X

  She offered me a seat on a couch upholstered in dove gray. The cushions must have been filled with down because I sank with a sigh of air. She sat in a matching chair, just close enough to suggest intimacy without invading my personal space. The coffee table between us was glass and chrome, but most of the other furnishings were antique. “Janie’s talked about you so often, I can’t believe our paths have never crossed,” she said.

  Oh dear. I don’t know anyone named Janie, and I was just about to pipe up and confess when I realized what she’d actually said was “Cheney.” I felt my head tilt metaphorically, and then the penny dropped. My mouth didn’t actually flop open, but I was momentarily without speech. This was Cheney Phillips’s mother. I remembered then that while his father was X. Phillips of the Bank of X. Phillips, his mother sold high-end real estate. All I could think to say was, “I need help.”

  “Well, I’ll do what I can,” she said without missing a beat.

  I described the situation as succinctly as possible, starting with the phone call from Hallie Bettancourt and moving on to our meeting. I repeated the lengthy tale of woe she’d laid on me, and then detailed Detective Nash’s subsequent revelation about the marked hundred-dollar bills. I capped the recitation with my confusion when Vera assured me the Clipper estate had been empty for years.

  I could see her curiosity mount as mine had, point by point, including the fact that the phone numbers Hallie had given me were nonoperant. When I finally paused, she took a moment to reflect.

  “She went to a great deal of trouble to pull the wool over your eyes,” she said.

  “And it worked like a charm. Honestly, she didn’t have to persuade me of anything. She offered me the bait and I took it. I thought her relationship with Geoffrey was odd—assuming she has a husband by that name—but I didn’t doubt for a minute she’d given birth to a son out of wedlock and put the child up for adoption. It didn’t even occur to me to question the fact that she hoped to make contact with him while keeping her husband in the dark. I quizzed her on a point or two, but I didn’t really dig into the story. When she cautioned me to be discreet, it all made perfect sense.”

  “I suppose in your line of work, clients are keen on discretion.”

  “Always,” I said. “What I don’t understand is how she got into the house. She had to be in cahoots with someone in real estate, didn’t she? I mean, I can’t think how else she could manage it.”

  “Could she have broken in?”

  “No evidence of it that I saw. At the same time, I’m assuming anyone with the right combination could open the lockbox on the property.”

  “True. All that’s required for access is to dial it in. Our system’s ancient. Some companies are moving to a new device that utilizes an electronic ‘key’ and keeps a running log of which agents have come and gone, but that’s a year or two in the future for us, which is no help to you now.”

  “In the meantime, what’s the procedure?” I asked. “I mean, suppose someone has a client who wants to see the house? Then what?”

  “The agent checks the MLS . . . the Multiple Listing Service,” she amended when she saw my look. “Standard instructions are ‘LB/cf,’ which means ‘Lockbox, call first,’ or ‘LB/apt,’ meaning an appointment is required. In the case of the Clipper estate, all the agents know the house is empty, so no one bothers with either one.”

  “So you’re saying anyone and everyone has access.”

  “As long as they’ve been given the combination.”

  “In other words, you couldn’t just stand there punching in numbers randomly, hoping to hit it right.”

  “I suppose you could if you were lucky,” she said. “Come to think of it, how did you get in?”

  I made a face. “I hauled off and smacked the lock with a chunk of wood, knocking it to kingdom come. I’ll be happy to pay to have the lock replaced.”

  “Don’t worry about it. I’ll have Nancy take care of it. She was given the listing because she’s worked here for all of two months and she’s low man on the totem pole. She’ll be thrilled with the mission. We can stop by her office and I’ll introduce you on the way out.”

  “She’s not here.”

  “Of course she is.”

  “Really? I thought she was gone. Kim said she had clients in from out of town and she was off showing property.”

  “I don’t know where she got that. Nancy’s right around the corner.”

  I didn’t press the point. As much as I’d have loved to get Kim in hot water, I wanted to stay on track. “Here’s the other thing,” I said. “The night I was up there, the place was fully furnished. Lots of Oriental carpets and paintings on the walls. She had deck chairs and outdoor heaters. Where did all that come from?”

