Midnight Baby

CHAPTER 10

“I can swim,” I said.

“With your throat cut?” Mike lifted a rubber ribbon that had recently been part of the Zodiak raft. City lifeguard divers had brought the raft up onto the dock and circled the area with yellow crime-scene tape. A chunk of the sidewalk had also been cordoned off to make room for some floodlights.

Mike had called in the Long Beach police and given them some of the pertinent history. A couple of carloads of men in uniform were drifting around somewhere, ogling the local talent with more energy, I thought, than they were giving the investigation. I guess we hadn’t infected them with the serious implications of the sinking of a six-foot inflatable.

The lifeguards had jumped right on it, but only because the outboard motor had sunk and was leaking oil and gasoline into the waterway. Not that one more oil slick would alter that environment significantly. My impression was that they were having an awfully good time in the water, at time and a half.

I was gratified that I could provide entertainment for so many. Regina and Martha watched all the activity from lounge chairs up on the Ramsdales’ terrace, baby-sitting the bottle of bourbon they had started at Martha’s house.

“So, I say it again,” Mike said. “I’m glad you weren’t in this thing when it went down.”

“Never happen.” I raised the Nikon 35mm I had dragged along and snapped a few frames of Mike holding up the ruins of the raft like a fisherman’s trophy. I needed the camera in front of my face so he couldn’t see the sweat on my brow.

“I look at this as the work of a coward,” I said. “If Regina and I had been out here, he wouldn’t have dared to shred the Zodiak.”

“Uh huh.” Mike dropped the flap of rubber. “Think about this: little Hillary got it with a razor in broad daylight, in a public place. Just like the raft.”

I had been thinking about little else for several hours. But, ever macho, I flexed my puny biceps for him. “Two competent women are hardly the same as a ninety-pound girl or a seagoing balloon.”

“You think you could scare him away?”

“Absolutely.”

Before I saw him coming, Mike somehow bumped his hip against me, grabbed me around the middle, and flipped me off my feet. If he had let go of me, I would have landed in the water. When my eyes stopped rattling, I was looking straight down at the lifeguard divers swimming around the dock pilings.

“Excuse me,” Mike said, setting me back upright. “What were you saying?”

“I don’t remember.” I gasped for air. “Was it ‘Fuck you’?”

He laughed. “The things that come out of your mouth.”

The camera, dangling from its strap, had banged into my shoulder when he flipped me. It hurt. While I didn’t want Mike to see me scared, I didn’t mind letting him know I was pissed. “Don’t do that again, Michael Flint.”

“Why? Because it shows you’re not so tough? You’ve been having a lot of fun, poking around, asking questions. But don’t forget for one little minute that someone is playing for keeps.”

“I am not poking around.”

“Call it what you like.” Mike kicked at the ruins. “Our friend is as cocky as he is nasty. You just stay the fuck away from him.”

“The things that come out of your mouth, Mike Flint.”

He glanced up, somewhere between sheepish and peevish. “I meant what I said.”

One of the divers bobbed up to toss another find onto the pile of deflated raft, bits of boats, and other interesting detritus he and his partner had recovered from the bottom of the canal.

“Found the outboard yet?” Mike asked him.

The diver cleared his mouthpiece. “Yeah. It’s down there, all right, but it’s fouled in a lot of crap. We’re going to set up a block and tackle, bring it up here in a few minutes.”

The second diver surfaced. He tossed a black wing-tip shoe, maybe a size twelve or thirteen, onto the heap.

“What’s the matter with these people, they don’t trust the city to haul away their trash?” he huffed. “Throw their shit into the canal. Must be a dozen bags of it down there.”

Mike picked up the wing tip by its shoestring. “You’re going to bring it all up, aren’t you?”

“If you want it.” The diver positioned his mask and pushed himself off the dock. His wrist light snaked down through the murky water like a dragon in a Chinese New Year parade.

I looked from the shoe to Mike’s foot. Mike is a slender six-two. The shoe he held would have been much too big for him. I called out to Martha, “Any idea how tall Randy Ramsdale is?”

“He’s tall.” She started for the dock. “Taller than your friend. And much stouter. What did they find?”

“A shoe.”

“A nice one?” she asked. “Randy likes nice things. Everything perfect.”

“It looks bankerish.” I leaned over for a closer look. “Mike, how long do you think it was in the water?”

