CHAPTER 6

I got my daughter’s bike out of the garage, put a small wrench in my pocket and took off down the hill, through San Anselmo, down Shady Lane until I came to the Ross School. I turned right toward Phoenix Lake and pedaled up the street past grand houses on even grander grounds, big shade trees, neatly clipped lawns, long driveways and metal gates that opened to the touch of buttons on a post nearby. When I came to Carmel Drive, I slowed, looking for 221. It had a big hedge along the front, another electronically- controlled metal gate, and a graveled driveway that led through an avenue of roses. I stopped, turned the bike upside down on the seat and handlebars and got out the wrench. I took off the front wheel, as if I were repairing a flat tire. No one would pay attention to a middle-aged man fixing his bike. The driveway led to a three-car garage, two stories, and Fuller had guessed right. There was a second story, which had, no doubt, at some time housed a chauffeur. The house was big, brown shingled, some ivy clinging to it, but the trim and windows were newly painted. It was the kind of house that was a Ross classic, probably built by a banker or a real estate tycoon or perhaps somebody in the now defunct San Francisco shipping empire. It was not only big, it was substantial, and I could see an addition tacked onto one side;high glass windows, a modern conservatory of some kind. There would be a swimming pool, too, somewhere on the slope behind the house. And somewhere higher up on the edge of Ross would be a lot with a horse. Three car garage. Probably a Mercedes or a Porsche and certainly something big, like a Land Rover with a full rhino package. The Ford Expedition would be gone. It was not the kind of a property where a three-year old car would be kept.

Whatever Earl Winslow did, it paid well. I took my time getting the tire off the rim, making mental notes of what I could see. There would be no point in trying to get inside that enclosure. There were, no doubt, security cameras posted. Two Hispanic men were trimming the roses, a pickup truck parked in front of the garage, the back filled with rakes, shovels, a powered lawnmower and a canvas tarp lying on the ground with clippings half filling it. They paid no attention to me. It was the middle of the day and Winslow would be at work, whatever that was. And the best way to waylay him would be when he came out of his driveway on the way to work. Which would require a few more trips to establish his routine. I needed to know where he worked, when he went to work, and it would require more observation. I needed to be the egret, waiting. I needed to see him wiggling in the mud at my feet. I needed to go back to Santa Rosa and get myself a gun. And I would stop him, and he would drive to Point Reyes and he would go into that wild surf. He would have no choice. Like my daughter, who was left no choice by Earl Winslow.