I broke the exchange first, closing my eyes, shaking my head. When I opened them, she’d disappeared. I twisted my hand back and forth on the clutch, revving the engine, and turned my back and bike on her and Manderley.

  Twenty-Five

  When my cell phone woke me up, I came slowly out of a deep sleep to find Frankie snuggled on top of the sheets against my right side. I was confused for a moment, not sure where I was, suddenly conjuring my boat, missing it, my rocking, soothing abode. I hadn’t slept there in more than a week as Frankie was closer to school and better off here.

  The phone kept ringing, and I cursed myself for forgetting to put it on airplane mode. I reached over the still sound asleep Frankie and picked it up.

  I whispered, “Yes.”

  “You killed him,” the voice said.

  I held the smooth plastic receiver against my ear. Repeating the words in my head, trying to make sense of them.

  I realized suddenly that the voice who’d uttered the ridiculous accusation belonged to Mrs. Wambaugh.

  “You’re going to pay, Mr. Plank. You took his life; I’m going to take yours.”

  She hung up her phone, and I was left holding mine.

  I was lost. It didn’t make sense.

  But I knew exactly what had happened.

  Twenty-Six

  I left Frankie still asleep on my, or rather, Alexandra’s, bed and called Bo on the phone in the kitchen.

  It was just after two a.m.

  He filled me in on the details of what I already knew.

  Christopher Wambaugh had shot himself in the head in his room at approximately eleven p.m., minutes after I left the house.

  The police were there, and all the guests and Bo and Rope and the staff were stuck there until everyone had been interviewed. They’d already questioned Bo and were huddled with Rope and his sous chef at the moment.

  He answered my question before I had the chance to. “I didn’t tell them anything about you being here. They didn’t ask, so I didn’t offer. Did anybody see you, other than my people?”

  “I don’t think so.” Christopher was dead. I had reason to believe, despite the fact that she’d threatened my life, that she might not finger me for a breaking and entering charge. “Have you seen Mrs. Wambaugh?”

  “No. I guess she found her son. She’s been holed up upstairs since.” He paused, breathed through his nose. “Do you have anything you want to tell me, Max?”

  “No.”

  “Okay, then.”

  “Sorry about this, Fiddle. Had no idea it would get so messed up.”

  “Shit happens,” he muttered. Then added, “It just seems to happen so much more frequently when you’re around.”

  “Thanks, buddy,” I said.

  “Anytime,” he said and hung up.

  Twenty-Seven

  A couple of days later, it was confirmed by Detective Marley that the gun Christopher used to kill himself, a Glock 27, a popular choice for novices, was the same one that had fired the bullet fished out of Sarah Swan’s gut.

  According to the police, that clinched things. MMO, the three cogs of the not- quite-round guilty wheel. There was Motive—Sarah breaking Christopher’s heart, Means—the gun that Christopher purchased, and Opportunity—his presence nearby, at the Children’s Network, the night of the crime.

  Of course, the latter hadn’t been proven.

  But as far as Detective Marley was concerned, the case was solved.

  Far as I was concerned, I felt guilty.

  Knowing that my confrontation with him, my goads and threats, likely put him over the top. There was no way around the fact that, whether he shot Sarah or not, I’d pushed the kid too far.

  I’d have to live with that unseemly fact long after this case was solved or forgotten. I pushed the accusatory thoughts away. There’d be plenty of time to drown in my guilt later.

  I still had some doubts as to whether Christopher had attacked Sarah that night, although if he didn’t, then my culpability would be even harder to deal with.

  What I’d found in Mrs. Wambaugh’s WF folder had raised questions that went beyond the simple tale now being told in the local paper about a distraught and depressed boy attacking his girlfriend after she broke up with him.

  I’d been busy while the ballistics and forensics pros were doing their work.

  But I had one piece of unrelated business to attend to before I followed up on what I learned at the big house in Atherton.

  I’d gotten a text from Marsh the previous evening, from somewhere in the space-time continuum, telling me that I had an appointment with Liu at his home on Russian Hill.