He shrugged. “Bodies in water I know. Shoes I don’t. It’s in pretty good shape, though.”

“Regina and Cynthia said that Elizabeth Ramsdale tossed Randy’s things into the canal the night she tossed him out.”

“Sound like nice people.”

Martha made slow progress off the terrace, talking as she came. “Rather vain about his appearance, I always thought.”

A big, good-looking cop with sergeant’s stripes on his sleeve overtook Martha just as she stepped into the bright circle made by the floodlights. The officer’s nameplate read Mahakian.

“You Flint?” he asked Mike.

“I am.” Mike set down the shoe and brushed his hands on his pants. “What’s up?”

“Where’s your witness?”

Mike nudged me forward. “Miz Maggie MacGowen here.” Mahakian seemed doubtful.

“Actually,” I said, “I didn’t see anything. I think I’m a victim, not a witness.”

Mahakian frowned some more. “No one answers at the house. We thought, after what Flint here told our detectives, that maybe we ought to go in, have a look around. But the judge is sticking about signing a warrant. He says anybody could have cut the raft, kids maybe. We have to show him some connection between the house and the raft, or some tie-in to your other case, or he’ll pass. If you can tell me you saw someone inside, and they’re not responding to the police, maybe I can talk the judge into a barricaded suspect.”

“All I saw was a curtain move,” I said. “Before Mrs. Szal and I went into the neighbor’s house, I thought that all of the Ramsdales’ windows were closed. When we came out again, one upstairs window was open. It could have been open all the time and I didn’t notice. This is a big house and there are lots of windows.”

“So you didn’t actually see anybody?”

“Right.”

“You’re sure?”

“Yes. But I’d be happy to make up something if it would help. I’m dying to see inside that place.”

He chuckled in spite of himself. “You a decorator or something?”

“Not hardly. I met the girl who was murdered. I would very much like to see her room.”

“Murdered,” Mahakian parroted. “God, you’d think just saying that much would be enough for this old creep to sign for us. Goddam Jerry Brown appointee.”

“Did you tell him the dead girl lived here?” I asked.

“He needs proof of ID.” Mahakian turned to Mike. “Is that what LAPD is doing down here, establishing ID?”

“Mas o menos,” Mike said, waffling his hand. “Most of the time I’m just trying to keep MacGowen here out of trouble. It’s a tough job, and I couldn’t get anyone else to do it.”

Mike thought he was funny, but I turned away. That’s when I saw the stricken expression on Martha’s face. I had forgotten she was there, had forgotten what she didn’t know about Hillary. Feeling that I had misspoken, I went over and put an arm around her.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

She shook me off. “I knew it was something bad. But, oh, why did it have to be Hillary?”

“I’m sorry,” I said again, at a loss for anything better. Mahakian came between us. “You the neighbor?” he asked Martha.

“I am,” she said briskly, tossing off her shock.

“I understand that Mr. Ramsdale is out of town. When was the last time you saw or spoke to Mrs. Ramsdale?”

“As I told Maggie, not since the boat sailed. Perhaps a week ago.”

Mahakian nodded as if that meant something to him. Something he wasn’t thrilled to know.

“What?” I asked.

“I asked the judge how nobody could be home if all the cars are in the garage. He had some ideas. A boat wasn’t one of them.”

I looked at Mike. “All the cars?”

Mike had my arm. “You’d better show us, sergeant.”

I felt a hole open in the pit of my stomach, like just before you reach the top of a roller coaster and you haven’t seen yet how far down the other side goes. It’s the expectation that gets you, not the drop.

I gave Martha’s shoulder another squeeze and fell in beside Mike, hustling to keep up with Mahakian. We went along a dark and narrow side yard overgrown with ivy, through a tall wooden gate, and out into an alley that ran between rows of garages. The Ramsdale garage was as wide as the house, room enough for four cars and some storage.

We went in through an unlocked side door. Before Sergeant Mahakian turned on the overhead light, I don’t know what I expected to see, except that it had something to do with a man who was fast with a straight razor. What I saw was sufficiently scary.

Ranged in a row were a new black Mercedes 500SEL, a utilitarian minivan, a two-man Sabot sailboat on a trailer. And a shiny red Corvette.

Mike pulled me to him. “What do you think, Maggie?”

“Looks like the same Corvette. But I’m no car expert. Maybe the tape will help.”

