J is for Judgment (17 page)

When she caught sight of me, she whipped off her glasses and stuck them upright on her head like a prescription tiara. She waved enthusiastically. “
¡Hola!”
she called in merry Spanish tones. So far, this was the only word we’d really mastered, and we used it on each other as often as we could. Some guy clipping the hedges looked up expectantly, probably thinking that Vera was addressing him.

“¡Hola!”
I replied.
“¿Dónde están los gatos?”
Still in search of those elusive black cats.

“En los árboles.”

“Muy bueno,”
I said.

“God, doesn’t that sound great?”

“Yeah, I’m almost sure that guy over there thinks we’re Hispanic,” I said.

Vera grinned, flashing him a thumbs-up before she turned back to me. “You’re here early for a change. You usually come flying in fifteen minutes late.”

“I was doing some paperwork and couldn’t wait to quit. How are you? You look great.”

We strolled into class, absorbed in chitchat and idle gossip until the instructor arrived. Patty Abkin-Quiroga is petite and enthusiastic, amazingly tolerant of our clumsy lurches through the language. There’s nothing so
humbling as being a dunce in a foreign tongue, and if it weren’t for her compassion, we’d have lost heart after two weeks. As usual, she started the class by regaling us with a long tale in Spanish, something to do with her activities that day. Either she ate a tostado or her little boy, Edwardo, flushed his baby bottle down the toilet and she had to have the plumber come out and take a look.

When I got home after class and let myself into my apartment, I could see the message light blinking on my answering machine. I pressed the button and listened as I moved around my tiny living room, turning on lights.

“Hello, Kinsey. Lieutenant Whiteside over at Santa Teresa Police Department. I got a fax this afternoon from our pals in the Los Angeles Passport Office. They don’t show anything on Dean DeWitt Huff, but they do have a record of a Renata Huff at the following address in Perdido.” I snatched up a pen and scribbled a note on a paper napkin while he was reciting the particulars. “If I’m not mistaken, that’s over in the Perdido Keys. Let me know what you find out. I’m off tomorrow, but I’ll be back on Thursday.”

I said, “All riiight,” giving both raised fists a shake. I did a quick dance, complete with butt wiggles, thanking the universe for small favors. I dumped my plans for dinner up at Rosie’s. Instead, I made myself a peanut-butter-and-pickle sandwich on whole-wheat bread, wrapping it in waxed paper and then sealing it in a plastic bag the way my aunt had taught me. In addition to the preservation of fresh sandwiches, my other notable household skill—thanks to her odd notions—is the
ability to gift wrap and tie a package of any size without the use of Scotch tape or stickers. This she considered essential preparation for life.

It was ten of eight and still light out when I hit 101 again. I ate my laptop picnic, steering with one hand while I held my sandwich with the other, humming to myself as the flavors mingled on my tongue. My car radio had been ominously silent for days, and I suspected some relevant fuse had given up the ghost deep inside. I flipped the on button anyway, on the off chance it had somehow healed itself in my absence. No such luck. I flipped the radio off, amusing myself instead with recollections of the annual celebration of Perdido/Olvidado township history, which consisted of a dispirited parade, the erection of many food booths, and the local citizens walking listlessly about, spilling mustard and hot dog relish on their P/O T-shirts.

Father Junipero Serra, who was the first president of the Alta California Missions, established nine missions along a six-hundred-and-fifty-mile stretch of California coastland between San Diego and Sonoma. Father Fermin Lasuen, who assumed leadership in 1785, the year after Serra’s death, founded nine more missions. There were other less luminous mission presidents, countless friars and padres whose names have vanished from public awareness. One of these, Father Prospero Olivarez, petitioned in early 1781 to build two small sister missions on the Santa Clara River. Father Olivarez argued that adjacent presidios, or forts, established on dual sites would not only serve as protection for the proposed mission to be built in Santa Teresa, but could
simultaneously convert, shelter, and train scores of California Indians who could then serve as skilled laborers for the projected construction process. Father Junipero Serra greatly favored the idea and granted enthusiastic approval. Extensive drawings were submitted, and the site was dedicated. However, a series of frustrating and inexplicable delays resulted in postponement of the ground breaking until after Serra’s death, at which point the plan was quashed. Father Olivarez’s twin churches were never built. Some historians have portrayed Olivarez as both worldly and ambitious, positing that the withdrawal of support for his project was intended to subdue his unbecoming secular aspirations. Ecclesiastical documents that have since come to light suggest another possibility, that Father Lasuen, who was championing the establishment of missions at Soledad, San Jose, San Juan Bautista, and San Miguel, saw Olivarez as a threat to the achievement of his own aims and deliberately sabotaged his efforts until after Father Serra’s demise. His own subsequent rise to power was the death knell of Olivarez’s vision. Whatever the truth, cynical observers renamed the dual sites Perdido/Olvidado, a mongrelization of Prospero Olivarez’s name. Translated from Spanish, the names mean Lost and Forgotten.

