Black Water Read online

  Earla Kuerner answered the knock and let them in. A little jingled when she shut the door behind them. She looked to be in early fifties, average height and weight. Wavy, gray-black hair and a good face.

  The living room was cool and the windows were draped to keep out the afternoon heat. An air conditioner hummed. There was a small TV with the sound turned down and two recliners set up in front of it, with a round occasional table between them. Green carpet. A brown plaid print sofa with heavy oak arms, a bookcase neatly stocked with paperbacks, family pictures on one wall, a china cabinet against another. Two framed paintings by Gwen hung beside the cabinet. One was of the front of the house and the two big pine trees, the other a kitten sitting in front of a barn. Merci noted that the stereo system still had a turntable.

  Lee Kuerner rose from the left chair, offered his hand to each detective and introduced himself.

  "Have a seat," he said.

  "I've got lemonade," said Earla.

  "I'd like some of that," said Paul.

  "Yes, that would be great."

  "I'll get it, honey," said Lee. Merci watched him walk toward the kitchen, a tall, slender man with a slowness about him that she instantly liked. Glasses, plaid shirt, jeans. Reminded her of her father, though Lee Kuerner was probably almost ten years younger. His hair was graying brown and full, long enough to touch his shirt collar.

  Zamorra carried the burden of small talk while they waited. Merci looked at the pictures on the wall. It looked like the Kuerners had four children, all girls. Gwen was either the youngest or second youngest, Merci saw, but she couldn't say for sure. The girls were all bony and toothy, pretty faces.

  Lee Kuerner came back with two glasses of lemonade balanced in one hand, and a TV tray under the same arm, which he snapped open with the other. To Merci it looked like the tray practically opened itself and locked its own legs into place. Well used. Lee set the tray between them, put the glasses on the tray, went back and got two more.

  "We got a tree in the back," he said. "Earla makes good lemonade off it."

  Merci sipped hers and agreed. Then, after a long pause: "I'm sorry."

  Lee looked away and nodded. Earla looked down into her lemonade glass. A tear ran off her cheek. A tissue appeared in her hand and she dabbed her face.

  Merci led, as usual. "Mrs. Kuerner, tell us about Gwen. Tell us who would want to kill her."

  "Oh, oh my. I'm just hoping and praying it wasn't Archie. Was it?"

  "We don't think so, but we don't know," said Paul. "There is some evidence pointing to him, and some evidence pointing away."

  "No," said Lee. "It wasn't Archie. The papers made it sound like he was a suspect."

  "The papers don't make that judgment," said Merci. "We do, and as of right now, he isn't."

  "But a neighbor said he'd heard them fighting earlier that day. Her birthday, the twentieth," said Zamorra.

  "People do fight sometimes, don't they?" asked Earla.

  "Gwen hadn't made any domestic violence complaints," said Zsmorra. "Did they fight a lot?"

  "We don't know of anything like that," said Earla.

  Neither Zamorra nor Merci spoke for a long moment. Merci picked it up again, which was how they usually worked—Rayborn leading and exploring, Zamorra clarifying, following up, shaping.

  "Tell us about your girl, Mr. and Mrs. Kuerner," she said. "And tell us about Archie." She slipped her blue notebook from the pock of her sport coat, got a good pen ready. Gwen was easy. Gwen was happy. She was beautiful from the hour she was born. She was a good student, a good girl. Beautiful voice and liked to sing. Good at drawing. When early adolescence came she was still a good girl. Had a lot of friends and earned them. Still had friends from back then when she . . . Never any drinking or drug problems, though she probably tried things. Worked Pizza Hut, Sirloin Stockade, then a music store. Liked horses, clothes and music. Especially the music. Bought a guitar with her own money and taught herself to play it. Had the knack, and nobody knew where she got it from. Didn't have steady guys, seemed to use good judgment that way. Fell in love with Archie Wildcraft when she was sixteen, sophomore in high school. Archie was playing scholarship college ball for UC Riverside, a sophomore also. Met him at a theater in the mall, Gwen was there with two of her girlfriends. Archie with two buddies. They went out for ice cream after the show, traded phone numbers. Lee and Earla weren't happy at all about this older guy. Name like Wildcraft spelled trouble, said Lee. Archie was twenty. They allowed him to come over and meet them and had a "pointed" discussion that night about whether to let him in the house again. Agreed that he was clean-cut, well mannered, handsome and head-over-cleats for Gwen.

