Games to Keep the Dark Away

Chapter 19

By the time I got back to Salmon Bay, I was physically exhausted. The tiredness I’d felt on the trip north was nothing to the bone-weariness I felt now. My arms and shoulders ached from steering; my right leg was stiff from pressing the accelerator; even my eyes burned from peering into the darkness through the headlights’ glare.

But my mind was alert, primed by questions answered and suspicions confirmed-and by fear.

A dark green VW was parked near the end of the semi-circular driveway at The Tidepools. I drove past and left the MG several yards down the highway, then walked back and looked at the other car. It was pulled in at an odd angle, its rear end sticking out and nearly blocking the drive.

The Tidepools itself seemed unnaturally quiet now, at a little after ten. The front wing, where the reception area and offices were, was dark except for small security lights set at intervals under the eaves. They did little more than illuminate the juniper shrubs that screened the windows. Brighter light shone from the rear wings where the patients presumably were, but even these were filtered through a thin sea mist.

I hesitated, checking the gun in my purse, then went up the drive to the VW. Its door was unlocked, the window on the driver’s side partly rolled down. In the glove compartment I found a registration made out to Abe Snelling at his Potrero Hill address.

As I’d suspected, Snelling had come to the place that-as indicated by the prints I’d found in his darkroom-had been very much on his mind all afternoon. And I thought I knew why he’d come. But where was he now? From the way he’d left the car, he’d taken no pains to cover his presence. But, then, he didn’t have to; the people here had probably never heard of Abe Snelling. Even if they had, they would never connect the car registration with Andy Smith. And I was pretty sure Snelling had arrived in a hurry and not planned to stay long.

But when had Snelling gotten here? He’d left his house early enough for both the ransacker and me to search it thoroughly. And for both of us to guess where he might be headed.

I looked around at the three other cars in the driveway. Two were station wagons with the name of the hospice painted on their doors. The other was a new-looking Jaguar XKE. All three cars had been in the drive on my previous visits.

Slipping into a grove of eucalyptus that bordered the right side of the driveway, I studied the low-shingled building. It was cold, and a strong wind blew off the ocean, rattling the dry leaves above my head. I could hear the surf crashing on the reefs and when I looked over there I saw whitecaps billowing. The tide was starting to come in now; soon it would cover the narrow beach and batter at the cliffs. I thought of the sea anemones in their dark, icy pools, and shivered.

I stood very still and stared into the darkness, looking for a telltale movement among the trees. Snelling had to be here some place-but where? Perhaps I should have gone directly to the police and let them find him. But what did I really have to tell them? Only that I felt, because I’d read Snelling’s negatives, it was all going to end here, where it had begun?

No, it would have taken the police-skeptical as they were of me now-all night to unravel my cat’s cradle of suspicions. And even then, I was afraid they would not take me seriously. Besides, this was my investigation; I should be the one to wrap it up.

I began to circle the buildings counterclockwise, keeping under the trees. The wind blew stronger and colder as I moved toward the sea. Through the rustle of the leaves and the scraping of branches, I could make out the strains of classical music. I followed them to a brightly lit side window and looked in from my dark vantage point. The window opened onto a large living room, full of comfortable, overstuffed furniture. A string quartet-three men and a woman-was playing on a raised platform at the front of the room, and about ten people sat listening. I tried to think of what the piece was. Mozart, maybe. Don would know. Don…

I stepped farther back into the shadows and continued circling. At the rear of the complex was a series of ells with sliding glass doors that reminded me of a motel. This was probably where the patients’ rooms were. There were a number of lights on and through one door I saw a white-haired man sitting up in bed reading. Yes, these were the living quarters.

What was left? I turned and surveyed the grounds. There was a small shingled outbuilding closer to the cliff’s edge. I started over there, sprinting across an open stretch of lawn and into a clump of wind-bent cypress. They were more thickly planted than the eucalyptus and, before my eyes could adjust to the blackness, a low-hanging branch caught me square in the face. I swatted at it and then felt my cheek. It was scratched, but only superficially.

Stand still until you can see where you’re going, dummy, I told myself.

I waited there, listening to the roar of the surf, until I could make out the shapes of the individual trees. Snelling, I thought. Where the devil was Snelling?

A movement off to my right caught my eye. I whirled and looked over, but it was only a curtain being pulled across one of the sliding glass doors. Its light-colored panels fluttered into place and became still.

I turned back and began scaling the rocky terrain under the cypress to where it sloped down toward the cliff’s edge. There the ground dropped abruptly away to the jagged reefs. The tide was coming in fast now, white water boiling around the dark outcroppings. The wind blew steadily, and I gripped a tree trunk for support.

The outbuilding was some fifty feet away, across a strip of open lawn. Once on the grass, I would be silhouetted against the horizon and easily spotted from any of the hospice’s wings. I debated chancing it, decided not to, and instead peered over there, trying to see what the building was. In the same architectural style as the main building, it had a peaked roof and small high windows. Its doors stood open.

A tool shed? These immaculate grounds would probably require the full-time services of a gardener. No need to risk investigating it. Although the grounds were not fenced and there didn’t seem to be any excessive concern with security, surely someone would come out here if he spotted a figure prowling around a tool shed.

