house was within sight of the San Luis Opisbo high school. A rich potential hunting ground for a predator of teenage girls.
The house was a typical southern California bungalow—beige stucco and a barrel tile roof—with overgrown purple bougainvillea and brilliant orange birds of paradise flanking the front porch steps. The yard was thin and weedy. The place had that odd feeling of vacancy about it.
Hicks went up onto the little porch. Mendez took a stroll around the back of the house and tried the back door. Locked. Through the window he could see the small kitchen. The counters were bare. There wasn’t so much as a water glass by the sink. The sun splashed in through a window, illuminating the layer of dust and the odd dead bug on the Mexican tile floor.
“Hey, you!”
He jumped a little at the sharp sound of the voice. Turning around, he came into the full glare of a skinny elderly woman in denim overalls and a blue Dodgers cap. A wild head of gray hair fell to her shoulders. Standing in the yard a few feet back from the stoop, she carried what looked like an ax handle, hefting it and making small circles with it like it was a baseball bat and she was getting ready to swing for the bleachers.
Mendez started to reach inside his coat.
“Don’t even think about it, pervert!” the woman snapped, shouldering the axe handle. Her accent was British, he thought. She came a couple of steps closer to the stoop, her wrinkled little mouth knotted up like a prune.
“I’m a law enforcement officer, ma’am,” Mendez said. “I’ll show you my badge if you’ll let me.”
“How do I know you’re not packin’ heat?”
“I
“Show it to me, then,” she demanded. “And don’t try anything funny. This is a hickory handle and I know how to use it.”
Mendez gently opened his sport coat so she could see both the badge clipped to his belt and the nine millimeter in his shoulder holster.
The old lady deflated with a big sigh and lowered her weapon. “Crikey,” she said. “What are you doin’ skulkin’ ’round back here? You scared the livin’ piss out of me!”
“I could ask you the same thing, ma’am. What are you doing back here? Do you live in this house?”
“No,” she said. “I live right over here. I’m on the neighborhood watch. I keep an eye on things around here. You never know what might go on, considering.”
“Considering what?”
“Considering the pervert that lived here.”
“Roland Ballencoa?”
“That’s him,” she said. “I couldn’t believe he moved right in next to me, bold as brass,” she said with absolute disgust. “Outrageous.
“I had read all about him in the Santa Barbara paper,” she went on. “I take four papers and read ’em front to back:
“And I know they never arrested him or nothin’ down there, but I can read between the lines. He done somethin’ to that poor girl, sure as anything.”
Hicks came around the side of the house, missing a step as he caught sight of the old lady. His eyes got big for a split second.
“There’s no one home,” he said.
“He moved out,” the woman said, and she spat on the ground. “Good riddance.” She looked up at Mendez and tipped her head at Hicks. “Is he a copper too?”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Detective Hicks, ma’am.” He showed her his badge.
“Mavis Whitaker,” she said. “I live next door. I’m with the neighborhood watch.”
Hicks looked at her ax handle and bobbed his eyebrows.
Mendez came down off the back steps.
“There’s nothing in the mailbox except for ‘Occupant,’” Hicks said.
“Oh, he didn’t get his mail here,” Mavis Whitaker said.
They both looked at her.
“I was speakin’ to the post carrier one day. She’s a woman, and a cute little thing. I told her all about the perv as soon as he moved in. You know, lest he try to lure her into the house and try somethin’.
“So I said, I don’t imagine he gets no mail but from his mother, if he knows who she is. And she told me he don’t get no mail at all. That he must have it delivered elsewhere. Not so much as a utility bill, she said.”
“How long ago did Mr. Ballencoa move out?” he asked.
“I don’t know. I went home to Australia for six weeks the end of April. When I got back, he was gone.”
“Do you have any idea where he might have gone?”
“I certainly don’t. I wouldn’t give him the time of day. Nor would he engage me in conversation. I told him in no uncertain terms when he moved here, if he thought he might get smart with me, I’d introduce Ol’ Hick’ry here to his kneecaps. Bloody wanker.”
“What did he say when you told him that?” Hicks asked.
“Nothin’. Not a word. He just looked at me like he was lookin’ through me, then went on about his business.
“I grew up in the Outback,” she said. “My dad was a miner, and a rough sort they are. Plenty of men like this one out there, walkin’’round with no souls. You wouldn’t walk beside them, I’ll tell you that. You’d go out in the bush and you’d never come back.”
“Did Mr. Ballencoa live here alone?” Mendez asked.
“I never seen nobody go in nor come out but him. Never saw a friend nor a girlfriend—’course he may have had one in a box in there. He’s that sort, ain’t he?”
“What kind of car did he drive?” Hicks asked.
“A white van. Plain as Jane. No windows.”
“Do you happen to know if he owned this house or rented?” Mendez asked.
“Rented. I called his landlord up and gave him a piece of my mind, I’ll tell you that. What kind of decent individual rents to a pedophile? And with the school right there? I called the police and gave them what for as well. It shouldn’t be allowed, but they told me he hadn’t been charged nor convicted and there weren’t nothin’ they could do about it.”
“Do you have a phone number for the landlord?” Hicks asked.
“Carl Eddard. Scum Lord I call him,” Mavis Whitaker said. “I do indeed. Come next door and I’ll get it for you.”
Mavis Whitaker’s home was identical in style to the one Ballencoa had lived in, but her yard was cute and tidy, and showed the fruits of her green thumb. Iceberg rosebushes loaded with big fat white blooms encircled the property inside the low black iron fence. Flower beds flanked the sidewalk and made a colorful border around the house itself.
A bell jingled as she let them in the gate. There were bars on her front door and grates over the windows. Ms. Whitaker did not leave her security to chance. And if an assailant made it past the first line of defense, she had Ol’ Hick’ry for her backup.
The house was immaculate and smelled of lemon furniture polish. The decor was a mix of antique pieces draped in doilies, shelves loaded with knickknacks, and a seventies plaid sofa and chair from a discount furniture mart. Two big brown tabby cats sat in an open window, taking in the sun.
“I’ve got it here in my address book,” Mavis said, going to a little writing desk in her dining room. “I even filed it under Scum Lord so I wouldn’t have to tax m’self sayin’ his name.”
She put her ax handle down on the dining room table, then turned to the desk and picked up the address book from beside her telephone.
“He’s a rude one, I’ll tell you,” she went on. “No regard for anyone but his banker. I said to him, what if this perv comes over in the night and attacks me. He says, considering what an old bitch I am, I shouldn’t have to worry