This trip, I bypassed the main business district. The architecture in the town itself was a mix of boxy, blocky modern buildings interspersed with Victorian structures. On the far side of 101, between the freeway and the ocean, there were whole sections of the land entirely covered with blacktop, a series of interconnecting
parking lots for supermarkets, gas stations, and fast-food establishments. One could drive for blocks through linked acres of asphalt without ever actually going out onto a city street. I took the Seacove off ramp, heading for the Perdido Keys.

Closer to the ocean, the houses seemed to take on the look of a little beach town—board-and-batten with big decks, painted sea blue and gray, the yards filled with impossibly bright purple, yellow, and orange flowers. I passed a house where there were so many wet suits hung to dry on a second-story balcony that it looked as if the guests from a cocktail party had wandered out on the deck for air.

Daylight had faded to indigo, and all the house lights in the neighborhood were coming on when I finally located the street I was looking for. The houses on both sides of this narrow lane backed onto the keys, long fingers of seawater stretching back from the ocean. The rear of each house seemed to boast a wide wooden deck with a short wood ramp leading down to a dock, the channel itself deep enough to admit sizable boats. I could smell the cool marina cologne, and the quiet was underscored by an occasional slap of water and the chorusing of frogs.

I cruised slowly, squinting at house numbers, finally spotting the address Whiteside had given me. Renata Huff’s house was a two-story dark blue stucco with white trim. The roof was wood shake, and the rear portion of the property was shielded from the street by a white board fence. The house was dark, and a
FOR SALE
sign hung from a post in the front yard. I said, “Well, damn it.”

I parked the car across the street and approached the house, moving up a long wooden ramp on to the front door. I rang the bell as if I expected to be admitted. I didn’t see a lockbox from the real estate company, which might mean that Renata was still in residence. Casually, I checked the houses on either side of hers. One was dark, and the other showed lights only at the rear. I turned then so I could scrutinize the houses across the street. As nearly as I could tell, I wasn’t under observation and there didn’t seem to be any vicious dogs on the premises. Often, I consider this a tacit invitation to break and enter, but I had spied, through one of the two narrow windows flanking the front door, the telltale dot of red light denoting an alarm system, armed and ready. This was not gracious behavior on Renata’s part.

Now what? I had the option to get back in my car and return to Santa Teresa, but I hated to admit I’d made the trip for naught. I glanced over at the house to the right of Renata’s. Through a side window I could see a woman in her kitchen, head bent to some domestic chore. I walked down the ramp and crossed the yard, trying to avoid the flower beds as I made my way to the door. I rang the bell, staring with idle curiosity at Renata’s front porch. Even as I watched, her burglar-fooling lights came on. Now it looked like an empty house filled with pointlessly burning lamps.

Somebody flipped on the porch light overhead and opened the door to the length of the chain. “Yes?” The woman was probably in her forties. All I could see of her was her long, dark, curly hair that cascaded past her shoulders, like the wig on a decadent
seventeenth-century fop. She smelled like flea soap. I thought at first it was some new designer perfume until I noticed the towel-swaddled dog she was toting under her arm. It was one of those little brown-and-black jobs about the size of a loaf of bread. Muffin, Buffy, Princess.

I said, “Hi. I wonder if you can give me some information about the house for sale next door. I noticed the outside ramp. Do you happen to know if the place is equipped for the handicapped?”

“Yes, it is.”

I was hoping for a little more in the way of information. “On the inside, too?”

