S is for Silence (Kinsey Millhone 19)

Poor dumb Padgett had bombed out twice with his get-rich-quick schemes: the first, an amusement park that would have cost the moon; the second, some hare-brained idea about buying a television station. Television was fine, but it wasn’t going anywhere. An Ardmore table-model TV set-like the one he owned-was retailing for $359.95, and how many people could afford to pay that? Less than ten percent of households in the country owned a TV. Besides which, there were already 326 television stations in the country. Los Angeles had nine. What was the point of one more?

The heavy-equipment business was at least practical, though Padgett would probably find a way to drive it into the ground, figuratively speaking. Chet was banking on the fact that Padgett didn’t know the first thing about putting together a business plan. If he managed to come up with the numbers, Chet could always blame his accountant when he finally turned him down. If he was clever about it, he could hold him off long enough for his country club membership to be approved before he delivered the bad news. He’d have to come up with the ten thousand dollars’ initial club-membership fee, but he’d figure that out.

Chet pulled into the dealership and parked in his usual spot. Passing through the showroom, he noticed the big gleaming coupe was gone and he felt a flash of hope. The car was prime, high-powered and streamlined, with all the latest gadgets. Of course, the factory had shipped the car with accessories he hadn’t ordered, but he was good at persuading buyers to accept pricey options. The car had arrived on the lot only two days before, and a sale this quick would be impressive in his ten-day report. Every month, he had to provide the factory with a sales estimate for the next three months. These figures were used to determine factory production, but if he didn’t have the sales, he wasn’t accorded the inventory, and if he didn’t have a good selection of cars his business would steadily diminish.

The dealership felt deserted that afternoon because two of his three salesmen were off for a variety of reasons that annoyed him no end. One had called in claiming he had a head cold, for pity’s sake. What kind of man was that? In all his years in the business, he’d never taken a sick day. Jerry Zimmerman, his other salesman, had come up with an excuse just as lame, which meant he was left with Winston Smith, the new hire, in whom he had no particular faith. Winston had been through the same extensive training every Chevrolet salesman enjoyed, but he didn’t have the fire. Chet wasn’t sure what the kid wanted out of life, but it wasn’t selling cars. His ambitions were airy-fairy, all talk and no substance. He probably pictured sales as a means to an end instead of a calling, which is how Chet saw it. At first Chet thought the boy had promise, but it hadn’t come to much. Winston wasn’t hungry and he couldn’t for the life of him get the concept of closure. Selling wasn’t about having nice long chats with folks. It was about making the deal, getting a signature on the dotted line. He’d have to learn to take control and bend others to his will. In the meantime, the boy was earnest and good-looking, and maybe that would be sufficient to carry him while he developed a spine.

Chet passed through the outer office, ignoring the fact that his potato-faced daughter was busily scribbling on a piece of pink notepaper that she slipped into a drawer as soon as she caught sight of him. It galled him that he was paying a dollar an hour when she had no office skills. Her phone manners were atrocious, and he was forever scrambling around behind her, trying to make amends for her moodiness and her snippy tone of voice.

She was their only child. Livia had lobbied for three, eager to start a family as soon as possible. Chet hadn’t married until he was thirty-two, hoping to be properly settled in life. At the time he met Livia, he was selling Fords in Santa Maria and he was tired of working for someone else. He’d been carefully setting money aside, and according to his reckoning he’d be able to buy his own dealership within the year. He’d insisted on postponing children for at least five years until he’d bought the franchise and gotten the business on solid ground. Livia had “slipped up,” or so she said, and she was pregnant within six months of the wedding, which meant his life plan had taken another hit. He was fine now, but it grieved him to think how much better off he’d be if she’d done as he asked. He’d made a surreptitious visit to a doctor in Santa Teresa, investing in a quick snip that eliminated any further slipups in that department.

Even so, when Kathy was born-six weeks premature-he’d felt so proud he thought his heart would burst. He’d first seen her in the nursery through the plateglass window, with a hand-printed sign that said BABY GIRL, CRAMER. She was such a tiny little thing-three pounds, fourteen ounces. Livia had been in the hospital for two weeks, and the hospital kept the baby for an additional four weeks until she topped five pounds. That bill had set him back yet again, and he didn’t recuperate for years. He hadn’t complained. He was happy the baby was healthy with all her fingers and toes. He’d pictured her developing into a beautiful young lady, smart and accomplished, devoted to her dad. Instead, he’d been saddled with this lump of a girl, pudgy and sullen, who had all the brains of a sprinkler head.