Electric City, page 5
Jane knew. Calvin had a whole roster of deadbeat legal clients who spent their lives getting into low-level scrapes from which he extricated them on a pro bono basis. “What’s the cat’s name?’ asked Jane.
“Name?” said Calvin. “I don’t know. I just call it the cat.” He looked down at it, seemed startled to find himself petting it, and stopped. “I can give you the name of a reporter on the Times,” he said. “I want some remuneration if she goes for the story. Like maybe lunch.”
“Deal,” said Jane, who figured she could have called up the papers on her own without his help, but who looked forward to lunch with him.
The next evening at six, Jane found herself presiding over a small gathering at her house. The four readers from the Columbia Clipping Service sat waiting for the reporter. Jane had been curious about Margaret and Norm, the two readers she hadn’t met.
Margaret was a pretty, plump women around sixty with a soft round face, a halo of fine wavy hair, and remarkably intelligent gray eyes. Norm was tall, thin, silent and nervous-looking. She imagined him to be around thirty-five. It was clear they had been brought up to speed on Jane’s efforts in whispered conferences at break time under the beady eye of Mrs. Webber, and they both seemed pleased to meet Jane, although Norm’s face broke out in bright red patches when they shook hands.
The reporter arrived, a dark-haired woman named Carla, who wore big earrings and bright red lipstick. “And how do you all feel about her disappearing,” she said, in the tone of a group therapy leader, after brief introductions.
Monica told Carla how amazed they all were. “It’s really strange. She led a very ordinary life. Same routine every day. The exact same bus to work, everything. We’re really worried about her.”
Clark’s attention seemed to wane. Jane observed him examining the old engraving of Saint George and the Dragon that hung over the mantel, recording the image, no doubt, in his photographic memory.
“No family, huh? Just you guys. Do you all miss her very much?” said Carla in a sentimental sort of way, obviously looking for an angle. There was a brief strained silence, during which Jane was reminded of Calvin Mason’s relationship with his cat.
The kind-faced Margaret filled the silence with a quote. “We’re all very concerned about Irene,” she said. “We need to know what happened to her for our own peace of mind, and as friends and colleagues.”
“And this Jeopardy! deal, how much did she win exactly?” said Carla, scribbling away.
Clark turned away from Saint George. “Twenty thousand four hundred and two dollars,” he said.
Carla nodded approvingly and wrote that down, then checked her watch. “I’ll tell people to call the Seattle Police Department if they know anything,” she said.
“Ha!” said Monica. “The detective on the case just has an answering machine.”
Carla ignored this. “And I need a picture,” she said.
“We just have a fuzzy Polaroid,” said Jane. “But I’m sure we can get you something better.” After all, they had a key.
“Okay,” said Carla. “I’ll hold on to the story until you can get a better picture. I guess I could try and get a driver’s license picture or something.” She sounded as if she thought the latter option would be too labor-intensive.
“She didn’t drive,” said Clark.
Carla shrugged. “Hey, without a picture, I’m not sure we want to run it. Let me know if you find one.”
Jane walked the reporter to the door. “This could be an interesting little story,” Carla said. Her voice dropped to a conspiratorial whisper. “All those clipping people are sort of sweet.” She wrinkled up her nose as if she were talking about puppies.
“They’re quiet individuals who love to read,” said Jane in a dignified tone meant to make Carla feel tacky for being condescending.
When she got back into the living room, Norm had broken his silence. “She won’t like our having used the name of the clipping service,” he said, obviously referring to the feared and loathed Mrs. Webber. “I just know it. We didn’t check with her. She’ll get us for this.” He gnawed on a cuticle.
Jane considered offering them all drinks, but also wondered churlishly if they’d hunker down for the night and expect dinner if she did. Her better nature took over, and she smiled. “Would anyone like a drink? There’s some Scotch and gin and everything and sherry and some white wine. And there’s Coke in the fridge.”
When Jane’s guests had all settled in with their drinks, and some cheese and fruit, and with festive, pleasant expressions on their faces, Monica said, “I meant to ask. What was that newspaper you found in the wastepaper basket in Irene’s room? You had it in your hand when we ran out of there, I know, because it kind of flapped against my face on the stairs.”
“My God,” said Jane, “I never took a look at that. It must still be in the car.” She was a little embarrassed by this lapse, excused herself and went out to the garage.
There it lay, in the back seat of the car, where she had flung it. It was a page of want ads, with some of them circled. Jane’s first reaction was that Irene was looking for another job. After meeting the odious Mrs. Webber, Jane could hardly blame her. But the page seemed to be apartment rentals.
Back in the living room, she showed them what she had found, and handed it to Norm, who was sitting closest to her. “I guess she was planning to move,” said Jane.
“Why rent when she already owned that house?” mused Margaret. “Irene was reasonably practical.”
Norm swallowed, and Jane watched his Adam’s apple slide up his long neck and back down. “I see a pattern here,” he said. “Did you notice? All the ads she’s circled are for security buildings. You know, with intercoms and special locks and like that.” He looked up at the rest of them. “I think Irene was afraid,” he said.
“Check the date,” said Jane.
