The Broken Promise Land Read online

  I rewarded him by demanding, “What? What?”

  “Ol’ Philip R. is currently boring the pants off budding historians at Cal State Long Beach.”

  “Long Beach! That’s practically next door to us!” I jumped off the bed and wrapped my arms around Mick’s neck. He pushed me away, flushing, then handed me the scratch pad. “Here’s his home address and phone number. Go for it.”

  Twenty

  Philip Terriss lived north of central Long Beach, worlds removed from the busy harbor, the offshore oil rigs, and the hotels and convention center that had sprung up to reclaim much of the waterfront. His was a quiet neighborhood of narrow, palm-lined streets. The homes were mainly California bungalows built in the twenties and thirties: wood-sided, with low-pitched gable roofs and deep front porches designed for sitting on warm summer evenings. They all appeared to be well kept up, but Terriss’s was immaculate, its blue-and-white paint fresh, flowering plants hanging in baskets from the wide eaves. As I got out of the car I heard the swish of a lawn sprinkler, smelled newly cut grass.

  A light shone behind closed blinds in Terriss’s front window; it was after eight—the earliest he’d been able to see me—and the porch was in shadow. I used the shiny brass door-knocker and waited.

  The sweatsuit-clad man who answered was thin, somewhat stooped, and prematurely balding; his brown hair stood up in unruly wisps. He wore thick glasses over watery blue eyes and his skin was very pale, as though he spent most of his time indoors. My first reaction was that I must have gotten the wrong house; surely this man couldn’t be the former husband of the beautiful young woman Ricky had described. But then he said, “Ms. McCone? Please, come in,” and another facet was added to my already contradictory image of Patricia Terriss.

  The front room of the bungalow was as lovingly tended as the exterior: Beautifully finished wood beams and window casings stood out against white walls, and the hardwood floor gleamed. Terriss had allowed the architectural features of his classic home to take center stage by choosing simple furnishings and leaving the walls unadorned. The result was a comfortable room, as tranquil as the neighborhood, yet one that caught and held the viewer’s interest.

  He seated me on a brown leather sofa, offered me coffee or a drink, which I refused, and perched on a chair opposite me. His expression was guarded and slightly apprehensive, as though he were afraid I might be bringing bad news. When he said, “You’re looking for my former wife,” his tone confirmed it.

  “Yes. You said on the phone that you don’t know her present whereabouts, but I thought that if we talked in person you might be able to tell me something that would lead to her.”

  “Why? I mean, why are you interested in her?”

  I studied him, debating how much to reveal. If Philip Terriss felt any protective impulse toward Patricia, he might close up if he knew the real reason I was looking for her. On the other hand, they were divorced; she had been the one to do the leaving, and abandoned husbands seldom wish their former spouses well. I decided to ignore his question and probe some.

  “I’ll get to that, Mr. Terriss, but… I wonder, when did you last see Patricia?”

  “Over three years ago.”

  “You were living here at the time?”

  “Yes. She came by, wanting something. As she usually did.”

  “Then you still saw her, in spite of the divorce.”

  “Not really. Until that spring I hadn’t seen her since she left me and moved to Austin in nineteen eighty-eight. But we kept in touch by Christmas card, and when I moved here from Fort Worth, I sent her the new address. When she came out to L.A., she looked me up.”

  “Why?”

  His mouth pulled down bitterly. “She needed money—why else?”

  “Did you give it to her?”

  “Yes. My ex-wife can be quite persuasive when she puts her mind to it.”

  “And when was that?”

  “Late April of ninety-two.”

  “And you saw her again…?”

  “Three times. Twice she needed a place to stay, once more she needed money.”

  “And the last time was…?”

  He looked away, fingers tensing on the arms of his chair. “Late June. That was the last I saw or heard from her.”

  Late June. Go slowly, McCone, go carefully.

  “You say she needed a place to stay. I take it she didn’t have a permanent home, or a job.”

  Terriss ran his tongue over his lips. “Ms. McCone, I’d appreciate it if you’d tell me why you’re looking for Patricia.”

  I opted for a half truth. “Your former wife had a brief affair with one of my clients. She’s been causing him some trouble over it, and he wants me to talk with her and see if I can persuade her to back off.”

  He nodded, as though he’d expected something of the sort. “Is your client married?”

  “Yes. Is that a pattern with her?”

  “It would seem so. I was married when I met her. She went after me with amazing persistence. And once she got me, she made sure my wife found out.” He laughed harshly. “Of course, I was completely smitten at the time. I couldn’t believe that such a lovely woman could want me so much. It wasn’t until some months later that I realized she’d found out I’d inherited money and hoped I’d bankroll a singing career for her.”

  “But you didn’t.”

  “Ms. McCone, it wasn’t that much money. I’m good for an occasional loan to a good friend, but I’ve never had nearly enough to make anybody a star. And Patricia isn’t really all that accomplished a singer.”

  “What can you tell me about her background?”

  “Not a great deal. We met at Texas Christian University. She was a freshman, I was a doctoral student. She wanted to be a country singer, but her father had had experience with musicians and insisted she get her degree as something to fall back on. She wasn’t happy about that, and as soon as we married she dropped out.”

