C is for Corpse

 

PHENOMENAL PRAISE FOR THE MYSTERY NOVELS OF
#1
NEW YORK TIMES
BESTSELLING AUTHOR

SUE GRAFTON

“Exceptionally entertaining . . . An offbeat sense of humor and a feisty sense of justice.”

—
San Francisco Chronicle

 

“Millhone is an engaging detective-for-hire . . . PI Kinsey Millhone and her creator . . . are arguably the best of [the] distaff invaders of the hitherto sacrosanct turf of gumshoes.”

 

—
The Buffalo News

 

“Once a fan reads one of Grafton's alphabetically titled detective novels, he or she will not rest until all the others are found.”

—
Los Angeles Herald Examiner

 

“Millhone is a refreshingly strong and resourceful female private eye.”

—
Library Journal

 

“Tough but compassionate . . . There is no one better than Kinsey Millhone.”

—
Best Sellers

 

“A woman we feel we know, a tough cookie with a soft center, a gregarious loner.”

—
Newsweek

 

“Lord, how I like this Kinsey Millhone . . . The best detective fiction I have read in years.”

—
The New York Times Book Review

 

“Smart, tough, and thorough . . . Kinsey Millhone is a pleasure.”

—
The Bloomsbury Review

 

“Kinsey is one of the most persuasive of the new female operatives . . . She's refreshingly free of gender clichés. Grafton, who is a very witty writer, has also given her sleuth a nice sense of humor—and a set of Wonder Woman sheets to prove it.”

—
Boston Herald

 

“What grandpa used to call a class act.”

—
Stanley Ellin

 

“Smart, sexual, likable and a very modern operator.”

—
Dorothy Salisbury Davis

 

“Kinsey's got brains
and
a sense of humor.”

—
Kirkus Reviews

 

 

 

 

 

Also by Sue Grafton

 

A Is for Alibi

B Is for Burglar

C Is for Corpse

D Is for Deadbeat

E Is for Evidence

F Is for Fugitive

G Is for Gumshoe

H Is for Homicide

I Is for Innocent

J Is for Judgment

K Is for Killer

L Is for Lawless

M Is for Malice

N Is for Noose

O Is for Outlaw

P Is for Peril

Q Is for Quarry

R Is for Ricochet

 

Coming soon:

S Is for Silence

 

 

 

A Kinsey Millhone Mystery

SUE GRAFTON

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

St. Martin's Paperbacks

 

 

 

C IS FOR CORPSE

 

Copyright © 1986 by Sue Grafton.

 

“Ac-cent-tchu-ate the Positive” by Harold Arien and Johnny Mercer © 1944 by Harwin Music Co. © renewed 1972 by Harwin Music Co. International copyright secured. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

 

“Someone to Watch Over Me” by George and Ira Gershwin © 1926 (renewed) by WB Music Corp. All rights reserved. Used by permission.

 

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews. For information address St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

 

Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 85-24797

 

ISBN: 0-312-93901-9

EAN: 9780312-93901-4

 

Printed in the United States of America

 

First published in the United States by Henry Holt and Company.

 

St. Martin's Griffin edition / December 2005

St. Martin's Paperbacks edition / December 2005

 

St. Martin's Paperbacks are published by St. Martin's Press, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

 

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

 

 

 

 

 

For the children who chose me:
Leslie, Jay, and Jamie

 

 

 

 

 

The author wishes to acknowledge the invaluable assistance of the following people: Steven Humphrey; Sam Chirman, M.D., and Betty Johnson of the Rehabilitation Group of Santa Barbara; David Dallmeyer, R.P.T.; Deputies Tom Nelson and Juan Tejeda of the Santa Barbara County Sheriff's Department; C. Robert Dambacher, Chief of Investigations, Los Angeles County Medical Examiner–Coroner; Andrew H. Bliss, Director of Medical Records, LAC-USC Medical Center; Delbert Dickson, M.D.; R. W. Olson, M.D.; Peg Ortigiesen; Barbara Stephans; Billie Moore Squires; H. F. Richards; Michael Burridge; Midge Hayes and Adelaide Gest of the Santa Barbara Public Library; and Michael Fitzmorris of Security Services Unlimited, Inc.

 

 

 

 

 

C Is for Corpse

 

 

 

 

 

 

I met Bobby Callahan on Monday of that week. By Thursday, he was dead. He was convinced someone was trying to kill him and it turned out to be true, but none of us figured it out in time to save him. I've never worked for a dead man before and I hope I won't have to do it again. This report is for him, for whatever it's worth.

