“Ranch?”
“You don’t know about that?”
“No. There was no mention of it on his application.”
“Place called Seaview Ranch, somewhere near Mendocino. The village, I mean. Carl bought it about six months ago — his weekend retreat, so he says.”
“An expensive piece of property?”
“I don’t know what he paid for it, but you can’t buy real estate anywhere in California these days without shelling out a good piece of change for it.”
“True enough. Is there anything else you can tell me about Mr. Emerson that my company ought to know?”
“I can’t think of anything, no.” Bexley consulted his watch. “I have an appointment at eleven; I can just make it if I leave now. If you don’t have any more questions, Mr. Rable...”
“I think that’s about it,” I said. I put the notebook and pen away, and when I stood up Bexley did the same.
He said, “I’d like to ask you a question.”
“Go right ahead.”
“Are Carl’s policy applications going to go through?”
“That’s not up to me. I’m just a field investigator.”
“But you do recommend acceptance or denial?”
“In some cases, yes.”
“What I’ve just told you... will it have a bearing on your recommendation in this case?”
“It might. I still have other people to see.”
“Well, I hope I’ve been of some help,” he said.
“You have, and I appreciate it.”
“My pleasure.” He smiled at me. There was a kind of satisfaction in the smile, as if he thought maybe he’d said enough to turn me against Emerson and the prospect pleased him. “If you’ll just wait while I say good-bye to my wife, I’ll walk out with you.”
“Fine.”
He disappeared again into the back of the house, and after a moment I heard him talking to Mrs. Bexley. The North Coast Insurance card was on the table next to his armchair, where he’d put it when he sat down; I moved over there and picked it up and slipped it into my pocket. I was standing by the door when Bexley returned. He didn’t even look at the table as he caught up his briefcase.
Outside, he shook my hand and gave me another smile before he went to open his garage. He was in a much better mood than when I’d arrived. I may not have made his wife’s day, but I had sure made Bexley’s.
Now, I thought as I walked to my car, let’s see if somebody can make mine.
Thirteen
Twenty-eight sixty Vallejo-Street turned out to be an old brick apartment building at the foot of Russian Hill, just above the Broadway tunnel. The bank of mailboxes on the porch confirmed that Jeanne Emerson lived in 4B, but there was no answer when I pushed the doorbell next to her nameplate. It figured she had a job somewhere, being divorced, which meant she probably wouldn’t be home until later in the day. I could have canvassed her neighbors to find out where she worked, but it seemed a better idea to wait. I wanted to talk to her in private; people are much more apt to be candid in their own homes than in their places of business, particularly when you were trying to get them to discuss their personal lives.
I drove through the tunnel to Montgomery and then swung around to Portsmouth Square. By the time I got into the garage and parked the car, it was almost eleven-thirty. From a phone booth I called Leo Vail at Waller & Company, identified myself as Andrew James, and asked him what else he’d been able to find out about Mid-Pacific Electronics.
“Not much, I’m afraid,” he said. “As I indicated to you yesterday, they’re quite a successful firm already and promise to be even more successful once they expand. Of course, a lot depends on their methods of expansion; they could be too ambitious, get in over their heads. But on the face of it, I think I can recommend purchase once their stock goes on sale.”
“What about Carl Emerson?” I asked. “I’ve done some checking on my own and I understand he’s something of a reckless sort.”
“If that’s the case,” Vail said, “your sources are better than mine. As far as I’ve been able to determine, Emerson and his partners have built Mid-Pacific on sound, shrewd business acumen.”
“Well, it doesn’t really matter. I’ve pretty much made up my mind to go ahead in any case.” I thanked him again, told him I would be in touch when Mid-Pacific made their official announcement, and hung up before he could ask me for an address and a telephone number.
There were fewer people in Portsmouth Square today, because of the fog and the raw wind off the bay. I cut through there to Grant Avenue. It gave me an odd feeling to be back in Chinatown, after what had happened yesterday and last night; I kept thinking this or that Chinese was looking at me as I passed, as if I wore some sort of brand that marked me as an enemy. Paranoia again, But the .38 on my belt was a reassuring weight just the same.
On Jackson, I walked down the narrow alley and into the passageway to Kam Fong’s door. But he wasn’t home today either; the same old woman stuck her head out of the same second-floor window and told me that in her broken English. Which left another visit to the Mandarin Café. If that was Fong’s regular noonday haunt, it was a good bet I’d find him there; my watch said that it was almost twelve.
Because it was still early, the Mandarin was only three-quarters full. I scanned the patrons from just inside the door; Fong wasn’t among them. There was an empty table along the near side wall, and I went over there and sat down to wait. I had nowhere else to go. If he didn’t show up by one o’clock, I would have to go back and camp on his doorstep; but that was something to worry about if and when the time came.
When one of the waiters came around I ordered a pot of tea and a bowl of soup. It was too warm in there again; I shrugged out of my overcoat. That made the arm sling even more prominent, and once more I had the feeling that some of the Chinese customers were giving me covert looks. Cut it out, I told myself. They’re just people. There’s no sinister alliance among the Chinese population; that’s a lot of racial crap and you know it. The only Chinese you’ve got to worry about are Jimmy Quon and his pals in Hui Sip.
The waiter brought my order. I managed to get most of the soup down, and I was working on the tea, watching the door, when Kam Fong blew in.
He took half a dozen steps toward the rear, saw me, did an almost comic double take, and reversed direction like a soldier doing an about-face on a parade ground. I got to him just as he was reaching for the doorknob. I caught hold of his arm and wedged him against the door with the right side of my body.
“You’re not going anywhere, Fong,” I said in an undertone. “We’ve got things to talk about.”
His eyes slid away from my face, rolled in a furtive glance over my shoulder. “Not here. Not talking here.”
“Where, then?”
It took him a couple of seconds to think of a place. “Cultural Center. You know it?”
“I know it.”
“Fifteen minutes. You come there, yes?”
He made a move for the doorknob again, but I held onto him. “If you don’t show up, Fong, I’ll come looking for you.”
He bobbed his head up and down. I let him go, and he was through the door and away in two seconds. When I turned around one of the waiters and two or three patrons were looking at me; but their faces showed nothing more than curiosity. As soon as I returned to my table, they went back to minding their own business. End of incident.
I finished the rest of my tea, paid the bill, and made my way back to Portsmouth Square. On the east side of it, above the garage, an elevated pedestrian causeway spanned Kearny Street and led to the Financial District branch of the Holiday Inn; the Chinese Cultural Center was at the end of the causeway, on an upper floor of the hotel building. I crossed over and went inside.