  “What was her maiden name?”

  “Smith. She liked mine because she said it had star quality.”

  “And her family lived where?”

  “We never talked about them. She hated her father, didn’t even tell him we were married. There was a sister, I think, but they weren’t close.”

  “She never talked about her past?”

  “Patricia isn’t much of a talker, except when it comes to her songs and her desire to become a star. She performed with a few bands around campus, but the response wasn’t enthusiastic, and when I suggested her ambitions might be unrealistic, she stopped talking at all. And then she left me.”

  “What about her friends?”

  “She didn’t have any. She was a loner, always off someplace inside her own head. The only friend she ever mentioned to me was a fellow she lived with on and off out here—a member of her former band in Austin who had a house in Venice.”

  “Do you recall his name?”

  He thought for a moment. “Tod something.”

  “Dodson?”

  “That’s it.”

  “Do you have his address?”

  “… You know, I may. When Patricia came to the L.A. area, she told the restaurant where she worked in Austin to send her final check in care of me. It still hadn’t arrived when she stopped by to ask for a loan, and she wrote down Tod’s address so I could forward it.” He got up and crossed to a small telephone table, rummaged through its drawer for a moment. “Here it is,” he said, adding sheepishly, “Sometimes being a pack rat has its advantages.”

  I took the paper, glanced at the meaningless street name, and placed it in my bag. Terriss sat down again, but I sensed he was anxious for me to go—and not because he had another engagement or pressing things to do.

  I said, “I have a few more questions, if I may.”

  He hesitated, then nodded.

  “You said that seeing a married man would seem to be a pattern with Patricia. Do you know of others she saw?”

  “… I’m not sure.”

  �
��There must have been more basis for your remark than the fact that you were married when you met her.”

  “I… Ms. McCone, are you sure you wouldn’t like a drink?”

  “I’m sure, but if you want one, please feel free.”

  “I think I will.” He excused himself and went to the back of the house. Ice cubes rattled faintly. When he reappeared carrying a glass of what looked to be whiskey, he seemed more at ease. I suspected he’d fortified himself with a shot or two while in the kitchen.

  Getting into the hard stuff now—and not just liquor. Getting into the hard facts about his former wife.

  “Where were we?” he asked as he sat down.

  “We were talking about Patricia and married men.”

  “Yes.” He drank, set the glass on the table next to him. “All right, I’m going to tell you this because… because you seem like a decent person, and if you do find her, perhaps you can talk to her, make her see that what she’s doing is not only wrong but very self-destructive. Back in ninety-two Patricia became involved with someone in the entertainment industry—a well-known country singer.”

  “Who?”

  “Ricky Savage. She met him in Austin. He’s married, has six children, but she claimed he brought her to the coast. She also claimed he was going to make her a star. Now, I’m not a fan of country, but I know Savage’s music. He’s good, both as a lyricist and a musician. Unless he’d taken complete leave of his senses, he would never have seen star material in Patricia. And he must have quickly tired of her as a lover. Patricia can be sexually intense and very attentive, but eventually everything comes back to her—to her songs, to what she thinks is her due. And finally she becomes strident and demanding. I don’t blame Savage for breaking it off.” Terriss paused to sip his drink. When he set it on its coaster his hand trembled. The man was plainly nervous about whatever knowledge he held inside—and just as eager to dump it in someone else’s lap.

  I said, “Nothing you tell me is going to be used against Patricia. This is strictly a private matter, and my client wants it to remain that way.”

  He let out a long sigh. “All right. It was early in the morning. June thirtieth of ninety-two. Around four-thirty, I guess. Patricia came to the house. She was… God!” He closed his eyes, took his glasses off, and pressed the palms of his hands against his lids. “She was wearing a raincoat with nothing under it but a flimsy nightgown. A white one. At least, it had been white. But there was dried blood all over it—a lot of blood. And her wrists were bandaged and wrapped in towels.”

  I waited, my hands clasped so tightly my fingers hurt.

  Terriss went on, more swiftly now. “She was high on something, and drunk too. Her car was parked out front with the keys in it. The seat was pushed way back for a much taller person, so I knew she hadn’t driven herself. And there were bloodstains on the passenger’s seat. I brought her in and cleaned her up and put her to bed in the spare room, but she couldn’t sleep and was afraid to be alone, so I sat with her and she told me what had happened.” Terriss took his hands from his eyes and looked bleakly at me. “Jesus, I hope you can do something to keep her from getting into that kind of trouble again.”

  “I’ll try.”

  He nodded. “All right, I sat with her and she talked to me. She told me Savage had broken up with her and she’d tried to get him back but nothing had worked. She’d threatened to tell his wife about their affair, and he had their phone number changed. Then she threatened to tell his kids. And finally she threatened to do something to them. She told me… she told me she was prepared to kill them, if that’s what it took.”

  “Did you believe her?”

  “Well, she was high, so high it had really messed up her head, but… Anyway, she said that after a couple of months of this going back and forth, Savage called her up and capitulated. They arranged a meeting for a motel someplace up the coast, but instead of him, two of his band members showed up to lean on her and persuade her to leave him alone.”

