Retired homicide inspector Henry Goya was in his mid-sixties. Not too long ago he had a quadruple bypass surgery that Raveneau knew about only because Cynthia, the Homicide Detail’s secretary, was good friends with Goya’s daughter. Goya’s daughter also got her dad to join Facebook.
On his Facebook page Goya looked like an ageing, slightly crooked art dealer. A photo showed him in a wicker chair on the porch of his house in Petaluma, gray beard cut short and carefully trimmed, left hand resting on the carved knob of a wooden cane. In his right he held a thin cigar. A whiskey sat on the glass-topped table in front of him, a small terrier expectantly at his feet. The photo was probably meant to communicate the wonderful time Goya was having in retirement, but Raveneau had heard the quiet excitement as Goya connected with the Krueger case again.
‘Did you find the Canadians?’
‘Not yet.’
‘Did my old partner ever call you?’
‘No.’ Raveneau had left several messages for Ed Govich, but Govich was yet to call back.
‘Henry, tell me again what you remember about the Canadians other than there was something off about them.’
‘OK, well, they were newly-weds here for a week and staying at the Hyatt, so that put them in the general area where the murder happened. They told us they liked to walk a city when they visited it, and that’s what they were doing, out walking when they decided to cross under the Embarcadero Freeway. They happened upon the body and called 911. Ed and I weren’t far behind the first uniform officers, so we got to the Canadians right away, and they were helpful, especially her.
‘But she was also shaken up or seemed to be. Or she was nervous. Ed thought she was nervous in the way a suspect might be, but I didn’t get that from her. Now the husband was different. He got huffy later when we asked them to come in with us to Homicide, and when they did come in he stopped cooperating. That’s part of why Ed flew up to Calgary to re-interview them.’
Goya sighed.
‘I’m sorry, Ben. I’m not answering what you asked about. They showed us passports, wedding rings, their itinerary, where they had eaten and visited, all the details of their visit, maybe too many details. So many that we checked on a restaurant they said they ate at and there wasn’t any record of them. Ed checked on that. Then a few days later we got an anonymous tip from someone who was farther away than the Canadians said they were and he reported hearing gunshots, but I already told you about that. Are you getting any closer to finding them?’
‘Not yet.’
‘Maybe I ought to look for you.’
This was the second time Goya had suggested this and the department did occasionally hire retired officers in what got called the 9-60 program. In it a retired officer could work twenty hours a week, but no more than nine hundred sixty hours a year. Goya wasn’t particularly coherent in how he framed his memory of the case, but then the murder was twenty-two years ago and what mattered most to Raveneau was that Goya still carried the case with him.
Raveneau had learned the truth in the cliche after he and la Rosa started the Cold Case Unit, that the good inspectors often carried their unsolved cases with them. Anytime a retired inspector phoned he always took the call. He thought of the retired inspectors as a collective consciousness that made the Cold Case Unit larger. They were his network. But Goya was a decade into retirement and getting him into the 9-60 program would be a very, very hard sell.
‘Henry, why don’t you come in tomorrow and we’ll go to lunch and talk the case through.’
‘Are you buying?’
‘I am.’
‘What time?’
‘Eleven thirty.’
‘I’ll see you then.’
Unlike him Goya and Govich didn’t have a videotape to refer to. They had tested different theories including an idea that Krueger was a spy, before settling on robbery because his wallet and the shoulder holster he wore were both empty. They figured Krueger’s gun was stolen too. But that the thief didn’t want to stick his hand in the bloody breast pocket, so the counterfeit bills got missed.
Before leaving for the night Raveneau made a list of what he wanted to go over with Goya tomorrow. AFIS, the Automated Fingerprint Identification System was in place in ’89, but barely. California, Alaska, and Tokyo were the first places to use it. Goya and Govich ran his prints through AFIS and as soon as they got a hit the Secret Service stepped in and ID’ed the body. Something was wrong there too and Raveneau was pretty sure the Secret Service ASAC, Nate Brooks, knew the back story.
Overall, Goya and Govich did a lot of things well. They pushed the Secret Service. Govich dogged the Canadians and traced an appendix scar to the hospital where Krueger was operated on. That led to Krueger’s Vietnam War record that the Navy previously couldn’t find. They found the London maker of the shoulder holster and the Hong Kong tailor who made Krueger’s pants and coat. They chased down the stamps on the false passports and they got feedback on the quality of the passports. The quality was so good one expert said he believed them to be real. Krueger’s shoes were handmade in Rome and the shoemaker kept records. The shoemaker had shipped four pairs of shoes to a Hong Kong apartment, but SFPD wouldn’t pay for a trip to Hong Kong in 1989, and they drew a blank with the Hong Kong authorities. Raveneau finished with his notes and questions for Goya just as Cynthia put a call through from the front desk.
‘You’ve got a Captain Frank call, a young man who says his name is Ryan Candel.’
‘Put him through.’
‘OK, and then I’m gone for the day. Hey, when does your girlfriend’s place open?’
‘A week from Friday.’
‘She must be excited?’
‘She is.’
‘I can’t wait to go there.’
Cynthia put the call through. This was the fourth call since they put out the piece last week asking for help from the public. So far the calls were sketchy, but that they got any response at all surprised him. The case was so old he hadn’t expected to hear anything from anybody on this one.
‘Inspector, I’m calling about Captain Frank.’
‘What do you know about him?’
‘I know I was the abortion that didn’t happen.’
‘You were what?’
‘Dude, Captain Frank was my dad. He was poppa. He was the man, but he didn’t want my mom to have me. I’ve got these photos she saved. I’ll give them all to you. Do you want to meet me tonight?’