“Were the doors and windows locked?”
“The doors all were,” I said. “I thought all the windows were, but I can’t swear to it.”
The questioning officer, Bo Peng, just nodded as he looked around.
Right away, I thought of Larry. But Kevin knew already that he had been coming into the yard, so I decided that it was best to answer Officer Peng’s questions without volunteering anything, and trust that Kevin would know what to say about Larry.
The search moved outside very quickly, following the intruder’s escape route across the backyard and probably over the fence, then, according to the first barking dogs, down the flood control ditch behind our house, headed toward the bottom of the hill. Once the police arrived, it seemed that every dog in the neighborhood had joined the chorus.
Officers searched the entire house and yard, making sure the intruder wasn’t there. When they were certain he was gone, and hadn’t left a friend behind, Officer Peng checked all the doors and windows again, wished me good night and left.
For the rest of the night, sleep eluded me except for short naps full of bad dreams. I was hyper-aware of every sound, until about five when the neighbors began to stir. Comforted by the gentle racket of garage doors, the paperboy, and the heels of early dog walkers along the sidewalk, I fell into a deep sleep that lasted only until the trash trucks came up the street about two hours later.
First thing that Friday morning, I went for a run to clear my head. The day was still young, but already heat was building in the East Bay, drawing ocean air over San Francisco like a cold, gray shroud. Berkeley, in the north, was clear and it was still cool enough for an uphill sprint. I ran across the bottom of Grizzly Peak and over the few blocks to Indian Rock Park, where Mrs. Bartolini’s body was found.
Indian Rock Park is a volcanic outcropping of stark gray granite that juts up out of the middle of a green hillside neighborhood; it is barely one block square. We used to play there as kids. Great for hide-and-seek and climbing, and sometimes just for hanging out. I knew from the Polaroid I found in Dad’s desk that Mrs. Bartolini had been dumped near one of the park entrances. At that place, there are a park sign, a bike rack and a drinking fountain. A set of steps hewn into the granite rises from that point to give rock climbers access to the tallest of the volcanic towers. Though Mrs. B lay only a few yards from the street, she had been placed in a sort of bowl formed by large boulders so she would not have been visible to passersby.
During weekends, the park is packed with rock climbers and kids and family picnics. But on a school day, it would have been deserted except for the occasional dog walker, or soul looking for a place for quiet contemplation, or kid ditching school. There are no rest rooms and there are vigilant neighbors close by, so the park is not attractive as a haven for homeless people.
We had continued to play among the rocks after Mrs. Bartolini died, though never alone. I don’t remember anyone being afraid as much as titillated when we saw some blood on the dirt where her body had been. There wasn’t very much blood and it disappeared soon after, probably washed downhill during the next rainstorm. With great ceremony, we built a small stone cairn as a memorial at the place where the blood had been, and for a while remembered to lay flowers on it. At some point, the cairn was dismantled by some boys playing caveman war, and no one rebuilt it. I won’t say that we forgot her, because we didn’t. But I think we began to forget to remember her link to the place.
I took a drink from the nearby fountain and walked over to the site, scuffed the dirt with my toe, expecting what? A magic clue? Nothing turned up except some buried cat droppings.
The steps cut in the granite took me up to an overlook. From the top, I could not see the base of the rock where our cairn had been, but I could look down into the yards of several of the houses below. People in those yards, though they could see the taller towers and might have seen people coming and going on the street, would not have been able to see Mrs. Bartolini.
On my way down, I saw a cross chiseled with care and precision in the granite directly above her resting place. Someone had made an effort. Someone remembered.
A fresh breeze came up off the Bay. Chilled, I started for home. When I turned onto the top of our street, I saw Chuck Riley in full security guard uniform with his shoes shined and his service Beretta fastened on his belt, walking down the hill in front of me, going toward his house. Out for a little morning stroll, a visit to a neighbor’s house before work, passing out Mary Kay catalogues for his wife, in full regalia? Why not, I thought. Once a cop, always a cop.
A car came down the hill behind me. The driver-I don’t know who it was-called out, “Morning, Maggie” as it passed me. Chuck heard, turned, and headed back up the street toward me.
“Out for a run, huh?” he called out. “Nice morning for it.”
“Very nice,” I said, slowing to a walk. “You on your way to work?”
“Pretty soon.” Chuck reached the end of our front walkway before I did and waited for me. “What was all that excitement up here last night?”
“I had a break-in,” I said, still breathing hard.
“I’ll be damned. They take anything?”
“Other than my peace of mind, no, not that I’ve found,” I said, sopping up my face on my sleeve. “But there isn’t much left in the house that’s worth taking.”
“Did you see who it was?”
“No. Just shadows. I don’t know how he got in, but it looks like he went out over the back fence.”
“That would take some doing, wouldn’t it?” he said, grinning broadly. “Probably some punk kid, out looking for anything he could find. He was probably more scared of you than you were of him.”
“Small comfort,” I said.
“One way to get your peace of mind back is to install a good floor safe,” he said. “I can connect you to a reliable dealer, probably get you a nice discount.”
“I’ll think about it,” I said, but wouldn’t. The Rileys, as I remembered them both, always seemed to have something to sell or a discount they could arrange for you.
“I need to get going,” he said. “But if you have any more trouble, don’t hesitate to give me a call, Maggie. I’m just down the way and I can be here in a hurry. The neighbors have always known they can call on me any time of the day or night if they need a little help.” As emphasis, he patted the service revolver on his belt.
“Thanks,” I said. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
“And give that floor safe some serious thought.” With a wave, he turned and walked back toward his home.
After a quick shower, I fired up Mike’s pickup and started making deliveries, grateful for a reason not to be alone in the house. Books went to the library, clothes to the thrift store. And two big boxes piled high with fresh garden vegetables went to a soup kitchen in the basement of an old church in downtown Oakland.
Juggling the heavy produce boxes, one on each arm, I managed to get down the back stairs and into the large community room without either falling or dropping anything; my arms were sore from lifting and carrying the day before.
As I set the boxes on the first table I came to, I heard a familiar voice call out.
“Hey, McGurk.” Father John, once my parents’ parish priest, leaned through the service window from the kitchen. He had a white paper cap on his head and an apron over the jeans and polo shirt he wore that day instead of his usual white cassock, looking fairly convincingly like kitchen help. “How long since your last confession?”
“I don’t know, Padre,” I said. “What year is this?”
“I thought so.” He grinned at me as I rubbed a kink out of my arm. He looked fine, a little pale, thinner, certainly older. I hadn’t seen him since my sister’s funeral six years earlier. “What’d you bring me?”