I drove across the Bay Bridge to Emeryville and Eastside Meat Packers. The burly warehouse foreman I spoke to there pulled a disgusted face when I asked for Charlie Bright. “Not working today,” he said. “Called in sick again.”
“Again?”
“Getting to be a habit the past few weeks. We don’t mind giving ex-cons a break, but they got to show up regular and pull their weight. Bright’s not doing either one. I told him this morning — one more sick day and his ass is fired.”
The rooming house address Ben Duryea had given me was in a semi-industrial area close to downtown Oakland. The woman who ran the place said, “He don’t live here anymore. I kicked him out more than two weeks ago.”
“Why?”
“Didn’t pay his rent, that’s why. I don’t allow freeloaders. Pay up on time or they’re history.”
“Why didn’t you report this to his parole officer? Isn’t that what you’re supposed to do?
“Told my daughter to take care of that. Mean she didn’t? Damn that girl; I can’t trust her to do nothing except run around with that no-good boyfriend of hers.”
I checked back with Eastside Meat Packers by phone, used Ben Duryea’s name to get their personnel department to look up Bright’s employee file. The address they had for him was the Oakland rooming house. Bright hadn’t bothered to inform his employers that he’d moved, either.
When I walked into the office shortly before noon, Tamara said, “You’re lucky you got me as your assistant, you know it?”
“Sure I know it. What’d you do that makes you look so smug?”
“Some PR, my man.”
“What kind of PR?”
“Media kind, best there is. Reporter and cameraman from Channel Seven showed up a while ago, wanted an interview about the two murders. You know about Cohalan getting wasted, right?”
“Fuentes called me in yesterday to ID the body. Didn’t I mention that in my phone message?”
“No, and they done surprised me with it. But I was smooth as silk. Gave ’em their interview and plenty more.”
“Tamara... what’d you tell them?”
“Nothing you won’t like, don’t worry. What a fine detective you are, how you always putting out for our clients, how much you taught me. No bullshit, just the wide-eyed truth. Man, they ate it up.”
“Terrific.”
“Yeah,” she said, misreading my reaction. “Now I’m glad I let Horace talk me into upscaling my image. I’m gonna look like I belong on Oprah, foxy black lady PI with butter just oozin’ out my mouth. We’ll have to beat off the new clients with a stick.”
Maybe so, but it did not set well with me; I wished she hadn’t done it. The last thing I needed right now was more media attention, a rush of new clients. But I didn’t say any of this to Tamara. Why burst her bubble? She was pleased with herself, believed she’d done a good thing with the best of intentions. So young, such a child of the new fast-track millenium where image and publicity and self-promotion ruled. Intellectually she understood what had happened to me Friday night, but its emotional baggage and effects were not within her experience. And I hoped to God they never would be. No one can understand what it’s like to be a victim of mindless violence except the survivors.
I asked her, “When did they say the interview would air?”
“Tonight. Six o’clock news.”
“If I’m near a TV I’ll be sure to watch,” I lied.
“No problem if you’re not. I already called up Horace and told him to tape it.”
I eased her off the subject by saying, “Right now we’ve got work to do. Any new information for me?”
“One piece on Byers. May not mean much.”
“Give.”
“Girl didn’t graduate with her high school class in Lodi. Never did get her diploma. Made me wonder, so I accessed some public records. What do you think?”
“Pregnant?”
“Right on. Knocked up at seventeen.”
“She have the baby?”
“Six-pound, nine-ounce boy. Kevin Paul.”
“Who’s the father?”
“Grant Johnson. Year older, went to the same high school.”
“He marry her?”
“Nope. Not in California or Nevada, anyway.”
“Who ended up with the kid? Not Byers?”
“Still working on that. Might be the father, might be she gave it up for adoption.”
“What else have you got on Grant Johnson?”
“Born in Lodi like Byers, played football and basketball in high school, worked as a truck driver and plumber’s helper before and after graduation. No criminal record.”
“Family wouldn’t be Australian, by any chance?”
“Uh-uh. American WASP.”
“See if you can get a photo of him anyway, or at least a general description.”
“Will do.”
“Here’s some more work for you. Pull up whatever you can on a character named Jackie Spoons — strongarm type reputed to be involved in the crystal meth trade. He’s a Greek, real name Andropopolous or something similar. What I’m most interested in is a connection between him and Dingo or any other Australian, him and Jay Cohalan and/or Charlie Bright.”
“You think one of those dudes is Baldy?”
“Not Jackie Spoons or Bright. But they might be mixed up with him in some way.”
Tamara’s self-satisfaction had rubbed away. She seemed to be seeing me clearly for the first time since I came in; her brown eyes showed concern. “You look tired,” she said. “You okay? I mean...”
“I know what you mean. Hanging in there.”
“Truly?”
“Truly.”
“That’s my dawg,” she said, but she wasn’t smiling.
I brought a cup of coffee to my desk. Tamara had laid a message on the blotter to call Joe DeFalco at the Chronicle. When I got DeFalco on the line, I ran the bunch of names by him. The only one that rang bells was Jay Cohalan, and only because of the double homicide.
“Check your morgue files, will you, Joe? See if you can turn up any links among Jackie Spoons, Dingo, and the others.”
“Quid pro quo,” he said. “If there’s an exclusive here...”
“You’ll get it, don’t worry. Same deal we’ve always had.”
“That Sentinels business,” he said reminiscently. “Man, I should’ve had a Pulitzer nomination for my expose.”
“Your expose. Right. Joe DeFalco, fearless investigative reporter. All you did, buddy, was write up what I handed you.”
“Sure, but I wrote it so damn well.”
Joe DeFalco, egotist and bullshitter.
I had some other casework to do, but my head wasn’t into it. I plugged away sporadically while Tamara went to get us a cold lunch; gave it up and considered a call to Nick Kinsella. Counterproductive, I decided. He was not a man you could prod, especially not when he was doing you a favor.
On impulse I took the plastic chip out of my wallet and studied it again, trying to get an idea. I’d shown it to Kerry yesterday, but if it was some kind of advertising gimmick, she knew nothing about it. Thumbing through the Yellow Pages had been a waste of time. Lucky Buffalo Chip. Remember the Alamo! Signifying what, and why had Cohalan been carrying the chip?
I was still fiddling with it when Tamara came back. She plunked one of two paper sacks down in front of me, paused, and then asked, “What’s that you got there?”
Young eyes, eagle eyes. I showed her the chip.
“Oh, yeah,” she said. “The Alamo.”
“You recognize this?”
“Sure. Don’t tell me you hang out down there.”
“Down where?”
“The Alamo. Somebody gave it to you, huh?”
“Mel Bishop. Carolyn Dain found it in her husband’s pocket.”
“No shit?”
“Tamara.”
“Sorry. Doesn’t seem like that dude’s scene, either.”