“I’ve been told that the first twenty-four hours are crucial,” Penelope said. “It’s now been twenty-four hours, almost exactly, since I dropped her off at school.”
I handed her a fresh legal pad and a pen and asked her to write down Daley’s and Richard Hauser’s contact numbers, dates of birth, Social Security numbers if she knew them, and the names and numbers of friends, relatives, and employers. Nick’s contact info and condo address, very important. And anything else she could give me.
She wrote carefully and slowly, in silence. Curls bobbing again. When she was done, she pushed the note pad toward me.
“I have more of her friends’ names and numbers at home on my computer,” she said.
“Those might be helpful. What was Daley wearing when you dropped her off at school yesterday?”
“Monarch Academy has a code,” said Penelope. “So a gray skirt just above the knee, and a white short-sleeved blouse. White athletic shoes. It was all in her hamper, though, when I came home from work. I don’t know what she might have worn to leave home. She likes skinny jeans and tees with bangles and pop-star graphics on them — Pink and Taylor Swift and Alicia Keys. I noticed that she’d taken those three particular shirts. And a black tee with an image of Beethoven. You know, with all the hair. She took her retro canvas sneakers, too — pink and black. Her travel guitar and rolling carry-on were gone.”
“What’s Nick drive?”
“A white van with a papillon face painted on the doors. Larger than life, of course. For his business. Does this mean you’ll find Daley?”
“It means I’ll try.”
I set my pen on the yellow legal pad. Penelope scanned my face with her blue eyes, waiting. In the good morning light now coming through the blinds I saw that her eyeliner was smeared and one side of her hair was a little flat and the chipper red polka-dot dress was finely wrinkled and darker under her arms. The long September night waiting in her car, I assumed.
“You’ve had quite a night, Mrs. Rideout. But you need to fill out missing-persons reports. There are four federal, three state, two local, and three private sites I recommend. Those pictures you have of Daley will be helpful, if you’re willing to post them.”
“Of course I am.”
“I can have some coffee or tea sent up, if you’d like.”
“Coffee with lots of cream. Thank you.”
The Dublin Pub downstairs opens early for breakfast and I’m on good terms with the help. I tip heavily.
One and a half hours and a pot of coffee later we had filed the twelve missing-persons reports and made six digital pictures of Daley Rideout available for distribution.
We stood and I walked her to the door. “If I haven’t located Daley by late afternoon, I’ll want to see her room, and I’d like that longer list of friends and their numbers from you.”
“Yes.”
“Try not to worry, Mrs. Rideout. Most of these cases resolve quickly and happily.”
“When I get an Amber Alert on my phone, it makes my scalp crawl,” she said. “I memorize the child’s description. I write down the car and license plate to look for. Now maybe I’ll get one for my own sister.”
“Amber Alerts are only for child abductions.” These comforting words from Roland Ford, friend of the afflicted. I still catch myself talking like a cop sometimes.
“Do you have a little sister?” she asked.
I nodded.
“Imagine her gone, Mr. Ford.”
“Call me Roland.”
“Roland, she’s the most important thing in my life. Get it?”
Through the window I watched her walk up Main Street, stop beside a yellow VW Beetle with its black ragtop up, then aim a key fob at the car. Noted the plates, because that’s what I do. Saw the lights blip and her pale shoulder turn in the sunlight and the yellow door swing open.
2
I knocked on Nick Moreno’s condo door and waited. This was an Encinitas complex named Las Brisas, the breezes, which at nine o’clock this morning were onshore, damp, and cool. From the ground-floor porch I could see the street where Penelope Rideout had parked for her night-long vigil. I pictured her half dozing, head against the rest and turned to the driver’s-side window. Moreno’s place had that nobody-home feel. I tried the doorbell again, heard the faint chime inside. The door was locked.
I followed a walkway around to the back gate. It opened to a concrete patio and a slope of ivy topped by a white vinyl privacy fence. Potted plants, a wound green garden hose, and a garage door, closed but not locked. I hit the lights, heard the fluorescent tubes buzz, saw the white van and the enlarged papillon regarding me pertly. Stepped up close and saw the van was empty. Stood there for a moment, looking at the tools of Nick Moreno’s trade neatly stacked on a shelf: boxes of dog treats and plastic poop bags and paper towels.
One of the adjacent neighbors, Lydia, hadn’t seen Nick in weeks. The other wasn’t home.
The upstairs tenant was an affable young man named Scott Chan. When I told him my name and business, he said he hadn’t seen Nick lately. When I asked about suspicious activity downstairs, Chan said not really, but the day before, he’d seen a silver Expedition SUV pull into the driveway. A round blue emblem on the driver’s door, but he couldn’t read it — bad angle. Two men got out and went into Nick’s. This was around noon. Just a few minutes later, he heard them come back out. Saw them through his upstairs office window.
Then Chan looked at me, waiting, pursing his lips against something he didn’t want to say.
“Was a girl with them?”
“When they came out of the condo, yes,” he said. “She worked with him sometimes. With Nick. I don’t know her name.”
His description fit Daley Rideout’s, down to her bouncy hair and bright blue eyes. He said she seemed to know the two SUV men. They were all talking. They seemed purposeful. She had rolling luggage and a guitar.
The men were in their late twenties or early thirties. One wore tan pants and a black golf shirt. He was big, looked strong, and had blond hair cut short on the sides and back but longer on top. The other wore the same clothes and a black windbreaker. Neat, clean-cut guys, Chan said. Could have been cops. Or Mormons. Ha.
“Did you go over to Nick’s after they left?” I asked.
“No. No reason to.”
“You didn’t call the police?”
“Why would I do that?” he asked.
“Because you saw a very young teenage girl get into a vehicle with two men you’d never seen before. You watched through your window and you knew it looked wrong, which is why you didn’t mention her until I asked you.”
Chan slumped a little, then caught himself. “Look. I actually thought of calling the police. But the girl and the men looked okay with each other. They could have been family. There was no awkwardness. They got into the front and she got into the rear. Then the driver, the big guy, hopped out and went back into Nick’s condo. A minute later he came back and drove away. Not fast, just regular. What would I tell police? That’s intrusive. I believe in privacy, Mr. Ford.”
“I believe in good judgment, Mr. Chan. Yours was bad.”
“Did something happen?”
“Something always happens.”
I gave Chan a business card with a fifty-dollar bill paper-clipped to the back. I always carry at least one such item in my wallet. It has paid off more than once. “If you see either Nick or the girl, call me. You’d be doing both of them a favor.”