“That man is the salt of the earth.” No hesitation at all. “His life has been very unhappy, but he burns himself out every day struggling to provide the children of this city with a decent education. Every year when the levies are voted down, the budget cuts always come out of curriculum. He’ll have heart failure some day if he doesn’t stop trying to raise the quality of education with less money every year.”
“You say unhappy? In what way?”
“His wife has leukemia.” Dr. Sandoval’s tone made it clear that she didn’t intend to say anything more about Astin Greenling’s unhappy life.
Ginny nodded. She was thinking the same thing I was. Treating leukemia costs money. Reams of money. But she
didn’t make any comment. Money was Smithsonian’s job. Instead she went on down the list. “What can you tell us about Martha Scurvey?”
The doctor frowned, took a moment to decide on an answer. Then she said, “I don’t like her personally. But since she was elected budget vice-chairman last year, our accounting procedures have started to climb out of the Dark Ages. And she seems to have a talent for procurement: She gets lower prices for our supplies. I have to respect that. It takes a little pressure off Astin.”
“How long has she served on the board?”
“Just a year.” Dr. Sandoval was sardonic. “For some reason, most people don’t seem to know that the full-time members of the board of education are elected by the city at large. As far as I know, she’s never been elected for anything before.”
I sighed to myself and mentally crossed Martha Scurvey off the list. She hadn’t been on the board when the first four girls disappeared. But Ginny went right on, not wasting the doctor’s time. “And Julian Kirke?”
“He isn’t an elected officer. We hired him. The board decided to get into this business of computerizing the files—which, incidentally, I’ve resisted every step of the way. It’s expensive, and I think the money should be spent on the children. But quality education doesn’t have as much prestige as computers. Machines have more dignity than human beings.”
I liked her more and more all the time.
“But that’s beside the point,” she went on. “When I was outvoted, the board looked for someone who could handle the nuts and bolts of this grand system. They found Julian. He’s a data-management expert, and had a good job with NCR, but they didn’t promote him fast enough to keep him. I think he is a petty tyrant, but that doesn’t prevent him from doing a good job. The fact is, in his hands the whole project has been less expensive than I thought it would be.”
“How long ago did you hire him?”
“Two and a half, maybe three years.”
“All right, Doctor,” Ginny said briskly. “Just a couple
more questions. How much do you know about the secretaries who work under Mr. Kirke?”
“Very little. That’s his department. I’m not involved with it. It’s my impression that he’s pretty hard on them. For that matter, he’s barely civil to me. But they do good work.” She sighed. “Our correspondence looks professional now. Finally.”
I wanted to think about that for a while. I didn’t know whether Kirke was a perfectionist or just a cantankerous sonofabitch. But it was going to have to wait. Ginny was asking, “How many people have access to those files?”
“In theory, everybody in the school system. They aren’t intended to be secret. They’re supposed to help the schools run better. But the process hasn’t reached that point yet. In practice, the files are primarily accessible to the full-time people. When the rest of us want information, we ask Julian or one of the secretaries.”
Ginny glanced at me, looking for more questions. But I didn’t have any. This was her type of investigation, not mine. If it’d been up to me, I would’ve told the doctor exactly what we were looking for and asked her for some kind of intuitive answer. Her intuitions I would’ve trusted. So I shook my head, and Ginny got to her feet.
Without seeming rude about it, Dr. Sandoval ushered us out quickly. About a minute after we stood up, we were past the resentment of all those mothers and in the Olds. By then the doctor was probably examining her next patient.
I pushed my sunglasses onto my face, but they didn’t help much. While Ginny started up the Olds, I muttered at her, “That was fun. What did we get out of it?”
She jerked around to me. “That’s a cheap shot.”
I looked away. I couldn’t face her.
“I know. I just said it because I feel useless. It’s my niece we’re trying to find, and you’re spending money like it was water, not to mention working your tail off, and my contribution is nil.”
“Stop that,” she snapped. “You know what we got out of it. Now when we go to talk to these people, we’ll have a handle on who we’re talking to.”