“It was the fourteenth,” said Norm. “That’s the last Friday she came to work.”
6.
The next morning Irene’s house seemed less sinister and more depressing. Jane circled the block and ascertained that there were no cars parked in either the front of the house on Argyle, or in the back on North 55th. In the yard next door, a young mother was pulling spring weeds from a bed of tulips and talking to a child of around three who was playing in a sandbox.
Jane tried the front door and found that it was locked. Whatever the guy with the crowbar had done to the door to get in, he’d managed to lock it back up again, or maybe the police had done that after she’d called them the other night. She took out the key, which still worked, and went inside.
She heard herself let out a little cry. The place had been ransacked with a vengeance. There were books pulled from the shelves all over the close, tobacco-scented living room, and a small table was overturned. Jane stood stock-still and listened. The house was silent, and there hadn’t been any cars parked in front. Just to be on the safe side, she left the front door wide open as she went inside. That way she could get out fast, or, worst-case scenario, the woman weeding her tulip bed could hear her scream. Jane glanced around the room. In the corner was a television set, dusty and untouched. Wouldn’t a thief go for that?
The dining room and kitchen had been searched too. At the sight of dishes on the floor, broken plates and teacups, and some plates still intact lying on the carpet, Jane found herself getting a horrible queasy feeling. The pattern, some old-fashioned pansies and California poppies, looked old and out-of-stock. Jane couldn’t help but think it was criminal to wreck a set, then realized what a minor matter a few incomplete plate settings was. A person was missing.
She had a sense that this wasn’t vandalism. After all, the dishes weren’t all broken, and some were still in the cupboard. Just enough of them had been pulled out of the cupboard to search behind them, by someone without Jane’s sensibilities about keeping a set of china intact. Someone like the thug with the crowbar.
The kitchen was a similar mess. Even the refrigerator had been searched. Jane looked down at the floor and saw an onion and a pile of dishcloths sitting next to a nest of mixing bowls and a box of Spic and Span on its side, the green powder spilling out onto the red-brick-patterned linoleum.
The bathroom sink was full of bottles of Tylenol and cough syrup. There was a mound of towels outside the linen cupboard in the hall. The bedroom had been pretty thoroughly gone over too, with clothing piled onto the bed. Overturned on the floor was a gray metal box—which looked as if it had been dragged from under the bed. On the bureau, a jewel box lay on its side, spilling out brooches and rings.
The center of the search, however, had clearly been in the second bedroom. The floor was a flurry of yellowed newspaper clippings and opened file folders. Jane just backed out of the room. Two things were clear. First of all, this wasn’t a burglary, this was a search. The television and the jewelry were still there. Second, whatever they’d been looking for, it didn’t look as if they’d found it. The search was too extensive.
Jane decided she should call the police, but first of all she decided she’d look for what she’d come to find.
She got lucky right away. That overturned metal box on the floor in the first bedroom looked like one of those fireproof boxes people used to keep insurance policies and other papers. Its position suggested it had been kept under the bed and Irene’s idea was to be able to grab it and run out in case of fire.
Jane tipped it up and underneath was a nest of papers. Jane sat on her heels and went through them. There was a homeowner’s insurance policy, a high school diploma from Lincoln High School, which would suggest Irene had indeed grown up in this house, the counterfoil of a Social Security card. And there was a small stack of photos including a few awkward group shots, and a baby picture that looked from the eyebrows as if it might have been Irene at about six months or so. She was sitting up in little dress with big square white baby shoes, looking inquisitively at the camera. It was sometimes easy to forget that nearly everyone had once been someone’s darling baby.
There were some other shots too. A thirtyish Irene with a large, gray-haired woman, presumably her mother. Vacation snapshots. Jane finally found a studio portrait that looked maybe ten years out of date. The hair hadn’t gone completely gray yet, there were just a few streaks, but it was enough like the woman on the Jeopardy! tape. Irene looked relaxed and pleasant. It was a nice picture, which pleased Jane. She was protective enough of Irene by now to want to make sure the newspaper had a nice picture of her.
Jane thought she should stay and look around some more. But she was overwhelmed by the task of sorting through the huge mess, and she didn’t really know what she was looking for.
Anyway, she already knew several things.
First, Jane believed from the absence of her purse, or signs of a struggle, that Irene had probably left the house in some routine, voluntary way. But the bedside book, the breakfast dishes in the sink and the toothbrush made her think that Irene had not planned to be gone long. Second, she agreed with Norm. Those circled newspaper ads meant Irene was frightened. Third, there was someone else interested in Irene right now. And that someone, according to the state of this house, didn’t have Irene’s best interests at heart.
Later that day, in a small Italian restaurant on Queen Anne Avenue, Jane dipped bread into olive oil and herbs. Across the table from her, Calvin Mason did the same. They were surrounded by a lot of gently animated white-haired ladies lunching at pretty tables with green cloths and pink napkins before a matinee at the theater around the corner. The world, as represented by the matinee ladies, seemed a kind, intelligent, orderly and predictable place.
“O Solo Mio” on tape floated in from the kitchen, and an Asian waitress came with Jane’s hearty lunch of angel hair pasta with sardines and roasted garlic. Calvin was having the special—singing scallops—which he dug enthusiastically out of the pink fluted shells.
