Don't Turn Your Back on the Ocean Page 14

  It is if it had anything to do with Ariel Logan’s murder, I thought. But I didn’t say it. At least not then.

  The music from the radio changed again. Nat King Cole’s velvety tones filled the uncomfortable silence, singing to “Sweet Lorraine.” Suddenly I wrinkled my nose. Something in the kitchen had overpowered the pleasant cooking odors that had earlier wafted into the bar. And it wasn’t charred California cuisine.

  My eyes began to water. “What the hell is that?”

  Mother and Karl pushed back their chairs as the smell grew in intensity, moving quickly from merely unpleasant to an overpowering stench that now made me gag.

  Rotten meat? Decaying fish? No, it didn’t have that sickly-sweet odor that went with food gone bad. It didn’t smell like a backed-up toilet in the rest rooms or a skunk that had strayed into this urban environment and let loose with its protective musk. Chemical, I thought, something that choked and burned my nose and throat.

  “Get out,” I told Mother, gasping. My eyes streamed tears. I pulled the neck of my T-shirt up to cover my nose and mouth and pushed my mother in Karl’s direction. He seized her arm and pulled her toward the entrance of Café Marie. Lori pelted from behind the bar, following them. Rachel went through the door after her, reservation book and the cordless phone in one hand, followed by two of the servers who’d been in the dining room.

  From the kitchen I heard someone shouting at the rest of the staff to get out. I ran down the hallway and saw Julian at the back door, a dish towel tied around his face. With one hand he shoved one of the cooks toward the open back door.

  One of the dishwashers had been overcome. He was slumped on the floor near the sink. Quickly I knelt and grabbed his arm, struggling to get him on his feet. Then Julian took his other arm. Together we propelled the dishwasher out the back door, into the garden at the side of Café Marie.

  Fresh air had never smelled sweeter.

  Rachel must have called 911 because I heard sirens in the distance. Julian pulled the dish towel from his face and stared into the face of the woozy dishwasher.

  “You gonna be okay?” he demanded. The other man nodded, gulping unadulterated air into his lungs.

  The fire department arrived first, quickly followed by the police. Within a few minutes we were ushered from the garden to a spot farther down the alley. We stood watching the chaos that now enveloped Café Marie, replete with flashing red lights, emergency vehicles, and shouting voices. Genderless figures swathed in protective clothing looked like they’d dropped in from another planet. Several of these space invaders were now unwinding yellow barrier tape around what they were already calling a hot zone.

  Out in the street a crowd had gathered, drawn by the sirens and red lights. I located Mother by looking for her bright melon-colored blouse. She was here in the alley, raking one hand through her hair as she talked with a police officer and a round-faced fellow in tan slacks. Karl Beckman loomed behind her, hands on his hips and his wide face creased by a frown. I walked over to them. Mother introduced me to Sergeant Smith of the Monterey Police Department, who identified himself as the incident commander. The civilian was Eric Lopez, a county environmental health specialist.

  “Is all this routine?” I asked, sweeping my hand around to encompass the activity. “The fire trucks, the protective suits, the perimeter tape? It seems like overkill for a bad smell.”

  “We don’t know what we’re dealing with,” Lopez said. “Could be hazardous, toxic. We always cordon off the zones. Now, I need to ask you some questions—” He turned to Mother first and I stepped back to await my turn.

  Julian Surtees stood to one side, watching this exchange. He still had the white dish towel draped around his neck. It made him look like a disconsolate bandit.

  “I suppose you think I did this, too,” he said.

  “If you did, I’d sure as hell like to know how you pulled it off. It seemed to be coming from the kitchen. Any ideas?”

  “The ventilators above the stoves, maybe.” He shrugged. “They pull the heat and the cooking odors out of the kitchen. Pull, not push. This stink seemed to come out of nowhere and all of a sudden it was everywhere. Besides, the vents have been on since the bakers were here early this morning.”

  At that moment one of the space aliens exited the restaurant through the back door and trotted down the alley toward Sergeant Smith. The two men conferred and I saw the man in protective clothing gesture toward the roof of the one-story building. I looked in the direction he’d pointed.

