by Josh Lanyon
Jake, lured by the smells -- or the crash of the cup I dropped -- wandered in wearing a pair of Levi’s and nothing else, and dropped down at the table. He scratched his very flat, hard belly in a leisurely fashion, brooding. I put a cup of coffee in front of him. He leaned over the table, both hands clasping his coffee cup as though in prayer.
“Fried or scrambled?” I held up an egg.
“Scrambled.”
I scrambled and said, “Listen, Jake. I thought over what you said last night. The fact is, you’re right. I’ve decided to go back to LA.”
Watching him out of the corner of my eye I saw his head jerk up like a Smokey the Bear scenting forest fire.
“I’ve got a few things to wind up and then I’m out of here.”
A beat.
“You’re serious?” he said finally.
“Yes.”
Another beat. He drank some coffee, set the cup down and said more cheerfully, “Well hell, maybe I should head back today?”
“That’s what I was thinking.”
“You think that would be a good idea?”
“I do. I think you should start packing right after breakfast. You don’t have to worry because I’ll be out of here by tonight myself.”
He smiled. “Hey, so if I start packing right away I could be on the road by lunch?”
“You won’t have to miss another day’s work.”
I stopped because he was laughing.
“Man, you are something else,” he said shaking his head.
“I don’t follow?”
“Don’t give me that little boy blue look,” he said. “You’re trying to get rid of me.”
“No. No, I thought about what you said last night. Really.”
“Shut up, Adrien,” he said. “I did some thinking myself last night.”
He didn’t say anything for a moment, then he admitted, “I was in a pisser of a mood at dinner.”
“That so?”
He met my eyes. Looked away. “It was my birthday yesterday. I have a hard time with birthdays.”
This was the last thing I expected. I mean, obviously Jake had birthdays like everyone else, but I guess it underlined how little I knew about him. Not the most basic things. Not his blood type. Not his birth date.
“Why didn’t you say something?” I didn’t like the tone of my voice but I couldn’t help it.
Jake shrugged.
“How old are you?”
“The big 4-0. Forty.” He grinned sheepishly.
Eight years older than me. I’d wondered about that. And a Taurus. The bull. The bullhead.
“Happy birthday,” I said cordially and turned back to the stove.
The bacon popped and spat my way.
I heard a chair scrape. Jake came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me. Big powerful arms that would be all too easy to find comfort in, to start relying on. Sniffing my ear, he said, “You smell good. What is that?”
“Bacon grease.”
He grunted.
I could feel his body all down the length of my own; feel the hard muscles in his thighs and arms, feel the heat of him through our clothes. He smelled good too, warm and sleepy and himself.
“How about I let you treat me to dinner tonight?” His breath was against my ear.
“I could treat you to lunch and you could be back in LA by nightfall.”
“Nah,” said Jake. “Today we’re going to see what’s up with our friends at the Red Rover mining camp.”
* * * * *
It looked like a town meeting was in progress when we reached the hollow.
“You don’t think --?”
“I think,” Jake said, opening his car door, “you need to decide what you’re going to do about all this. Pronto.”
Swell. I didn’t have a clue what I was going to do about all this.
Kevin detached himself from the crowd gathered around the supply tent and strode across the grass to meet us.
“We found the entrance to the mine,” he called.
Together we walked across the clearing while Kevin explained that the mouth to the Red Rover mine had been discovered a mile from base camp.
Discussion raged as to whether base camp should be moved or not.
Everyone but Melissa seemed to be there, and everyone seemed to have an opinion. Shoup and Kevin were all for pulling up stakes. Marquez led the others in loud objection.
“Isn’t it up to Dr. Livingston anyway?” I suggested to Kevin under-voiced, while the opposing arguments were being made.
“Sure, if we could get hold of him.”
“What does that mean?” Jake questioned in his official voice.
Kevin shrugged. “He’s not at his hotel, and he was due back two nights ago.”
