bus with the rest of the citizens. I'll swing in front on Fourth in
about ten minutes. Cool?'
'Yep. See you then.'
I used the ten minutes to make sure nothing urgent was waiting for me
back in the office and to put something called mud in my
moisture-crazed hair for the trip. My best friend, Grace, is a
hairdresser. She cut my dark brown locks (the bottle says coffee, to
be exact) into a wispy little do a few months back, and to her chagrin
I was in the ugly process of growing it back into my boring reliable
shoulder-length bob. According to her, all I needed was the right
product to see my hair through its growing pangs. I must have been
doing something wrong with the mud, because by the time my fingers were
done crimping and twisting, I looked like Neil Young in drag.
I left the courthouse just as Johnson and Walker pulled up in a white
unmarked bureau Crown Vic.
Lunch-hour traffic had begun to accumulate downtown, but the drive was
quick once we crossed 1-405 and got out of the downtown business
district. As Johnson maneuvered the tight curves up the west hills, I
asked Walker what they knew so far about Susan Kerr.
'Not too much. Her PPDS printouts right there,' he said, reaching back
to hand me a sheet of green computer paper from the Portland Police
Data System. 'Nothing to see. She's forty-two, no criminal history,
drives a Mercedes.'
'The big one,' Johnson cut in. 'I told you, the woman's got some
cash.'
'We don't know much more than that. One criminal complaint four years
ago for a smash-and-grab,' Walker explained.
Portland has low violent crime and high property crime, driven
primarily by a large population of street kids and drug addicts. Almost
everyone with a car has at some point been a smash-and-grab victim. My
poor Jetta's windows have been smashed on three occasions, once for my
stereo, once for the gym bag I stupidly left in the backseat, and once
for nothing but a new Lyle Lovett CD. That one really pissed me off.
Walker pulled his spiral notebook from the breast pocket of his shirt
to refresh his memory. 'The co-complainant on the smash-and-grab was
Herbert Kerr at the same address. Presumably the husband, but he's got
a 1932 date of birth. He died two years ago.'
'Hey, some women go for the old guys. Look at you. You've got a
woman.' Johnson was laughing at his joke, but Walker gave his partner
a look to show he wasn't amused.
'Yeah, and she's been stuck with me for thirty-two years. Somehow I
suspect I'm not Susan Kerr's type.'
'Well, I know I'm not.'
'Excuse me, fellas, but could we get back to talking about the case?
For the record, I think any woman would be lucky to have either of
you.'
'Sorry, Sam,' Walker said. 'Lack of sleep gets to you. Truth is,
we're not getting anywhere. Media coverage is usually good on a
missing persons case, but this one's out of control. Calls have been
flooding into the hotline we set up, but it's a bunch of stuff that's
either wrong, contradictory, or totally irrelevant.'
'Like what?' I asked.
I could tell he didn't know where to begin. 'Well, we've got people in
the neighborhood telling us they saw her walking her dog on Sunday at
eight a.m.' eleven a.m.' three p.m.' and seven p.m. We've got people
all over town calling us about possible sightings today. Then we've
got the callers who need us to know everything they ever happened to
notice about the Easterbrooks that their landscapers were out on
Tuesday, that UPS left something on the porch on Friday, that the
windows were open overnight on Saturday. You don't want to tell people
to stop calling, but you'd think these people would have the good sense
to know they're not being helpful.'
'Don't forget the psychics, Jack.'
'Ah, Jesus. The psychics. One lady called up crying that Clarissa was
at the bottom of the Willamette and couldn't cross over to heaven until
we recovered her body from the river. Fucking ghoulish. There's just
way too many nut jobs out there for us to keep up with the leads.'
'Well, I think I might have something worth pursuing,' I said. I gave
them the limited information I'd gotten from Nelly Giacoma about the
ticked-off evicted guy.
'Hard to look into it without knowing who we're talking about,' Johnson
said. 'Want us to get a warrant for the office?'
'I'm working on it. I think it'll be faster to go through the City
Attorney, but I'll let you know what I hear. What about the husband?'
I asked. 'He still acting like what you'd expect?'
Walker answered. 'Yeah, seems all right. I was over there this
morning. You know, shook up but not overwrought. He's definitely in
no shape to be cutting anyone open; he was doing what he could to get
his hospital rounds covered. But he's out there on the news, being
cooperative. I'm not getting a vibe from this one.'
'Me neither,' Johnson said, 'but you never can tell.'
I assumed when the car stopped in front of one of the nicer Portland
Heights spreads that we had arrived at Susan Kerr's. As deluxe as the
place was, however, it must not have been good enough because she was
making some improvements. There was a dumpster in the driveway and a
construction truck across the street.
I opened my door, but Johnson wasn't ready to drop the subject of
Townsend Easterbrook. 'I know you got your boss to think about,
Kincaid, but I think we need to at least consider whether we should ask
the guy to take a poly. Far as I'm concerned, the husband's always a
suspect. I don't care who he is.'
'OK, we'll talk about it after we're done here.' I stepped into the
rain, making my way to the house as quickly as I could.
Three.
I was surprised when a maid answered Susan Kerr's front door.
Definitely not a Portland thing. This woman had real money.
The maid led us through three rooms and told us to sit in the fourth.
Big on color-coordinated stripes, dots, and paisleys, Susan Kerr's
