Mostly Murder: A Short Story Collection

File #1: The Mayfield Case

Larry Ballard was halfway to the Daniel Kearny Associates office before he remembered to switch on his radio. After a whine and a blast of static, O’Bannon’s voice came on loudly in mid-transmission.

“...Bay Bridge yet, Oakland 3?”

“Coming up to the toll plaza now. The subject is three cars ahead of me. I’ll need a front tail once he’s off the bridge, over.”

“Stand by. KDM 366 Control calling any San Francisco unit.”

Ballard unclipped his mike and pressed the red TRANSMIT button. “This is SF 6. My location is Oak and Buchanan, moving east, over.”

“Oakland 3 is trailing a red Comet convertible across Bay Bridge, license Charlie, X-Ray, Kenneth, 8-8-1. The legal owner, California Citizens Bank on Polk Street, wants car only — contract outlawed.”

Oakland 3 cut in: “Wait by the Ninth and Bryant off-ramp, SF 6.”

“Control standing by,” said O’Bannon. “KDM 366 clear.”

O’Bannon set down the hand mike on Giselle Marc’s desk, leaving it flipped to MONITOR. He was a wiry red-headed man about 40, with twinkling blue eyes, freckles, and a hard-bitten drinker’s face.

“Who’s SF 6? The new kid?”

“Right. Larry Ballard. With us a month yesterday.” Giselle was a tall lean blonde who had started with DKA as a part-time file girl while still in high school; after graduation from S.F. State two years before, she had taken over the Cal-Cit Bank desk. “He’s a green pea but he’s eager and maybe — just maybe — he can think. Kathy’s putting him on his own this week.”

O’Bannon grunted. “The Great White Father around?”

“Down in his cubbyhole — in a vile mood.”

O’Bannon grimaced and laid his expense-account itemization on her desk with great reverence. Giselle regarded it without enthusiasm.

“Why don’t you do your own dirty work, O’B?” she demanded.

Same day: 10:00 a.m.

Ballard was lanky, well-knit, in his early twenties, with blue eyes already hardened by his month with DKA. He was stopped, by Dan Kearny himself, at the top of the narrow stairs leading to the second floor of the old Victorian building that housed the company offices.

“That Comet in the barn?”

“Yes, sir,” said Ballard.

“Terrif. Any static?” Kearny was compact and powerful, with a square pugnacious face, massive jaw, and cold gray eyes which invariably regarded the world through a wisp of cigarette smoke.

“I front-tailed him from the freeway. When he parked on Howard Street, Oakland 3 and I just wired up the Comet and drove it away.”

Kearny clapped Ballard’s shoulder and went on. Ballard entered the front office, which overlooked Golden Gate Avenue through unwashed bay windows. Three assignments were in his basket on the desk of Jane Goldson, the phone receptionist with the Liverpool accent: through her were channeled all assignments, memos, and field reports.

Carrying the case sheets, Ballard descended to the garage under the building. Along the right wall were banks of lockers for personal property; along the left, small partitioned offices used by the seven San Francisco field men. He paused to review his new cases before leaving.

The most puzzling one involved a new Continental, financed through Cal-Cit Bank, which had been purchased by a Jocelyn Mayfield, age 23. She and her roommate, Victoria Goodrich, lived at 31 Edith Alley and were case workers for San Francisco Social Services. What startled Ballard was the size of the delinquent payments — $198.67 each — and the contract balance of over $7000. On a welfare worker’s salary? Even though her parents lived in the exclusive St. Francis Woods area, they were not cosigners on the contract.

From his small soundproofed office at the rear of the garage, Dan Kearny watched Ballard leave. Kearny had been in the game for over half of his 43 years, and still hadn’t figured out the qualities which made a good investigator; only time would tell if Ballard had them. Kearny jabbed an intercom button with a blunt finger.

“Giselle? Send O’Bannon down here, will you?”

He lit a Lucky, leaned back to blow smoke at the ceiling. O’B had come with him six years before, when Kearny had resigned from Waller’s Auto Detectives to start DKA with one car and this old Victorian building which had been a bawdy house in the ’90s; and reviewing O’B’s expense accounts still furnished Kearny with his chief catharsis.

