thumb.
'Holy fuck,' Frank repeats, throwing the Honda into neutral and jerking the parking brake. She scrambles through her briefcase, finding the picture.
A Mercedes behind her bleats, trying to get Frank to advance another twelve feet. Frank ignores the imperative. She scrutinizes the photo. It's the long shot from the dumpsite. Six vehicles down from the photographer, barely visible behind a work truck on the south curb, is a truck with a cab-over camper. Frank stares and the Mercedes' driver leans on her horn.
Frank moves into the space without even looking from the picture. Noah had checked every vehicle on the street. The camper had stood out because it was parked three blocks from where the owner lived. The brother of one of the women Noah had interviewed on tape. The woman who watched Oprah every day and bitched about having to feed her family. And her brother visiting from up north. Frank swears, wishing the murder books weren't on her dining room table. She tries to quell her enthusiasm. Noah would have teased it out if there was something worth teasing.
Wouldn't he?
Noah had interviewed the brother and marginal notes seemed to indicate he'd dismissed him as a potential suspect. Frank dredges the mud in her brain, trying to remember what Noah had written. She exits on the closest ramp and works north to Pasadena. The twenty-minute drive still takes almost an hour and Frank is so hyped when she gets home she forgets to pour a drink. She doesn't even unload her belt or pockets before flipping through the murder books. She can't find the obscure notation and has to go through the notes again, slowly.
There it is. Antoine Bailey. Sister said he was with her all day. Went to the grocery store in the morning, watched TV together and played Mexican Train all afternoon. Noah had run Bailey through the system, coming up only with minor vehicular infractions and traffic misdemeanors. An addendum to his notes showed Noah talked to the brother ten days later. He was on disability, an electrician by trade. Traveled back and forth between his folks' place in Bakersfield and his sister's in L.A., where he collected his check once a month.
'Don't get your panties in a wad,' she tells herself. 'It's probably nothing.'
But she lays out Ladeenia Pryce's autopsy photos. She studies one in particular. The closeup of the bruise on Ladeenia's leg.
The bruise is shaped like the ribbed edge of a Formica tabletop.
Chapter 34
Frank is in the squad room long before the rest of the crew comes in. She can't call the Disability Insurance office until eight so in the meantime she runs Bailey through the system again. His name pops up on two priors. One's a lewd and lascivious charge about two years after the kids were murdered, and the second is a dismissed assault only seven months old. By 9:00 am she has tracked Bailey through the DI records. His check gets sent to an address in Bakersfield. Frank cross-references the address to Kevin and Sharon Ferris. This doesn't surprise her.
She knows from knocking on doors that a Mexican family now lives in the house that the Ferrises used to live in, and from listening to Noah's tapes last night, she remembers Sharon Ferris saying her parents moved up to Bakersfield after she got married, leaving her the house on Raymond Street.
Bailey had his DI checks sent to Ferris when she lived in L.A., and now the checks go to her in Bakersfield. Frank wonders if Antoine is close to his older sister, what their relationship is like. Why the sister and not his folks? What's the bond there? Is she backing him where his parents won't? What's the hook? Frank has to find that out and work Ferris from that angle.
Ferris has two sons. She tracks one to Bakersfield, at an address not far from his mother. The second boy still lives in South Central and has accrued a variety of misdemeanors. Nothing serious and probably nothing worth riling his mother about. From the tone of Noah's interviews, Frank decides Ferris isn't friendly with the law but not openly hostile either. This gives Frank a slim edge and she drums the desk with her fingers. She hasn't felt this good since she saw Izzy Miron putting his dolls to bed.
She spends most of the day garnering information about Bailey, his sister and their family. At end of watch she hits the highway, catching I-5 to Bakersfield. Traffic is stodgy and Frank listens to the Ferris tapes over and over.
Bailey's story is consistent with his sister's. It was rainy. They spent the day together watching TV and playing dominos. In the morning they got groceries. A checker from Ralph's verified Bailey was in the store around ten that morning. She remembered because he was persistently and irritatingly macking on her. The next day he left town. He'd explained that his camper was near the site because he and Sharon had heard about some children getting killed and wanted to see for themselves. It was a shame. That's why their parents had fled L.A. When crack hit the streets they couldn't stand it anymore. They didn't want to spend their old age worried about getting hit on the head and jacked for a Social Security check. Leaving Sharon and her kids with the house, they moved up north, back to their farming roots. Antoine stayed with his sister until her husband kicked him out for not carrying his weight. Antoine stayed with his folks until the father gave him his old pickup. Antoine had been living in it ever since.
'Duh, right there all along.'
She speaks aloud, wondering how many times she and Noah looked at the picture with Bailey's truck in it. What shift in vision or altering of the cosmos allowed her to connect the dots? Why couldn't either of them see the camper six days, six weeks or even six months ago? Why does it take six years for her to finally see it? Frank admits to tunnel vision with a van or SUV-type vehicle. She'd even allowed for a work truck but she associated campers with retirees or avid fishermen. Frank marvels at the hologram effect of clues. They can be hanging right in front of your face, but until you have a shift in perception you can't see them.
She comes into Bakersfield around five o'clock and heads straight to Ferris's address, noting only one car in the driveway. She finds a 7-Eleven near a Mickey D's and buys two beers to wash down a Big Mac. She eats in her car then locks up and walks around the block, giving the Ferrises time to get home from work and have dinner. While she ambles, she considers Bailey's relation to his sister. Taking in a store window gaudily displaying items for '$.99 or less!' Frank mutters, 'How do we approach her?'
Frank hears herself and is embarrassed. She moves on, musing that she's getting as bad as a street person. Yet she is dimly aware, and comforted, that the 'we' included Noah.
The sun dips into the horizon and Frank returns to the Ferrises' house. When she knocks on his door, Kevin Ferris doesn't look surprised. She follows him into the kitchen where his wife is doing the dinner dishes. He may not have been surprised to see Frank, but Sharon Ferris is obviously startled.
Frank introduces herself, using the time to note how Ferris's eyes dart back and forth between Frank and her husband, how she's wringing the dishtowel.
'I see you're busy,' Frank says amiably. 'I won't keep you long. Just a couple things I need to ask about your brother.'
'My brother?' A pulse starts jumping in Ferris's throat.
'Antoine Bailey. He is your brother, correct?'
Ferris nods. She turns away, attacking a baking dish in the soapy water. 'What's he done?' she asks.
'Why do you think he's done something wrong?'
Ferris glances sideways at Frank and shrugs. 'Why else would you be here?'
'Do cops usually show up at your door asking about your brother?'
Ferris is silent but her husband asks, 'Look, Lieutenant, what's this all about?'
Frank nods but doesn't answer. By keeping the Ferrises waiting for her response she maintains control of the conversation.
'All right,' she says at length, feigning cooperation. 'I won't beat around the bush with you. Antoine's in trouble.'
Sharon Ferris stops scrubbing. 'What kinda trouble?'
'He's facing some pretty serious charges.'
'This got anything to do with them kids they found murdered?'
Bingo. It's significant that after all this time, that's the first trouble Ferris thinks of.
'I'm not gonna lie to you. It does.'
Ferris assumes a defensive posture, hips against the sink, crossed arms guarding her chest. 'Antoine ain't had nothin' to do with that.'
