Suicide, all right, I thought. Has to be.
I checked through the list of people Gates and his men had interrogated, looking for someone who had known Crane well enough to offer a theory about the nature of his depression. Aside from Yankowski and the Porters, there wasn't anyone. I wrote down the names of a few people, those who, like Dancer, had been in the same profession and/or who might have been occasional drinking companions. But it seemed a dead-end prospect. On the list were the two writers Kiskadon had spoken to and who hadn't been able to enlighten him; and the rest figured to be long gone from San Francisco or dead by now.
I put the report back in the manila envelope, hauled the phone over, and dialed Stephen Porter's number. I wanted to ask him about Crane's first wife, Ellen Corneal; if he knew what might have become of her. I also wanted to ask him his opinion as to why Crane had withdrawn that $2,000 from his savings account. But talking to him again would have to wait: there was no answer. Late afternoons seemed to be a bad time to try to reach him.
I called Bates and Carpenter. Kerry was on another line; I sat there for five minutes, listening to myself on hold, before she came on. I told her where we were going tonight, and what time, and she said, “Italian again? I might have known it. I hate that woman, I really do.”
“Just grin and bear it, okay?”
“If you promise me this is the last time.”
“You know I can't promise you that.”
“Oh, all right. The last time for a good long while, then. At least that.”
“Deal. How's your day been?”
“Shitty. So my evening better not be.”
“It won't,” I said, and hoped I wasn't lying in my teeth.
We settled on what time I would pick her up, at which point she had another call and had to ring off. “I should be so popular,” I said, but she was already gone.
I swiveled around to the typewriter stand and hammered out a brief report for Michael Kiskadon. I intended to go see him later, so I could check through his Johnny Axe novels; but clients like to have written as well as verbal reports. Words more or less neatly typed on agency stationery reassure them that I'm a sober, industrious, and conscientious detective and give them a feeling of security.
When I was done I dialed Kiskadon's number. Lynn Kidkadon answered. I asked for her husband, and she said, “He's sleeping. Who is this?” Her response when I told her came in a much lower voice, almost a whisper, so I could barely hear her: “Oh, good, I'm glad you called. I've been trying to reach you for two days.”
“So you're the woman who's called my office several times.”
“Yes.”
“Why didn't you leave your name?”
“I didn't want you ringing up here and asking for me if Michael answered.”
“Why not?”
“Because I don't want him to know I've gotten in touch with you. I think we need to talk.”
“What about?”
“Michael and his father. The job he hired you to do. Can we meet somewhere? Right away?”
“Well … I was going to ask your husband if I could stop by.”
“Here? Why?”
“I need to look at his father's novels.”
“What on earth for?”
“To find a name. Look, Mrs. Kiskadon—”
“We could meet in the park,” she said, “the one across the street. Just for a few minutes, before you see Michael. Please, it's important.”
“… All right. Where in the park?”
“There's a circle with benches around it, straight across the green from our house and along the first path you come to. You can't miss it. How long will you be?”
“Twenty-five minutes or so.”
“I'll be waiting,” she said.
The wind off the ocean was pretty stiff today, bending the trees in Golden Gate Heights Park and making humming and rattling noises in their foliage. Nobody was out on the green; the only people I saw anywhere were a couple of kids on the playground equipment on the north side. I parked the car where I had yesterday, across from the Kiskadon house, and crossed the lawn with my head down: the wind slapped at my face and made my eyes water.
I found the path with no trouble, and Mrs. Kiskadon a few seconds later. Huddled inside a white alpaca coat, a bright blue scarf over her short hair, she was sitting on one of the benches at the near end of the circle, opposite a big cedar that grew in its center. She looked cold and solemn and worried.
“Thanks for coming,” she said as I sat down beside her. Then she shivered and said, “God, that wind is like ice.”
“We could go sit in my car.”
“No. Michael was still sleeping when I left, but I don't want to take the chance.”