He smeared out the cigarette; through the one-way glass he could see O’Bannon approaching the office, whistling, his hands in pockets, his blue eyes innocent of guile. When he came in, Kearny shook out a cigarette for himself and offered the pack. “How’s Bella, O’B?”

“She asks when you’re bringing the kids for cioppino again.”

Kearny indicated the littered desk. “I’m two weeks behind in my billing. Oh... this expense account, O’B.” Without warning his fist smashed down in sudden fury. “Dammit, if you think...”

O’Bannon remained strangely tranquil during the storm. When Kearny finally ran down, the red-headed man cleared his throat and spoke.

“Giants leading three-two, bottom of the third. Marichal—”

“What do you mean?” Kearny looked stunned. “What the—”

O’Bannon fished a tiny transistor radio from his pocket, then apologetically removed miniature speakers from both his ears. Kearny gaped.

“You mean — while I — you were listening to the ball game?”

O’Bannon nodded dolorously. Speechless with rage, Kearny jerked out the expense-account checkbook; but then his shoulders began shaking with silent laughter.

Same day: 9:30 p.m.

Larry Ballard parked on Upper Grant; above him, on Telegraph Hill, loomed the concrete cone of Coit Tower, like a giant artillery piece about to be fired. Edith Alley ran half a block downhill toward Stockton; Jocelyn Mayfield and her roommate, Victoria Goodrich, had the lower apartment in a two-story frame building.

The girl who answered the bell wore jeans and sweatshirt over a chunky figure; her short hair was tinted almost white. Wide cheekbones gave her a Slavic look.

“Is Jocelyn here?” Ballard asked.

“Are you a friend of hers?” Her voice was harshly attractive.

Ballard took a flyer. “I was in one of her Sociology classes.”

“At Stanford?” She stepped back. “Sorry if I sounded antisocial. Sometimes male clients get ideas, y’know?”

He followed her into the apartment. “You must be Vikki — Josie has mentioned you. You don’t act like a social worker.”

“‘Say something to me in psychology?’ Actually, I was a waitress down in North Beach before I started with Social Services.”

There were cheap shades at the windows of the rather barren living room, a grass mat on the floor, a wicker chair and a couch, and an ugly black coffee table. The walls were a depressing brown. It was not a room in keeping with monthly automobile payments of $200.

“We’re going to repaint eventually,” Vikki said. “I guess.”

Ballard nodded. “Has Josie mentioned selling the Continental?”

“The Continental?” She frowned. “That belongs to Hank — we both use my Triumph. I don’t think he wants to sell it; he just got it”

“Hank, huh? Say, what’s his name and address? I can—”

Just then a key grated in the front door. Damn! Two minutes more would have done it. Now the subject was in the room, talking breathlessly. “Did Hank call? He wasn’t at his apartment, and—”

“Here’s an old friend of yours,” Vikki cut in brightly.

Ballard was staring. Jocelyn Mayfield was the loveliest girl he had ever seen, her fawnlike beauty accented by shimmering jet hair. Her mouth was small but full-lipped, her brows slightly heavy for a girl, her brown liquid eyes full-lashed. She had one of those supple patrician figures maintained by tennis on chilly mornings.

“Old friend?” Her voice was low. “But I don’t even know him!”

That tore it. Ballard blurted, “I’m — uh — representing California Citizens Bank. We’ve been employed to investigate your six hundred dollar delinquency on the 1967 Continental. We—”

“You dirty—” The rest of Vikki’s remark was not that of a welfare worker. “I bet you practice lying to yourself in front of a mirror. I bet—”

“Vikki, hush.” Jocelyn was blushing, deeply embarrassed. Vikki stopped and her eyes popped open wide.

“You mean you did make the down payment on that car? It’s registered in your name? You fool! He couldn’t make a monthly payment on a free lunch, and you—” She stopped, turned on Ballard. “Okay, buster. Out.”

“Vikki, please.” Then Jocelyn said to Ballard, “I thought — I had no idea the payments — by Friday I can have all the money.”

“I said out, buster,” Vikki snapped. “You heard her — you’ll get your pound of flesh. And that’s all you’ll get — unless I tear Josie’s dress and run out into that alley yelling rape.”

