Where Love Has Gone (23 page)

“This is nothing but cheap blackmail. Even if you pay off you don’t know whether they’ll hold out some letters for another shakedown. I’d turn this over to the police.”

“Hasn’t there been enough in the papers already? Do you want more?”

I stared at her. “Haven’t you done more than enough to protect the good Hayden name?” I shot back sarcastically. “Do you think anything can make Nora smell less like a rose than she already does? Do you think people are so stupid they don’t know what’s been going on in her house?”

“No. People aren’t stupid. But you are!” She shoved the envelope angrily back into her purse.

“I’m no longer concerned with what they say or print about Nora. There’s nothing I can do to change that and, frankly, I don’t even intend to try. But perhaps you didn’t read the letter.”

“I read the letter.”

“Did you read where it said there were also letters from Dani, and that she was in love with Riccio too?” the old lady asked irascibly.

“I read it. But I didn’t pay any attention to it. After all, Dani is just a kid.”

“Then you’re even more stupid than I thought. Dani may be a child in years, but have you taken a good look at her? She’s mature physically and she’s been mature since she was a little over eleven years old. She’s her mother all over again. Nora had her first sexual experience when she was scarcely thirteen, her first abortion when she was a little over fifteen. There were at least two more that I know of before she married you!”

I stared at her. “You knew all that?”

Her eyes fell. “I knew it,” she admitted in a low voice. “But I hoped it would remain a thing of the past if she married you. That she would grow up and see what a fool she’d been.”

“But you still stood up for her. You still protected her.”

“I am her mother,” the old lady said simply. There was a proud kind of dignity about her. “It was never the Hayden name I really cared about it. It was my daughter. Just as it’s not the name I care about now. It’s Dani. I don’t want her damned before she has a chance. I don’t want her to be like her mother. I want to help her.”

“Nora said that I wasn’t even Dani’s father,” I said.

“I know what Nora said. I think I’m old enough to accept the truth now. I wonder if you are?” I put down my drink. “Try me and see.”

Her eyes held mind steadily. “I don’t think even Nora knows whether you’re Dani’s father or

not.”

I didn’t speak.

“So you see,” she continued gently, “It all comes back to you. To how you feel about Dani.”

I picked up my drink and took another sip. The ice cubes had melted and the fine taste of the

whiskey had been lost in the water. It always seemed to come back to me. Harris Gordon had said the same thing on Saturday, maybe a little differently, but in essence the same thing. Either I was her father or I was not.

I turned to the sideboard and added some whiskey to my glass. I thought about the baby that I’d loved before I ever knew what Nora would some day say. Then I thought about the child I’d played with on the boat down in La Jolla, after Nora had said that I wasn’t her father. I knew that I loved that child just as much as I’d loved the baby. And as much now as I did then.

I turned back to my former mother-in-law. “I guess it takes more than an act of nature to make a father,” I said. “It also takes an act of love.”

Her bright old eyes glittered. “All it takes, Luke, is the act of love. The other thing doesn’t really

matter at all.”

I took a small pull at my drink and sat down. “Now, what are we going to do about the letter?” “I’ve already inserted the ad. It will run on Thursday. Today is Monday. That gives us three days

to find out where the letters are and who has them.”

“Two days. Tomorrow and Wednesday. Today is shot already and a good part of tomorrow we’ll be in court. I don’t even know where to start. I don’t know anything at all about Riccio. Not even who his friends were.”

“Sam Corwin would know.”

“Sam?” I asked, wondering. I hadn’t thought about Sam at all. It was strange that I’d forgotten about him. He and Nora had been married about a year after our divorce. I’d seen him at the house several times when I’d brought Dani back from her visits with me. He’d always been polite and friendly.

“Yes, Sam. Poor Sam. He knew what Nora was like when he married her, but he thought he could change her. But after she met Riccio, I guess even Sam gave up. It was because of Riccio that Sam divorced her and was able to enforce a strict community property split.”

“Then Sam must have had something on her?” I asked. “He had something on both of them.”

