THE FOLLOWING MORNING I CONSULTED MY CRISSCROSS directory for the South Bay, looking up the number Sam Raynor had written on the sheet of paper Ruth found. It was a Wells Fargo branch in downtown San Jose. Bingo, I thought, picking up my coffee mug, speculating as I sipped the black brew. Raynor had moved the money from Bank of America on Guam to Wells Fargo in San Jose. Maybe. It would be nice if it were that easy. I’d have to see if I could get any information out of the bank when it opened.
I got up and poured myself another cup of coffee. It was going to be another hot day in the Bay Area. My office window was already open, seeking a breeze. The building that had gone up just down the street now blocked my view of the Oakland waterfront and I think it blocked the air flow as well.
Back at my desk I read through that morning’s edition of the Oakland Tribune. The Port of Oakland was losing money, businesses were in trouble all up and down Broadway and the city’s budget was stretched to the limit. There had been another fatal drive-by shooting, probably drug-related, and I wondered if my ex-husband Sid Vernon, an Oakland homicide cop, was working on that one. He’d been working on a similar case last May.
I pushed the newspaper aside and checked my calendar for that day. I had an appointment at ten with a prospective client, then some work to do for an insurance company. This afternoon I planned to watch Sam Raynor’s attorney’s office—again.
At nine I called the Wells Fargo bank in San Jose. I told the teller on the other end that I had a check for twenty thousand dollars given to me by Sam Raynor and I wanted to know if he had sufficient funds to cover it. He wanted to know the account number.
Damn. I punted. “I don’t have it in front of me,” I said, sounding like a harried executive. “I’m calling from my car phone. All I know is it’s drawn on your branch. I don’t want to know the man’s life story, I just want to know if he’s got funds to cover it. Surely you can tell me that.”
“Just a moment.” The teller put me on what seemed like permanent hold. For several minutes I watched the second hand of my clock go round and round. Finally he came back on the line and said, “We did have an account for a Samuel Raynor, but it’s been closed.”
“What?” Indignation sharpened my voice. “That thief. I trusted him. When was it opened and closed?”
“It was opened in June and closed in July.”
“He said he had the money. Where did he transfer those funds?” I demanded, taking a wild shot on the remote chance the teller would drop all the details in my lap.
“I’m sorry, I can’t give you that information.” He stumbled a bit over the words, realizing he’d given me too much already.
After I broke the connection I sat back in my chair and sipped coffee, thinking. Someone named Samuel Raynor had opened and closed an account at the Wells Fargo branch in San Jose. Given the June-July time frame, I assumed it was the Sam Raynor I was investigating. Raynor left Guam the first week in July. Maybe he’d authorized a wire transfer before he left, so his money would be waiting for him in the Bay Area. Something else was waiting for him—divorce papers. That prompted him to close the account and hide the money. But where?
I picked up the San Jose telephone directory and made several calls to school administration offices, in an attempt to find out whether Sam Raynor had in fact attended school in that city. Since it was late August, the districts were gearing up for the coming school year, but no one had the time or inclination to assist me in this particular quest.
I replaced the phone in the cradle, speculating as I swallowed the lukewarm dregs of my coffee. A suspicious nature is an asset in a private investigator, and I certainly had one. Sam Raynor had lied to Ruth about many things during their marriage. What if he wasn’t from San Jose after all? Apples don’t fall far from the tree, or so they say. Maybe Raynor’s hometown was nearby—Milpitas, Morgan Hill, or Gilroy.
Worth a few phone calls to investigate, I decided, but right now I had other things to do. Before I left for my ten o’clock appointment, I initiated credit checks on Raynor’s acquaintances, Harlan Pettibone and Chief Yancy. The phone book had addresses for both, in Alameda. I figured anyone who knew Raynor on Guam was a likely accomplice, particularly since Yancy was Sam’s poker-playing buddy. I liked the theory of a gambling debt as a hiding place for part of Raynor’s cash, and I wanted to explore that further.
The day went by quickly. I grabbed a salad between tasks, saving room for my dinner with Alex that night, before our movie date at the Paramount. By three I was parked outside the MacArthur Boulevard office of Sam Raynor’s attorney, sipping a soda from a nearby fast food stand, one eye on a paperback and the other on the office. Please let me get lucky, I muttered, chewing on the end of the straw. It’s too damn hot to be sitting in this car.
I got lucky.
Just after four a bright red Trans-Am parked on the other side of the street. Sam Raynor got out of the car and stuck a few coins into the parking meter, then walked briskly into his lawyer’s office. I got out of my Toyota and jaywalked across MacArthur for a closer inspection of the Trans-Am. It was a late model, and I wrote down the license plate number as well as the number of the NAS Alameda sticker in the front window. Unfortunately the car was locked. I peered inside and saw a collection of cassette tapes scattered on the passenger seat Raynor’s taste ran to rock and country.
I returned to my own car and finished my soda while I waited. At a quarter to five Raynor left the lawyer’s office. The evening rush hour was in full snarl and he had to wait for an opening in traffic. I started my own car, thinking this was going to be dicey because we were on opposite sides of the street. But Raynor pulled out of the parking place and made a quick illegal U-turn.