Ballard retreated; he had no experience in handling a Vikki Goodrich. And there was something about Jocelyn Mayfield — private stock, O’Bannon would have called her. She’d been so obviously let down by this Hank character; and she had promised to pay by Friday.

Monday, May 29th: 3:30 p.m.

Jane Goldson winked and pointed toward the Office Manager’s half-closed door. “She’s in a proper pet, she is, Larry.”

He went in. Kathy Onoda waved him to a chair without removing the phone from her ear. She was an angular girl in her late twenties, with classical Japanese features. Speaking into the phone, her voice was hesitant, nearly unintelligible with sibilants.

“I jus’ rittre Joponee girr in your country verry littre time.” She winked at Ballard. “So sorry too, preese. I roose job I... ah... ah so. Sank you very much. Buddha shower bressings.”

She hung up and exclaimed jubilantly, “Why do those stupid s.o.b.’s always fall for that phony Buddha-head accent?” All trace of it had disappeared. “You, hotshot, you sleeping with this Mayfield chick? One report, dated last Tuesday, car in hands of a third party, three payments down — and you take a promise. Which isn’t kept.”

“Well, you see, Kathy, I thought—”

“You want me to come along and hold your hand?” Her black eyes glittered and her lips thinned with scorn. “Go to Welfare and hint that she’s sleeping around; tell her mother that our investigation is going to hit the society pages; get a line on this Hank no-goodnik.” She jabbed a finger at him. “Go gettem bears!”

Ballard fled, slightly dazed as always after a session with Kathy. Driving toward Twin Peaks, he wondered why Jocelyn had broken her promise. Just another deadbeat’ He hated to believe that; apart from the Mayfield case he was doing a good job. He still carried a light case load, but he knew that eventually he would be responsible for as many as 75 files simultaneously, with reports due every three days on each of them except skips, holds, and contingents.

The Mayfield home was on Darien Way in St. Francis Woods; it was a huge pseudo-colonial with square columns and a closely trimmed lawn like a gigantic golf green. Inside the double garage was a new Mercedes. A maid with iron-gray hair took his card, returned with Jocelyn’s mother — an erect, pleasant-faced woman in her fifties.

“I’m afraid I’m not familiar with Daniel Kearny Associates.”

“We represent California Citizens Bank,” said Ballard. “We’ve been engaged to investigate certain aspects of your daughter’s finances.”

“Jocelyn’s finances?” Her eyes were lighter than her daughter’s, with none of their melting quality. “Whatever in the world for?”

“She’s six hundred dollars delinquent on a 1967 Continental.”

“Indeed?” Her voice was frigid. “Perhaps you had better come in.”

The living room had a red brick fireplace and was made strangely tranquil by the measured ticking of an old-fashioned grandfather clock. There was a grand piano and a magnificent Oriental rug.

“Now. Why would my daughter supposedly do such a thing?”

“She bought it for a” — his voice gave the word emphasis — “man.”

She stiffened. “You cannot be intimating that my daughter’s personal life is anything but exemplary! When Mr. Mayfield hears this... this infamous gossip, he... he is most important in local financial circles.”

“So is California Citizens Bank.”

“Oh!” She stood up abruptly. “I suggest you leave this house.”

Driving back, Ballard knew he had made the right move to bring parental pressure on Jocelyn Mayfield, but the knowledge gave him scant pleasure. There had been a framed picture of her on the piano; somehow his own thoughts, coupled with the picture, had made his memory of their brief meeting sharper, almost poignant.

Same day: 5:15 p.m.

Dan Kearny lit a Lucky. “I think you know why I had you come back in, Ballard. The Mayfield case. Are you proud of that file?”

“No, sir.” He tried to meet Kearny’s gaze. “But I think she broke her promise to pay because this deadbeat talked her into it.”

“You took a week to find that out?” Kearny demanded. “Giselle found out that the subject walked off her job at Welfare last Friday night — took an indefinite leave without bothering to leave any forwarding address.”