  I texted Marsh back for further clarification, but he’d disappeared back into some black hole.

  I had no idea what Liu knew about the meeting or the situation with his nephew or who I was or why I was there. But he’d obviously agreed to meet me, so I was hoping that Marsh hadn’t strayed too far from the truth to get me access. From our sources, Liu hadn’t made his money by nefarious means and wasn’t actively involved with criminal elements. Nevertheless, I always kept in mind Balzac’s dictum: Behind every great fortune lies a crime.

  There was such a cynical realism behind that quote. It was perhaps not one hundred percent true, but close enough for this world.

  I got to The Summit on Green Street, the name of Liu’s thirty-two-story high rise, in time for the doorman to check my bonafides and direct me up to the twenty-second floor. I knocked on Liu’s front door at exactly 9:02 a.m.

  According to Google, he lived in one of San Francisco’s most exclusive neighborhoods on one of the original seven hills, and in one of its most iconic buildings, designed by Joseph Eichler, the most influential architect in the Bay Area in the mid-fifties. Joe wanted to bring style and class, in the mode of Frank Lloyd Wright, to tract housing. Whether you like them or not, his designs are instantly recognizable with their post and beam construction, floor-to-ceiling windows, exposed ceiling beams, and funky atriums.

  After knocking, I waited, stepping back from the door so I could be examined in the peephole. When I judged that relatively enough time had passed, I raised my fist again, but lowered my hand at the sound of something being dragged across the floor inside.

  The doorknob rattled for a few seconds before a firm grip was established and the door swung open.

  George Liu stood trembling, both hands gripping his walker. He was a short wisp of a man. A brown beret clung perilously to one side of his bald head. His desert sand-colored skin was pockmarked with age spots. His brown eyes were partially shielded beneath lightly tinted oyster-shell glasses. He was a seasoned member of the octogenarian club.

  I smiled at him, introduced myself. He pursed his lips and nodded. He made an effort to lean back with the walker, but it didn’t move even a centimeter. I stepped in and around, offering a shoulder to lean on. He mumbled something I couldn’t understand, took my arm, and we inched slowly into the living room.

  It was spectacular. Twelve-foot, floor-to-ceiling windows on all sides with views of downtown San Francisco and the fog-shrouded bay in the distance.

  After what seemed like an hour but probably may have been closer to five minutes, we arrived at a round table with five chairs set squarely between the views of the TransAmerica Pyramid and the Bank of America building. One of the adjustable vinyl-covered chairs was set higher than the rest, and Liu indicated that he wanted to sit there. I guided him down into it and took the seat beside him.

  He sighed as he settled in, coughed, and cleared his throat.

  As if on cue, a stout middle-aged black woman wearing a kind of black Nehru-style jacket appeared with a tray carrying both tea and coffee, two bowls of steamed buns, and one of white rice.

  As she put the platters in the center of the table, carefully placing an empty plate and cups in front of each of us, her eyes took my measure discreetly. I gave her a smile.

  She shook her head almost imperceptibly from side to side, bowed, and left.

  Perhaps she didn’t like my smile, despite the sincerity behind it.

  Liu cleared his throat again, pointed at each of the bowls in turn and said softly, “Pork, vegetable, soybean.” Using chopsticks, he picked up one each of the buns and then, slowly, nudged some of the rice onto his plate.

  I mimicked his actions, picked up the tea pot and, after getting his assent, poured him a cup. I poured myself a coffee.

  He took a sip, then silently started working away at his breakfast. I took a bite of the vegetarian bun. It was delicious, as was the coffee.

  I gathered the old guy wasn’t interested in talking before eating so I occupied myself enjoying the breathtaking views of the most beautiful city in the country while downing four buns and a little rice.

  As I finished the last of my coffee, Liu cleared his throat again, and said, “My nephew. Tell me.”

  I put my cup down. The jangle it made was jarring—I hadn’t noticed how quiet the condo was.

