“Jenny’s aunt took him in.”
“The aunt in Deer Run? Pauline Devries?”
“That’s right. Jenny and the boy’d been living with her since her divorce.”
“She raised him?”
“As far as I know. I lost touch with her after a couple of years. That happens with cold cases… well, I don’t have to tell you.”
“So you don’t know if he’s still in the area.”
“No, no idea what happened to him. You’ll have to ask the aunt, if she’s still living in Deer Run.”
“I will. Did Jenny Noakes have any other relatives?”
“No male relatives,” Van Horn said. “Another aunt, I think.”
“Local?”
“No. I think she lived here in California, but I don’t remember where. Or what her name was.”
“Shouldn’t be too difficult to track down.”
“Internet, huh? Things sure have changed since my day.”
Runyon said, “The changes come faster every year,” and got to his feet.
“Listen,” Van Horn said at the front door, “you find out anything definite about Jenny Noakes’s murder, I’d really appreciate it if you’d let me know. That case has bothered me for twenty years. One of the few I wasn’t able to close.”
“I’ll do that,” Runyon promised, and meant it. There were a couple of cases he’d handled in Seattle he felt that way about. Still cold, as far as he knew, and a source of frustration in the empty hours when he couldn’t sleep.
D eer Run, according to the sign on the western outskirts, had a population of 603. The village was strung out along both sides of the highway for a sixth of a mile-old buildings that housed a cafe, a couple of taverns, a few other businesses, and a newish strip mall at the far end. Hill Road intersected the highway just beyond the strip mall. It led Runyon up a sharp incline, made a dogleg to the left. The first house beyond the dogleg was number 177.
Only problem was, it had a deserted aspect and there was a FOR SALE sign alongside the driveway.
Runyon pulled into the drive. A chill, damp wind thrust against his back as he climbed the front steps, rang the bell. No response. He stepped over to look through an uncurtained window. The room beyond was empty of furniture.
When he came back down the porch steps, he noticed a woman in the front yard of the property across the road. She was leaning on the handle of a weed whacker, watching him. He left the Ford where it was, crossed the road to the edge of her driveway, and called out, “Okay if I talk to you for a minute?”
“Not if you’re selling something.”
“I’m not.”
“Rain coming. I need to get this grass down.”
“I won’t take up much of your time. I’m looking for Pauline Devries.”
The woman straightened and gestured for him to come ahead. She was in her sixties, wearing a plaid coat, woolen cap, and work gloves. The wide swath she’d cut in the high grass along the driveway had a rounded sweep, so that she seemed to be standing in a miniature crop circle. Runyon stopped at the edge, smiling a little to let her know he was harmless.
“You a relative of Pauline’s?” she asked.
“No. A business matter.”
“Thought you said you’re not a salesman?”
“I’m not.”
“What kind of business?”
He showed her his license. She blinked, frowning. The frown used all of her facial muscles, so that her features seemed to fold in on themselves like a dried and puckered gourd.
“Oh, Lord,” she said. “Not Jenny again after all these years? Jenny Noakes?”
“Her murder may be connected to a case my agency is investigating.”
“So that’s why you wanted to talk to Pauline?” The woman sighed heavily. “Well, I guess you don’t know then. She passed away four weeks ago. Complications from diabetes.”
Four weeks. That was why the address and phone listings still showed current. Tamara had accepted them at face value on her first quick check, and he’d made the same natural assumption.
He said, “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“So was I. Friend and neighbor for thirty years.”
“Then you know the boy she raised. Her niece’s child, Tucker Noakes.”
“Tucker Devries, you mean.” The woman made a sourlemon mouth around the name.
“She adopted him?”
“Year after the murder. Big mistake, you ask me. But she never married, never had any kids of her own. Maternal instincts got the best of her.”
“Why do you say it was a mistake?”
“He gave her a lot of grief, that’s why. Strange boy, moody, wouldn’t talk to anybody for days, weeks at a time, not even Pauline.” She tapped her temple with a blunt forefinger. “Not quite right in the head, and worse once he got into his teen years. All he ever cared about was taking pictures.”
“Pictures?”
“Went roaming and sneaking around with a camera she gave him for his birthday, taking pictures of everything and everybody in sight. Told Pauline he was going to be a famous photographer someday. Hah! She was sorry when he left, but I sure wasn’t. Nobody else around here was, either.”
“When was that?”
“Must’ve been ten years now. Never even finished high school.”
“He keep in touch with her? Come back to visit her?”
“Now and then he’d show up, when he wanted money. Not to pay his last respects, though.”
“Do you know where I can find him?”
“No idea. Anna might be able to tell you-Anna Kovacs, Pauline’s sister. She was in Fort Bragg for the services and out here afterward cleaning out the house. I asked her where Tucker was but she didn’t want to talk about him. Acted like she wouldn’t lose any sleep if she never saw him again.”
“Where does Mrs. Kovacs live?”
“Some town near Sacramento. I forget the name.” A sudden thought recreated the dried-gourd look. “Could be he didn’t come to the funeral because he’s back in some institution. Wouldn’t be surprised.”
“Institution?”
“Loony bin. They put him in one once, I don’t know what for.”
“Who did?”
“Police, doctors, courts-whoever.”
“When was that? While he was living here?”
“No. Couple of years after he left.”
“Where was this, do you know?”
“Nowhere around here, I can tell you that much.”
“Did Pauline tell you why he was institutionalized?”
“She never wanted to talk about it. Well, she did say something once… what was it? Something about an episode.”
“Psychotic episode?”
“Episode, that’s all I remember.”
A fter five by the time he got back to Fort Bragg. Misty, the wind herding in banks of low, scudding clouds that backed up the Deer Run woman’s forecast of rain. The smart thing to do was to take another motel room here for the night, head out early in the morning. But that would make for another long period of downtime.
He hunted up an Internet cafe. No need to burden Tamara with the basic searches that needed to be done now. The agency subscribed to a bunch of different search engines, some more sophisticated than others, and he had the passwords to most of them.
