evaporated when I showed her the photocopy of my license and asked if she’d mind answering a few questions about her ex.
“Why?” She said it softly, with a glance across at where the male employee was polishing the glass top of a display counter. He didn’t seem to be paying any attention. “Are you investigating Mitch for some reason?”
“Not specifically, no. He’s involved in a case I’m working on.” Little white lie to maintain confidentiality and forestall a lot of questions and explanations.
The shape of her mouth turned wry and bitter. She leaned forward and said even more softly, “It has to do with a woman, I’ll bet.”
“As a matter of fact, yes.”
“And not his wife. If he’s still married to number two.”
“He is.”
“Amazing. She must be a saint.”
“Why do you say that?”
“To put up with him this long. I divorced him after ten months, and I was a fool not to have done it sooner.”
“He was unfaithful to you?”
“Oh, yes.” No hesitation, no reticence about discussing personal matters with a stranger. I had the feeling the pump in her was always primed and ready when the subject of Mitchell Krochek came up. “Twice that I know about. Twice in ten months. The first time… well, let’s just say the honeymoon didn’t last very long. If I’d found out about it at the time, I’d have left him then and there.”
“He was pretty young then,” I said. “Young men make mistakes that they don’t always repeat as they grow older.”
“Are you telling me he’s turned into a faithful husband? I don’t believe it.”
“Once a cheat, always a cheat?”
“That’s right. Mitch… well, it isn’t just a roving eye with him. It’s compulsive. He’ll never be satisfied with just one woman. He needs a steady stream of conquests to boost his ego.”
“And he doesn’t really care about any of them, is that it?”
“Well, that’s not exactly true. Give the devil his due. He cares for a while, genuinely, I think, but he just can’t sustain his feelings. He-”
“Mrs. Layne.” That came from the male across the room. “Do you need any assistance?”
“No, thank you, Mr. Tarbell.” She reached down into the display case, brought up a bracelet bristling with diamonds, set it on the glass in front of me. “Pretend you’re interested in buying this,” she whispered to me.
I picked it up, gingerly. A discreet little price tag hung from one clasp. $2,500. Some bracelet. Kerry would love it. She would also give me a swift kick in the hinder if I bought her a piece of jewelry anywhere near that expensive.
“How did Mitch react when you told him you were divorcing him?”
“React?” she said. “I’m not sure I know what you mean?”
“Was he angry, upset over the financial implications?”
“No. He was just starting out at Five States Engineering and we didn’t have much to divide between us, much less get upset about.”
“Was he ever violent?”
“Mitch? Violent? Good Lord, no.”
“Never raised a hand to you?”
“Never. I’ll say this for the man-he was always a gentleman, in and out of bed.”
“How would he handle a major argument?”
“The same way he handled everything else. Yell a little, whine a little, rationalize everything, and never accept responsibility. The two affairs that broke us up… it was the women’s fault, they wouldn’t leave him alone, they seduced him?
All of which pretty much coincided with my take on the man. I still had the diamond bracelet in my hand; it felt cold and hot at the same time and I put it down as gingerly as I’d picked it up. “How long has it been since you’ve seen him?”
“Oh, a long time. More than seven years. I ran into him at a party about a year after the divorce. We didn’t have much to say to each other.”
“No contact since then?”
“None.”
“Do you know his second wife?”
“No. When I heard he got married again, I thought about calling her up and sharing some things with her. But I’m not really the vindictive type. And I expected she’d find out for herself soon enough what he’s like.” She leaned forward again, her eyes avid. “Has she, finally?”
I said, “I think they both know each other pretty well after eight years together,” which I thought was a noncommittal response, but the words made her smile anyway. Mary Ellen Layne may not have been a vindictive person, and nine years is a long time, but she was still carrying a grudge. Not that I blamed her, if what she’d told me was an accurate portrait of her ex-husband.
H einold’s First and Last Chance Saloon was the oldest little piece of Jack London Square, a historical anachronism surrounded by the concrete, asphalt, and modern buildings that now dominated the Oakland waterfront. It was a literal shack built around 1880 from remnants of an old whaling ship, first used as a bunk house for men who worked the East Bay oyster beds, then converted into a saloon. It’d been in continuous operation ever since, with food service added when the Square began to flourish decades ago. Jack London himself was rumored to have hung out there with his pals in the oyster pirating game.
Deanne Goldman was seated at one of the umbrella-shaded outdoor tables when I arrived. There weren’t many of them, so she must have been there a while; the place was already teeming with lunch trade. She was shorter and darker than Krochek’s two wives, but cut from the same body mold and bearing a vague resemblance to Mary Ellen Layne. She wore a neutral expression that didn’t change when I introduced myself and sat down, but there was nervousness behind it: she kept rotating a glass of iced tea in front of her without drinking any of it. A determined set to her jaw told me I was not going to get anything out of her about her boyfriend that she didn’t want to give voluntarily.
The first thing she said to me was, “Have you found out anything yet about Mitch’s wife?”
“Not yet.”
“He’s half-frantic with worry, poor man. He’s so afraid that Janice is dead and he’ll be blamed for it.”
“If he’s innocent, he has nothing to worry about.”
“ If he’s innocent? Of course he’s innocent.” Her eyes narrowed; the determined jaw poked out a little farther. “He’s your client, for God’s sake. Surely you don’t think…”
“I don’t think anything, Ms. Goldman. I’ve exhausted a lot of possibilies in Mrs. Krochek’s disappearance and there aren’t many others left. I need to get as complete a picture of the situation as possible-that’s why I’m here. He’s told you everything about the situation, I take it?”
“Everything, yes. We don’t have any secrets from each other.”
“How long have you known him?”
“Eleven weeks. I know it’s not very long, but that doesn’t matter. You don’t have to know somebody for a long time to love and understand them.”
Wrong, lady. Some people you do; some people you could know for a lifetime and never understand. But I said, “When did he tell you he was married?”
“At the beginning of our relationship. That’s one of the things I love about Mitch-he’s honest, forthright, he doesn’t try to hide anything.”
“It doesn’t bother you?”
“That he’s married? Why should it? He doesn’t love her anymore, and she doesn’t love him. He loves me.”
“But you know he doesn’t want a divorce.”
“Of course he doesn’t. She’s already squandered so much of his assets, why should he give her half of everything he has left?”
