and thirty. It must be much the same for that poor woman’s daughters.”
“I suppose so. Will you tell me about seeing her that afternoon?”
“Well, I’d been walking my then dog, Kiro, along with my friend Bryan Taft and his standard poodle, Dewey. We were coming back toward the parking lot when one of those old VW buses pulled in. I took particular note of it because I’d owned one of the same color. I remember saying something to Bryan about being surprised the thing still ran. Mine was a dreadful vehicle-underpowered, and in the end it got so bad I’d actually have to put it in reverse and back up the hills. Anyway, the bus pulled into a space at the far side of the lot, and the woman got out. She locked the bus and came straight toward us, so we got a good look at her.”
We’d reached the water’s edge by now. Lighthill motioned to the right and we took a path leading toward the commercial district along the shore.
“How did she seem?” I asked. “Nervous? Upset? Business as usual?”
He considered. “I’d say purposeful. She knew where she was going and she was going to get there as quickly as possible. But first she made a detour to the ladies’ room.”
“That wasn’t in any of the newspaper accounts.”
“Possibly because Bryan didn’t think to mention it. And I-well, a rest stop seemed irrelevant, and really nobody’s business but the woman’s.”
“Did you see her come out of the restroom?”
“Yes. She wasn’t in there long. Bryan and I were still in the parking lot, standing next to his car and discussing plans to go to a regional AKC show in Los Angeles the next weekend. I only glimpsed her from behind, but it was the same woman. I recognized her by the sweater she wore-I guess they’re called ‘hoodies’ now. It was tan, and she’d pulled the hood up over her head, even though it was a warm day.”
“You didn’t see her face? Or her hair?”
“No. But it had to be the same woman. No one else had gone into the restrooms.”
Lighthill was frowning, as if he too had spotted the error in his logic. “It was the same jeans, the same sweater,” he said defensively.
“And she walked off toward town, without turning around?”
“Yes. She cut across the grass to this very path and went the same way we’re walking.”
“How long did you stay in the parking lot after that?”
“Only a few minutes. Bryan and I firmed up our plans. He left in his car, and Kiro and I walked home.”
“Your friend Bryan-I wasn’t able to locate a current address for him. Do you have one?”
“Sorry, I don’t. His wife died ten years ago, and he moved to Mexico. After a couple of years my letters were returned as undeliverable. I can provide you with that address, if you like.”
Just in case all my other leads came to dead ends, I gave him my card and said, “I’d appreciate it if you’d phone it in to my office, collect, when it’s convenient.”
We reached the end of the path and turned onto the main street, passing a row of small run-down cottages that perched above the water. Like many of the buildings I’d seen in Cayucos, they harked back to another, more gentle era.
I said, “No one here in the business district ever came forward about seeing Laurel Greenwood. Where could she have gone, that she would’ve escaped notice?”
“Hard to say. But it’s not unusual that nobody took note of her; even in those days we had a lot of tourists.”
“The town must’ve been quite different then.”
“Well, yes. Businesses have changed hands. Old buildings have been torn down and replaced with new ones.”
“D’you recall what was here? Can you describe it?”
“These cottages, they’ve been here as long as I remember, and I’ve lived here thirty years. That restaurant”-he pointed-“is relatively new; a marine supply used to be there. The shops-owners come and go, merchandise changes. Farther uphill there’re new antiques stores and boutiques of all kinds. A big wine and gourmet-food emporium is on the lot where the mini-storage and equipment-rentals place was. Like any tourist town, they take away the things that’re for the residents-I used to keep my camper in one of the little garages at the storage company-and put up things for the out-of-towners. But the lay of the land, that hasn’t changed. You can alter what’s on it, but as Morro Rock stands up to erosion, the land stands up to man.”
I hesitated. “Can you think of anyone in the immediate area who would have been here that day? Who might have noticed Laurel Greenwood and for some reason not come forward?”
Lighthill stopped walking, allowing Csoda to sniff around a sidewalk trash receptacle. “Well, I always did wonder about Herm Magruder. He was the local gossip columnist, wrote a weekly piece-‘Doings About Town’-for the little paper. Called himself ‘Mr. Morro Bay.’ Gathered most of his information in the bars or from the front porch of his house. It stood right across the street, where that shell shop is now. He was on the porch with a drink in his hand when I went by earlier that day, so he must’ve been there when the Greenwood woman came out of the park. Once Herm sat down with his drink, you couldn’t pry him off that porch.”
Magruder hadn’t been mentioned in any of the news reports. “D’you know if the police questioned him?”
“Should have. He was right there, and he was the eyes and ears of the town, but he had such a reputation as a drunk that they might not’ve bothered.”
“Where can I find him?”
“He and his wife, Amy, moved to a condo at Pacific View, a complex on the bluff south of town, after they sold the old house.”
“He still write his column?”
“No, the paper closed down about five years ago. Must be hard on Herm, having no excuse to sit in the bars and poke into people’s business. He’d probably be glad to have a visitor.”
After Ira Lighthill and I parted-he and Csoda heading up the hill toward home-I got the Magruders’ number from information and called it. No one answered. I retraced my steps to the main street and had a cup of coffee at a cafe, then called again. Still no answer. In response to the high temperatures inland, the fog was creeping back; Morro Bay looked bleak and inhospitable. I decided to pack it in, drive back to Paso Robles, and phone the office.
“So that’s where things stand,” I said to Patrick. “Rob Traverso at the Paso Robles PD is letting me go over their files on the case tomorrow morning. He couldn’t help me with Laurel’s final painting; it was returned to Roy years ago, and I assume he destroyed it like the others. Traverso’s putting me in touch with a Deputy Selma Barker at the county sheriff’s department. After I go over the PRPD casefile, I’ll meet with her and try to talk with the Magruders. And the babysitter has agreed to see me in the late afternoon.”
I was sitting at the desk in my room at the lodge, the air-conditioning cranked up to maximum. Today the inland temperature was in the high nineties, and showed no signs of cooling, even though it was after five o’clock.
“You want me to ask Derek to background the Magruders?” Patrick asked. “He said he’ll be working late tonight.”
“I’d better talk with him personally. Will you transfer me? And why don’t you take your files on the case home and review them over the weekend. That is, if you don’t have plans.”
“No plans. My ex is taking the kids to Disneyland, so I won’t have them this week.”
I waited for Derek to pick up, asked him to run checks on both Amy and Herm Magruder. Then I said, “I haven’t checked my e-mail yet; did you find anything on Josie Smith or the inmates who attended Laurel’s art class at the Men’s Colony?”
“The prison wouldn’t give out information, so I’m trying to get in touch with Craig’s contact at DOC. Probably I won’t be able to get you anything on that till Monday. I’ve got basic background on Josie Smith: date of birth, marriages and divorces, date of death.” He read them off to me. “Smith went by her husbands’ names during her marriages-Dunn and Bernstein-but took back her birth name after the second marriage failed.”
“Any children?”
“None. Smith studied nursing at San Jose State. Dropped out to get married after her junior year, then went