“He checked out?” I asked.
“That’s just it. According to the hotel, he never checked in.”
“Could the hotel have made a mistake?” I inquired out of bitter experience. The generator kicked on. I had to strain to hear Kevin over the rattle and hum of mechanical indigestion.
“Sure. That’s probably it, but it doesn’t change the fact that he’s not here. No one at the JC has heard from him. His wife hasn’t spoken to him in almost a week. She didn’t know he had left the site.”
Kevin was summoned away by Dr. Shoup, who looked none too thrilled to spot Jake and me in the crowd.
I said to Jake, “Modern marriage, huh?”
“What’s that?”
“The Livingstons.”
He made one of those sounds that indicated he wasn’t really listening, so I wandered over to Dr. Marquez who seemed about as animated as I’d seen him.
“They don’t know what they’re asking,” he said to me hotly. “All these file cabinets, all these boxes of artifacts, we can’t just throw them in a truck!”
“What happens if you don’t move the camp?”
“Nothing! It just means we have to walk further to and from our digging. It’s an inconvenience, but not as much an inconvenience as picking up stakes and dragging everything down the road.”
He studied me, a speculative gleam in his dark eyes. “You could refuse to let them move the campsite. It’s your land.”
“I’ll pretend I didn’t hear that. Can I see the mine?”
After a hesitation, he nodded. I caught Jake’s eye and indicated where I was going. He nodded.
Marquez seemed disinclined to chat as we left the camp behind us and walked into the woods. I didn’t take it personally; he was not a chatty guy.
“So what’s this about Dr. Livingston disappearing?” I asked as we followed the ruts of the old stage road. Grass and wild flowers covered the faint indentations, but the track was still there, leading straight into history.
Marquez paused mid-step. “Disappearing? What are you talking about?”
“Kevin said nobody’s heard from him since he left here. He said that according to the hotel Livingston never checked in.”
“That’s not true. He’s called several times.” Marquez stopped dead. His dark eyes blinked at me through the thick lenses. “The hotel lost track of his reservation. What’s unusual about that?”
“Nothing, I guess.” Marquez turned and led the way through the undergrowth. I said to his back, “So if Livingston’s due back any minute why not wait and let him make the decision of whether to move camp?”
I didn’t think I was going to get an answer, but then Marquez halted again, turning to face me. “Why? I’ll tell you why. Lawrence -- Dr. Shoup -- isn’t about to wait for Daniel to return. Maybe I’m talking out of turn, but it’s no secret he wants the credit for this find. He’s not going to want to share that. Not if he has a choice.”
This was the longest speech I’d heard Marquez make. I wasn’t quite sure I followed his reasoning, but he clearly believed what he was saying.
“Am I missing something? What does moving base camp have to do with who gets credit for finding an old mine?”
Nothing.
“A lost mine,” Marquez corrected finally.
“Okay, a lost mine.”
Marquez took a deep breath and said, “It probably doesn’t make sense to you, but a find, a significant archeological find, can mean the difference -- academically speaking -- between life or death.”
I ducked a tree branch as it swung back behind Marquez. “How does the Red Rover mine constitute a significant archeological find?”
He was silent.
He was right, it didn’t make sense. “I can barely find a record that this mine existed. Why is its discovery significant?”
“It could be.”
“Why?” I persisted.
Marquez said reluctantly, “Because Royale was a rich man when he died -- and it didn’t come from some wedding dowry.”
I turned that notion over, held it up to the light. “You think the mine is still workable?”
“Probably not, but you never know.” He smiled at me more cheerfully. “Nice for you, eh?”
Thar’s gold in them hills!
I opened my mouth to pipe up with the first of my many doubts, but was distracted by Marquez who pointed to the hillside before us.
“There it is. That’s the mine entrance.”
