J is for JUDGMENT Read online

  Then I spotted her. She was standing near the elevator doors, with a couple of different editions of the newspapers in hand. Apparently no one had told her how seldom the elevators worked. She hadn’t yet applied makeup, and her dark hair was still tousled and asymmetrical from sleep. She wore rubber thongs and a terry-cloth beach coat loosely belted at the waist. Through her gaping lapels, I caught sight of a dark blue bathing suit. If the two were scheduled to depart that day, I didn’t think she’d be dressed for the pool. She glanced at my camera but avoided my eyes.

  I took my place beside her, looking up with blank attention as the indicator light moved haltingly from the third floor to the lobby. The elevator doors opened and two people emerged. I hung back discreetly, allowing her to get on the elevator first. The woman pressed 3, and then flashed an inquiring look at me.

  “That’s fine,” I murmured. She smiled at me vaguely, with no real intention of being friendly. Her narrow face looked pinched, and dark shadows under her eyes suggested she hadn’t slept well. The musky scent of her perfume filled the air between us. We rode up in silence, and when the doors slid open I gestured politely, allowing her to get off first.

  She turned to the right and headed for a room at the far end of the corridor, her flip-flops slapping against the tiles as she walked away. I paused, pretending to search my pockets for my key. My room was one floor down, but she didn’t have to know that. I needn’t have bothered with my wee attempt at deception. She unlocked the door to room 312 and went in without a backward glance. It was then almost ten, and the maid’s cart was parked two doors away from the room the woman had entered. The door to room 316 was standing open, the room empty, stripped of occupants.

  II headed back to the elevator and went straight to the front desk, where I asked to have my room changed. The clerk was most accommodating, possibly because the hotel was nearly vacant. The room wouldn’t be ready for an hour, he said, but I was gracious about the wait. I crossed the lobby to the gift shop and bought myself a copy of the San Diego paper, which I tucked under my arm.

  I went up to my room and packed my clothes and my I camera in the duffel bag, gathering up toilet articles, shoes, and dirty underwear. I took the duffel with me to the lobby while I waited for the room change, unwilling to give Wendell the opportunity to skip. By the time I went up to claim 316, it was almost eleven. Outside 312, someone had set a room service tray stacked with dirty breakfast dishes. I scanned the toast crusts and coffee cups. These people needed to include a fruit exchange in their overall meal plan.

  I left my door ajar while I unpacked. I had now placed myself between Wendell Jaffe, and the exits, as both the stairs and the elevators were several doors to my right. I didn’t think he could pass without my being aware of it. Sure enough, at 12:35 I caught a glimpse of him and his lady friend as they went downstairs, both now dressed for a swim. I moved to the balcony with my camera and watched them emerge on the walkway three floors down.

  I lifted my camera, following their progress in the viewfinder, hoping they’d alight within zoom range of me. They passed behind a splashy screen of yellow hibiscus. I caught a glimpse of them arranging their belongings on a nearby table, seating themselves with some attention to comfort. By the time they got settled, stretching out on their chaises in preparation for sunning, the flowering shrubs obscured all but Wendell’s feet.

  After a decent interval, I followed and spent the bulk of the day within a few yards of them. Various pale new arrivals were establishing their minikingdoms, staking out their turf between the bar and the pool. I’ve noticed that resort guests tend to be territorial, returning to the same recliners day after day, reclaiming bar stools and restaurant tables in hastily improvised routines that would rival all their old, boring habits at home. After one day’s observation, I could probably predict how most of them would structure their entire vacations. My guess was they went home feeling ever so faintly puzzled that the trip hadn’t generated the kind of rest they were looking forward to.

  Wendell and the woman had parked themselves two loungers down from the spot they’d occupied the day before. The presence of another couple suggested they hadn’t been quite quick enough for the location they really wanted. Again, Wendell occupied himself with two issues of the news: one in English from San Diego and one in Spanish. My proximity attracted little notice, and made a point of making no eye contact with Wendell or the woman. Casually I took pictures, feigning interest in architectural details, arty angles, ocean views. If I focused on anything in range of them, they seemed to sense it, retreating like exotic forms of sea life recoiling in self-protection.

