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  Poppy wasn’t conventionally pretty, but she was stylish and well-liked. Schoolwork was her curse. She was one of those borderline cases where year after year, teachers had talked themselves into passing her along without requiring a command of core subjects. This had always worked to Poppy’s advantage, keeping her in lockstep with classmates she’d known since kindergarten. The problem was that grade by grade, she’d been advanced on increasingly shaky grounds, which meant the work only became harder and more opaque. Now Poppy alternated between feelings of frustration and feelings of despair. Iris’s role, as she saw it, was to take Poppy’s mind off her scholastic woes, thus the dope-smoking and junk food.

  Iris couldn’t imagine what Mr. Lucas wanted with her. She’d gone for months without a detention slip and she wondered if he understood how much effort and self-discipline that took. She could use a pat on the back, positive reinforcement for what she’d achieved in the way of maturity and self-control. Acting out was easier. She relished the feeling of being unleashed, free to act on impulse, doing whatever occurred to her.

  Mr. Lucas entered the office and signaled to Iris, who got up and followed him. Once he settled at his desk, he seemed perplexed. “What can I do for you?”

  “I don’t know. I got a note saying you wanted to see me.”

  Mr. Lucas stared at her blankly and then recovered himself. “That’s right. Sorry. This isn’t actually about you. It’s about your friend Poppy.”

  Iris looked at him with interest. This was a change in the script. “What about her?”

  “She has a lot at stake academically and the faculty is concerned about her plummeting grades.”

  Iris was taken aback. “I don’t get it. What’s this have to do with me?”

  “She’s struggling. You probably see that as well as I do. In a curious way she looks up to you as a role model.”

  “Yeah, curious, no shit. How can I be a role model when I’m fourteen years old?”

  “You underestimate yourself. You’re a bright girl. You can afford to coast because you manage to keep up without putting in much effort. Poppy has to work much harder than you. She’s got the Proficiency Test coming up next week and it’s vital that she stay on point. If she doesn’t improve her academic standing, she won’t get into the college of her choice, which I understand is Vassar.”

  Iris laughed. “Vassar? No way. She’ll be lucky to get into City College for a two-year degree.”

  “That’s not ours to decide. The point is, you could be a big help if you’d encourage her to study instead of goofing off. She needs the support.”

  Offended, Iris said, “She doesn’t need my ‘support.’ She does fine. I don’t understand why you’re blaming me if Poppy’s bored with school.”

  “It’s more than boredom, isn’t it?” He made an O of his thumb and his index finger, putting them to his lips as though he were toking on a joint.

  Iris kept her face blank. How the heck could he know about that? “If you’re implying Poppy and I smoke dope, I don’t know where you got that idea because you’re dead wrong. I might have done that a couple of times back in Michigan, but I’ve sworn off. Poppy, I don’t know about. You’d have to ask her.”

  With exaggerated patience, Mr. Lucas said, “Look, Iris. I’m not here to argue. I was hoping to enlist your aid.”

  “In doing what? Dumping my best friend? Because that’s what you’re suggesting, isn’t it?”

  “Not dumping her. Cutting back on the time you spend together, just as a temporary measure.”

  “So now you’re telling me who to hang out with?”

  “I’m soliciting your help. In terms of schoolwork, Poppy’s done okay so far, but she’s faltering.”

  “And that’s my fault?” Iris found it infuriating that she’d been called into Mr. Lucas’s office, not to reward her for good behavior, for which she’d made a special effort, but to heap phony praise on her in hopes she’d give Poppy Earl a boost.

  “You’re an influence. You have a strong personality. Scholastically, she’s not as quick as you are. I’m suggesting it might be in her best interests if you backed off a bit and let her focus on her schoolwork.”

  Iris started to protest and then she clamped her mouth shut. She could feel the heat rise in her cheeks at the notion that he’d blamed her for Poppy’s failing grades. Worse still was the idea that she should sacrifice a friendship for any reason whatsoever. If Poppy’s grades needed an assist, there were other ways to go about it than dropping a friend. She said, “I’ll think about it.”

  Mr. Lucas seemed surprised that she’d yielded so easily. “Good. Well, that’s great. That’s really all we’re asking—that you’ll give some thought to your effect on her and ease up.”

  “Right.”

  He went on for a bit, but Iris had tuned him out. She was livid that the faculty had been discussing Poppy’s mediocre grades and pointing the finger at Iris, like it was her responsibility. What the fuck was that about? She and Mr. Lucas continued to chat, going through a bullshit exchange, while she pretended everything was okay when in fact she was furious.