The door behind her opened and the maid came into the room. “Dinner is served, ma’am.” We got to our feet and the old lady smiled at me. “Will you give me your arm, Luke?”

I smiled back at her. “I’d be proud to.”

2

__________________________________________

For the first time I approached the front entrance of the building. The parking lot was filled up and I’d had to leave my car several blocks away. I walked up the curved path leading to the entrance from the street. A gardener in work clothes was busy clipping the neat hedges that lined the walk. He looked up at me as I walked by. I could see the heavy beads of sweat on his forehead from the morning sun.

I looked at the glass doors. There was lettering in gold leaf.

STATE OF CALIFORNIA SAN FRANCISCO COUNTY

I went in and found myself in a large lobby filled with reporters and cameramen. A few flashbulbs went off and several reporters pressed around me. They were much less pushy than they’d been the other day.

“Is there anything you can tell us about plans for your daughter’s defense, Colonel Carey?”

I shook my head. “No, I can’t. It’s my understanding that under the laws of this state there is no such thing as a trial for a minor. This is merely the first of a series of custodial hearings.”

“Will you attempt to get custody of your daughter?”

“That’s up to the court to decide. I feel sure the best interests of my daughter will be the primary consideration.”

“Have you seen your daughter?”

“I visited her on Sunday afternoon.” “Was her mother with you?”

“No, her mother was ill.”

“Has her mother visited her at all?”

“I don’t know. But I do know that there were packages from her mother.”

“Do you know what was in them?” “Clothing, books, candy.”

“What did you and your daughter talk about?” “Nothing much. Father-and-daughter talk, I guess.”

“Did she tell you anything more about what happened Friday night?”

I looked at the man who asked that question. “We didn’t talk about that at all.” “Did you learn anything that might throw more light on what happened?”

“No,” I said. “I know nothing beyond what I heard at the coroner’s inquest yesterday. I believe most of you were there. Now, if you’ll be good enough to let me through—”

They opened a path for me.

Juvenile Court was off to the left of the entrance hall. I followed the arrow down a long corridor and around the corner. Another pointed down a flight of stairs. I went down and came out opposite a glass-enclosed waiting room. I passed through the waiting room and opened the door to the Juvenile Court.

It was a small courtroom with a raised platform at the far end of the room. In front of the judge’s desk was a long table with several chairs around it. Slightly to the side of the table, between it and the bench was a small desk and chair. The walls were painted an official-looking tan and brown, and there were four large windows in the long wall. The rest of the space was taken up by extra chairs and benches.

As I stood there a man entered from one of the doors behind the judge’s desk. He stopped when he saw me.

“Is this where they’re holding the Dani Carey hearing?” I asked.

“Yes, but you’re early. Court doesn’t convene until nine o’clock. You can wait outside in the reception room. You’ll be called.”

“Thank you.”

There were several benches in the waiting room. I looked at my watch. It was eight thirty-five. I lit a cigarette.

A few minutes later another man came in. He looked at me, lit a cigarette and sat down. “Judge not in yet?”

I shook my head.

“Damn,” he said. “I’ll bet I lose another half-day’s pay. Every time I come down here it costs me. They never get to my case until late.”

“Do you have a child here?”

“Yeah,” he said, jerking his head. The ashes from his cigarette fell on his dirty work shirt. He paid no attention to them. “They got my kid down here. She’s nothing but a whore, that’s what she is. I told them the next time they picked her up they could keep her. But no, they get me down here

anyway.”

He peered at me. “Say, you look familiar,” he said. “I seen you down here before?” “No. This is the first time.”

“Brother, you’re in for it. They’ll keep you coming back and coming back until you agree to take your kid home again. That’s what they done to me. She’s only a fifteen-an’-a-half-year-old girl, they say. You got to give her a chance, they say. So I do, and what happens? Two days later she’s shacked up in a hotel taking on all comers for five bucks apiece. The cops get her and here I am again.”

He squinted up through his cigarette smoke. “You sure I didn’t see you here before?” I shook my head.