  “It’s called staging; common practice in real estate. If a house goes on the market unfurnished, the feeling is that most buyers who tour an empty house lack the imagination to see the possibilities. A stager will show an appealing living room arrangement and set up the dining table and chairs, complete with table linens, flatware, and a centerpiece. Sometimes a buyer even asks to have the furniture included in the purchase price.”

  “Isn’t that expensive?”

  “Quite.”

  “So if Hallie hired a stager to furnish the house short-term, who paid for it?”

  “She would have, I guess, though the cost would have been prohibitive. I believe you said this was for one night, yes?”

  “More or less. I met her at the house last Monday and there was stuff everywhere. Now it’s empty,” I said. “Why prohibitive?”

  “A stager has to maintain a large inventory of furniture because they’re often handling eight or ten big houses at the same time. Part of their overhead is the warehouse space for items not in use. That gets factored in to the client’s overall cost. There’s also the expense of moving furniture into a house and then out again at the end of a contract. In this case, that’s a lot of time and effort.”

  “I wonder if any of the neighbors saw the moving van?”

  “In that area? Doubtful. On the other hand, all she had to do was create the illusion of furnished rooms. How much of the house did you actually see?”

  “Not much, now that you mention it. The furniture in the living and dining rooms were largely covered in tarps. I guess there could have been old cardboard boxes under them.”

  “Sleight of hand,” she said.

  “I can’t believe I fell for it.”

  “You’re fortunate in one respect. Under ordinary circumstances, you wouldn’t have caught on to the trick at all. You’d have tracked down the information, sent off your report, and that would have been the end of it. If that police detective hadn’t come into your office with the story about the marked bills, you’d still be in the dark.”

  “You think there’s any point trying to find the stager?”

  “Probably not. We all know one or two, but there’s no formal list. Hallie either paid handsomely or the stager was doing her a personal favor. It’s also possible she didn’t need outside help at all. She might have brought in all the items from home.”

  I said a bad word, but Catherine Phillips never flinched. This is probably what comes of having a grown son who works for the police department.

  Soon afterward, I rounded out our chat with a few incidental questions and then excused myself. I didn’t see any point in talking to Nancy Harkness. Catherine Phillips had been more than generous with her time, and my curiosity was tapped out. “Hallie Bettancourt” had taken me for a ride for reasons that eluded me. I’d have to give the situation some serious thought before I decided what to do next. In light of the hundred-dollar bill I’d forfeited, I was already in the hole, and I couldn’t see what there was to be gained by pushing the point.

  When I passed the front desk on my way out, Kim Bass, Receptionist, was nowhere to be seen. This
was fortunate, as I was so irritated with the way she’d treated me, I might have bitten her on the arm. I’d been a biter as a kid and I can still remember the feel of flesh between my teeth. It’s like biting a rubber bathing cap, in case you’re curious.

  12

  When I arrived back at the office, Henry was sitting on my front step with a handful of papers. Ever the gentleman, he rose to his feet as I approached. “I’ve been playing with Pete’s number grid,” he said.

  “You broke the code?”

  “Not yet, but I have an idea. If I take a look at your Smith Corona, I can tell you if I’m right.”

  “Sure thing,” I said.

  I unlocked the door and he followed me in. I continued on into my inner office, talking over my shoulder. “I thought I gave you a key. Why didn’t you let yourself in?”

  “I might have if you hadn’t shown up when you did. Otherwise it would have seemed cheeky.”

  “God forbid,” I remarked.

  I put down my shoulder bag, pushed aside my swivel chair, and hauled my typewriter from the knee space under my desk. I placed it on top, removed the lid, and then turned the machine so it was facing him.

  He sat down in one of my two visitors’ chairs and placed his papers on the desk to his left. The top sheet was the graph paper where Pete had recorded his grid of numbers. Henry reached for one of my letter-size yellow legal pads and jotted a column of numbers along the left margin, one through twenty-six. I could see his eyes trace a line back and forth between the keyboard and the grid. I walked around the desk so I could look over his shoulder.

