Kinsey and Me (16 page)

“Would you object if I checked back with the other witnesses? I might get more out
of them since I was there.”

He studied me for a moment, then reached over to the file and removed the list of
witnesses, which he handed to me without a word.

“Don’t you need this?” I said, surprised.

“I have a copy.”

“Thanks. This is great. I’ll let you know what I find out.”

Dolan pointed a finger. “Keep in touch with the department. I don’t want you going
off half cocked.”

I
DROVE OUT TO
the campus area to the restaurant where Caroline Spurrier had worked. The place had
changed hands recently, the decor downgraded from real plants to fake as the nationality
of the food changed from Mexican to Thai. The shift manager, David Cole, was just
a kid himself, barely twenty-one, tall, skinny, with a nose that belonged on a much
larger face.

I introduced myself and told him I was looking into Caroline’s death.

“Oh yeah, that was awful. I talked to her mom.”

“She says you mentioned some guy who’d been bugging her. What else can you tell me?”

“That’s about all I know. I mean, I never saw the guy myself. She was working nights
for the last couple months and just switched back to days to see if she could get
away from him.”

“She ever mention his name?”

“Terry something, I think. He used to follow her around in this green van he drove.
She really thought the dude was bent.”

“Bent?”

“You know . . . twisted.” He twiddled an index finger beside his head to indicate
his craziness.

“Why’d she go out with him?”

“She said he seemed like a real nice guy at first, but then he got real possessive,
all jealous and like that. In the end, I guess he was totally nuts. He must have showed
up on Friday, which is why she took off.”

I quizzed him, but couldn’t glean much more from his account. I thanked him and drove
over to the block of university housing where Caroline had lived. The apartment was
typical of student digs—faintly shabby, furnished with mismatched items that had probably
been languishing in someone’s garage. Her roommate was a young woman named Judy Layton,
who chatted despondently as she emptied kitchen cabinets and packed assorted cardboard
boxes. I kept the questions light at first, asking her about herself as she wrapped
some dinner plates in newspaper, shoving each in a box. She was twenty-three, a senior
English major with family living in town.

“How long did you know Caroline?”

“About a year,” she said. “I had another roommate, but Alice graduated last year.
Caroline and I connected up through one of those roommate-referral services.”

“How come you’re moving out?”

She shrugged. “Going back to my folks’. It’s too late in the school year to find someone
else and I can’t afford this place on my own. My brother’s on his way over to help
me move.”

According to her, Caroline was a “party-hearty” who somehow managed to keep her grades
up and still have a good time.

“Did she have a boyfriend?”

“She dated lots of guys.”

“But no one in particular?”

She shook her head, intent on her work.

I tried again. “She told her mom about some guy harassing her at work. Apparently
she’d dated him and they’d just broken up. Do you have any idea who she might have
been talking about?”

“Not really. I didn’t keep track of the guys in her life.”

“She must have mentioned this guy if he was causing such a fuss.”

“Look. She and I were not close. We were roommates and that was it. She went her way
and I went mine. If some guy was bugging her, she didn’t say a word to me.”

“She wasn’t in any trouble that you knew about?”

“No.”

Her manner seemed sullen and it was getting on my nerves. I stared at her. “Judy,
I could use a little help. People get murdered for a reason. It might seem stupid
or insignificant to the rest of us, but there was
something
going on. What gives?”

“You don’t know it was murder. The policeman I talked to said it might have been some
bozo in a passing car.”

“Her mother disagrees.”

“Well, I can’t help you. I already told you everything I know.”

I nailed her with a look and let a silence fall, hoping her discomfort would generate
further comment. No such luck. If she knew more, she was determined to keep it to
herself. I left a business card, asking her to phone me if she remembered anything.

I spent the next two days talking to Caroline Spurrier’s professors and friends. From
the portrait that emerged, she seemed like a likable kid—funny, good-natured, popular,
and sweet. She’d complained of the harassment to a couple of classmates without giving
any indication who the fellow was. I went back to the list of witnesses at the scene
of the accident, talking to each in turn. I was still tantalized by the guy in the
pickup. What reason could he have to falsify his identity?

I’d clipped out the news account of Caroline Spurrier’s death, pinning her picture
on the bulletin board above my desk. She looked down at me with a smile that seemed
more enigmatic with the passing days. I couldn’t bear the idea of having to tell her
mother my investigation was at an impasse, but I knew I owed her a report.

I was sitting at my typewriter when an idea came to me, quite literally, in a flash.
I was staring at the newspaper picture of the wreckage when I spotted the photo credit.
I suddenly remembered John Birkett at the scene, his flash going off as he shot pictures
of the wreck. If he’d inadvertently snapped one of the guy in the pickup, at least
I’d have something to show the cops. Maybe we could get a lead on the fellow that
way. I gave Birkett a call. Twenty minutes later, I was in his cubbyhole at the Santa
Teresa
Dispatch
, our heads bent together while we scanned the contact sheets.

“No good,” John said. “This one’s not bad, but the focus is off. Damn. I never really
got a clear shot of him.”

“What about the truck?”

John pulled out another contact sheet that showed various views of the wrecked compact,
the pickup visible on the berm behind. “Well, you can see it in the background, if
that’s any help.”

“Can we get an enlargement?”

“You looking for anything in particular?”

“The license plate,” I said.

The California plate bore a seven-place combination of numbers and letters that we
finally discerned in the grainy haze of two blowups. I should have called Lieutenant
Dolan and had him run the license number, but I confess to an egotistical streak that
sometimes overrides common sense. I didn’t want to give the lead back to him just
yet. I called a pal of mine at the Department of Motor Vehicles and asked him to check
it out instead.