Kearny paused to form a smoke ring. He could blast this kid right out of the tank, but he didn’t want to do that. “I started in this game in high school, Ballard, during the Depression. Night-hawking cars for Old Man Walters down in L.A. at five bucks per repo — cover your own expenses, investigate on your own time. Some of those Oakies would have made you weep, but I couldn’t afford to feel sorry for them. This Mayfield dame’s in a mess. Is that our fault? Or the bank's?”

“No, sir. But there are special circumstances—”

“Circumstances be damned! We’re hired to investigate people who have defaulted, defrauded, or embezzled — money or goods — to find them if they’ve skipped out, and to return the property to the legal owner. Mayfield’s contract is three months delinquent and you spin your wheels for a whole week. Right now the bank is looking at a seven-thousand dollar loss.” He ground out his cigarette and stood up. “Let’s take a ride.”

Later, ringing the bell at 31 Edith Alley, Ballard warned, “This Victoria Goodrich is tough. I know she won’t tell us anything.”

Vikki opened the door and glared at him. “You again?”

Kearny moved past Ballard so smoothly that the girl had to step back to avoid being walked on, and they were inside. “My name is Turk,” he said. “I’m with the legal department of the bank.”

She had recovered. “You should be ashamed, hiring this person to stir up trouble for Josie with her folks. Okay, so she’s two lousy payments behind. I’ll make one of them now, and next week she can—”

“Three payments. And since the vehicle is in the hands of a third party, the contract is void.” He shot a single encompassing look around the living room, then brought his cold gray eyes back to her face. “We know Miss Mayfield has moved out. Where is she living now?”

“I don’t know.” She met his gaze stubbornly.

Kearny nodded. “Fraudulent contract; flight to avoid prosecution. We’ll get a grand-theft warrant for her seven-thousand dollar embezzle—”

“Good God!” Vikki’s face crumpled with dismay. “Really, I don’t know Hank’s addr — I mean I don’t know where she’s gone. I—” Under his unwinking stare, tears suddenly came into her voice. “His wife’s on welfare; he’s no damn good. Once when he’d been drinking he — he put his hands on me. I guess she’s with him, but I don’t know where.”

“Then what’s Hank’s last name?”

She sank down on the couch with her face in her hands and merely shook her head. Ignoring her, Kearny turned to Ballard. “Sweet kid, this Mayfield. She steals the woman’s husband, then a car, then—”

“No!” Vikki was sobbing openly. “It isn’t like that! They were separated—”

Kearny’s voice lashed out. “What's his last name?”

“I won’t—”

“Hank what?”

“You’ve no right to—”

“—to throw your trashy roommate in jail? We can and we will.”

She raised a tear-ravaged face. “If you find the car will Josie stay out of prison?”

“I can’t make promises of immunity on behalf of the bank.”

“His name is Stuber. Harold Stuber.” She wailed suddenly to Ballard. “Make him stop! I’ve told everything I know — everything.”

Kearny grunted. “You’ve been most helpful,” he said, then strode out. Ballard took a hesitant step toward the hunched, sobbing girl, hesitated, and then ran after Kearny.

“Why did you do that to her?” he raged. “Now she’s crying—”

“And we’ve got the information we came after,” Kearny said.

“But you said to her—”

“But, hell.” He called Control on the radio. When Giselle answered he said, “Mayfield unit reportedly in the hands of a Harold Stuber — S-t-u-b-e-r. Check him through the Polk Directory.” He lit a cigarette and puffed placidly at it, the mike lying in his lap.

“The only listing under Harold Stuber shows a residence at 1597 Eighteenth Street; employment, bartender; wife, Edith.”

“Thanks, Giselle. SF 6 clear.”

“KDM 366 Control clear.”

Driving out to Eighteenth Street, Ballard was glad it had been Vikki, not Jocelyn Mayfield, who had been put through the meat grinder. Vikki wasn’t soft, yet Kearny had reduced her to tears in just a few vicious minutes.

The address on Eighteenth Street was a dirty, weathered stucco building above the heavy industrial area fringing Potrero Hill. It was a neighborhood losing its identity in its battle against the wrecker’s ball. Inside the apartment house, the first-floor hall wore an ancient threadbare carpet with a design like spilled animal intestines.

“Some of this rubbed off on your true love,” remarked Kearny.