  “Did they hurt her?”

  “Physically? No. Emotionally, it was shattering. Patricia… she doesn’t respond normally to rejection. She goes straight through disappointment and pain to anger. And she usually acts out anger in ways that are harmful to her. Her reaction to Savage’s deception was to get even by seducing the men he’d sent. She suggested they ‘party’ and took both of them on. And afterward she went into the bathroom, broke a glass, and slashed her wrists. The men stopped her in time, bandaged her, and at her request brought her here.”

  “Was it a serious suicide attempt?”

  “Yes. I saw those cuts.”

  “Had she ever done anything like that before?”

  “She’s threatened suicide, but this was the first time I know of that she’d done more than talk.”

  So there I had it: the ultimate result of Ricky’s carelessness and expedient solution to his problem.

  I asked Terriss’s former husband, “How long did she stay with you?”

  “Only till that evening. Once she saw how much her story upset me, she called her friend Tod, and he caught a ride up here and drove her in her car to his place.”

  “You never checked to see if she was okay?”

  “No. To tell you the truth, that episode finished any feeling I had left for her. I never wanted to see her again.” His empty eyes met mine, his pain almost palpable now, filling the well-tended room. I’d seen that expression on the faces of people who had lost loved ones, and I supposed in a way he had.

  Softly he added, “No matter how badly he treated her, I can’t help but empathize with Savage. You see, I was her victim too.” He held out the back of his right hand; there was a scar on it that looked like it had been caused by a deep puncture wound.

  “She did that to you?”

  “Yes—with a letter opener, in one of her black, bloody rages, when she realized I couldn’t afford to bankroll her career. Whoever your client is, you’ll want to protect him, and if you locate Patricia I suggest you be very careful. You don’t want to find yourself on the receiving end of her anger.”

  By day Venice is the most colorful of California beach towns, with continuous street theater being played out on Ocean Front Walk by rollerbladers, vendors, and eccentric characters of every stripe. But after sunset the actors in this drama disappear and the tourists flee; ordinary people hole up behind locked doors. Then the narrow streets beside the canals belong to the homeless and the gangs, who prowl side by side, an uneasy and unspoken truce between them.

  It was close to ten, and the scavengers and predators were out in full force when I arrived at the address Philip Terriss had given me for Patricia’s friend Tod Dodson. I locked the rental car and scanned the shadows before I approached the little frame cottage that sagged between two newish architectural mistakes on a side street near the beach. The light from its uncurtained window laid a swath across the tiny front yard and showed daisies growing among a tangle of weeds; through the glass I glimpsed a shabby brown sofa and unframed rock-concert posters tacked to the walls.

  The woman who came to the door had a round, bloated face under a tangle of blond curls and wore a soiled white dress and dirt on her bare feet. She looked at my I.D. with unmasked hostility and shook her head when I asked for Dodson. “He don’t live here anymore.”

  “Do you know where I can locate him?”

  “Why?”

  “Personal business.”

  “What, somebody die and leave him money?”

  “Something like that.”

  Her expression said she only half believed me. “Well, Tod went back to Nashville, couldn’t make it in the pop scene here. My old man and me, we sublet the place from him.”

  “You have an address or phone number for him?”

  “Might.”

  Uh-huh. I reached into my bag for my wallet. The woman’s eyes watched me greedily as I pulled out a twenty. She snatched it from my fingers, said, “Wait here,” and went inside, shutting the door.

&
nbsp; I waited, turning up the collar of my light cotton shirt and hugging my elbows for warmth. A wind was blowing off the Pacific, funneling up the narrow streets and canals and rattling the fronds of the tall palms. I glanced at my watch, realized that Ricky was on stage now, would be leaving the amphitheatre for Union Station within the hour.

  Hurry up! I thought.

  The woman returned and handed me a slip of paper with a phone number scrawled on it. “No address,” she said. “Me and my old man, we’re not much when it comes to writing.”

  “But you’ve been in touch with Tod recently?”

  “Yeah, sure.” Now that money had changed hands she was friendlier, as if it had formed a bond between us. “My guy met Tod when he was playing with this band out in the Valley. The regular drummer quit and the keyboards player knew a waitress whose boyfriend knew Tod and… well, you know how that goes. Tod’d come out from Austin thinking to get himself on as a sideman at one of the studios, break into the pop scene—only pop’s kind of flat, although everybody says it’s gonna rally. Anyway, Tod ended up in my old man’s band, and when that fell apart they both got gigs in Marina del Rey at this singles bar, which is where my guy is tonight. Tod hung on till a year ago, but he started to listen to people talking about how country’s the big thing now and he decided to get back to his roots and headed for Music City Row.”

  “What about his girlfriend?”

  “Monica? No way. She’s an L.A. lady, wouldn’t be caught dead living in a town full of hillbillies. She told Tod so, and that blew it.”

  “I was thinking of Patricia. Patricia Terriss.”

  The woman’s mouth turned down. “That bitch! She split on Tod three years ago. Was in and out of here for a couple of months like this place had revolving doors, and then one day she was gone and so was his emergency stash.”

  “She robbed him?”

  “Took his cash and his dope. Can you believe it?”