Wolf in the Shadows - Marcia Muller [82]
The house was well kept up, the lawn well barbered, but there was a touch of loneliness about it, in spite of its proximity to its neighbors. Loneliness and abandonment, a sense that nobody lived there anymore and hadn’t for a long time. A caretaker might check it periodically; Fontes’s friends might be in and out; the gardeners might come and go; automatic timers might turn on lights; automatic sprinklers might play on the lawn. But only a shadow of life went on here, and to me the house seemed more desolate than if it had been allowed to fall into ruins.
The man with the beagle passed my car, giving me another wary look. I smiled at him and got out. “It’s in good shape for a place that’s not owner-occupied,” I said, gesturing at the house. “Roof looks like it could pass inspection. Of course, you don’t know about termite damage; that can be the killer. Still, I’ve got a client who would make an all-cash deal and waive inspections, providing I can get hold of the owner.”
The man’s wary look faded. “Oh, you’re a real-estate agent.”
“Broker. Rae Kelleher, Century Twenty-one.” I offered my hand.
He shook it enthusiastically. The beagle began sniffing my shoes. “Owen Berry,” he said. “I live down the block, and I’d be thrilled if that place sold.”
“Why? It’s not rented to undesirables, is it?”
“Used by undesirables is more like it.”
The beagle moved from the toes of my shoes to the heels. Its leash began to wind around my calves. In the interest of preserving my newfound rapport with Mr. Berry, I ignored it.
“Now, that worries me,” I said—meaning the so-called undesirables rather than the dog. “Will you explain?”
“Fontes is a beaner,” Owen Berry said. “Very well off, but still a beaner, if you get my drift. He’s got a grudge against the neighbors—something that happened before my wife and I moved here—and he takes it out on them by letting all sorts of lowlifes use the place. He keeps it up, so they can’t cite him for creating a nuisance; can’t condemn it, either. But you should see what goes in and out of there.”
The leash was wrapped tight around my calves now; the beagle was energetically snuffling my jeans. I thought, If he pees on me or sniffs my crotch, I’ll smack his inquisitive little nose—rapport with his owner be damned. “What does go in and out of there?” I asked.
“Beaners. Probably drug dealers. Women with skirts up to their asses and hair out to here.” The hand that wasn’t holding the leash described a big perm. “Probably call girls. The only thing he hasn’t loaned the place to is a faggot, but I hear that in Mexico they don’t like fags any more than we do.”
Now it was Berry whom I wanted to smack. The dog didn’t know his behavior was disgusting. Come to think of it, Berry probably didn’t, either. I curbed the impulse to tell him what I thought of him and instead said, “Well, maybe my client and I can solve the problem. Do you have Fontes’s address in Mexico, or know anyone who does?”
“I don’t have it, but my next-door neighbor might. He tried to buy the place about a year ago, had some correspondence with Fontes.”
“Would you ask him for it?”
“I’d be happy to.” Berry yanked on the dog’s leash. It cut into my calves. The animal made a gagging sound and staggered backwards on its hind legs, leash unpeeling from me like the skin of an apple. Now my sympathies were fully on the beagle’s side; if there was any justice, someday he’d rip his owner’s vocal cords out.
Berry began dragging the hapless dog along the sidewalk. “You coming?” he asked me.
I’d had all of him I could take. “I don’t want to intrude on your neighbor. I’ll wait here, if you don’t mind.”
As he left, I turned and looked off at the brilliant blue water beyond the sandstone cliffs, trying to clear my head of the muddying effects of Berry’s bigotry. I told myself he was essentially a small and stupid man, but that didn’t help. Owen Berry was a symptom of everything that was reeling