“I been busy. Didn’t have time to eat before.”
The weary-looking waitress came, and Neverman ordered a hamburger and fries. I asked for a Coke. When the food came, Neverman lubricated everything with catsup and dove in.
“So,” he said, his mouth full, “you decide to take me up on my offer after all?”
“What offer?”
“Jesus!” He rolled his eyes exaggeratedly. “I make a pass and you forget it. What in hell did I ever see in you anyway?”
“You were pretty stoned last night.”
“That must’ve been it.”
“So the food at the Blind Center’s bad?” I asked, to keep the conversation rolling.
“Yeah. You’d think they’d try to make it good. Those loonies over there don’t have many other pleasures.”
“Loonies like Sebastian, you mean.”
He squeezed more catsup onto his plate. “Yeah, like Sebastian.”
“What do you think of him, anyway?”
He glanced up briefly. “Like I said last night, he’s like something out of the Addams Family. But most of them are. I guess if you can’t see, you got a right to be crazy.”
“Well, Herb Clemente is sane, at least,” I said. “I hear you’ve known him a long time.”
“Right,” he said guardedly.
“Since he counseled you when you got out of prison.”
He paused, hamburger halfway to his mouth. “Anya did tell you,” he said flatly. “Herb wouldn’t. It had to be her.”
I shrugged. “What does it matter who told me?”
“Ah, that bitch. She can’t keep her yap shut. Always got to tell people what rotten old Jeffrey did to her. ‘Jeffrey went and got arrested on me. I waited for him all the time he was in jail, and then he left me. Rotten, horrible Jeffrey.’ ” Again, his harsh whine sounded remarkably like his wife.
“Do you blame her?” I asked.
“I blame me for getting mixed up with her in the first place.”
“And for getting arrested?”
He heaved a sigh. “You sure are one-track. So I took a few things. Overloads. I’d short a customer now and then. Everybody does it. They’ve even got a name for it in the business — truckers’ shortages. They expect it, it’s built into their cost. Why should I be the one to get caught?”
“Just unlucky, I guess.”
He shoved his plate away. “Look, Ms. Private Eye, don’t sit there so smug. I took a fall for a lot of guys. Plenty of them were selling their overloads. We had regular setups with fences, regular prices. But who gets caught? Me. No trucking line would even hire me to sweep their loading dock now.”
“Clemente hired you.”
“Herb was upset that his counseling didn’t work. I just can’t get it together any more, and that’s a blow to Herb’s professional pride, so he took me in and made me his trained monkey. I got no illusions about Herb’s reasons.” Neverman stood up, pulling a couple of dollar bills from his jeans and tossing them on the table. One settled on his catsup-smeared plate. “Got to go.” He turned and strode out of the cafe.
I rescued the bill from the pool of catsup and looked at the check. Neverman hadn’t left enough to cover his meal. Sighing, I took the additional amount, plus the price of my Coke, from my bag. Call it a business expense, Sharon.
And now make it your business to find out more about the Sunrise Blind Center. There’s something going on there that even your twenty-twenty vision can’t see.
13
It was four o’clock when I returned to All Souls, where I could use the phone for free before business hours were over. I called the state Department of Health in Sacramento and, after being put on hold six times, finally reached the woman who had information on the Sunrise Blind Center.
My dear Uncle Jim, I explained — with mental apologies to that gentleman — had been blinded in an accident. His doctor had referred him to the Center. I had toured it and spoken with the director this afternoon, but I still had reservations. What could she tell me about the place?
Again on hold, I waited for her to fetch a file. I doubted I would learn anything revealing, but the possibility was worth the long-distance charge.
The woman came back on the line. Sunrise Blind Center had had an outstanding rehabilitation rate in the three years since its present director, Mr. Herbert Clemente, had taken over. The average period of time in which a resident returned to the community was less than a year. Both state and federal grants for the Center had recently been renewed.
And Mr. Clemente? I asked. What were his qualifications?
A rattling of paper. Mr. Clemente had a distinguished record of community service work. His B.A. in psychology was from California State University at Long Beach. He had served as a prison guard for five years, then run a halfway house for ex-convicts, and finally headed up a job-training and counseling program for parolees.
I wrote the word “parolees” on my legal pad and doodled a box around it as she talked. “The uncertainty of the length of time my Uncle Jim would have to remain at the Center disturbs me,” I said stuffily when she had finished. “It’s all well and good to speak of averages, but I know for a fact there’s one man at the Center who’s been in residence since Mr. Clemente became director.”
A pause. “I don’t have information on the individual patients, ma’am.”
“Well, from your experience with this — and similar — programs, wouldn’t you say that’s an awfully long time?”
“Is the man severely handicapped?”
“Mr. Clemente described him as a very able worker.”
“Perhaps, then, there’s some problem that isn’t readily observable. I suggest you take it up with Mr. Clemente.”
I thanked her for the information and hung up.
“Parolees.”
I stared down at the word, then went to Hank’s office and stuck my head in the door.
“What’s the name of your friend at the Department of Corrections?”
Hank looked up, owlish behind his thick glasses. “Dave Gardner. Why? What’re you doing here? I thought you were investigating that murder.”
“I am. Thanks.”
Back in my office, I dialed the Department of Corrections and got Dave Gardner on the line. He’d done Hank many a favor in the past, and was glad to look up Jeffrey Neverman’s record for me.
“It’s not bad, as they go,” he commented when he returned to the phone. “A couple of minor jail terms for D and D about ten years ago. Just brawls at a tavern over a waitress. Then the big one, grand theft. He drew three-to-five on that, was released two years ago September, and he’s been a good boy ever since.”
“What are the specifics on his offense?”
“He was caught ripping off merchandise from the truck line he drove for. It’s a common practice, but the company decided to make an example of Neverman and prosecuted to the fullest. Your boy’s just not lucky.”
That was what Neverman thought too. I thanked Dave for his help, and he asked me to tell Hank he’d stop by sometime next week.
“I hope you’ll be around the office, too,” he added. “After all I’ve heard, I’d like to meet you.”
What had Hank told him? Afraid to ask, I merely said I’d like to meet him too.
Now for Sebastian. His long stay at the Blind Center puzzled me. Clemente had said the brush man had been blinded in an explosion at an oil refinery. There were a number of those dotting the shores of the Bay near Richmond and the Carquinez Straits, and a personnel department could tell me...
I stopped, chagrined. I didn’t know Sebastian’s last name.
Who would know? Who could I call without tipping off Clemente that I was prying into the Center’s business?
I called the Albatross Superette. Mr. Moe answered, sounding rushed. Sebastian’s last name was Hetzer. H-e-t-z-e-r. Why did I need to know?