She didn’t say anything.
“So why do you think Andre broke his own rules with this woman?” I asked.
“I don’t know. They didn’t last too long the second time-like I said, a couple of weeks or maybe even less. That’s why I thought Jeff was being ridiculous. Andre used to ask me about it. Andre and I didn’t last long together. I was just looking for a way out of my relationship with Jeff. And I think Andre was more interested in trying to find out what Jeff had told me about Nadine than he was in dating me. I always had to tell him what I’m telling you-Jeff thought Andre had crossed some kind of boundary by dating someone he worked with, and he didn’t think Nadine was trustworthy. But maybe Jeff would have ended that friendship anyway. I don’t know.”
“So who arranged for Nadine to walk in on you and Andre?”
“No one.
“What?”
“Yes. I think they must have had a fight out on the boat. Went fishing one day, and that was that.”
That’s three records for Nadine, I thought, becoming all the more curious about her. Andre dated his own graduate assistant, reconciled with her, and she left him before he could leave her. “Ivy-do you still have that friend in the college records office?”
“Sure. You want me to have her track down Nadine?”
“Yes. If the records office doesn’t have a current address, maybe your friend could find out if Nadine Preston has asked for transcripts to be sent somewhere.”
“I’ll do what I can.”
“Even if I could get her student ID number-it’s the same as her Social Security number, right?”
“Right,” she said. “You think you might be able to locate her with that?”
“Maybe. By the way, you wouldn’t happen to know where Jeff is these days?”
There was a long silence. “You honestly don’t know?”
“No.”
“I guess you weren’t around then.”
“Around when?”
“Jeff killed himself not long after I left him.”
“Jeff? I can’t believe-” I quickly realized that it was the wrong thing to say. The trouble was, there was no right thing to say. “I-I’m sorry, Ivy. I didn’t know.”
“It was a long time ago,” she said, sounding as if it wasn’t. “It happened when you were living in Bakersfield, I guess.”
“No one told me-”
“Don’t worry about it. Now, where should I call you with the information? Are you going to be in your office?”
I looked at the little black object on my desk. “Let me give you my pager number.”
23
ITRAVELED THE TWISTSand turns of the building’s corridors, my thoughts so absorbed with Ivy’s revelations that I passed up the room occupied by the business section and had to double back.
I worried about Ivy, thought of how carelessly I had referred to Jeff throughout the conversation. I had undoubtedly opened old wounds. Ivy had always been kind to me, and inadvertently, I had been unkind to her.
Nadine Preston occupied my thoughts as well. Andre-who was so unwavering in his relationship patterns that a hundred women could recite them chapter and verse-had been remarkably unpredictable in his dealings with her.
ICAUGHT UP WITH Murray at his desk. He was hard at work on the Sunday real estate section, which would go to press on Thursday morning. Watching him work on predated pages, I remembered how disillusioned I was when-early on in my study of journalism-I learned that the whole paper wasn’t always printed up the night before it was delivered.
Murray looked up when I cast a shadow across his desk, glanced around, and saw that we were alone. Probably in a world of his own until I stood in his light.
“What have you got for me?” I asked.
He smiled and opened a desk drawer. “I don’t know how you found out about this before I did,” he said. “Swear you’ll keep me posted on your progress?”
“Girl Scout’s honor? Or may I simply cross my heart?”
He tugged at a manila clasp envelope, pulling it out of the drawer but keeping it in his hand. “Here are the records on the area near the Angelus. You wanted the redevelopment projects for 1974-78 with Tyler, Hill, Dage, and Watterson, right? I did that, but I also looked up a couple of other items, including the current status of ownership in the area. This has turned out to be very interesting,” he said, opening the clasp. “Right now, the building next to the Angelus is owned by Hill and Associates.”
“Roland Hill’s company. I remember seeing construction work being done on it.”
“Hill owns several of the buildings surrounding it. If there’s construction being done on any of them, Keene Dage’s company is doing the work. He owns one or two of the properties himself, as does Corbin Tyler.”
He pulled out a sheet of paper and handed it to me. It was the current list. The name at the top of the list surprised me.
“You sound shocked. He hasn’t owned it for very long; officially, just for a couple of weeks. That’s not the most important thing you can learn from that list, anyway.”
I studied it. “Most of these were purchased within the last month,” I said.
“Keep that in mind. Now look at the list of owners for these same properties a year ago.”
He handed another sheet of paper to me. There was only one owner listed for all of the properties. Pacific View Associates.
“Pacific View Associates? Didn’t you write about them recently? They’re on the verge of bankruptcy, right?”
He smiled. “Yes. Most of PVA’s properties are going cheap, although that may change soon. But we’ll come back to that in a moment. There’s the list of owners for the years you asked for. Take a look.”
I studied this list for a moment, then said, “Hill owned almost all of the properties that PVA owns now.”
“Exactly.”
“I don’t get it. Why would Hill sell it to PVA, then buy it back again?”
“Hill, Dage, and Tyler-the businessmen on your list. Sometimes Hill brings in other investors, but very few others are involved. Let’s just say Hill for now. He has an uncanny ability, wouldn’t you say? Buys very cheap, sells higher, buys cheap again. He has an eye for choice properties.”
“You said ‘choice properties.’ Forgive me if I don’t see this section of town as ‘choice.’”
“Irene, you disappoint me! You’re never going to make the kind of money these people do if you don’t learn to use your imagination. Where did Las Piernas plan to build a convention center?”
“I’ll never make that kind of money anyway. But to answer your question-until recently, down on the waterfront.”
“And?”
I frowned, thinking over what I knew about the project. “The plans for the convention center have become a big disappointment to a lot of folks; those waterfront properties belong to a mixture of owners, including the city itself. But the California Coastal Commission put the kibosh on the plans last week, and it’s not clear if the city will spend the time and money fighting it because-Oh, hell.”
“My faith in you is about to be restored,” Murray said.
“I should have thought about the area less than a block away from the Angelus. Las Piernas may not fight the Coastal Commission, because there are alternative sites. One of the alternative sites for the convention center is