My name is Kinsey Millhone. I'm a licensed private investigator, doing business in Santa Teresa, California, which is ninety-five miles north of Los Angeles. I'm thirty-two years old, twice divorced. I like being alone and I suspect my independence suits me better than it should. Bobby challenged that. I don't know quite how or why. He was only twenty-three years old. I wasn't romantically involved with him in any sense of the word, but I did care and his death served to remind me, like a custard pie in the face, that life is sometimes one big savage joke. Not funny “ha ha,” but cruel, like those gags sixth-graders have been telling since the world began.

It was August and I'd been working out at Santa Teresa Fitness, trying to remedy the residual effects of a broken left arm. The days were hot, filled with relentless sunshine and clear skies. I was feeling cranky and bored, doing push-downs and curls and wrist rolls. I'd just worked two cases back-to-back and I'd sustained more damage than a fractured humerus. I was feeling emotionally battered and I needed a rest. Fortunately, my bank account was fat and I knew I could afford to take two months off. At the same time, the idleness was making me restless and the physical-therapy regimen was driving me nuts.

Santa Teresa Fitness is a real no-nonsense place: the brand X of health clubs. No Jacuzzi, no sauna, no music piped in. Just mirrored walls, body-building equipment, and industrial-grade carpeting the color of asphalt. The whole twenty-eight-hundred square feet of space smells like men's jockstraps.

I'd arrive at eight in the morning, three days a week, and warm up for fifteen minutes, then launch into a series of exercises designed to strengthen and condition my left deltoid, pectoralis major, biceps, triceps, and anything else that had gone awry since I'd had the snot beaten out of me and had intersected the flight path of a .22 slug. The orthopedist had prescribed six weeks of physical therapy and so far, I'd done three. There was nothing for it but to work my way patiently from one machine to the next. I was usually the only woman in the place at that hour and I tended to distract myself from the pain, sweat, and nausea by checking out men's bodies while they were checking out mine.

Bobby Callahan came in at the same time I did. I wasn't sure what had happened to him, but whatever it was, it had hurt. He was probably just short of six feet tall, with a football player's physique: big head, thick neck, brawny shoulders, heavy legs. Now the shaggy blond head was held to one side, the left half of his face pulled down in a permanent grimace. His mouth leaked saliva as though he'd just been shot up with Novocain and couldn't quite feel his own lips. He tended to hold his left arm up against his waist and he usually carried a folded white handkerchief that he used to mop up his chin. There was a terrible welt of dark red across the bridge of his nose, a second across his chest, and his knees were crisscrossed with scars as though a swordsman had slashed at him. He walked with a lilting gait, his left Achilles tendon apparently shortened, pulling his left heel up. Working out must have cost him everything he had, yet he never failed to appear. There was a doggedness about him that I admired. I watched him with interest, ashamed of my own interior complaints. Clearly, I could recover from my injuries while he could not. I didn't feel sorry for him, but I did feel curious.

That Monday morning was the first time we'd been alone together in the gym. He was doing leg curls, facedown on the bench next to mine, his attention turned inward. I had shifted over to the leg-press machine, just for variety. I weigh 118 and I only have so much upper body I can rehabilitate. I hadn't gotten back into jogging since the injury, so I figured a few leg presses would serve me right. I was only doing 120
pounds, but it hurt anyway. To distract myself, I was playing a little game wherein I tried to determine which apparatus I hated most. The leg-curl machine he was using was a good candidate. I watched him do a set of twelve repetitions and then start all over again.

“I hear you're a private detective,” he said without missing a beat. “That true?” There was a slight drag to his voice, but he covered it pretty well.

“Yes. Are you in the market for one?”

“Matter of fact, I am. Somebody tried to kill me.”

“Looks like they didn't miss by much. When was this?”

“Nine months ago.”

“Why you?”

“Don't know.”

The backs of his thighs were bulging, his hamstrings taut as guy wires. Sweat poured off his face. Without even thinking about it, I counted reps with him. Six, seven, eight.

“I hate that machine,” I remarked.

He smiled. “Hurts like a son of a bitch, doesn't it?”

“How'd it happen?”

“I was driving up the pass with a buddy of mine late at night. Some car came up and started ramming us from behind. When we got to the bridge just over the crest of the hill, I lost it and we went off. Rick was killed. He bailed out and the car rolled over on him. I should have been killed too. Longest ten seconds of my life, you know?”

“I bet.” The bridge he'd soared off spanned a rocky, scrub-choked canyon, four hundred feet deep, a favorite
jumping-off spot for suicide attempts. Actually, I'd never heard of anyone surviving that drop. “You're doing great,” I said. “You've been working your butt off.”