“And you knew he was selling drugs?”
“Well… I heard that’s how he was supporting himself.”
“How’d you hear?”
“From Coy. He tried to get me to give Troy another chance to straighten himself out. I was willing, but the first day he was supposed to come back to work he never showed. After that, well, I just wrote him off. Damn shame, like I said. But what else could I do? I got a business to run and times are tough enough as it is.”
“When was that?”
“Three years ago. Last time I saw him.”
Runyon said, “I understand you and the Madisons grew up together.”
“Down in Bakersfield, right.”
“Close friends?”
“I wouldn’t say close,” Linkhauser said. “Hung out together sometimes.”
“Were the brothers close?”
“Not so’s you’d notice. Always arguing about something. Coy used to beat up on Troy sometimes.”
“Coy did? Not the other way around?”
“Nah. Thing about Troy, he’s a mild guy, you know? Shy, laid-back. Go out of his way to avoid a fight.”
“And his brother was the opposite?”
“Well, not exactly opposite. Coy’s okay until something gets him riled up. Got a temper. Piss him off some way, he’d go after you. That’s the way he was as a kid, anyhow.”
“Troy have a short fuse, too?”
“No. Real easygoing kid.”
“Never retaliated when Coy beat on him?”
“Not that I ever saw.”
“Was Troy afraid of Coy?”
“Seemed that way to me.”
Runyon said, “Coy must care about his brother, if he tried to get you to help him straighten out.”
“Wasn’t his idea. It was Troy’s.”
“Is that right? Then why was Coy the one who contacted you?”
“Troy asked him to,” Linkhauser said. “Too shy and ashamed to come to me himself. This was after one of the times he got busted for possession and I guess he figured it was time to get clean. But he was hooked too deep and it didn’t last. Went right back on the stuff.”
“Would Coy help him on his own, do you think? If he’s in big trouble like he is now?”
“Sure, probably.” Linkhauser frowned. “Help him run away, you mean?”
“Or hide out.”
“I can’t answer that, man. It’s been three years since I seen either of them, like I said. Who knows what people will do when push comes to shove?”
“Suppose, for the sake of argument, that Coy did want to hide him out. Any place you know of where he might do that?”
Linkhauser shook his head.
Runyon said, “Do you know Jennifer Piper?”
“Who? Oh, that chick Troy was living with. What he saw in a skank like her I’ll never understand.”
“You know anything about her? Where she comes from, who her friends are?”
“Uh-uh. I only met her once and Troy never talked about her.”
“Know any of his friends?”
“No. I never saw him with anybody except the skank.” Linkhauser paused, frowning again. “What’ll happen to Troy if you find him? I mean, how much time in prison will he do?”
“Depends. Three or four years, maximum, if he’s convicted on the dealing charge.”
“Better that than being a fugitive, getting himself in deeper trouble.”
“Much better.”
Linkhauser looked off toward the loading dock. Thinking about something, making up his mind. “If Coy is helping him… what happens to him?”
“Harboring a fugitive is a felony,” Runyon said. “But it doesn’t have to come to that.”
“You wouldn’t bring charges against him? Coy?”
“Troy’s the man I’m after, not his brother. The quicker I find him, the better for everybody concerned.”
“… Yeah. Okay, then. Maybe I ought to keep my mouth shut, but
… Coy and his wife own a piece of rental property. Or did, anyway-I think she might’ve inherited it. They let Troy stay there for a few weeks after he first moved up from Bakersfield, until he got a place of his own.”
“Where’s this property located?”
“Can’t tell you that. Might’ve been S.F., but I’m not sure. Troy mentioned it once, that’s how I know about it, but I didn’t pay much attention to where it was. For all I know, they could’ve sold it by now.”
“You did the right thing by telling me about it.”
“I hope so,” Linkhauser said. “It’s hard to know what’s best for other people, you know? Half the time I don’t even know what’s best for me and my family.”
16
Everett Belasco was doing some repair work on his front stoop: down on one knee, a trowel in his right hand and a tray of wet cement beside him. As soon as he saw Helen Alvarez and me coming up his front walk, he put the trowel down and got slowly to his feet.
He looked at me, at Mrs. Alvarez, back at me. “Back again so soon? How come?”
“I’ve been out talking to Charley Doyle,” I said.
“Doyle? Why?”
“I caught him in a lie. About Mrs. Abbott’s alleged ghost.”
“You mean what happened last night? You don’t think Charley-?”
“No, he wasn’t the man in the sheet. But he knew of her fancy about her dead husband’s ghost when I questioned him two days ago. She only had the notion Monday night, and he hadn’t talked to her since he fixed her broken window. Somebody else had to tell him about it.”
“Who? Helen?”
“No, not me,” she said. I hadn’t told her why we were going to see Belasco-I wanted her along as a witness-but she was smart, a lot smarter than Doyle. Or Belasco, for that matter. From the hostile look she was directing at him, she’d already put two and two together. “I wouldn’t give that idiot the time of day.”
I said, “Only one other person besides Mrs. Alvarez and me knew. You, Belasco. She mentioned it when we saw you in your garden Tuesday afternoon.”
“Me? What about Leonard?”
“I didn’t tell him until this morning,” Mrs. Alvarez said, “after that sheet nonsense. Or anyone else. Only you.”
“And you think I told Charley Doyle? Why would I? I haven’t seen or talked to him in weeks.”
I said, “When I got here this morning, you were on Mrs. Abbott’s porch. Did you go inside the house?”
The sudden shift in questions bewildered Belasco. “Why do you want to know that?”
“Just answer the question. Were you inside her house this morning?”
Mrs. Alvarez answered it for him. “No, he wasn’t. Not while I was here.”
“Wasn’t any reason for me to go in,” he said.
“The last time you were in there was when?”
“I don’t remember exactly.”
“More than a few days?”
“A lot longer than that.”
“Do you own a cat?”