“How will that help?” Trying to sound neutral.
With grim patience, she said, “We’ll finally be able to put on some pressure. Maybe we can get our kidnapper to make a mistake.”
I couldn’t argue with that. It was something to do. It might even work. So I just sat there while Ginny stamped down on the accelerator and took the Olds squealing out of Dr. Sandoval’s parking lot onto the highway.
I
knew that Ginny and I were headed for a showdown.
I wasn’t looking forward to it. It was a guaranteed no-win situation for me. In this day and age, there’s no way to talk about shame and guilt without making it sound like self-pity. That’s why people with any integrity keep their goddamn mouths shut. A nice trick, if you can do it.
But the fireworks weren’t going to start yet. We didn’t have time for them. We were on our way back to big Central High and the school board to take a crack at one of Ginny’s plans.
When we got close to the school, we started hunting for a phone booth. Ginny’s idea was to begin with Kirke. She didn’t have anything particular against him—she just wanted to take advantage of the way he treated his secretaries. I had to admit it was a good idea. If he felt the pressure, it might shake him up a bit. And if he didn’t, he might pass the joy on to someone who did.
When we found a phone, Ginny said, “I’ll give you ten minutes.”
“Should be enough. How long can you keep him?”
She got out of the Olds, and I slid over into the driver’s seat. “I’ll try for half an hour,” she said, “but I can’t guarantee it.”
I put the car in gear. “That’s OK. If he catches me, it’ll just make someone more nervous.”
She said, “Right,” and I drove off.
I parked in the Central High lot and went into the building. Ten minutes didn’t turn out to be too much time. It was between class breaks, and the halls were full of kids, half of them apparently trying to run into me. On top of that, with all the kids coming and going every which way, I
missed a turn and had to ask directions. And the whole time I had to fight this crazy impulse to stop what I was doing and just go hunting for Alathea. Seeing so many young girls made me feel more desperate than ever. What with one thing and another, it took me more than eight minutes to reach the board of education door.
From there I went back down the hall and tucked myself around a corner where I could watch the door without much chance of being seen. Then I waited.
Exactly three minutes later, Kirke left the office. He looked a little more awake than he had the day before, and he was moving fast. Not hurrying, really. Just going like a man who couldn’t afford to waste any time. Ginny knew how to get results over the phone.
When he disappeared around a corner, I gave him a minute for second thoughts, then went to the door and let myself in.
The front room hadn’t changed. It still reminded me of the police duty room in the Municipal Building. But it was busier. Several kids at the counter occupied the attention of five secretaries. Fortunately the one I wanted wasn’t one of them. I was looking for the secretary that Kirke had chewed out in front of Ginny and me the day before.
She sat at her desk with a harried look on her face.
I caught her eye, and she came over to the counter. I said, “Sondra?” She nodded. My face didn’t register with her, so I said, “My name’s Axbrewder. I was here yesterday.”
“Oh yes, I remember.” For a moment her expression relaxed, and she turned pretty, the way she was born to look. She leaned toward me and said softly so that the kids couldn’t hear, “You’re the private detective.” Word gets around.
“That’s right.” I took a stab at trying to look charming, but for some reason my smile didn’t feel right, so I dropped it. “I’d like to talk to you.”
The way she turned her eyes up at me conveyed the impression that she gave my smile credit for good intentions. “What about?”
“I can’t tell you here. Can you take a break or something? I’ll buy you a cup of coffee.”
At that her face closed like a shutter. “I can’t.”
“Oh, come on.” Axbrewder at his most persuasive. “Kirke won’t catch you. My partner has him, and she won’t let him go for at least half an hour. And if he comes back sooner, I can cover you.” I was prepared to try almost anything. “He’d look better with his nose sticking out his ear, don’t you think?”
Well, I was right about one thing, anyway. Kirke had been leaning on her hard. Too hard. Even timid people have limits, and Sondra had just reached hers. Her smile looked brittle and vaguely feverish, but it was a smile. “Where shall we go?”
