First Avenue (16 page)

“That would be kind of you, sir,”
Sanchez
said, “but the father is here. He will help us with that. You have done much already.”

“Father? What father?”
Sam
asked.

“Our priest, Officer Wright. From the church. He came last night. We’ll go home as soon as we have our baby.”

“That’s good. That’s good,”
Sam
repeated.

“We want to thank you for your help. It is very kind of you to bring the picture.”

“There’s no need to thank me. We’ll find
Alberta
,
Mr.
Sanchez
. I promise you that.”

“I know you will, sir.”

Now he was making promises. It was easy to make promises sitting beside them in their sorrow-burdened room. It might not be so easy to carry them out when he left.

“The Father wishes to have a service for our baby on Friday,”
Sanchez
said. “There is no need to wait. We would like you to come if you are not busy.”

“I’m not busy,”
Sam
said. “What time will it be?”

“
Two o’clock
. At
St.
Anthony
’s church. I can give you directions to the church.”

“No, that’s all right. I’ll find it.”

“Yes. A policeman from a big city can find his way around in our small town.
Seattle
is too big for us. We are ready to go home.”

“I understand.”

Mr.
Sanchez
spoke briefly to his wife.
Sam
realized she had followed most of their conversation without translation. She asked a question directly to
Sam
, but
Sam
had to look to
Mr.
Sanchez
for help.

“My wife wishes to know if you have children?”
Sanchez
asked.

“No,” he said to her. “I was married once, but the marriage did not work. We had no children,” he felt obliged to explain.

“But you’re a young man, still,”
Sanchez
said.

“I’m not so young anymore.”

“Young man,”
Mrs.
Sanchez
said in English and patted his hand with one she had released from the picture.

When he and
Sanchez
went out to the car for the boxes, he could smell the death odor from the trunk. He decided not to mention it. They already knew more about death than he could ever explain. As
Sam
drove off,
Mrs.
Sanchez
stood with her husband at the door and waved. She still held the picture.

The morning light was unusually bright. As he crossed the Aurora Bridge on his way back to First Avenue, he felt a need to slow down and take in the sights that presented themselves on all sides—mountains east and west and Mount Rainier beyond the city to the south. Below him, bare-masted sailboats plowed through the ship canal connecting
Lake Washington
and
Puget Sound
. The boats were on their way to the Ballard Locks, which would lower them to sea level and salt water. The weather was warm and he had the window down. He wanted to feel the warm air and have it carry away the odor trapped in the trunk.

He found himself thinking of a special set of words. They were not words of his own, or words from the worn kind voices of Mr. and
Mrs.
Sanchez
, or from
Gabriel
the frightened Eskimo. The words came from the poet. He could almost hear
Alberta
’s voice reading them out loud. “How do you like to go up in a swing, up in the air so blue?” He would be happy if he could write words like that, words that made you think of someplace else.

It was the second consecutive day that Sam had made the backstairs trip to Homicide. He carried a file folder that he had dug out of the seldom-explored pockets of his briefcase. Inside the folder, he had arranged the homicide reports. On top was the only copy of an Officer Statement from his brief and tenuous encounter with
Gabriel
Romanov
.

Markowitz folded the newspaper he had been reading and laid it on his desk. He did not look cheerful.
Sam
wondered if he was becoming impatient with these morning interruptions.

“Thought you might be interested in this,”
Sam
said as he placed the
Romanov
statement in front of
Markowitz
.

Markowitz picked up the single page and rocked back in his chair.

“Kind of sounds like our guy,
Pierre
what’s-his-name,”
Markowitz
said.

“It is
Pierre
,”
Sam
said. “We ought to compare his fingerprints with the ones you found in the room.”

“Yes. We should, and we tried, but we can’t. We don’t have his prints on file.”

“So, we’ll get them.”

“Sure. I’ll just drop by this morning and ask him to be a good citizen and give us a set of fingerprints so that we can tie him into this homicide.”

“I don’t think he’s a citizen,”
Sam
said.

“What do you mean?”

“He claims he’s French—makes a big deal out of that. His fingerprints must be on file someplace.”

“I’ll check with Immigration and see if they have anything,”
Markowitz
said.

“Maybe we could get his prints from one of those greasy doughnuts he makes.”

“Actually, that’s not a bad idea,”
Markowitz
said. “Get him to serve you something in a glass, then sneak out with it.”