I went back through the cypress grove the way I had come, then skirted the other side of the main building. Lights in the patients’ rooms were steadily winking out. I glanced at my watch but couldn’t make out the time. Either they went to bed early here-which would be logical, since the place was a sort of hospital-or I’d been moving through the trees for longer than I’d realized. I slipped forward to the edge of the foliage, where the mist-shrouded moon provided some illumination. The hands of my watch showed ten-twenty.

I’d been here nearly fifteen minutes and hadn’t spotted Snelling. Where was he?

In the closest room of the bedroom wing, about twenty feet away from me, the glass door slid open. I stepped back. The tree branches rustled.

“Over there,” a man’s voice said. “I could swear I saw someone.”

“Where?” The second voice was female.

“Under those trees. Someone was standing right at the edge, watching the place.”

“I don’t see anyone.”

“They moved back when I opened the door. You could see the branches shake, couldn’t you? Someone’s hiding out there.”

“Why would anyone do that?” The woman’s voice was patient and somehow patronizing. A nurse, I thought.

“How should I know? But I saw someone. For all we know, they’re casing the place.”

“Why?” This time there was an edge of annoyance to the word.

“I don’t know! Drugs, maybe. Someone looking to steal drugs.”

“Well, it won’t do him any good no matter how hard he ‘cases.’ The drugs are under lock and key and only the pharmacist can open up. And I think now it’s time you went to bed.

“I tell you, I saw someone.”

“There’s no one out there.”

“Just you wait until you’re sitting out there at the nurses’ station and some crazed hophead bursts in and pulls a gun on you and tries to make you open up the pharmacy. Don’t say I didn’t warn-” The door slammed shut.

I moved deeper into the grove of trees and waited a full five minutes before I moved on. While the nurse claimed not to believe that the patient had seen someone, she might just have been allaying his fears. If so, she would send someone out to check immediately. Finally I decided no one was coming and made my way back toward the front of the grounds and the office wing

Snelling’s car was still parked at the end of the drive, as were the station wagons and Jaguar. I moved behind the Juniper hedges so I could see into the office windows. Just then the front door slammed and high-heeled shoes tapped down the flagstone walk. I peered over the hedge and saw Ann Bates getting into the Jaguar.

The personnel director was here very late. Was that part of her regular duties or something to do with Snelling’s presence?

Bates stopped, her hand on the door of the Jaguar. Then she turned and went down the drive to Snelling’s car. She looked it over without trying its doors. Then she shrugged and went back to her sports car.

So much for the idea that Snelling had confronted Bates, I thought. If the personnel director hadn’t seen him, then where was he?

The Jaguar’s engine roared and its lights flashed on. It swung up the semicircle, beams sweeping over the facade of the building-and over the bush in front of me. I ducked unsure whether I’d moved in time. The car continued down the drive, red brake lights flaring briefly before it turned in the direction of Port San Marco. I crouched in the bushes, my heart pounding. Ann Bates must be doing well as part-owner of the The Tidepools, I thought. The Jaguar appeared to be a recent model and, even used, they weren’t cheap to buy or maintain. No wonder she had caused so much tension at the hospice this past week; what with records disappearing and police and private detectives asking questions, she must be very worried that something would destroy her handsome livelihood. Perhaps that accounted for her late hours.

The conversation I’d heard between the patient and the nurse about a possible drug holdup had made me think about the hospice’s security system. It would stand to reason there must be some sort of alarm. Even if the drugs were kept under lock and key, someone who didn’t know that might force his way in and demand them. I inched forward, under the eaves, looking for an alarm box.

I found one, prominently marked with the security firm’s name. A large warning proclaimed that an alarm would also sound at the Port San Marco police station. The wires running from the box were intact. There was no way Snelling could have breached the system. I couldn’t even do it without the proper tools-and I knew a fair amount about burglar alarms from my days in security work.

The only place I hadn’t checked was the tool shed. And come to think of it, what was its door doing open anyway?

I hurried back through the trees, past the bedroom wing. Almost all the lights were off there now.

Into the cypress grove, down toward the sea. This time I was careful not to run into any branches.

The expanse of lawn looked as forbidding as before, but my motivation for crossing it was stronger. I glanced back at the hospice. The lights had been turned off in the living room. A soft glow emanated from beyond, presumably in a hall. Everyone was probably in bed but the night-time nursing staff, and I didn’t think any of them would be standing by a darkened window. I ran across the lawn and flattened myself against the wall of the shed.

Breathing hard, I stared through the darkness at the hospice. No lights came on. No doors or windows opened.

Then I heard a groan.

It came from inside the tool shed. I waited, but it was not repeated. My hand on my gun, I inched along toward the door. Inside, to the right, was a lawnmower. On the back wall, I could make out a row of rakes and hoes.

On the floor lay Abe Snelling.

He was on his back. The front of his light-colored shirt was darkly stained. But he was still breathing, shallowly in ragged gusts.

I moved through the door, saying his name. He didn’t respond. I said his name louder. There was blood, a lot of blood. Almost as much as when John Cala…

“Abe,” I said, “dammit, Abe. Not you too.”

I pushed my gun back into my bag and knelt beside him, started to feel for his pulse. A rustling sound came from behind me. Before I could straighten, something hit me from behind, and I dropped the bag and my gun. Someone grabbed me by the shoulders and I felt cold steel against my neck.

“Don’t scream,” Liz Schaff’s voice said. “Don’t scream-or I’ll cut your throat.”