“You know we’re concerned about you. All of us.”
“I thank you for that and for everything.”
“As long as you’re okay.”
He shook his head. “I’m not okay. I’m old.”
I spent a quiet morning at the office, tidying my desk and paying some bills. I took care of simple jobs: tossing, filing, taking out the trash. I was still brooding about Gus, but I knew there was no point in going over the same ground again. I had to focus on something else. Like Melvin Downs. Something about the man bothered me, above and beyond the issue of tracking him down, which I was certain I could do.
Once my desktop was orderly, I spent an hour transcribing my interview with Gladys Fredrickson, tracking back and forth through the tape recording. Amazing how background noise interferes with audibility: the rattle of paper, the dog barking, her wheezing breath as she spoke. It would take more than one session to get the interview typed up, but it gave me something to do.
When I wearied of that, I opened the pencil drawer and took out a pack of index cards. In the same drawer, I spotted the toy I’d salvaged from the back of the closet in Melvin Downs’s room. I squeezed the two sticks together, watching while a double-jointed wooden clown did a series of maneuvers on the high bar: back giant, clear hip to handstand, three-quarter giant. I had no way of knowing if the toy belonged to him or to the tenant who’d occupied the room before he arrived. I set the toy aside and picked up the stack of index cards.
Card by card, one line each, I jotted down what I knew of him, which didn’t amount to much. He most likely worked in the area adjacent to City College, where he caught the bus. He was fond of movie classics that seemed, in the main, to be sentimental yarns about young boys, baby animals, and loss. He was estranged from his daughter, who refused to let him see his grandsons for reasons unknown. He’d been in prison, which might have had a bearing on his daughter’s disenfranchising him. He had an imaginary friend named Tía that he created using a lipstick-red mouth tattooed in the U formed between the thumb and index finger of his right hand. Two black dots inked on the knuckle became the hand-puppet’s eyes.
What else?
Melvin was mechanically inclined, with a fix-it mentality that allowed him to repair miscellaneous items, including a malfunctioning TV set. Whatever his day job, he was paid in cash. He finished work and sat waiting for a bus on Tuesdays and Thursdays by midafternoon. He was polite to strangers but had no close friends. He’d saved enough money to buy a truck. He’d been in town the past five years, ostensibly to be near the very grandsons he was forbidden to see. His room at the hotel was grim, unless of course he’d taken countless doilies, needlepointed pillows, and other decorative items with him when he left. When he’d seen the flyer I’d distributed, his response was to panic, pack his possessions, and disappear.
When I ran out of facts I shuffled the cards and arranged them randomly to see if enlightenment would ensue. I spread them out on the desk and leaned my head on my hand, thinking, Which of these facts doesn’t belong?
I could think of one possibility. I pulled two cards forward and stared at them. How did the mechanical clown and Melvin’s imaginary friend, Tía, fit into the larger scheme of things? Nothing else I’d learned about him suggested a playful nature. Indeed, there was something furtive in his reluctance to display the lipstick tattoo. So maybe the toys weren’t intended for his amusement. Maybe Tía and the toy clown were meant to amuse someone else. Like who? Kids, any number of whom I’d seen at the nearby elementary school and the child care center near the bus stop he frequented.
Was he a pedophile?
I knew child molesters often kept games and videos on hand, befriending children over a period of time until a bond was formed. Physical contact was gradually introduced. In the wake of affection and trust came the fondling and fumbling, until touching and secrets were the intoxicating spice of their “special” relationship. If he was a sex offender, it would explain his fright that he’d been spotted within one thousand yards of a school, a playground, or a day care center. It would also explain his daughter’s refusal to let him see his grandsons.
I picked up the phone and called the county probation department. I asked to speak to a parole officer named Priscilla Holloway. I expected to have to leave a message, but she picked up on her end and I identified myself. Her voice was surprisingly light, given what I remembered of her physical stature. She was a big-boned redhead, the sort who’d played rough sports in high school and still had softball and soccer trophies displayed in her bedroom at home. I’d met her the previous July when I was babysitting a young renegade named Reba Lafferty, who’d been paroled from the California Institute for Women.
“I’ve got a question for you,” I said, when we’d dispensed with the chitchat. “How familiar are you with the registered sex offenders in town?”
“I know most of them by name. We all do. Lot of them are required to come in for drug testing. They also call in changes of address or changes in employment. Who in particular?”
“I’m looking for a fellow named Melvin Downs.”
There was a pause and I could almost hear her shaking her head. “Nope. Don’t think so. The name doesn’t sound familiar. Where’d he do his time?”
“I have no idea, but I’m guessing he was in prison on a child molest. He has a crude tattoo that looks like prison vintage-a lipstick-red mouth in the web between the thumb and index finger on his right hand. I’m told he’s an amateur ventriloquist and I’m wondering if he trots out his talent in seducing young kids.”
“I can check with the other POs and see if they know him. What’s the context?”
“You know an attorney named Lowell Effinger?”
“Sure, I know Lowell.”
“He wants to depose Downs as a witness in a personal-injury suit. Downs is a hard man to find, but I finally ran him to ground. He seemed cooperative at first, but then he turned around and bolted so fast it made me wonder if he was in the system somewhere.”
“I don’t think here, but he might be a fugitive from another state. These guys want out from under, all they have to do is hit the road without telling us. We’ve got ten to fifteen unaccounted for at any given time. And that’s just locally. Statewide, the numbers are mind-boggling.”
“Jeez, all those sex offenders on the loose?”
“Sorry to say. Give me your number again and I’ll get back to you if I learn anything.”
I thanked her and returned the handset to the cradle. My suspicions hadn’t been confirmed, but she hadn’t shot me down. Altogether, I was feeling a flicker of encouragement.
As a consequence, early Thursday afternoon, I drove up Capillo Hill again and sat in the parking lot of the organic foods market, looking out at the intersection where I’d seen Downs two days before. Since his work schedule seemed consistently Tuesdays and Thursdays, I hoped I had a decent chance of spotting him. I was bored to tears with the hunt, but I’d brought a paperback novel and a thermos of hot coffee. There was a ladies’ room available at the gas station two doors down. What more did a girl require? I read for a while, periodically glancing through the windshield to scan the area.
I paid a visit to the service station, and as I came out of the ladies’ room I could see activity across the street. A van pulled in at the curb in front of the laundromat. Idly, I watched as two men got out and went in. I was already sitting behind the wheel of my car again when they emerged minutes later, toting cardboard boxes, which they stowed in the rear of the van. There was lettering on the side panel, but I couldn’t read what it said. I reached into the backseat and snatched up the binoculars I keep close at hand. I adjusted the focus until the lettering became sharp.