David Dodge - The Long Escape

DAVID DODGE

the

long

escape

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ABOUT The Long Escape

Al Colby investigator, got a letter from a lawyer that began: "Dear Al, Here is a chance for you to earn an honest penny. Robert R. (for nothing, as far as I have been able to learn) Parker disappeared from Pasadena, California, five years and some months ago, leaving behind him a wife, no children, and substantial valuable real estate... Parker appears to have been something of a man of mystery ... I am very anxious either to get in touch with Mr. Parker or to obtain sound evidence that he has departed this vale of tears..."

Colby, out of Mexico City on the very, very cold trail of the very, very mysterious Mr. Parker, soon found himself in Santiago, Chile, mixing it with a fistful of Chilean grandees, a beautiful and agreeable American named Ann Farrell and someonehe didn't quite know whowho seemed intent on killing him before he got a line on his quarry.

You will find this a fast-growing puzzler skillfully unfolded against an authentic, refreshingly different South American background.

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This is for

Don Gustavo Stahl

of Guatemala

It started out like any other job. I was in Mexico City, getting ready to drive down to Cuernavaca for a weekend witli friends who iiad a liouse there, when the letter reached me. It came registered air mail, so I took it along for the weekend instead of sticking it in a drawer until Monday.

When I got around to opening it, the envelope held a fuzzy snapshot of a middle-aged Joe Doakes squinting into the sun, a photostat of an Examining Physician's Report on an insurance-company form, another photostat of a note addressed to Dear Helen, and a long letter from a lawyer I knew in Los Angeles named Adams. Adams' letter said:

Dear Al:

Here is a chance for you to earn an honest penny.

Robert R. (for nothing, as far as I have been able to learn) Parker disappeared from Pasadena, California, five years and some months ago, leaving behind him a wife, no children and substantial valuable real estate All the other information I have been able to assemble about him is contained in the enclosed documents.

Parker appears to liave been something of a man of mystery. He was married for fifteen years to the same wife and spent his entire married life in Southern California, yet neither his wife nor his friends know anything definite about his early life; i.e., where he came from, or where he got his stake, or what the score was in any respect. He is said to have stated that he was born in San Francisco. I can find no record of him there. You may be aware that all San Francisco birth records were destroyed in the 1906 fire, a convenient fact for anybody who is old enough and who requires a native birthplace to keep from being deported or for other reasons. Of course many people were born in San Francisco prior to 1906. He may or may not be one of them.

On the surface, Parker seems to have been just another man who parlayed a modest sum of money into a respectable fortune on the increase in Southern California land values. This is the reason for my interest in him. Knowing your ignorance of legal matters, I will simply state in words of one syllable that much of the real property which he acquired during his married life qualifies as community property under California law, and a wife cannot transfer clear title to community property while her husband is living, unless he joins in the transfer. Inasmuch as the wufe, my client, has been offered approximately a quarter of a million dollars for clear title to a piece of said community property, I am very anxious either to get in touch with Mr. Parker or to obtain sound evidence that he has departed this vale of tears. Personally I would prefer to learn that he is dead, as this would simplify matters, but I do not suggest that you take any steps to help him from this life to a better one.

For your further information, I will state confidentially that my client, the wife, is a first-class bitch, and I do not blame Parker for running out on her. How he stood it for fifteen years is more than I can understand, after a rather brief business relationship w ith her. I inject this apparently irrelevant note as a possible explanation for her complete lack of any information about her husband's background, as she spends so inuch time talking about herself that she probably never listened to anything he had to say. On the other hand, it seems strange that she would not have learned a few things about him during the course of fifteen years of marriage, unless he was being careful that she should not, and it occius to me that he may have had something to conceal; e.g., a criminal record or some such thing. This is only conjecture on my part, of course, but it might explain why he was so shy about being photographed. I have been able to discover only the one poor snapshot which is enclosed.

Parker's last note to his wife, a copy of which is also enclosed, was mailed from Mexico City, which is the reason I am turning the job over to you. Please do your utmost to get a line on him. If he is dead, send me a death certificate or its equivalent, plus whatever affidavits you can obtain from people familiar with the circumstances of his death. If he is alive, persuade him to get in touch with me. You can promise that no attempt will be made to interfere with his personal life, as Mrs. P., who is considerably younger than her husband, has plenty of other boy friends and refers to Mr. Parker as "that old bastard." Her only interest is in the money. I think she might also enjoy making him squirm if there were any way she could do soshe seems to resent the fact that he left her before she could leave him but as far as I know he has committed no offense worse than simple desertion, which is not a crime in this state when you leave the desertee as well-fixed as she will be if she gets the money from the sale of the properties. Note the "if," which will be an important arguing point in case he is non-cooperative. You can promise him the moon if he will sign the necessary papers. His note to her, copy enclosed, clearly shows his intent to relinquish interest in the properties but does not constitute sufficient evidence of the relinquishment for our purposes. It will be approximately another two years before we can have him declared legally dead, and the two hundred and fifty thousand dollars will not wait that long.

It may be of help to you to know that Parker left here in a brand-new (five years ago) Buick sedan. California license 5C-71-25, engine number 2032245, serial number 6JA11-4548. I have been unable to trace this car, and I think he may have driven it into Mexico. At least it is an angle to work on.

I have persuaded my client to guarantee expenses and a reasonable fee for your services up to a maximum of $2500 in toto. I will add unofficially that if you deliver the goods, a small bonus may be in order as well. Please give me action, as time is of the essence.

Regards and best wishes. How is your golf?

Chuck.

I didn't feel much like working just then, but a chance at twenty-five hundred dollars is always interesting. I looked over the rest of the stuff that had come in the envelope.

The snapshot wouldn't be any help. Parker had a hat on, and either because of the sun or because he knew what he was doing, he had screwed his face up until you couldn't tell whether he looked like Clark Gable or Jo Jo the trained chimp. His physical condition, according to the insurance company report, was so-so for a man of thirty-five, which he had been when the examination was made. No scars or other peculiar marks of identification. He had a lot of fillings in his teeth, according to a chart that accompanied the medical report. I worked the dates around to make him fifty when he pulled his freight from Pasadena and fifty-five or fifty-six Avhen I started looking for him.