The Breakers Read online

  “I doubt you have enough evidence that a crime has actually been committed to rely on them.”

  “Probably not. But I’m glad I reported the disappearances anyway.”

  “Always good to leave a paper trail.”

  “Will, what do you think about that killers’ wall gallery?”

  “I really don’t understand how it figures in Chelle’s disappearance.”

  “I have a feeling it does, somehow.”

  “Yeah, you may be right. You want another glass of wine?”

  “Why not?” I wasn’t driving, and home was only two blocks away.

  After he’d placed our order, Will asked, “You’re not going to stay at the Breakers again tonight, are you?”

  “No. Doesn’t seem to be much point in it. Besides, I miss my cats and my house.”

  Will looked relieved. When our refills came, he touched his glass to mine and said, “To Chelle.”

  “To Chelle and her safe return.”

  11:12 p.m.

  Of course, I can never leave well enough alone. Especially when it comes to a personal investigation like this one.

  After leaving Jasmine’s I started thinking about Zack’s Jeep. Parked where it was, abutting the corner at the end of Jardin Street, it might have been ticketed and towed away, though it was probably a little too soon for that to have happened. If the Jeep was still there, I wanted to examine its contents for a possible clue to his whereabouts.

  The Jeep was still there, and it hadn’t been ticketed. It was a CJ-7—forerunner of today’s Wrangler. I recognized the model because for most of their teenage years my older brothers had spent half their time conferring under the hood of one. Theirs, which ran only periodically, had been a muddy olive drab, perhaps once painted in a camouflage pattern, and its canvas cover was torn in various places. This one didn’t have much of an edge on it: the grille was badly dented; the windshield was scored with cracks; the door gave a mild screech as I opened it; I caught my foot on a torn floor mat as I climbed in.

  If Zack Kaplan had voluntarily walked away from this derelict machine, he’d been fully justified.

  There were no keys in the ignition or any of the obvious places. I dug around under the seats and came up with nothing more than crumpled fast food wrappers and Styrofoam cups. A used condom surfaced from under a magazine and my ick factor rose, but I bagged it anyway for possible DNA testing.

  I moved the seat forward a quarter of an inch, jiggled it to see if there was anything lodged underneath. Something shifted slightly but refused to come free. I moved the seat some more, wedging my body up against the steering wheel. Then I heard a pinging sound and whatever it was fell to the trash-covered floor. I twisted around to retrieve it, shone my flash on it.

  It was a key—bent but probably still usable. I stomped on it with the heel of my boot and straightened it some. When I tried it in the ignition it turned, and the engine started right away.

  So if Zack had left the Breakers voluntarily last night, why hadn’t he taken the Jeep? And if his disappearance hadn’t been voluntary, who had caused it and why?

  And where was he now?

  MONDAY, AUGUST 8

  7:17 a.m.

  I woke up with one cat snoring on the pillow above my head, the other nestled between my feet. When I wriggled around and reached for my phone, they both levitated and then stalked out of the bedroom, intent on the food bowl in the kitchen downstairs.

  “You can wait for breakfast,” I called after them. “You’re both way too fat anyway.”

  I checked my voice mail, as I’d done on the way home from Jardin Street last night. Nothing new pertaining to Chelle or Zack. A lot of other messages had accumulated, a few of which I’d briefly listened to before. I decided to start returning them.

  Hy: “Still in Amsterdam, but heading for New York tomorrow. We got the contract. Talk to you soon.”

  All right!

  Ted: “You’re going to love the new Botany 500 outfit I’ve scored!”

  Oh, no I won’t.

  My younger sister Charlene, currently living in London with her second husband, Vic Christiansen, was complaining about the behavior of her youngest girls: “Molly and Lisa have driven us crazy during this visit. You want to adopt them?”

  Your fault for having six kids.

  My other younger sister Patsy, with kitchen noises in the background: “Ben and I have set our wedding date for November, and I’ve signed a lease on a second restaurant, in Sonoma this time. Didn’t I tell you I’m getting closer to you guys all the time?”

