Jonathan Kellerman: Billy Straight

“Who?”

“In my office, please.”

His office was big, done up in blue tweed and fake Colonial. Two women in their sixties sat in overstuffed chairs. One was chunky, broad-shouldered, with wiry gray hair uncoiling under a small charcoal pillbox hat, an ancient, no-nonsense tweed suit, a melt-the-glacier stare. The other was very thin, with coiffed hair the color of brandy, tasteful jewelry, light makeup. Navy suit that looked like Chanel, matching shoes. Her face was longish, painfully angular. She’d probably been beautiful once. She looked frightened. Petra was baffled.

“Detective,” said Bancroft, “this is Mrs. Adamson. She and the late Mr. Adamson were among our most generous benefactors.”

Slight inflection on the past tense. Bancroft winced. The thin woman smiled. Her hands were white, blue-veined, slightly liver-spotted. Petra noticed one index finger making tiny circles atop her purse. Gorgeous shoes, gorgeous suit, but, like the stocky woman’s getup, the outfit looked old, gave off a clear sense of history.

No introduction of the other woman. She was examining Petra like a fishwife rating mullet.

“Well, I’ll leave you to talk,” said Bancroft. He left.

The chunky woman got up too, looking none too happy.

“Thank you, Mildred,” Mrs. Adamson told her. Mildred nodded grimly before closing the door.

Mrs. Adamson turned to Petra. Her mouth worked. Finally, she said, “Please call me Cora. I’m so sorry to take your time, but…” Instead of continuing, she removed something from her purse and held it out.

Color snapshot of Billy. A little younger-maybe eleven. He stood on a boat dock, waving.

“How did you get this, ma’am?”

“It’s mine. I snapped the picture.”

“You know Billy Straight?”

The bottom half of the woman’s mouth trembled, and her eyes pooled with tears. “This isn’t Billy Straight, Detective Connor. It’s Billy Adamson. William Bradley Adamson, Jr. My son. My late son.”

Petra examined the back of the photo. A handwritten inscription said: Billy, Arrowhead, 1971. The colors were a little faded; she should have noticed. Some detective.

The boy was smiling, but something was off-the smile required effort.

A handkerchief had flown to Cora Adamson’s face. She said, “Perhaps there are things I could’ve done differently, but I wasn’tHow could I know for sure?”

“Know what, Mrs. Adamson?”

“Forgive me, I’m not making sense, let me organize my thoughts.. Billy — my Billy-was an only child. Brilliant, he taught himself to read at four. He graduated from Cal law school thirteen years ago, immediately began doing legal work for the Farm Workers Union. My late husband was convinced it was a stage, rebellion, getting back at the corporate world. But I knew better: Billy had always been caring, kind. Even as a small boy, he refused to hurt anything-he wouldn’t fish. Bill senior loved to fish, but Billy refused. The day I shot that picture, he and Bill had had a tiff about that. Bill insisted he was going to show Billy how to fish once and for all. Billy cried and insisted he wouldn’t get in the boat, refused to kill anything. Finally, Bill told him if he couldn’t be a man, just to stay behind with his mother. Which he did. But he was upset-he loved his father. I took the picture to cheer him up.”

Petra stared at the photo. Same eyes, same hair. Same cleft chin. Jesus, even the expression was a clone.

“At twelve he became a vegetarian,” said Cora Adamson. “Again, Bill thought it was a phase, but Billy never touched meat or fish again-I’m wandering, forgive me-where was I-the farm workers. Billy could have gotten a job with any firm in the country, but he chose to travel around the state with the farm workers, looking for violations, living the way they lived. He seemed happy, then suddenly he showed up at home and announced he’d quit, gotten a job with the public defender’s office. But he wasn’t happy there either, and left soon after.

“After that, he started to drift, driving around the state in an old car, growing his hair long, a long beard, doing legal work for various free clinics, never settling down. I knew something was bothering him, but he wouldn’t tell me what it was. He wasn’t around long enough to tell me. His father was so angry at him… he just kept wandering, leaving me no phone number, no address-I knew he was lost, but he refused to be found.”

Sitting up straighter, she twisted the handkerchief. “Then one weekend he showed up at our place in Arrowhead. We had guests-business associates of his father-and Bill was embarrassed about the way Billy looked. Billy didn’t care-it was me he wanted to talk to. He came to my room late at night, brought a candle and lit it. He said it was confession time. Then he told me he’d had an affair with a girl in Delano, one of the migrant girls, a young girl, underage. And she became pregnant. Or claimed to. Billy never saw a child, because he panicked when she told him, being a lawyer. Her age-statutory rape. He was also worried some grower would find out and use it against the union. Instead of shouldering his responsibility, he gave the girl every dollar he had with him and left town. That’s when he joined the public defender’s office. But it never stopped bothering him, and he began driving around California trying to find her-he said her name was Sharla and that she wasn’t sophisticated but she had a good heart. He never found her.

“‘But let’s face it, Mom,’ he told me. ‘If I’d wanted to badly enough, I would’ve, right? I’m not sure I want to know-Father’s right, I am a coward, spineless, no use to anyone.’ I told him the fact that he was telling me now showed he was extremely courageous-he still had a chance to buck up. I promised to do everything I could to help him find the girl, make financial arrangements for the child. If there was one- because I was skeptical, thought the girl was out for money. That infuriated him. He began pounding the bed, shouting that I was just like all the others, everything was money, money, money. Then he blew out the candle and stomped out. I’d never seen him like that and it shocked me. I thought I would let him cool down. The next morning, he was found floating in Lake Arrowhead. They said it was an accident. I never looked for the girl. I was never sure it was true. I did wonder from time to time… and then I saw the picture in the paper. And I knew. And now you’ve found him, Detective Connor.”

Petra took another look at the photo and handed it back. Too close to be anything but righteous, and the time line was right. William Bradley Adamson. William Bradley Straight.

“What is it you want me to do for you, Mrs. Adamson?”

“Detective, I know I have no right to-maybe legal rights, but morally… but this child. He must be my grandson. There’s no other rational explanation. I’m sure we can prove it with genetic tests. But not now, not with all he’s been through-I want to… help him.”

Suddenly, she looked down at her lap.

“I don’t have the resources I used to have. My husband ran into some… misfortune before he passed away.”

Petra found herself giving a sympathetic nod.

“The truth is,” said Cora Adamson, still averting her eyes, “I’ve been living off savings for several years, but I know how to budget and I’m by no means penniless. Learning about Billy-this Billy-has crystallized my plans. I live in a grotesquely oversized house that I’ve been thinking of selling for some time. Until now, I lacked the incentive-and the will-to make the change. Now, it’s clear. There’s no mortgage on the house. Once I sell it, even after taxes, I should have enough to support myself and my grandson in a reasonable manner.”

A pleading note had entered the woman’s voice. Here she was, Chanel suit and all, applying for parental rights. What do you say to that?