  The meeting ended and the minute Mr. Lucas closed his office door, she scurried into the hall, blind with rage. She halted, feeling the rush of anger narrow to a point. On the wall across the corridor, between the girls’ restroom and the janitor’s closet, there was a fire alarm box. The process was simple. Break glass, press here. She cast a glance in both directions and saw that the hallway was clear. She used a corner of her history book to break the glass. She pressed the button and an ear-splitting siren sounded. She walked into the girls’ bathroom and closed herself into a stall, pulled her feet up, and rested them against the door so if anyone looked under, the stall would appear to be empty. Beyond the quiet of the bathroom, she could hear doors banging open, the high-pitched chatter of students pouring out of the classrooms.

  Mr. Dorfman, the principal, was on the intercom, instructing teachers and students to proceed to their stations in an orderly fashion. The drill was one they’d done a hundred times, but the practice was usually announced in advance. She could tell from their shrill response that everyone was uncertain if this was the real deal or not. Something exciting about the idea of a school burning to the ground. Within minutes, the corridors were silent. Iris stood up and left the stall, peering around the door to see if anyone was patrolling for strays. No sign of a soul, so she scooted back across the hall to the office, which was also empty.

  She scanned the faculty mailboxes and lifted the first of the manila envelopes she spotted. This was in Mrs. Rose’s cubbyhole, the envelope unsealed but secured with a clasp. The copy machine was still humming and it took less than a minute to reproduce the Proficiency Test and the accompanying answer sheet. She put the pages back in the envelope, pressed the clasp flat, and returned it to Mrs. Rose’s cubbyhole. Then she went out into the hall and mingled with the students who were returning to the building. She couldn’t wait to tell Poppy what she’d done. Thanks to her, Poppy Earl and Troy Rademaker were home free.

  Later, Kinsey Millhone would wonder how differently events might have played out if she’d been present in the vice principal’s office that day. No one could have predicted the consequences of Iris’s impetuous actions in response to Mr. Lucas’s summons. In point of fact, Kinsey wouldn’t meet up with the principal players for another ten years and by then, the die would be cast. Odd how fate is so often embedded in the aftermath of a simple conversation.

  2

  Friday, September 15, 1989

  Another September had rolled into view and Santa Teresa was in the throes of an artificial autumn generated by the drought, which was in its fourth year. The landscape was scorched and the reservoir that provided water to the city was at an all-time low. In California, a shortage of deciduous trees means that the residents are denied the splendid array of changing colors that heralds the fall in
other parts of the country. Here, even the evergreens looked exhausted and the lawns were dead, except for those of the rich who could afford to have water trucked in. In the presence of such severe conditions, a series of wildfires had burned across the state in unprecedented numbers. So much for the weather report. My name is Kinsey Millhone. I’m a female private investigator, aged thirty-nine, living and working in this Southern California town ninety-five miles north of Los Angeles. I’m also single and cranky-minded to hear some people tell it. The small studio I’ve been renting for the past eight-plus years was once a single-car garage, now expanded, designed, and custom-built by Henry Pitts, my eighty-nine-year-old landlord. Of course, he didn’t do the actual labor, but he supervised the construction crew closely, making sure everything was done to his high standards.

  In the interest of conservation, Henry had stripped his backyard of grass, which left us with dirt, sand, and stepping-stones. Henry’s two Adirondack chairs were arranged in conversational range of each other on the off chance we might want to enjoy a late afternoon cocktail as the sun went down. This was never the case. I didn’t want to sit contemplating barren packed earth, which doesn’t promote relaxation in my humble opinion. His potting bench and gardening gloves were superfluous and the row of larger tools he’d hung on the side of his garage—shovels, wood-handled garden forks, and pruning shears—had been unused for so long the spiders had spun webs and now lurked in ominous arachnid tunnels in hopes of snagging prey. Henry’s cat, Ed, seemed to look on the backyard as one big litter box and he made use of it every chance he could—one more reason to avoid the area.

  In terms of my professional life, I’d had a nasty run-in with a man named Ned Lowe the previous March, and he’d nearly succeeded in strangling me to death. I still wasn’t entirely certain why I’d been spared, but I felt I should be prepared in case he came flying at me on some future occasion. Most of the time I didn’t think about him at all, a defense mechanism, I’m sure. There were moments, though, when I pictured him with an unnerving clarity. Somewhere in the world, he was alive, and while that was the case, I’d be looking over my shoulder, wondering if he’d suddenly reappear. He was a man obsessed and I knew I’d never feel safe until he was dead and buried.

  Shortly after the assault, I’d applied for and been granted a permit to carry a concealed weapon. I already owned a Heckler & Koch VP9, which I kept in a locked trunk at the foot of my bed or in a briefcase that I locked in the trunk of my car. I’d paid the processing fee, completed a training course, and passed the NICS, the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, fingerprint and background check. The police department seemed satisfied that I was of “good moral character,” and my reasons for applying were apparently persuasive, even if Ned Lowe was nowhere to be found at the time. I worked, preparing myself for another encounter, in which I was determined to prevail. For that, I needed strength, endurance, determination, and skill. A loaded handgun seemed like a good idea as well.