  They ordered lunch by the pool. I munched on some wholesome chips and salsa at the bar, nose buried in a magazine but keeping them in view. I sunbathed and read. Occasionally I went over to the shallow end of the pool and got my feet wet. Even with the oppressive July temperatures, the water seemed nippy, and if I lowered myself into the depths by as much as six inches, I suffered shortness of breath and a nearly overwhelming desire to shriek. I didn’t really relax my vigilance until I heard Wendell make arrangements to go deep-sea fishing the following afternoon. Had I been truly paranoid, I might have pictured the outing as a cover for his next big getaway, but at that point what did he have to get away from? He didn’t know me from Adam, and I hadn’t given him any reason to suspect that I knew him.

  To pass the time, I wrote a postcard to Henry Pitts, my Santa Teresa landlord. Henry’s eighty-four years old and adorable: tall and lean, with a great set of legs. He’s smart and good-natured, sharper than a lot of guys I know who are half his age. Lately he’d been on a tear because his older brother William, who was now eighty-six, was having a geriatric fling with Rosie, the Hungarian woman who owned the tavern down the street from us. William had come out from Michigan early the previous December, fighting off a bout of depression that descended on him in the wake of a heart attack. William was a trial under the best of circumstances, but his “brush with death” (as he referred to it) had exacerbated all his worst qualities. I gathered that Henry’s other siblings – Lewis, who was eighty-seven, Charlie, age ninety-one, and Nell, who turned ninety-four in December – had taken a completely democratic family vote and, in Henry’s absence, had awarded him custody.

  William’s original two-week visit had now expanded to seven months, and the personal proximity was taking its toll. William, a self-absorbed hypochondriac, prissy, temperamental, and pious, had fallen in love with my friend Rosie, who was herself bossy, neurotic, flirtatious, opinionated, penny-pinching, and outspoken. It was a match made in heaven. Love had turned them both rather kittenish, and it was nearly more than Henry could bear. I thought it was cute, but what did I know?

  I finished the card to Henry and wrote one to Vera, employing a few carefully chosen Spanish phrases. The day seemed interminable, all heat and bugs, kids shrieking in the pool with ear-splitting regularity. Wendell and the woman seemed perfectly content to lie in the sunshine and brown themselves. Hadn’t anyone ever warned them about wrinkles, skin cancer, and sun poisoning? I retreated into the shade at intervals, too restless to concentrate on the book I was reading. He certainly didn’t behave like a man on the run. He acted like a man with all the time in the world. Maybe after five years he no longer thought of himself as a fugitive. Little did he know that officially he was dead.

  Around five, the viento negro began to blow. On a nearby side table, Wendell’s newspapers gave a rattle, pages rimed into “napping attention like a set of canvas sails. I saw the woman snatch at them with annoyance, gathering them together with her towel and her beach hat. She slid her feet into her flip-flops and waited impatiently for Wendell to collect himself. He took a final plunge in the pool, apparently washing off the sunscreen before he joined her. I collected my belongings and left in advance, conscious that the two of them were not far behind. As anxious as I was to maintain a connection, I thought it unwise to be any more direct than I’d been. I might have introduced myself,
striking up a conversation in which I might gradually bring the subject around to their current circumstances. I’d noticed, however, their scrupulous avoidance of any show of friendliness, and I had to guess they’d have shunned any overtures. Better to feign a similar disinterest than excite their suspicion.

  I went up to my room and shut the door behind me, watching through the fish-eye until I saw them pass. I had to assume they’d hole up the way the rest of us did until the winds had died. I took a shower and changed into a pair of dark cotton slacks and the dark cotton blouse that I’d worn on the plane. I stretched out on the bed and pretended to read, dozing intermittently until the corridors were quiet and no noises at all filtered up from the pool. I could still hear blowing sand slant against my sliding glass door in gusts. The hotel’s air-conditioning, which was fitful at best, seemed to drone off and on in a fruitless attempt to cut into the heat. Sometimes the room would be refrigerator chilly. The rest of the time the air was merely tepid and stale. This was the kind of hotel that generates worries about exotic new strains of Legionnaires’ disease.

