Silent Joe (27 page)

"Can I look at Miguel Domingo's personal items, the things he had on him when he died?"

"We've got everything but the weapons."

He led me back to the property room, talked to the sergeant on duty. He made a call. A few minutes later a deputy brought a plastic box to the counter and set it down. McCallum signed for it and we took it back to the lab.

There wasn't much: a plastic bag with $6.85; a pack of matches from a convenience store; a black plastic comb; an OCTA ticket stub; a wallet and a ballpoint pen. A bloody shirt in white butcher paper. Bloody pants. Another bag with socks and underwear. Two worn athletic shoes with the laces tied loosely together.

"The wallet, may I?"

"Go."

I opened the bag and took out the wallet. It was old and worn and lopsided the way a wallet can get. One picture of five children and two adults, all standing in front of a wall with climbing roses on it. I recognized a face that looked like Enrique's, one that looked like Luria's. No ID. the billfold was a small, folded piece of newsprint. I unfolded it and said the
Journal
article that told of Luria Bias's accidental death. I folded it and put it back.

"Pants?" I asked.

"They're a mess."

I worked the butcher paper loose. Black jeans, bloodstains a deep rust color on the fabric. Nothing in the front pockets. Nothing in the back, slipped a finger into the watch pocket and felt something slick. I worked my finger around and tried to get it out but it was stuck. I used the tweeze on a pocketknife I carry. The tweezers slipped off twice before the dried blood gave way and a square of paper came out. I unfolded it and flattens it against the table. It looked like part of an envelope—you could see the diagonal seam in the paper. It had been torn into an approximate square, about five inches on each side. One edge was dark and wilted with blood

The handwriting was cramped and difficult to read.

Senora Catrin—Puerto Nuevo

Senor Mark—Punta Dana

Senora Julia—Laguna

Senora Marcie—Puerto Nuevo

The first three names had lines through them. Senora Marcie of Newport Beach did not. I read them twice.

I remembered Bo Warren's words from that first time we'd talked in the Blazak living room:
Marcie, that's the head maid here.

"Jesus," said McCallum. "We missed this. What, just names and cities?"

"Miguel was distraught. He was investigating Luria's death. Maybe these are contacts, or suspects."

"Well, the Suburban driver was Gershon—Barbara Gershon. Her name was published. It wasn't withheld."

I tried to come up with a logical explanation but I couldn't. Although I knew there was one phone call I'd have to make, soon.

"Joe, I'll have to log this in, make sure Newport PD knows about it."

"Yes, sir."

"You okay?" McCallum asked.

"Yes. I'm just tired of bullets and blood and broken bones."

"Job security," he said.

I stopped off at the bank to retrieve the contents of the safe-deposit box.
Crap. Nothing.
Even if that was true, it was time to deal with it. I emptied the box into Will's briefcase, signed myself out and headed back over to the sheriff's department shooting facility.

I drew and fired one hundred rounds through my .45s, half right-handed and half left. Fifty with the .32 on my ankle. I shot the Tall One and Whoever Beat Luria and Whoever Kidnapped Savannah, if someone even had. I shot Thor, but took less pleasure in it than usual. Then I shot some monsters and some ghosts and some demons. I shot Satan himself, right in the heart.

I'm good with the left hand but there's less endurance. The last ten rounds went all over the torso at fifty feet, but at least they hit black. I don't use wad-cutters for targets. I use the full-grain loads, copper-jacketed bullets, factory brass. I don't want anything behaving differently if I have to hit something other than paper. The devil, for example.

When I was done I broke down the guns and cleaned them. Light oil. Wonderful smell, Hoppe's gun oil. My left hand was buzzing and sore, and both of them smelled like gunpowder.

"Luz Escobar," said Ray Flatley. "Aka Pearlita. That's her name with the Raitt Street Boys. She carried a pearl-handled derringer in her pocket when she was thirteen. Still does, for all I know."

"May I see the file?"

He handed it across to me. I looked at her mugs. She was five feet six, 170 pounds. Hair cropped short.

"She dresses like a man," said Flatley. "We had her for a drive-by Santa Ana. But our witness was shot dead one night in his living room. Good-bye case against Pearlita. She's a shot-caller, Joe. Runs the hits and the retaliations. We've got our witness against Felix under protective arrest in another state. We keep waiting for Pearlita's punks to make a move, but so far, he's still alive."

I looked at the picture again. Even with the killers and rapists I'd guarded in jail, I'd rarely seen such malice in a person's face. She didn't look like a woman. She didn't look like a man. She looked like something neutral and mean.

"What's up?" Flatley asked. "What's your interest in Luz Escobar?

"Will talked to her on the phone the night he died. I think she want to get him to influence Phil Dent."

Flatley stared at me. "Rick know?"

"I came clean, sir. Everything."

"Good, Joe. Because Pearlita is bad company. And if Will wasn't willing to talk to Phil Dent on the behalf of a cold-blooded killer, may Pearlita's famous temper was tripped."

"Do the Raitt Street Boys and the Cobra Kings mix?"

"They hate each other."

I spent a few minutes over in Mod F, locked in the plumbing tunnel. I sat behind a cell occupied by a low-level Asian hood named Hai Phan. I leaned back against the dusty wall and looked at the pipes and the ducts. Phan was talking to the guy next to him—another Asian gangster—but they we speaking Vietnamese. I remained still, trying to overhear anything that might relate to Will or Savannah or Alex.

