“So any checks would go there?” she asked a put-upon SSA worker.
“She hasn't filed for benefits, so there are no checks going out.”
“If you get a change of address, would you please let me know, Mr…”
“Vicks. If it comes to my attention I'll try, but we don't work with individual petitions unless there's a specific problem-”
“I've got a specific problem, Mr. Vicks.”
“I'm sure you do- all right, let me tag this, but I have to tell you things get lost, so you're best off checking in with us from time to time.”
She called Player's Management. No one answered; no machine. Maybe Balch was on his way up the coast to Montecito. Taking some downtime to obliterate evidence at the boss's request.
Next came the Merrill Lynch broker. Morad Ghadoomian had a pleasant, unaccented voice, sounded prepared for the call.
“Poor Ms. Boehlinger. I suppose you want to know if she had any financial entanglements. Unfortunately, she didn't.”
“Unfortunately?”
“No entanglements,” he said, “because there was nothing to tangle.”
“No money in the account?”
“Nothing substantial.”
“Could you be a little more specific, sir?”
“I wish I could- suffice it to say I was led to expect things that never materialized.”
“She told you she'd be investing large sums of money but didn't?”
“Well… I'm really not sure what the rules are here in terms of disclosure. Neither is my boss- we've never dealt with a murder before. We do get deceased clients all the time, estate lawyers, IRS reporting, but this… suffice it to say Ms. Boehlinger only came by my office once, and that was to fill out forms and seed the account.”
“How much seed did she sow?” said Petra.
“Well… I don't want to step out of line here… suffice it to say it was minimal.”
Petra waited.
“A thousand dollars,” said Ghadoomian. “Just to get things going.”
“In stock?”
The broker chuckled. “Ms. Boehlinger's plans were to build up a sizable securities account. Her timing couldn't have been better- I'm sure you know how well the market's been doing. But she never followed through with instructions, and the thousand remained in a money market fund, earning four percent.”
“How much did she say she was going to invest?”
“She never said, she just implied. My impression was that it would be substantial.”
“Six figures?”
“She talked about achieving financial independence.”
“Who referred her to you?”
“Hmm… I believe she just called on her own. Yes, I'm sure of it. A reverse cold call.” He chuckled again.
“But she never followed through.”
“Never. I did try to reach her. Suffice it to say, I was disap-pointed.”
Financial independence- Lisa expecting a windfall? Or just deciding to get serious as she approached thirty by banking Ramsey's monthly support check and living off her editor's salary? A surplus of eighty grand a year could add up.
A reduction in the eighty would have upset Lisa's investment plans.
Had Ramsey balked after Lisa got a job, threatened to take her back to court, and was that why she hadn't followed through?
Or was it something simple- she'd chosen another broker?
Not likely. Why would she have left the thousand sitting there with Ghadoomian?
Was money another issue between the Ramseys?
Money and thwarted passion- no better setup for murder.
She spent an hour on the phone talking to civil servants at the Hall of Records, finally located the original Ramsey divorce papers. The final decree had been granted a little over five months ago. No obvious complications, no petitions to alter support, so if Ramsey had balked, he hadn't made it official.
Then a message came through to call ID Division at Parker Center, no name.
The civilian clerk there said, “I'll put you through to Officer Portwine.”
She knew the name but not the face. Portwine was one of the prints specialists; she'd seen his signature on reports.
He had a reedy voice and a humorless, rapid delivery. “Thanks for calling back. This could be either a major-league screwup or something interesting, hope you can tell me which.”
“What's wrong?” said Petra.
“You sent us some material from the Lisa Boehlinger-Ramsey crime scene- food wrapper and a book. We obtained numerous prints, most likely female from the size, but no match in any of our files. I was just about to write you a report to that effect when I got another batch, supposedly from another case- burglary on North Gardner, latents from a kitchen knife and some food containers. I had a spare minute, so I looked at them, and they matched yours. So what I need to know is was there some kind of mix-up in the batch numbers, the forms getting screwed up? Because it's bizarre, two batches coming from Hollywood, one after the other, and we get the exact same prints. We caught hell about our cataloging last year. Even though we're careful, you know how much stuff we process. We've been bending over backwards, meaning if there is a problem on this one, it's on your end, not ours.”
How could a guy talk so fast? Enduring the speech, Petra had dug her nails into her palm.
“When was the burglary?” she said.
“Last night. A Six car handled it and referred it to one of your D's- W. B. Fournier.”
Petra looked over at Wil's desk. Gone and checked out.
“What kind of food containers were printed?”
“Plastic orange juice jug, the prints were on the paper label. And a pineapple- that was interesting, never printed a pineapple before. There're some other samples supposedly coming, says here a Krazy Glue tape from stainless steel plumbing fixtures, and a bottle of shampoo, also tape from… looks like a refrigerator, yes, a refrigerator. Sounds like a kitchen burglary. So what's the story?”
“I don't know a thing about the burglary. All we sent you from Ramsey were the food wrapper and the book and the victim's clothing.”
“You're telling me this other material isn't yours?”
“That is exactly what I'm telling you,” said Petra.
Portwine whistled. “Two sets of prints from the same person, two different crime scenes.”
“Looks that way,” said Petra. Her heart was racing. “Do you still have the Ramsey batch- specifically, the book?”
“Nope, sent it down to evidence yesterday at seventeen hundred hours, but I did keep a copy of the prints. Some pretty distinctive ridges, that's how I noticed the match.”
“Okay, thanks.”
“Welcome,” said Portwine, grudgingly. “At least we don't have a problem.”
She left Wil Fournier a note to get in touch. Still no message from Stu, and he didn't pick up his cell phone.
After driving downtown to Parker Center, she smiled her way into the employee parking lot and went up to the third-floor evidence room, where she filled out a requisition for the library book. The evidence warden was a dyed-blond black woman named Sipes who was unimpressed by the fact that the victim was L. Boehlinger-Ramsey and pointed out to Petra that she hadn't written in the case number clearly. Petra erased and rewrote and Sipes disappeared behind endless rows of beige metal shelving, returning ten minutes later, shaking her head. “That lot number hasn't been checked in.”
“I'm sure it has,” said Petra. “Last night. Officer Portwine from ID sent it over yesterday at five P.M.”
“Yesterday? Why didn't you say so? That would be in a different place.”
Another fifteen minutes passed before Petra had the evidence envelope in hand and Sipes's permission to take it.
Back in the Ford, she removed the book. Our Presidents: The March of American History.
Bag lady with an interest in government and burglary. Breaking into homes stealing food? Most likely schizo. She flipped pages, looking for notes in the margin, some overlooked bit of scrap. Nothing. Remarkably, the checkout card was still in the circulation packet.