F is for FUGITIVE Page 4

  “I thought if you were charged with murder, they wouldn’t reduce that.”

  “True, hypothetically, but that’s not the way it works. It was just discretionary with the district attorney how he filed. What Lehto did was, he goes to De Witt and says, ‘Look, George, I’ve got evidence my guy was under the influence at the time. Evidence from your own people.’ He pulls out the police report. ‘If you’ll note in the record, when the officers arrested him, it states he appeared to be drowsy…” Blah, blah, blah. Clifford does this whole number and he can see George start to sweat. He’s got his ego on the line and he doesn’t want to go into court with a big hole in his case. As DA, you re expected to win ninety percent of the time, if not higher.”

  “So Bailey pleaded guilty to the manslaughter and the judge maxed him out,” I said.

  “Exactly. You got it, but we’re only talkin’ six years. Big deal. With time served and time off for good behavior, he might have been out in half that. The whole time, Fowler’s thinking he got screwed, but he doesn’t understand how lucky he was. Clifford Lehto did a hell of a job for him. I’d have done the same thing myself.”

  “What happens next?”

  Clemson shrugged again, stubbing out his cigarette. “Depends on how Bailey wants to plead on the felony escape. What’s he gonna say, ‘No, I didn’t escape’? Extenuating circumstances? He can always claim some prison goon was threatening his life, but that hardly explains where he’s been all this time. The irony is, he should have hired some hotshot attorney the first couple rounds. At this point, it’s not going to do him much good. I’ll go to bat for him, but no judge in his right mind is going to set bail for some guy who’s been on the lam sixteen years.”

  “What do you want from me in the meantime?”

  Clemson got up and started pawing through the piles of paper on his desk. “I had my secretary pull all the clippings from the time of the murder. You might want to look at those. Lehto said he’d send down everything he’s got. Police reports, list of witnesses. Talk to Bailey and see if he’s got anything to add. You know the drill. Go back through the players and find me another suspect. Maybe we can develop evidence against somebody else and get Bailey off the hook. Otherwise, he’s lookin’ at a lot more years in the slammer unless I can persuade the judge no purpose would be served, which is what I’ll try to do. He’s been clean all this time, and personally, I can’t see the point of puttin’ him back in, but who knows? Here.”

  He unearthed an accordion file and handed it to me. I got to my feet and we shook hands again, chatting about other things as we left his office, walking toward the front. The office temp was sitting at her desk by then, trying to sustain an air of competence. She looked young and bewildered, out of her element in the world of habeas corpus, or corpuses of any kind.

  “Oh yeah, one thing I almost forgot,” Clemson said when we reached the porch. “What Jean was upset about that night? She was pregnant. Six weeks. Bailey swears it wasn’t his.”

  Chapter 5

  *

  I had about an hour to kill before I was due at the jail. I got out a city map and found the little dark square with a flag on it that marked the location of Central Coast High School. San Luis Obispo is not a large town, and the school was only six or eight blocks away. Lines painted on the main streets delineated a Path of History that I thought I might walk later in the week. I have an affection for early California history and I was curious to see the Mission and some of the old adobes as long as I was there.

  When I reached the high school, I drove through the grounds, trying to imagine how it must have looked when Jean Timberlake was enrolled. Many of the buildings were clearly new: dark, smoke gray cinder block, trimmed in cream-colored concrete, with long, clean roof lines. The gymnasium and the cafeteria were of an earlier vintage, Spanish-style architecture done in darkening stucco with red tile roofs. On the upper level, where the road curved up and around to the right, there were modular units that had once served as classrooms and were now used for various businesses, Weight Watchers being one. The campus seemed more like a junior college than the high schools I’d seen. Rolling green hills formed a lush backdrop, giving the facility a feeling of serenity. The murder of a seventeen-year-old girl must have been deeply distressing to kids accustomed to pastoral surroundings such as these.