  “Thank you for the breakfast, Mr. Liu. What did my associate tell you?”

  He dabbed at the corners of this mouth with a napkin, smacking his lips, making little bird-like gasping sounds. “He asked me if my nephew’s actions regarding my investment with Mr. Dao had been authorized by me.” He cleared his throat, smacked his lips again, mumbled, “Must tell Felice to steam buns longer still.”

  I waited a few seconds while he stared at his plate, considering whether to finish a half-eaten pork bun. “And did you?”

  He raised his eyes to mine, blinking repeatedly. “I do not know what my nephew did. Mr. Marsh did not tell me. He sent you here. Tell me.”

  “Do your nephew and his family live here with you?” The place was huge, the room we occupied, encompassing the living and dining rooms and ultra-modern kitchen, had to be at least three thousand square feet. Long hallways branched off from the center north and south of us to what I assumed were lots of bedrooms and baths.

  “No longer. Felice and I. Just the two of us.”

  The old man suddenly seemed sad, a pained expression settling on his face. Or maybe it was just the way the he looked after breakfast. I wanted to ask about when his extended family moved out, but it didn’t seem relevant in the moment and was none of my business anyway.

  “Please, Mr. Max, tell me about my nephew.”

  I felt restless. I stood, walked over to the glass wall, watched the fog drifting through the Bay Bridge spires and cables, a ghostly misty merging.

  Einstein’s theorem popped into my head: E=mc2.

  Energy is equal to mass times the square of the speed of light. Somehow the ethereal fog blending with the hard, manmade mass of the bridge seemed to embody the famous scientist’s profoundly difficult equation. It made little sense, but neither did the theory.

  Deep thoughts, my friends. Max Plank is known to have them, sometimes at the most inappropriate moments.

  I took a deep breath and began to summarize the actions taken by Takeshi against Dao along with our countermeasures. I summarized as best as possible but spoke for several long minutes. Liu sat silently, listening I hoped.

  When I thought I pretty much had covered all relevancies, I took one last long look at the fog and the bridge and rethought my linking of those juxtapositions to the most famous theory in the history of science. I could see no sense in my link.

  I sat back down next to Liu and waited for his response.

  He’d finished the rest of his steamed bun. He took a sip of tea, frowned, and said, “I was afraid. I should never have let them leave.”

  “Where are they living now?”

  “Here. On the third floor.”

  “That’s so close—”

  “No. It is as far as China. I never leave this house. They do not visit. My brother, ever since he stopped working and his Jinjing, she dies, he is depressed. I send Felice down, and they tell her they will come. But they do not.”

  He closed his eyes, shook his head, smacked his lips, struggling to swallow.

  He was old and weak physically, but I wasn’t detecting any signs of the dementia or mental deterioration that his nephew had emphasized.

  “So you haven’t seen Takeshi in…?”

  “Two months, more.”

  “And he wasn’t acting on your behalf?”

  “No!” Liu’s voice sounded like broken glass.

  “But you had to discuss your losses, your involvement with Dao, with your nephew.”

  “No,” he said, his eyes meeting mine. “I told my brother. I was unhappy, but I did not blame Dao.” He flashed a half-smile. “Maybe a little.”

  “You told your brother you were unhappy or mad at Dao?”

  “Maybe,” he said. “But Dao warned me. I decided that with his record, what I knew, that he could be trusted. I invested a little too much.” He cleared his throat. “It was crazy.”

  “You lost a lot of money?”

  “Oh, yes.” He paused and flashed a mischievous smile. “But I have a lot of money still. I pay for this home and for my brother’s home below, too. I will not run out of money before I run out of breath.”

  “So you weren’t mad enough to try and retaliate to Dao in any way?”

  “No. No. He did not cheat me. It was my fault. I was upset with him, but with myself too.”

  “Tell me about your nephew.”