“Sergeant,” Mike said, “did you run the cars?”

“Yessir.” Mahakian pulled out his notebook. “They are all registered to Randall Ramsdale, this address. No wants, no warrants, no nothing on any of them.”

Mike went over and felt the hood of the Corvette. “It’s cool now. What time did you call me, Maggie?”

“About five.”

“Three hours ago.”

Mahakian felt the hood, too. “You want to tell me about it?”

“A witness to Hillary Ramsdale’s killing identified the doer as a male, Cauc, fair complexion, six-two to six-four, drove a late-model red ‘vette.”

“Sly would know the car, Mike,” I said. “Probably give you a better ID on the car than he would on the driver.”

Mike nodded. “Tell the kid to talk to me, would you?”

“He’ll talk to you,” I said. “Without Hillary, he isn’t so tough. He’s scared.”

Mahakian jotted something on his notepad and pocketed it.

“Detective Flint, sir, I need to go call my supervisor, take another shot at the judge. Would you mind securing the premises until I can send someone to relieve you?”

“Go ahead,” Mike said. “We’ll stay here and neck till you get back.”

Poor Mahakian didn’t quite know how to respond to that. He patted his notebook, sucked in his round tummy, and left us.

When he was gone, I grabbed Mike by the shirtfront. “You can hug me. But I’m really not in the mood for anything else.”

“Come here.” He held me against him and stroked my back. Mike gives good succor. “You got pretty tight with the locals. Tell me what you know.”

I thought for a moment, my cheek resting on his chest. I didn’t know very much at all. I only had scraps. That’s where I started.

“Hillary was sweet to old ladies. Her father, a perfectionist when it came to pleasure, doted on her. Her stepmother was straight out of Grimm’s. There was a lot of noisy fighting for the entertainment of the neighbors. It seems that Randy, true to his name, had another woman. He gave her a ring with a substantial rock for Valentine’s day. As I put it together, that’s just about the time that Randy took off for parts unknown. Alone. About a month later, Hillary followed him. But if Hillary was actually living on the streets up in L.A., where was Randy? And if a nice kid like her preferred the mean streets, how horrible must it have been at home with the stepmother?”

“Real bad.” Mike rubbed his face, a tired, disdainful gesture. “I talked to my friend Art in juvenile records up in Sacramento this morning.”

“And?”

“How come no one filed a missing-person report on Hillary?”

“You tell me,” I said.

“Couple of possibilities come to mind. And I don’t like any of them. Parents don’t lose their kids for a month without reporting it. Not if they want them found again.”

I took a step back from him. “Where’s Michael?”

“He couldn’t wait for us. Had some homework to finish.”

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I know getting us together is important to you.”

“It’s not your fault. Shit happens, huh?”

I didn’t have anything to say. We waited there in silence for a few more minutes before we were relieved by a pair of uniformed Long Beach officers.

While his partner wiped squashed snail off his shoe, the less picky of the two walked into the garage.

“Detective Flint?”

“Officer?”

“The sergeant said to tell you the warrant is on the way down. The minute it gets here, he’s going to boot the door.”

“Sounds like fun,” I said.

“After you,” Mike said, bowing me through the door. Mike and I picked our way back around front.

By the time we got there, the block and tackle had been set up at the side of the dock where the raft had gone down. The pile of waterlogged stuff had grown in mass, clusters of green trash-bag bundles taking up most of the small dock.

A few of the bags were torn. What I saw spilled out seemed to be mostly clothes – Neptune’s garage sale. There was so much of it that I marveled at the vastness of Elizabeth’s rage at Randy. Most of us would have been satisfied to toss out a few prized things and watch them float away, or sink into oblivion. But how many of us could sustain fury as long as Elizabeth had? Very scary woman.

The bourbon bottle on the table between Regina and Martha was empty. Martha still seemed chipper, but Regina had reached capacity. She was sound asleep, looking a lot like the sleeping toddler her friend had been holding at the yacht club.

Mahakian was at the front door with a couple of suits, holding a long, slender tool. They knocked a few times, hit the bell a few more, called out, “Police. Open up.”

Mike joined them. I had another agenda.

Yellow police tape kept a growing number of spectators at a distance. I wasn’t a spectator. I ducked under the tape, unchallenged, and went for a closer look at the junk on the dock.