  And her four-star restaurant’s getting closer too!

  My niece Jamie, a performer like her father, country superstar Ricky Savage: “The gig in Denver went great! Want to meet me in Colorado Springs tomorrow?”

  Sorry, kid—but I’ll see you soon.

  Nothing from Ma, who always called from Pacific Grove late on Sunday when the rates were low.

  Now that was worrisome.

  Aunt Adeline: Who the hell was she? Oh, right—a scam. She was in trouble and wanted money.

  Mick, speaking in an Australian accent: “G’day. I’m here in the Outback having a cold one with some new cobbers from Halifax. Golf courses everywhere, but for me it’s the wineries. Found a good cab sav yesterday and sent you a couple of bottles. Went to a great piss-up last night, and I’m still feeling kind of legless.”

  A quick study with dialects, the kid was, even if he’d been to a great party the night before with his new friends and was now hungover.

  “Anyway,” he went on, “I’ll be winging your way soonest. Cheerio to all.”

  I tried phoning Ma, but my call wasn’t answered, and I couldn’t leave a message; my mother didn’t believe in answering machines or voice mail. She called herself “a true Luddite.” Well, I’d have to try again later.

  I was about to leave for the agency when the phone rang. I picked up.

  There was a pause, and then an unfamiliar female voice said, “Stay out of it, McCone. I’m warning you—stay out!”

  10:00 a.m.

  When I got to the agency, I glanced into the conference room. Julia and Patrick sat at the old round table. Patrick gestured to me and I went in.

  Julia said, “Pat and I have been brainstorming about where Chelle Curley might be.”

  “Oh?” I set my briefcase down on the scarred tabletop.

  The round oak relic had once stood by the kitchen windows at All Souls’ Bernal Heights Victorian, where it was a gathering place for many of us back in the days when we were young and idealistic and—let’s face it—foolish about the cruel ways of the world. The table was covered with wine and coffee and other unidentifiable stains that would never come out. Initials and sayings were carved or deeply inked into its rough surface: War Sucks. Racism Sucks. Stop Saying Everything Sucks! Grrrrh! Why would anybody wanna be a lawyer? Me. You are one.

  “Any conclusions?” I asked.

  Patrick said, “Chelle has only the one brother, Sean. And her father Jim is her birth father, right?”

  “Right.”

  “There goes the deadbeat dad theory. Also a snatch by a disgruntled former spouse of her mother.”

  I said, “A good idea, but the Curley family are as normal as they come.”

  “Says you.”

  “What makes you think the Curleys aren’t normal?”

  “A few things Chelle’s said in my hearing: they’re always traveling, and they forget to leave contact numbers; they break off conversations when she comes into a room, like they have secrets; sometimes she’d like to run away from them.”

  Julia said, “Tonio’s taken to running away from home whenever my sister or I criticize him. Of course, we always know where he is because of the feathers.”

  “What?”

  “He hides in an old chicken coop that belongs to the neighbors. When he comes home, the feathers are a dead giveaway.”

  “But what does this have to do with Chelle?”

  “Ma
ybe she had a disagreement with her parents, and—”

  I shook my head. “Her parents didn’t mention one; besides, she’s a grown woman and probably isn’t all that fond of chicken coops. But in light of this ‘right to disappear’ note, we’ll look into possible hiding places.”

  “Such as?” Patrick asked.

  “Well, in the area of the Breakers. Near her parents’ home. Other places she’s been known to frequent. How about I pull you off the deadbeat dad detail and let you handle this?”

  Patrick nodded and jotted down some notes.

  I excused myself and tried to call Ma again. Still no answer, so I rang Mrs. Kingsley, a neighbor who often checked up on her. No answer there, but the neighbor—no Luddite—had voice mail, so I asked her to call me back. Then I hurried to the conference room.

  Ted entered the room behind me and said, “A call came in yesterday—”

  “Probably from somebody wanting to revive the Botany 500 line,” Julia remarked.

