“She was.” Gomez bowed his head. “I appreciate your help, and I wish you peace.”

Then he turned and walked away. I’d probably never see him again, and I felt a little bad about that.

I tailed José the next morning. He and his brothers were part of a crew framing a house in the Hollywood Hills. I kept watch from a quarter block away, my truck partly hidden by the overhanging boughs of a eucalyptus. I was trying to figure out how to get José alone, and then I got a big break. The roach wagon pulled in, and José was elected by his brothers to pick up lunch.

I got out of my truck, intercepted him as he carried an armful of burritos, and stuck my.38 in his side, telling him if he said a word, I’d pull the trigger. My Spanish must have been very clear, because he was as mute as Dopey.

After I got him into the cab of my truck, I took the gun out of his ribs and held it in my lap.

I said, “What happened to Martina?”

“I don’ know.”

“You’re lying,” I said. “You killed her.”

“I don’ kill her!” José was shaking hard. “Yo juro! I don’ kill her!”

“Who did?”

“I don’ know!”

“You killed her for the ring, didn’t you, José?” As I spoke, I saw him shrink. “Martina would never tell you she had the ring: She knew you would take it from her. But you must have found out. You asked her about the ring, and she said she didn’t have any ring, right?”

José didn’t answer.

I repeated the accusation in español, but he still didn’t respond. I went on.

“You didn’t know what to do, did you, José? So you waited and waited, and finally, Monday morning, you told your brothers about the ring. But by that time, Martina and the ring had already taken the bus to work.”

“All we wan’ do is talk to her!” José insisted. “Nothin’ was esuppose to happen.”

“What wasn’t supposed to happen?” I asked.

José opened his mouth, then shut it again.

I continued, “Pasqual has a truck-a Ford pickup.” I read him the license number. “You and your brothers decided to meet up with her. A truck can go a lot faster than a bus. When the bus made a stop, two of you got on it and made Martina get off.”

José shook his head.

“I called the bus company,” I said. “The driver remembered you and your brother-two men making this woman carrying a big bag get off at the stop behind the big garbage bin. The driver even asked if she was okay. But Martina didn’t want to get you in trouble and said todo está bien-everything was fine. But everything wasn’t fine, was it?”

Tears welled up in José’s eyes.

“You tried to force her into the truck, but she fought, didn’t she?”

José remained mute.

“But you did get her in Pasqual’s truck,” I said. “Only you forgot something. When she fought, she must have knocked off Pasqual’s Dodgers cap. He didn’t know it was gone until later, did he?”

José jerked his head up. “How you know?”

“How do I know? I have that cap, José.” Not exactly true, but close enough. “Now, why don’t you tell me what happened?”

José thought a long time. Then he said, “It was assident. Pasqual no mean to hurt her bad. Just get her to talk. She no have ring when we take her off the bus.”

“Not in her bag-su bolsa?”

“Ella no tiene ninguna bolsa. She no have bags. She tell us she left ring at home. So we took her home, but she don’ fin’ the ring. That make me mad. I saw her with ring. No good for a wife to lie to husband.” His eyes filled with rage, his nostrils flared. “No good! A wife must always tell husband the truth!”

“So you killed her,” I said.

José said, “Pasqual… he did it. It was assident!”

I shook my head in disgust. I sat there in my truck, off guard and full of indignation. I didn’t even hear him until it was too late. The driver’s door jerked open, and the gun flew out of my lap. I felt as if I’d been wrenched from my mother’s bosom. Pasqual dragged me to the ground, his face looming over me, his complexion florid and furious. He drew back his fist and aimed it at my jaw.

I rolled my head to one side, and his hand hit the ground. Pasqual yelled, but not as loud as José did, shouting at his brother to stop. Then I heard the click of the hammer. Pasqual heard it, too, and released me immediately. By now a crowd had gathered. Gun in hand, José looked at me, seemed to speak English for my benefit.

“You kill Martina!” José screamed out to Pasqual. “I’m going to kill you!”

Pasqual looked genuinely confused. He spoke in Spanish. “Yo u killed her, you little shit! You beat her to death when we couldn’t find the ring!”

José looked at me, his expression saying: Do you understand this? Something in my eye must have told him I did. I told him to put the gun down. Instead, he turned his back on me and focused his eyes on Pasqual. “You lie. You get drunk, you kill Martina!”

In Spanish, Pasqual said, “I tried to stop you, you asshole!”

“You lie!” José said. And then he pulled the trigger.

I charged him before he could squeeze another bullet out of the chamber, but the damage had been done. Pasqual was already dead when the sirens pulled up.

The two other brothers backed José’s story. They’d come to confront Martina about the ring. She told them she had left it at home. But when they returned to the house and the ring wasn’t there, Pasqual, in his drunken rage, had beaten Martina to death and dumped her body in the trash.

José will be charged with second-degree murder for Pasqual, and maybe a good lawyer’ll be able to bargain it down to manslaughter. But I remembered a murderous look in José’s eyes after he’d stated that Martina had lied to him. If I were the prosecutor, I’d be going after José with charges of manslaughter on Martina, Murder One on Pasqual. But that’s not how the system works. Anyway, my verdict-right or wrong-wouldn’t bring Martina back to life.

I called Mrs. Pollack after it was all over. Through her tears, she wished she’d never remembered the ring. It wasn’t her fault, but she still felt responsible. There was a small consolation. I was pretty sure I knew where the ring was.

I’m not too bad at guesses-like the one about Pasqual losing his hat in a struggle. That simple snapshot in my mind of the brothers at the church-three with beat-up Dodgers caps, the fourth wearing a new painter’s cap. Something off-kilter.

So my hunch had been correct. Pasqual had once owned a Dodgers cap. Where had it gone? Same place as Mr. Pollack’s robe. Martina had packed the robe in her bag Monday morning. When she was forced off the bus by José and his brothers, I pictured her quickly dumping the bag in a garbage bin at the bus stop, hoping to retrieve it later. She never got that chance.

As for the ring, it was right where I thought it would be: among the discards that had shrouded Malibu Mike the night he died. The Dodgers cap on Malibu ’s head got me thinking in the right direction. If Malibu had found Pasqual’s cap, maybe he’d found the other bag left behind by Martina. After all, that bin had been his spot.

Good old Malibu. One of his layers had been a grimy old robe. Wedged into the corner of its pocket, a diamond ring. Had Malibu not died that Monday, José might have been a free man today.

Mrs. Pollack didn’t feel right about keeping the ring, so she offered it to Yolanda Flores. Yolanda was appreciative of such generosity, but she refused the gift, saying the ring was cursed. Mrs. Pollack didn’t take offense; Yolanda was a woman with pride. Finally, after a lot of consideration, Mrs. Pollack gave the ring to the burial committee for Malibu Mike. Malibu never lived wealthy, but he sure went out in high style.