"S" is for Silence (10 page)

“How long has she been gone?” His voice sounded shrill and he knew he was losing control. He made a point of never speaking to an underling in anything other than a civil tone. But the enormity of the error, the possible consequences…

“I didn't check the time—”

“Approximately, you dolt!”

“I'd say sometime around noon. Well, I don't know, maybe a little bit before then, but close enough.”

Assume he minimized and what were we talking about here, four hours? Five? Chet closed his eyes and his voice dropped. “You're fired. Get out.”

“But sir. I can explain.”

“Get off the lot. Right now. I want you out of my sight or I'm calling the police.”

The boy's cheeks flamed with embarrassment, and the look Winston pinned on him was bleak.

Chet waited until he could see the boy was leaving, and then he turned and walked back to his office. He'd have to notify the sheriff's department and the highway patrol. If she'd been involved in a wreck, or if she'd stolen the car outright, she could be anyplace by now. He had liability insurance, blanket coverage for anything on the lot, but his premiums would double the minute he made a claim. Money was already tight. He sat down in his swivel chair and reached for the phone.

“Daddy?” Kathy was in the doorway.

“What!”

“Mrs. Sullivan just pulled in.”

Through the glass he spotted the car and relief washed over him. The vehicle didn't appear to be damaged, at least the parts he could see. He went out to the floor, knowing that in no way possible could she afford to buy the coupe. Violet turned as he approached, and he was startled by her vibrancy—the flaming hair, the creamy skin, her eyes a vivid green. He'd never seen her at close range because Livia made a point of crossing the street, tugging him by the arm, if she spotted Violet anywhere in town. She thought Violet was a tramp, wearing those sheer nylon blouses you could see right through. The sundress Violet wore today emphasized the suppleness of her arms, and the flowing skirt showed her legs to advantage. Livia was thick-waisted and narrow-minded, critical of others whose circumstances or beliefs or behaviors were an affront to her own. Chet was irritated by her scathing pronouncements, but he'd kept his mouth shut. From afar, he'd seen Violet's flirtations with married men, and he'd wondered how it would feel to have her attentions lavished on him.

“Hello, Chet. Sorry I was gone so long.”

He circled the car until he was satisfied no harm had come to it. On impulse, he leaned in and checked the odometer: 257 miles. For a moment he was speechless. She'd turned this beautiful new Bel Air into a piece-of-shit used car. “Come into the office,” he snapped.

Violet caught up with him and tucked a hand through his arm, forcing him to slow his pace. “Are you mad at me, Chet? May I call you ‘Chet'?”

“You can call me ‘Mr. Cramer' like everyone else. You put two hundred fifty-seven miles on that car? Where the fuck did you go?” He regretted the swear word the minute it was out of his mouth, but Violet didn't seem to care. As he opened his office door, she passed in front of him and he could smell her cologne.

His heart gave another double thump, this time warming his blood. He moved away from her. “Take a seat.”

“Yes, sir.”

He went around and sat down behind his desk, suddenly conscious of the power he wielded. She had to know she was in the wrong, that he could extract any price he named. Two hundred and fifty-seven miles on a brand-new car? He wondered if she'd set it up that way. Maybe she'd had her eye on him at the same time he'd had his eye on her. She stared at him with interest, apparently undismayed by his rage or the fact that he was ordering her around.

She extracted a pack of cigarettes from her purse. Ever the gentleman, he took out his lighter and fanned the striker. She leaned across the desk, allowing him a glimpse of the swell of her breasts as she accepted his light. There was a bruise on her chin and he knew what that was about. She reclaimed her seat and crossed her legs. He glanced at Kathy, visible in the outer office beyond his glass-enclosed cube. She was watching the back of Violet's head with her mother's same spiteful stare, constructing new and better ways to feel superior. When Kathy caught him looking at her, she got up and walked to the water cooler. Fourteen, and she was already as rigid, nasty-minded, and prissy as her mom. She'd taken out a piece of pink notepaper and it sat squarely in the middle of her desk. He could see the heavy black writing on it even at that distance, an angry-looking scrawl that slanted across the page.

He picked up a pencil and tapped on his desk while he rearranged his thoughts. He had no idea how he should play it, but he loved feeling in command. “So what are we going to do about this, Mrs. Sullivan?”

Her smile was slow, smoke drifting from her lips as though she was smoldering at the core. “Well, Mr. Cramer, Sweetie, I can make a suggestion, but I'm not sure you want to talk about it here. Buy me a drink and I'm certain we can work something out.”