  When I woke it was dark. I was disoriented at first, unsure where I was. I reached out and turned the light on, checking my watch: 7:12. Oh, yeah. I remembered Wendell and the fact that I was dogging his trail. Had the pair left the premises? I got up from the bed and padded to the door in my bare feet, peering out. The hall was brightly illuminated, empty in both directions. I slipped my key in my pocket and left the room. I moved down the hall, passing 312, hoping a crack of light beneath the door might indicate that their room was occupied. I couldn’t tell one way or the other, and I didn’t dare risk plastering my ear to the door.

  I went back to my room and slipped on my shoes on. Then I went into the bathroom, where I brushed my teeth and ran a comb through my hair. I snagged a shabby hotel towel and took it out on the balcony, placing it on the railing near the right-hand side. I left my room lights on, locked the door behind me, and went downstairs with my binoculars in hand. I checked the coffee shop, the newsstand off the lobby, and the bar downstairs. There was no sign of Wendell or the woman who accompanied him. Once outside on the walkway, I turned and lifted my binoculars, skimming my sights across the hotel’s facade. On the top floor, I spotted the towel on my balcony, magnified now to the size of a blanket. I counted two balconies to the left. There was no sign of activity, but Wendell’s room lights were dimly visible and the sliding glass door seemed to be halfway open. Were they gone or asleep? I found the house phone in the lobby and dialed 312. No one answered my ring. I returned to my room, tucked my room key, pen, paper, and my soft-sided flashlight in my pants pocket. I doused the lights.

  I went out onto my balcony and leaned my elbows on the railing, staring out at the night. I kept my expression contemplative, as though I were communing with nature when I was really trying to figure out how to break into the room two doors over. Not that anyone was watching. Across the face of the hotel, less than half the rooms were lighted, bougainvillea trailing like dark Spanish moss. I could see an occasional guest sitting out on the balcony, sometimes a cigarette ember glowing in the shadows. By now it was fully dark and the grounds were plunged in gloom. The exterior walkways were lined with little low-voltage lamps. The swimming pool glowed like a semiprecious stone, though the filtering system was probably still laboring to remove all the soot. On the far side of the pool, some sort of social event was just getting under way-music, the buzz of conversation, the smoky scent of grilled meat. I didn’t think anyone would notice if, chimplike, I swung from one balcony to the next.

  I leaned forward as far as I could and peered right. The adjacent patio was dark. The sliding glass door was closed and the drapes were drawn. I had no way of knowing if the room was occupied, but it didn’t seem to be. I was going to have to risk it in any event. I swung my left leg over the railing and tucked my foot between the pales, adjusting my position before I swung my right leg into place. The distance to the next balcony was a bit of a stretch. I grabbed the railing and gave it a preliminary yank, testing it against my weight. I was aware of the yawning three-story drop, and I could feel my basic dislike of heights kick in. If I slipped, the bushes wouldn’t do much to cushion my fall. I pictured myself impaled on an ornamental shrub. Not a pretty sight, that one-a hard-assed private eye, punctured by a sticker bush. I wiped my palm on my pants and reached across again. I extended my left foot and inserted it between the pales on the next balcony. It’s never smart to give a lot of thought to these things.

  I made my mind a blank and hauled myself clumsily from my balcony to the next. In silence I crossed my neighbor’s patio and went through an identical procedure on the other side, only this time I paused long enough to peer around the comer and satisfy myself that Wendell’s room was empty. The drapes were pulled back, and though the room itself was dark, I could see a rectangle of light slanting out of the bathroom. I reached across to his railing, again testing my weight before I ventured the distance.

