“The bed, sí.”
“Where was the chair he’d been sitting in?”
“Como?”
“Was it on the floor too, knocked over?”
“No. At the table. Both chairs.”
“Close to the table, you mean?”
“Sí, close.”
“The things he was using to clean his gun — rags, oil, things like that. Were some of them on the floor?”
“I doan think so.”
“All still on the table?”
“Sí.”
“Knocked over, scattered around?”
Blank look, another headshake; she said something in Spanish to the older woman, who shrugged and remained silent. The older one didn’t want any part of this interrogation.
I said patiently to Carmelita, “When you bump into a table, the things that are on it sometimes fall over, even if they don’t roll off onto the floor. Comprende?”
“Sí.”
“Is that the way the things on the table looked?”
“No, señor. Everything... you know, not fall over.”
Battle hadn’t mentioned the burning cigarette to me; or the positioning of the chairs and the body; or the fact that the cleaning supplies were still in order on the table. Maybe he hadn’t seen anything suspicious in any of that or all of it combined. But I did. Why would anyone clean a handgun with a lighted cigarette in his hand or mouth? Cleaning fluid is flammable, for one thing. And you need clear eyes and both hands free throughout the process to do a proper job. It wasn’t inconceivable that a distracted, obsessive man would make the mistake of lighting up; in fact, it could’ve been the cigarette that led to an accidental firing of the weapon — smoke getting in his eyes, hot ash dropping on his hand, that kind of thing. Still, it didn’t feel right to me. None of it did. If he’d been sitting at or close to the table when the gun went off, the impact of the bullet would have kicked both him and the chair backward, toppled both to the floor. Chances were he’d have also whacked the table in reflex, sent some or all of the supplies toppling over and off. The fact that none of that had happened said to me he’d either been standing when the slug hit him, or he’d been perched on the edge of the bed — and it didn’t make much sense that a man would stand up to clean a weapon, or sit to do the job five feet from where the supplies were...
The two women were watching me, Carmelita fidgeting and the older one in a kind of rigid, waiting-to-be-activated posture not unlike the vacuum cleaner. I smiled at them and said, “That’s all, you can go back to work now,” and plucked a pair of sawbucks out of my wallet and handed one to each woman. “Mil gracias.”
They looked at the money, at me, at each other. Their expressions were mirror images — an openmouthed mixture of incredulity and awe. An Anglo policeman who spoke Spanish, even if it was of the schoolbook variety, and handed out ten-dollar bills for no apparent reason? In their world, the not-so-brave new world of Los Estados Unidos, it was as much a miracle as any they were ever likely to encounter.
16
Geyserville. Village a dozen miles or so north of Healdsburg, at the upper end of the Alexander Valley. Surrounded by wineries, vineyards, long stretches of flatland and low rounded hills. Tucked away in the hills were numerous mineral hot springs that gave the hamlet its name. Friend, fellow investigator, and licensed pilot Sharon McCone, who has flown over the area on her way to a Mendocino County retreat she shares with her significant other, once told me that from the air you can not only see and even smell steam rising from the underground springs, but also see a huge network of PG&E pipelines and energy-harnessing pumping stations. From ground level around Geyserville, though, your only view is of mostly pastoral countryside split by the concrete corridors of Highway 101.
The village is laid out along the east side of the freeway — a few dozen buildings, most flanking Geyserville Avenue and old enough to give the place a 1940s aspect that I found appealing. There were a couple of service stations, the one affiliated with the American Automobile Association, Kane’s Towing and Service, on the south end. I’d found that out by calling Triple A from the car phone on my way up. The service truck and driver were out on a call when I rolled in at one-thirty; wouldn’t be back until after two, the manager informed me. So I left the car there and walked back to the only restaurant, a well-regarded Italian place I’d eaten in a time or two, and killed forty minutes over a bowl of minestrone and some sourdough French bread. When I got back to the station, the tow truck was just pulling in.
The driver’s name was Pete Flynn. Three or four years younger than me, with a substantial pot belly that made him seem bigger than he was and hair, eyebrows, and mustache all growing in wild tangles, like brush on a boulder. He was the garrulous type, always a fortunate draw when you’re hunting information.
“Sure,” he said, “I’m the guy took that call last week. Mule Deer Road, right?”
“Gail Kendall, two-fifteen Mule Deer Road.” Tamara had gotten the address for me.
“Some name. The road, I mean. Ain’t been a mule deer out that way in forty years. You another cop?” He grinned. “ ’Scuse me, officer of the law.”
“No. Private investigator.”
“Yeah, huh? How come you’re askin’ same as the cops?”
“Insurance matter,” I lied.
“Insurance,” he said, as if it were a synonym for the next word out of his mouth. “Shit. One of ’em screwed my brother-in-law big time three years back. Fell off the roof of his house, up there puttin’ new shingles on, busted both his legs and couldn’t do nothing but sit around in a body cast for six months. Bastards wouldn’t pay off. Said he was drunk. Hot day, man works through a six-pack or two, that ain’t drunk. I ast you — you think that’s drunk?”
“Depends on your brother-in-law’s capacity for beer.”
“Capacity? Put my money on Hank against all comers in a chuggin’ contest. Buncha freakin’ crooks, you ask me. Insurance companies.”
“Some are worse than others,” I said agreeably.
“But not yours, huh?”
“Mine, too. I work for more than one. Freelance.”
“Then you ain’t exactly one of ’em. Man’s got to work, I don’t hold that against nobody. What was it you wanted to ast me?”
“About the Kendall service call.”
“What about it?”
“What time did she call in? Can you look up the exact time for me?”
“Don’t have to look it up,” Flynn said. “I remember on account of the sheriff’s boys ast me when they come around. Eight-fifteen, ayem. On the nose.”
Eight-fifteen. And Erskine had been shot at seven-forty. The timing, at least, didn’t rule out Kendall as a suspect. I asked, “What time’d you get out to her house?”
“Musta been about eight-thirty. Left right away, takes maybe fifteen minutes to get to Mule Deer Road from here.”
“And Gail Kendall was there waiting for you?”
“Sure. Out in the driveway, standin’ next to her car. Ford Taurus. Piece of crap, the Ford Taurus. Buy American, I believe in that, I own a Chewy myself, but a piece of crap is a piece of crap, no matter who makes it.”
“The car had a dead battery, is that right?”
“Dead as hell. Couldn’t raise a spark with the single cables. I hadda put the double jumpers on to get any juice.” Ridges appeared in the leathery skin of his forehead; he scratched his tangle of reddish hair with a dirty fingernail. “Funny thing, though.”
“What is?”
“Bugger was old and corroded, older than the damn car, looked like. But she musta got a spark out of it in the garage before she called us.”