The license plate was registered to a 1984 Toyota pickup, navy blue, the owner listed
as Ron Cagle with an address on McClatchy Way.

The house was stucco, dark gray, with the trim done in white. My heart was pounding
as I rang the bell. The fellow’s face was printed so indelibly in memory that when
the door was finally opened, I just stood there and stared. Wrong man. This guy was
probably six-foot-seven, over two hundred pounds, with a strong chin, ruddy complexion,
blue eyes, auburn hair, red mustache. “Yes?”

“I’m looking for Ron Cagle.”

“I’m Ron Cagle.”

“You are?” My voice broke in astonishment like a kid reaching puberty. “You’re the
owner of a navy blue Toyota pickup?” I read off the number of the license plate.

He looked at me quizzically. “Yes. Is something wrong?”

“Well, I don’t know. Has someone else been driving it?”

“Not for the last six months.”

“Are you sure?”

He half laughed. “See for yourself. It’s sitting on the parking pad just behind the
house.”

He pulled the door shut behind him, leading the way as the two of us moved off the
porch and down the driveway to the rear. There sat the navy blue Toyota pickup, without
wheels, up on blocks. The hood was open and there was empty space where the engine
should have been. “What’s going on?” he asked.

“That’s what I’m about to ask you. This truck was at the scene of a recent accident
where a girl was killed.”

“Not this one,” he said. “This has been right here.”

Without another word, I pulled out the photographs. “Isn’t that your license plate?”

He studied the photos with a frown. “Well, yes, but the truck isn’t mine. It couldn’t
be.” He glanced back at his pickup, spotting the discrepancy. “There’s the problem. . . .”
He pointed to the license. The plate on the truck was an altogether different set
of numbers.

It took me about thirty seconds before the light finally dawned. “Somebody must have
lifted your plates and substituted these.”

“What would be the point?”

I shrugged. “Maybe someone stole a navy blue Toyota truck and wanted plates that would
clear a license check if he was stopped by the cops. Can I use your telephone?”

I called Lieutenant Dolan and told him what I’d found. He ran a check on the plates
for the pickup sitting in the drive, which turned out to match the numbers on a vehicle
reported stolen two weeks before. An APB was issued for the truck with Cagle’s plates.
Dolan’s guess was that the guy had left the state, or abandoned the pickup shortly
after the accident. It was also possible that even if we found the guy, he might not
have any real connection with the shooting death. Somehow I doubted it.

A week passed with no results. The silence was discouraging. I was right back where
I started from with no appreciable progress. If a case is going to break, it usually
happens fast and the chances of cracking this one were diminishing with every passing
day. Caroline Spurrier’s photograph was still pinned to the bulletin board above my
desk, her smile nearly mocking. In situations like this, all I know to do is go back
to the beginning and start again.

Doggedly, I went through the list of witnesses, calling everybody in turn. Most tried
to be helpful, but there was really nothing new to add. I drove back to the campus
to look for Caroline’s roommate. Judy Layton had to know something more than she’d
told me at first. Maybe I could find a way to worm some information out of her.

The apartment was locked and a quick peek in the front window showed that all the
furniture was gone. I picked up her forwarding address from the manager on the premises
and headed over to her parents’ house in Colgate, the little suburb to the north.

The house was pleasant, a story and a half of stucco and frame, an attached three-car
garage visible at the right. I rang the bell and waited, idly scanning the neighborhood
from my vantage point on the porch. It was a nice street, wide and tree-lined, with
a grassy divider down the center planted with pink and white flowering shrubs. I rang
the bell again. Apparently, no one was home.

I went down the porch steps and paused in the driveway, intending to return to my
car, which was parked at the curb. I hesitated where I stood. There are times in this
business when a hunch is a hunch—when a little voice in your gut tells you something’s
amiss. I turned with curiosity toward the three-car garage at the rear. I cupped my
hands, shading my eyes so I could peer through the side window. In the shadowy interior,
I saw a pickup, stripped of paint.

I tried the garage’s side entrance. The door was unlocked and I pushed my way in.
The space smelled of dust, motor oil, and primer. The pickup’s license plates were
gone. This had to be the same truck, though I couldn’t think why it hadn’t been dumped.
Maybe it was too perilous to attempt at this point. Heart thumping, I did a quick
search of the cab’s interior. Under the front seat, on the driver’s side, I saw a
handgun, a .45. I left it where it was, eased the cab door shut, and backed away from
the truck. Clearly, someone in the Layton household had been at the murder scene.

I left the garage at a quick clip, trotting toward the street. I had to find a telephone
and call the cops. I had just started my car, shoving it into gear, when I saw a dark
green VW van pass on the far side of the divider and circle back in my direction,
headed toward the Laytons’ drive. The fellow driving was the man I’d seen at the accident.
Judy’s brother? The similarities were obvious now that I thought of it. No wonder
she’d been unwilling to tell me what was going on! He slowed for the turn and that’s
when he spotted me.

If I’d had any doubts about his guilt, they vanished the minute he and I locked eyes.
His surprise was replaced by panic and he gunned his engine, taking off. I peeled
after him, flooring it. At the corner, he skidded sideways and recovered, speeding
out of sight. I went after him, zigzagging crazily through a residential area that
was laid out like a maze. Ahead of me, I could almost chart his course by the whine
of his transmission. He was heading toward the freeway.

At the overpass, I caught a glimpse of him in the southbound lane. He wasn’t hard
to track, the boxy shape of the van clearly visible as we tore toward town. The traffic
began to slow, massing in one of those inexplicable logjams on the road. I couldn’t
tell if the problem was a fender bender in the northbound lane or a bottleneck in
ours, but it gave me the advantage I needed. I was catching him.