Thin Air Part 13

Chapter 18.

Pomona is a thirty-mile ride east of LA, on route 10, along a corridor of low shopping malls and office parks with black gla.s.s windows and big air-conditioning units on the roof. I was alone. Susan had decided to sit by the pool at the hotel with a copy of a book by Alice Miller called The Drama of the Gifted Child. I didn't mind. I was used to being alone. In fact, I liked it, unless it was for too long and I started to miss her.

The place wasn't called Pomona Detox at all. Its real name was Pomona State Hospital for Alcohol and Drug Addiction. The director was a psychiatrist named Steven Ito, and he talked to me in his cluttered office overlooking the employees' parking lot.

"My name is Spenser," I said. "I'm a private detective from Boston and I'm trying to find a missing person named Lisa St. Claire, who was apparently treated here in the mid 1980s under the name Angela Richard."

"I got a call from LAPD about you," Ito said. "They asked me to cooperate."

He was a well-set-up j.a.panese man, with short black hair and strong hands. He had on a white coat over a blue shirt and flowered tie.

"Popular on both coasts," I said.

"No doubt, deservedly," Ito said. "How can I help you?

"Do you have a record of Angela Richard being here?"

"Yes," Ito said. "I had it pulled when I knew you were coming. She was in fact here in 1985."

"Drugs or alcohol?" I said.

"Alcohol," Ito said, "which is not to say that alcohol isn't a drug."

"Sure," I said. "So is caffeine. How long she stay?"

"Three months."

"She sober when she left?"

"She saw a social worker every day, attended all her meetings, and when she left us, yes, she was sober."

"May I see the file?" I said.

"No," Ito said.

"The social worker still here?"

"No. Mrs. Eaton was married to an Air Force officer, a bomber pilot, I think, over at March Field. He got transferred to Germany in 1990 and she went with him."

"You have an address for her when she was admitted?"

"Yes. I'll write it out for you, it's in Venice."

He wrote on a prescription pad, tore off the top sheet and handed it to me. I put the address in my shirt pocket.

"Did you know her?" I said.

"No. I didn't come here until 1987."

"Anyone that might have known her?"

"I doubt it. There is rapid staff turnover. And even those who have remained with us have no reason to remember her. We get a great many people through here."

"How many employees you have on staff?"

"One hundred and fifty-three," Ito said. "Three shifts."

"You got a company newsletter?"

Ito nodded. "Yes," he said. "I could put a notice in there asking if anyone remembered her. Do you have a card?"

I gave him the dignified one, where it says Investigations under my name and address. The one where I'm pictured shirtless with a knuckle knife in my teeth I save for the hoodlums. Ito put the card in his desk drawer and riffled through the file again.

"She would be what, about thirty-one now?" he said.

"Yes. She appears to have turned her life around before she disappeared."

"Social worker's report indicates that she was eager, Mrs. Eaton says 'desperate,' to improve herself. Might she have simply left her husband as a means of continuing her self-improvement?"

"Husband's a pretty good man," I said. "But yes, it's possible. On the other hand, he was shot and badly wounded a few days after she disappeared."

"Which you a.s.sume is not coincidence."

"It's a useful a.s.sumption," I said. "It gives me a theory to work on."

"Yes," Ito said. He paused as he riffled the file and looked at one entry for a moment.

"Here's something," he said, "that may help you. Miss Richard was seen by a Beverly Hills psychiatrist named Madeleine St. Claire."

"St. Claire?" I said.

"Yes. She's quite a prominent doctor in Los Angeles, and once a week she comes down here and works with our patients. Pro bono."

"It's the name Lisa took when she came east."

"As you say, coincidences are not useful-."

"You have her address?"

"Yes."

He wrote on his prescription pad again.

"And I'll call her if you wish, and tell her you're coming."

He handed me the address. I folded it and put it beside the other one in my pocket.

"You have my card," I said. "Anybody remembers anything about Angela Richard, you'll get in touch."

"Certainly," Ito said.

We stood. He shook hands with me.

I said, "Thank you, Doctor."

"Will her husband recover?" Dr. Ito said.

"From being shot, they think so."

"It is possible," Ito said, "that she is drinking again, and it is related to her disappearance. That sort of thing happens."

"I know it does," I said. "And I hope it's not the explanation."

"What explanation do you hope for?" Ito said.

"I'm G.o.dd.a.m.ned if I know, Doctor."

"Yes," he said. "That makes it difficult."

Chapter 19.

The Venice address was now a motorcycle repair shop, and probably not even that for long. The building smelled of decay and dampness. The paint had weathered off, and the framing around the doors and windows was sagging badly.

I talked to the proprietor, a tall bony guy in a Harley logo tank top and black jeans. He had a gold tooth and a three-week beard and the name Lenny tattooed crudely along both forearms. He was smoking a joint when I arrived, but it didn't seem to have made him mellow. He looked at me like I might be a field rep from the Moral Majority. I smiled heartily.

"Lenny around?" I said.

"I'm Lenny."

"Honest to G.o.d?" I said. "Talk about coincidences."

"Whaddya want?" Lenny said.

"I'm looking for a woman used to live here," I said. "Angela Richard."

"Never heard of her."

"How about Lisa St. Claire?"

"Never heard of her."

"Someone named Vaughn?"

"Never heard of him."

"Anita Bryant?"

"Never heard of her."

"Sic transit gloria," I said.

"Huh?"

"How long this place been a bike shop?" I said.

"Whadda ya mean?"

I sighed. "Are these too hard for you, Lenny? You want to warm up with something easier?"

"Hey, Duke. Don't get bright with me. I'll run your a.s.s right out of here."

"Not unless you're better than you look," I said.

Lenny reached over and picked up a ball peen hammer.

"How good's this look?" he said.

I opened my coat and showed him the gun. And gave him a big charming smile.

"You a cop?" Lenny said.

"How long since this place was a house?" I said.

Lenny shrugged. He kept the hammer in his hand, letting it rest against his right thigh.

"I took the place over last year. Guy owed me dough. It was a bike shop then."

"You around here in 1985?" I said.

"No."

"Where were you in '85?''

"I was outta LA."

"How far out? Chino, maybe? Getting tattooed?"