  His attack had left me wary of doing my usual three-mile morning jog in the early morning dark, so I’d returned to the gym, mixing weight lifting with stints on the treadmill. This bored the bejesus out of me, but at least I worked out in a room full of fitness nuts, most of them male, with the occasional kick-ass female. I appreciated the bright lights, the noise, the bad music, and the muted television game shows. Most of all the sense of safety. My workouts took place in the middle of the day, and when I emerged from the gym, it was still light outside. Where possible, I took to jogging on the beach path in broad daylight, which I still preferred as long as there was a goodly number of people in evidence.

  That Friday afternoon, I was writing a report on the job I’d just completed, working as a temporary front office receptionist/secretary for a general practitioner. The doctor had been subject to thefts of drugs and petty cash and she needed someone to determine who was doing it. She had two partners and twelve on staff and no clue about how to identify the perpetrator. Her office manager was out for three weeks, having surgery for a bad back, and it made sense that the doctor would hire someone to fill the gap. I was sufficiently skilled at typing, filing, and answering the phone that I could pass for an old hand at office work. Anything I didn’t know about the medical profession was easy enough to explain, given the fiction that I was from a temp agency.

  In the course of the job, I’d found occasion to work late, which gave me ample opportunity to snoop. Turned out it was the office manager herself who had her hand in the till, supplementing her salary with petty cash and easing her back pain with meds she lifted from the supply cabinet. The detail men dropped off countless samples during their meetings with the doctors in the practice, so she had her choice of the latest remedies. The doctor who hired me was reluctant to pursue a criminal complaint, but my work was done and, more important, I’d been paid.

  I’d just removed the last page of the report from my trusty portable Smith Corona and I was neatly separating the carbons from the originals when my phone rang. I picked up the handset and tucked it against my left ear while I stacked the pages and placed them in a file folder. “Millhone Investigations.”

  “May I speak to Kinsey?”

  “This is she.”

  “Ah. Well, I’m glad I reached you. My name is Lauren McCabe. Lonnie Kingman gave me your name and suggested I get in touch with regard to something that’s come up.”

  Lonnie had been my attorney for the past ten years, so anybody he sent my way was automatically okay in my book, at least until proven otherwise. The name Lauren McCabe set off a distant clanging of bells, but I couldn’t place the reference. “Something that’s come up” could have meant just about anything.

  I said, “I appreciate Lonnie’s referring you. What can I help you with?”

  “I’d prefer to discuss this in person, if that’s all right with you.”

  “Fine. We can meet at your convenience. What did you have in mind?”

  “I’d love to say today, but I play duplicate on Fridays and I’m gone most of the day. I was hoping you could stop by tomorrow afternoon. We’re in a condominium downtown and the place isn’t hard to find.”

  “Sounds good. Why don’t you give me the address?”

  I made a note of the street number on State, three blocks up from the office I’d occupied when I worked for California Fidelity Insurance. In those days, I investigated arson and wrongful death claims, which didn’t often come my way now that I worked independently.

  I said, “What time would suit?”

  “Let’s say four. My husband will be out and we’ll have time alone. I know it’s a Saturday and I’m sorry if I’m intruding on your weekend plans.”

  “Don’t worry about it. I’ll be there.”

  “Good. I appreciate your flexibility.”

  As soon as I hung up the handset, the penny dropped and I remembered where I’d come across the name McCabe. There’d been an article on the front page of the local paper at some point in the past two weeks. Unfortunately, the unwieldy accumulation of newspapers was stacked up under my desk at home.

  I checked my watch, noting that it was 4:15. The call was excuse enough to close up early and head out. With the job I’d just finished and a new job lined up, I felt I was entitled to the rest of the day off. The drive to my studio apartment took ten minutes, not surprising given the size of the town, which topped out at eighty-five thousand souls. Santa Teresa is wedged between the Pacific Ocean and the Santa Ynez Mountains, one of the few mountain ranges with an east/west orientation. Between the two geological boundaries, we have palm trees, red-tile roofs, bougainvillea, and Spanish architecture interlaced with Victorian. Half the rich folks live in Montebello at one end of town and the other rich folks live in Horton Ravine. The divide is usually characterized as old money versus new, but the separation isn’t that distinct.

  Once home, I dug my way down through the papers. This felt like an arc
heological excavation, uncovering in reverse order events that had passed since the article had run. I pulled out the relevant issue and perched on a kitchen stool while I brought myself up to speed. On page one of the first section, there was an article about Lauren McCabe’s son’s mandatory release from the California Youth Authority on a charge of first-degree murder pursuant to the felony murder rule, that being a killing committed in the course of a kidnapping. Since he’d reached the age of twenty-five, the state was forced to let him go. I noted the journalist was my pal Diana Alvarez, about whom my feelings were mixed. She and I had tangled in the past and there was no love lost between us. Then again, we were both practical enough to know we might help each other on occasion.