W Is for Wasted

14

The route from Santa Teresa to Bakersfield isn’t complicated, but there aren’t any shortcuts. I could drive north on the 101 and head east on Highway 58, which meandered a bit but would finally put me out on the 99 a few miles north of Bakersfield. Plan B was to drive south and cut over to Interstate 5 on the 126. It was going to take me two and a half hours either way.

I went south, in part to avoid passing the town of Lompoc, where my Kinsey relatives were entrenched. My grudge against my mother’s side of the family was predicated on the fact that they were only an hour away and never once made contact in the three decades following my parents’ death when I was five. I’d enjoyed feeling righteous and I’d taken great satisfaction in my sense of injury. Unfortunately, the conclusions I’d drawn and the assumptions I’d made were dead wrong. I’d taken the Kinseys to task only to find out there was far more to the story than I’d known, and while I was willing to admit my error, I didn’t like to be reminded of it.

I wasn’t sure why it hadn’t occurred to me to hold my father’s family to the same strict accounting. Where had they been all these years? As it turned out, they’d been in Bakersfield, which seemed curiously remote. Geographically, it was only 150 miles away, but located in an area of the state through which I seldom traveled. Somehow that afforded them a pass in the matter of my resentment. Contributing to the difference in my attitude was the fact that my rage had begun to bore me, and my long whiny tale of woe had become tedious even to my own ears. As much fun as I’d had being irate, the drama had become repetitive. I could probably still wring sympathy from a stranger, but the recital had taken on a certain rote quality that lacked energy and conviction.

I tuned into the moment at hand. The sky was a washed-out blue, contrails like chalk marks beginning and ending for no apparent reason. Sunlight caught the telephone wires and turned them silver, linking them from pole to pole like strands of spider silk. Just shy of the Perdido city limits, I left the 101 and took the 126 east. Now, instead of having the Pacific Ocean to my right, the countryside was awash with orchards and mobile homes.

Along the horizon lay a range of low hills of the sort that hikers would disdain. At intervals, signs announced FRUIT STANDS 100 YARDS! Most were closed for the season. The road was heavily traveled with pickup trucks, dump trucks, panel trucks, and semis. I passed a tree farm that resembled a portable forest of palms. Quonset huts served as nurseries. Fields were covered in opaque plastic like an agricultural frost.

I reached the junction of 126 and Highway 5 and headed north, driving through miles of flat farmland. The snow-capped mountains in the distance seemed so incongruous they might as well have been pasted on. Kern County is about the size of New Jersey, give or take a few square miles. Bakersfield is the county seat, the largest of the inland cities, and the ninth-largest city in the state. Los Angeles is 110 miles to the south; Fresno, 110 miles to the north. This part of the state lies in California’s central valley, blessed by good weather much of the year. Once upon a time, millions of acres of wetlands graced the area, but much of the water was diverted for irrigation purposes, creating a rich agricultural region where cotton and grapes flourish.

I cruised into town at 11:45, taking the off-ramp from Highway 99 onto California Avenue. I was hungry by then and ready to stretch my legs. With the first break in traffic, I pulled over to the curb and studied the map Henry had so graciously provided. Beale Park was in easy range. I took surface streets as far as Oleander Avenue and parked on a stretch between Dracena and Palm. The park itself was probably five acres all told, featuring old trees, large swatches of grass, a playground, and picnic tables. More to the point, there was a public restroom, which was clean and in perfect working order. I went back to the car and hauled out my picnic basket, which I set on a table in the shade of an oak.

After lunch, I tossed my napkin, crumpled waxed paper, and the apple core into the nearest trash can. I returned to the car and cruised the area until I spotted a one-story Thrifty Lodge that looked about my speed. According to the motel marquee, the rooms were cheap ($24.99 per night) and came with color TV and a free continental breakfast. There were no burglar bars on the windows, which I took as a positive sign. By that time it was 1:15 and I figured I could drop off my bags and do some reconnoitering. I checked in, collected the key, and headed down the outside walk with my duffel in hand.

