Bill Pronzini - The Other Side Of Silence

Still locked.

He couldn’t keep hanging around here, on the chance that Ulbrich would show up. Better try to press it. Back in the lobby he called the Confidential number-another answering machine-and then Ulbrich’s home number again. He left brief messages on both machines, giving a made-up name and asking for a callback and an appointment ASAP to discuss a professional matter.

As tired as he was from the long drive, he was too keyed up to sit in one place. He let the Jeep’s GPS guide him to National City and Ulbrich’s home address, an apartment building just below the San Diego line. Lower middle-class, racially mixed neighborhood, the building a three-story walkup and as nondescript as the one where Ulbrich had his office. So his business couldn’t be all that profitable. Scraping by, probably, on domestic and insurance work. The kind of small-timer who’d overcharge a client if he thought he could get away with it, even though he’d been exonerated on the one charge five years ago. Who’d be inclined to cross the line into blackmail if the situation looked ripe enough.

Fallon rang Ulbrich’s bell, got nothing for the effort. Two other tenants answered their bells, but neither would talk to him about Ulbrich. On the same block were a small grocery store and a dry-cleaning place. Better cooperation there, but no information. The merchants knew Ulbrich, but not well enough to remember seeing him recently or to describe his habits. Evidently he didn’t spend much time in the neighborhood, kept pretty much to himself when he was there.

North Park and the Confidential office again. Running around in zigzag loops, going over and over the same ground the way he had in Vegas when he was hunting Bobby J. But what else could he do?

When he walked into the lobby this time, a fat, tired-looking man in overalls was perched on a tall ladder replacing a burned-out fluorescent ceiling tube. Fallon rode the elevator to the third floor. Ulbrich’s office was still closed tight. He rode back down to the lobby, where the overalled man was just coming down off his ladder. Fallon asked him if he worked here regularly. Affirmative; he was the building’s maintenance superintendent.

“So then you must know Sam Ulbrich.”

“Oh sure, I know Mr. Ulbrich. Been here almost as long as I have.”

“Last time you saw him?”

“Couple of days ago.”

“Monday?”

The super’s face screwed up in thought. “No, it wasn’t Monday. Must’ve been last Friday. That’s right, last Friday around noon. He was on his way out to lunch at O’Finn’s.”

“A place he goes regularly?”

“When he’s here. He’s away a lot on business. I guess you know Mr. Ul-brich’s a private eye. He doesn’t like you to call him that, but that’s what he-”

“Where is it, this restaurant?”

“Not a restaurant,” the super said. “They serve food, but it’s a pub, Irish pub. I go there myself sometimes. Great corned beef and cabbage.” He glanced at his watch. “Almost noon. Some of that corned beef and cabbage would go good today, now I think of it.”

“O’Finn’s. Where?”

“Up on University, half a block east.”

Fallon found it easily enough. Typical urban Irish pub, with shamrock-and-shillelagh décor inside and out. Long, brass-railed bar, clusters of tables covered by Kelly green cloths, a row of high-backed wooden booths parallel to the bar. Most of the lunch trade hadn’t come in yet; the score or so of customers were either grouped at the bar or occupying the booths.

He bellied up to the plank. When the bearded bartender came his way, he said, “You know Sam Ulbrich? Has an office over on Chenango Street, comes in regularly for lunch.”

“Sure, I know him.”

“Seen him recently?”

“That I have.”

“When?”

“Oh, about three seconds ago.”

“… What?”

The bartender laughed. “Right behind you. Third booth from the front.”

FALLON TURNED TO PEER across the room. He hadn’t expected anything walking over here, but he’d finally caught a piece of luck. He hesitated, watching the man in the booth hoist a pint of Guinness. Brace him here and now? Or wait until he was finished and then follow him and brace him when he was somewhere by himself? Either way, he would have to do it without the Ruger for leverage. The sidearm was still locked inside the Jeep.

He went to the booth, walking slow, getting a read on Ulbrich on the way. Midfifties, heavy-set, craggy features, close-cropped iron-gray hair. Wearing a short-sleeved blue shirt, no tie, in deference to the warm weather. There was a sports jacket folded neatly on the seat beside him. If he was armed, it was probably a hideout piece and he’d have to be crazy to flash it in here.

“Sam Ulbrich?”

Ulbrich looked up, cocked his head to one side when he didn’t recognize Fallon. “That’s me.”

“My name’s Fallon.” No reaction. “I’d like to talk to you.”

“Business?”

“That’s right.”

“Well, I’ve just ordered lunch. First food I’ve had a chance at all day- I’ve been on a job in Lemon Grove since seven. Join me and we can talk while we eat. Or if you’d rather wait until afterward, my office isn’t far…” “Here’ll do.”

“Corned beef’s the house specialty,” Ulbrich said. “Lamb stew with black pudding’s good, too, if you like black pudding.”

“I’m not hungry.”

“Guinness? Ale?”

“Just talk.”

Ulbrich shrugged, lifted his glass again as Fallon sat down opposite. On his right forearm was a faded tattoo of the Marine Corps EGA, a spread-winged American eagle holding in its beak an unfurled banner with the words Semper Fi emblazoned on it. Ulbrich saw him looking at it, said, “Four and out in the early seventies. You ever in the military?”

“Army. MPs. Four years.”

“MPs, huh? I went into police work when I got out. San Diego force for fifteen years.”

Fallon said nothing.

“See any action on your tour?”

“No.”

“Me, neither. Came close, though. My company was in Saigon, just sent over from the Philippines, when the war ended.” Ulbrich drank again. “I was lucky. Sounds like we both were.”

Fallon was silent again.

“So. What can I do for you, Mr. Fallon?”

“You can tell me where to find Casey Dunbar and her son.”

Like tossing a dud grenade. A raised eyebrow was Ulbrich’s only reaction. His gaze remained steady on Fallon’s eyes, its only expression one of curiosity. “What’s your interest in the Dunbars?”

“I’m a friend of Casey.”

“What’s your interest in the Dunbars?”

“I’m a friend of Casey.”

“Is that right? Then you ought to know where to find her.”

“She’s missing. She’s been missing since Monday night.”

“Is that right?” Ulbrich said again. “Well, I’m sorry to hear it. But why come to me?”

“You found her ex-husband for her.”

“I wish that was true, but it isn’t. I traced Court Spicer to Vegas, but that was as far as I got. I might’ve been able to find him eventually if I’d stayed on the case, but she couldn’t afford to keep paying the bills-”

“Laughlin,” Fallon said. “Bullhead City.”

“I don’t get you.”

“Rented house. Sixty Desert Rose Lane.”

“Is that supposed to mean something to me?”

Another dud. Fallon felt uncertainty moving in on him again. He’d convinced himself Ulbrich was his man, yet the responses he was getting didn’t support it. Not a whisper of guilt.

Ulbrich said, “So Mrs. Dunbar is missing. Monday night, you said? Where? What circumstances?”

Fallon said carefully, “The last I saw of her was in Laughlin.”