  He was clearly pleased with himself. “Good man! I knew he was doing something of the sort. Pull up a chair and take a look.”

  I scooted the second chair closer and sat down.

  Henry said, “Remember I said this was probably a number-letter substitution code? I figured chances were good he used a format of some kind, a matrix or template that would govern the assignment of a particular number to a given letter. He could have done this any number of ways. He might have written the alphabet, A B C D and so forth, and then used 1 for A, 2 for B, 3 for C, down the line. Pete constructed his cipher along other lines, which is what I’ve been trying to pin down.”

  “Swapping one number per letter would make it twenty-six altogether, yes?”

  “Right.”

  “What about that number? The 1909,” I said, pointing to a four-number group.

  Henry said, “I suspect that’s the number 19 followed by the number 9. I’m theorizing Pete put a zero in front of any letter between 1 and 9. So 03 is something and 04 is the next in the sequence, whatever the sequence is.”

  “I guess you have to start somewhere.”

  “It’s basically trial and error, though if you do these often enough you get a feel for what’s going on. The obvious system where 1 is A, 2 is B, and so forth didn’t work, which didn’t surprise me in the least. Pete was too wily for something so simplistic. So I said to myself, what’s next? As kids, we used a system called Rot 1—Rotate 1—which means that B becomes A, C becomes B, and so forth. I experimented with that and a few other well-known systems and got nowhere. And then I wondered if this could be a keyboard pattern, which is why I needed your Smith Corona.”

  He looked up with a sly smile, tapping the paper with his pen. “This is a QWERTY code, starting with the top row of letters on a typewriter. Read left to right and keep on going. Q is 1, W is 2, E is 3, or 03 the way he writes it. R is 4 or 04. You’ll see I’m completing that first row of letters and then starting again left to right, moving down all three rows. The last row is Z X C V B N. Do you see what I’m doing here? M is the last letter, which in this format makes it the twenty-sixth.”

  “Just tell me what it says.”

  Henry rolled his eyes. “So impatient. Give me a minute and I’ll write it out for you.”

  “You want some coffee?”

  “Only if you’re making some,” he said, distracted. He was already busy writing down the letters he matched with the numbers on the grid.

  I left him where he was and went down the hall to the kitchenette, where I picked up the coffeepot and filled it with water. I poured the water into the reservoir and then opened a packet of coffee, the grounds neatly sealed in a filter that I tucked into the basket. I flipped the switch and stood there until I could hear the gurgling begin.

  Moments later, I placed both mugs of coffee on my desk and resumed my seat. Henry was still translating, so I waited for him to finish. “This is a list of names,” he said. “Six of them. I’ll start with the first. You see the numbers 1216, then 0804 and so forth. The 12 is the letter S, followed by 16, which is the letter H. Here, 08 is the letter I, followed by 04, which is the letter R. I won’t go through every single grouping. Trust me when I tell you the first name is Shirley Ann Kastle. The line under her name reads ‘Burning Oaks, California,’ with the state abbreviated.”

  “Never heard of her.”

  “Next is the number series starting with 1903 2509 and on down the line. This line spells the name Lenore Redfern, also from Burning Oaks, California, which is the line under the name. I believe hers was the name written in the Bible you found.”

  “April’s mother,” I said. “It looks like she wanted April to have her Bible and the other items. I’m not sure why she mailed them to the priest, unless he was supposed to hold them and pass them on in due course. According to April’s wedding announcement, Ned’s now married to a woman named Celeste. Go on. I didn’t mean to slow you down.”

  “The third name is Phyllis Joplin, Perdido, California, again the state abbreviated. Are you familiar with the name?”

  “Nope.”

  “Under her name, if you’ll look at my cheat sheet, you’ll see that 05 is T, the number 11 is A, 04 is R, 06 is Y . . .”

  I checked the next number in the sequence. “And 25 is N, and the name is Taryn,” I said. I knew exactly who this was. “Surname is Sizemore.”