I unlocked the door and flipped on the light. The interior was dank. On the beige wall-to-wall carpet there was a ghostly foot path from the bed into the bathroom. A small secondary side road ran from the bed as far as the television set. I did a quick circuit. The heating and air-conditioning system, if you want to call it that, was a narrow unit installed just under the windowsill, with seven options in the way of temperature control. Heat: off or on. Cold: off or on. Fan: on, off, or auto. I tried to calculate the number of possible combinations, but it was way beyond my rudimentary math skills. The bathroom was clean enough and the motel had provided me two bars of soap, neatly sealed in paper. One was slightly larger than the other and was intended for the shower. I unwrapped the smaller one, standing at the sink. The chrome fixtures were pitted and the cold-water knob squeaked in protest when I paused to wash my hands. I felt a tap on my head and looked up to find water dripping slowly from a ceiling fixture. I unloaded my toiletries from the duffel—shampoo, conditioner, deodorant, toothbrush and toothpaste—and lined everything up on the vanity. True to form, there were no other amenities provided, so I was happy I’d brought my own. I tried the wall-mounted dryer and smelled burning hair.

I was getting a bit long in the tooth to stay in places like this. When you’re young and intent on proving how nonmaterialistic you are, a bare-bones motel room is a prize. After all, you say to yourself, I’ll only be here at night and why do I care about the room when I’m sound asleep? At my age, there ought to be more to life than feeling virtuous about how many pennies I was managing to pinch. I could see how the shadowy notion of half a million bucks might alter my perception. Since the money was only nominally mine, I was loath to fritter it away on high-class imaginary digs. What bothered me was the suspicion that when I crawled into bed that night, the sheets would feel moist.

I sat down on the side of the bed and checked the bed table drawer, hauling out a tattered copy of the telephone book. I was hoping to spot Ellen or Anna Dace, even Evelyn, the ex-wife. I went to the D’s and discovered a chunk of pages missing, the very ones I was hoping to consult. I took out my city map and opened it to the full. The address I had for Ethan, which Dace had noted in his will, was on Myrtle Street. I checked the list of street names, found Myrtle, and traced the coordinates from section 13 on the vertical and G on the horizontal. I’d focus on the house numbers once I reached the neighborhood. My guess was that Dace’s two daughters had refused to give their father contact information, which is why he’d mentioned them by name without including phone numbers or home addresses.

I put a call through to Henry, letting him know the name and number of my motel in case he needed to get in touch. All was quiet on the home front, so we chatted briefly and let it go at that.

I retrieved my car and circled back to Truxtun, one of the main arteries through town. I found Myrtle and scanned the house numbers as I crept by at half speed. When I finally spotted the correct address, I pulled over to the curb. The house was dark and there was a For Rent sign on a wooden stake pounded into the lawn. I killed the engine, got out, and walked up the short concrete drive. What had once served as a two-car garage was now walled in and stuccoed over, probably in order to create additional interior space. There was a window built into the center, so I cupped my hands around my eyes and took a peep. Not surprisingly, the room I was looking into was empty.

I knocked at the front door without result. It was locked, so I went around to the rear of the house, where a “spacious back patio” consisted of a six-foot undulating hard-plastic overhang supported by six metal poles. A window on the right was boarded over. I tried the back door and was delighted to discover that it was unlocked. I offered a couple of tentative yoo-hoos. “Hello? Anybody home?”

When I received no reply, I treated myself to a tour of the place. The interior looked like it had been gutted in advance of a demolition. Doorknobs were missing, switch plates had been removed, and the wall-to-wall carpeting had been pulled up, leaving the concrete floors spotted with patches of black mastic. The kitchen cabinets were scuffed and the backsplash at the kitchen sink was some kind of wallboard, scored to look like ceramic tile. There were no lightbulbs in any of the overhead fixtures. Maybe Ethan was the kind of tenant who believed his rent entitled him to anything that wasn’t nailed down, including the toilet seat, which was nowhere in evidence. The laundry room was edged in black mold that crept along the seams like grout. Leaking water had loosened the hinges on the bathroom vanity, and the rust streaking from the faucets looked like the run of mascara on a weeping woman’s face. All the rooms smelled of mildew, animal dander, and pee.

“Any information I can offer you about the place?”

I shrieked and whipped around, clutching my chest to prevent my heart from tearing through my shirt. “Shit!”

I stared at the man who’d shortened my life by years.

He was in his early thirties, with a cresting wave of dark hair cutting across his forehead. His eyes were dark and his eyebrows were thick, while his mustache and beard appeared to be a recent undertaking that, so far, wasn’t a success. He wore an oversize black shirt that hung down over his jeans in a style that was meant to disguise his weight. I put him a good thirty pounds over the line, though it didn’t really look bad on him. I was going to tell him so and decided I’d best not. Men sometimes mistake a compliment for an invitation to become better acquainted.

His smile was apologetic, his teeth white, but cluttered. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. I saw you go around the side of the house as I was driving up. I figured you noticed the For Rent sign and wanted to check it out.” He’d smoked a cigarette at some point in the past fifteen minutes.