  “What’s in that metal box up there?” I asked Julian.

  “The motor for the ventilating system.” He stared at it, as though trying to see something hidden in code.

  The metal box was close to the roof’s edge. The vents above the stoves were supposed to pull cooking odors out of the kitchen. Pull, not push, Julian had said. But the odor spread through the kitchen and out into the dining area. I didn’t know much about motors but I was willing to bet someone had climbed up on the roof of Café Marie and tinkered with some electrical wires.

  It would be easy enough to get up there. I saw a small Dumpster right next to the back door. The Dumpster lid, about chest high, was closed. If there weren’t yellow tape and men in protective clothing between me and the building, I could take a running jump and haul myself up on top of the Dumpster. Another jump, and I could probably climb onto the roof to examine the metal box and the screws that held it in place, looking for some fresh scratch marks.

  But that didn’t account for the fact that the vents had been on since this morning. Of course not. The havoc caused by the smell wouldn’t be as great while the baker was making rolls. The saboteur had waited until dinner preparation at Café Marie was well under way, when maximum damage could be inflicted. I wondered if this stink bomb had a timer attached.

  I scowled at the metal box and the Dumpster. Then I turned my head to the right and saw Mother pacing back and forth at the perimeter, along the yellow tape barrier. Then she stopped next to Karl Beckman and he put his arms around her, pulling her close in an embrace.

  I tried not to glare at him and didn’t succeed. Julian, still at my side, intercepted my look and flashed me a sudden sardonic grin that said he knew exactly how I felt about the boatyard owner.

  It wasn’t just Beckman and his relationship with my mother, I told myself. It was also the fact that Beckman always seemed to be on the spot whenever there was trouble. Saturday night at the restaurant, when Mrs. Grady found the mouse on her plate. And here, now, at the scene of Mother’s latest disaster.

  Mother withdrew from Karl’s arms as she saw me walking toward her. Just as I reached her the sergeant joined us. “Looks like there’s something in one of the ventilating ducts,” Smith reported. “The pH test paper shows it’s an acid. You’ll have to get it tested to find out exactly what it is.”

  The sergeant explained that now that the county hazardous response team had taken the sample, it was the property owner’s responsibility to have it analyzed by a lab. The additional bad news, delivered by Lopez, was that Café Marie was closed until an industrial hygienist could determine the origin of the odor.

  “How long will that take?” Mother ran a hand through her already disarranged hair. I saw the look in her eyes and knew she was tallying the cost in ruined food and canceled reservations. The lost revenue would hurt badly.

  “Two weeks is the standard turnaround time,” Lopez said. “But there’s a lab in Seaside that’ll do it in twenty-four hours. Of course, it costs quite a bit more, if you want to pay the price.”

  “I have to pay the price,” Mother said, her voice grim. “I can’t afford to be closed for two weeks. If I have any customers left after this.”

  Seventeen

  CARMEL MISSION WAS INITIALLY FOUNDED IN 1770, in Monterey, the second of the twenty-one missions scattered the length of what was then known as Alta California. But Father Junípero Serra didn’t like being so close to the soldiers of the Monterey Presidio. The following
year he found another site, where the Carmel River runs into the sea, closer to the Indian population he intended to Christianize.

  Never mind that California’s native population didn’t particularly want to be Christianized. Civilization, brought to the Indians by the Spanish sword and cross, now recalled in the mission’s paternalistic murals of saintly friars and little brown brothers, was the death of many of them. I think of that whenever I see any of the missions, and this morning was no exception.

  It was warm and sunny this Monday morning, now the first week in October. The parking lot of the mission complex was full and cars overflowed onto Rio Road and Lausen Drive, the side street. I left my car a block up Rio Road and walked to the mission, wearing a blue dress and heels borrowed from Mother’s closet. First I saw Bobby’s T-bird. Then I saw him standing alone near the open gate that led under an archway of foliage to the mission’s front courtyard. He wore a navy-blue suit. I couldn’t recall the last time I’d seen him look so formal.

  I took his arm. “Where’s Donna?”

