Blood Walk Part 5

Until they knew, they had no way of establishing opportunity for the cults. Checking movements was treadmill work.

Still, it needed to be done, and over the next four days they visited the cult groups Faye and Centrello listed, then those with ads that their rookie contacted for them. They visited people who had reported animal mutilations to the Humane Society. Garreth did not like most of the cultists he met-some he detested on sight-but he found them very educational: women who simultaneously attracted and chilled him, people who he would have taken for dull businessmen on the street, and some, too, who looked like escapees from Hollywood horror movies. No group, though, had a very tall red-haired female member.

None of Mossman's jewelry appeared in the p.a.w.nshops.

At the same time, they hunted up the four girls who had joined Mossman's group on that Monday night-and cleared all four of any Tuesday night involvement with Mossman-and kept prodding their contacts for Wink O'Hare's hiding place. Garreth spent his evenings in North Beach on a systematic search for the singer. On Tuesday, September 6, one week after Gerald Mossman died, Garreth found her.

4

Calling the singer tall seemed an understatement. In boots with four-inch heels, to go with the satin jeans, shirt, and Stetson of her urban cowgirl outfit, the redhead towered over the patrons of the Barbary Now as she walked between the tables singing a sentimental Kenny Rogers song. The red hair, black in shadow, burning with dark fire where the light struck it, hung down her back to her waist and framed a striking, square-jawed face. Watching the long legs carry her between the tables, Garreth remembered the description the bellboy had given of the woman in the Mark Hopkins lobby. She had to be the same woman. Surely there could not be two like this in San Francisco. He would slip something extra to Velvet, above the usual, to thank her for finding this woman.

The hooker had called the office that afternoon. He and Harry had been out, but she left a message:If you're still looking for that redhead, try the Barbary Now after 8:00 tonight.

So here he and Harry were, and here was a redhead.

"Nice," Harry said.

Garreth agreed.Very nice. He beckoned to a barmaid. "Rum and c.o.ke for me, a vodka collins for my friend, and what's the name of the singer?"

"Lane Barber."

Garreth watched her. He did not blame Mossman for having stared at her. Most of the present male eyes in the room remained riveted on her throughout the song. Garreth managed to take his own off just long enough to see that.

The barmaid brought their drinks. Garreth tore a page out of his notebook and wrote on it. "When the set finishes, will you give this to Miss Barber? I'd like to buy her a drink."

"I'll give it to her, but I'd better warn you, she has a long line waiting for the same honor."

"In that case"-Harry took out one of his cards-"give her this instead."

The girl held the card down where the light of the candle on the table fell on it. "Cops! If you're on duty, what are you doing drinking?"

"We're blending with the scenery. Give her the card, please."

Three songs later, the set ended. Lane Barber disappeared through the curtains behind the Piano. She reappeared five minutes later in a strapless, slit-skirted dress that wrapped around her and stayed on by the grace of G.o.d and two b.u.t.tons. She made her way through the tables, smiling but shaking her head at various men, until she reached Garreth and Harry.

She held out the card. "Is this official or an attention-getting device?"

"Official, I'm afraid," Harry said.

"In that case, I'll sit down." Garreth felt her legs rub against his under the small table as she pulled up a chair. She smiled at Harry. "Konnichi wa,Sergeant Takananda. I've always enjoyed my visits to j.a.pan. It's a beautiful country."

"So I hear. I've never been there."

"That's a pity." She turned toward Garreth. "And you are-?"

"Inspector Garreth Mikaelian."

She laughed. "A genuine Irish policeman. How delightful."

She was not really beautiful, Garreth realized with surprise, studying her as well as he could in the flickering candlelight, but she moved and talked and dressed to seem that way, and something radiated from her, something almost irresistible in its magnetism.

She looked no more than twenty or twenty-one.

"Now, what is this unfortunately official visit about?" she asked. "It can't be a traffic ticket; I haven't driven anywhere in weeks."

"Were you working last week?" Harry asked.

