Beryl Tree and Ames were at a table in the back near the bar. Ames was watching the door. Beryl was nibbling at a giant chili burger. Ed Fairing, the proprietor and chef, was talking to Ames. Ed sports a big flowing mustache and wears string ties with turquoise or Petosky stones. Ed probably would have enjoyed pulling unruly customers out into the street for a public execution. Ed, though born and raised in the good part of Sacramento, California, lived the role. He had even developed a Texas accent.
“Fonesca,” he said, giving my hand a more than hearty shake. “Happy as ever.”
“Happy as ever,” I said.
“Burger and chili? Chili or burger? Beer?”
“Burger, thick, cheese, tomato, no onion,” I said, sitting. “You pick the beer and put it in a mug.”
“Gonna see a lady?” Ed said. “No onion, no chili. You always have onion and chili.”
“You should have been a private eye, Big Ed,” I said. He loved to be called Big Ed.
Ed left and I turned to Beryl Tree.
“Everything’s quiet,” said Ames. “I called Flo. She said she’d welcome the company.”
I nodded and said, “Mrs. Tree…”
“Beryl,” she said.
“Beryl,” I continued. “I’m going to eat fast and we’re going to see a therapist who might know how we can find Adele. Just tell her who you are, why you want your daughter found, about your husband, everything. If she asks for identification, give it. Her name is Sally Porovsky.”
“A therapist? They think Adele is crazy? Dwight’s the crazy one,” she said, pushing away her half-finished burger.
“Your daughter’s been through a lot,” I said. “My guess is the police or a court or her school referred her to the counseling service where Ms. Porovsky helps kids. You don’t have to be crazy to need help.”
She nodded, though I knew she was still not convinced.
“When we finish talking to Ms. Porovsky, Ames and I will take you to a friend’s house where your husband won’t be able to find you,” I said.
“If Dwight comes looking, he’ll find me. He’s mean, rotten even, but he’s not a fool. He’s smart in some ways. You know, like a animal, sharp teeth. I think he means what he told me. If I don’t go and call you off, he’ll do his best to kill me and maybe you, too.”
Ed came back with the steaming burger and a mug of beer. The foam curled over the side as it was meant to. I thanked Ed, who ambled over to another table, looking as if he had spent a lifetime in the saddle.
“You want to call it off?” I asked.
“No way on earth or in heaven,” she said.
Ames sat quietly watching the door, hands in his lap. I hoped he wasn’t carrying the gun I had seen him with earlier.
I ate fast. The burger was great and Ed had topped it with blue cheese and a thick tomato. I drained the mug of beer and got up.
“Let’s do it,” I said in my best imitation of William Holden in The Wild Bunch. Considering the surroundings, it seemed like the right thing to do. Considering who I was and how I probably sounded, it was a bad mistake.
John Detchon was at the reception desk reading and talking on the phone at the same time. He recognized me, smiled and examined Beryl Tree. He had probably seen a lot of Beryl Trees from behind his desk. Ames was waiting in the car. I wondered if it would be worth asking Detchon if he knew Geoffrey Green or anyone who might know him. Sarasota isn’t that big and I didn’t think the gay community, if it was a community, would be hard to keep track of. I decided against it, at least for now, and led Beryl to the elevator.
She clutched her purse and looked straight ahead.
When the doors opened and we went into the office of Children’s Services of Sarasota, I saw more people sitting in the cubicles than I had before. They were making notes, phone calls, faces. Sally Porovsky looked as if she hadn’t moved. Whatever it was about her kicked in and I decided to make a call to Ann Horowitz in the hope of finding some way of dealing with a feeling I couldn’t deny but wasn’t sure I wanted.
“Mr…?”
“Fonesca,” I reminded her, disappointed that she hadn’t remembered, and annoyed that I was disappointed.
“Fonesca, yes. I’m sorry.”
“That’s all right. This is Beryl Tree, Adele’s mother.”
Sally Porovsky’s voice was exactly as I remembered it. Musical, a little husky. Sally rose, took Beryl’s hand and smiled, guiding her to the extra chair in her cubicle. This time I stood, a step back.
“I’m sorry to ask you this,” Sally said gently, leaning toward Beryl and lowering her voice. “But do you have some proof of your relationship to Adele?”
“Got her birth certificate in my purse, photographs, report cards from grade school, health insurance, Social Security card, whatever I could find when I came out here.”
She opened her purse and began fishing out folded pieces of paper, cards and photographs of Adele. Sally examined them, returned some and asked Beryl if she could make copies of the ones she had kept.
“Just so I get ’em back,” she said.
“I’ll do that now and give them right back. Can I get you a coffee, Coke, water?”
“No, thank you.”
“Mr. Fonesca?”
“Lew,” I said. “No, thanks.”
“Be right back.”
Sally moved across the room and disappeared to the left behind a pile of cardboard boxes.
“I like her,” said Beryl.
“Yes,” I said.
“You can tell with some people,” Beryl said. “I think she tried to help Adele.”
I agreed. Sally returned in less than three minutes carrying a manila folder, handed the original documents to Beryl, who put them in her purse, and sat down.
“Mrs. Tree,” she said. “Your daughter said her name was Prescott, Adele Prescott.”
“Prescott?”
“Her father’s name is Dwight Prescott.”
“No, it’s Dwight Handford.”
“He said it was Prescott. He had a driver’s license, Social Security number, Sarasota address,” said Sally, putting her hand on Beryl’s. “Since Adele confirmed he was her father and… Mrs. Tree, they said you were dead.”
“Adele told you I was dead?”
“I’m afraid so.”
“He made her,” Beryl said. “She was afraid of him.”
“She came to Sarasota on her own to look for him, Mrs. Tree,” said Sally. “That’s a brave thing to do for a sixteen-year-old girl.”
“She told you she was sixteen?”
“Yes.”
“She’s fourteen,” said Beryl. “Her birthday was on the fourth of last month.”
Sally sat back, sighed, closed her eyes and looked up at me. I nodded to confirm what Beryl had said so far.
“Your daughter got in trouble with the police,” Sally said. “They referred her and her father to us. The referral was mandatory, court ordered. That meant they had to work with us.”
Someone laughed, a man on a telephone not far away.
“What kind of trouble?”
“She was soliciting,” Sally said, taking Beryl’s hand again.
Beryl nodded. She knew what that meant and the information didn’t seem to surprise her. It hurt, but she wasn’t surprised.
“Where is she now?” asked Beryl.
“We don’t know,” said Sally. “We’re looking for her. Her father hasn’t been very cooperative and… we’re looking. Beryl, Adele said some things to me that… How can I put this? Did your husband ever abuse your daughter?”
“Hit her?”
The pause was long.
“Sexually,” said Sally.
This pause was even longer. I turned away.
“I…” Beryl began. “I don’t know for sure. He went to prison for
…”
“He sexually abused a young relative,” I said.
“I thought maybe when Adele was…” Beryl said. “But I couldn’t believe it. I didn’t want to believe it. Adele never said anything. I can’t think.”
“I understand. Are you going to be in town for a while?”