morning that had caused me to miss breakfast.
I didn't figure it was any of his business.
CHAPTER 16
By the time I was ready to head across the great water to Port Angeles, it was after four. I probably should have taken a departmental car, but between driving a Porsche 928 and a Dodge Diplomat, there's really no contest. However, I did stop by Captain Powell's fishbowl long enough to get a verbal okay from him.
'If you put a dent in that little hummer of yours while you're over there, Powell warned, shaking his finger in my face, 'you'd better not plan on vouchering it.
'No problem, I told him, fool that I am.
Lemmings rushing to the sea have nothing on Seattlites bent on escaping the city and going across Puget Sound on sunny Friday afternoons. With my usual finesse and timing, I managed to be stuck smack in the middle of the worst of the traffic. At the ferry terminal I bought a ticket to Winslow and maneuvered the 928 into the proper line.
The ferry Walla Walla is a huge, cavernous affair. When it was ready for loading, row after row of cars started their engines and drove onto the car decks. For a while, it looked as though I would make it, but I didn't. Loading stopped three cars away, leaving me near the head of the line for the next ferry-an hour later. The Washington State Ferry System is nothing if not implacable. No amount of whining, pleading, or dashboard pounding would fix it. And so, I sat there in my car, doing a slow burn, with nothing to do but think.
Halvorsen's report of his conversation with the detective in Illinois had had a disquieting effect on me. It had stayed in the back of my mind and nipped away at me all afternoon. Now, sitting there trapped in the ferry line, I let out all the stops and stewed about it in dead earnest.
In order to find a killer, a cop sometimes has to put himself in the place of either the victim or the killer, and sometimes both. In this case, I had thought I was coming to grips with Tadeo Kurobashi, with who he was and what made him tick. But now, Alvin Grant's talk about Lorenzo Tabone and Aldo Pappinzino showed me that there was a giant blind spot in my perception of the dead man.
Tadeo Kurobashi's connection with a Chicago-based Mafia boss was something that didn't fit and didn't make sense, something I couldn't get a handle on. Had Kurobashi been involved in the drug trade as Andy Halvorsen had suggested? Even as I asked the question, I discarded it. Nothing in Tadeo Kurobashi's life had hinted at drugs. To all appearances he had been a hardworking entrepreneur, brought to his knees by a conspiracy of less than honest competition.
And if the mob was involved, as they evidently were, what did they want? Was the Mafia branching out and going high-tech these days? Had Tadeo invented some kind of electronics wizardry valuable enough to the criminal element that they were willing to kill in order to lay hands on it? If so, what was it and had they already gotten it? Sitting there in the line with the setting sun glaring in my face, my frustration level went up yet another notch or two.
I wished I could be in two places at once. Kimiko Kurobashi, unwittingly or not, probably held the key to everything I didn't know, and by now, Detective Halvorsen should have finished interviewing her. What had she told him, and would it help us find her father's killer? As my need to know went over the top, I reached for my car phone, dialed the Whitman County sheriff's department, and asked to speak to Detective Halvorsen.
'Sorry, he's sick. He's gone home for the day, the dispatcher told me.
'Home! I yelped. 'I thought he was on his way to Spokane.
'I know he was planning to, but he called in sick early this afternoon.
'Do you have his home number? I asked.
'I'm not allowed to give it out.
Of course he wasn't allowed to give it out. I had the number myself, in my jacket, in the backseat. It just wasn't easily accessible. I found it though, and a minute or so later, Halvorsen's phone was ringing. It had rung seven or eight times, and I was about to hang up when he finally answered.
'Hello? He sounded funny-distant, hesitant.
'Andy? This is Beau, in Seattle. Are you all right?
'She's gone, he managed. His words were slurred. He sounded drunk.
'Gone? My heart rose to my throat. Kimiko dead too? Had someone gotten to her in the hospital, or had she fallen victim to some unforeseen medical complication?
'How can that be? I demanded. 'I thought she was getting better, that the doctors said she was going to be okay.
'Doctors? What doctors?
'Kimiko's doctors, goddamnit. Halvorsen, are you drinking or what?
'Who said anything about Kimiko? Monica's gone. She left me. Went home to her mother. I can't believe it. How could she? I mean, she's why I divorced Barbara. I gave up my kids because of her.
Monica was gone, not Kimiko. My relief was almost overwhelming. 'So Kimiko's all right? Did you talk to her?
'No, I came home to tell Monica I was on my way to Spokane and found her packing to leave. I tried to talk her out of it, but she wouldn't listen. Wouldn't even talk to me.
The poor bastard doesn't know when he's well off, I thought. I said, 'That's too bad, Andy. I'm sorry to hear it. What are you going to do?
'Beats the hell out of me. Wait here, I guess. See if she changes her mind and comes back.
I didn't tell him not to hold his breath. Going to her mother's was probably nothing but a smoke screen. My guess was that Monica's shopping around had zeroed in on somebody more to her liking and closer to her own age.
The next ferry had pulled into the Colman dock and was disgorging its load of vehicles. Around me, people were returning to their cars, starting their engines.
'Look, Andy, I said. 'I've gotta go. The ferry's here and I'm going to have to hang up. Don't try to do anything tonight. You're in no condition, but tomorrow get your ass to Spokane and go to work. It'll be good for what ails you, take your mind off your troubles.
'You're probably right, Andy Halvorsen mumbled, but he didn't sound convinced. I replaced the phone in its holder, started the car, and rumbled up the gangway onto the car deck. Front and center.
It's an eighty-seven-mile trip from Seattle to Port Angeles, part of it by ferry and the rest on narrow two-lane secondary roads that meander through the forests of the Kitsap Peninsula, Bainbridge Island, and the Olympic Peninsula. It sounds rural, and it is, but it's also full of traffic, particularly on Friday nights. I didn't make very good time.
The various port and sawmill towns that dot the Washington coastline-Port Angeles, Port Townsend, Raymond, Sequim-are as similar as peas in a pod. I've always maintained that you could get drunk in one, wake up in another, and never know the difference.
Port Angeles is built on two levels. The upper one is the town proper. Regular houses are there along with churches, grocery stores, and the trappings of small-town life and business. The lower one is a duke's mixture of tourist traps and lowbrow hotels, taverns, cafes, and restaurants that cater to freighter crewmen, sawmill workers, derelicts, and, occasionally, legitimate tourists. The shops do a land-office business in used books and made-in- Washington gewgaws.
The first person I asked for directions, a teenager pumping gas at a Texaco station, had never heard of the Ritz Hotel. I had expected an establishment with that kind of name to have a certain amount of stature in town and to be something of a landmark. The second person I asked, a grizzled drunk with a rolling gait and a pint bottle of vodka stashed in his hip pocket, nodded and pointed.
'Right up there, fella. Right over Davey's Locker. You got a quarter for a cup of coffee? I tossed him a quarter, knowing full well he'd put it to bad use.
Davey's Locker turned out to be a tavern on the street level of a long, narrow, two-story frame building whose blackened shingles were rotting with age. The street outside was empty, so I parked directly in front. The
