“Nope.”
“Or notice if there was one over his uniform pocket?”
“Nope.” The dentures made a sharp clicking sound. “Got it.”
“Sir?”
“Company name,” the old man said. “SunGold. Sun-Gold Bakery.”
SunGold Bakery Products was located in the southeastern section of the city, a block off Bayshore Boulevard. Two good-sized warehouse-type buildings connected by a short wing that fronted on the street, with a cyclone- fenced yard along one side. The wing housed the company offices, and the main entrance was there; Runyon parked in front of it, but he didn’t go inside. Outfits this size had rules about employees giving out personal information, and office workers generally observed them. Deliverymen, if properly approached, weren’t so apt to be close followers of company policy.
The yard gates were open and he walked in through them. A dozen or more large white vans were parked there, the SunGold emblem-a smiling face inside a sunburst-and the company name painted on their side panels. Three men were in sight, two dressed in white uniforms, one in mechanic’s overalls. Runyon picked the oldest of the deliverymen, who was whistling tunelessly to himself while he checked some sort of list attached to a clipboard. Good choice. Friendly when he was approached, still friendly after the questions started. And not reticent about dispensing information.
“Sure, I know who you mean,” he said. His name was Harry; it was stitched in gold thread over his uniform pocket. “How come you’re looking for him?”
“I’ve been told that he knows someone I’m trying to find. A young woman who’s gone missing.”
“Is that right? I wouldn’t want to get him in any trouble.”
“Nothing like that. The woman’s disappearance was voluntary.”
“Couldn’t be somebody he was dating.”
“No, just a casual acquaintence.”
“Uh-huh. I hate to say it, Sean’s a pretty good guy, but it’s kind of hard to imagine him ever being with a woman. You know, his size. He was real self-conscious about it.”
“Was?”
“Still is, I guess. He doesn’t work for SunGold anymore.”
“Since when?”
“Oh, must be a couple of years now.”
“Quit? Fired?”
“Quit,” Harry said. “Offer of a better job somewhere else.”
“Do you know where?”
“No, sure don’t.”
“Or what kind of job?”
“Sorry. He didn’t talk much, about himself or anything else.”
“Shy.”
“Real shy. Kind of a loner.”
“The brooding type?”
“I wouldn’t say that. No, he seemed pretty upbeat most of the time, usually had a smile on his face. Good guy, like I said.”
“What’s his last name?”
“Osgood? No, that’s wrong. Something started with an O… Ostrow? That’s it, Ostrow.”
“O-s-t-r-o-w?”
“Sounds right.”
“And Sean, spelled S-e-a-n or S-h-a-w-n?”
“S-e-a-n.”
“Do you know where he lived?”
“Someplace over by Golden Gate Park,” Harry said. “I know that because the park was on his route and sometimes he’d time his deliveries over there so he could go home for lunch. Big eater. Man, he could really pack it in.”
“Any chance you could find out the address for me?”
“How would I do that? You mean check the company files?”
“I’d be willing to pay for the information.”
“Hey, no, I couldn’t do that,” Harry said. “Not for any amount. Bosses found out, they’d throw my ass right out of here. I shouldn’t even be talking to you right now.”
Now he had a name. Sean Ostrow. With that and the other information Runyon had gathered, it should be relatively easy to track the man down.
Should be, but wasn’t.
Back at the office, he checked the city phone directory. No listing for Sean Ostrow. The agency kept phone books for all the Bay Area cities dating back five years, and he checked each of the San Francisco books for that period. Same results. An Internet background search was the next step. He could have started one himself, but Tamara was far more skilled at that kind of thing than he was. He went to her with the need and the favor.
She said, “We’re off the Troxell case. And we don’t have a client to justify mixing in a homicide investigation.”
“Unofficial client. My time, my expense. I told Erin Dumont’s sister I’d try to help.”
“Why?”
Because she looked like Colleen. Because she seemed to be stuck in his head and he couldn’t get her out. He said, “Because she’s the type who’ll keep on grieving until there’s some kind of closure. And the SFPD hasn’t come up with anything in six weeks. You know what that means.”
“Unsolved file.”
“If it isn’t there already.”
Tamara sighed. “What makes you think Ostrow did that girl?”
“I don’t. I think he’s a possible.”
“Why?”
“Everything points to an obsession killing. Love, rejection, hate, lust, remorse-all part of the pattern. And Ostrow fits the profile.”
“Maybe so. But hanging around her for a month two years ago doesn’t make him obsessed.”
“Neither does being obese, shy, a loner. But add them all together and you’ve got a possible.”
“Yeah. But what doesn’t add is that two-year gap. If he was so obsessed with her, how come he stayed away from her all that time? What took him so long to work up to that night in the park?”
“Could be he didn’t have a choice,” Runyon said.
“What, you mean he might’ve been locked up somewhere those two years, for some other crime?”
“Worth checking on.”
But Ostrow, according to Tamara’s contact at the SFPD, had no criminal record of any kind in California. A record in another state was still a possibility, but getting that information would take time.
She ran other checks. Sean David Ostrow was a member of the Teamsters Union, but obtaining personal information from a major union on one of its members was almost as impossible as obtaining it from the IRS. Under a fairly recent state law, private individuals-and that included private detective agencies-no longer had open access to DMV records. But the DMV, unlike unions, could be circumspectly breached with the right kind of know-how. Ostrow had a California driver’s license, issued four years ago in San Francisco and valid for another two years. His registered vehicle was a 1988 Ford Taurus, license number 2UGK697. The first numeral and first letter matched the ones on Troxell’s memory notes, but that didn’t have to mean anything; 2U was a common enough prefix. His birthdate was May 14, 1979. His address was listed as 2599 Kirkham, and there had been no notification of change since the date of issue.
Runyon drove out to Kirkham Street. Number 2599 was a twelve-unit apartment building not far from Golden Gate Park, but on the opposite side several miles from where Erin Dumont and Risa Nyland lived. Ostrow’s name wasn’t on any of the mailboxes in the foyer. None of the other boxes bore a building manager’s label, so he rang bells until he’d gone through all twelve. Three responses. A woman on the second floor said she remembered