“Actually, I’m looking for Ethan Dace.”

“Too late. He pulled up stakes a week ago. At least from what the neighbors say.”

“How long did he live here?”

“I don’t know. Eighteen months? Might have been less.”

“I take it he left without giving notice.”

“He also left owing two months’ rent. Are you a bill collector?”

I shook my head. “I’m here on a personal matter. His father died. I figured someone should let him know.”

“Why you?”

“We’re distantly related.”

“How distant?”

“Second cousins, once or twice removed. That’s a guess on my part. I’ve never understood the distinctions.”

“I take it you never met Ethan.”

“I’ve never had the occasion.”

“You’re in for a disappointment. I’m not saying the guy’s a bum, but he’s a lousy tenant. He was a slow pay and sometimes he couldn’t bring himself to pay at all, which I was supposed to tolerate on account of he’s such a talented guy. If I came knocking on his door to collect, he’d pony up, but it always seemed to take him by surprise. I was about to evict him anyway, so he saved me the paperwork. Get a deadbeat in a rental and it’s damn near impossible to get ’em out.”

“You know where he went?”

“Most likely back to his wife. This is the third or fourth time she’s kicked him out. Bugged her no end that he wouldn’t get a job. Able-bodied white male and all he does is sit around and play his guitar. Time to time, he collects unemployment, but that doesn’t go on forever. Problem is, with him gone, she’s stuck shelling out a bundle for child care. She’s got one in school and two were enrolled in what they call ‘pre-kindergarten’ to the tune of two hundred bucks a week. Per kid. She’s better off with him on the premises. What the hell else is he doing with his days?”

“Why’d you rent to him if you knew he didn’t have a job?”

“I felt sorry for the guy.”

“What line of work is he in?”

“Musician, which I don’t think of as a ‘line of work.’ It’s more like goofing off, accompanied by a musical instrument. He has this band, Perforated Bowel—or something equally profound. He’s lead singer and doubles on guitar. The other two play keyboard and drums, respectively. They have gigs in town couple of weekends a month. That’s the claim at any rate, for what it’s worth.”

“Is he any good?”

“Don’t know. I never heard him play. He says he’s booked into the Brandywine, but I haven’t checked it out. With him gone, it’s no concern of mine.”

“You know his wife’s name?”

“It’s on his application. Heitzerman, Heidelman. Heidie-something. I can’t remember how it’s spelled and I might have got it wrong. First name’s Mamie. Like in Eisenhower. House is in her name. I called her, hoping she’d be kind enough to pay his back rent. No such luck. Chick’s smarter than I thought.”

“Wonder why she didn’t take his name when they married.”

“She probably didn’t like the family association. I guess you heard what happened to his dad.”

“The business in 1974?”

“Was it that long ago?”

“That’s the year he went to prison.”

“I’d have said, five, six years. You’re talking fourteen.”

“Time flies,” I remarked. I gestured toward the empty house. “Was Ethan the one who stole the doorknobs?”

“The doorknobs are gone?”

“Some of them. Did he strip the carpeting?”

“I did that. He kept his dogs locked up while he was out and they tore the place apart. Only two of ’em, but they must have egged each other on. Get rid of the smell of dog pee, I’d have to burn the place down. You smell that or is it just me?”

“Place stinks.”

“Appreciate the confirmation. He talked me out of a pet deposit. I must’ve been smokin’ crack that day. You’re not a local?”

“I’m not. I drove up from Santa Teresa this morning.”

“What’d he die of, the old guy?”

I didn’t see any reason to tell this guy the whole of it so I shrugged. “I don’t know the details. Just the broad strokes.”

“The broad strokes being what?”

“Probably a heart attack,” I said. “I’d like to talk to Ethan’s sisters as long as I’m in town. Ellen and Anna. Are they still around?”

“The younger one for sure. Anna’s the wild child. She does manis and pedis in some dump of a salon. The other girl, I never met.”

“‘Manis and pedis’—meaning manicures and pedicures?”

“Whoa! You are really sharp.”

I ignored the sarcasm. “Do you know how I can reach them?”

“What’s your stake in this?”

“What makes you ask?”

“I can’t believe you drove all the way up here for something you could’ve done by phone.”

“I didn’t have Ethan’s number. Besides, if I’d called I’d have missed him by a week, right? I thought it would be a kindness if they heard it from me instead of reading about it in the paper.”

“You’re a good Samaritan.”

“Some would call it that.”

“Any rate, you don’t want to rent the place, it’s time I locked up.”