Staring past Marquez I spotted the half-boarded opening of what appeared to be a cave in the hillside; chill air whispered out of its snaggle-toothed mouth. Saplings grew out of the hillside, concealing the timber frame of the mine. Easy to see how it had been missed for so long.
“Who found it?” I asked.
“Melissa. And Kevin.”
“Has anyone been inside?”
“Not yet. It may not be safe.” Marquez’s glasses glinted blindly in the sunlight. “The stairs down appear to be rotted.”
Leery, I walked up to the opening and peered inside through the slats. It was pitch black inside. I couldn’t see anything. The breath of the mineshaft was gelid and dank against my face. I ducked back out.
“Watch for snakes,” Marquez warned. “We found a rattler in camp a couple of days ago. They’re irritable this time of year. They’re shedding their skins.”
I turned to stare at him. “What happened to the snake?”
“Dr. Shoup killed it and buried it.”
A thought went through my head -- and kept on going. I just couldn’t picture Indiana Bones tucking baby rattlesnakes in among the circular fliers of my mail.
And yet someone had.
“Are you sure this is the right mine?” I inquired as we started back to camp.
Mid-step Marquez paused. He gazed at me as though he suspected I was trying to be funny.
“It’s the only mine,” he said with finality.
* * * * *
We celebrated Jake’s birthday dinner at La Chouette, a century-old, two-story Victorian with a wisteria-framed verandah and a Parisian-trained chef.
“French food?” Jake said doubtfully. “What is that? Sauces and snails?”
“I’m sure they have a recipe or two for red meat. According to the Auto Club it’s the best place in town.”
He mulled this over. “So long as I don’t have to wear a tie,” he conceded at last, grudgingly.
Neither of us wore ties. In fact we wore Levi’s which were all we had, Jake complementing his with a tight black turtleneck that looked so sexy he could have modeled for the Under Gear catalog.
We kicked off the celebration with drinks in the cozy saloon-bar and then moved out onto the verandah for dinner. It was a lovely, mild evening; outside heaters worked overtime to keep it that way. Lost mines, rattlesnakes and dead bodies all seemed like something that happened to other people in distant galaxies.
“How’s your book coming?” Jake inquired, making civilized conversation halfway through his delice de veau.
“It’s coming,” I said, reaching for the thirty-dollar bottle of Merlot. “What were all those phone calls you were making this afternoon?”
“Just checking on a couple of ideas.”
“Like?”
He pushed his glass my way. I filled it and signaled the waiter for another bottle.
I expected Jake to brush me off, tell me not to worry my pretty little head, but he said finally, “The problem is we don’t have an ID for your stinker in the barn. Most homicides are solved within forty-eight hours, because most of the time there’s a known connection between the perp and vic.” He explained, “Cops ask themselves what would someone have to gain by the vic’s death? Who profits? But if we don’t know the vic, it’s hard to draw a connection.”
“We know about Ted Harvey.”
He sighed, but apparently decided to let it ride.
I swallowed a forkful of my coq au vin, and proposed, “Suppose Harvey’s death has nothing to do with drug running?”
He mulled this over. “Your supposition is based on what?”
“On the fact that someone was searching Harvey’s trailer.”
“I’m not tracking.”
“What would they be searching for?”
“Harvey,” Jake said unhesitatingly. “Or money. What do you think they were searching for?”
“Jake, if we were dealing with drug runners don’t you think their approach would be more direct? Do drug lords typically waste time playing with snakes and knocking people out? Wouldn’t they just come in with automatic weapons and mow us down?”
“You’ve seen way too many Steven Seagal movies.”
I choked on my wine. “Whose fault is that? Besides, I think handling a rattlesnake demands a certain amount of expertise. You don’t just buy them at pet stores. You have to find one, first off.”
“Maybe.”
“What do we know about Harvey? He was a doper, yes, but he was also a small-time crook not above trying his hand at fraud. Maybe he got ambitious.”
“You think Harvey did the DB in the barn?”