He stared at me for another moment, then snapped his fingers. “I know you! I seen your pitcher in the papers. You’re the guy whose kid knocked off her mother’s boyfriend!”

I didn’t say anything.

He leaned toward me, his voice a confidential whisper. “Ain’t it a bitch? What kids get into nowadays! Tell me, the guy banging her too? It wouldn’t surprise me at all if he was. The papers don’t give you half the story.”

I felt my fists clench. I forced my fingers to loosen. There was no sense in getting angry. This was just something I had to get used to. I felt a twinge in my heart. Dani would have to get used to it, too. That was even worse.

Two women came in. They looked like Mexicans and were jabbering excitedly in Spanish. They fell suddenly silent as they saw us, then went over to a bench and sat down. The younger one looked pregnant.

A moment later a colored woman came in, then a man and a woman. The woman’s face was puffed and bruised and she had a black eye. The man tried to take her arm to lead her to a seat, but she shook his arm off angrily and sat down along the other wall. She didn’t look at him.

The colored woman spoke to one of the Mexicans. “Think they goin’ to give you yo’ girl back, honey?”

The pregnant woman made the classic gesture of ignorance. “I don’ know,” she said, her accent faintly Spanish.

“It’s the relief what wants them kep’ here, honey. I’m sho’ of it. If she stays here it costs only forty a month for her keep. They let you take her home they got to give you seventy. It’s the money, honey.”

The pregnant girl shrugged her shoulders. She said something in Spanish to the other woman and she nodded her head in violent agreement. On the bench along the wall the woman with a black eye began to cry silently.

More people came down the stairs and soon all the benches were occupied. The overflow began to gather in the corridor outside the waiting room. At five minutes to nine Harris Gordon appeared, followed by Nora and her mother. I got up and went out to meet them.

Harris Gordon looked through the glass. “Looks pretty crowded.” “S.R.O.,” I said. “It looks like we’re not the only people with troubles.”

He gave me a peculiar look. “People in trouble seldom are alone. Wait here. I’ll go check the clerk and find out when the judge expects to get to us.”

He disappeared down the corridor. I turned to Nora. “How are you?” I asked politely.

She nodded, her eyes searching my face for any signs of sarcasm. “I’m all right. I went home and stayed in bed after I got through in court yesterday. I was completely exhausted.”

“I can understand that. What you did wasn’t easy.”

“Did I do all right? I didn’t want to say anymore than I had to. I could hardly bring myself to testify but I had no choice, did I?”

“That’s right. You had no choice.”

Gordon came back. “We won’t have long to wait,” he said. “We’re the third case on the docket.

The first two shouldn’t take more than fifteen minutes, the clerk told me.”

I lit a cigarette and leaned back against the wall. The door to the courtroom opened and I heard a name called. I turned and saw the two Mexican women get up. The door closed behind them. It was exactly nine o’clock.

They couldn’t have been inside for more than ten minutes. The pregnant woman was crying as they walked past. The clerk called another name. It was the man who had come in just after me.

He came out in less than ten minutes, a look of smug satisfaction on his face. He stopped in front of me on his way to the stairs. “They’re going to keep her for good this time. I told ’em they can throw away the key for all I care!”

I didn’t say anything. He turned and stamped up the stairs. I heard the clerk’s voice behind us. “Carey.”

We went through the waiting room into the court. The clerk motioned us to seats at the table in front of the judge’s desk and surveyed us with a bored expression. “Is this the first time you’ve been here?”

We nodded.

“The judge stepped out for a moment. He’ll be right back.”

The words were no sooner out of his mouth than the door behind him opened. “All rise and face the court,” the clerk called. “Be it known that the Juvenile Court, State of California, County of San Francisco, the honorable Justice Samuel A. Murphy presiding, is now in session.”

The judge was a tall man in his early sixties. His hair was white and thin, and through his horn- rimmed glasses his eyes were blue and piercing. He wore a rumpled brown suit, white shirt and dark maroon tie. He sat down and picked up a paper from the desk in front of him. He nodded to the clerk.

The clerk got up and walked over to a door on the right side. He opened it. “Danielle Carey.”