Ballard gritted his teeth. Their knock was answered by a man two inches over six feet, wide as the doorway. His rolled-up sleeves showed hairy, muscle-knotted arms; his eyes were red-rimmed and he carried a glass of whiskey. He looked as predictable as a runaway truck.

Kearny was unimpressed. “Harold Stuber?”

“He don’t live here no more.” The door began to close.

“How about Edith Stuber?”

The hand on the door hesitated. “Who’s askin’?”

“Welfare.” When Kearny went forward the huge man wavered, lost his inner battle, and stepped back. The apartment smelled of chili and unwashed diapers; somewhere in one of the rooms a baby was screaming.

“Edie,” yelled the big man, “coupla guys from Welfare.”

She was a boldly handsome woman in her thirties, with dark hair and flashing black eyes. Under a black sweater and black slacks her body was full-breasted, wide-hipped, heavily sensual.

“Welfare?” Her voice became a whine. “D’ya have my check?”

“Your check?” Kearny’s eyes flicked to the big man with simulated contempt. He whirled to Ballard. “Johnson, note that the recipient is living common-law with a Caucasian male, height six-two, weight two-twenty, estimated age thirty-nine. Recipient should—”

“Hey!” yelled the woman, turning furiously on the big man, “if I lose my welfare check—”

Kearny cut in brusquely, “We’re only interested in your legal spouse, Mrs. Stuber.”

Her yells stopped like a knife slash. “You come about Hank? He ain’t lived here in five months. When he abandoned me an’ the kid—”

“But the Bureau knows he gets in touch with you.”

“You could call it that.” She gave a coarse laugh. “Last Wednesday he come over in a big Continental, woke us — woke me up an’ made a row ’bout Mr. Kleist here slee — bein’ my acquaintance. Then the p’lice come an’ Hank, he slugged one of ’em. So they took him off.”

Kearny said sharply, “What about the Continental?”

“It set here to the weekend, then it was gone.”

“What’s your husband’s current residence address?”

She waved a vague arm. “He never said.” Her eyes widened. “He gave me a phone number, but I never did call it; knew it wouldn’t do no good.” Behind her the baby began crying; the big man went away. Her eyes were round with the effort of remembering. “Yeah. 860-4645.”

Back in the agency car, Kearny lit a cigarette. “If it’s any consolation, there’s the reason for her broken promise. He gets busted Wednesday night, gets word to Mayfield Thursday, on Friday she quits her job. Saturday she sees him at the county jail, finds out where he left the car, drops it into dead storage somewhere near his apartment, and holes up there to wait until he gets out. Find her, you find the car.”

“Can’t we trace the phone number this one gave us?”

Kearny gestured impatiently. “That’ll just be some gin mill.”

The next day the Mayfield folder went into the SKIP tub and a request went to the client for a copy of the subject’s credit application. Skiptracing began on the case. The phone number proved to be that of a tough Valencia Street bar. DKA’s Peninsula agent found that Stuber had drawn a thirty-to-ninety-day rap in the county jail, the heavy sentence resulting from a prior arrest on the same charge. Stuber still said he lived at Eighteenth Street and denied knowing the subject. A stakeout of the jail’s parking lot during visiting hours was negative.

Police contacts reported that the Continental had not been impounded, nor was it picking up parking tags anywhere in San Francisco. Stuber had no current utilities service, no phone listing. The time involved in checking dead-storage garages would have been excessive. By phone Giselle covered Welfare, neighbors around the Edith Alley and Eighteenth Street addresses, the subject’s former contacts at Stanford, Bartender’s Local Number 41, all the references on the credit application. Ballard supplemented with field contact of postmen, gas station attendants, newsboys, and small store owners.

None of it did any good.

Thursday, June 9th: 7:15 p.m.

Ballard was typing reports at home when his phone rang. He had worked thirteen cases that day, including two skips besides Mayfield; it took him a few moments to realize that it was her voice.

“What have I done to make you hate me so?” she asked.

“I’m all for you personally, Josie, but I’ve got a job to do. Anyway, if I let up it just would mean that someone else would keep looking.”

“I love him.” She said it without emotion — a fact by which she lived. “I love him and he said he would leave me if I let them take his car while he’s — away. I couldn’t stand that. It’s the first thing of beauty he’s ever possessed, and he can’t give it up.”