She nodded. Oddly, the flame of the candle reflected red in her eyes. Garreth had never seen that in humans before. He watched her, fascinated.

"Do you remember speaking to a man on Monday who was in his thirties, your height when you're barefoot, and wearing a red coat with black velvet lapels and collar? He was with four other men, all older than him."

She shook her head ruefully. "I must have talked to over a dozen different men that night, Sergeant. I do every night. I like men.

I'm afraid I can't recall any particular one."

"Maybe this will help." Garreth showed her the picture of Mossman.

She tilted it to the flickering light of the candle and studied it gravely. "Now I remember him. We didn't really talk, though. I flirted with him while I sang because he was nice-looking, and as he left, he came over to say how much he liked my singing." She paused. "You're from Homicide. Is he a suspect or a victim?"

The lady was cool and fast on the uptake, Garreth reflected. "A victim," he said. "Someone cut his throat Tuesday night. Did he come back here at any time on Tuesday?"

"Yes. He asked me out, but I didn't go. I don't date married men."

Harry said, "We need to know exactly what he said and did Tuesday. What time did he come in?"

"I don't really know. He was here when I did my first set at eight. He stayed all evening and we talked off and on, but not too much. I didn't want to encourage him. Finally I told him I wasn't interested in going out with him. The bartender, Chris, can confirm that we sat there at the end of the bar. About twelve-thirty he left."

Garreth made notes by the light of the candle. "Was that the last you saw of him?"

"Yes. Lots of men don't know how to take no for an answer, but he did."

"I suppose you have a fair number of guys try to hustle you. Do you ever take anyone up on the offer?"

She smiled. "Of course, if the man interests me. I don't pretend to be a nun. What business is it of yours?"

"Where do you usually go, your place or his?" Her eyes flared red in the candlelight, but she replied evenly, "Yes."

Garreth dropped the subject, recognizing evaporating cooperation. There would be time enough later to question her about Adair, if need be. "I'm sorry; that was irrelevant. I'll need your name and address, though, in case we want to talk to you again."

"Of course." She gave him the address, an apartment near Telegraph Hill.

"Are you a permanent resident of the city?" Harry asked.

"I travel a good deal, but this is home base, yes."

"Are you a native like Harry there, or an immigrant like me?"

"Yes," she replied, and when their brows rose, she smiled. "Women are more fascinating with a bit of mystique, don't you think? Leave me mine until you absolutely must have the information, can't you?" She glanced at her watch. "It's almost time for the next set. Please excuse me."

She rose and left, walking gracefully toward the piano. Garreth looked after her, sighing. He could not see her as a bloodthirsty cultist.

Harry grinned at him. "Do you still want to involve her in two murders?"

She began a song in sultry tones that jostled Garreth's hormones pleasantly. "I'd rather date than arrest her," he admitted. "She seems cooperative enough and she didn't hesitate to admit she'd seen Mossman Tuesday. Still . . ."

"Still," Harry agreed. "You never know, so we'd better check her out."

5

In the darkness of his bedroom, lying awake, Garreth heard the foghorns start. The years living here had taught him to recognize the patterns of a few, like the double hoot of the one on Mile Rocks and the single every-twenty-seconds blast of the one on Point Diablo.Fog moving in, he thought.

He stopped consciously listening when the horns and diaphone on the Golden Gate Bridge joined the chorus. The dial of his watch glowed on the bedside table, but he resisted the urge to look at it. Why see how long he had lain awake?

He sat up, hugging his blanketed knees. What was wrong? Why should he be bothered that their interviews with the manager of the Barbary Now and the singer's neighbors last night and today turned up nothing to connect her with the murders?

"I wish everyone I hired were as dependable," the manager had said. "She's always on time, always polite to even the biggest a.s.shole customers, never drunk or strung out. Lane never causes trouble."

Her neighbors echoed the sentiment. One said, "You'd hardly know she's there. She sleeps all day and comes home from work after we've gone to bed. If she brings anyone home, I don't know it because she never makes a sound. She's away on tour sometimes and it may be a week before I realize she's gone."

