I’d clapped a hand over my mouth so she couldn’t see me laughing during her conversation with Timatovich. “I have to tell you, Carolyn, people don’t appreciate being harassed about their language.”
“That reminds me, Sam, if you’re going to take in a foster child, you’ll have to stop swearing.”
“Jesus Christ, just call Harry, will you?”
She did and gave him so much information that by the time she finished, Harry had promised to have the Fraud guys audit the center books and increase the efforts to find Ray Faulk. He said he’d go over himself to talk to Myra Fox and Charles Desmond if such a visit was merited when the reports on the books were in. Her next call was from the anxious husband again.
“Really?” she said. “That does sound like an interesting toxin. Where does it come from? . . . Plants? Did I tell you that I met a woman whose company is named Nightshades? I thought it was the poison, but they make cosmetics for women of color. . . . Really? Toxic face powder? What century was that?”
I shook my head. Conversations at their house must be downright surreal.
45
Crab Cocktail and the Faulk Story
Carolyn
I
must have
been getting on Sam’s nerves because he pushed back the last pile of papers and said, “OK, I’ll take you out for lunch. Then we’ll come back here, and you can write a column.”
“Where are we going?” What a terrible woman I am. Just a minute before I had been fretting about the safety of Teresa Faulk, and it took only the promise of lunch and a column to focus my mind on food.
“Swan Oyster Depot,” he replied. “It’s an institution; founded the early part of the century by four Danish brothers. Great ambiance, great oysters—”
“Actually, I don’t care for oysters. Do they have anything else?”
“How about a crab cocktail that will send your taste buds into swoons of ecstasy?”
“That’s very poetic, Sam.”
We stood outside the Oyster Depot looking into the front window, which was packed with fish and shellfish. “It looks like a grocery store,” I said.
“Fish market and oyster bar,” Sam responded.
“Freshest fish in town,” said a man who had stopped beside me. “You can tell by looking at the trout’s eyes. They’re not cloudy.” I wasn’t sure which, among the many fish, the trout were, so I took his word for it, and Sam and I entered. Ambiance indeed. It was like a football game with fish. Behind the long marble bar was a team of burly men shouting happily to one another, mixing sauces, and serving fish. On the customer side were tall stools filled with enthusiastic seafood lovers. We found two rickety seats for ourselves at the far end of the narrow enclosure. A glass case of fish loomed in front us with only a narrow eating area. Framed pictures of fish covered the walls.
“Sammie,” shouted one of the dark-haired owners. “The Nova Scotia Malpeks are great today.”
“OK. Six of those and eighteen of whatever else. I leave it to you, man.” They slapped hands. “The lady will have a crab cocktail with your special sauce. We’ll both have the Heinekens on tap.”
Our particular brother—Sam introduced us, but I’ve forgotten the name—mixed the cocktail sauce with great speed and flair, naming ingredients as he put them in, and then tossing the sauce into about a pound of crab chunks. Then he fixed Sam’s oysters, explaining to me that he and his brothers cut the oyster from the small half of the shell and transferred it to the large half, which had all the juice.
“Best way to do it,” Sam said and began to fork up oysters and toss down the liquid from the shells. He was Jason’s kind of man; I could tell from the way he ate oysters, which my husband loves.
And Sam was right about the crab cocktail. My taste buds swooned. I was so enchanted that I didn’t want to abandon the cocktail to answer my cell phone.
“Better get it,” Sam advised. “Might be Harry.”
It wasn’t Inspector Yu; it was Jason. “You won’t believe what I’m having for lunch.” I described my cocktail and Sam’s plate of oysters. Then I read the list of the day’s oyster selections from the wall. Jason was so envious. “Why don’t we come here for lunch tomorrow before the anniversary celebration?” I suggested. He agreed.
“Are you being careful?” he asked, sounding worried now that he’d stopped thinking about oysters.
I glanced up and down the row of customers at the counter, then behind at those waiting to take our seats when we finished. “Not a murderer in sight,” I whispered into the phone, “and Sam’s got a gun, so you needn’t worry.”
“Oh, great,” said Jason. He doesn’t like guns and won’t have one in the house, which is perfectly all right with me.