  “That’s right. He’s written ‘Santa Teresa, California’ on the line beneath, so she must be local. You know her?”

  “She was the plaintiff in the lawsuit I mentioned earlier.”

  “Much of this seems to hark back to that lawsuit,” he said.

  “Could be coincidental.”

  “Possible. Fifth name on the list is Susan Telford, who apparently lives in Henderson, Nevada. Ring a bell?”

  “Nada.”

  Henry said, “Speaking Spanish now. Very nice.”

  I pointed to the next sequence of numbers. “Who’s that?”

  “Last name is Janet Macy in Tucson, Arizona.”

  “Which doesn’t ring any bells.” I thought about the names for a moment. “I can’t imagine what the relationship is among these women.”

  “It might help if you talked to someone in Burning Oaks. Father Xavier would be the obvious choice.”

  “I’m not planning to do anything unless I figure out what Pete had in mind.”

  “I’m not sure how you’ll arrive at that. I gather he didn’t confide in Ruthie, at least where this business is concerned,” he said. “Is that a copy machine?”

  “It is.”

  Henry picked up the single sheet of graph paper and the yellow pad, crossed to the machine, and pushed the power button. While he waited for the machine to warm up, he neatly tore off the top two sheets of lined yellow paper, and when the Ready light went on, he opened the cover, placed the first sheet facedown on the glass plate, and lowered the cover again. He pushed Print and we stared, transfixed, as a line of light moved down the page and a copy emerged from the innards of the machine. I didn’t have a clue how the process worked. He then copied the second sheet, and last he made a copy of the grid of numbers.

  When he finished, he handed me the originals and folded the copies, putting them in the pockets of his shorts. Indica
ting the first sheet he’d given me, he said, “That’s the key, written down the left-hand margin; the QWERTY letters with a number value next to each. You come across any other eight-place grids, you should be able to translate. I’m not sure what you’ll do with the names, but I’ll leave you to ponder the possibilities.”

  “I’ll do that, and thanks.”

  “I enjoyed watching Pete’s mind at work,” he said. “Nearly forgot to mention I had a plumber out this morning to take a look at the irrigation issue. He was full of good advice. He kept saying ‘reduce before reuse.’”

  “You already knew that,” I said. “Nothing practical?”

  “You want to hear his recommendation? Tear out the lawn. Get rid of all the grass. ‘It’s dead anyway’ was what he said. He recommended Astroturf. Can you imagine it?”

  “Well, it would be green all year round.”

  “I told him I’d think about it and get back to him. Then I put a call through to someone else. At any rate, I’ll see you back at the house.”

  Once he left, I sat and chewed on the significance of what I’d learned. Henry had provided the key to the list without supplying the point. Pete’s purpose wasn’t obvious, but the six women must have had something in common. The fact that he’d encrypted the names suggested he thought the list worth protecting, but I had no idea why. Who did he imagine might come across information so sensitive that he couldn’t leave it in plain English?

  I picked up the handset and punched in Ruthie’s phone number. The machine picked up and I dutifully left a message at the sound of the beep. “Hi, Ruthie. Sorry I missed you. This is Kinsey with another update. Henry’s broken the code and I’ll tell you what it says when you have a minute. Meanwhile, the files are here at the office. I’ll search again if you think there’s any point. Fat chance in my view, but you’re the boss. Hope your appointment went well. Give me a call as soon as you get home. I’m panting to hear.”

  I stacked the sheets, folded them, and put them in my bag. More from curiosity than anything else, I pulled out the telephone book and checked the white pages for residential listings in hopes of spotting Taryn Sizemore. In the ten years since the lawsuit, she might have married, died, or left town, in which case there’d be no sign of her. Under the S’s, I found ten Sizemores, none of whom were T. or Taryn. I shifted my search to the business section of the white pages and found her: Sizemore, Taryn, PhD. No clue as to the field she was in. College professor, educational consultant. She might be an audiologist or a speech therapist. The address was in downtown Santa Teresa with a phone number. I pulled out my index cards, made a note, and then replaced the rubber band and returned the cards to my bag.