It almost sounded like a proposition.
“But,” Sanchez sighed, “with friends like him your enemies would see you hung up by the balls.”
It was a simple trick. He knew about the times I had been in jail and the kinds of people that I’d been involved with. What he wanted was for me to confess to that history without him actually mentioning anything. That way I would be in the position of confessing to him, telling him things without him having to ask.
“We take our friends where we can,” I said. He was going to have to do better than that if he wanted to hogtie me.
“You were looking for Idabell Turner this morning.”
“I what?”
“Mrs. Turner,” Sanchez said. “You asked about her in the main office this morning. Mrs. Martinez mentioned it.”
“I did?”
“You were asking for the victim’s name yesterday.”
“No,” I said.
“Well, you asked if I’d found out the victim’s name.”
I didn’t have to answer that.
“His name was Roman Gasteau,” Sanchez continued. “Twin brother of Holland Gasteau.”
Sanchez’s eyes were saying, loud and clear, that I knew what he was talking about. They were inviting me to enter into the conversation.
But I refused.
“Why’d you ask about Mrs. Turner this morning, Mr. Rawlins?”
“She’s a friend’a mines. I heard her dog got killed or somethin’.”
“If she’s such a good friend, why didn’t you call her house?”
“I did. She wasn’t home,” I said. “What’s this all about?”
“Where were you last night, Mr. Rawlins?”
“At home mostly. For a while I was out lookin’ at my property.”
“And where’s that?” he asked. He’d been leaning forward but now he sat up straight; it wasn’t going to be as easy to break me down as he’d thought.
“I got a buildin’ on Denker and one on Magnolia Street. I went out to see how they was lookin’.” My language became completely comfortable. I didn’t need to pretend about who I was with Sanchez. “You could ask my manager—Mofass.”
He wanted Mofass’s number, and I obliged him with the answering-service line. Any call Mofass got from the LAPD, he’d talk to me first.
“Now what’s this all about, sergeant?” I asked. “You got some kinda problem with me?”
He shrugged his shoulders. “Has Mrs. Turner been having any problems lately?”
There are moments in your life when you can tell what’s right and wrong about yourself—your nature. I wanted my job and my everyday kind of life. I wanted to see Jesus get his track scholarship at UCLA and Feather to become the artist I knew she could be.
All I had to do was say, “Yeah, she said she’d been fightin’ with her husband. He threatened to kill her dog. I know ’cause she gave the dog to me yesterday morning.” I didn’t have to talk about our good time on the desktop. I didn’t have to confess about breaking into her house.
Instead I said, “Not that I know of. But you know, she’s kinda private about anything at home. I mean, I got her number but last night was the first time I ever called it.”
I was a fool; but I was my own fool.
Sanchez sniffed at the lie and then stood up suddenly.
Before turning to leave he pointed at me. “We’ll be talking again soon, I think, Mr. Rawlins.”
They left and I went back to my vacation charts.
CHAPTER 11
I SPENT A WHILE GOING over other papers and requests that had piled up. I started filling out an order form for central supply, but no matter what I tried to concentrate on I ended up thinking about Simona on that bench and Jorge taking her off.
“HEY, PENA!” I found him an hour later on the lower campus. He was hosing down the handball wall out beyond bungalow 1.
“Hey, Mr. Rawlins.” Jorge twisted the nozzle on his hose until the water stopped spouting. “How you doing?”
“Okay. All right. I wanted to ask you something.”
“What’s that?”
“What’s wrong with Simona?”