"Do you ever see any of her friends?" Garreth had asked.

"Once in a while. They're men, mostly, leaving in the morning, but all very well dressed . . . none of the dirty, hairy, blue-jean types."

Altogether their questions produced a picture of an ideal neighbor and employee. So what did he find so disturbing about that?

Maybe justthat. He had an innate suspicion of people who kept a profile low to the point of invisibility. Even granting differences between professional images and private lives, he could not quite reconcile such a lifestyle with the s.e.xy, coolly sophisticated young woman from the Barbary Now.The maiden is powerful, l Ching said.One should not marry such a maiden. Beware of that which seems weak and innocent.

And yet, he could not picture her threading a needle into Mossman's jugular, either . . . not with his present knowledge of her.

"I need to know more," he said aloud into the darkness.

The midchannel Golden Gate diaphone sounded out of the fog in its bellow-and-grunt voice, as though replying to his remark.

He would talk to her landlord, he decided, lying back in bed, and then to more of the Barbary Now personnel. He would see if all their opinions matched the ones he had already heard.

That decided, he lay relaxed, listening to the hooting and bellowing of the foghorns reverberate through the night. The rhythmic chorus carried him into sleep.

6

The woman inside the protective grille across the doorway wore a bathrobe and slippers. She blinked through the grille at Garreth's identification. "Police? This early?"

"I'm sorry about the hour, Mrs. Armour, but I need to ask a few questions about a tenant of yours." He himself had been up for hours, finding out who owned the house where Lane Barber lived.

Mrs. Armour opened the grille with a frown and led the way up a steep flight of stairs to a sunny kitchen looking out over the fog that shrouded the lower marina and bay. "Which one, and what have they done?"

"I don't know that Lane Barber has done anything. She merely knows someone involved in a case I'm investigating."

The frown faded. She sat down at the table, returning to the toast and coffee that Garreth's ring had obviously interrupted.

"Coffee, Inspector?" When he accepted with a nod, she poured a cup for him. "I'm glad Miss Barber isn't in trouble. Actually, I would have been surprised if you'd said she was."

Mrs. Armour, too? Garreth added cream and sugar. "You know her well?"

"Not personally, but she's one of my best tenants. I have a number of properties in that area and most of them are rented by restless young people who are here this year and gone the next. I wish you could see the state they leave their apartments in. It's appalling. But Miss Barber pays her rent on time every month and when I go in with the painters to repaint her apartment, as I feel ought to be done every few years, her place is always spotless. She takes beautiful care of it."

Garreth stopped stirring his coffee. "Every few years? How long has she been a tenant?"

Mrs. Armour pursed her lips. "Let's see. I think I've had her apartment done three times. She must have been with me about ten years. No . . . I've painted four times. She's been there twelve years. She's my oldest tenant."

Twelve years? Garreth blinked. "How old was she when she moved in?"

"Very young, but at least twenty-one. I remember she told me she was singing in a club."

Garreth stared at her. The singer was twenty-onetwelve years ago? He clearly remembered the face above the candle; it had not belonged to a woman in her thirties, although her level of sophistication certainly seemed more commensurate with that age than with twenty-one. Had she had a face-lift, perhaps?

"What has her friend done?" Mrs. Armour asked.

For a moment, Garreth struggled to think what the woman was talking about. "Oh . . . he died. In the time Miss Barber has been your tenant, have you ever had any trouble with her? Has the apartment . . . smelled strange, or have neighbors complained of strange people coming and going?" Cult types. It occurred to him that if she lived in the middle of a shifting population, former neighbors may have seen things present ones could not know about.

"Smelled strange? Like marijuana?" Mrs. Armour sat bolt upright in indignation. "Certainly not! I've never had a single word of complaint about her."

Garreth could not believe in this paragon. It was obvious, however, that Mrs. Armour was not going to add any clay to the lady's feet, so he thanked her for her help and headed for Bryant Street.

As he came into the squad room, Harry said, "You're supposed to call Narco."