The Crooked Street

27

Marjorie Detlowe lived in a small row house south of the fog-swept trails of Lincoln Park. The rocky overlook at the Pacific coast was only two blocks away, and the damp chill of the ocean was always in the air. It was an old neighborhood, but the house looked new, with fresh blue paint, bright-white Tudor crossbeams, and a single steep gable. A red MINI Cooper was parked in the driveway.

The forty-something woman who answered the door had fluffy hair that was more silver than blond. She wore a white crocheted sweater and pleated slacks that were loose enough to hide a couple of extra pounds on her frame. At her feet, a gray terrier barked excitedly until she bent down and scooped him into her arms.

“Ms. Detlowe?” Frost said. “I’m Inspector Frost Easton. I was hoping to ask you a few questions about Alan.”

Her smile was friendly, but her head cocked in surprise. “I’m sorry, isn’t Trent Gorham still with the police? I thought he was in charge of Alan’s investigation.”

“He is, but Alan’s name came up in the context of a different case. I’m following up.”

“Oh, all right. You better come in.”

She waved him through the doorway and put down the dog, which scampered ahead of them to the living room. Frost took a seat on the sofa, and the dog jumped up and sniffed around him, as if immediately suspicious that Frost was a cat person. Marjorie sat on the adjacent love seat and patted the cushion beside her, and the dog quickly relocated to her lap.

“Let me say first how sorry I am for your loss,” Frost said.

“Thank you. Three years probably seems like a long time, but it may as well have been yesterday. You learn to live with it, but you never get over it. And please, call me Marjorie. I’m a police widow. We’re all part of the same team. You said your name was Frost?”

“That’s right.”

“What an unusual name. I like it. Well, what can I tell you, Frost?”

He hesitated because he wasn’t sure if the cordial rapport between them would evaporate with his first question. “This is actually a little awkward.”

“Oh, please don’t worry about that. Charge ahead. What do you want to know?”

“I believe you’re familiar with a private detective named Richard Coyle,” Frost said.

Marjorie turned her eyes down to her lap. She stroked her fingers idly through her dog’s curly fur. “Ah. Now I see.”

“Mr. Coyle told me that you hired him to follow your husband not long before he was murdered.”

“Yes, I did. I feel stupid about it now. I hope Alan never found out. I would feel awful to think that he knew I didn’t trust him, given what happened.”

“If you don’t mind my asking — why didn’t you trust him?”

Marjorie shook her head and looked embarrassed. “Oh, it was as much me as him. It was a time of my life where I wasn’t feeling good about myself. I’d gone through cancer treatment and had major surgery done. It took an emotional toll, not just a physical toll. I had trouble seeing myself as an attractive woman after that. I became obsessed with the idea that Alan was going to look elsewhere, that he would never be satisfied with me again. Part of it was his job, of course. He dealt with all these women whose lives revolved around sex. It had never bothered me before, but at that particular juncture, I questioned everything.”

“I’m sorry,” Frost said.

“That was the worst year of my life. First the cancer, then Alan’s murder. Afterward, I felt guilty about having him followed, because Mr. Coyle never found any evidence that he was unfaithful. You’d think that would have made me feel better, but it only made me feel worse about what I’d done. I was caught up in this awful cycle of jealousy and self-hatred. Of course, it didn’t help that Alan was such a handsome man. Have you seen pictures of him?”

Frost shook his head. “I haven’t.”

Marjorie reached into a pocket for her phone. “All I have left of him are a few digital photos.”

She handed him the phone, and Frost saw a picture of Alan Detlowe with his wife at what was obviously a Christmas party. He could see mistletoe above them, and Alan wore a big smile as his wife kissed his cheek. Alan was tall and broad shouldered, with trimmed salt-and-pepper hair and a discreet mustache. His chin was chiseled and square. Marjorie was right. He was a good-looking man.

Frost swiped to the next photograph, which showed two men mugging for the camera at the same party, with their hands wrapped playfully around each other’s necks.

One was Alan Detlowe. The other was Trent Gorham.

“Were Alan and Trent good friends?” Frost asked.

“Oh, best friends. Alan was about ten years older than Trent, but the two of them were practically brothers. They worked together for years at vice, you know. Trent was devastated by Alan’s death.”

“I’m sure.”

“Trent was very sweet to me afterward. He was always checking in on me to make sure I had everything I needed. I know he feels bad that he hasn’t been able to bring Alan’s killer to justice, but I understand how hard it is. The badge on your shirt makes you a target. If you’re good at your job, you make a lot of enemies.”

“Did Trent know that you’d hired Coyle?” Frost asked.

“Yes, eventually, I admitted it to him. I was ashamed of myself, but I realized he needed to know everything. Trent and Coyle talked, but unfortunately, Trent told me there was nothing helpful in what Coyle had discovered. That made me sad. At least if hiring Coyle had helped identify Alan’s killer, I would have felt better about losing faith. I suppose that sounds foolish.”

“No, it doesn’t,” Frost said. “In fact, I’m hoping that there might still be useful information in what Coyle found.”

“I don’t see how,” Marjorie replied.