Go home, I muttered, moving into place a couple of cars behind Raynor. He made a right turn onto Fruitvale and drove through Oakland. After he crossed the Fruitvale Bridge into Alameda, he headed for the West End. Finally he pulled the Trans-Am into the parking lot of a two-story apartment building on Pacific Avenue near Third Street, just a few blocks from the Naval Air Station.
It was an L-shaped building of faded orange stucco, looking like so many of the cookie-cutter boxes thrown up in Alameda during the fifties. The length of the L ran deep into the lot, with the short end at the back, paralleling the street. Brown doors with no screens, and windows with Venetian blinds, faced a sidewalk on the first floor and an open-air walkway on the second. Raynor parked at the short end and took the metal stairs to the second floor. He unlocked the first door he came to and entered the apartment.
I waited, but Raynor didn’t come out, so I chanced a stroll into the parking lot. I counted ten units per floor. The door Raynor had opened was numbered 210, and the blinds on the window were drawn shut. I returned to my car by way of the mailboxes at the front of the building. The name on 210 was Pettibone.
So Sam Raynor was living with his friend Harlan. I sat in my car, waiting and looking at my watch. The movie was at eight, and I was supposed to meet Alex for dinner at Le Cheval at six-thirty.
Just after six Raynor left the apartment, dressed in blue jeans and a T-shirt. He started the Trans-Am and pulled out of the lot, turning left onto Pacific. I followed him across Webster to a discount liquor store. As soon as he went through the door, I was out of my car, headed for the phone booth near the entrance, hoping I could catch Alex at home.
“I’m tailing someone. I don’t know how long I’ll be,” I said when Alex picked up the phone. I kept one eye on the liquor store’s checkout counters. So far I hadn’t spotted Raynor. “If I don’t meet you at the restaurant, I’ll meet you at the theater.”
“And if you don’t meet me at the theater?” Alex inquired, his voice somewhere between disappointed and understanding.
“Then I’m sorry and we’ll talk later.”
As I hung up the phone, I saw Raynor wheel a cart to one of the cashiers. He stacked a case of Budweiser on the conveyor belt and followed it up with several liquor bottles, a large can of nuts, and some bags of pretzels and chips. Either he was going to a party or stocking up for the weekend. The cashier rang up the sale and bagged Raynor’s purchases. By the time he’d unloaded the stuff into his Trans-Am, I was in my Toyota, the engine running, ready to follow him on the next leg of his journey.
Raynor drove back across Webster Street, through a residential section of the West End, and finally parked on Fourth Street near Marion Court. Alameda is full of little cul-de-sacs like this one, short dead-end streets tucked between blocks, lined with cottages built close together. On Marion Court they were beige stucco, probably constructed in the thirties or forties, each with a tiny porch and a postage-stamp front yard, grass going brown in the drought. There were six one-story cottages on either side of the court, and two at the back with second stories built over a garage. The narrow street was crowded with parked cars, most with two wheels on the sidewalk.
Raynor tucked the case of beer under one arm and picked up his brown paper sack with his free hand, cradling the burden against his chest. His destination was the fourth cottage on the left, the one with a large green and white spider plant hanging next to the door. He knocked and was promptly admitted.
Another car parked in front of me and two men got out, one black and one white, both with short haircuts, both edging toward forty. One carried a large bucket of take-out chicken, and the other a grocery sack similar to the one Raynor had carried. I heard one man laugh and say, “Didn’t I tell you never to draw to an inside straight?” I watched them walk into Marion Court, their destination the fourth cottage. So the Friday night poker game made the transition from Guam to Alameda. I’d say the odds were good that the game’s host was Chief Yancy.
I got to Le Cheval just as the waiter set Alex’s dinner in front of him. He raised black eyebrows above his dark brown eyes and greeted me with his quirky smile. I glanced at the menu and ordered, glad that I’d have enough time for dinner. It had been several long hours since my salad at lunch. Fortunately the service at the Vietnamese restaurant was quick and efficient, and Alex and I were able to get to the Paramount Theater right before the show started at eight o’clock.
We bought our tickets at the box office under the Paramount’s brightly lit marquee, advertising Bette Davis in Dark Victory, then strolled through the sumptuous green and gold lobby, In the orchestra section we found two vacant seats near the aisle and sat down, listening to the guy at the Wurlitzer organ play “Strike Up the Band.”
“The tail job,” Alex said, draping his arm around my shoulder, “is it the case that involves a sailor?”
“Yes.” I waited a moment as the organist segued into “Night and Day.” “This Chief Yancy in your department, did he just transfer here from Guam?”
Alex looked alarmed as he swiveled his head in my direction. “You’re not investigating Chief Yancy?”
I shook my head. “No. Someone who knew him on Guam.”
“There’s another man in my department whose last duty station was Guam. Also a recent arrival.”
“Sam Raynor?” I guessed.
“Damn.” Alex frowned. “I don’t like the sound of this.”