Every syllable she spoke was weighted with promise. Her gaze was fixed on his mouth with a hunger he'd never seen in a woman and had certainly never experienced in himself. How could this be happening? She was his for the taking. He knew that as surely as he knew his name. Though he'd never admit it, he was a man of conventional inclinations. He was forty-seven years old, and in fifteen years of marriage, he'd never been unfaithful to his wife, not for lack of opportunity, but for lack—he saw now—of comprehension. After the first few months with Livia, the sex was workaday—pleasurable, and of course a blessed relief, but in no way compelling. Livia might not be wildly attractive, but whatever his ordinary irritations with her, she'd never denied his needs, and she'd never implied that she found sex onerous. While he wasn't dissatisfied, he'd never understood what all the fuss was about.

In one stroke that had changed.

Here before him, Violet Sullivan, with her insolence and her boldness, had ignited him, sparking a desire so consuming he could barely breathe. He thought maybe this was what it meant to sell your soul to the devil, because he knew in that moment he'd be willing to rot in hell for her.

Thursday morning, I went through my usual routine, waking at 6:00 to do my three-mile jog. I prefer to have exercise under my belt before I start my day. In the late afternoon, it's too easy to think of reasons to sit around on my buns. The morning air had a faint chill to it, and the sky was layered with salmon and amber clouds, overlapping like ribbons sewn on the borders of a bright blue tablecloth. I used the brief walk to the beach as a way of warming up before I eased into a trot. Along the bike path, the palm trees were still, no breeze at all ruffling the fronds. A fifteen-foot expanse of ice plant stretched between the bike path and the beach. Beyond that the ocean tumbled and churned. A man had parked his car in the public lot and he was tossing bread-crumbs in the grass. Gulls were wheeling in from all directions, shrieking with delight. I picked up my pace, feeling my body warm and my muscles become loose. It wasn't the best run I ever had, but it felt good nonetheless.

Home again, I showered, threw on my jeans, my boots, and a T-shirt, and then ate a bowl of cereal while I cruised through the local paper. I reached the office at 8:30 and spent an hour on the phone, taking care of business unrelated to Violet Sullivan. At 9:30 I locked up, hauled my portable Smith-Corona typewriter out to the car, and drove to Santa Maria for my meeting with Kathy Cramer. I didn't expect to get much from her. At the time, she'd been too young to qualify as a keen observer of adults, but I figured it was worth a try. You never know when a fragment of information or an offhand remark might fill a blank spot on the canvas I was painting bit by bit.

 

The Uplands, the golf course subdivision Kathy Cramer had just moved into, was still a work in progress. The course itself was an irregular series of fairways and bright greens that formed an elongated V the length of a shallow valley. A man-made lake sat in the angle between the front and back nine holes. View homes were perched on the ridge that ran along one side of the course while on the opposite hill, I could see the lots laid out and marked with small flags. Many homes had been completed, with sod lawns and an assortment of shrubs and saplings in place. Other houses were under construction, some framed and some consisting solely of the newly poured slabs. Across the low undulating hills, I could see a hundred houses in various phases of completion. Kathy's house was finished, but the landscaping wasn't in. I'd seen its twin or its mirror image replicated up and down the street—buff-colored stucco with a red tile roof. I parked at the curb, where moving boxes had been piled in anticipation of a garbage pickup. I took the walkway to the front door. The shallow porch had already been furnished with a faux-wicker couch, two faux-wicker chairs, and a welcome mat.

As I was knocking, a car pulled into the driveway and a woman got out, her frizzy mane of blond hair held back with a navy headband. She was dressed in tennis shoes and navy shorts and a matching navy jacket, with a white leotard visible where the jacket was unzipped. Her legs were as lean and muscular as a biker's. She said, “Sorry. I hope you haven't waited long. I thought I'd get here before you did. I'm Kathy.”

“Hi, Kathy. I'm Kinsey. Nice meeting you,” I said. “Your timing's perfect. I just arrived.”

We shook hands and then she turned and unlocked the front door. “I switched to an earlier Jazzercise class, but got caught in traffic coming home. You want ice water? I need to rehydrate.”

“I'm fine, thanks. You like Jazzercise?”

“I should. I'm taking six to eight classes a week.” She dropped her bag on a console table just inside the front door. “Make yourself at home. I'll be back in a sec.”