The bags had been perforated, so they split when the divers manhandled them to the surface. I pulled a bag, heavy-gauge lawn and leaf size, into a clear space and ripped it open. No one stopped me.

The first garment I pulled out was a cream silk pajama top with RR embroidered on the breast pocket. The size on the label was XL. Seawater had surely ruined the fabric, but until they got wet, the pajamas had been in good shape, no tears or frayed areas. Further digging found more pajamas of similar style and quality, folded stacks of men’s boxer underwear – also monogrammed – a couple of terry robes, and, bizarre, a few pounds of ironstone dishes. Expensive, heavy dishes that probably gave the bundle enough weight to send it to the bottom and keep it there.

I looted through a few more open bags, found more of the wardrobe belonging to RR.

I looked up and saw Martha leaning over the tape. “What did you find, dear?”

“Randy’s clothes.”

“So many?” She seemed worried. “He must have bought all new things for his trip.”

Mahakian worked the tool between the front door and the jamb. With a sharp crack, the frame splintered and the latch and the deadbolt popped. The door swung open.

I dropped the clothes and went up to Mike on the terrace. Martha was right behind me.

I tugged his shirtfront again. “Can we go in?”

“Not until we’re invited. Let them look around first, just to be safe.”

Mahakian and his colleagues paused in the open doorway and seemed to be smelling the house air. I figured out why in a big hurry and my stomach took another roller-coaster ride. After a moment, they went in, hands poised on the weapons at their belts. I watched the lights come on at the windows, followed their progress around the first floor, then up the stairs.

After no more than five minutes, Sergeant Mahakian came back out. Mike went up and huddled with him, then he gestured for me.

“Hey, Miz Victim, come on in,” Mike said.

“What about me?” Martha demanded.

“Wait for the second tour bus,” Mike told her.

I was up the terrace steps and in the door before Mike. Behind me, I heard Martha grousing, “Why her?”

“What did you find, Sergeant?” I asked.

“No one’s home. Detective Flint thinks you might be able to tell us a few things if we let you look around. You know better than to touch anything. Right?”

“Of course.” I walked past him and into the living room I had seen earlier through the windows.

The rooms were beautifully done, if rather too opulent for my taste: restored antiques, heavy brocades in jewel tones of amethyst, garnet, and emerald, drapes with velvet swags. I had the feeling that anything that seemed less than perfect looked that way by design. Here and there a down-filled sofa cushion was scrunched, a few books on an end table were stacked randomly, a cashmere afghan was tossed rather than folded over an ottoman. A very old brass spyglass rested on a chair next to the window.

The only flaw was the dust that dulled the shine on the mahogany tables and on the ebony concert grand piano. I suppose there are scientific ways to measure the passage of time by the accumulation of dust. My best guess was days rather than weeks had passed since the room had been cleaned. The important thing was, the dust was undisturbed.

The other rooms on the first floor were a formal dining room, the kitchen, a breakfast room, and maid’s quarters. Each was as beautiful as the next, and all had the same fine, undisturbed layer of dust. I worried about the tracks we were all making in the dust on the white marble floor of the entry, even if no one else seemed to.

Odd as it may sound, I couldn’t feel Hillary in those graceful yet somehow sterile rooms. I had seen her piano, and could imagine her in a stiff party frock playing for the entertainment of a roomful of stiff adults. Beethoven, not boogie-woogie. No place to let down her guard. That impression changed when Mike opened the door to what appeared to be Randy’s study.

The dark and ornate gave way to scarred natural pine floors, threadbare rugs, a brick fireplace, and big comfy chairs pushed in front of a huge television set. The walls were covered with Hillary, from formal poses to fuzzy snapshots of goofy faces. Over the rolltop desk there were a framed finger painting and a crayon still life of a easeful of flowers on either side of a huge, immensely ugly paint-by-the-numbers seascape. All were signed by the adored child artist.

I nearly lost it when I saw the penciled hash marks on one wall, Hillary, age five, Hillary, age six, marked all the way up to age fourteen. And all made on the same date, November 1. The worst part was the thick line a couple of inches higher than Mike’s head. “Dad” was written next to the line, and below it were nine dates. Every year as Hillary grew, Dad had remained a measurable constant.

Mike was looking at the same marks, looking as sad as I felt. I put my arms around him.

“What do you think?” he said.

“Daddy doted on his little girl. Tough competition for a wife. Come to think of it, I don’t see any wifey pictures here at all.”

