Play Dead by John Levitt Page A

of paper, wrote something on it, and handed it to me. “There’s a gate into where the houseboats are moored. Here’s the combination. About noon, then?”
    “We’ll be there,” I said.
    I left soon after, promising Haley I’d be back next week. Driving home, I was well satisfied. Already I was one step closer to Jackie. This detective stuff wasn’t turning out to be that difficult after all.

FOUR
     
    I WOKE UP EARLY THE NEXT MORNING WITH another headache, but by the time I’d finished my coffee it was gone. I waited until a decent hour before calling Sherwood to ask for her help a second time.
    “Again?” she said. “Why am I supposed to do all the work?”
    “This will be easy, and you’ll get a free psychic reading out of it.”
    “Just what I’ve always wanted. How did you know? Oh, wait, are you psychic, by chance?”
    I explained about Cassandra and how I was supposed to bring someone over for a reading. Sherwood, of course, would play that role.
    I drove over to pick her up. Sherwood had finally moved into her new place, a pleasant garden apartment on Potrero Hill. Mission Creek is nearby to Potrero Hill, but closer to the downtown area. It’s a unique place to live, mostly industrial. The new UCSF Mission Creek campus is located there and a large medical complex as well, though they weren’t totally up and running yet.
    An odd collection of houseboats sits moored on the channel leading to the bay, inhabited by both bankers and eccentrics. Not far from where the homeless guy once known as Bridge Guy, now known as Rolf, hung out. And where the energy pool was located. The one we’d been unable to so far close off.
    “This woman lives on a houseboat?” Sherwood asked as we drove over.
    “So she says.”
    “I had no idea there was such a thing in the city.”
    Fifteen minutes later I pulled up and parked next to the small park that lay alongside the narrow channel. A mud flat ran down to the water’s edge, ending in a jumble of rocks of various sizes. Two well-fed cats prowled cautiously by the water, jumping from rock to rock. Lou’s ears perked up when he saw them, but there was no way he was going into that muck just to see them run.
    Ramps led across the channel to where the houseboats were moored, each ramp blocked by a wire cage door with a combination lock. A gated community, though not the usual sort.
    The houseboats were more house than boats. Some were small, but most were two stories and a couple of them were three. Right across from where we had parked, a pink three-tiered boat did a credible imitation of a wedding cake, each level slightly higher and smaller than the one below. Another, dark blue with white trim, reminded me of a top hat. All the houses exhibited the same curious mixture of ornate and ramshackle, with junk strewn over the long mooring dock and expensive-looking sailing boats tied up alongside. These houseboats weren’t going anywhere, any more than the double-wide trailers in an RV park.
    We strolled up to one of the entrance ramps, which was blocked by the tall wire mesh gate.
    “They do like their privacy,” I said, “but I was given the code.”
    I punched in the numbers and swung the door open. We passed along the row of houseboats, finally stopping at one of the smaller ones. The number thirty-two was visible over the front door, but it wasn’t needed. There was no mistaking it; no two houseboats looked even vaguely similar, and this was the only one painted bright red.
    “What’s our story again?” Sherwood asked.
    “You’re having relationship trouble. You want to know if your current boyfriend is really the one.”
    “And you’re the boyfriend?” She looked at me critically.
    “No, that might be a hard sell. How could you possibly be having doubts about someone like me? I’m the skeptical brother, watching out for poor, credulous you.”
    “And Lou?”
    “Lou’s a dog.” He threw me a dirty look. “He doesn’t need a cover story.”
    I