identified
herself as Lisa Osterling.
“That’s a crime lab photo. How’d you come by it?” I said when the preliminaries were
disposed of.
She fumbled in her handbag for a tissue and blew her nose. “I have my little ways,”
she said morosely. “Actually I know the photographer and I stole a print. I’m going
to have it blown up and hung on the wall just so I won’t forget. The police are hoping
I’ll drop the whole thing, but I got news for
them
.” Her mouth was starting to tremble again, and a tear splashed onto her skirt as
though my ceiling had a leak.
“What’s the story?” I said. “The cops in this town are usually pretty good.” I got
up and filled a paper cup with water from my Sparkletts dispenser, passing it over
to her.
She murmured a thank-you and drank it down, staring into the bottom of the cup as
she spoke. “Rudd was a cocaine dealer until a month or so before he died. They haven’t
said as much, but I know they’ve written him off as some kind of small-time punk.
What do they care? They’d like to think he was killed in a drug deal—a double cross
or something like that. He wasn’t, though. He’d given it all up because of this.”
She glanced down at the swell of her belly. She was wearing a kelly green T-shirt
with an arrow down the front. The word OOPS! was written across her breasts in machine embroidery.
“What’s your theory?” I asked. Already I was leaning toward the official police version
of events. Drug dealing isn’t synonymous with longevity. There’s too much money involved
and too many amateurs getting into the act. This was Santa Teresa—ninety-five miles
north of the big time in L.A . , but there are still standards to maintain. A shotgun blast is the underworld equivalent
of a bad annual review.
“I don’t have a theory. I just don’t like theirs. I want you to look into it so I
can clear Rudd’s name before the baby comes.”
I shrugged. “I’ll do what I can, but I can’t guarantee the results. How are you going
to feel if the cops are right?”
She stood up, giving me a flat look. “I don’t know why Rudd died, but it had nothing
to do with drugs,” she said. She opened her handbag and extracted a roll of bills
the size of a wad of socks. “What do you charge?”
“Thirty bucks an hour plus expenses.”
She peeled off several hundred-dollar bills and laid them on the desk.
I got out a contract.
M Y SECOND ENCOUNTER with the Parker shotgun came in the form of a dealer’s appraisal slip that I discovered
when I was nosing through Rudd Osterling’s private possessions an hour later at the
house. The address she’d given me was on the Bluffs, a residential area on the west
side of town, overlooking the Pacific. It should have been an elegant neighborhood,
but the ocean generated too much fog and too much corrosive salt air. The houses were
small and had a temporary feel to them, as though the occupants intended to move on
when the month was up. No one seemed to get around to painting the trim, and the yards
looked like they were kept by people who spent all day at the beach. I followed her
in my car, reviewing the information she’d given me as I urged my ancient VW up Capilla
Hill and took a right on Presipio.
The late Rudd Osterling had been in Santa Teresa since the sixties, when he migrated
to the West Coast in search of sunshine, good surf, good dope, and casual sex. Lisa
told me he’d lived in vans and communes, working variously as a roofer, tree trimmer,
bean picker, fry cook, and forklift operator—never with any noticeable ambition or
success. He’d started dealing cocaine two years earlier, apparently netting more money
than he was accustomed to. Then he’d met and married Lisa, and she’d been determined
to see him clean up his act. According to her, he’d retired from the drug trade and
was just in the process of setting himself up in a
herself as Lisa Osterling.
“That’s a crime lab photo. How’d you come by it?” I said when the preliminaries were
disposed of.
She fumbled in her handbag for a tissue and blew her nose. “I have my little ways,”
she said morosely. “Actually I know the photographer and I stole a print. I’m going
to have it blown up and hung on the wall just so I won’t forget. The police are hoping
I’ll drop the whole thing, but I got news for
them
.” Her mouth was starting to tremble again, and a tear splashed onto her skirt as
though my ceiling had a leak.
“What’s the story?” I said. “The cops in this town are usually pretty good.” I got
up and filled a paper cup with water from my Sparkletts dispenser, passing it over
to her.
She murmured a thank-you and drank it down, staring into the bottom of the cup as
she spoke. “Rudd was a cocaine dealer until a month or so before he died. They haven’t
said as much, but I know they’ve written him off as some kind of small-time punk.
What do they care? They’d like to think he was killed in a drug deal—a double cross
or something like that. He wasn’t, though. He’d given it all up because of this.”
She glanced down at the swell of her belly. She was wearing a kelly green T-shirt
with an arrow down the front. The word OOPS! was written across her breasts in machine embroidery.
“What’s your theory?” I asked. Already I was leaning toward the official police version
of events. Drug dealing isn’t synonymous with longevity. There’s too much money involved
and too many amateurs getting into the act. This was Santa Teresa—ninety-five miles
north of the big time in L.A . , but there are still standards to maintain. A shotgun blast is the underworld equivalent
of a bad annual review.
“I don’t have a theory. I just don’t like theirs. I want you to look into it so I
can clear Rudd’s name before the baby comes.”
I shrugged. “I’ll do what I can, but I can’t guarantee the results. How are you going
to feel if the cops are right?”
She stood up, giving me a flat look. “I don’t know why Rudd died, but it had nothing
to do with drugs,” she said. She opened her handbag and extracted a roll of bills
the size of a wad of socks. “What do you charge?”
“Thirty bucks an hour plus expenses.”
She peeled off several hundred-dollar bills and laid them on the desk.
I got out a contract.
M Y SECOND ENCOUNTER with the Parker shotgun came in the form of a dealer’s appraisal slip that I discovered
when I was nosing through Rudd Osterling’s private possessions an hour later at the
house. The address she’d given me was on the Bluffs, a residential area on the west
side of town, overlooking the Pacific. It should have been an elegant neighborhood,
but the ocean generated too much fog and too much corrosive salt air. The houses were
small and had a temporary feel to them, as though the occupants intended to move on
when the month was up. No one seemed to get around to painting the trim, and the yards
looked like they were kept by people who spent all day at the beach. I followed her
in my car, reviewing the information she’d given me as I urged my ancient VW up Capilla
Hill and took a right on Presipio.
The late Rudd Osterling had been in Santa Teresa since the sixties, when he migrated
to the West Coast in search of sunshine, good surf, good dope, and casual sex. Lisa
told me he’d lived in vans and communes, working variously as a roofer, tree trimmer,
bean picker, fry cook, and forklift operator—never with any noticeable ambition or
success. He’d started dealing cocaine two years earlier, apparently netting more money
than he was accustomed to. Then he’d met and married Lisa, and she’d been determined
to see him clean up his act. According to her, he’d retired from the drug trade and
was just in the process of setting himself up in a
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