  I silenced her with a frown.

  “A call came in,” Ted repeated, “but the person wouldn’t identify themself. Just said they had important information about one of our investigations. They hung up when I asked who they were and never called back.”

  “Man or woman?”

  “Woman, I think, but I’m not sure. The voice was muffled.”

  “Did you ask the tech department to try to trace it?”

  “Yes. No luck so far.”

  “I’ll need a copy of that call when they’re done with it.”

  “Right.”

  Will had appeared on Ted’s heels. “Last night Shar and I discussed Chelle’s note about the right to disappear. She feels there’s something odd about it.”

  “What seems odd?” Patrick asked me.

  “The tone and handwriting. They’re not her usual style. Nothing specific; you’d have to know her well to notice it.”

  “So it might’ve been written under duress.”

  “Exactly. You’ll all be getting a copy of it and a memo shortly, but right now I’d like to show it to you.” I flicked the button for visual display; it lowered the screen on the far wall and dimmed the lights, and an image of Chelle’s note appeared.

  They all studied it. Julia asked, “Is her writing always that bad?”

  “Her signature is clear, but then I’ve never received anything but cards from her.”

  Ted said, “Look at that.”

  “What?”

  He got up and went to the screen. “See this? This little squiggle here in the lower left corner.”

  “Squiggle” was the right word for it. It wavered, went straight, then vanished.

  I said, “It looks as if she was trying to add something else, and then the note was taken from her. Is there any way the tech department can figure out what she might have intended it to be?”

  Ted shrugged. “It’s worth a try.”

  I checked my watch. “Okay, I’ve got to go. Thank you for coming on such short notice. Now let’s get to work.” I didn’t need to ask that they let me know anything—even the smallest detail—that they found out.

  2:00 p.m.

  That unfamiliar-sounding voice on the phone this morning had kept nagging at me. I had recorded it, but even the technology we used at M&R could not have yielded the kind of information I wanted. Around eleven I’d called Carolina Owens, an old friend from college who worked for a tech forensics firm. She told me to copy whatever I had. She was busy for an hour, but maybe we could meet at two for lunch at Yanni’s?

  I resisted telling her that I hated Yanni’s. It was too hip, served too much weird, bad food, and the drinks were wildly expensive—even the Pellegrino. But she was doing me a favor, so I agreed, steeling myself for a terrible meal. Not long after two o’clock I was seated at an unsheltered table on Yanni’s Bayside deck, perspiring and wondering why so many items on today’s menu involved squid ink.

  Carolina arrived, wearing a big picture hat that would have done Scarlett O’Hara proud. Her walk was as bouncy as it had been when we used to stroll Telegraph Avenue together, and her shoulder-length blond hair bounced in counterrhythm. We hugged, and then she seized the menu and said, “Oooh! Squid ink pasta with smoked salmon is on special. One of my favorites.”

  Perversely, I ordered a cheeseburger. We chatted about inconsequential topics till our meals came. Hers looked like a combination of orange bugs and long white worms swimming in black ooze. I kept my eyes on my burger, which had proved to be overcooked.

  “So,” she said, “you need some technical information?”

  “Yes.” I took the two recordings out of my bag. “This is a call I received at home this morning. The voice is unfamiliar to me. I’m wondering if there’s a way you can enhance it.”

  “I can both enhance and possibly identify the voice for you.”

  Voice recognition. Of course her firm would have that capability.

  She asked, “How much do you know about tech forensics?”

  “Some. Refresh me, please.”

  “Well, I won’t give you a full course in it—because we’d end up sitting here for the next two weeks—but here’s the gist of what we tell clients that our experts can do.”

  Speaker recognition, Carolina told me, uses acoustic features that differ widely among individuals. One relates to anatomy: the size, shape, and possible malformations of the throat, nasal passages, teeth, and mouth. The second is derived from behavioral patterns, such as voice pitch, regional accents, speed and volume, and stuttering and other general speech patterns. Emotional reactions—nervousness, depression, elation, and manifestations of obsessive-compulsive disorder—can also figure in.