  Lee voted no; Earla voted yes.

  So Archie started coming over for an hour, sometimes two, every evening he wasn't traveling for ball. He lived on campus, maybe half an hour away. Earla and Lee never let them be really alone, which wasn't hard with two of their other girls still in the house. Though after a while they gave the young people the privacy of the living room to watch TV, or the family room to study together. Archie never brought her home late from a date, and the curfew was always early. He brought Earla flowers and Lee some choice bass plugs Archie's father had carved, helped him overhaul the outboard on his little fishing boat. Helped them paint the house three weekends running. They never smelled alcohol on either of them, never saw any affection between them except for hugs and reasonable kisses hello and good-bye. All the Kuerner girls liked him, thought Gwen had a catch. Gwen actually colored when he was there or when his name was spoken around the house. Named a kitten Archie so she could say it a lot. She was seventeen when she said she wanted to marry Archie after she graduated.

  Lee voted no; Earla voted yes.

  Two months after her graduation Lee walked her down the aisle of a little Methodist church in Riverside. One of the happiest and saddest times of his life. Down to his last two girls. But he liked Archie and thought he'd be good to his daughter. Trusted him. Liked him. Archie's ERA was 2.18 and the bass plugs worked.

  Earla got up and gave him a tissue and Lee turned his head away and pulled off his glasses in one motion. Merci quietly cleared her throat. Zamorra looked at Earla, then away

  "How'd the marriage go?" asked Merci.

  "It went fine," said Earla. "Gwen called every day, then every week, right up until. .. Archie missed baseball at first, but he got on quick as a deputy and really took to it."

  "Why did he quit ball?" Zamorra asked.

  "He thought he'd get drafted but he didn't. Never had good control of the fastball and the forkie wasn't working his senior year. Tendonitis, too. Tried out as a walk-on but knew it wasn't for him. No offers."

  "That's too bad," said Paul.

  "He took it good, though. He was ready to try something else."

  "Was Gwen working then?" Merci asked.

  "Gwen had a band and made a little money, too," said Earla. "She wrote a beautiful song that got accepted for a TV movie. They paid her good money for it, but got somebody else to sing it."

  "Then they were doing okay, financially?"

  "Gwen didn't grow up with a lot," Earla said carefully. "And neither did Archie. So, compared to what they came from they were doing fine. They had enough. She was happy and Archie was too, unless he was fooling us. All of a sudden, then, middle of last yes they hit it big with this stock and made a lot of profit. Bought a nice house in the hills, new cars. Took trips. Heck, they offered us a hundred thousand to remodel this place, or just sell it and find a better neighborhood. We didn't feel right about it. They weren't greedy people. Not in the least. But both of them liked nice things. And they worked hard to get them. And when they got them they enjoyed them."

  "Stock in what?" asked Merci.

  "OrganiVen," said Earla. "Then it got bought up by B. B. Sistel and everybody made a lot of money. You probably read about it."

  Merci hadn't, though of course she knew B. B. Sistel Laboratories. They made everything from the stuff she too
k for headaches to the birth control pills she'd taken during her months with Mike McNally.

  "Some doctors started it, down in La Jolla. They made this tumor treatment using rattlesnake venom. The idea was old but they found a way to make it work. Gwen and Archie told us that they'd seen slides and videos, and this stuff made from poison could kill those tumors in just minutes. Said it was like watching a miracle. The company called it MiraVen. Anyway, Gwen and Archie invested twenty thousand dollars early last year. Really scraped to come up with it. Then the company went public. Then Sistel bought it. There were splits and options and dividends and all sorts of stuff. And they made two million dollars, practically overnight."

  Merci made a note of that. "Invested twenty thousand, got back two million in less than a year?"