Ballard was swept by a sudden wave of sympathy, almost of desire for her; he could picture her, wearing something soft, probably cashmere, her face serious, her mouth a pink bud. How could Stuber have such a woman bestowed on him, yet keep thinking of a damned automobile? How could he make Jocelyn see Stuber as he really was?

“Josie, the bank objects so strongly to Stuber that they’ve declared the contract void; as long as he has possession, they’ll hold the account in jeopardy. Surrender it. Get him something you can afford.”

“I couldn’t do that,” she said gravely, and hung up.

Ballard got a beer from the refrigerator and sat down at the kitchen table to drink it. After only one meeting and a single phone conversation, was he falling for Jocelyn Mayfield? He felt a deep physical attraction, sure; but it wasn’t unsatisfied desire which was oppressing him now. It was the knowledge that he was going to keep looking for the car, that there was no way to close the case without Jocelyn being badly hurt emotionally.

Friday, June 17: 10:15 a.m.

“If I see her mother once more, she’ll call the cops,” Ballard objected. “Stuber gets out June twenty-ninth. We could tail him—”

“The bank’s deadline is next Tuesday — the twenty-first,” said Kearny. “Then their dealer recourse expires and they have to eat their loss — whatever it is. Find the girl, Ballard, and get the car.”

The intercom buzzed and Jane Goldson said, “Larry’s got a funny sort of call on 1504, Mr. Kearny. She sounds drunk or something.”

Kearny gestured and stayed on as Ballard picked up. The voice, which Ballard recognized as Jocelyn’s, was overflowing with hysteria.

“I can’t stand it any more and I want you to know you’re to blame!” she cried. “My parentsh hate me — can’t see Hank on weekends ’cause I know you’ll be waiting, like vultures — sho — I did it.” She gave a sleepy giggle. “I killed myself.”

“You’re a lively sounding corpse,” said Kearny in a syrupy voice.

“I know who you are!” Surprisingly, she giggled again. “You made Vikki cry. Poor Vikki’ll be all sad. I took all the pillsh.”

Kearny, who appeared to have been doodling on a sheet of scratch paper, held up a crudely printed note: Have Kathy trace call. Ballard switched off, jabbed Kathy’s intercom button. Please God, he thought, let her be all right. What had brought her to this extremity?

“I’ll trace it,” rapped Kathy. “Keep that connection open.”

He punched back into 1504. “—Ballard’s shoul when I die — lose car, lose Hank, sho—” Her sing-song trailed off with a tired sigh; there was a sudden heavy jar. After a moment a light tapping began, as if the receiver were swinging at the end of the cord and striking a table leg. They stared at one another across the empty line.

The intercom buzzed, making Ballard jump. Kathy said, “469 Eddy Street, Apartment 206, listed under Harold Stein — that’ll be Stuber. The phone company’ll get an ambulance and oxygen over there. Good hunting.”

Ballard was already out of his chair. “It’s a place on Eddy Street — we’ve got to get to her!”

As they rocketed up Franklin for the turn into Eddy Street, Ballard said, “We shouldn’t have hounded her that way. Do you think she’ll be all right?”

“Depends on how many of what she took. That address — between Jones and Leavenworth in the Tenderloin — crummy neighborhood. The nearest dead-storage garage is around the corner on Jones Street. We can — hey! What the hell are you doing?”

Ballard had slammed the car to a stop in front of a rundown apartment building. “I’ve got to get to her!” he cried. He was halfway out the car door when Kearny’s thick fingers closed around Ballard’s tie and yanked him bodily back inside.

“You’re a repo man, Ballard,” he growled. “That might not mean much to you but it does to me, a hell of a lot. First we get the car.” Ballard, suddenly desperate, drew back a threatening fist. Kearny’s slaty eyes didn’t flicker; he said, “Don’t let my gray hairs make a coward of you, sonny.”

Ballard slumped back on the seat. He nodded. “Okay. We'll drive on, damn you.”

As they turned into Jones Street, a boxy white Public Health ambulance wheeled into Eddy and smoked to a stop on the wrong side of the street. At the garage half a block down, Kearny went in while Ballard waited in the car. Why had he almost slugged Kearny? For that matter, why had he backed down?

