Blood on the Vine (21 page)

“No, I’m the one who’s appreciative. I met with you to see what I could learn about William Ladington’s death.”

“Yeah, but I’m the one who’s ended up learning things. Tell me again about this Mary Jane—”

“Proll. Mary Jane Proll.”

“Right.”

I recounted for him the trip George and I had made to Calistoga after having had lunch at Ladington’s restaurant where we learned about Ms. Proll. He listened quietly, nodding now and then, focusing on his driving. When we reached Calistoga and were a few hundred yards from Hampton Spa, he pulled to the side of the road.

“She’s likely to be not very happy having you bring me to her,” he said. “I’d appreciate it if you could smooth the way, grease the skids.”

“I’ll do what I can. She claims to be afraid of Ladington, or at least of some of the people who surrounded him. She specifically mentioned his driver, Raoul. I don’t think she’ll be happy to see me, either.”

We pulled up in front of the spa, parked, and I led us inside. The same woman who’d greeted me the last time sat behind the desk.

“Hello,” I said.

“Hi.” She cocked her head and narrowed her eyes. “You were here just a few days ago.”

“Yes, I was. I had a mud bath. Mary Jane Proll took care of me.”

Her expression soured.

“I was wondering if she was working today.”

“No.”

“Day off?”

“She quit.”

“Permanently?” I asked.

“Permanently and last minute. She really left me in the lurch. We had reservations booked for her, but she just didn’t show up this morning. I called her apartment. She said she was leaving town.”

“Today?”

“I suppose so.”

“Could you tell us where she lives?” I asked.

The woman looked at Davis.

“This is Sheriff Davis,” I said.

“I thought so. I’ve seen your picture in the papers. I don’t think I should be giving out employees’ home addresses.”

“This is an official police matter,” Davis said.

“Has she done something wrong?” the woman asked.

“Just tell us where she lives,” he said in a gentle, yet firm voice.

She consulted a notebook from a drawer and wrote on a slip of paper, and handed it to me.

“Thanks,” I said.

“You just can’t depend on help anymore,” she said. “They have no sense of loyalty or responsibility.”

“I know what you mean,” Davis said. “Much obliged.”

“Do you know where this is?” I asked as we got back into his car.

“Yes, I do. An apartment complex east of town.”

The complex was a five-minute drive from Hampton Spa. The two-story buildings, with small porches in front of each unit, were stacked up one behind the other on a low terraced hill, with a narrow road separating them. Mary Jane’s apartment was in the third building from the base of the hill.

We got out of the car and went up onto the porch. The front door was slightly ajar. Sheriff Davis went to it and knocked, causing it to open a little more. “Hello,” he said through the gap. “Anyone home?”

There was no response.

He called her name, pushed the door fully open, and stepped inside. I followed.

We were in a large central room. A dining table was to the left, in front of a low counter separating the room from a small kitchen. Two open doors led to bedrooms.

“Looks like Ms. Proll made a hasty getaway,” Davis said, referring to the condition of the room. Clothes had been tossed everywhere. An open suitcase lay on the counter separating the kitchen from the main room.

He went into one of the bedrooms. It was even more chaotic than the living room. Dresser drawers hung open. The door to the closet was ajar, revealing clothing on hangers dangling precariously from a metal rod.

I went to a desk wedged in a comer of the room. Drawers were open and papers and books were strewn across it. A pile of magazines a foot high was on the floor next to a rickety chair. I sat and glanced at some of the materials in front of me. Many of the papers were bills, and offers for credit cards. I looked into the open top drawer to my right and absently pulled things from it. One item was a small green leather address book that was buried at the bottom. I flipped through it, perusing the handwritten names and numbers, and in a few case addresses, noted next to the names. As I was doing it, Davis entered the bedroom carrying a framed photograph.

“This is Louis Hubler,” he said, handing me the picture.

“A nice-looking young man,” I said. Hubler stared at me with pale blue eyes beneath a mop of blond hair. The picture had obviously been taken in summer. Hubler wore tan shorts and a yellow T-shirt, and a lake could be seen in the background. He had an engaging, wide, crooked smile exposing large, white teeth.