  "Half a year. All these young geniuses put the OrganiVen company together, based on the cancer treatment. Doctors, business geniuses, marketing geniuses—they were all friends from college."

  She exchanged glances with Zamorra. Slowly, almost absently, she wrote CKOrganiVen. Somebody turned twenty grand and snake poison into two million in less than one year, she figured fraud. But something like that could happen legally on Wall Street, or the Nikkei, or the Pacific Stock Exchange right here in Southern California.

  Merci wasn't sure what to ask next, so she went with the obvious. "Did the big money make them happy?"

  "Very."

  "Because sometimes, people are fine until they hit it rich. Then problems start."

  Lee nodded quickly, as if he'd thought of that a long time ago.

  "I saw no signs of that," he said. "They both seemed kind of... relieved. That twenty thousand was hard to get. They used their retirement money, borrowed eight hundred from us. Borrowed from friends. Got a second on their little house in Santa Ana. So when it all happened just like they wanted it to, they seemed almost to not believe it. It was like they'd hit a slot in Vegas, rather than making a sound financial investment."

  Merci wrote couldn't believe it.

  The Kuerners looked at each other. Lee broke the gaze and turned to Merci. "Do you think it was something to do with all that?"

  "Do you?"

  "It worried me that they made so much," he said. "It was all legal know that. But it worried me."

  "We're modest people," said Earla.

  "Were Archie and Gwen keeping different company last year, when the money started coming in?"

  "Not that we know," said Lee.

  "Did they ever mention taxes, or getting out of taxes, or hiding the money from the government—even just joke about it?"

  Lee frowned and looked at Merci. "No. Once Archie told me that if they made the two million, he'd still have to figure on the government taking almost half. But he didn't say it like he had to hide the money. Or bitterly. Just matter-of-factly."

  "So far as you know, did they declare all that income to the IRS

  "Yes, so far as I know."

  Merci let a silence punctuate her change of thought. "Mr. and M Kuerner, did Gwen ever talk to you about having affairs with other men?"

  "No," said Earla.

  Lee was looking at the dead TV, his hands folded on his lap. "No,'' he said quietly.

  "What was the maddest she ever got at Archie?"

  Earla sighed and looked up at the ceiling. "Once, she told me he was awfully darned nice to some of the women he worked around. Said he always had a smile and a nice word for the pretty ones. Said half the women Archie ran across wanted to take him away from her. She was feeling insecure right then, I think. I don't think she was talking about any girl in particular. And she wasn't accusing Archie of being unfaithful. She was just down at the time."

  "Do you know why?"

  "After that one song she sold to TV, she didn't sell any more. Her band was getting fewer bookings. This popular nightclub down by the beach—the Nut House—they wouldn't book Gwen's band anymore. After three years, they just stopped booking them. She felt like she wasn't any good at writing and singing. Those things were important to her."

  Merci looked to Zamorra again. "When was the last time you saw Gwen alive?" he asked.

  "Her birthday," said Earla. "She drove all the way out here to take us out to lunch. It was a tradition."

  "How was she?"

  "Oh, she was in good spirits. A little thoughtful maybe, like you can get on a birthday, looking back at the years. But Archie had gotten a reservation for dinner that night at a nice restaurant in Newport Beach. She was looking forward to that. It was actually a party but she didn't know it. Our youngest, Priscilla, was at the party, if you want to talk to her about it."

  Rayborn made a note. "What time did Gwen get here?"

  "Noon, almost exactly."

  "And what time did she leave?"

  "A few minutes after three."

  Merci looked at Zamorra. He held her eye and she knew he was wondering the same thing she was: if Gwen was here at three on that day, how could she be at home, arguing with Archie in the backyard?

  "We came back here after the restaurant and talked," said Lee. "She wanted to see some old family pictures. Like Earla said, Gwen was thoughtful that day. Had something on her mind. I don't know what. I didn't ask. I wish I had."

  There was a moment of silence. Zamorra gave Merci his all-finished nod.

  She rose and went to the wall of family pictures. "Tell me about your family. Four girls. And Gwen was what... second youngest?"