  From what I remember of high school, our behavior was underscored by a hunger for sensation. Feelings were intense and events were played out in emotional extremes. While the fantasy of death satisfied a craving for self-drama, the reality was usually (fortunately) at some safe remove. We were absurdly young and healthy, and though we behaved recklessly, we never expected to suffer any consequence. The notion of a real death, whether by accident or intent, would have pushed us into a state of perplexity. Love affairs provided all the theater we could handle. Our sense of tragedy and our self-centeredness were so exaggerated that we weren’t prepared to cope with any actual loss. Murder would have been beyond comprehension. Jean Timberlake’s death probably still generated discussion among the people she knew, giving rise to a disquiet that marred the memories of youth. Bailey Fowler’s sudden reappearance in the community was going to stir it all up again: uneasiness, rage, the nearly incomprehensible feelings of waste and dismay.

  On impulse, I parked the car and searched out the library, which turned out to be much like the one at Santa Teresa High. The’ space was airy and open, the noise level subdued. The vinyl floor tile was a mottled beige, polished to a dull gleam. The air smelled like furniture polish, construction paper, and paste. I must have eaten six jars of LePage’s during my grade-school years. I had a friend who ate pencil shavings. There’s a name for that now, for kids who eat inorganic oddities like gravel and clay. In my day, it just seemed like a fun thing to do and no one ever gave it a passing thought as far as I knew.

  The library tables were sparsely occupied and the reference desk was being handled by a young girl with frizzy hair and a ruby drilled into the side of her nose. She had apparently been seized by a fit of self-puncturing because both ears had been pierced repeatedly from the lobe to the helix. In lieu of earrings, she was sporting the sort of items you’d find in my junk drawer at home: paper clips, screws, safety pins, shoelaces, wing nuts. She was perched on a stool with a copy of Rolling Stone open on her lap. Mick Jagger was on the cover, looking sixty if a day.

  “Hi.”

  She looked at me blankly.

  “I wonder if you can give me some help. I used to be a student here and I can’t find my yearbook. Do you have any copies? I’d like to take a look.”

  “Under the window. First and second shelves.” I pulled the annuals from three separate years and took them to a table on the far side of a row of free-standing bookcases. A bell rang and the corridor began to fill with the rustling sound of students on the move. The slamming of locker doors was punctuated by the babble of voices, laughter bouncing off the walls with the harsh echo of a racquetball court. The ghostly scent of gym socks wafted in.

  I traced Jean Timberlake’s picture back, volume by volume, like the aging process in reverse. During her high school years, while the rest of California’s youth were protesting the war, smoking dope, and heading for the Haight, the girls at Central Coast were teasing their hair into glossy towers, putting black lines around their eyes and white gloss on their lips. The junior girls wore white blouses and bouffant hair, which curved out in a heavily sprayed flip at the sides. The guys had damp-looking crewcuts and braces on their teeth. They couldn’t have guessed how soon they’d be sporting sideburns, beards, bell-bottoms, and psychedelic shirts.

  Jean never looked like she had anything in common with the rest. In the few group pictures where I spotted her, she never grinned and she had none of the bouncy-looking innocence of the Debbies and the Tammies. Jean’s eyes were hooded, her gaze remote, and the faint smile that played on her mouth suggested a private amusement still evident after all these years. The blurb in the senior index lis
ted no committees or clubs. She hadn’t been burdened with scholastic honors or elective offices, and she hadn’t bothered to participate in any extracurricular activities. I leafed through candid shots taken at various school functions, but I never did catch sight of her. If she went to football or basketball games, she must have hovered somewhere beyond the range of the school photographer. She wasn’t in the senior play. All the prom pictures focused on the queen, Barbie Knox, and her entourage of beehived, white-lipped princesses. Jean Timberlake was dead by then. I jotted down the names of her more conspicuous classmates, all guys. I figured if the girls were still living in the area, they’d be listed in the phone book under married names, which I’d have to get somewhere else.