“Now that you mention it,” Mike said.

“I’d sure like to talk to Randy.”

“I have a real bad feeling about that.”

“Would it hurt anything if we peeked in his desk?”

“Sorry, kid. Much as I’d like to take a shot at it myself. That’s a private zone until we get a different warrant. But we can go upstairs. Want to see Hillary’s room?”

I was still looking around the room.

“Maggie?”

“I keep thinking about Casey and her dad. We abandon children in so many ways. Why should they ever trust us?” Mike caught my hand as I turned for the door.

“What?” I said.

“Trust me.” He kissed me, a brush across the lips that left a cool streak.

“Try it again,” I said. He’s so cooperative. There was nothing cool about any part of me when I drew away.

“Ready now?” he said, cocksure.

“Stunned,” I said, working to breathe normally. “Lead the way.” Once I had found Hillary in the house, she seemed to be everywhere. It was tough going, walking where she had walked, seeing her things. Mike had done a good deed when he embraced me.

As we approached the room where Hillary must always have slept between clean sheets, the bathroom where she could shower whenever she wanted to, I thought about the first time I had seen her. The street had been so noisy. A big contrast to the warm, quiet, orderly house.

I had to remind myself that danger comes in many guises. Sometimes wrapped in pretty packages.

I held on to Mike, because the contact made me feel better. And he made sure he was available to hold.

The carpet on the stairs was deep. It muffled the sound of our steps. All the way up I could hear the other police talking somewhere above us, and voices from outside coming in through an open window. They had grown very loud and excited, like a block party.

I looked up at Mike. “Do you think Martha has been passing around more bourbon?”

“Sounds like it.”

We turned into the first doorway at the top of the stairs and nearly collided with Mahakian on his flight out.

“Sorry,” he panted.

“In a hurry?” I asked.

“Yeah.” He sidled past us and fled down the stairs. “The outboard is coming up.”

“Oh,” I said.

“It’s bringing some shit up with it. Probably more trash bags. Those candy-ass lifeguards are screaming for help.”

We went into the master bedroom, an enormous expanse done in peach and vanilla ice cream, like Randy’s pajamas. The sheer silk draping the windows billowed in the breeze from the French doors. Very ethereal, very feminine. And very sexy.

The two detectives who had come in with Mahakian were outside the French doors, standing on a narrow balcony that overlooked the terrace below and the dock. Mike joined them.

I was far more interested in looking around Elizabeth’s room than watching the lifeguards raise Regina’s outboard motor.

The room was dramatic for its starkness. There was very little furniture to distract from the focal point: the high canopied bed covered with a puffy satin comforter. An oversize bed, with lots of room for rolling around, even for a man like Randy, who, by all accounts, was a big man.

No one was paying any attention to me, so I pillaged the night-table drawers. I was looking for something to humanize the place, define its inhabitants. The electric dildo I found helped a lot. I found it among a variety of interesting things: K-Y Jelly, many dime-store silk scarves, wrinkled as if they had been knotted, reading glasses.

In the dildo drawer I also found a copy of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca. One of my favorite books. I flipped through the pages. Then I looked back at the window where the detectives were calling down to someone below. Just like a scene from Rebecca.

I tossed the book onto the bed and went on through the room to the adjoining dressing room and walk-in closets.

Her closet was bigger than his. Either closet could have been converted into a good-sized bedroom. The odd thing was, while her closet was crammed, his was absolutely empty. I knew where his things were, out there on the dock. That wasn’t the puzzler.

When my ex, Scotty, moved out, it took me a while to decide to spread my things into his closet space. A week, maybe two. Elizabeth had had a couple of months. And she really needed more closet space. Unless she was expecting Randy to come back, what was her hang-up?

I was puzzling over this when I closed the closet door behind me. I walked back into the bedroom and saw the men still leaning over the balcony railing. Just as in Rebecca when her sailboat was found at the bottom of the sea. With her in it.

“Mike?” I picked up the book and walked toward the windows. “I want to show you something.”

The noise outside crescendoed, a collective groan. The detective standing shoulder to shoulder with Mike covered his mouth, ducked away, and, green-faced, ran past me headed for the bathroom.

“Mike?” I started for the balcony.

Mike met me, blocking my way. He was green-faced, too. “What is it?” I asked.

“I think we found Randy.”