Sue Grafton - B Is For Burglar

"Shit," I said. I couldn't think of anything else to say. The last thing in the world I needed right now was a dressing down by Andy Montycka, the CFI claims manager. Andy's in his forties, conservative and insecure, a man whose prime obsessions are biting his fingernails and not making waves.

"You want me to tell him you haven't come in?" she asked.

"Yeah, do that for me, if you would. Just let me check my phone messages and I'll disappear," I said. I unlocked the file and took out the folder on Elaine Boldt, looking back at Vera. "I'll tell you something, Vera. This is hot. Leonard Grice has had six months to file a claim, but he hasn't lifted a finger. Now, all of the sudden, he's putting pressure on the insurance company to pay off. I'd like to know what prompted him."

"Hey, I gotta scoot before they come looking for me," Vera said. "Just don't cross Andy's path today or you'll pay for it."

I thanked her for the warning and told her I'd be in touch. She eased out into the hallway again, closing the door behind her. Belatedly, I felt my cheeks flush and my heart begin to thump. I got sent down to the principal's office once in first grade for passing notes in class and I've never recovered from the horror of it. I was guilty as charged, but I'd never been in trouble in my life. There I was, a timid little child with skinny legs, so stricken with fear that I left the school and went home in tears. My aunt marched me right back and read everybody out while I sat on a little wooden chair in the hall and prayed for death. It's hard to keep passing myself off as a grown-up when a piece of me is still six years old and utterly at the mercy of authority.

A glance at my answering machine showed no messages. I locked up again and went down the front way so that I could avoid passing the glass double doors of California Fidelity. I got back in my car and drove over to Elaine's old condominium. I wanted to have a brief talk with Tillie and let her know what was happening. I was turning right on Via Madrina when I glanced in the rearview mirror and realized there was some guy on a motorcycle roaring right up my tailpipe. I eased over slightly to let him pass and glanced back again. He was beeping away at me frantically. What had I done, run over his dog? I pulled over to the curb and he pulled up behind me, turning his bike off and booting his kickstand into place. He was wearing a shiny black jumpsuit, black gloves and boots, and a black helmet with a smoky face guard. I got out of my car and walked back toward him, watching him peel his helmet off as he approached. Oh hell, it was Mike. I should have guessed. The pink of his Mohawk seemed to be fading and I wondered whether he did his touch-ups with Rit dye, food coloring, or cooked beets. He was irked.

"God, I been honking at you for blocks! How come you never called me back? I left a message on your machine on Monday," he said.

"Sorry. I didn't realize it was you back there. I thought you said you were going to call me."

"Well, I tried to, but I kept getting your machine so I gave up. Where were you?"

"Out of town. I just got back last night. Why? What's happening?"

He pulled his motorcycle gloves off and tucked them in his helmet, which he cradled in the crook of his arm. "I think my Uncle Leonard has a girl friend. I just thought you might like to know."

"Oh really? How'd you find out about that?"

"I was moving that… uh… stash out of the shed at his old place and I saw him go into the building next door."

"The condo?"

"Well yeah, I guess that's what it is. That big apartment building."

"When was this?"

"Sunday night. That's why I called you so early Monday morning. At first, I wasn't sure it was him. I kind of thought it was his car pulling up out front but it was almost dark and I couldn't see that good. I figured he was coming over to the house for something and I was shovin' shit in my duffel bag like crazy. Man, I didn't know how I was going to explain what I was up to. Finally I was in such a panic, I whipped into the shed and pulled the door shut and watched through the crack. He ended up going over there instead."

"What makes you think he has a girl friend, though?"

"Because I saw him with her. I didn't have anything else to do, so I went across the street and hid behind a tree and waited until they came out. He was only in there five or ten minutes and then the lights went out, second floor left. Pretty soon they came out and shoved some stuff in the trunk and got in the car."

"Did you get a good look at her?"

"Not really. It was hard to see 'em from where I was and they were walking kind of fast. Then when they got in the car they were all over each other. He nearly jumped her bones right there in the front seat. It was kind of weird. I mean, you usually don't see people that age making out, you know what I mean? And anyway, I never thought about him like that. I figured he was just some old dried-out fart who couldn't even get it up. I didn't think he had it in him."

"Mike, the man is probably fifty-two years old. Would you knock that off! What did she look like? Had you ever seen her before?"

Mike held his hand up to his chin. "She came up to about here on him. I noticed that. She had her hair tied back with a scarf-like a babushka or whatever you call 'em. I don't think I'd seen her before. I mean, it wasn't like I thought, Oh yeah, there's old what's-her-face or anything like that. She was just some babe."

"Look, do me a favor. Go find a pencil and paper and write all this down while it's fresh in your mind. Make a note of the date and time and anything else you remember. You don't have to say what you were doing around here. You can always claim you came over to check on the house or something. Will you do that?"

"Okay, sure. What are you going to do?"

"I haven't made that part up yet," I said.

I got back in my car, and five minutes later I was being buzzed through from the lobby to Tillie's apartment.

She was waiting for me at the door and I followed her into the living room. She was wearing a pair of spectacles low on her nose and she peered at me over the rims. She took a seat in the rocker and picked up some needlework. It looked like a hunk of upholstery fabric printed with a scene of mountains and forest, deer grazing here and there, a stream gushing down through some rocks. She had wads of cotton and she was shoving them into the back of the cloth with a crochet hook. The deer were puffed out into three dimensions, surrounded by stitching, to produce a quilted effect.

"What is that?" I asked, sitting down. "Are you stuffing it?"

She smiled faintly. She'd finally let her new permanent wave have its way and her head was a nest of tight, frizzy curls the color of apricots. "That's right, I am. It's called trapunto. When I finish, I'll have it blocked and framed. I do it for the church bazaar in the fall. This is cotton I save out of the tops of pill bottles, so next time you open some Tylenol or cold caps, you keep the packing for me. Sit down. I haven't seen you for days. What have you been up to?"

I gave her a summary of events since Friday, which was when I had seen her last. I did some censoring. I told her how I'd found the cat, but deleted the stash of drugs Mike kept in the shed next door. I told her about Aubrey Danziger and my confrontation later with Beverly, the suitcases, the trip to Florida, the threatened lawsuit, and Mike's tale about Leonard Grice having a girl friend upstairs. That made her take her glasses off and click the stems against the frames.

"I don't believe it," she said flatly. "Mike must have been high."

"Well, of course he was high, Tillie, but a little grass isn't going to make him hallucinate."

"Then he's inventing it."

"I'm just telling you what he told me," I said.