Sue Grafton - U Is For Undertow

“That’s true. On the other hand, Greg and Shelly had their druggie pals who kept them supplied with dope. They sat out in the bus and smoked so much weed, I could have gotten high myself. I realize now I should have turned them in to the police, but I was still hoping the problem would go away of its own accord.”

“Did you meet their friends?”

“I never laid eyes on them. They’d park around the corner and approach on foot, which allowed them to bypass the house and go straight to the cabana where the bus was parked. One of them had a motor scooter. I remember that because every time he left, I could hear it puttering down the street.”

“I wish I could make sense of it.”

“You and me both,” she said. “Oh, before I forget. Rain’s driving up from L.A. for a few days. She took over the family business after Patrick died. I’m sure she’d be willing to tell you what she remembers. It isn’t much, but you might pick up a useful tidbit.”

“That’s great. I’ll call and set something up.”

The four-mile beach walk with Deborah had warmed me, but once I cooled off and my body temperature dropped, I could feel the chill in my bones. I returned to my car and pulled on my socks and running shoes. My feet were still wet and so grubby with sand that the cotton sawed against my flesh like a wood rasp. While I was out and about I made a quick stop at the drugstore and stocked up on blank index cards.

At 5:00, I unlocked the studio door and let myself in. My first order of business was to strip off my damp clothes and hop in a hot shower, after which I put on my sweats and went down to the living room. For supper I made myself a peanut butter and pickle sandwich. Recently I’d been making an effort to upgrade my diet, which meant cutting down on the french fries and Quarter Pounders with Cheese that had been my mainstays. A peanut butter and pickle sandwich was never going to qualify as the pinnacle on the food pyramid, but it was the best I could do.

I set my plate and napkin on the table at one end of the sofa, then opened a bottle of Chardonnay and poured myself a glass. I returned to the living room, a round-trip of twenty feet. I found a ballpoint pen and curled up on the sofa with a quilt tucked around my legs. I opened the first packet of index cards and started taking notes.

I had a lot of ground to cover, consigning everything I’d learned to note cards, one item per card, which reduced the facts to their simplest form. It’s our nature to condense and collate, bundling related elements for ease of storage in the back of our brains. Since we lack the capacity to capture every detail, we cull what we can, blocking the bits we don’t like and admitting those that match our notions of what’s going on. While efficient, the practice leaves us vulnerable to blind spots. Under stress, memory becomes even less reliable. Over time we sort and discard what seems irrelevant to make room for additional incoming data. In the end, it’s a wonder we remember anything at all. What we manage to preserve is subject to misinterpretation. An event might appear to be generated by the one before it, when the order is actually coincidental. Two occurrences may be linked even when widely separated by time and place.

My strategy of committing facts to cards allowed me to arrange and rearrange them, looking for the overall shape of a case. I was convinced a pattern would emerge, but I reminded myself that just because I wished a story were true didn’t mean that it was. As my Aunt Gin used to say, “It’s like the Singer sewing machine repairman said to the housewife, Kinsey. ‘Wishing won’t make it sew.’ I confess I didn’t get the point until I was in third grade and realized that “sew” and “so” sounded the same but served different functions. More pertinent in my experience was another saying of hers: “Wish in one hand and shit in the other and see which fills up first.” Sometimes a dog tag is just a dog tag, and two guys digging a hole are gathering worms in preparation for a fishing trip.

I devoted most of Thursday to other business. Despite my fascination with Mary Claire Fitzhugh, I had other work-related responsibilities. I’d been asked to comb public records for hidden assets in a nasty divorce. In that case, a husband was suspected of playing fast and loose with certain real property he claimed he’d never owned. I was also in the process of tracking down a witness to a hit-and-run accident and that required a lot of knocking on doors, so I was out of the office for most of the day. I stopped by at 4:00 and spent the next forty-five minutes transcribing my field notes to rough-draft reports. I’d been so caught up in work I hadn’t noticed the message light blinking on my answering machine.

I punched Play.

Tasha said, “Hi, Kinsey. I’m down in Santa Teresa to meet with a client and I was wondering if you’d be available later this afternoon. I have something I think will interest you. It’s roughly noon now, so I’m hoping I’ll hear from you. I’ll be staying at the Beachcomber on Cabana until tomorrow morning.” She recited the number, which I ignored.

I went back to typing notes, but I’d lost my train of thought. I pressed Play and listened to the message again, this time jotting down the number at her hotel. She must have known me better than I thought, because nothing is more irresistible than veiled references to a topic of interest. I couldn’t imagine what she was up to, but I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt.

I dialed the number and the switchboard put me through to her room. She was out, but a very pleasant automated woman told me that the party I was calling was not available at this time. She invited me to leave a message at the tone and that’s exactly what I did, saying, “Hi, Tasha. Kinsey here. I just got your message and I was hoping to catch you. I’m on my way home, but if you like, we could meet for a drink. Why don’t you join me at Rosie’s on Albanil, where we met before. The desk clerk can give you directions if you’ve forgotten where it is. The place still looks like a dive, so don’t be put off. Five-thirty works for me if it works for you. Hope to see you soon.”

I left the office at 5:00 and was home again at 5:10, stripping off my clothes as I scrambled up the stairs. For someone indifferent to her kin, it’s amazing how hard I work at looking good in their eyes. Since I tend to deal with only one aunt or cousin at a time, I don’t want reports going back to the clan that my boots are scuffed or my hair is sticking out in all directions, as is usually the case. I showered and shampooed. I even shaved the requisite legs and armpits just in case I fell in a swoon and one or the other was exposed to view. How did I know how the evening would proceed?

I stood in front of my closet, wrapped in a towel, staring at my clothes for one full minute, which was a long time, given that in ten minutes more I was expected to present myself fully dressed. I nixed the all-purpose dress. Though comfortable, the garment is looking a bit shopworn, which is not to say I won’t be wearing it for years. I considered my tweed blazer, but if I remembered correctly, I was wearing that very blazer the last time Tasha and I met. I didn’t want her to think I had only the one blazer, though that was close to the truth. I pictured Diana Sutton Alvarez. As much as I disliked her, she did dress with class. What was it about her? Black tights, I thought, and quickly rooted through my sock drawer until I came up with a pair. I put on clean choners and then shimmied into the black tights and added a skirt. The fabric was wool and the color was dark so I figured I couldn’t go wrong there. I found my tassel loafers and then struggled to find a top. I put on a white blouse and discovered a button missing. I tucked my shirttail into the waistband of my skirt and then pulled on a hunter green crewneck sweater. The “ensemble” (which means: a bunch of clothes all worn at once) didn’t look half bad, but it needed another touch. I looked around the bedroom. Ah. I’d been using a hand-knit wool scarf along the bottom of the door to the upstairs bath, keeping out the drafts that crept through the crack where there should have been a threshold. I snatched up the scarf, shook off a few woofies, and slung it around my neck. I checked my reflection in the full-length mirror. I was, as they say, a sight for sore eyes.