“We can do that?”

“Sure. Tell me,”
Markowitz
said, as he peered once more at
Sam
’s written statement, “did this
Mr.
Romanov
say anything about other visitors?”

“No.”

“Nothing about any young fellows?”

“No.”

“Did you read the paper this morning?” Markowitz asked.

“Some of it.”

“Did you read this?”
Markowitz
pushed the newspaper toward
Sam
and pointed to a small headline buried inside. Publisher’s Son Drowns.

Sam had not read the article. It was two paragraphs long. Ben Abbott, the son of Mildred Abbott, publisher of the
Seattle Tribune
, and the late Ralph Abbott, had drowned Monday night in a boating accident in Lake Washington. Divers continued to search for his body.

“Got a call from this Mrs. Abbott’s lawyer at eight sharp this morning. This wasn’t a boating accident. The story given to the patrol guys was that the kid was high on dope and jumped off the boat, but it’s not a very good story.
Mrs.
Abbott
says her son was an excellent swimmer.”

“Why are you telling me this?”
Sam
asked.

“Because, according to the lawyer, this Abbott kid might have been Olivia’s father.”

“You have to be kidding.”

“No.
Mrs.
Abbott
knew about Alberta Sanchez, but not about the baby. Not until yesterday.”

“I’ll be damned.”

“I think the patrol guys screwed up when they took the report. They believed the accident story.”

“So what are you going to do? Check out the boat?”
Sam
asked.

“Can’t. It burned.
Six o’clock
this morning at the Seattle Yacht Club.”

“I’ll be damned,”
Sam
repeated.

“You can say that again,”
Markowitz
said. “They usually take better care of their boats.”

“
Ben
Abbott
,”
Sam
said. He tried to remember if he had ever heard that name before. He didn’t think so, but he knew the
Abbott
name well enough. Most people in
Seattle
knew that name.

“What would a rich kid like
Abbott
be doing with Alberta Sanchez?”

“Don’t know. Sure like to find out, though. Apparently
Mrs.
Abbott
is too grieved to talk right now. So says the lawyer. We have to give her a little more time to collect herself.”

“What’s the name of the lawyer?”
Sam
asked.

“Mayes or
Hayes
—something like that. Bigshot firm downtown. Why? What difference does it make who it is?”

“Just wondering, that’s all.”

It was a strange business, Maria thought, when most of the customers bought nothing.
Mr.
Polanski
would have trouble making money in his drugstore if kids stood in the aisles all day so that paying customers could not get by. Would these kids stay all day?

Bill arrived for work ten minutes after ten. She knew it must be him by the way he walked into the kitchen. Her smile was wasted as he silently passed her.
Pierre
said nothing to him about being late, although he had made a big point of telling her to be on time when he hired her.
Pierre
did not introduce them, either. He must not have thought it was important for them to know each other.

Bill put on a dirty white apron that was hanging on a hook beside the sink and immediately began washing doughnut pans.
Pierre
walked over beside him. Both had their backs to
Maria
.
Pierre
spoke to
Bill
in a voice too low for her to understand.

“I go upstairs for a while,”
Pierre
told her as he walked up to the cash register. He stopped and pointed his finger up as though that would explain everything. “If you have questions, you can ask him.”

She turned around to look at
Bill
. He did not look at her, and she doubted she would have any questions.

“You can sit down for a while if you want. Eat a doughnut. Take care of customers when they come.”

“Thank you,” she found herself saying, then thinking it ridiculous.

“Sure. Maybe one of the cinnamon twists.” His voice softened slightly. Perhaps he remembered she was not one of the kids asking for free doughnuts. “They came out good this time.”

She nodded, but there were no words from her this time. His dark bloodshot eyes scanned the room. Secretly the kids watched him, but they pretended otherwise. It was uncomfortable and strange the way they watched everything.

“No free doughnuts today,” he said as he walked past their tables. “Tomorrow maybe. No more today.”

About half the kids left after
Pierre
. Those who stayed were content to look out the window and do nothing more. There was less friction among the holdovers.

She got a carton of milk from the refrigerator and sat down at the table closest to the cash register. It felt good to be off her feet. She was hungry but had no interest in the doughnuts or the cinnamon twists. Tomorrow, if there were a tomorrow here, she would bring something to eat.