number is B16. I ride the elevator up to the second floor and wander down the industrial-carpeted hallway. The door to B14 is slightly ajar, and I hear a young woman singing softly to herself in Spanish. I stop at B16, ring the buzzer. No answer. I wait ten seconds, try it again. No luck. Then I go back to B14 and knock. The singing stops, and a young, dark-haired woman opens the door slightly and leans against it. I feel some kind of tension coming off her; it’s like the door is all she has and she’s coiled in back of it, ready to slam it in my face.
“Yes?”
“I’m looking for your next-door neighbor,” I say. “Risa Barsky? You know her?”
I put a breezy smile on my lips as I say this. Take my hat off like a gentleman. Do what I can to make a good impression. You don’t have to worry, I almost say to her. I’m not a rapist or an ex-husband. It’s not that kind of thing. We stare at each other in silence. What must I look like to her? I wonder. A strange old white guy who forgot to shave this morning, knocking on her door, asking impertinent questions. Maybe she doesn’t get out much. Maybe the walls of this apartment in Van Nuys are her whole world. I see her hand gradually relax around the doorframe. Whatever she was afraid of now subsides. She looks at me cautiously.
“She hasn’t been here in a couple of weeks,” she says. “How do you know her? You a friend? She owe you money?”
“No,” I say. I chuckle, and it comes out sounding like a cough. “No, not at all. We’ve never met. But I like the way she sings. My grandson, Elijah, is having a bar mitzvah in June, and I thought maybe we could work something out.” This is a bald-face lie, obviously. But as lies go, it’s pretty harmless. I’ve told far bigger ones in my time. And it’s good enough. I could be searching for someone to sing at Elijah’s bar mitzvah, if only I had such a grandson and his name was Elijah. In this business you say what you have to sometimes if you want to hear what you need.
The woman, who I guess is a Latina, in her mid-twenties, with long dark ringlets of hair, squirms a little, and for the first time I notice she has a small child hiding behind her skirt. “I don’t know what a bar mitzvah is, but Risa is in some kind of band.”
“Right. So my question is, do you know where I can find her? It could be worth money to her.”
“I don’t know where she goes every day. We just moved here three months ago. You should ask Lola in B26.” She points to her left. “They are good friends.”
“Lola. B26,” I say. “Thanks.”
She closes the door, and I hear her saying something in Spanish to her child. It sounds soft and soothing, but then Spanish is a beautiful language and almost everything I’ve ever heard in Spanish sounds soothing, even when someone’s telling you to go to hell.
I wander down the hall, stop at B26, brace myself, and press the buzzer. A shuffling noise comes from inside, followed by the sharp click of two deadbolt locks extricating themselves in the door. Then all at once, there she is. Lola gives me the once-over.
“Oh hi,” I say. I smile. She’s what my dad used to call an original or, sometimes, a pistol. A stout, feisty woman in her fifties. Her cheeks are powdered and her lips are painted red. Horn-rimmed glasses dangle from around her neck, and she’s wearing a lavender velour tracksuit and tennis shoes, but her hair is in curlers and I’d be willing to bet you a dollar she’s not about to go for her daily run.
“Hello there, handsome,” she says. “What can I do for you, young man?” Maybe it’s my Dodger cap, I think, that confused her. I take it off.
“I haven’t been a young man for a long time,” I say. “Handsome, okay, I’ll give you that.”
She grins. “All right, you win. You’re neither. But still, you’re here, so you must want something. Nobody knocks on Lola’s door unless they want something.”
I hold out my hand for her to shake. She stares at it, and I shove it back in my pocket. “The name is Parisman. Your neighbor told me you might be able to tell me where to find Risa Barsky.”
“I might. I might know a lot of things. But why should I tell you?” She folds her arms resolutely in front of her. She’s not suspicious or scared, exactly, not like the other woman with the child, but I can see I’m not going to get very far without giving her a few hard facts.
“As you must know already, Risa’s in a band,” I say. “What you may not know is that she hasn’t shown up for rehearsals in a couple weeks.”
“Oh no?”
“Not only that,” I say, “she doesn’t answer her phone or return messages or emails. Some people are starting to worry. It’s like she’s on the other side of the moon.”
“You a cop?” Lola asks. Her eyes narrow.
I frown. “Would it make any difference if I were?”
“No, not much,” she says. “I’ve just never had any use for cops. They didn’t show up the one goddamn time I needed them. You pay for their services, right? You’d think they’d show up.”
“I can’t argue with you there,” I say. Then I reach into my wallet, pull out one of my little blue business cards, and hand it to her. “I’ve been paid to find her. My client cares about her. He’s hoping she’s all right, but he’s anxious, you know. It’s keeping him awake at night. Like I say, she hasn’t shown up in a while. That’s not normal.”
Lola looks hard at my card. There’s not much printed on it—just my name and address and phone number and what I do for a living now and then. Finally she lowers it, then heaves a sigh.
“Who’s your client?”
“I can’t tell you that,” I say. “Some people probably would. Some people would say anything to get you to help. That’s not me. Not how I work. But you wouldn’t know him anyway.”
“Fair enough,” she says.
“Tell me, Lola. Is there a manager around? Somebody with a passkey? I’d love to take a real quick peek inside her apartment. Just to be sure she wasn’t tied up in the bathtub or something like that.”
“Is that what you think?”
“I don’t know what to think. She doesn’t answer her phone. She doesn’t come to the door. Maybe she hasn’t gone anywhere. Maybe she’s in a coma, maybe she’s still alive, maybe she’s hurt, but if—God forbid—she’s lying there dead on the floor, well, you’re going to smell it pretty soon.”
Lola looks at me sternly. “You wait here, buster. I’ll be right back.” Something in her manner has changed. The door slams in my face. Then, before I can speculate on what the hell’s going on, she’s back again and she’s marching me double time like a drill sergeant down the hall toward B16. “You’re a damn good talker,” she says. “And I don’t do this for anybody, you understand? Not ordinarily, I mean. Not unless I believe them.” She halts at the door and produces a large gold key chain with a rabbit’s foot attached. “Risa gave me this, just in case.” She puts the key in the lock and twists. It opens. “Go on in, Mr. Detective. You look around. But you don’t touch anything, and you have exactly five minutes. That’s all. And remember—I’m keeping my eye on you.”
I nod. “You’ve very kind, Lola. I appreciate it.” I step gingerly into the darkened living room, which, with the blinds drawn, probably looks and feels like every other living room in this apartment complex. Then Lola switches on the lights behind me, and the first thing that comes to my attention is how messy everything is.
“Oh my God,” Lola whispers. Everything is overturned. Pillows that should be propped up neatly on the couch are strewn on the floor. A large campaign poster of Barack Obama is hanging askew over the mantel, and a bundle of sheet music is scattered on the rug. In the kitchen, the three wood-veneer cabinet drawers have been yanked out, and someone has tossed all the silverware into the sink. I press my lips together and move quickly and quietly from