“That’s right. Her husband suffered a real bad stroke about ten years ago…a month before they started work on the house. She had the contractor adjust all the plans for wheelchair access, including a lift up to the second floor.”

“Amazing,” I murmured. “My sister’s in a wheelchair, and we’ve been looking for a place that would accommodate her disability.” Since I couldn’t see the woman’s face, I found myself addressing my remarks to the dog, who really seemed quite attentive.

The woman said, “Really. What’s wrong with her?”

“She was in a diving accident two years ago and she’s paralyzed from the waist down.”

“That’s too bad,” she said. Her tone suggested the sort of fake concern a stranger’s story generates. I could have bet she was formulating questions she was too polite to ask.

Actually, I was beginning to feel pretty bad about
Sis myself, though she sounded brave. “She’s doing pretty well. She’s adjusted, at any rate. We were driving around today, checking out the neighborhood. We’ve been house hunting now for what seems like ages, and this is the first that’s really sparked her interest, so I told her I’d stop by and ask. Do you have any idea what they’re asking for the place?”

“I heard four ninety-five.”

“Really? Well, that’s not bad. I think I’ll have our real estate agent set up an appointment to show us through. Is the owner home during the day?”

“That’s hard to say. Lately, she’s been out of town quite a lot.”

“What’s her name again?” I asked as if she’d told me once.

“Renata Huff.”

“What about her husband? If she’s not home, could I have the agent give him a call instead?”

“Oh, sorry. Dean died, Mr. Huff. I thought I mentioned he had a heart attack.” The dog began to wiggle, bored with all this talk that didn’t directly relate to him.

“That’s awful,” I said. “How long ago was that?”

“I don’t know. Probably five or six years.”

“And she hasn’t remarried?”

“She never seemed to have the interest, which is surprising. “I mean, she is young—in her forties—and she comes from a lot of money. At least that’s the story I heard.” The dog began to lick upward, trying to hit the woman’s mouth. This might have been some kind of doggy signal, but I wasn’t sure what it meant. Kiss, eat, get down, stop.

“I wonder why she wants to sell? Is she leaving the area?”

“I really couldn’t say, but if you want to leave me your number, the next time I see her, I can tell her you stopped by.”

“All right. I’d appreciate that.”

“Hang on. Let me get some paper.”

She moved away from the door to a drop-leaf table in the foyer. When she came back, she had a pencil and a junk-mail envelope.

I gave her my number, inventing freely. As long as I was about it, I gave myself the prefix for Montebello, where all the rich people live. “Can you give me Mrs. Huff’s number in case the agent doesn’t have it?”

“I don’t have that. I think it’s unlisted.”

“Oh, the agent probably has it. Let’s don’t worry about that,” I said casually. “In the meantime, do you think she’d mind if I just peeped in a couple of windows?”

“I’m sure not. It’s a really nice place.”

“Sure looks like it.” I remarked. “I notice there’s a boat dock. Does Mrs. Huff have a boat?”

“Oh, yes, she has a nice big sailboat…a forty-eight-footer. But I haven’t seen it out there for a while. She might be having some work done. I know she pulls it out of the water from time to time. Anyway, I better go before the dog gets cold.”

“Right. Thanks very much. You’ve been very helpful.”

“No problem,” she said.

T
wo reproduction carriage lamps cast overlapping circles of light onto the front porch. The front door was flanked by two panels of glass. I put my cupped hands to the window on the right. I found myself peering past the foyer and down a short corridor, which seemed to open to a great room at the rear. The interior of the house had highly polished hardwood floors, bleached and then rubbed with a wash of pale gray. Doorjambs had been removed for easy wheelchair passage. A row of French doors along the rear wall allowed me to see all the way to the wood deck out back.

In the section of the great room defined by lamplight, I could see that the Oriental carpet had been laid flush with the pickled flooring. To my right, a stairway angled up to the second floor. The neighbor had mentioned a lift, but there was none in evidence. Maybe Renata had had the mechanism removed once Mr. Huff expired. I wondered if it was his passport Wendell Jaffe was using. I
crossed the porch, moving right to left. From window to window, I could see the house unfold. The rooms were uncluttered, orderly, surfaces gleaming. There was a den at the front and what looked like a guest bedroom, probably with a bath attached.