S is for Silence (Kinsey Millhone 19)

“That’s what I thought at the time.”

“Why?”

“Because the violence had escalated and she was serious about pressing charges, which would’ve been bad news for him. It’s like the deputy DA told me, ‘You don’t have a witness, you don’t have a case.’ If he’d gone to trial, chances are he’d have ended up in jail. It certainly worked to his advantage that she was gone.”

“I’m assuming there was an investigation.”

“Oh, yes. We could pretty much trace her activities up until the time she left the house that night. This would have been six fifteen or so, after the babysitter showed. It wasn’t dark yet and wouldn’t turn dark until closer to nine o’clock. Couple of people saw her drive through town. They said it looked like she was alone except for her little dog, standing in her lap yapping out the window. She stopped and bought gas, filling up her tank at a service station near Tullis, so we know she made it that far.”

“What time was that?”

“Six twenty-five, round about then. The fellow at the pump cleaned her windshield and checked her tires, which he needn’t have done. The car was brand new and he was interested in hearing how she handled. They spent a few minutes talking about that. I asked him if he noticed anything unusual because I was curious about her mood. If she was leaving her little girl for good, you’d think she’d be down in the mouth, but he said she seemed happy. ‘Giddy’ was his word. Of course, he’d never laid eyes on her before, so as far as he knew, she was always that way. I was hoping she’d said something about her destination, but no such luck. Her dog was barking up a storm, jumping from the front seat to the back. She finally let it out to do its business in the grass. After she put the dog back in the car, she went in the office, paid the clerk for her gas, and bought a Coca-Cola from the cooler. Then she got in the car and off she went, driving toward Freeman.”

I opened my shoulder bag and took out a pen and my map of Santa Maria. “Can you show me the location of the service station? I’d like to take a look.”

He adjusted his bifocals and studied the map, opening it to the full and then refolding it. “That’d be here,” he said, making a mark on the page. “Place is still there, though the pump jockey and clerk have both left the area. From that point, she could have gone anyplace. Down one of these side roads and out to the 101-south to Los Angeles, north to San Francisco. She could have circled back and gone home. We calculated how far she could get on a tank of gas and checked with every station within that radius-no easy task. No one remembered seeing her, which struck me as odd. That car was a beauty and so was she. You’d think someone would have noticed if she’d stopped for anything-meal, restroom, to walk the dog. I don’t know how she could have vanished like that, literally, without a trace.”

“The papers said Foley wasn’t considered a suspect.”

“Of course he was. Still is. We put that out, hoping to coax him into telling what he knew, but he was a wily one. He went straight out and hired an attorney, and after that, he wouldn’t say a word. We never did come up with anything to hang him on.”

“He gave no explanation at all?”

“We managed to get a little bit out of him before he clammed up. We know he stopped by the Blue Moon and had a couple of beers. He claimed he got home a short time after that, which would have made it somewhere between ten and ten thirty. Trouble is, the babysitter, Liza Mellincamp, said she didn’t see him until sometime between midnight and one, which means if he killed her he had time to dispose of the body.”

“He must have done a good job of it if she’s never been found.”

Schaefer shrugged. “I imagine she’ll turn up one of these days, assuming there was something left of her once the critters got through.”

“Also assuming he killed her, which he might not have.”

“True enough.”

“Not that I’m arguing for or against,” I said.

“I understand. I go back and forth myself, and I’ve had years to ponder the possibilities.”

“Did anybody support Foley’s claim that he got home when he said?”

Schaefer shook his head. “Far from it. They know roughly when he left the Moon, but no one seems to know where he went after that. Might or might not have been home. Liza’s word against his.”

“What about the car? I understand there’s never been any sign of that either.”

“My guess is it’s long gone, probably broken down for parts. If not that, there’s always a demand for stolen cars in Europe and the Middle East. In California, L.A. and San Diego take the biggest hit.”