This card stands for pain, affliction, tears, sadness, desolation.”

  “Well, dang.”

  “Exactly. I’d say you’re up poop creek without a roll of TP.” Belmira turned up another card.

  Dorothy climbed up on my chest, purring. She put her face in mine and we stared at each another. I glanced back at the tarot deck. Even I, believing none of this, could see the trouble I was in. Aside from the Hanged Man, there was a fellow burdened with heavy sticks, yet another fellow face down on the ground with ten swords protruding from his back. The card for Judgment didn’t seem to bode well either, and then there was the Nine of Wands, which showed a cranky-looking man clinging to a staff, eight staves in a line behind him. That card was followed by a heart pierced with three swords, rain and clouds above.

  By then, I’d succeeded in rescuing the lost
stitches, and I reached around Dorothy to return the knitting to Cordia. I thought it was time to get down to business, so I asked Cordia what she could tell me about Mickey.

  “I can’t say I know all that much about him. He was extremely private. He worked as a bank guard until he lost his job in February. I used to see him going out in his uniform. He looked handsome, I must say.”

  “What happened?”

  “About what?”

  “How’d he lose his job?”

  “He drank. You must have known that if you were married to him. Nine in the morning, he reeked of alcohol. I don’t think he drank at that hour. This was left from the night before, fumes pouring through his skin. He never staggered, and I never once heard him slur his words. He wasn’t loud or mean. He was always a gentleman, but he was losing ground.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. I knew he drank, but it’s hard to believe he reached a point where drinking interfered with his work. He was a cop in the old days when I was married to him.”

  “Is that right,” she said.

  “Was there anything else you could tell me about him?”

  “He was quiet, no parties. Paid his rent on time until the last few months. No visitors except for the nasty fellow with all the chains.”

  I turned my attention from Dorothy. “Chains?”

  “One of those motorcycle types: studs and black leather. He had a cowboy mentality, swaggered when he walked. Made so much noise it sounded like he was wearing spurs.”

  “What was that about?”

  “I have no idea. Dort didn’t like him. He was very rude. He knocked her sideways with his foot when she tried to smell his boot.”

  Bel said, “Oh, dear. This card represents the King of Cops … reversed again. That’s not good.”

  I looked over with interest. “The King of Cops?”

  “I didn’t say cops, dear. I said Cups. The King of Cups stands for a dishonest, double-dealing man: roguery, vice, scandal, you name it.”

  Belatedly, I felt a flutter of uneasiness. “Speaking of which, what made you think I was a cop when I came to the door?”

  Cordia looked up. “Because an officer called this morning and said a detective would be stopping by at two this afternoon. We thought it must be you since you were up there so long.”

  I felt my heart give a little hiccup, and I checked my watch. Nearly two o’clock now. “Gee, I better hit the road and let the two of you get back to work,” I said. “Um, I wonder if you could do me a little favor … .”

  Bel turned up the next card and said, “Don’t worry about it, dear. We won’t mention you were here.”

  “I’d appreciate that.”

  “I’ll take you out the other door,” Cordia said. “So you can reach the alley without being seen. The detectives park in the front … at least, they did before.”

  “Why don’t I leave you a number? That way you can get in touch with me if anything comes up,” I said. I jotted down my number on the back of my business card. In return, Cordia wrote their number on the edge of the rental application. Neither questioned my request. With a tarot like mine, they must have assumed I was going to need all the help I could get.

  11

  On the way home, I stopped off at McDonald’s and bought myself a QP with cheese, an order of fries, and a medium Coke. Once I’d picked Dorothy’s hair off my lip, I steered with one hand while I munched with the other, all the time moaning with pleasure. It’s pitiful to have a life in which junk food is awarded the same high status as sex. Then again, I tend to get a lot more of the one than I do of the other. I was back in Santa Teresa by four-fifteen. The only message on my machine was from Mark Bethel, who’d finally returned my Monday-afternoon call at eleven-thirty Wednesday morning.

  I dialed his number, taking a moment to unzip my jeans and remove Mickey’s mail from my underpants. Naturally, Mark was out, so I ended up talking to Judy. “You almost caught him. He left fifteen minutes ago.”

  “Shoot. Well, I’m sorry I missed him. I just got back from Los Angeles. I have news about Mickey and I may need his help. I’m in for the afternoon. If he has a chance to call, I’d love to talk to him.”

  “I’m afraid he’s gone for the day, Kinsey, but if you like you can catch him at seven tonight at the Lampara,” she said, naming a downtown theater.

  “Doing what?” I asked, though I had a fair idea. Mark Bethel was one of fourteen Republican candidates who’d be battling it out in the primary coming up on June 3, a scant twelve days off. I’d heard four of them had been invited to debate the issues at an event being sponsored by the League for Fair Government.

  “This is a public debate: Robert Naylor, Mike Antonovich, Bobbi Fiedler, and Mark, talking about election issues.”