Having reassured my husband and given him oysters to look forward to, I gave Sam the benefit of my pretrip research. “Did you know that there weren’t any oysters here in 1850, and people really wanted them, so someone went searching up and down the coast, found some, brought them back, planted them in a bed, and fed them bran for a year?”
“Yeah, I read that book. They were small, tasteless, and worth their weight in silver. Thank God Swan’s gets them from all over the place.” He forked up another.
I beamed at him. A fellow reader of local histories. “Well, did you know that the first settlers to the Bay area were Ohlone Indians who left over four hundred shell mounds?”
Sam grinned and said he was working on his own right here at the Oyster Depot.
“Not one six hundred feet long, I hope. We’ll never get to the center to give the Fraud Squad Denise’s notes.”
“You didn’t give them to Harry yesterday?”
“We were looking at different suspects then. Freddie and Ray Faulk. Don’t you imagine the financial investigators are there by now? Denise’s notes might be very helpful, not to mention the ones from my talk with Mr. Rylander.”
“All right,” said Sam, without enthusiasm. He drained his beer, paid the bill, and off we went to the center, where two plainclothes policemen were ensconced in the business office. At first, they tried to get rid of us, but I persevered and secured their interest. They looked at the notes. One said to the other, “Look up this name on the computer, Ross.”
“Oh boy,” said Ross. “This looks promising.” He had been skipping from one file to another on the screen. “Records of payouts for food, but no records from Nutrition Central of receiving the deliveries. Colin, go into the file cabinets and see if you can find paper receipts under Nutrition Central for a load of fish on 2/20 this year.”
Colin looked. “Nothing here,” he said.
“OK,” said Ross, “we’ll concentrate on these notes. Thanks.” Then they forgot about us, so we left.
“See,” I said to Sam.
“So it was a good idea,” he admitted. “Just be glad they didn’t ask how we got those notes.”
“I never thought of that, but I’ve got another idea.” He groaned. “Now, don’t be that way. I can’t stop worrying about Teresa Faulk. What if she’s in that house, injured or dead? I think we should go over and . . . well . . . break in, if we have to.”
Sam slapped his forehead with sardonic drama. “I’ve turned a respectable professor’s wife into a criminal. Anyway, the front door’s not in an empty apartment hall. It’s right out on the street. We could get arrested.”
“Well, we could at least peek in a window. That’s not illegal.”
“The hell it isn’t.”
“Then we’ll drive by and ring the bell. You can see into the living room from the front door.”
“You’re incorrigible.” But we went, and when we got there, I could see Teresa sitting on the sofa, just as she had been before, except that two children sat on either side of her, and she was reading them a story. She had a black eye. Sam said, as I rang the bell, “Looks like Ray’s been back. She didn’t have that shiner before.”
“She didn’t,” I agreed. Teresa peered through her peep-hole and then let us in. “What happened?” I asked her. “By the way, this is Sam Flamboise. I didn’t get to introduce him before. He’s the investigator on Denise’s murder. And he carries a gun.” They shook hands. I could tell Teresa was trying figure out where his gun was. I didn’t know myself.
“Raymond came back from work the night after you were here and beat me up,” she said angrily. “Then he told me to get him some dinner. The children and I ran out the backdoor, caught a cab two blocks over, and went straight to the shelter Denise told me about last year.”
She motioned us to seats in the living room and sent the children off to play in their rooms. “We stayed a day and two nights, but this morning I decided that I wasn’t going to be driven out of my own house, so I went to the police, filed charges against Raymond, and got a restraining order. They brought me home in a police car, but he wasn’t here, thank goodness. I had the locks changed.”
“Good for you,” I said.
“They’re driving by every hour, and they gave me a telephone that connects me right to the police station in case he shows up. I can’t believe how helpful they’ve been.”
We didn’t mention that they were looking for Ray for more reasons than wife abuse. Sam said, “Mrs. Faulk, does your husband play poker on Thursday nights?”
“Poker?” She looked startled, then outraged. “Gambling? He’s been gambling? Well, that’s the last straw. He knows my father ruined our family by losing everything at the casinos in Macao. He knows I hate gambling.”
“We don’t know that he’s been gambling, Mrs. Faulk,” said Sam gently, “but someone at his office suggested that might be the case, because he wasn’t there the night Denise was killed.”