I moved the candle aside to see his face better. “I don’t know. But you heard Marnie Starr say Harvey was boasting about a big score. What does that sound like?”
“A drug deal.”
“Forget about the pot for a minute,” I said, nettled. “What else does it sound like?”
“What?”
I pushed my dish out of the way. “That’s what we have to figure out.”
Jake shook his head and carved another hunk off his veal.
“I’ve been thinking about that corpse in the barn,” I said.
“I don’t doubt it.”
“It’s a small town. How come nobody has claimed him?”
“Maybe he’s not from around here.”
“Then how did he get here? Where’s his car? The sheriff must have checked against missing person reports.”
“I’m sure you’ve got a theory.”
“Maybe no one knows he’s missing yet.”
A busboy whisked away my plate. I leaned forward on my elbows. “Maybe no one knows he’s missing because until today everyone thought they knew where he was,” I offered.
Jake looked up then, his expression wry. “Dr. Livingston, I presume?”
“You think it’s crazy?”
He floored me by saying, “No. The thought occurred to me today too. I guess we ought to have Billingsly get someone from the site to take a look at John Doe.”
The waiter brought the dessert tray and Jake selected a white and dark chocolate mousse with raspberry sauce. I ordered the Hot Brandy Flip which turned out to be three parts brandy and one part flip. A couple of swigs and I started wondering if Jake’s mouth would taste like dark chocolate or raspberry?
To distract myself from my incredible shrinking jeans, I questioned, “So what’s the deal with turning forty?”
Jake shrugged.
“You thought you’d be a lieutenant by now?”
“Nah.” He met my eyes briefly. “I just thought I’d be ... I don’t know.”
I made a wild guess. “Married?”
His eyes met mine. “Yeah, maybe. I guess I expected to have kids by now. My own
family.”
“Kids?” I echoed.
He said defensively, “I like kids. I’m good with kids.”
“You are?”
“I’ve got nieces and nephews.”
Jake’s biological time clock was ticking. Who’d a thunk it? I sighed.
“Okay, I’ll do it. I’ll have your baby.”
He stared at me, unamused.
“It’s a joke,” I explained. “The truth is, I can’t have babies. My doctor told me.”
“See, you say I don’t communicate, but when I do ....”
Damn. A billy club right between the eyes. I blinked at him a couple of times. “Sorry,” I said. “I guess I don’t get it.”
His eyes looked amber in the candlelight. “You don’t care that you’ll never have kids? Your family line ends with you?”
“Probably a wise decision, don’t you think?” At his expression I admitted, “Oh, hell. I’m not the paternal kind. Kids make me nervous. Kids and small dogs.”
Jake finished his wine. The delicate crystal stem looked effete in his large, tanned hand. It was a hand designed for beer bottles and boxing gloves.
“So why don’t you get married?”
He said finally, “I plan to.”
Razors to my wounded heart, as Will put it in Titus. I drained my brandy and inquired, “Anyone I know?”
He probably would not have answered anyway, but right then the waiter brought the bill. I reached for the leather book.
“Thanks for dinner,” Jake said.
“My pleasure,” says I.
* * * * *
We were passing the old movie revival house when I spotted the marquee.
“Hey, they’re playing Captain Blood,” I said. “We could catch the ten o’clock showing.”
Jake, who hadn’t spoken since we left the restaurant, said, “What’s Captain Blood? Tell me it’s not another pirate movie.”
“You’ll love it. It’s got Errol Flynn, your favorite not gay actor.”
“What is it with you and pirates?”
“I don’t know. My deep and abiding love of the ocean, I guess.”
“Oh, what the hell,” grumbled Jake and we pulled into the parking lot behind the theater, Jake no doubt hoping to prevent any further spilling of conversational guts.
The theater smelled of old popcorn. The red velvet furnishings were as tacky as the Coke-stained floor, but the seats were Jake-sized and comfortable, and it was all ours, except for the row of teens making out in the back.