  “Sounds hot,” I said, thinking, Who’s kidding who? The California Secretary of State, March Fong Eu, was predicting the lowest voter turnout in forty-six years. Of the candidates Judy’d mentioned, only Mike Antonovich, the conservative L.A. County supervisor, had even a slim chance at winning. Naylor was an assemblyman from Menlo Park, the only Northern Californian in the race until Ed Zschau had stepped in. Zschau was the front-runner. Rumor had it that the San Diego Union, the San Francisco Chronicle, the San Francisco Examiner, and the Contra Costa Times were all coming out in support of him. Meanwhile, Bobbi Fiedler, a San Fernando Valley congresswoman and a seasoned politician, had had the rug pulled out from under her when a grand jury indicted her for allegedly bribing another candidate into leaving the race. The charges turned out to be groundless and had been dismissed, but her supporters had lost enthusiasm and she was having trouble recovering her momentum. As for Mark, this was his second fling at a statewide election, and he was busy pouring Laddie’s money into TV spots in which he touted himself for running such a clean campaign. Like anyone gave a shit. The notion of sitting through some droning political debate was enough to put me in a coma of my own.

  Meanwhile, Judy was saying, “Mark’s been preparing for days, mostly on Prop Fifty-one. That’s the Deep Pockets Initiative.”

  “Right.”

  “Also Props Forty-two and Forty-eight. He feels pretty strongly about those.”

  I said, “Hey, who wouldn’t?” I pushed some papers around my desk, uncovering the sample ballot under the local paper and a pile of mail. Proposition 48 would put a lid on ex-officials’ pensions. Yawn, snore. Prop 42 would authorize the state to issue $850 million in bonds to continue the Cal-Vet farm and home loan program. “I didn’t know Mark was a veteran,” I said, making conversation.

  “Oh, sure, he enlisted in the army right after his college graduation. I’ll send you a copy of his CV.”

  “You don’t have to do that,” I said.

  “It’s no trouble. I have a bunch of ’em going out in the mail. You know, he won a Purple Heart.”

  “Really, I had no idea.”

  While Judy nattered on, I found the comic section and read Rex Morgan, M.D., which was at least as interesting. Judy interrupted herself, saying, “Shoot. There goes my other phone. I better catch that in case it’s him.”

  “No problem.”

  As soon as I hung up, I propped my feet up on my desk and turned my attention to the mail I’d snitched. I picked up my letter opener and slit the envelopes. The bank statements showed regular paycheck deposits until late February, then nothing until late March, when he began to make small deposits at biweekly intervals. Unemployment benefits? I couldn’t remember how that worked. There was probably a waiting period during which claims were processed and approved. In any event, the money he was depositing wasn’t sufficient to cover his monthly expenses, and he was having to supplement the total out of his savings account. The current balance there was roughly $1,500. I’d found cash hidden on the premises, but no sign of his passbook. It would be nice to have that. I was surprised I hadn’t come across it in my initial search. The monthly statements would have to do.

  By comparing the activity in his savings and checking acco
unts, I could see the money jump from one to the other and then slide on out the door. Canceled checks indicated that he’d continued to pay as many bills as he could. His rent was $850 a month, which had last been paid March 1, according to the canceled check. Through the last half of February and the first three weeks of March, there were three checks made out to cash totaling $1,800. That seemed odd, given his financial difficulties, which were serious enough without pissing away his cash. The police probably had the April statement, so there was no way for me to tell if he’d paid rent on the first or not. My guess was that sometime in here he’d let his storage fees become delinquent.

  By April, he was already in arrears on his telephone bill, and his service must have been cut before he had a chance to catch up. The cash he’d hidden probably represented a last resort, monies he was reluctant to spend unless his situation became desperate. Maybe his intent was to disappear, once all his other funds were depleted.

  On the twenty-fifth of March, there was a one-time deposit of $900. I decided that was probably from the sale of his car. A couple of days later, on the twenty-seventh, there was a modest deposit of $200, which allowed him to pay his gas and electric bills. I did note that the $200 appeared the very day the call was made from his apartment to my machine. Someone paid him to use the phone? That would be weird. At any rate, he probably figured he could stall eviction for another month or two, at which point—what? He’d take his cash and phony documents and leave the state? Something about this gnawed at me. Mickey was a fanatic about savings. It was his contention that everyone should have a good six months’ worth of income in the bank … or under the mattress, whichever seemed safer. He was such a nut on the subject, I’d made it a practice myself since then. He had to have another savings account somewhere. Had he put the money in a CD or a pension fund at his job? I wasn’t even sure why he’d been fired. Was he drunk on duty? I sat and thought about that and then called directory assistance in Los Angeles and got the number for Pacific Coast Security in Culver City. I figured I had sufficient information to fake my way through. I knew his date of birth and his current address. His social security number would have been an asset, but all I remembered of it was the last four digits: 1776. Mickey always made a point about the numbers being the same as the year the Declaration of Independence was signed.