Brennan just looked at her. She pressed in again, bullying him, making such a pest of herself that at last Brennan sighed, swung away to his desk, and got Harper on the radio.
The call changed Brennan's behavior. Within seconds, Captain Harper phoned her, on a private line which Brennan said she could take in the back, at Harper's desk. She had graduated from faceless civilian to someone Brennan paid attention to. Walking back to Harper's desk, she glanced innocently at the two officers who had watched her, a little while ago, trot past their desks in cream-colored fur behind the heels of the office clerk.
She picked up the phone at Harper's desk, standing away from the desk top so she wouldn't appear to be reading the stack of papers and scattered notes.
Harper's voice was strained and hurried. "You have some evidence to give me, Kate? For what? What kind of evidence? What is it that can't wait?" He did sound as if he was in the middle of something urgent.
"I have some bankbooks of Jimmie's. They were in our desk."
"What kind of bankbooks? Tell me about them." His voice had softened, and slowed. He sounded like he might be sitting down.
"There are five books, on five foreign accounts. Big balances. Several hundred thousand each. Money," she said, "that he couldn't have legally. I didn't know what else to do with them, but I think they're important. I didn't know who else to go to. I don't have an attorney, not one I trust."
She couldn't say that she knew Harper wanted the bankbooks, that she had heard him tell Clyde how important this evidence was. "There are two accounts in the Bahamas, two in Panama, one in Curacao. The sums have been deposited over a four-year period. They add up to more than two million. This year's deposits are about two hundred and fifty thousand. Captain Harper, there's no way Jimmie could have this kind of money."
"Kate, you bet I want to see them. Can you wait at the station for, say, half an hour? We're in the middle of something urgent here, but I'll be back as soon as I can. Within the hour."
"I have some errands. Could I come where you are?"
"No. Will you leave the books at the station? Meet me there in an hour?"
"I'd rather give them to you."
"Kate, give them to Officer Brennan. He's completely reliable. Those bankbooks are-may be more important than you can guess. You can watch Brennan book them in, watch him put them in the safe. Tell him to make photocopies for you. And Kate, do you know where Jimmie is?"
"Right now? He's… at home. He's-in bed."
"At home? Is he sick?"
"He's-not alone."
"Oh?" There was a long pause, then, "Thank you, Kate. Let me talk to Brennan. I'll see you at the station in an hour. Meantime, be… Don't go home."
"Not likely," she said, laughing. But she felt, suddenly, chilled and shaky.
She nodded to Officer Brennan, and he picked up an extension. She hung up. Why had Harper asked her where Jimmie was? Why wouldn't he assume that Jimmie was at the shop?
In a minute Brennan hung up and came out to the back, his stomach preceding him slightly in the tight shirt. He led her down the hall and into the evidence room. She watched him book in the evidence and make photocopies for her of the bankbook covers and the deposit pages. He stapled them with an itemized receipt on which he listed every detail, names of the banks, the cities and countries, the amounts. She watched him lock the books in the safe with a duplicate of her receipt. The man might be officious, at least sometimes, but he was thorough.
From the police station she drove directly to the Molena Point bank and drew a cashier's check for the forty thousand in their joint savings account. She took that across the street to the Bank of California.
In the cool, high-ceilinged lobby, with its skylights and potted ficus trees, she sat opposite a bank officer at his desk filling out the required cards and forms for an account in her name alone. And, because everyone in Molena Point knew everyone else, she told the young man that she and Jimmie were making some adjustments for tax purposes.
Leaving the bank, she drove north through the village. The sun was pushing up toward noon through a clear blue sky. It was going to be warm, one of those clear sunny innocuous days that, to Californians, sometimes grew tedious by their very bland repetition. Though according to village custom, this kind of grousing was sure to bring on atypical floods, high winds, or earthquake.
She realized she hadn't had breakfast, that she was famished again though she'd stuffed herself so late last night on Clyde's spaghetti and garlic bread. There was a new little restaurant up on Highway One that was supposed to serve light French pancakes, and she headed up Ocean. She'd have breakfast, then drive on up into the hills and sit quietly until time to meet Harper. Take time for a last look at the view she loved; once she was out of town, it might be a long time before she could enjoy the hills again. The morning, despite the sun's brilliance, was still nice and cool. The heat wouldn't descend until afternoon. She drove slowly with her windows down, tasting the salt wind. Going up Ocean she saw patrol cars clustered around the shop, and a shock of coldness hit in her. She pulled over, looking.
The police had blocked off the entry to the shop with two squad cars and some sawhorses, and they had blocked off Haley Street with a patrol car angled across it. An officer stood before the door of the agency showroom, as if to let no one inside. She parked, locked her car, and walked over.
26
The cats crept behind a beam, cringing down as Wark's light swept the attic above them; it returned low, just missed them, flashing over along the top of the heavy timber where they hid.
And suddenly he fired again, into the dark beyond the beam but too close, they heard it ping into the ceiling not three feet from them; it was a wild shot. His light careened on along the base of the slanted roof, searching.
When he failed to find them he fired twice more, wild and uselessly. But he was crawling in their direction, hunching along a narrow joist straight toward them. "Split up," Dulcie whispered. "We can jump him from behind."
"And get blown to confetti."
"Have to make him drop his gun, hit him, and leap away. If he drops it down among those wires, that will give us time while he tries to fish it out."
"I don't think…" He had started to say it was a crazy idea, when, from below in the street, sirens screamed.
Nothing, nothing had ever sounded so good.
Immediately Wark's light went out and they heard him scuttle away, back toward the hole in the ceiling. That earsplitting squad car wail was the finest sound Joe had ever imagined.
Two more sirens screamed from the front of the building, then another from the side street. He could just picture the police units careening up Ocean, converging on the agency-fierce and predatory, all muscle.
They sat up and stretched, and slowly their pounding hearts eased into a gentler rhythm. They heard, below, the big metal gates roll open, and then voices. And, nearer, they heard a thud as if Wark had dropped down, perhaps onto the desk in the office.
"Is he gone?" Dulcie breathed.
"He'd better be. This is no way to spend the rest of your life."