“What a shame,” I said, handing the photo back to Davis.

“A young man with his future all in front of him,” Davis said, shaking his head. “Damn drugs destroy too many young lives.”

“You sound convinced that drugs were involved,” I said, continuing to flip through the address book.

“I don’t think there’s much doubt, Mrs. Fletcher.”

“Did he have drugs in his system?”

“Marijuana. A high level, according to Dr. Ayala.”

“But that doesn’t mean he was murdered because of drugs,” I said.

“No, it doesn’t, at least on the surface. The undercover narcs will hopefully come up with something on that. Any idea where she might have gone?”

“No. I know nothing about her. I’ve been looking through papers here hoping I’d come up with something, some indication of where she has family, or had lived previously.”

“I checked the other bedroom,” he said. “Neat as a pin.”

The sound of the front door being closed caused both of us to turn.

“Who are you?” a young woman asked as she appeared in the doorway. She was short and chunky, and had close-cropped brown hair. She wore very tight jeans and a sweat-shirt with U. of Cal-Berkeley imprinted on it.

“I’m Sheriff Davis,” he said. “This is Mrs. Fletcher.”

“What are you doing here?”

“Looking for Ms. Proll,” I said. “Do you live here with her?”

“I did.” She didn’t sound happy.

“It looks like she’s gone,” Davis said.

“She sure is. She, like, threw some things in a bag this morning and took off.”

“Do you know where she went?” I asked.

“No idea, but I wish I did. She owes half the rent for this month, and owes me money too.”

“She’ll probably be back in touch with you,” I offered, not really meaning it. “Do you know why she left in such a hurry
^?
”

The woman shook her head and said, “I don’t care. She babbled about some bad guys being after her. She was, like, paranoid, you know.”

Davis showed her the photo of Louis Hubler. “This was her boyfriend, wasn’t it?” he asked.

“Until he started messing around with that old woman and got himself killed.”

“Old woman?” I said. “You mean Mrs. Ladington?”

“Yeah.”

“Mary Jane told you about it?”

“Yeah. She was, like, really bummed out.”

“Did she talk to you about who might have killed Hubler?” Davis asked.

“She figured it was either old man Ladington or his wife.”

I continued looking through the green address book while the conversation was taking place.

“Does Ms. Proll use drugs?” Davis asked.

His question visibly unnerved Mary Jane’s roommate. She turned and went to the living room. Davis followed. “I ask only because it might help identify who killed Hubler,” I heard Davis say.

“What do you think I am, like, dumb or something?” the woman said. “Talk to a sheriff about drugs? Give me a break.”

I turned the pages in the address book until I’d reached the end. The final page contained a list of phone numbers. Unlike the rest of the book, in which names were entered in alphabetical order, these numbers were jumbled together with no regard for the alphabet. I stared at the list as I heard Davis ask, “Do you know whether Louis Hubler dealt drugs?”

“I heard something like that,”’ she replied.

“Does your roommate, Ms. Proll, deal drugs?”

“Do you have a warrant or something?”

“No,” said Davis. “We’re just trying to get to the bottom of things.”

“Who’s she in there?”

“Mrs. Fletcher? She’s a famous writer of murder mysteries. She’s helping in the investigation.”

“Well, I’m not talking to you anymore unless I get, like, a lawyer or something.”

“You won’t need a lawyer,” Davis said. “Thanks for your cooperation.”

I slipped the address book into the pocket of my jacket as Davis reappeared.

“We might as well leave,” he said.

“Yes. There’s nothing more to do here,” I said, standing.

We said good-bye to Mary Jane’s roommate on the way out, got in the sheriff’s car, and he drove me back to Ladington Creek.

“Thanks for your help,” he said, stopping at the raised drawbridge. Wade Grosso stood at the other end.

“And thank you. It’s been an interesting day.”

“Look, Mrs. Fletcher, I think having you inside the castle could be helpful. Obviously, you and your Scottish buddy, Sutherland, seem to have a knack for finding out things. I’d appreciate your keeping in touch.”

“Of course. You’ve been very generous with what you know.”

