On Tuesday morning, Lindsey told Flor about her conversation with Merle Sefton. “She thought she heard a baby cry at the Aragón house. The woman who worked there seemed to confirm this. The reporter never saw the children. They were probably taken to an orphanage.”
“That much I guessed,” Flor said. “But this doesn’t help me get Efraín back. I went to the Farmers Market on Saturday but he wasn’t there. That leaves me with the high school. What else can I do?” She looked at Lindsey, her face full of hope and trust, seeking answers.
Confession is good for the soul, so goes the saying. Thus far, revealing secrets had left Lindsey’s soul feeling bruised. But she couldn’t keep the information from Flor any longer. She took a deep breath. “I know who he is. I know the people who adopted him.”
Trust ebbed from Flor’s face. “Why did you keep this from me?”
Lindsey faltered, her words awkward, excuses rather than explanations. “I didn’t know he was Efraín until you pointed him out. I’ve known his adoptive parents for years. The orphanage in San Salvador said his parents were dead.”
Flor was angry now. “I’m alive. I’m his mother. I want my son. Tell me where he is.”
“Please give me some time. He doesn’t have any idea you’re alive. I’ve been waiting for the right moment to talk with my friends. Let me tell them. Then I’ll arrange a meeting. Give me a few days.”
Flor shook her head as she pushed back her chair. “I’ve waited weeks. I will give you a day. If I don’t hear from you by noon tomorrow, I will go to the high school and stand outside until I see him, no matter how long it takes. Find a way to tell them.”
“I will.” But there would never be a good time to have that conversation with Gretchen and Doug. “Oh, Flor...I’m sorry.”
“So am I.”
* * *
The Dunlin Building on the corner of Montgomery and California streets was a matronly dowager of graceful proportions, with decorative cornices on the roof and ledges and sensible sash windows that opened to let in breezes from the bay, unlike its towering neighbors with their sealed glass and air conditioning, their bland postmodern masks. The building harked back to a different San Francisco, when life was slower, more ordered, more elegant, and people wore gloves and hats when they went downtown. Now security guards staffed a barrier in front of the elevators, a sign this was no longer that gracious time. In an alcove off the lobby, an espresso bar and retail shop dispensed Dunlin coffee and tea.
Lindsey had called Max early this morning, before leaving to meet Flor. As long as she was going to be in San Francisco, she hoped to talk with him. He’d agreed to meet her in the lobby and talk on the way to his lunch appointment. How would she find out what she needed to know? Max could spot a concocted story a mile off. The truth, or a variation thereof, was best.
“Max. How are you?”
“Fine.” For a man his age, Max looked good in his well-cut gray suit, still big and broad-shouldered, with more wrinkles on his face. What hair remained was white. He smiled at her. “Good to see you. I understand your daughter, Nina, is temping, as Claire’s assistant.”
Lindsey felt a pang as she thought about Nina. “Yes. She started this morning.”
They walked out to California Street. Max cut through the lunch-hour crowds like a battleship followed by a tugboat. “What’s on your mind, Lindsey?”
She chose her variation of the truth carefully, though her story sounded threadbare to her. “I’m working on a book. I need background detail about the coffee business in El Salvador during the civil war. Dunlin Corporation has connections there. I’d like to talk with someone who traveled to coffee plantations and may have observed the conflict. I’ve interviewed an immigrant who was there in the spring of nineteen eighty-nine, working on an estate in Chalatenango department. I thought I’d start with you. You’re chief of operations and you’ve been with the company since—”
“Since Moses was an altar boy,” Max finished as they walked up Montgomery Street.
“Hal has visited Salvadoran growers,” Lindsey said. “But I don’t want to bother him. What about you? Have you been there?”
“Not me. I don’t travel much, never did.” Max gave her a sidelong glance that left her feeling as though he’d figured out there was more to her variation of the truth than book research. “El Salvador... Specifically ’eighty-nine?”
“Since my other source was there that year it would be good to get another viewpoint from the same period.”
“I certainly remember the civil war,” Max said. “The rebels targeted coffee growers, trying to shut down production and paralyze the economy. You should talk with Rod Llewellyn.”
“There’s a name from the past. He was one of the guards at the Berkeley house.”
Max nodded. “He’s now a senior vice president in Operations, based in Houston. I’m sure he visited El Salvador in ’eighty-nine.”
They crossed Market Street at Third, stopping on the corner in front of the Rand-McNally store, its window displays full of maps and guidebooks about Latin America. “What’s his phone number in Houston?” she asked.
“You can talk face-to-face,” Max said. “Rod’s in town on company business.”
“The board meeting,” Lindsey said. “Interesting column in the Chronicle business section last week.”
“It should be an equally interesting board meeting,” Max said. “I’ll have Rod call you.”
“I’d appreciate that. He can reach me at these numbers.” Lindsey handed him her card.