"How can that be? I demanded. "I thought she was getting better, that the doctors said she was going to be okay.
"Doctors? What doctors?
"Kimiko's doctors, goddamnit. Halvorsen, are you drinking or what?
"Who said anything about Kimiko? Monica's gone. She left me. Went home to her mother. I can't believe it. How could she? I mean, she's why I divorced Barbara. I gave up my kids because of her.
Monica was gone, not Kimiko. My relief was almost overwhelming. "So Kimiko's all right? Did you talk to her?
"No, I came home to tell Monica I was on my way to Spokane and found her packing to leave. I tried to talk her out of it, but she wouldn't listen. Wouldn't even talk to me.
The poor bastard doesn't know when he's well off, I thought. I said, "That's too bad, Andy. I'm sorry to hear it. What are you going to do?
"Beats the hell out of me. Wait here, I guess. See if she changes her mind and comes back.
I didn't tell him not to hold his breath. Going to her mother's was probably nothing but a smoke screen. My guess was that Monica's shopping around had zeroed in on somebody more to her liking and closer to her own age.
The next ferry had pulled into the Colman dock and was disgorging its load of vehicles. Around me, people were returning to their cars, starting their engines.
"Look, Andy, I said. "I've gotta go. The ferry's here and I'm going to have to hang up. Don't try to do anything tonight. You're in no condition, but tomorrow get your ass to Spokane and go to work. It'll be good for what ails you, take your mind off your troubles.
"You're probably right, Andy Halvorsen mumbled, but he didn't sound convinced. I replaced the phone in its holder, started the car, and rumbled up the gangway onto the car deck. Front and center.
It's an eighty-seven-mile trip from Seattle to Port Angeles, part of it by ferry and the rest on narrow two-lane secondary roads that meander through the forests of the Kitsap Peninsula, Bainbridge Island, and the Olympic Peninsula. It sounds rural, and it is, but it's also full of traffic, particularly on Friday nights. I didn't make very good time.
The various port and sawmill towns that dot the Washington coastline-Port Angeles, Port Townsend, Raymond, Sequim-are as similar as peas in a pod. I've always maintained that you could get drunk in one, wake up in another, and never know the difference.
Port Angeles is built on two levels. The upper one is the town proper. Regular houses are there along with churches, grocery stores, and the trappings of small-town life and business. The lower one is a duke's mixture of tourist traps and lowbrow hotels, taverns, cafes, and restaurants that cater to freighter crewmen, sawmill workers, derelicts, and, occasionally, legitimate tourists. The shops do a land-office business in used books and made-in-Washington gewgaws.
The first person I asked for directions, a teenager pumping gas at a Texaco station, had never heard of the Ritz Hotel. I had expected an establishment with that kind of name to have a certain amount of stature in town and to be something of a landmark. The second person I asked, a grizzled drunk with a rolling gait and a pint bottle of vodka stashed in his hip pocket, nodded and pointed.
"Right up there, fella. Right over Davey's Locker. You got a quarter for a cup of coffee? I tossed him a quarter, knowing full well he'd put it to bad use.
Davey's Locker turned out to be a tavern on the street level of a long, narrow, two-story frame building whose blackened shingles were rotting with age. The street outside was empty, so I parked directly in front. The tavern, its front windows painted an opaque blue, took up the entire bottom of the building except for the width of a steep, dilapidated stairway that led up from a single door in one corner of the front of the building. Gilt letters stenciled on the glass proclaimed somebody's small joke on the world-THE RITZ HOTEL. Ritz indeed! It looked like an over-the-hill flophouse. A condemned over-the-hill flophouse.
To my surprise, the battered door wasn't locked. I pushed it open and looked up a steep flight of scarred linoleum-covered stairs. Both the walls of the stairway and the ceiling as well had been covered with what looked like old egg crates. I recognized the wall covering as a poor man's version of make-do soundproofing. A single naked light bulb hung from a twisted brown cord high above the stairs.
Attached to the wall on the downstairs landing was a pay telephone. The number was printed on the face of the phone, but when I reached for my notebook to check that number against the one taken from Tadeo Kurobashi's message pad, I realized I had left my notebook on the seat of the car. I stood there wavering for a moment, wondering if I should go back out and get it right then, or wait.
I decided to wait. My life is like that, made up of small and seemingly inconsequential decisions that come back later and nip me in the butt.
"Hello? I called up the stairs.
Nobody answered, but just then a gigantic burst of music rumbled down the stairs like an avalanche, with bass notes so loud that they vibrated the wooden hand rail I was holding.
"Hello, I called again, but there was no answer. No one could possibly have heard me above that earsplitting racket.
The music stopped momentarily and then started again at the exact same note. It sounded as though an entire symphonic orchestra must be rehearsing in the dim upstairs reaches of the Ritz Hotel.
I climbed to the top of the stairs, covering my ears with the palms of my hands in an effort to filter out some of the music. The noise level reminded me of a rock concert. The music, more classical than rock, was nothing I recognized.
The upstairs landing was soundproofed just as the stairs had been, and so was the long narrow corridor that led from the top of the stairs to the far end of the building. I had expected that the corridor would be lined with a long row of doors leading to separate rooms. Instead, only two doors were showing in the entire hallway, one at the far end of the building and the other directly in front of me. I waited until the next lull in the music and pounded on the door as soon as it was quiet.
The man who opened the door was in his mid to late thirties, six-foot-five at least, with long flowing chestnut hair. I know women who would kill to have hair like his, women who have paid a hundred dollars a crack for permanents and dye jobs in futile attempts to duplicate that look.
In the old days this guy would have worn rope sandals and been called a Jesus freak. Instead, he wore earphones and carried an open laptop computer. I looked beyond him, expecting to see a roomful of people. Instead, I saw a huge room filled with all kinds of computer equipment. Clay Woodruff was an electronics junky. A hacker.
"Are you Clay Woodruff? I asked.
He nodded. "Whaddaya want? he demanded, holding one of his earphones away from his head. "Can't you see I'm busy?
"My name is J. P. Beaumont. I'm with the Seattle Police. May I come in?
"Come back later. I'm working on a deadline.
He punched a few keys on the computer and closed his eyes to listen. Again a blast of music exploded around me. I waited. He was evidently playing only a short passage on some kind of complicated synthesizer, and I figured he'd stop the music again before long. When he did, I was still standing in the doorway.
"Not enough bass, he muttered loudly when he once more shut off the music. "Ever since those kids messed with my stuff, I haven't been able to get enough bass.
"It sounds like there's more than enough bass to me, I yelled, in order to be heard through his earphones.
Clay Woodruff looked at me in surprise, as though I had materialized out of thin air. "I'm here concerning Tadeo Kurobashi, I added, still shouting.
Woodruff's thick, bushy eyebrows came together in a frown. "What about him? he asked.
"He's dead.
In one swift motion, Woodruff peeled off his earphones and put them on a table beside the door. "You're kidding. When? How?