  Earla nodded, rose and walked over to the picture wall. "Next to youngest, that's right. Priscilla is our youngest, then Diana and Lizzy. More lemonade?"

  "Sure."

  Half an hour later Earla was finished with her quickie family history. Merci followed along via the wall pictures, then looked at the photographs that Earla Kuerner had shown Gwen on her birthday, less than eighteen hours before she was murdered in her own bathroom.

  Zamorra and Lee stayed in the living room and Merci caught stray snippets of their conversation: the aggressiveness of large-mouth bass versus smallies; Martinez's phenomenal August so far; speculation on Archie Wildcraft's capacity for spousal violence. No, I don't think so Detective. Good man.

  Merci had just handed Earla her empty lemonade glass when the little bell jingled and a young woman in a business suit came through the front door. She looked so much like Gwen that Merci blinked; same smart eyes, same wavy dark hair, same good figure. She look quickly at Merci, then Zamorra.

  "These are the police," said Earla.

  "How do you do," said the woman. "I'm Priscilla Brock. Soon be Kuerner again."

  She looked at her mother. "Did you tell them I was at the party

  "They know."

  Priscilla nodded. "I was one of the last people to see them before it happened. Arch threw a nice party at the Rex. There were twenty of us."

  Arch. Merci made a note of that, too.

  Priscilla seemed to evaluate her, then Zamorra. Her chin quiver then set hard. "Now there are what, eighteen and a half of us?"

  "Can you take a few minutes and tell us about the party?"

  "Give me five."

  She walked over to her father and hugged him, then disappear down the hall.

  Priscilla came out a few minutes later in the same clothes, but no nylons or shoes. She'd pinned up her hair and taken off her makeup. They sat with her in the little dining room while Lee and Earla watch the news. Priscilla got more lemonade for them and tap water over ice for herself.

  She told them about the party at the Rex, how Archie told Gwen it was a birthday dinner date for the two of them, but when she walked into the private room they were all there and she just about fainted. Everybody toasted her and brought presents, some really nice ones, then ate a lot and drank some. It was ten couples—everybody from musician friends of Gwen's to cop friends of Archie's. Priscilla was the only sister to make it—one was out of state, the other was working nights and couldn't switch shifts.

  "How did they seem that night?" asked Zamorra.

&nb
sp; Priscilla took a moment. "Archie was a little worried, a little controlling, as he tends to be. I think he got a little upset at some of his friends, for hugging and kissing Gwen. Nothing big—it passed. Gwen was happy. A little embarrassed at the expense of it all, but happy. Her friends were important to her. She looked exceptionally beautiful."

  Priscilla looked down at the table. She took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

  Zamorra again: "Do you know what Archie was worried about?"

  "That's his personality. I don't think he was worrying about anything big. You know, if the prime rib was right or the drinks were coming fast enough. If Gwen was really having a good time."

  Merci mostly listened and made notes. She saw quickly that Priscilla responded better to Paul, so it was best for him to lead. Priscilla twice mentioned the decorations in the private room. Beautiful, lots of work, a couple of the women had helped her and Archie set them up that afternoon while Gwen was here with her folks.

  Norco to Newport Beach, she thought. Idea.

  "Did you pick up Archie at home, on your way to set up the room?" Merci asked.

  "Yes."

  "A lot of work getting all those decorations out there and put up. So what time did you get to Archie and Gwen's place?"

  "Two, two-thirty."

  Merci waited and let the silence work on Priscilla. Zamorra did the same.

  "So what did you and Archie argue about in the backyard?"

  Merci saw the anger flash into Priscilla's eyes, but not back out.

  "We didn't argue about anything."

  "Oh," said Merci. "One of the neighbors said he heard loud voices—a man and a woman—about three that afternoon."

  "Well, those would have been Archie's and mine. But it sure wasn't an argument. What it was, was me going off on my stupid sonofabitch soon-to-be-ex-husband. And Archie trying to calm me down. I've got a temper. I lost it then."

  "Why?"

  "What do you mean, why?"

  "Why then, with your sister's husband?"

  Priscilla colored and Merci made a quick scribble then looked up hoping to aggravate the woman.