“How’s that?” asked Curt quickly.
The man jerked a calloused thumb. “Realtor. Or Charlie, even.”
Curt arrived home fifteen minutes later, sweaty-faced and branch-lashed from his hurried return through the woods. Before going up to shower and shave, he dialed the Heritage Realty Company, 2101 Armando Road, to see if they were open on Sunday. They were. When he came back downstairs in fresh slacks and sport shirt, he paused at the phone again. There was no listing for Barbara Anderson, but there was for Charles. Homestead Avenue, Mountain View. Curt dialed, got an answer on the sixth ring from a voice full of Sunday morning phlegm.
Curt said, “Sorry to disturb you this way, Mr. Anderson, but I’m trying to get in touch with Barbara. She—”
“It’s in the phone book, for Chrissake! 1791 Edgewood Drive...”
“She moved from there about a month ago, Mr. Anderson.”
“Look, buddy,” he said flatly, “we got divorced two goddamn years ago. She got the works: house, bank account, everything but my left nut, see? I don’t have anything to do with her, don’t wanna, beyond the support payments — which go to her P.O. box. I ain’t seen her or the kid, either of ’em, for half a year. She owes you money, look somewhere else for it.” He slammed down the receiver with a curse.
Heritage Realty was a small place sharing a new but cheaply constructed building with a doughnut shop. The walls were covered with diagrams, mocked-up house-plan blueprints, and faded Polaroids of uninspiring tract houses. Behind a redwood-faced counter were four desks littered with papers; at the second desk, on the telephone, was a rather suet-faced woman with dark hair. Her name plate announced MRS. PINNEO to a waiting world. When she hung up, Curt asked his question.
“1791 Edgewood Drive? A lovely property, sir. Three bedroom, two bath, patio, electric kitchen, built-in barbecue, new—”
“I’m just trying to get in touch with the owner.”
She had dark piercing eyes, her best feature, a small pursed mouth as if she were drinking cold coffee, and pads of flesh over her cheekbones which gave her a squirrel-faced look. Her smile got soft around the edges at Curt’s remark. “We are fully authorized to act as Mrs. Anderson’s agents.”
“Yes, I’m sure. This is personal, however. Her address would—”
“Quite impossible.” The smile had thawed, and a frown was freezing quickly into place. She tapped her pencil impatiently on the desk. “We cannot give you any information whatsoever regarding Mrs. Anderson.”
“Well, then, just a phone number. I can call—”
“That number is unlisted, sir. Good day.”
“But I—”
“I said good day, sir.”
Curt stopped outside the door, blinking in the glaring midday sunshine. So. No closer to Barbara Anderson, perhaps; but morally certain that she was the one he wanted. She was, after all, obviously secluding herself and her son from someone or something. Curt didn’t doubt for a moment that it was the predators by whom she felt threatened. And didn’t that mean there was a good chance that she, or her son, knew something Curt didn’t? Something the police didn’t? That Worden didn’t?
It was time for Archie Matthews again, because this was it: the new factor in the equation. Barbara Anderson. And Jimmy.
Chapter 19
“Floyd tells me you’re about ready to qualify for the private investigator’s exam,” Archie Matthews said with a grin.
“He oversold the product,” said Curt gloomily. “I’m pretty sure that Barbara Anderson is the mother of the boy I want, but it doesn’t do much good if I can’t find her. When your answering service said on Sunday that you wouldn’t be available until today, I got her P.O. box number from her husband and sent her a letter. But she didn’t answer.”
It was Wednesday, and Curt was in Matthews’ anonymously modem office again. The private investigator had been working a case in the East Bay, had just gotten off it two hours before, and was yawning.
“What about the realty office?” he asked Curt. “They have to be able to reach her in case they get a firm offer on the house.”
“I tried them Sunday. The woman wouldn’t tell me a damned thing.”
Matthews yawned again. “Sounds like this chick has covered herself pretty well. Probably took an apartment with utilities included — which means the connection still would be in the landlord’s name, and my contacts with the gas and electric people wouldn’t be able to help.” He sat down at the desk and reached for the phone book. “Let’s try it the easy way. What’s the name of the woman at the realty company?”
“A Mrs...” Curt squinted, thinking hard. “Mrs. Pinneo.”
Matthews dialed Heritage Realty, leaning back in his expensive leather swivel chair and gazing at the ceiling with bloodshot eyes. Curt got the feeling that countless hours of Matthews’ life had been spent in just this way, patiently, emptily — and a line from Eliot’s Prufrock popped into his head: I have measured out my life with coffee spoons. Or, in Matthews’ case, phone calls.
Matthews leaned forward abruptly. “Yes, Mrs. Pinneo, please.” His voice had thickened and harshened. “Mrs. Pinneo? This is Charles Anderson. I drove by to see Barbara today, and found your For Sale sign on the Edgewood Drive house.”
The phone made squawking noises. Although Matthews’ tired face remained bland, almost cherubic, his voice became positively biting. “And just why the hell wasn’t I contacted? If my ex- had bothered to show you a copy of the divorce decree, you’d know that I retain a one-fourth interest in... what? Don’t give me that crap, lady. I gave nobody any permission...”
He broke off for more squawks, caught Curt’s eye, winked, and then went on in a nearly apoplectic voice. “You go right ahead. I’d contact her myself if I had her new address and — say, you’d better give me that, now I think of it, I — what? What the hell do you mean, you don’t... oh. Well, address, phone number, what the hell’s the difference? After three o’clock, huh?”
He listened a final time, scribbled on the back of an envelope, dropped the receiver back on the hooks, and gave the envelope to Curt. “She can be reached there, 982-7764, any time after three P.M. It’s probably unlisted, but she might have gotten cute and given a work number. Just let me check...” He got the phone company service rep on the number, asked for the registration on it, and after thirty seconds of waiting, listened, nodded, and hung up. “What I thought. Unlisted. That makes it tougher, because Ma Bell is a bitch with employees who dish out unlisted numbers.” He shot a look at the wall clock. “We’ve got until three o’clock to wait.”
Curt said, “You’re damned tired, Archie; I didn’t mean that you should do this today, without sleep...”
Matthews yawned again, rasped his hand over his stubbled chin. “Yeah, I just came in today to check the mail; was just on my way to the gym when you caught me. What say you meet me there at three o’clock and—”
“Only if you let me pay you for a full day’s work.”
The detective shook his head. “To hell with that, Curt. I cost you three yards without turning a damned thing, and here you find the kid all by yourself. For my professional pride I’ve got to do you some good. Tell you what. Buy me and the mirror athlete a good lunch, and we’ll call it square.”
Over lunch with Preston and the detective, Curt realized that Matthews, like Preston, was another of a type which was coming to interest him more and more. A doer, not a talker. Not a cynic, but a bleakly hard-nosed realist, accepting human nature as he found it, not attempting to explain evil, merely accepting its existence. Hell, Curt, my profession is the dead-beats, the drop-outs, and the cop-outs. Those who aren’t making it or want to make it all at once. He sounded remarkably like Monty Worden, that professional prober in the soft underbelly of society. There’s just two kinds of people in my book, mister: the worms and the human beings. Law-breakers and law-keepers. Even Preston, whom Curt had come to regard as a professional man, lived by the philosophy: If a guy wants trouble, hit him first.