  The principal at that time was a man named Dwight Shales, whose picture appeared in an oval on one of the early pages of the annual. The school superintendent and his two assistant superintendents were each pictured separately, seated at their desks, holding official-looking papers. Sometimes a member of the office staff, female, peered over some man’s shoulder with interest, smiling perkily. The teachers had been photographed against a varied background of maps, industrial arts equipment, textbooks, and blackboards on which phrases had. been writ large in chalk. I noted some of their names and specialties, thinking I might want to return at a later date to talk to one or two. A young Ann Fowler was one of four guidance counselors photographed on a separate page with a paragraph underneath. “These counselors gave extra time, thought, and encouragement to us as they helped us plan our program for the next year wisely or advised us when we had decisions to make regarding our future plans for jobs or college.” I thought Ann looked prettier then, not as tired or as soured.

  I tucked my notes away and returned the books to the shelves. I headed down the hallway, passing the nurse’s office and the attendance office. The administrative offices were located near the main entrance. According to the name plate on the wall beside the door, Shales was still the school principal. I asked his secretary if I could see him, and after a brief wait, I was ushered into his office. I could see my business card sitting in the center of the blotter on his desk.

  He was a man in his mid-fifties, medium height, trim, with a square face. The color of his hair had changed from blond to a premature white, and he’d grown it out from its original mid-sixties crewcut. His whole manner was authoritarian, his hazel eyes as watchful as a cop’s. He had that same air of assessment, as if he were checking back through his mental files to come up with my rap sheet. I felt my cheeks warm, wondering if he could tell at a glance what a troublesome student I’d been in high school.

  “Yes, ma’am,” he said. “What can I do for you?”

  “I’ve been hired by Royce Fowler in Floral Beach to look into the death of a former student of yours named Jean Timberlake.” I’d expected him to remember her without further prompting, but he continued to look at me with studied neutrality. Surely he couldn’t know about the dope I’d smoked back then.

  “You do remember her,” I said.

  “Of course. I was just trying to think if we’d held on to the records on her. I’m not sure where they’d be.”

  “I’ve just had a conversation with Bailey’s attorney. If you need some kind of release…”

  He gestured carelessly. “That’s not necessary. I know Jack Clemson and I know the family. I’d have to clear it with the school superintendent, but I can’t see that it’d be any problem… if we can locate ‘em. It’s the simple question of what we’ve got. You’re talking more than fifteen years ago.”

  “Seventeen,” I said. “Do you have any personal recollections of the girl?”

  “Let me get clearance on the matter first and then I’ll get back to you. You’re local?”

  “Well, I’m from Santa Teresa, but I’m staying at the Ocean Street in Floral Beach. I can give you the number…”

  “I’ve got the number. I’ll call you as soon as I know anything. Might be a couple of days, but we’ll see what we can do. I can’t make any guarantees.”

  “I understand that,” I said.

  “Good. We’ll help you if we can.” His handshake was brisk and firm.

  At three-fifteen I headed north on Highway 1 to the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff’s Department, part of a complex of buildings that includes the jail. The surrounding countryside is open, characterized by occasional towering outcroppings of rock. The hills look like soft humps of foam rubber, upholstered in variegated green velvet. Across the road from the Sheriff’s Department is the California Men’s Colony, where Bailey had been incarcerated at the time of his escape. It amused me that in the promotional literature extolling the virtues of life in San Luis Obispo County, there’s never any mention of the six thousand prisoners also in residence.

  I parked in one of the visitors’ slots in front of the jail. The building looked new, similar in design and construction materials to the newer portions of the high school where I’d just been. I went into the lobby, signs directing me to the booking and inmate information section down a short corridor to the right. I identified myself to the uniformed deputy in the glass-enclosed office, where I could see the dispatcher, the booking officer, and the computer terminals. To the left, I caught a glimpse of the covered garage where prisoners could be brought in by sheriffs’ vehicles.