  “She couldn’t make it,” Bobby said. “Can’t get away from work. I guess you’ll have to be my sole protector.”

  We went through the arch into the long narrow courtyard, its pebbled pavement edged in red brick. On our left was an adobe building with a red-tiled roof that now housed a museum. To our right, a garden was filled with fall blooms. A hummingbird darted among the blossoms, outmaneuvering the slower bees. Both the courtyard and the garden were crowded with people in sober clothing, the buzz of their voices nearly drowning the musical tinkle of water from the fountain in the center of the garden.

  As we moved across the court toward the sandstone church, I saw heads turn in Bobby’s direction. Once or twice I heard his name, audible above the muted murmur. I tightened my grip on Bobby’s arm and kept walking toward the massive wooden doors that led into the sanctuary of the basilica. Directly above the doors, a star window pierced the church’s sandstone facade, and the Moorish tower with its four bells loomed above and to the left. Finally we went through the doorway into the sanctuary, which was starting to fill. We found seats in a pew on the right, midway up the center aisle.

  The whitewashed walls of the church’s nave curve inward as they rise, forming an arch that frames the main altar. Father Serra is buried here under the stones at the foot of the altar, in front of a low railing. On this side of the railing I saw Ariel Logan’s casket, its closed cover blanketed by roses with lush petals of pink, apricot, and yellow. Their scent competed with the candles that burned in holders on either side of the altar. Other flower tributes had been arrayed on either side of the casket. Somewhere an organ played.

  This was the second funeral I’d attended in as many months, in both instances the funeral of a murder victim. The services last month had required my presence as an observer rather than a mourner. In addition to offering Bobby whatever support he needed, that was the case here as well.

  I looked around for faces I recognized, and saw Errol and Minna Seville in a pew on the left side of the aisle. I could almost see Errol’s antenna twitch as he swept his eyes over the assemblage. Our eyes met, he raised his silvery eyebrows, and his mouth curved into that foxy smile. Minna Seville had turned and was talking quietly with two people in the pew behind her. Karl and Lacy Beckman, I noted, looking, as usual, like a married couple.

  My antenna was out, too. As was the case in the courtyard, I could feel people’s eyes on Bobby, who sat on my right, head down, staring at the floor. My gaze met that of a couple across the aisle and they quickly dropped their eyes. But someone else was staring. I could feel it. I turned, looking for the source of the scrutiny. Sergeant Mike Magruder of the Monterey County Sheriff’s Department stood at the rear of the nave, gazing at Bobby’s back. He shifted his eyes to me, his face a mask. I had a feeling I’d be talking to the sergeant later.

  The people gathered to bid good-bye to Ariel were a cross section of the Monterey peninsula. I had expected older people, contemporaries of Ariel’s parents, but there were also a few children and young people in their teens and early twenties, reminding me that Ariel had gone to Carmel schools all her life. It was also likely that some of her classmates from Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo had made the trip up the coast for the funeral. I hoped that one of the young women I saw in the front pews was Ariel’s roommate, the one who’d alerted the Logans to the fact that their daughter was missing.

  I saw three people enter from the side, one a woman of medium height, wearing a black dress and a hat with a black veil that masked her features. On her left was a tall slender woman with silvery blond hair that fell to the collar of her black suit. She and the tall man who stood to the right of the veiled woman were two halves of a cameo. He had the same silvery blond hair smoothed back over his temples, the same chiseled features and patrician nose. This must be Peter Logan, Ariel’s father, and the tall woman in the black suit his sister Glennis. It didn’t take any deductive skills to guess that the veiled woman was Ariel’s mother, Sylvie Romillard Logan.

  The woman I’d identified as Glennis Braemer turned, surveying the assembled mourners. Her eyes paused briefly on Bobby. I wondered if she knew who he was.

  The priest entered the sanctuary, formal in his vestments, and stood before the ornate red-and-gold altar. Candles burned all around him, illuminating the smaller statues of saints perched to the sides and above the center of the arch where a large crucified Christ hung against a blue background. The scent of incense filled my nose as the funeral mass began.