This time my own smile was a lot more genuine. “How about the cafeteria?”
“OK.” She went to her desk and got her purse, then said to one of the other secretaries in a determined little voice, “I’m going to take my break now.” A minute later she was guiding me down the hall in the direction of the cafeteria.
I kept my mouth shut for a while, giving her a chance to feel as indignant and defiant and maybe scared as she wanted. But when we’d poured ourselves some coffee and found a table in the oversized mausoleum they called the cafeteria, I got started.
“How long have you worked here, Sondra?”
“About a year.” She was so preoccupied with the risk she took that she seemed to have forgotten I had a particular reason for wanting to talk to her.
“A year,” I repeated, crossing her off my list. “How do you like it?”
She grimaced. “It’s a job. I don’t have much choice. I’ve got to work somewhere.”
“But you don’t get along with Kirke.”
“Who does?” Defiance had the upper hand at the moment.
“What’s his problem?”
Bitterly she said, “He thinks secretaries shouldn’t make mistakes. He thinks secretaries shouldn’t be human. And,” she added after a moment, “he doesn’t like women.”
I scanned her with what I hoped was an appreciative gleam in my eyes. “He’s a little confused.”
She rewarded me with another smile. If her color hadn’t been so high already, she might’ve blushed.
I took a slug of my coffee, then fought down an almost overwhelming desire to throw up. What could they have made the stuff out of, Clorox? When the impulse to puke passed, I asked carefully, “Sondra, how much do you know about this new filing system Kirke is working on?”
“Not much.” The coffee didn’t seem to faze her. She must’ve been used to it. “He only lets three of us touch it, and I’m not one of them. Just Mabel, Joan, and Connie. The rest of us do ordinary office work. Letters, transcripts, reports, newsletters, stuff like that.”
“What do you do if you need something in those files? Say you need to look up the records for a kid who goes to Ensenada Middle School.”
“Usually I ask Mabel. Or Connie or Joan, if Mabel isn’t around.”
“I see.” I pushed my coffee away. Just looking at it made my stomach queasy. “Besides them and Kirke, who knows how to use the files?”
“Well,” she considered, “there’s Mr. Greenling—he’s nice—and Mrs. Scurvey. Mr. Stretto never touches anything. If he wants something, he asks Mr. Kirke for it. I think that’s all.”
“None of the other people on the board?”
“No.” She was sure.
“What about people from other schools? What if the vice-principal of Mountain Junior High, for instance, wants to know something?”
“They ask for it, and Mabel or Connie or Joan gets it for them. Or maybe Mr. Kirke. Those files aren’t easy to use. They’re sort of in-between, you know? You don’t just look in a filing cabinet alphabetically and pull out what you want. They’re getting ready to be put in a computer, so they aren’t handy. Mabel says they’re all in pieces, cross-indexed every which way. Besides”—her tone went sour again—“Mr. Kirke doesn’t like other people to touch them.”
“That figures.” I paused for a moment, trying to guess how far I could go with her without losing her spontaneity. Then I said, “Would you mind telling me a little more about Mabel and Connie and Joan?”
“Like what?” She must’ve felt giddy with courage. She sure as hell wasn’t feeling suspicious.
“Well, take Mabel. What’s her last name?”
“Allson. Mabel Allson.”
“What’s she like? Is she married?”
“I like her. She’s the only one who ever stands up to Mr. Kirke. I think it’s because she doesn’t need the job. Her husband is a bank president. Flat Valley Savings and Loan, I think. She works because she likes it.”
“How about Connie?”
“Connie Mousse.” Sondra giggled. “We call her the Moose. She’s a frustrated old maid. She hates everything. She works here because she likes hating it. If she had a husband, she wouldn’t need the job, she could hate him instead.”
“And Joan?”
