Spit In The Ocean: A Laid-Back Bay Area Mystery (The Jake Samson & Rosie Vicente Detective Series Book 4) by Shelley Singer Page A
Authors: Shelley Singer
Tags: Mystery, California, San Francisco, cozy mystery, private investigator, murder mystery, mystery series, Jake Samson, P.I. fiction, sperm bank, Shelley Singer, Bay Area mystery
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color they sell for concrete. The front yard was two small patches of carefully tended lawn, with rhododendrons up against the house.
The front door was much newer than the rest of the house, one of those carved, Spanish-style numbers they sell in places like Sears and Montgomery Ward. It had a brass knocker. A horseshoe.
When Clement opened the door, we stepped directly into a beige-carpeted living room painted a soft rose, and were invited to sit on a beige and gold brocade couch backed up against a side wall and facing a large white-draped window. Clement disappeared through a small dining room into the kitchen and we looked around the room. There were several large plants, including a five-foot palmetto in one corner and a large rectangular planter of asparagus fern against the arch-cut wall dividing living room from dining room.
It was a while before I noticed that the palmetto was populated by several small plastic birds, and that nestled in the asparagus fern were a foot-tall mother monkey with child, glazed pottery of some sort.
The wall behind us and above our heads was covered with photographs, family photographs that spanned at least four generations, framed and arranged, or so it seemed, chronologically from sepia Victorian formality to infant in paper diapers. Clement came back into the room, bearing a tray of cheese and crackers, chips and onion dip, and beer, which he set down on the glass-topped coffee table before us.
The house was very clean, very neat, but Clement’s presence was comfortable, so I wasn’t afraid of dropping crumbs. Come to think of it, the place didn’t look much like it belonged to Clement, who tended toward a rumpled look.
“Noticed you looking at the pictures,” he said. “That’s my wife up there.” He pointed over our heads. “The wedding picture. That’s me in the uniform.”
World War II. A young soldier, a corporal, with a silly, glazed grin on his face. A young bride in white, with shoulder-length rolled-under and pompadoured blond hair. Dark eyebrows, dark lipstick, looking happy but exhausted, or possibly frightened.
At last, their faces seemed to say, they would get to go to bed together.
“She’s beautiful,” I said, although that wasn’t strictly true. She was pretty, but it’s always hard to tell how good-looking someone from another era really is. The style, even the bearing, get in the way.
“Yes, she was. Right up to the day she died.”
“When was that, Clement?” Rosie asked. I didn’t want to know.
“Been nearly two years now.” He was gazing at the photos. “Stroke. Just took her away. She died in our bedroom early in the morning. I couldn’t decide what she should be dressed in… but you don’t want to hear that.” We murmured things just below the level of real speech.
“Quite a collection of pictures though, isn’t it? Both our families, way back.”
Dutifully, we turned again, twisting our bodies to look up at the wall. He started with the Victorians on his side, who, he said, had lived in Oregon. My neck was getting stiff and I didn’t need to have anything else hurting, so I stood up. From the Victorians, he introduced us to the flaming youth, and then the serious folk of the Depression. World War II, his own wedding, and, in the years right after the war, what seemed to be dozens of relatives all living in little houses and multiplying like crazy. His own son as a baby, a fifties child, a long-haired student in Berkeley in the sixties. Clement and his wife, Rita, growing middle-aged and then beginning to get old. No more photos of them after that. Two grandchildren, a boy and a girl, rushing toward their teens. Another picture of the grandson, the infant in paper diapers.
The tour was finished. Clement sat down. I sat down.
“Nice house,” Rosie said, to change the subject.
“It’s just the way she left it,” he said. “I haven’t changed much. She was the decorator in the family. Hell, I work most of the time,
The front door was much newer than the rest of the house, one of those carved, Spanish-style numbers they sell in places like Sears and Montgomery Ward. It had a brass knocker. A horseshoe.
When Clement opened the door, we stepped directly into a beige-carpeted living room painted a soft rose, and were invited to sit on a beige and gold brocade couch backed up against a side wall and facing a large white-draped window. Clement disappeared through a small dining room into the kitchen and we looked around the room. There were several large plants, including a five-foot palmetto in one corner and a large rectangular planter of asparagus fern against the arch-cut wall dividing living room from dining room.
It was a while before I noticed that the palmetto was populated by several small plastic birds, and that nestled in the asparagus fern were a foot-tall mother monkey with child, glazed pottery of some sort.
The wall behind us and above our heads was covered with photographs, family photographs that spanned at least four generations, framed and arranged, or so it seemed, chronologically from sepia Victorian formality to infant in paper diapers. Clement came back into the room, bearing a tray of cheese and crackers, chips and onion dip, and beer, which he set down on the glass-topped coffee table before us.
The house was very clean, very neat, but Clement’s presence was comfortable, so I wasn’t afraid of dropping crumbs. Come to think of it, the place didn’t look much like it belonged to Clement, who tended toward a rumpled look.
“Noticed you looking at the pictures,” he said. “That’s my wife up there.” He pointed over our heads. “The wedding picture. That’s me in the uniform.”
World War II. A young soldier, a corporal, with a silly, glazed grin on his face. A young bride in white, with shoulder-length rolled-under and pompadoured blond hair. Dark eyebrows, dark lipstick, looking happy but exhausted, or possibly frightened.
At last, their faces seemed to say, they would get to go to bed together.
“She’s beautiful,” I said, although that wasn’t strictly true. She was pretty, but it’s always hard to tell how good-looking someone from another era really is. The style, even the bearing, get in the way.
“Yes, she was. Right up to the day she died.”
“When was that, Clement?” Rosie asked. I didn’t want to know.
“Been nearly two years now.” He was gazing at the photos. “Stroke. Just took her away. She died in our bedroom early in the morning. I couldn’t decide what she should be dressed in… but you don’t want to hear that.” We murmured things just below the level of real speech.
“Quite a collection of pictures though, isn’t it? Both our families, way back.”
Dutifully, we turned again, twisting our bodies to look up at the wall. He started with the Victorians on his side, who, he said, had lived in Oregon. My neck was getting stiff and I didn’t need to have anything else hurting, so I stood up. From the Victorians, he introduced us to the flaming youth, and then the serious folk of the Depression. World War II, his own wedding, and, in the years right after the war, what seemed to be dozens of relatives all living in little houses and multiplying like crazy. His own son as a baby, a fifties child, a long-haired student in Berkeley in the sixties. Clement and his wife, Rita, growing middle-aged and then beginning to get old. No more photos of them after that. Two grandchildren, a boy and a girl, rushing toward their teens. Another picture of the grandson, the infant in paper diapers.
The tour was finished. Clement sat down. I sat down.
“Nice house,” Rosie said, to change the subject.
“It’s just the way she left it,” he said. “I haven’t changed much. She was the decorator in the family. Hell, I work most of the time,
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