Billy Straight

There's a space between the church and Cafe Eats. I slip around to the back, where there's an alley, parked cars, but none driving. Two spaces behind the synagon but no cars. They're praying Friday night. That's tomorrow.

I check out the back door. Plain wood, with some little wooden thing nailed to the frame on the right side, also with a Jewish star. Probably some kind of good-luck charm, maybe asking God for money.

The back door's locked, too. Right next to it is a window, a small one, too small for a man to fit through, but not for me. A screen over it, just like at the pineapple house. Also like that one, it comes right off.

I don't have to break this window; it's loose. When I push up on it, it jiggles. So I shove harder and feel it give some more, then something pops and it slams open and I look up and down the alley.

Still no one. I'm in.

I'm getting good at this.

The room I land in is a bathroom, small but clean- a toilet, a sink, and a mirror. No shower. The mirror tells me I don't look as bad as I thought, just the scratches on my face and some white crust around my ears and my lips. I wash it off, use the toilet.

Considering I almost drowned, I look pretty good.

I thank God, in case it was Him; wash my hands.

Now, let's find some Jewish money.

38

Petra awoke confused, at 6:30, her head crowded with Ron Banks, Estrella Flores, Ramsey, the boy with the presidents book- she wrapped herself in a robe and collected the morning paper.

There it was, page 3, the drawing smack in the center of the article, no credit given to the artist.

The gist of the article was no progress; the implication, those bumbling police. Salmagundi, the department spokesman, careful not to make too big a deal about the witness angle. The boy was “just one of several leads we're looking into.”

The last paragraph made her inhale sharply.

Twenty-five-thousand-dollar reward to anyone providing information about the boy or anything else that led to the arrest of a suspect. Money put up by Dr. and Mrs. John Everett Boehlinger, all calls to be directed to Hollywood Detectives.

Her extension. Blindsided. They must have gone through Schoelkopf, goddamn him. She couldn't work this way.

All day fielding crank calls- had Stu seen it yet?

Normally, she'd call him. Nothing was normal anymore.

She got dressed in the first thing she pulled out of the closet, took the paper with her, and drove much too fast to the station.

There were already ten messages on her desk: nine sightings of the boy, and a psychic from Fontana claiming to know who'd murdered Lisa. What would the afternoon bring?

Stu hadn't come in yet. To hell with him. Fournier was checked out, too.

She stormed into Schoelkopf's office waving the article. He was sitting at his desk; jumped up and jabbed a finger at her.

“Don't get all pissy with me. The parents blew into town yesterday, went straight to Deputy Chief Lazara- he calls me at ten P.M. I have to come down here to deal with them. The father's an obvious asshole, used to having his way. Who knows what he'll try to do next.”

I tried to warn you, idiot, and you brushed me off.

“You could've called me,” said Petra.

“I could've bought Microsoft at ten bucks- what's the point, Barbie?”

The nickname had never bothered her. Now it was a razor scraping raw nerve fiber. “The point is-”

“The point is I've been ru

He waved her out.

A TV cop would have handed in the badge and gun.

A real cop kept her mouth shut. She liked the job and the department was paramilitary, would always be, meaning lockstep rhythm, death of the individual, hierarchies. You pissed down, not up.

Look at Milo Sturgis- she'd worked with the gay detective on one case, had seen him as the ace he was. But before that she'd heard only curses affixed to his name. The highest solve rate in West L.A.; to the department, that didn't make up for sleeping with a man.

She returned to her desk, put aside the ten message slips, and phoned the Nancy Downey Agency in Beverly Hills. A woman with a Latin accent said, “You should talk to Mr. Sanchez. He's at our other office in San Marino.”

San Marino and B.H. Covering the high-priced spreads, east and west.

A man answered there, similar accent.

“Mr. Sanchez?”

“Yes.”

She identified herself, told him she was looking for Estrella Flores.

“I am, too.”

“Pardon?”

“I just got a call from her son in El Salvador. He's worried, hasn't heard from her since Sunday. Is this about Mrs. Ramsey's murder?”

“We'd just like to talk to her, sir. Why's the son worried?”

“Usually she calls him two, three times a week. He said he phoned the Ramsey house but got only a machine. I tried; the same thing happened to me. I left a message, but no one's called me back.”

“Mrs. Flores quit working for Mr. Ramsey, sir.”

“When?”

“The day after the murder.”

“Oh.”

“So she didn't call you about another placement?”

“No.” Sanchez sounded concerned.

“Any ideas where she might be, sir?”

“No, I'm sorry. She worked for the Ramseys for… hold on, let me look… here it is. Two years. Never complained.”

“Where did she work before that?”

“Before that… I couldn't tell you.” Wariness had crept into his voice.

“She wasn't legal?”

“When she came to us, she was legal. At least she presented papers. We do our best to-”

“Mr. Sanchez, I have no interest in immigration issues-”

“Even if you did, Detective, we have nothing to hide. Our women are all legal. We place them in the finest homes, and there must never be a hint of-”

“Of course,” said Petra. “Please give me Mrs. Flores's son's name and number.”

“Javier,” he said, reciting an address on Santa Cristina in San Salvador and a number. “He's a lawyer.”

“You don't know of any other places she worked?”

“She told us she worked for a family in Brentwood, but only for three months. No name- she didn't want to use them as references because they were ‘immoral.' ”

“Immoral in what way, sir?”

“I think it was something to do with drinking. Mrs. Flores is a very… moral woman.”

Petra hung up, thought about the maid's disappearance. If Flores had left of her own accord, why hadn't she contacted her son? It didn't take much morality to be repulsed by murder. Had she seen something? Or been seen?

Where to go with it… more calls to substations, to see if Flores had turned up somewhere as a victim? Unlikely. If she'd been eliminated by Ramsey because she could blow his alibi, he'd have made sure to conceal the body.