“So did you call the cops about the place being tossed?” said Calvin. Jane thought he was trying to sound stem. “You should, you know. I know you like to mess around yourself so you can drag some case back to the board . . .”
Now he was starting to lecture her. There were times Jane wished Calvin didn’t know what she did for a living. “Of course I did,” she said firmly. “Well, actually, I had Monica at the clipping service do it.” Monica had left another message on the answering machine in Missing Persons.
Calvin had touched on a sore point. If Jane really cared about right overcoming wrong in the pure way her uncle had, she’d want the police to find Irene. With their superior resources and skill, they could probably do a pretty good job if they ever hacked through all the cases they must have, judging by their apparent lack of activity.
But Jane also cared about Uncle Harold’s lovely money—money that enabled her to lead a quiet, dignified life after years of marginal living. And the only way she could get her hands on that money was to take on some hopeless case, and solve the problem herself, to the board’s satisfaction. Which meant rooting for the police not to do their job properly.
Surely Uncle Harold had realized, when he set up the trust, that her motivation would be different than his had been. He had even alluded to it, not unkindly, in a posthumous letter to her, mentioning her love of luxury. After all, he was rich and hadn’t needed the money. Jane was sure if she had plenty of her own money she’d be free to behave just as decently too. “What do you think the police will do?” said Jane.
Calvin shrugged. “Not a lot. She could be anywhere. Without screaming relatives, it might take a dead body to get their attention. Or maybe if Carla runs that newspaper story it will produce some leads.”
Jane suddenly had an unpleasant realization. She didn’t want the police to get those leads. She wanted them herself.
“So what did you find out about that license plate?” she said. Calvin reached into his pocket and handed her a piece of paper with a name and an address in Renton. “Guy’s name is Craig Swanson,” he said. “Does that mean anything?”
Jane shook her head. “No. I had the idea he might be some kind of hired thug.”
“Why didn’t you say so?” said Calvin. “I can see if he’s got any outstanding warrants.”
“How much?” said Jane.
“For you, since you’re buying me this nice lunch, nothing.”
“Deal,” said Jane. “While you’re at it, could you find out whether the cops arrested him the night I called in? What really confuses me is that I know I heard sirens maybe twenty minutes or so after I was there, so how could the guy have searched the place so thoroughly?”
Calvin shrugged. “Maybe he came back later.”
The warm, fragrant pasta dish and the nice Italian wine were making her sleepy. She woke herself up with a cappuccino, because she still had a few things to do later that afternoon.
Jane had planned to drop off Irene’s picture with Carla at the newspaper office after lunch. Now, instead of dropping by Editorial, she went to the Retail Advertising department with the picture, and wrote a check for $3,276 to buy a quarter-page ad to run in both Seattle dailies, the afternoon Times and the morning Post-Intelligencer. She wrote her address on the back of the photograph and asked that it be returned as soon as the ad was produced.
The ad, a rough layout of which she sketched on a piece of paper, featured Irene’s picture, and underneath it the words “Have you seen this woman? Concerned friends of Irene March want to talk to anyone who saw her after May 14th, when she was last seen leaving her office in downtown Seattle.” Jane added her own number and said anyone with information could call collect. She decided to forget about a reward. She’d get too many false leads, and the board wouldn’t like it.
She hadn’t told Calvin about her plan. She was a little ashamed that she was hogging this case for her own selfish reasons. She was also afraid he’d tell her it was foolhardy to put her own phone number there, and link herself to Irene’s disappearance. But Jane wanted to shake things loose fast, and this seemed like a good way. Something that would get things moving, even if it were a little dangerous, was better than doing nothing. Jane also took satisfaction in the fact that the ad might put whoever else was interested in Irene, whoever might have done her harm, on notice. Someone cared what had happened to Irene March.
7.
The day after her ad ran, Jane spent all morning on the phone. Thank God, she thought, she had call waiting. The first call was from a woman named Donna MacLaine from a town called Pateros. “I hope I’m not calling too early,” she said. “I go on shift in twenty minutes, and we get real busy, so I thought I’d better call you now.”
“Pateros,” said Jane, as if the name were familiar. She was wondering where it was. She didn’t want to start out insulting her informant by her ignorance of the place. Washington was a big state and people in Seattle were notoriously vague about anything outside the city limits.
“East of the mountains,” said Donna. “In Okanogan County. I’m calling ’cause I think I’ve seen that lady in the newspaper.”
“And when was that?” said Jane.
“I can tell exactly,” said Donna. “Because it was the weekend of the Omak Stampede. That makes it almost a year ago. She was in here for lunch. With a strange guy.”
“And you remember her after all that time?” said Jane.
“I know it sounds funny, but I do. Things were real tense at their table.”
Donna spoke to someone in the background. “Just a sec, honey,” she said. She turned her attention back to Jane. “I knew there was some story behind it all. If you didn’t watch the people and see what they’re doing and thinking, waiting tables would get pretty boring. I like to know where people are coming from. If I don’t, it drives me nuts, to be honest. There was some weird story there, I’ll tell you that.”