“I appreciate the information about Ethan’s wife. I’ll see if I can track her down.” I held a hand out. “My name’s Kinsey Millhone.”

“They call me ‘Big Rat.’ And don’t ask. Long story and it really doesn’t have a point.”

We shook hands.

“If I run into Ethan, I’ll tell him you’re in town,” he said.

“He won’t know who I am. I didn’t find out about him until yesterday.”

“You expect to be here overnight?”

“Unless I catch up with him today.”

“I run into him, I’ll let you know. Where you staying?”

I didn’t think it was any of his business, so of course I lied.

“Don’t know yet. I haven’t found a motel. What would you suggest?”

“Padre Hotel. It’s been around for years. Used to be high-class. Now it’s so-so, but location’s good. Close to downtown.”

“What happened to Evelyn Dace?”

“She married someone else. Some guy from her church. I have a friend rents a little place above their garage.”

He slipped his wallet from his back pocket and removed a business card that he held out. “Tell you what. I get back to the office, I’ll look up Dace’s application and get you his wife’s name. Probably a phone number listed as well. Might save you some time. Give me a call in an hour or so and I’ll try to help you out.”

“Thanks.” I glanced down at the card, noting that his last name was Rizzo. I was betting his nickname, “Big Rat,” originated from the film Midnight Cowboy, twenty years before. Dustin Hoffman played the part of Ratso Rizzo.

Big Rat said, “I don’t guess he’s coming into money now his old man’s croaked?”

“None as far as I know, but it never hurts to ask.”

“Amen to that.”

• • •

I sat in my car for a moment, making a quick note about the club where Ethan played on weekends and an approximation of his wife’s last name. I watched as Big Rat locked the front door and climbed into his truck, which he’d parked at an angle in the foreshortened driveway. He backed out and swung wide, giving me a jaunty wave as he disappeared down the street. His red Nissan pickup with yellow flames custom-painted along the bed was as conspicuous as my car, which served as one more reminder to dump the Mustang and find something else.

I got back on Truxtun and turned right, trolling in an eastward direction. I confess I was having trouble getting the hang of how the streets were laid out. Some were numbered and some of them had names. The ones I was passing were lettered, as in E, F, G, H, and Eye, the latter probably spelled out so the I wouldn’t be mistaken for the number one. Truxtun and California Streets seemed to be parallel, but other streets were a-kilter, as though the whole geographical plain had taken a forty-five-degree turn. I was looking for the Beale Memorial Library, which according to my map was no more than half an inch away.

Once I spotted it, I parked in the lot to the left of the structure and headed for the entrance. The exterior was handsome, buff-colored, with a band of desert rose along the roofline. The building was new with a plaque on the side indicating that it had been dedicated only six months before, April 30, 1988. A time capsule had been sealed in the foundation to be opened in April of 2038. It might be worth a trip back just to see what was buried there. I’d be pushing eighty-eight years old and ready for a touch of excitement, assuming it didn’t prove too much.

The interior was spacious and smelled of new commercial carpeting. The ceiling was high and the light was generous. I couldn’t even guess at the square footage or the number of books the building housed, but the patrons had to have been thrilled with the facility. I asked a woman sitting at the information desk where I might find old city directories, and she suggested the Jack Maguire Local History Room on the second floor. I bypassed the elevator and trotted up the stairs. The door to the local history room was locked and empty from what I could see through the glass. I spotted a woman in a wheelchair working at a desk in the room next door.

“Is there any way I can get in there? I’d like to check city directories from a few years back.”

“You might ask Verlynn at the reference desk. She has a key.” She pointed to a desk halfway across the vast carpeted expanse.

I crossed and waited my turn. When Verlynn was free, I explained what I wanted and she followed me back to the history room with her key in hand.

She unlocked the door and opened it, flipping on the overhead lights. “The volumes you want are on that wall straight ahead. We have city directories going back to 1899 and telephone books from about 1940. Those shelves over there you’ll find yearbooks from elementary, junior high, and high schools in the area. Not every year is represented. We depend on our patrons for donations. Will you be okay on your own?”

“I’ll be fine. Thanks.”

“Let me know when you’ve finished and I’ll lock up.”

“I’ll do that.”

I already knew where Dace had lived before his incarceration. I’d picked up that address from the expired California driver’s license in his safe deposit box. What I was interested in were two other sets of addresses. I hoped to track back in time to the point where Dace interacted with his beloved Uncle R. The dates on the backs of the two black-and-white photographs I’d seen were September 1941 and June 4, 1945. Something else occurred to me. My parents were married in 1935, which meant my mother might well have been with him on trips to Bakersfield. What if she was the one who’d taken the two photographs? The notion sent a chill down my spine.