Nothing. I may as well have been listening to cats fighting or trees hissing in the wind. Then I went to the guard station in the mess hall and watched the inmates filing in for dinner. Dinner starts at four. It looked like it always looked: an institutional dining room, guards with their backs to the walls, a seemingly endless river of orange jumpsuits filing in and out. As usual, the Mexican car was the biggest, then the wood car, the black car, the Asians. Sullen. Quiet. Orderly. Another peaceful day, so far.

I went to my cubby and picked up my mail.

One item only: a postcard from Las Vegas. It showed a big hotel made to resemble an Italian city. The handwriting was neat and large.

Dear Joe,

You saved my life and I'm okay for now. I'm very afraid of

what might happen.

S.B.

It was postmarked three days earlier. I called Steve Marchant.

"I want you to do two things," he said. "One, put it in a paper bag, touching only the edges. Use tweezers or tongs. Two, bring that bag over here immediately or sooner."

Marchant took me into the small FBI workroom on the third floor and shut the door. He took the bag and slid out the postcard, using his pen to right it on the light table in front of him. He swung an infrared lamp over the light table and clicked it on.

"IR will illuminate the salts in body oil," he said. Then, "Look at this."

He stepped aside and let me look. I could see the nice thumbprint. It looked like it had been rolled in a booking room.

"Wait here."

He slammed the door behind him on his way out, slammed it when he came back in. He set two fingerprint cards and a folder on the table next to the postcard, then swung out a magnifier that was clamped to the table.

"Yeah, cute. Real cute."

He whispered something I couldn't hear, then stepped away. I looked down through the magnifier at the print, then at the thumb cards, then at the print again.

"To the naked eye, that's Savannah Blazak's," said Marchant. "I'll get Washington to run the points and make it official."

He clicked off the IR light and pushed the magnifier back against the wall. He turned and looked at me, and I could see the anger in his face.

From the folder he removed a handmade Mother's Day card a slipped one of the clear plastic holders over the top. It said
"Mom, I love you more than all the stars put together. Your Girl, Savannah."
March; pushed the postcard up next to the card, then used a pair of tweezers turn it over.

I looked over his shoulder. The writing was identical.

From the other folder he brought out a sheet of stationery with "Alex Jackson Blazak" embossed at the top, and his home address at the bottom I read the salutation and first two lines.

Dear Chrissa,

I can't tell you how long ago it seems since I saw you. That

Valentine's Day dinner was dyno.

"Savannah wrote the postcard," said Marchant.

"And she's afraid of what might happen."

He stood back and looked at me. "I'm going to get this guy, and I going to spring his hostage. You can quote me on that."

I nodded.

"Thanks, Joe. Thanks for the quick heads-up. Excuse me now, I've gotto get on the line to Las Vegas. Interstate flight with a juvenile, for immoral purposes. We've got so much mileage out of the Mann Act, you wouldn't believe it."

"Do you believe the immoral purposes part?"

Marchant thought a moment. "I'm going to tell you something I probably shouldn't. Don't let it leave this room. We polygraph the mom and dad as soon as they came to us about their daughter. They both passed, l didn't like some of what I saw with Jack. That's all I'm going to say right now."

"I found out yesterday about the arrangement with Ellen Erskine."

"Your father kept her in the dark, didn't even give her Savannah's name. Erskine wasn't sure if he was on the level about it or not."

I waited for more, but Marchant said nothing. Then: "What about you? You still think he was on the level?" "Yes. I'd bet my life on it."

On my way home I called Lorna Blazak on my cell phone. "Mr. Trona, have you heard from her?"

"She sent me a postcard from Las Vegas. I got it just an hour ago.

She's fine, Mrs. Blazak, but she's afraid."

"Dear God . . . and my son?"

"I can only assume he's there with her."

"I don't know what to do. Tell me what I can do."

"Wait, Mrs. Blazak. Help the Bureau help you."

Silence.

"Mrs. Blazak, did you employ a woman named Luria Bias as a house-cleaner?"

"No. Why?"

"I have some evidence that she was in contact with Marcie."

"That may well be, but no one named Luria Bias has worked here in this home. She was the one killed in Fullerton, right?"

"That's correct."

"My heart goes out to her and her family, Mr. Trona. But please don't add her to our list of woes here."

"I won't do that, Mrs. Blazak. I was just checking on a lead. It's important to follow through."

"I understand."

"Marcie is your main domestic help, correct?"

"Yes."

"May I have her last name?"

Silence again. "Diaz. Mr. Trona, bear in mind there must be more than one Marcie doing domestic work in this county."

"I will. And thank you. Ma'am, we're doing everything we can to find your daughter and son."

"It's absolutely frustrating, Mr. Trona. They're seen, then they disappear.

They're seen again, they disappear again."

"Please be patient."

"I need
something
I can hold on to."

"Hold on to the knowledge that Savannah is alive. Hold on hard, M Blazak."

"Thank you. And thank you for calling."

I
wasn't sure what kind of gift to bring June Dauer on our first real date but I knew she liked rubies. I bought a bracelet with rubies all around it and had it wrapped up very nicely. Then I realized that flowers were customary, so I got some of those too, and some chocolates to go with them, and a big basket of gourmet coffees and liqueurs because the gift store had a sale on them.