  I’m not Catholic, nor am I particularly religious. I was here for Bobby, whose low voice repeated the responses. I felt his pain and loss and confusion at Ariel’s death, and I knew deep in my gut that’s usually right that he couldn’t have had anything to do with her murder. But he was keeping something from me. Why? I raised my eyes and found Karl Beckman. It had something to do with the older man and I had to find out what it was.

  When the service was over, the sound of bells was replaced by shuffling feet as people prepared to leave the sanctuary. The priest escorted the Logans toward the side entrance. Ariel’s mother walked slowly, bent as though the black veil, a tangible expression of her grief, weighed upon her as much as her daughter’s death. One black-gloved hand clutched a white handkerchief. The other gripped her husband’s arm. Peter Logan’s sister brought up the rear. Before exiting the church, she stopped to talk to a dark-suited man, giving him some directions accompanied by gestures.

  People began to file out of the pews, heading down the central aisle to the church’s doors, talking quietly among themselves as they moved into the midday sun that seemed incredibly bright compared with the mission’s interior.

  “Do you want to go to the cemetery? Or speak to the family?” I asked Bobby, hoping he didn’t. I could still feel the hostility some of those present were directing his way.

  He shook his head and smiled, but it was a sad smile. “I can visit her grave later, when no one’s around. Ariel’s parents don’t like me. There’s no point in saying anything to them.”

  We walked across the courtyard, toward the gate leading to the parking lot. As we passed the fountain Errol and Minna joined us, greeting Bobby with handshakes. Errol leaned toward me, keeping his voice low. “Come by the house later. I have the autopsy report and some information.”

  I nodded. “Do you know whether Ariel’s roommate is here? I’d like to talk with her.”

  “That young woman with the long black hair, in the gray dress with the white cuffs. Maggie Lim.”

  I glanced in the direction Errol had indicated, where a group of mourners was poised at the sanctuary door. I saw a young Asian woman, hair blowing loose around her shoulders. I started toward her. Maybe I could talk with her before she left.

  Suddenly a man appeared from the garden to our left, cutting past Errol. He seized Bobby’s arm and spun him around, then leaned toward him, his face full of fury, his voice a snarl.

  “You murdering scumb
ag. You have a hell of a nerve showing up here.”

  All conversation in the courtyard stopped and people nearby turned to gape. Bobby’s brown eyes smoldered with a rage that matched the other man’s emotion. Then he banked the fire and shook off the hand that held his arm. He turned as though to leave but the other man moved closer, raising his hand again.

  “You have a problem?” My voice was level as I stepped between the two men and stared into the other man’s gray eyes.

  He was six feet tall, maybe more, looking fit and tan in expensive gray pinstripes. His dark blond hair was short and combed back from his forehead. Right now he had a small tic to the left of his thin-lipped mouth. He stared back at me as though wondering what planet I’d dropped from. Somewhere behind him a redhead in a dark green dress hissed, “Ryan!”

  Ryan Trent. The lawyer who used to date Ariel Logan. Minna Seville had described him as brash. No doubt about that, I thought as I stared him down. Maybe I looked intimidating, or he belatedly realized that the aftermath of Ariel Logan’s funeral was not the best time to settle whatever score he felt needed settling. Trent dropped his hand.

  Minna wrapped her arm through Bobby’s and started for the gate, Errol a few paces behind. The woman who’d spoken to Trent tugged at his arm, alarm written all over her face.

  “This isn’t over.” Trent snapped out the words, at me, his most convenient target.

  “Not by a long shot.” I favored him with my version of Errol’s predator smile. The lawyer and his companion crossed the courtyard. By now Errol and Minna had escorted Bobby through the gate to the parking lot. I knew they’d accompany him to his T-bird. I looked around for Maggie Lim, Ariel’s roommate. But she no longer stood at the church door. Instead I saw Sergeant Magruder standing in front of me, his bulk filling his dark suit, blue eyes cold in his rugged face.

  “Sergeant Magruder,” I said politely.

  “Jeri Howard,” he said. “You’re Bobby Ravella’s cousin. Private investigator out of Oakland. You used to work for Errol Seville.” So the sergeant had checked me out. “What are you doing in Monterey?”