She disappeared down the hallway, moving toward the kitchen, her rubber soles squeaking on the gray ceramic tile. I turned right and went down two stairs into the sunken living room. The walls were painted a dazzling white, and the only artwork in sight was an oversize painting from a chain of commercial galleries devoted to one man's work. The autumnal scene was of a mare and foal in a gauzy-looking pasture at dawn.

There were no window coverings and the light spilled in through a haze of construction dust. The powder blue wall-to-wall shag carpeting had been installed recently, because I could still see bits and pieces—tufts and scraps—left behind by the flooring guys. The couch and two matching chairs were upholstered in a cream-colored chenille. On the coffee table, she'd arranged a stack of decorator magazines, a centerpiece of pale blue silk flowers, and a cluster of color photographs in silver frames. The three girls portrayed were variations of their mother—same eyes, same smile, and the same thick blond hair. Their ages seemed to fall within a six-year range. The oldest was probably thirteen, braces gleaming on her teeth. The other two girls stair-stepped down from eleven to nine. The middle girl was decked out in a majorette's uniform, a baton held aloft.

Kathy returned to the living room with a tumbler of ice water in hand. She found a coaster and moved toward a conversational grouping of navy blue club chairs with a glass-topped table in the center as though for a conference of some kind. I pictured a meeting of the neighborhood association during which other people's tacky yard ornaments would come under fire. She took one chair and I sat across from her, taking a mental snapshot without having to stare. I pegged her at a youthful forty-eight or forty-nine. She was thin in a way that suggested strict attention to her weight. She seemed high-strung, but having caught her on the back end of a workout, I knew her energy level might have been the result of an hour of strenuous exercise. She looked as though she'd spent the summer working on her tan, and I imagined an above-ground pool in the backyard of the house she'd just left.

“Those are your daughters?” I asked.

“Yes, but the pictures are out of date. Tiffany was twelve when that was taken. She's twenty-five now and getting married June of next year.”

“Nice fellow?”

“A doll. He's in law school at UCLA, so they'll be living down there.”

“And the other two?”

“Amber's twenty-three; she was a majorette in her junior high school band. She's technically in her senior year of college, but she's taking a year off to travel. Brittany turns twenty next month. She's at Allan Hancock,” she said, naming the local community college.

“They look just like you. Must be quite a crew.”

“Oh, they're great. We have a good time together. You want to see the rest of the house?”

“I'd love to.”

She got up and I followed her.

“When did you move in?”

“A week ago. The place is still a mess,” she said, talking over her shoulder as we moved down the hall. “I've got half the boxes unpacked and most things in place, but some of the rooms won't be furnished until god knows when. I need to find a decorator I can get along with. Most are so pushy. Have you ever noticed that?”

“I've never worked with one.”

“Well, don't if you can help it.”

She walked me through the house, pointing out the obvious: the empty dining room, butler's pantry, eat-in kitchen, mud room, and laundry room. Through the kitchen windows I could see the backyard, which consisted of a poured concrete patio sitting like an island in a sea of raw dirt. Upstairs there were five bedrooms—a master suite, a bedroom for each of the girls, and a guest room, devoid of furniture. She chattered on and on, her prime interest focused on her decorating schemes. I found myself making chirpy, insincere remarks. “Oh, I've always been
crazy
about Louie the Fourteenth. That'll look great in here.”

“You think?”

“Absolutely. You couldn't do better than that.”

Tiffany's bedroom walls were painted a pale cream. The furniture was in place, but I got the impression that she wasn't moving in. Her sights were set on the future, when she'd be married and coming back for holidays with her husband and kids in tow. Amber's room was stark purple and had the same unoccupied air. Brittany, at nineteen, still clung to her collection of stuffed animals. The color scheme she'd chosen was pink and white—stripes, checks, and florals. Everything had ruffles, including the dressing table, the bed skirt, and the canopy that arched over her four-poster bed. Kathy detailed a number of triumphs each of the girls had chalked up, but I'd tuned her out by then.

Tramping down the stairs, I said, “The house is wonderful.”

“Thanks. I like it,” she said, flashing me a smile.

“What sort of work does your husband do?”

“He sells cars.”

“Like your father.”

“He works for Daddy.”

“Great. I'll introduce myself. I'll be going by the dealership in the next couple of days to chat with your father about Violet. Didn't he sell her that car?”

