“She won’t talk about the boy?”
“She’s still pretty much out of it. The only thing she did mention was her mother disappearing. Did that come up here?”
“Never that I heard but she might’ve told one of the other girls. They have all kinds of stories, our residents. Which isn’t to say none are true — hey, maybe that’s why she invades other people’s territory, trying to make it back home symbolically or something? How’s that for pop psychology? Think I can get my own talk show?”
I smiled.
“I shouldn’t joke but it helps,” she said. “I’m just the fool who took this job because my teaching position at Northridge was X’d out.”
Milo said, “Hardly.”
“Pardon?”
“You don’t seem like a fool to me, ma’am. What’d you teach?”
“Public administration. I’m an organizer, never done a minute of therapy. Not officially, anyway.”
He said, “But you still get to go home every night knowing you did something important.”
Sherry Andover stared at him then she blushed. “That’s got to be the sweetest thing anyone’s said to me since my husband proposed — and I won’t tell you how that worked out. You single?”
Milo smiled and shook his head.
She said, “Okay, I’ll take important. And now good manners means I have to say the same applies to you. Which it does. To both of you.” She laughed harder. “Look at us, a bunch of saints.”
As we drove away, Milo said, “Why’d you ask her about booze and dope?”
“Zelda got busted for drunk and disorderly twice, and I’m wondering if she’ll head for some dive bar if she grows restless.”
“Or to someone’s backyard.”
“That, too.”
“I wouldn’t overthink it, Alex. Like I told you, enforcement’s political and people like her don’t get put through Breathalyzers, they just get hauled in. The arresting officers were looking for a charge to pin on her so they called her drunk.”
“So I shouldn’t pub-hop?”
He laughed. “That’s a separate issue. What next, fellow important person?”
Chapter 10
Back at the station, we agreed there was little left to do.
Milo would check with Central Division to see if anyone remembered Zelda and Ovid and I’d go “the glam route,” trying to reach someone associated with SubUrban.
After that, it would be time to back away.
He was telling the truth. I, not so much.
Moments after he dropped me off I was compiling a list of California boarding schools that accepted pre-adolescents. Workable list: thirty-nine institutions, with student bodies ranging from the intellectually gifted to kids with special needs — mostly defined as learning disabilities and/or weight problems. The latter I eliminated, which cut the roster by fifteen.
Nearly every school was situated where land was plentiful and scenic. When tuition rates were posted, they were at Ivy League levels. Maybe Zelda had managed to create an educational fund before her breakdown, even hired a trustee to guard Ovid’s welfare.
Or...
I got to work, spinning the same story to receptionist after receptionist: I was Ovid Chase’s uncle, his mother had just been hospitalized for an acute ailment (“Ovid knows the details”) and needed to talk to her son. Reactions were invariably sympathetic but when records were checked and Ovid’s name didn’t show up, confusion gave way to suspicion and I hung up, thankful my home number was blocked.
Two-plus hours of utter failure. I called Kevin Bracht and asked how Zelda was doing.
“No change, Doc, would’ve called you if there was. I could go in and try to talk to her but I figure let sleeping patients lie.”
“Agreed. I’ll be by tomorrow to take her to a placement I found. Anything else I should know, Kevin?”
“Just that it’s extremely weird being here at night. The Hyphen and her secretary leave at four and the building’s locked up tight. I have a key but I’m starting to feel I’m the 5150. So please, Doc. Rescue me.”
“Will do,” I said. “Try to have a good dinner.”
“You bet,” said Bracht. “Found a few fancy places on the take-out list. I’m looking forward to steak and lobster, courtesy of the federal government.”
“Bon appétit.”
“Might as well be bon something.”
Partial episodes of SubUrban were all over the Internet. I was about to view one when Robin came into my office and ruffled my hair.
“Can I distract you long enough for dinner?”
I glanced at my desk clock. Just after eight p.m. “Where we going?”
“Thirty feet away. I barbecued some chicken.”
“Oh. Great, thanks — I’d have been happy to help.”
She smiled. “I looked in on you an hour ago and saw a man possessed.”
I hadn’t seen or heard her. “More like dispossessed.”
“Of what?”
“Progress.”
That sounded like Milo but Robin was kind enough not to point it out. I got up and drew her to me and kissed her. When we broke, she was breathless and laughing. “Nice to be appreciated, but maybe you should wait to taste the chicken.”
The meal was great, my token contribution clearing and loading the dishwasher, then mixing us a couple of Sidecars. “Let’s drink out by the pond, handsome. It’s a nice night.”
Still trying to settle me down.
She’d probably suggest a bath before bedtime. The only person who ever cared much about me. I kept her drink light, tossed extra brandy into mine.
We settled by the water’s edge, sipped and watched the fish create gentle eddies.
I reached for Robin’s hand, said the right things, made the right facial expressions.
When we returned to the house, she said, “I haven’t bathed yet.”
The next morning at eight I caught Milo at home and asked him to get the details of Zelda’s Bel Air arrest.
“Why?”
“Sherry Andover’s questions about violence stuck with me. I’d like to be on solid ground.”
An hour later, he got back to me. “The female resident heard noise in the backyard and went out and found Zelda crouched in a corner. Zelda stood up and began waving her hands and screaming ‘horribly.’ That woke the male up and he overpowered Zelda, who tried to fight him off while his girlfriend dialed 911. Does that change anything?”
“It could be worse,” I said, “but compared with her previous arrests, it’s a step in the wrong direction.”
“Speaking of previous, no one at Central remembers her and there’s no record of her ever having a kid with her. But I was half wrong about no alcohol testing. They took blood from her the second time and she popped a .21.”
“Serious intoxication.”
“Yeah and there’s more. She was also positive for heroin and meth. No needle marks, so she sniffed. That’s a nasty combination, couldn’t have done much for her mental status.”
“I’ll call Andover and tell her. If she turns Zelda down, I’ll come up with something else.”
“You’re really carrying this woman, Alex. Is it something about her or just the kid?”
“Mostly the kid,” I said. “But maybe she’s also gotten to me — the plunge from what she was to who she is now. She was gorgeous, now she looks like a crone.”
“The street can do that to you.”
I said, “I need to disengage, huh?”
“Maybe if you do find out the kid’s okay, it wouldn’t be a bad idea.”
“That doesn’t look likely.” I told him about striking out at boarding schools.