I is for Innocent

I heard footsteps behind me and I turned, glancing back. A young woman was approaching in tight jeans and high-heeled cowboy boots. She wore a Western-cut shirt and a big leather bag slung across her shoulder like a mail pouch. Her face was a clumsier version of Rhe's, though I suspected the maturation process would refine her features somewhat. At the moment, she looked like a rough pencil sketch for a portrait in oil. Her face was wide, her cheeks still rounded with the last vestiges of baby fat, but she had the same green eyes, the same long, dark hair pulled up in a braid. I placed her in her late teens or very early twenties. Bright-looking, good energy. She flashed me a smile.

"Is my mother in there?"

"She'll be out in a minute. Are you Tippy?"

"Yes," she said, surprised. "Do I know you?"

"I was just talking to your mom and she said you'd be stopping by. My name is Kinsey."

"You teach here, too?"

I shook my head. "I'm a private investigator."

She half smiled, getting ready for the punch line. "For real?"

"Yep."

"Cool. Investigating what?"

"I'm working for an attorney on a case going into court."

Her smile faded. "Is this about my aunt Isabelle?"

"Yes."

"I thought that already went to court and the guy got away with it."

"We're trying again. A different angle this time. We may nail him if we're lucky."

Tippy's expression seemed to darken. "I never liked him. What a creep."

"What do you remember?"

She made a face… reluctance, resistance, a touch of regret perhaps. "Nothing much, except we all cried a bunch. Like for weeks. It was awful. I was sixteen when she died. She wasn't my real aunt, but we were really close."

Rhe emerged from the classroom with her key ring in her hand. "Hi, baby. I thought that was you out here. I see you met Miss Millhone."

Tippy gave her mother's cheek a kiss. "We were just waiting for you. Yon look tired."

"I'm okay. How was work?"

"Work was fine. Corey says I might get a raise, but it's only like three percent."

"Don't knock it. Way to go," Rhe said. "What time are you picking Karen up?"

"Fifteen minutes ago. I'm already late."

Tippy and I watched while Rhe slipped the car key from the ring and then pointed toward the parking lot. "It's in the third row, to the left. I want the car back by midnight."

"We're not even out until quarter of!" Tippy yelped in protest.

"As soon as possible after that. And don't run me out of gas the way you did last time."

"It was empty when you gave it to me!"

"Would you just do what I say?"

"Why, you have a date?" Tippy asked impishly.

"Tippy…"

"I'm just teasing," she said. She plucked the key from her mother's hand and started off across the parking lot, bootheels clacking.

" 'Gee, Mom, I hope this isn't inconvenient,' " Rhe called toward her departing form. "'Thank you, darling mother.' "

"You're welcome," Tippy called back.

Rhe shook her head with the kind of mock disgust that only a totally smitten parent indulges in. "Twenty years they're totally self-involved, then they turn around and get married."

"I know people must say this to you all the time, but you really don't look old enough to be her mother."

Rhe smiled. "I was sixteen when she was born."

"She seems like a neat kid."

"Well, she is, thanks to AA, which she joined when she was sixteen."

"Alcoholics Anonymous? Are you serious?"

"The drinking started when she was ten. I was working to support us and the baby-sitter was a lush. Tip would go there after school and guzzle beer every chance she got. I never had a clue! Here I am thinking it's neat because my child is so docile and obedient. She never once complained. She never whined if I was late or had to leave her overnight. I had other friends who were single moms like me. They had a bitch of a time. Their kids ran away, or caused trouble. Not my little Tippy. She was so easy to get along with. She didn't do well in school and she had the 'flu' a lot, but otherwise she seemed fine. I guess I was in denial, because I know now she was drunk or hung over half the time."

"You're lucky she straightened out."

"Part of that was Izzy's death. It did us in. It made us closer. We lost the best friend we ever had, but at least it brought us back together."

"How'd you find out about her drinking?"

"She reached a point where she was drinking so much I couldn't miss it. By the time she reached high school, she was really out of control. Popping pills. She smoked dope. She'd had her driver's license six months and she'd already had two wrecks. Plus, she stole anything that wasn't nailed down. This was actually the autumn before Isabelle's murder at Christmastime. She'd started her junior year, cutting classes, flunking tests. I couldn't handle it. I kicked her out, so she went to live with her father. When Iz died, she came back." She stopped to light another cigarette. "Jesus. Why'm I telling you this stuff? Look, I gotta get back to class. Do you mind hanging out? I really do need a ride home if you can do me that."

"Sure. I'd be happy to."

8

I drove her home at 10:30 after class had ended. Most of the students were gone by five after ten, cars spilling out of the darkened parking lot with the sweep of headlights, engines thrumming. I offered to help her tidy up, but she said it'd be quicker if she did it herself. I wandered around the room, doing an idle survey while she emptied the coffee urn and rinsed it out, put away the drawing supplies, and then flipped out the lights. She locked the doors behind us and we headed for my VW, which was the only car left in the parking lot.

As we drove through the gated driveway, she said, "I live in Montebello. I hope that's not too far out of your way."

"Don't worry about it. I'm on Albanil, near the beach. I can come back along Cabana and it's no big deal."

I turned right onto Bay, and then right again on Missile, picking up the freeway about two blocks down. She gave me directions to her place and for two miles we chatted idly, while I tried to decide what I could learn from her. "How'd you first hear about Isabelle's death?"

"The cops called about two-thirty and told me what had happened. They asked if I'd come over there and just sit with Simone. I threw some clothes on, hopped in the car, and barreled over there right away. I was just in shock. The whole time I was driving, I kept talking to myself like some kind of nut. I didn't cry till I got there and saw the look on Simone's face. The Seegers were a mess. They kept telling the same story over and over again. I don't know which of us was in worse shape. Actually, I think I was. Simone was numb and out of it until David showed up. Then she lost it completely. She really came unglued."

"Oh, that's right. He claimed he was jogging in the middle of the night. Did you believe him?"

"God, I don't know. I did and I didn't. He'd been doing night runs for years. He said he liked it because it was quiet and he didn't have to worry about all the traffic and exhaust fumes. I guess he suffered from insomnia and roamed the house at all hours."

"So he used the jogging to wind down when he couldn't sleep?"

"Well, yeah, but on the other hand, the night of the murder, it seemed awfully contrived." She twisted a finger in an imaginary dimple in her cheek like a ditzy blonde. "'What a coincidence. I was just passing by on my two a.m. run.'"

"Simone tells me he was living down the road at that point."

She made a face. "In that awful house. He told the cops he was just getting back from a run when he saw the lights up at Isabelle's and stopped to see what was going on."

"Did he seem upset?"