“Yes, but I doubt he can tell you any more than I can.”

“Every little bit helps. It's like working on a jigsaw puzzle without the picture on the box. Right now, I don't even know what I'm looking at.”

Returning to the living room, Kathy sat on the couch and I took a matching upholstered chair. She picked up her glass and rattled the ice, drinking off the half an inch of water that had accumulated in our absence.

“How well did you know Violet?” I asked.

“Not well. I was fourteen years old and never had much to do with her. My mother hated her guts. The irony is, six months after Mom died, Daddy married a woman who looked just like Violet—same dyed red hair, same white-trash ways. Caroleena's pushing forty-five, three years younger than me, if you can believe that. I'd hoped it was a phase, but they've been married twenty years so I guess she's here to stay. More's the pity.”

I said, “Ah,” for lack of anything better.

She caught my tone and said, “It's embarrassing, but what're you going to do? I guess I should be glad he has someone to look after him. Saves me the aggravation. Of course, I'd be willing to bet if he ever gets sick, Caroleena's heading out the door.”

“What's the age spread between the two?”

“Thirty-six years.”

“Wow.”

“‘Wow' is right. When they married, he was sixty-one and she was twenty-five. Don't even bother asking me what's in it for her. She lives well and she knows how to get anything she wants,” she said, rubbing her thumb against her index finger, indicating money.

I felt my brow lift, wondering if the “new” Mrs. Cramer would be acing Chet's only daughter out of her inheritance. “What about Violet? You must have had some sense of her.”

“Oh, please. I had the same opinions my mother did. She made sure of that. Violet was flashy, but that was about it. Men followed her around like a pack of dogs so I guess she had something. Whatever it was, it went over my head.”

“You went to the fireworks that night?”

She straightened the edges of the decorator magazines. “Yes. Liza and I were supposed to go together, but Violet asked her to babysit so that was that. I think Liza went over there at six o'clock to get Daisy bathed and ready for bed.”

“Did you happen to see Foley at the park?”

“Sure. For a while, he was talking to my mom. He'd stopped off at the Blue Moon and he was drunk as usual, so he and my mom got into it.”

“About what?”

“Who knows?”

“Did you talk to him yourself?”

“Not me. I was scared of him as it was and I didn't want to have anything to do with him.”

“Did you ever keep Liza company when she was babysitting?”

“Once in a while. I'm glad Mom never found out, or she'd have had a fit. She was a teetotaler who thought all the evil in the world came out of a bottle.”

“What was it about Foley that scared you?”

“What didn't? His violence, his temper, the way he lashed out. With him, you never knew what was coming next. I figured if he was willing to hit Violet, why not Liza or me?”

“Did you ever see him hit Violet?”

“No, but I saw the evidence after the fact. That was good enough for me.”

“When did you hear Violet was gone?”

“Sunday morning. I didn't know she was
gone
gone, but I knew she hadn't come home. Mr. Padgett came over for lunch after church and he was the one who told my mom.”

“How'd he hear about it?”

“Town the size of Serena Station, everybody knows everything. Maybe someone noticed the car wasn't parked out front. That would've set tongues to wagging.”

“Was there any gossip about who Violet was seeing? Someone must have come under suspicion.”

“Not necessarily. Violet was a tramp, so it could have been anyone. Some guy she picked up in a bar.”

“I gather it didn't surprise you to think she'd run off.”

“Oh, heck no. Not her.”

“Even though it meant leaving Daisy behind?”

Kathy made a face. “Daisy was a whiny little brat in those days. And look how they lived. The Sullivans were dirt poor, their house was disgusting, and Foley beat Violet up every chance he could. The better question is why she waited as long as she did.”

 

I drove from Kathy Cramer's subdivision into Santa Maria proper, where I found a phone booth in the parking lot of a strip mall. I dialed the work number I'd been given for Violet's brother, and the woman who picked up on the other end said, “Wilcox Construction.”

“Hi. My name's Kinsey Millhone. I'm trying to reach Calvin Wilcox.”

“May I ask what this is in reference to?”

“His sister.”

A pause. “Mr. Wilcox doesn't have a sister.”

“Maybe not now, but he did. Would you ask him if he can spare a few minutes? I'd like to talk to him.”

“Hang on and I'll see if he's in.”

I figured she was saying that so she could comfortably claim he was “away from his desk,” but the next thing I knew, the man himself picked up the call. “Wilcox.”