  Once on Wendell’s balcony, I took a little time to catch my breath. A breeze touched my face, the chill making me aware that I was sweating from tension. I stood near the sliding glass door and peered in. The bed was a king-size, the cotton spread pulled down. The sheets were atangle, showing the tousled imprint of a little predinner sex. I could smell the lingering musk of the woman’s perfume, the damp smell of soap where they’d washed up afterward. I used my little pocket flash to amplify the light seeping in from outside. I crossed to the door and secured the chain, peering through the fish-eye at the empty corridor beyond. I checked the time. It was 7:45. With luck, they’d taxied into town for dinner as I had the night before. I flipped on the overhead light, trusting providence.

  I did a, visual survey of the bathroom first, since it was closest to the door. She had covered the counter on either side of the sink with a profusion of toiletries: shampoo, conditioner, deodorant, cologne, cold cream, moisturizer, skin toner, foundation, blusher, loose powder, eye shadow, eyeliner, mascara, hairdryer, hairspray, mouthwash, toothbrush, toothpaste, floss, hairbrush, eyelash curler. How did the woman ever manage to leave the room? After doing her “toilette” every morning, it’d be time for bed again. She had washed out two pairs of nylon underpants, which she’d hung over the shower rod. I had pictured her in black lacy bikini briefs, but these were that serviceable, high-waisted style favored by lingerie conservatives. She probably wore bras that looked like connective appliances after back surgery.

  Wendell had been accorded the lid to the toilet tank, where his Dopp kit sat, black leather with a monogram in gold that read DDH. That was interesting. All he carried with him was a toothbrush, toothpaste, shaving gear, and contact lens case. He probably borrowed her shampoo and deodorant. I checked my watch again. The time was 7:52. I peered through the fish-eye with caution. So far the coast was clear. My tension had passed, and I suddenly realized I was enjoying myself. I suppressed a quick laugh, doing a little dance step in my tennis shoes. I love this stuff. I was born to snoop. Nothing’s as exhilarating as a night of breaking and entering. I turned back to the task, fairly humming with happiness. If I didn’t work in behalf of law enforcement, I’d be in jail, I’m sure.

  Chapter 4

  *

  The woman turned out to be the sort who unpacked all her suitcases, probably within minutes of checking into a room. She’d taken the right side of the double dresser, and she’d filled the space neatly: jewelry and underwear in the top drawer, along with her passport. I scribbled down her name, which was Renata Huff, passport number, birth date, place of birth, the passport agency that had issued the document, and the date of expiration. Without searching further among her personal effects, I checked the top drawer on Wendell’s side of the dresser, hitting pay dirt again. His passport indicated that he was using the name Dean DeWitt Huff. I made a note of the data and checked the fish-eye again. The corridor was empty. It was now 8:02, probably time to scram. With every additional minute, there was an accelerating risk, esp
ecially since I had no idea what time they’d left. Still, as long as I was there, I thought I’d see if anything else turned up. I went back and opened the remaining drawers systematically, sliding my hand under and between the neatly stacked articles of clothing. All of Wendell’s clothes and his personal effects were still in his suitcase, which was propped open on a stand. I worked in haste, with as much care as I could muster, not wanting them to discern my presence after the fact. I lifted my head. Had I heard a noise or not? I checked the fish-eye again.

  Wendell and the woman had just emerged from the elevator and were heading in my direction. She was visibly upset, voice shrill, her gestures theatrical. He was looking grim, his face stony and his mouth set, slapping a newspaper against his leg as he walked.

  One of the things I’ve learned about panic is that it inspires gross errors in judgment. Events take place in a blur in which the instinct for survival-winged flight, in this case – overrules all else. Suddenly you find yourself on the far side of a crisis in worse shape than you were to start. The instant I spotted them, I tucked all my personal items in my pants pocket and slid the security chain off the slide track. I reached for the bathroom light and flipped it out, flipped out the overhead light in the bedroom, and then moved speedily to the sliding glass door to the balcony. Once outside, I glanced back to assure myself that I’d left the room just as I’d found it. Shit! They’d left the bathroom light on. I’d flipped it out. As though with X-ray vision, I could picture Wendell approaching on the far side of the door, room key at the ready. In my imagination he was moving faster than I was. I calculated rapidly. It was too late to correct. Maybe they’d forget or imagine that the bulb had burned out.