“As I mentioned, another case has come up, and it’s possible Alan was looking into it in the days before he disappeared. Unfortunately, Coyle’s surveillance notes aren’t available. I was hoping you might have copies of the reports he sent to you about Alan.”

Marjorie shook her head. “No, I don’t. I’m sorry.”

“Did you destroy them?” Frost asked.

“I intended to, but honestly, I couldn’t bear to take them out of my desk and look at them. They were a bad reminder to me. However, as it happens, the reports were destroyed anyway. God works in mysterious ways.”

Frost looked at her, puzzled. “What do you mean?”

“About six months after Alan’s death, this house burned down. I lost everything. All of the memorabilia from our marriage was gone. It was like losing Alan all over again. And of course, the reports Coyle had given me were destroyed, too.”

“You rebuilt in the same spot?”

“Yes, I did. I didn’t want to move anywhere else.”

Frost leaned forward with curiosity. “How did the fire start?”

“The fire department says I left an old electric space heater plugged in, and it must have been sparked by a power surge. I don’t remember doing it, but I wasn’t exactly myself that year. It’s just lucky that I was away with my sister that weekend.”

Frost didn’t think that luck had anything to do with it.

He also didn’t think that Marjorie Detlowe had left her space heater plugged in. The fire was Lombard’s doing, making sure there was no evidence left behind of what Alan Detlowe had been investigating in his final days.

“I’m sorry I can’t be more help,” Marjorie added. “Did you talk to Mr. Coyle? He may have kept his notes.”

Frost looked at her. “Dick Coyle was murdered two nights ago.”

“Oh, how awful! He was such a nice young man.” Marjorie’s face flushed with concern. “You don’t think there’s a connection to Alan, do you? After all this time?”

“I don’t know, but that’s why I’m trying to trace Alan’s movements before he was killed.” Frost pulled out his own phone and showed her a photograph of Fawn. “Do you recognize this woman?”

Marjorie studied it. “She’s lovely, but no, I don’t know her.”

“Did Alan ever mention the name Fawn to you? Or the name Zara Anand?”

“Not that I recall,” Marjorie said.

He showed her another photograph. This one was of LaHonda Duke, who went by the street name Naomi. “What about this woman?”

Marjorie shook her head. “No. I’m sorry. Who are these women?”

“They’re professional escorts,” Frost said.

“Ah. Well, Alan was certainly familiar with that world. It’s possible he knew them, but I can’t tell you for sure.”

“Before Alan was killed, did he tell you anything about what he was working on? Did he share information about his cases?”

“No, he rarely did that. The last thing I wanted to hear about was his work with hookers and drug dealers. All the violence scared me. Of course, sometimes he needed to let it out. Some of the stories he told me about what these women went through, well, it was just terrible. Alan always dealt with them kindly, even when he had to arrest them. He was a rare breed as a cop. He helped them put their lives back together whenever he could. I hate to say it, but that was one of the reasons I found it difficult to trust him. I knew how easily he got emotionally involved with the people he dealt with.”

“Was there anything like that in those last days?” Frost asked.

“Not that he mentioned. However, I wasn’t being particularly receptive at that point, so I’m not sure he would have opened up to me anyway.”

“Do you remember anything unusual happening during that time?”

Marjorie hesitated. A wrinkle appeared in her forehead and then went away. “No.”

“Are you sure? You looked like you remembered something.”

“Oh, it wasn’t anything unusual. Not really. But it did cause a big fight between us. I wish I could take it back.”

“What happened?” Frost asked.

“Well, two days before Alan was killed was our wedding anniversary. We’d made dinner plans. He was going to take me to the Top of the Mark. And then at the last minute, he had to cancel. I was upset about it, and I told him so.”

“Why did he cancel?”

“That’s the thing. His reason wasn’t very convincing. He said Billy Chee at the Moscone Center hired him to do private security for an event that evening. Do you know Billy? Or was he before your time?”

Frost nodded. “I know him. We overlapped on the force for a couple of years before he left.”

“Well, those kind of private corporate jobs are lucrative, as I’m sure you know. Alan made a lot of extra money for us that way. But on our anniversary? I wasn’t happy about it. Honestly, I thought he was making up the whole thing, but Mr. Coyle told me that Alan really did go to the Moscone Center that evening. So I assume it was legitimate.”

“Did Alan tell you anything else about it?”

Marjorie settled back in the sofa cushions, looking smaller. She stared at the ceiling as she tried to remember. “I asked him why this job was so important that he had to miss our big day.”

“What did he say?”

“He said it wasn’t just the security detail. He needed to talk to someone who was going to be at the event.”

“Did he say who? Or why he needed to talk to this person?”

“No.”

“Did Coyle see him with anyone?” Frost asked.

Marjorie shook her head. “No, it was a private event of some kind. Coyle wasn’t able to get inside. He simply told me that Alan did go to the Moscone Center. That was all he knew.”

“And Alan didn’t tell you anything more afterward?”

“No, at that point we weren’t talking,” Marjorie said sadly. “I was angry, and he knew it. I have to live with that. But now that I think about it, I do remember one other thing. I asked Alan how come he couldn’t talk to this person some other time. Why did it have to be on our anniversary? And he said the convention was almost over, and this person was from out of town. He was going to be leaving San Francisco the next day.”