“He wasn’t? And you think he killed her.” Tears rose in her eyes.
“We don’t know that,” I chimed in.
She picked up the telephone by the sofa, dialed a number, asked for her husband, then asked for someone named Hank. “Who does Ray play poker with, Hank?” she asked, evidently got an answer, said “Thank you,” hung up, and dialed again, asking for someone named Gaskin. “Mr. Gaskin, this is Teresa Faulk. Was my husband playing poker with you a week ago yesterday? . . . You’re sure? You may have to tell the police that, so you can’t lie about it. . . . Thank you. Goodbye.” She turned to us. “He was playing poker from 7:30, which was just after he left the house, to 11:00. Can you believe that? I’m going to divorce him right away.”
“I would,” said Carolyn, “and since he evidently didn’t kill Denise, he’s going to inherit the money his father left her. He wouldn’t have got it if he’d killed her. I saw that on TV. Isn’t that right, Sam?”
“Yep. TV is a great source of information on criminal law.”
I ignored the sarcasm. “I think you should call a lawyer right away. In fact, I can give you the number of your father-in-law’s estate lawyer.”
“There might be a conflict of interest there if Ray is the heir,” said Sam.
“Mr. Rylander?” asked Teresa. “He’s a very nice man. He had a talk with Ray once about hitting me. Ray was furious, but it helped. I’ll call him right away.”
We said goodbye to Mrs. Faulk and went back to the BMW. “Well, that’s about all we can do,” said Sam. “I’ll take you back to the house. You’ll be safe enough with Paul.”
My cell phone rang, Jason I surmised. I was wrong. Inspector Yu was calling to tell me that information I’d given the Fraud detectives provided enough evidence to get a warrant for Myra’s arrest and one to search her apartment. Inspector Yu and his partner were leaving momentarily. “What about Charles Desmond?” I asked. “He must have killed Denise. Myra couldn’t wield a knife. A conversation wears her out.”
“We’ll see what we find at the apartment,” said the inspector.
“Sam, we need to get over to Myra Fox’s. The police are on the way to arrest her and search the apartment.”
“Believe me, Carolyn, we won’t be welcome. We’ve done as much as we can.”
“Nonsense. What about Charles Desmond? He’s the murderer, and they don’t have a warrant for his arrest.”
Sam stared at me for a moment, then said, “Oh, what the hell,” and put the car in gear.
46
The Apprehension of a Cancer Victim
Carolyn
W
hen we arrived
at the Fox apartment, Myra was weeping hysterically and Cammie Cheever hovering over her muttering, “Calm down, lady, calm down. We need to ask you some questions.” Policemen were tearing the place apart and putting things into bags under the direction of Harry Yu, and Charles Desmond was nowhere in sight. Harry told us to go away and wait for a call. On the other hand, Myra Fox was glad to see me. In fact, she threw herself into my arms.
“What am I going to do?” she cried against my shoulder. Cammie gave her partner a significant look, and he backed away.
What could I say to her? On the one hand, I felt sorry for her. Breast cancer and its treatment were troubles I wouldn’t wish on anyone. On the other hand, she had probably stolen money and was going to jail for it, not to mention being responsible directly or indirectly for Denise’s death and my mother-in-law’s incarceration. “Where’s Charles?” I asked. “In times of stress the presence of a loved one is the greatest solace.” Police conversation ceased, waiting for her answer.
“I don’t know,” she whimpered. “He left this morning. He’s looking for work, you know.” She sounded defensive. “He’ll certainly be home by dinnertime. He’s going to bring home steamed crab.”
She looked so lost and afraid, and I was not convinced that Charles would be coming back. “This must be terribly stressful for you.” I got her seated on the sofa and patted her shoulder. “Do you have any tranquilizers?”
“In the bathroom.” She dropped her head into her hands and recommenced weeping.
“I’ll get you one,” I offered and rose to do it, motioning with my head for Harry Yu to follow me. Sam did too, and we went to the bedroom, where officers had the couple’s underwear out on the bed and were moving on to the closets.
“He’s in the wind,” said Sam.
“Can’t be sure of that,” Yu replied without seeming convinced.