I was also looking for any Millhones in the area at that time, and for Quillen and his wife, Rebecca, in particular. If my father grew up in Bakersfield, there might be other family members still in town. I pulled the Polk and the Haines directories for 1942, 1943, and 1946. The 1941 city directory was probably published early in the year, which meant that by fall of 1941, the information might be six months out of date. The same was true of the photo taken in June of 1945. People move. They die. Couples get divorced. The constant shift in status and location far outstrips any attempt to report.

The Polk Company has been publishing city directories since 1878, beginning with a simple alphabetical listing of the residents of any given town. In 1916, the directory was expanded to include both an alphabetical listing of residents and an alphabetical listing of street addresses, with names of the occupants included. The Haines directory, also known as a crisscross, is a mechanical reversal of the information in the phone book, its listings ordered by street names and by telephone numbers in sequence, beginning with the area code, then moving on to the exchange. If you have a street address and you want to know who lives there, you can consult either publication. If you have a phone number but no clue whom it belongs to, you start a search with the Haines and work backward to the name and address of the person to whom the number has been assigned. There are a certain percentage of unlisted numbers, but in the main you can uncover more than you’d imagine.

In addition to the six directories I had, I pulled both the Polk and the Haines for the calendar year 1972 to see if any of the names carried over. I toted all eight volumes to the closest table and sat down. I loved having the room to myself. It was quiet and smelled of old paper. The windows were clean and the light spilling in had a peaceful quality. I reached into my shoulder bag and found my index cards. I removed the rubber band and shuffled through them until I found the address I’d cribbed from Dace’s driver’s license. I picked up the 1942 Polk and began a finger walk through the pages.

Moving from page to page, I uncoupled my emotions, like a string of railroad cars I was leaving behind while the engine chugged on. This was about numbers and street names, which meant nothing to me. I simply recorded the information as I came across it. Later, I would attach sights and sounds to each location as I discovered it.

There were two Dace families. The first, Sterling Dace (Clara): util wkr, PG&E, (h) 4619 Paradise. The second was Randall J Dace (Glenda): srvc rep, PG&E, at 745 Daisy Lane. I was guessing these were Dace’s parents. If so, it looked like he’d moved into the family home at some point after his mom and dad had passed away. I circled the address in my notes and then picked up the names, occupations, and addresses of the nearby neighbors. I wasn’t sure what the relationship was between Randall and Sterling. Brothers? Cousins? Maybe father and son. I turned to the M’s and found Quillen Millhone (Rebecca): winch trk oprtr, Keller Ent (h) 4602 Choaker Road.

I pulled the 1946 Polk directory from the stack and placed my hand on the cover as though swearing an oath. I worked my way through the oversize pages and found the same two listings for Randall and Sterling Dace at the same respective addresses.

I backtracked to the M’s and again found Quillen Millhone. I could find no other Millhones. Again, I made a note of the neighbors on either side of the Choaker Road address on the off chance there might be someone still living who remembered them. A quick study of the city map showed Choaker Road off Panama Lane, which was too far out of town to worry about at this point. I’d confirmed that the Daces and my grandparents were contemporaries. I’d seen both sets of names in the years 1943 and 1946. All were present and accounted for.

I checked the 1972 Polk and found R. Terrence Dace. Evelyn was there as well (her name tucked next to his inside parentheses), followed by his occupation, tree trmr, and the street and house number, 745 Daisy Lane. I noted the names and addresses of neighbors on either side. There was a David Brandle at 741, a Lorelei Brandle at 743, and a Penrose and Melissa Pilcher at 747. No Millhones. I returned the books to the shelves. On a hunch, I moved forward in time to the current telephone book in hopes of finding the last names Pilcher or Brandle, wondering if Dace’s neighbor lady was still living. There was an L. Brandle at another address, though I didn’t expect the two were a match. There was no sign of Mr. and Mrs. Pilcher. In that same phone book, I flipped through the residential listings to the H’s, searching for Ethan’s wife. I ran a finger down the page: Heiman, Heimendinger, Heimluck, Hein, Heindle, Heinemann, Heining, Heinrich, Heintz, Heiser, Heisermann. The name after the surname Heisermann was Mamie, complete with a street address in the 5600 block of Laurel Canyon Drive. That was the best news I’d had all day. I made a note of the phone number, though I didn’t intend to call first. In my business, it’s better to tackle certain interviews without warning the subject in advance. Metaphorically speaking, you can sometimes catch people with their pants down around their ankles.