Kearny stuck his head in the window. “It’s easy when you know where to look.” He laid a hand on Ballard’s arm. “On your way up there call Giselle and have her send me a Hold Harmless letter.”

Ballard circled the block and parked behind the ambulance. On the second floor he saw three tenants gaping by the open door of Apartment 206. A uniformed cop put a hand on Ballard’s chest.

“I was on the phone with her when she — fainted.”

“Okay. The sergeant’ll wanna talk with you anyway.”

She was on the floor by the phone stand, her head back and her mouth open. Her skin was very pale; the beautifully luminous eyes were shut. A tracheal tube was down her throat so that she could breathe. The skirt had ridden high up one sprawled thigh, and Ballard pulled it down.

“Is she... will she—”

The intern was barely older than Ballard, but his hair already was thinning. “We’ll give her oxygen in the ambulance.” He opened his hand to display a bottle. “Unless she had something in here besides what’s on the label, she should be okay.”

Ballard glanced around the tiny two-roomer. There was a rumpled wall bed with a careless pile of paperbacks on the floor beside it; he could picture her cooped up there day after day, while her depression deepened. Above the flaked-silver radiator was a large brown water stain from the apartment upstairs; it was a room where dreams would die without a whimper.

Ballard backed off; instead of talking to the detective in charge he would call her folks so that their own doctor could be at the hospital to prevent it being listed as an attempted suicide.

That afternoon DKA closed the file on the Mayfield case. She was released from the hospital a few days later and returned to 31 Edith Alley. Without really knowing why, Ballard went over there one Tuesday evening to see her; she refused to come out of the bedroom, and he ended up in the living room, drinking tea with Vikki Goodrich.

“She’s grateful for what you did, Larry. But, as far as anything further—” She paused delicately. “Hank Stuber will be out tomorrow.” She paused again, her face suddenly troubled. “She’s going to surprise him and pick him up in my Triumph; he doesn’t know about the Continental. After that I guess she’ll be — well, sort of busy.”

Leaving the apartment, Ballard told himself that ended it Yet he sat behind the wheel of his car for a long time without turning the ignition key. Damn it, that didn’t end it! Too much raw emotion had been bared...

Thursday, June 30th: 8:15 a.m.

Each short journalistic phrase in the Chronicle, read over his forgotten restaurant eggs, deepened his sense of loss, his realization that something bright in his life had been permanently darkened.

Ballard thought, I’ve never even seen the son-of-a-bitch I could pass him on the street and not even know it. He felt a sudden revulsion, almost a nausea, at his own role in the destruction of Jocelyn Mayfield. Half an hour later he slammed the Chronicle down on Kearny’s desk.

“Stuber said he’d leave her if we took the Continental while he was in jail. He left her, all right.”

Kearny looked at him blandly. “I’ve already seen it.”

“If we hadn’t taken the car—”

“—she would have killed herself next month or next year over some other deadbeat. She was an emotional loser, Ballard, a picker of wrong men.” He paused, then continued drily, “It’s the end of the month, Ballard. I’d like to review your case file.”

Ballard dropped his briefcase on the littered desk. “You know what you can do with your case file, Kearny? You can take it and—”

Kearny listened without heat, then reached for his cigarettes. He lit one and sneered, through the new smoke, “What will you do now, Ballard — go home and cry into your pillow? She’s going to be dead for a long, long time.”

Ballard stared at him, speechless, as if at a new species of animal — the square pugnacious face, the hard eyes which had seen too much, the heavy cleft chin, the nose slightly askew from some old argument which had gone beyond words. A long slow shudder ran through the younger man’s frame. Work — that was Kearny’s answer to everything. Work, while Jocelyn Mayfield lay with a morgue tag on her toe. Work, while scar tissue began its slow accretion over the wound.

All right, then — work. Very slowly he drew his assignments from the briefcase. “Let’s get at it then,” he said in a choked voice.

Dan Kearny nodded to himself. A girl had died; a man had had his first bitter taste of reality. And in the process DKA bought themselves an investigator. Maybe, with a few more rough edges knocked off, a damned good investigator.