  I asked Carolina, “Is it difficult to link all these factors to a specific individual?”

  “In many cases it’s impossible. But if we possess an existing template for the person, we can. I have to tell you that many of the methods of accessing templates that we don’t have are not legal. You’ll need to swear that you’ll never reveal whatever I do for you.”

  Over the course of my career I’d bent and broken many a law in the pursuit of justice. “I swear.”

  “Okay. Templates can be recorded with the individuals’ consent, either in person or over the phone. And without their consent in the same manner. Police departments do it regularly with suspects they interrogate. As do companies that are interviewing job applicants or independent contractors. If you’ve ever ordered a product by phone in the past few years, your voiceprint may be stored with the company and its affiliates. And your bank or stockbroker keeps it as a security feature. Firms like mine have huge libraries of templates that we buy from various sources.”

  “So you’re telling me that anything I say on the phone or even in person can be made public.”

  “That’s right, anything. And until this country gets off its collective ass and enacts legislation against the practice, nothing ever will be private. But that’s very unlikely to happen, because it would put firms like mine out of business.”

  I felt a tickle of anger. “And, as usual, business wins.”

  Carolina sensed my feelings and added, “There are plenty of good uses the technology can be and is being put to: identifying criminals, particularly kidnappers asking for ransom; nailing the perpetrators of frauds; discouraging nuisance callers and telemarketers.”

  “Then I’m all for it.”

  “Good. By using my firm’s library, I may be able to find out who made this menacing call to you. If the person’s in our catalogue, I can do it within a couple of hours. If not, I may have to go to other firms’ libraries, and it’ll take longer. Now, this other recording?”

  “A call my office manager took, also this morning. The person never got back to me.”

  “Tricky, but I’ll see what I can do.”

  4:01 p.m.

  Late that afternoon I finally heard from Mrs. Kingsley, Ma’s neighbor. “I’ve been with your mother at the hospital all day today, dear.”
/>   “Hospital? Which one? What happened?”

  “She’s at Monterey Peninsula Community. Now, don’t go getting excited. I’m sure it’s nothing serious. In fact, she asked me not to tell you, so you wouldn’t rush down here and make a big fuss.”

  “But why is she in the hospital?”

  “Well, she needed to be sedated.” Mrs. Kingsley’s voice had taken on an edgy note.

  “Sedated? Why?”

  She sighed. “I suppose you have a right to know, in spite of her wishes. There have been…episodes, both manic and depressive. She wanders off, sometimes to inappropriate places. Last week I found her in an alley, looking for your brother Joey.”

  “My God! He’s been dead for—”

  “I know, dear. I know.”

  “What happened this time?”

  “She was in a totally manic state, making a cake for Joey’s return—his favorite chocolate cake, she told me—but she let it burn and the oven did a meltdown. It’s lucky there wasn’t a more serious fire.”

  Since last Christmas, my mother had become vague and confused, but preparing for Joey’s return? And now a fire?

  “Do my brother and sisters know about this?”

  “No. You’re the only one I’ve told.”

  “Why didn’t anybody from the hospital let me know?”

  “Typical bureaucratic confusion. Until I got your message, I thought the doctor would notify you. He claimed I should have, and I’m sorry I didn’t.”

  “Not your fault, Mrs. Kingsley. Nobody’s, really. What’s the doctor’s name and number?”

  “Ralph Germon.” She read off the number to me.

  I thanked her, told her I’d report what I found out, and ended the call. Then I sat back in my chair, closed my eyes, and breathed deeply.

  When and why, I wondered, had Ma become secretive about her health?

  Usually even something so small as a paper cut had sent her running for the first aid kit. And the drama at every ache and pain had been monumental. Of course, for most of her life she’d had quite an audience. But now, living alone, there was none to play to; maybe she was embarrassed at not being able to fend for herself.