“Give me a call in the morning. And tell him to lower the bridge.”

“I will,” I said, “but I’ll walk over. Thanks again.”

I got out of the car and motioned for Grosso to lower the bridge. He went to the wooden box by the front door, activated the switch, and the bridge creaked down until it spanned the moat. I walked to the midway point, turned, waved to Sheriff Davis, and continued across until reaching the drive in front of the castle. I watched the sheriff drive away.

“Have a nice day, Mrs. Fletcher?” Grosso asked.

“Yes, very. You?”

He didn’t respond. Instead, he returned to the box and drew the bridge back to its upright position. I entered the castle, paused in the huge foyer, reached in my pocket, withdrew the green address book, closed my eyes against the thoughts I was having, decided to put them off for now, and went upstairs in search of George.

The door to George’s room was open when I arrived. He wasn’t there. I dropped off my purse in my room and went downstairs where I bumped into Raoul, who’d just come in from outside.

“Hello,” I said. “Have you seen Inspector Sutherland?”

“No, ma’am,” he said, and walked past me.

I went to the office. Roger Stockdale was sitting behind Bill Ladington’s desk. “Have you seen George?” I asked.

“He was outside a half hour ago,” he said, glancing up from what he’d been doing and returning his attention to it.

My next trip was to the French doors leading to the patio. I stepped through them. It was a splendid afternoon, sunny and seasonally cool, a “fat day” as Seth Hazlitt would say. I looked out over the vineyards and saw Wade Grosso at the edge of the Ladington Creek vineyard. He was talking to a man I’d seen before at a distance, the neighboring vintner, Robert Jenkins. I looked in the other direction and saw George sitting on a wooden bench with Bruce; that he’d felt well enough to leave his room heartened me.

He saw me and waved.

“Good afternoon,” I said to the security guard who sat in the director’s chair by the manually operated drawbridge across the moat. He nodded and mumbled something. I crossed the narrow wooden bridge and headed for George and Bruce. As I got closer, Bruce got up and walked in my direction. I could see that he was upset; his face was fixed in a sad expression, and as he came abreast of me, I thought I saw traces of tears on his chubby cheeks.

“Hello, Bruce,” I said, smiling.

“Hello, Mrs. Fletcher,” he said.

“I see you and Laura have been taking good care of George.”

“He’s feeling better,” he said, lowering his head and walking past me.

George stood to greet me.

“Feeling better, I see,” I said.

“Yes, thank goodness. I’m being prudent in my movements, however. Easy for my back to go out again.”

“I imagine. What were you talking with Bruce about?”

“A number of things, Jessica. He’s a very sad young man.”

“Poor man. He looks miserable. Did he have anything new to say about his father’s death?”

“No. He just keeps repeating that someone killed him. He told me quite a bit about his relationship with his father and stepmother. No love lost between him and Tennessee. I found myself vacillating between sympathy for him and a certain degree of scorn. I’m not especially proud of the latter feeling, but he’s typical of people I’ve known who offer themselves as doormats, then whine about being stepped on.”

“I understand what you’re saying. A practiced victim.”

“Exactly. I don’t know why he chose me to be his sounding board, but he did. I suppose because I’m not part of his usual world and—”

“And what?”

“And because we have something in common.”

“Which is?”

“We’re both men.”

I paused, then asked, “Why is that important?”

“He shared some personal information with me about his marriage to Laura.”

“Oh?”

“Yes. As we’ve observed, it isn’t a marriage made in heaven.”

When he didn’t continue, I said, “And?”

“The young Mr. Ladington is sterile.”

“I see.” My immediate thought was of having made the observation that Laura might be pregnant.

George was thinking the same thing. “If his wife is pregnant as you claim,” he said, “it’s doubtful the father of the child is her husband.”

“He told you this, George?”

“Yes. According to him, they’ve discussed various medical approaches to the problem of not being able to have children. I’m not terribly up on such things. Of course, this is just one of many problems with their marriage. His father’s dislike of Laura hasn’t helped, nor has his father’s disdain for his son.” He looked me in the eye. “Are you certain, Jessica, that she’s pregnant?”