“Let me think,” said Caravanza. “It was only three times, four, whatever…what did she say…mostly she said she was lonely. That was basically it, lonely. In some shitty little apartment. She didn’t miss me or want to get back together, nothing like that. She just wanted to tell me she was feeling shitty.”
“What did you say?”
“Nothing, I listened. Mostly that’s what I did when I was married. She talked, I listened.”
I reached Milo’s cell and reported both conversations.
“Hooking up with a movie star, huh?”
“Maybe she settled for someone who looked like one.”
“Meserve or another PlayHouse Adonis.”
“With her level of naiveté, someone who’d been around just a bit longer could’ve seemed impressive.”
“Wonder how long Meserve’s been getting insight from Nora Dowd.”
“Longer than two years,” I said. “He was there before Michaela arrived.”
“And when Tori showed up. So where the hell is he…okay, thanks, let me toss this around while I wait for Michaela’s landlord.”
The day floated by with all the importance of a cork in the ocean. I considered calling Allison, then Robin, then Allison again. Settled for neither and filled Saturday by running and sleeping, doing scutwork around the house.
Sunday’s balm and glorious blue skies made matters worse; this was a day to be with someone.
I drove to the beach. The sun had brought people and cars to the coastline. Golden-haired girls promenaded in bikini tops and sarongs, surfer dudes peeled in and out of wetsuits, tourists gawked at natural wonders of all types.
On PCH, a conspicuously crawling highway patrol car lowered the pace to race-walk from Carbon Beach to Malibu Road. The southern entry to Latigo Canyon was closer but that meant more miles of winding road. I kept going to Kanan Dume and turned off.
Alone.
I tooled up the canyon, both hands on the wheel as the twists tested the Seville’s mushy suspension. Despite being up here years ago, the sharpness of the curves and the dead drops if you steered wrong surprised me.
Not a spot for a leisurely cruise and after dark the route would be treacherous unless you knew it well. Dylan Meserve had hiked up here and returned to play out a fraudulent kidnapping.
Maybe because of the isolation. I had yet to encounter another vehicle challenging the mountains.
I drove another few miles, managed to turn around on a skinny ribbon of asphalt, hooked right on Kanan, and drove into the Valley.
Tori Giacomo’s last known address was a dingy white multiplex. Old cars and trucks filled the street. True to her father’s description, the people I saw were mostly brown-skinned. Some were dressed for church. Others looked as if faith was the last thing on their minds.
Laurel Canyon south led me back into the city and Beverly Boulevard east took me to Hancock Park. No Range Rover in Nora Dowd’s driveway and when I walked up to the door and knocked, no response.
Go west, aimless man.
The weeds where Michaela had been dumped had fluffed, obscuring any history of violence. I stared at plants and dirt, got back in the car.
On Holt Avenue, I spotted Shayndie Winograd and a young, sparsely bearded man in a black suit and a broad-brimmed hat walking four small children and steering a double stroller north toward Pico. The allegedly ailing Gershie Yoel was the picture of health as he tried to shinny up his father’s trousers. Rabbi Winograd fended him off, finally lifted the boy and slung him over his shoulder like a sack of flour. The kid loved it.
A short drive away, on Reynold Peaty’s block of Guthrie, I looked for Sean Binchy but couldn’t find him. Was the guy that good? Or had born-again obligations prevailed on Sunday?
As I coasted past Peaty’s building, a young Hispanic family came down the stairs and headed for a dented blue van. Definite church garb, including three chubby kids under five. These parents looked even younger than the Winograds- barely out of their teens. The father’s shaved head and stone-faced swagger were at odds with his stiff gray suit. He and his wife were heavy. She had tired eyes and blond-streaked hair.
Back in my intern days, the psych staff had favored a smug, knowing line: Kids having kids. The unspoken tsk-tsk.
Here I was, driving around by myself.
Who was to say?
I’d stopped without meaning to in front of Peaty’s building. One of the little kids waved at me and I waved back and both parents turned. Shaved-head Dad glared. I sped off.
No action at the PlayHouse, same for the big cantaloupe-painted complex on Overland that Dylan Meserve had left without notice.
Shabby place. Rust streaks beneath the gutters I hadn’t noticed the first time. Front grid of stingy little windows, no hint anyone lived behind them.
That exhumed memories of my student days living on Overland, alone and faceless and so full of self-doubt that entire weeks could slog by in a narcotic haze.
I pictured Tori Giacomo mustering the courage for a cross-country move and ending up in a small, sad room on a street full of strangers. Fueled by ambition- or delusions. Was there a difference?
Lonely, everyone lonely.
I recalled a line I’d used on girls back then.
No, I don’t do drugs, more into the natural low.
Mr. Sardonic. Every so often, it had worked.
Monday morning at eleven, Milo phoned from his car. “Damn landlord stood me up Saturday, too much traffic from La Jolla. Finally, he tells me I can get a key from his sister who lives in Westwood. Asshole. I waited for the techies, just finished doing my own toss.”
“Learn anything?”
“She wasn’t living large. No food in the fridge, granola bars and canned diet shakes in the pantry. Mydol, Advil, Motrin, Pepto-Bismol, Tums, a little marijuana in her nightstand. No birth control. Not much of a reader, the extent of her library was back issues of Us and People and Glamour. TV but no cable hookup and the phone was dead. My subpoena for her calls is paying off in a few days but like I said her land line was disconnected for nonpayment and I can’t find any cell account. One thing she did have was nice clothes. Not a lot, but nice, she probably spent all her dough on duds. Manager of the restaurant she worked at said she was fine, no problems, didn’t make much of an impression. No guys he remembers seeing her with. Meserve’s shoe-store boss said Meserve was unreliable and could be snotty to customers. Anyway, we’ll see if any interesting prints come up. No signs of violence or struggle, doesn’t look as if she was killed there. How was your weekend?”
“Quiet.”
“Sounds nice.”
I told him about driving up to Latigo, left out the rest of my motor tour and the memories it had evoked.
He said, “No kidding. I was up there myself, early in the morning. Pretty, no?”
“And out of the way.”
“I talked to a few neighbors, including the old guy Michaela scared when she jumped out naked. No one had ever seen her or Meserve there before. Also, I got Mr. Albert Beamish on the phone this morning. Saturday and Sunday he spends at his place in Palm Desert. Sunshine did nothing for his disposition. What he was itching to tell me was he spotted Nora’s Range Rover leaving her house Friday around nine.”
“Right after our meeting at Brad’s house.”
“Maybe Brad advised her to take a vacation. Or she just felt like some down time and didn’t bother to tell her students because she’s an indolent rich girl. I asked Beamish to keep an eye out, thanked him for being observant. He barks back at me, ‘Show your gratitude by doing your job with minimal competence.’ ”