He bustled back into the kitchen, brandishing a section of the San Francisco Chronicle. “It’s a backgrounder for a news item on the theft of two containers of Tanqueray gin from Circle Wharf and Warehouse in Alameda last Thursday,” he announced. “Seems like somebody made off with two forty-foot containerized shipments of the stuff, worth around four hundred and sixty thousand dollars.”
He riffled through the pages of the paper. “Anyhow, what’s interesting is the statistics on cargo pilferage in the background story. Listen to this: for the ports of San Francisco, Oakland and Alameda, and the two airports, cargo pilferage amounted to $194,966 last year alone — and they say that figure is only eighty percent accurate. Wow, that latest theft is really going to boost this year’s figure!”
Wide awake and bright-eyed, Hank pored over the article, picking out statistics with his forefinger. “Catch this quote, will you! ‘Any veteran of the waterfront will tell you he doesn’t take anything, but he has plenty of co-workers who consider pilfering little more than a fringe benefit.’ ”
I yawned. “That’s how Neverman described it.”
“They say it’s hard to locate the weak link in the security chain — it can be in the freight station itself, after cargo clears Customs, with the truckers, or at the consignee’s own warehouse after the merchandise is accepted.”
I yawned again.
“Circle Wharf and Warehouse also recently lost fifty-one bags of Colombian coffee worth twenty thousand dollars. That much for only fifty-one bags! No wonder it’s so expensive. Corned beef is another item that’s pilfered a lot. I wonder why...” He paused, frowning at me. “Am I keeping you up?”
“As a matter of fact, I wonder if I could sleep on the couch tonight?”
He grinned. “Sorry. I do have a tendency to ramble on into the wee hours. I’ll get you some blankets.”
I cleared the coffee mugs and, when Hank delivered the bedding, curled up on the long leather sofa in the combination living-and-waiting room. My head still spun. It definitely must be the brandy, I decided, as I fell into a deep sleep.
18
I awakened the next morning to a big brown eye staring unblinkingly into mine. Soft little breaths tickled my face.
A voice spoke in Chinese, and the eye disappeared. I jerked upright and saw a small girl scamper across the room to where her mother sat knitting. She scolded the child and pulled her into the chair beside her.
I shrank back down and looked at my watch. Almost ten o’clock. What were they doing, letting me oversleep in the waiting room with the clients!
Hastily, I got up and gathered the blankets. “Rough night — busy litigating,” I muttered as I backed out the door.
Halfway down the hall, I bumped into Hank. He had my bag and jacket in hand. “Here, take these. Give me those blankets,” he commanded.
“What? What’s...”
“Greg’s out front. Ted’s stalling him. You’d better get out of here, if you don’t want to wind up your investigation in a cell.”
“Oh, Lord! Thanks. I...”
“Go!”
I crashed through the waiting room and the kitchen to the service porch. As I went out the back gate and climbed the hill, I wondered what the client with the little girl had thought. If she’d been there before, she was probably used to all sorts of strange behavior.
The stone steps were slippery with fine, gray rain, a rarity for the month of June. When I reached my MG, I ran the defroster for a few minutes. My face looked pasty in the rear-view mirror, and my hair was tangled and snarled. I brushed it, which helped some. I could still do with a toothbrush, a bath, and a change of clothes. A couple of aspirin wouldn’t hurt either.
So Greg was anxious to locate me. That meant he probably had a man on my apartment. The last thing I needed this morning was to unravel my complicated discovery for Greg, and lose time explaining why I’d fled the scene of a crime, an offense for which I could lose my license. The only way out of this jam was to find the killer and present him to Greg like a box of See’s candy.
I drove to Guerrero Street, cursing the wiper blades that never got the windshield clear. Sure enough, a vehicle with the unmistakable aura of unmarked cop car stood at my curb. Head averted, I went on to the intersection.
The Superette was a hive of activity. Trucks from the Produce Terminal, the bakeries and the grocery wholesalers double parked, unloading crates onto the wet sidewalk. Mr. Moe scurried about, dragging them in from the rain. The grocer looked none the worse for his late-night mission.
When the light changed, I turned left, toward the alley behind my building. The apartments were built on two levels, with a three-car garage at the rear. I glanced up at my window, over the garage. The draperies were tightly drawn. No one who resembled a cop lurked in the alley.
I pulled the MG behind the trash bins and followed a narrow passageway to Tim O’Riley’s apartment at the front of the basement near the furnace room. Tapping on his door, I glanced around nervously. Tim answered right away.
“You!” he exclaimed, regarding me with censorious bloodshot eyes.
“Sssh!” I pushed past him. “Lock the door quick!”
Frowning, he did as I told him. “You’re in a whole peck of trouble, you know.”
“I know. Where’s the cop?”
“In the lobby. Jesus, this place is practically turning into a branch of the morgue. You really kill her?”
“Of course not! They just want to ask me some questions.”
Tim looked dubious. “You know something?”
“They think I do.”
“How come your boyfriend isn’t sticking up for you? He’s a cop.”
Greg wouldn’t stick up for me, not after what I’d done. He’d be more likely to start proceedings to yank my license. I ignored Tim’s question and glanced around the apartment. It was smaller than mine, with pale-green cinderblock walls. Tim had decorated with bullfight posters and those hideous paintings on velvet that were the pride of any Mexican border town. On every surface stood souvenirs of his yearly fishing trips to Mexico — mostly ashtrays lifted from cheap motels.
In a moment, Tim flung out his arms resignedly. “Since you’re here, you want a brew?”
“I don’t think so, not this early. Do you have any coffee?”
“Never touch the stuff, but I think there’s some instant. Myself, I’m having a beer. Might as well start the day right.”
From his breath, he already had.
I sat down on a rattan chair. When Tim came back, I asked, “What are your chances of going up to my place and getting me a change of clothes?”
“Zilch. That cop would catch on in a flash if I was to stroll through the lobby with an armful of ladies’ duds.”
“True.” I stirred my coffee. “Have you seen Linnea this morning?”
“Nope. She must be sleeping it off. She was really stinko last night when your boyfriend talked to her. Was downright nasty to him, as a matter of fact.”
“She’s got reason to be.” I recalled Linnea’s account of her previous meeting with Greg. “Well, I guess I’m stuck with these clothes. Do you think I could wash up?”
There was a knock at the door.
Tim and I stared wide-eyed at one another.
“In the closet,” he whispered, yanking me up and pushing me toward a curtained-off alcove.
I leaped in there and stood, wrapped in the embrace of Tim’s only suit.