  While arrangements were being made to bring Bailey out, I was directed to one of the small, glass-enclosed booths reserved for attorney-client conferences. A sign on the wall spelled out the rules for visitors, admonishing us that there could only be one registered visitor per inmate at any one time. We were to keep control of children, and any rude or boisterous conduct toward the staff was not going to be tolerated. The restrictions suggested past scenes of chaos and merriment I was already wishing I’d been privy to.

  I could hear the muffled clanking of doors. Bailey Fowler appeared, his attention focused on the deputy who was unlocking the booth where he would sit while we spoke. We were separated by glass, and our conversation would be conducted by way of two telephone handsets, one on his side, one on mine. He glanced at me incuriously and then sat down. His demeanor was submissive and I found myself feeling embarrassed in his behalf. He wore a loosely structured orange cotton shirt over dark gray cotton pants. The newspaper photograph had shown him in a suit and tie. He seemed as bewildered by the clothing as he was by his sudden status as an inmate. He was remarkably good-looking: grave blue eyes, high cheekbones, full mouth, dark blond hair already in need of a cut. He was a tired forty, and I suspected circumstances had aged him overnight. He shifted in the straight-backed wooden chair, clasping his hands loosely between his knees, his expression empty of emotion.

  I picked up the phone, waiting briefly while he picked up the receiver on his side. I said, “I’m Kinsey Millhone.”

  “Do I know you?”

  Our voices sounded odd, both too tinny and too near.

  “I’m the private investigator your father hired. I just spent some time with your attorney. Have you talked to him yet?”

  “Couple of times on the phone. He’s supposed to stop by this afternoon.” His voice was as lifeless as his gaze.

  “Is it all right if I call you Bailey?”

  “Yeah, sure.”

  “Look, I know this whole thing’s a bummer, but Clemson’s good. He’ll do everything possible to get you out of here.”

  Bailey’s expression clouded over. “He better do something quick.”

  “You have family in L.A.? Wife and kids?”

  “Why?”

  “I thought there might be someone you wanted me to get in touch with.”

  “I don’t have family. Just get me the hell out of here.”

  “Hey, come on. I know it’s tough.”

  He looked up and off to one side, anger glinting in his eyes before the brief show of feeling subsided into bleakness again. “Sorry.”

  “Talk to me. We may not have long.”

  “About what?”

  “Any
thing. When’d you get up here? How was the ride?”

  “Fine.”

  “How’s the town look? Has it changed much?”

  “I can’t make small talk. Don’t ask me to do that.”

  “You can’t shut down on me. We have too much work to do.”

  He was silent for a moment and I could see him struggle with the effort to be communicative. “For years, I wouldn’t even drive through this part of the state for fear I’d get stopped.” Transmission faltered and came to a halt. The look he gave me was haunted, as if he longed to speak, but had lost the capacity. It felt as if we were separated by more than a sheet of glass.

  I said, “You’re not dead, you know.”

  “Says you.”

  “You must have known it would happen one day.”

  He tilted his head, doing a neck roll to work the tension out. “They picked me up the first time, I thought it was all over. Just my luck there’s a Peter Lambert out there wanted on a murder one. When they let me go, I thought maybe I had a chance.”

  “I’m surprised you didn’t take off.”

  “I wish now I had, but I’d been free so long. I couldn’t believe they’d get me. I couldn’t believe anybody cared. Besides, I had a job and I couldn’t just chuck it all and hit the road.”

  “You’re some kind of clothing rep, aren’t you? The L.A. papers mentioned that.”

  “I worked for Needham. One of their top salesmen last year, which is how I got promoted. Western regional manager. I guess I should have turned it down, but I worked hard and I got tired of saying no. It meant a move to Los Angeles, but I didn’t see how I could get tripped up after all this time.”

  “How long have you been with the company?”

  “Twelve years.”

  “What’s their attitude? Can you count on them for any help?”

  “They’ve been great. Real supportive. My boss said he’d come up here and testify… be a character witness and stuff like that, but what’s the point? I feel like such a jerk. I’ve been straight all these years. Your proverbial model citizen. I never even got a parking ticket. Paid taxes, went to church.”