“She’s Joan Phillips. We get along OK, I guess, but I don’t feel close to her. All she ever talks about is her fiancé, Jon, what’s his name? Jon Gren, that’s it. I ought to know all about him by now. He’s a second-year intern at University Hospital. They’re going to get married when he graduates.”
She said some more, but all of a sudden I wasn’t listening. I was thinking,
intern.
Who else besides pushers know where to get drugs? Doctors, that’s who. Not Camilla Sandoval. It would be too risky for her. There was a hell of a lot of junk involved, and all the records would be in her name. But how about a second-year intern in a major hospital? If he knew what he was doing, he could rip off any drug he wanted by the pound.
“Sondra,” I said, “you’re a delight. I haven’t been delighted in a long time, and I need it. But we’re just about out of time.” I fished out one of Ginny’s cards and handed it to her. “You can get me with that number. If there’s ever anything I can do for you, call. Day or night, it doesn’t
matter. Especially give me a call if Kirke hassles you about talking to me. I’ll make a pretzel out of him.”
She smiled bravely. But the mention of Kirke brought back her fear, her smile betrayed a hint of the old despair.
“I mean it,” I said. “Nobody pushes my friends around.”
“All right, Mr. Axbrewder,” she said brightly. She was determined to carry it off. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
It wasn’t until we were on our way back to her office that I remembered there was something else I had to ask her. “Just one more thing, Sondra. People like Mabel, Joan, Connie—how long have they worked here?”
“I’m not sure. Longer than I have. I know it’s been a long time for Mabel. The Moose has been here forever. And Joan—I don’t know, maybe a couple of years.”
I thanked her again and we went back through the school board door. The whole time I’d been with her, she hadn’t once asked what all these questions were about. When she sat down at her desk, her face was white and her hands shook.
Apparently I’d underestimated just how scared she was of Kirke.
I found it a little hard to understand. He wasn’t back yet, and unless someone ratted on her, he wouldn’t know that she’d been talking with me. But she seemed to think he’d know. Just know.
Then he came back. Stalked into the office so quickly that he almost hit me with the door. We glared at each other for a second. A hot red spot marked each of his pale cheeks, and his chain-saw mouth was gripped tight. Ginny had put pressure on him, all right.
“I just finished telling your partner where to stick it,” he rasped. “What the hell do you want?”
I grinned unkindly. “I’m waiting for her. When she gets here, we want to talk to Mr. Greenling.”
Kirke turned on his heel. The kids were gone now. He had a room full of women at desks to consider. But he homed in on Sondra as if she’d sent up a flare. He had a good eye. There was something scared in the way she hunched over her work, not looking at anything except the
paper in her typewriter, and he spotted it. At once he went over to her, stood beside her. He didn’t say anything. All he did was drum lightly on the desktop with his fingers. And watch her fall apart. The shaking of her hands got worse. Her fingers tangled, and in a minute she’d made a hopeless snarl out of what she was typing.
“When Miss Fistoulari gets here,” he said, “take her and Mr. Axbrewder to see Mr. Greenling.” He made it sound like a form of torture. Then he went into his private office and closed the door.
“Nice guy,” I said to the room.
It might as well have been empty. Nobody even glanced at me.
“Thanks,” I said. “I think I’ll wait outside.”
Stepping into the hall, I closed the door behind me. Mostly for my own protection. I couldn’t stand the reproach of Sondra’s hunched shoulders.
Before long Ginny came down the hall. There was a fighting flare to her nostrils, but mostly she was just alert and ready, like she’d gone the distance with him, and he hadn’t laid a glove on her.
“This better be worth it,” I growled. “That man is a solid-gold bastard.”
She considered for a moment, then shrugged. “We’ll find out.”
“What did you get out of him?” I asked.
“Not much. I don’t know whether he’s tough or not, but he’s hostile as all hell. At first I couldn’t figure it out. I wasn’t hassling him in the beginning. But then it hit me: He hates women. According to him, he left his job at NCR because his boss was a woman. ‘All women are bitches’—that’s a direct quote.” A fighting light shone in her eyes. “That’s when I cut into him.”