I turned the air conditioner on full.
I reached over and took Stella’s gloved hand in mine.
We were five hours outside Carmel, California, with no other white cars in sight.
12
Former detective Terrance Stack, just Terry now, spent the better part of an hour tracking down a phone number for Charter Pharmaceuticals and a live person. The number listed with directory assistance was answered by an auto-attendant. That auto-attendant provided a series of options, none of which led to a real person. Instead, each time he selected something new from the menu, the call either rolled to another recording or disconnected altogether, and he had to start over. He was damn near ready to throw the phone against the wall when he got an idea.
The number directory assistance had given him ended with 371-1050.
He dialed the original area code, then: 371-1051. This, too, went to the auto-attendant.
371-1052. Auto-attendant.
371-1053. Auto-attendant.
371-1054. Auto-attendant.
371-1055. Auto-attendant.
When he got to 1063 through 1081, the auto-attendant no longer picked up. Instead, the lines rang until eventually timing out after a few minutes.
He considered giving up and trying something else as he dialed 371-1097.
“Sanders.” No hello or greeting of any kind, only the single name. Muttered more as an afterthought than the answer to a phone call. “Somebody there?”
Stack opened his mouth to speak and realized he hadn’t figured out what he planned to say if he actually got through to someone. He cleared his throat. “I’m looking for Calvin Gurney. I believe he’s a janitor there.”
Stack knew full well Gurney had died back in 1978 in the Nettleton house, but he figured if he wanted to rattle some chains, no reason to pussyfoot around.
The voice replied. “Who?”
“Calvin Gurney.”
“How’d you get this number?”
“Dunno. The auto-attendant transferred me.”
“Fucking auto-attendant. Hold on.”
There was the rustling of papers, then the voice came back. “I don’t see anyone by that name in the directory.”
Stack said, “Calvin told me if he wasn’t around, I should ask for Eura Kapp.”
Eura Kapp died in 1986—a forty-seven year-old female found burned but not burned.
“Nobody by that name, either.”
“What about Andy Olin Flack?”
Flack was the thirty-three year-old child molester left in the alley across from the kid’s apartment.
“Flack? Flack hasn’t worked here in at least a decade. Who is this?”
Stack thought about that for a second. “Richard Nettleton.”
The line went dead.