  “I will not say he is a good boy. He has good qualities.” He sighed heavily. “I should have sent him back to China, to Chengdu, where my family is. Perhaps…no…I am old. I do not understand. I want to blame America for Takeshi, for corrupting him. I want to blame my brother. He is a quiet man, much like men of his generation, Asian men with their sons.” He touched the right side of his face with a trembling finger, frowned. “He tried his best with Takeshi, but he did not understand what needed to be done. And now he’s given up. Some men are born with E gui—hungry ghosts inside, that they cannot control. That is Takeshi. He is fascinated by the Yakuza. He is a foolish and mean young man. I have talked with him, and he seems to listen. But I doubted. And now, with what you tell me, I can see that my words had no effect.”

  “I’m afraid that he will try again. I worry for my friend Dao and his wife. They live in fear now. And I fear for your nephew. My friend, Mr. Marsh, is a very dangerous man. Dao is his good friend. He will deal with Takeshi harshly if he threatens Dao again.”

  A long silence followed. Liu stared unseeing out the picture windows. I kept on trying to re-link that tenuous connection between Einstein and the fog and bridge to no avail.

  Finally, Liu said, “Takeshi will not bother Dao again. I will meet with him today, even if I have to leave this house. I, too, know very dangerous men in this city. Someone in my business, the sale of and management of large properties, is involved with all kinds of men, men who one would rather not meet, but must. I have enriched a few of them, without wanting to. They will respond to my request for a favor.” He closed his eyes again, and they filled with tears. He reached up with quivering fingers and wiped them away.

  “Can you bring my walking machine before you leave?”

  I propped it beside him, thanked him for breakfast and for his help. He fixed me with a steady gaze and said, “Takeshi will not bother you again.”

  I nodded and left him there, hoping that Felice, that sturdy, much younger woman, wasn’t just his caretaker, but his friend. Like so many lonely old people in the big city, he needed one.

  Twenty-Eight

  That evening, while I was preparing Frankie my famous cheesy cheese mac ‘n cheese, I got a call that eventually led to a whole new understanding of the case and the crimes, and the secrets and lies running just beneath the calm surface of things.

  At first glance, it didn’t seem to be anything but another senseless death.

  “How are you, Q?”

  “Been better. Been a whole lot worse. Doing a lot better than our friend, Speed.”

  Then he told me about the poor bastard, and I began to think that there was truly something murderous about my approach to people in this case.

  “When did it happen?”

  “Last night, I guess. Woman, I know the girl, named Felicia, pretty black girl but a coke head. Don’t know if she was dating him or supplying him. Anyway, she came to his apartment and found him dead on the living room couch. He was sitting there with his eyes open, staring at nothing. TV was set to Jeopardy. She called me before she called the police. I’d just called to ask her a week ago about Speed, after you asked me to check him out. I told her to call 911. She didn’t want to. Told her they’d find out she was there anyway, and she’d be in real trouble, she tried to pretend she was never there.”

  “So you don’t know if he tried to kill himself or it was just an accidental overdose?”

  “Overdose. Heart attack. Killed hisself. All the same thing in Speed’s case. He was on a spiral. Couldn’t control anything in his life, including the gambling.”

  I remembered him sitting across from me at Pirate’s Cove. The desperation in his eyes, the bitterness, the constant sniffing and nose rubbing. I knew whatever happened wasn’t my fault. But my toughness with him surely hadn’t helped. Thinking about Christopher and Speed, had I known more about their fragility, would I have handled them differently?

  If I thought either one of them was on the verge of suicide, certainly I would have. But, lacking clairvoyance, I was never going to be able to predict who of my many suspects might be vulnerable.

  Still, I couldn’t help feeling like an asshole.

  “The cops are probably going to want to talk to you if they find out Felicia called you first or if she mentions you contacted her about Speed.”

  “Yeah. Figured that.”

  “Let me know if they give you a hard time.”

  “Oh, they gonna give me a hard time. But it don’t bother me no more. I expect it, dealt with it before. You don’t get to be a black man my age and not figure out how to deal with the blue men.”

 

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