“I really don’t.”
“You’re being nice,” she said. “I am. I was. I didn’t know what I was doing. I trusted Pineda. He was a lawyer.”
“That seems like the worst reason to trust someone.”
Elvira cackled. “I like you.”
“What happened when you got there?”
“Oh, it was terrible. That road — have you seen it?”
I shook my head.
She mimed puking. “Like a roller coaster. It took hours, my car was overheating. I get to the town and there’s no houses. There’s no buildings. It’s just trees and trees and dirt and trees and dirt, and everywhere plastic signs sticking up, with numbers. I drove around in circles till I found it. Sea Otter Lane. Eighty-one, seventy-nine... Seventy-one, that’s mine. But there’s nothing.”
“Was there supposed to be something? I thought it was an empty lot.”
“Yeah. But this is nothing. It’s a big hole. Like there was an earthquake.”
Arenhold, in his deposition, had stated: The disclosures explicitly indicate that heavy seasonal precipitation poses an erosion risk and that the buyer is therefore advised to conduct an independent soil survey.
“It doesn’t look like the pictures,” she said.
I further made explicit to Ms. Dela Cruz that those images are meant to give a sense of the geology and biodiversity of the region as a whole, rather than referring to any plot in particular.
“I was in shock,” she said.
“I bet.”
“I had my camera with me. I brought it to take a picture to put on my wall at home. Instead,” she said, giggling, “I took pictures of the hole.”
“I’m amazed you can laugh about it.”
“I wasn’t laughing then, I was crying. When I finished taking pictures of the hole, I got in my car. It won’t start.”
“Oh no.”
“Oh yes,” she said gleefully. “I didn’t have a phone, either. So I walked.”
“Where?”
“I don’t know, I just started walking and crying. I got lost. I wanted to lie down and die. A truck comes by and a man rolls down the window. ‘What’s wrong, miss?’ ”
“Who was he?”
“He didn’t say his name. But he was handsome, too. I told him there’s a hole in my land and my car won’t start. He smiled and said, ‘Hop in.’ It was stupid, to go with a strange man.”
“You were stuck.”
“Yup. He drove me to my car. He couldn’t get it to start, either. He said he would take me to his friend who’s a mechanic.”
I said, “There are no houses but there was a mechanic.”
“Well, when he started driving, then I saw some houses. They’re in another part of town, close to the water. The mechanic tows my car to his garage, puts coolant in. Four hundred dollars.”
“For a bottle of coolant.”
“And to tow.”
“That’s crazy.”
“Oh yes,” she said. “But he had my keys, what was my choice? I wrote him a check and drove away as fast as I could. When I got home I showed the pictures of the hole to my sister’s husband. He’s an engineer. He laughed at me. ‘Elvira, you can’t build here. They cheated you.’ I went back to Pineda. ‘You need to sue them and get my money.’ He said he can’t do that, he’s Bill’s lawyer, too. It’s a conflict of interest. He told me he can’t be my lawyer anymore.”
“Did you try to find another one?”
“I couldn’t afford it. Everyone I talked to told me to forget it. But it made me so mad. So I did it myself. More stupid. I lost and I had to pay Pineda even more.”
“I’m so sorry you had to go through this.”
She swirled a piece of bok choy in broth. “Boo-hoo.”
“Ms. Dela Cruz, do you know a woman named Marisol Santos Salvador?”
“I don’t think so.”
“This is her,” I said, showing a picture.
Elvira popped the bok choy into her mouth, chewed. “Okay, yes.”
“You do know her?”
“She was a patient of Dr. Quinio,” she said. “I remember her teeth.”
Chapter 5
The Law Offices of Rolando Pineda and Associates occupied a second-floor suite above a bakery on Mission Street — the same bakery, perhaps, where Marisol used to buy her day-old bread. I climbed the steps through a heady aroma of butter and toasted coconut.
The door displayed Pineda’s name in gilt. No word on who the associates were.
As I entered, the receptionist whirled around in her chair, as though I’d caught her napping. She was in her sixties, wearing a leopard-print blouse. Big-bodied, with a big blond bouffant.
“Can I help you?”
“My name is Clay Edison. I’m a private investigator. I’m here to speak with Mr. Pineda.”
“Do you have an appointment?”
“No.”
“What is this regarding?”
“Marisol Santos Salvador.”
“Have a seat, please.”
She went through an interior door, returned. “I’m sorry, Mr. Pineda isn’t available.”
“It’ll only take a second.”
“He’s out of the office.”
“Then who are you talking to back there?”
She tried to look authoritative but fell far short. “You’ll have to make an appointment.”
“How about tomorrow?”
“We don’t have any openings.”
“You’re not even going to check the calendar?”
“It’s a very busy day.”
“What’s the first available?”
“I’m afraid we’re not taking new clients.”
“I’m not a client.” I shouted over her head: “Mr. Pineda, I need to talk to you.”
“Please keep your voice down.”
“Tell him it’s about Swann’s Flat. Tell him William C. Arenhold sent me.”
She blanched and disappeared again. When she came back she didn’t say anything, just held the door.
Chris had described Rolando Pineda as not totally with it. To me he appeared perfectly sharp: younger than his eighty-five years, with dyed-black hair and a pencil mustache, eyes set deep in a vaguely saurian face. Framed photos, taken over decades of evolving fashion, showcased his longevity.
Pineda, shaking hands with a mitered bishop.
Pineda, cutting the ribbon on a baseball field.
Receiving an award for civic leadership.
In full-dress uniform, waving from a Veterans Day float.
An enlarged copy of a check for $2.2 million hung beside diplomas from Loyola Law School and Cal State Fresno and his license from the State Bar of California.
“You gave my girl quite a turn.” He folded his hands over a concave belly. “She has a heart condition. You should be more careful.”
“My apologies.”
“May I see your license, please?”
California PI licenses are embarrassing. They look like they were made on the teachers’ lounge copy machine by an unambitious third grader, especially compared with the august license on Pineda’s wall. He scanned briefly and returned the card as if doing me a favor.
I said, “Marisol Santos Salvador was your client.”
“I can’t comment on that. Privileged information.”
“She owned a property in a town called Swann’s Flat.”
Like most lawyers, Pineda knew how to use dead air to his advantage. He said nothing, let me stand there, my statement deteriorating.
“For thirty years she’s been making payments to an entity called Swann’s Flat Resort Area,” I said. “It adds up to around fifty thousand dollars.”
“Who hired you?”
“In 2002 you represented William C. Arenhold in another suit over Swann’s Flat land.”