'Mrs. Leavitt?'
'Yes?'
'This is Dr. Delaware. I used to work with Jennifer at Project 160-'
'Oh, yes, Doctor. Jennifer was quite anxious to talk with you. She said to tell you she'll be out for the day. She and Danny - that's her boyfriend - have gone to La Jolla. But she should be back this evening. Where can she reach you?'
I gave her my home number and thanked her.
'My pleasure, Doctor. Jennifer always had wonderful things to say about you. She was so young when she entered the project, and you really helped her adjust.'
'That's great to hear.'
'Now she's going to be a doctor herself. Isn't that wonderful?'
'You must be very proud.'
'Oh, we are, Doctor. We are.'
I did some housekeeping, fed the koi, practised karate katas, took a three-mile run and a long soak in the tub. The morning mail held the usual junk along with a subpoena to appear as an expert witness in a custody case I'd thought long resolved, but the date was a month away, so I filed it.
All the makings of a peaceful morning, but the fact that someone had outbid me for The Wretched Act kept slipping into my mind. Voids Will Be Voids was some surgeon's tax dodge, hardly meant to be a bustling enterprise, yet all of a sudden customers were vying for a particular sculpture. The more I thought about it, the less I liked it.
It was only twelve-thirty, several hours before the gallery opened, but I had time on my hands, so I drove back downtown in the hope of spotting Stripehead nearby. He was nowhere in sight, and the gallery was dark, so I went for lunch in Chinatown.
Belly full of dim sum, I returned at two. Voids was still closed, but I spotted my quarry picking through the rags on a rack in front of one of the clothing outlets. By the time I'd parked and walked up behind him, he'd selected a pair of mock tigerskin stretch pants, a polyethylene tank top, and an extra-large J.C. Penney white-button shirt.
'Hi,' I said softly.
He jumped and dropped the clothes on the sidewalk. I picked them up and brushed them off. The Korean who owned the outlet stared suspiciously from the doorway. Stripehead absorbed the suspicion and passed it along to me.
'Whaddya you want, man?'
'I want to do a little more business.'
'Business starts at four o'clock.' He pretended to inspect the tank top.
'I'm not interested in art. Just information.'
'Then call the freakin' information bureau.'
The Korean came out and stood beside us. 'Buy or look?' he demanded.
Before Stripehead could sneer a reply, I said:
'Buy. How much?'
The Korean quoted a figure. I offered him half as much, and we settled for two-thirds. Stripehead looked on incredulously, then held the clothes out to me.
'Keep 'em,' I said. 'Merry Christmas.'
He started walking toward the gallery, and I stayed with him.
'You Jewish or something?' he asked.
'No. Why?'
'You do business like a Chink or a Jew, and you're sure not no Chink.'
'You're welcome.'
'Huh?'
'Nevermind.'
We reached Voids. He stood with his back to the iron grating, clutching the clothes as if afraid that he who gaveth would suddenly taketh away.
'I want to know who bought The Wretched Act.'
'I told you, man. Some suit.'
'What was the man's name?'
'He din't give no name.'
'What about a receipt?'
'He wanted cash-and-carry, just like you.'
'Tell me what he looked like.'
'I told you, man, I don't look at - '
The twenty under his nose stopped him mid-sentence.
'Fifty.' He tried.
I pulled the money back angrily.
'Forget it. I have a friend on the police. When I leave here, I'm calling him and filing a complaint about fraudulent business practises.'
'Hey, man, I didn't do nothing.'
'Maybe, maybe not. But when they take one look at you, it'll be body-search time.'
I turned to leave. Scrawny fingers held me back.
'Hey, man, I was just tryin' to be fair. The other suit paid me fifty not to talk, seems you should do the same.'
I peeled his hand off and started walking.
'Fuck you, man! Okay, okay! Twenty.'
I stopped and turned around.
'First let's hear what you have to say.'
'He had a big freaking mouth.'
'I need a description, not a personality assessment.'
'Okay, hold on. Let's see. He was white. And tan. Like some faggot who sits in front of a sun lamp all day.'
'How tall?'
'Like you, but heavier.'
'Fat?'
'Muscles.'
' What about his hair?'
'Short. Like some faggot who lifts weights and grooms himself all day.'
'What else?"
He contorted his face, trying to remember.
'He had a beard. Yeah. That's it, man."
'What colour?'
'Dark.'
In his addled way he'd produced a good description of Erno Radovic.
'Did he say why he wanted the sculpture?'
'No, he, uh - sure. He said he liked art.'
I showed him another twenty and said:
'Come on. Let it out."
'Hey, man, I don't wanna get in any shit over this. He was a real asshole.'
'He'll never know.'
He looked up and down the street, then back at the money.
'The first time you were here he came in right after you left. Asked me what you were up to. I said, "Hey, man, this is Voids, not some information bureau." Then he got this bizarro look on his face and produced some cash, so I told him I never saw you before, you just wanted to buy trash. I showed him which trash, and he bid you up. That's it, man. Okay?'
Milo had told me to call him if the bodyguard showed his face. I went to the phone booth in the parking lot and punched in his number at the West L.A. station.
He was out, so I asked for Del Hardy, his occasional partner. It took a while to locate the black detective, and when he came to the phone, he was out of breath.
'Doc,' he panted.
'Hi, Del. You okay?'
'Aerobics... stress management programme... orders from the brass... dropping like flies... gonna lose... a lot of good men.'
'Milo involved in it, too?' -
'Supposed to be... but he keeps... making up excuses. Like trying to solve crimes.'
I laughed.
'I'd like to talk to him when he gets back. It's no emergency, just something about Erno Radovic.'
He exhaled, and his voice tightened.
'That racist pig? He hassling you again?'
'Not exactly. But I have reason to believe he's been following me.'
'You in any trouble?'
'Not at all. Like I said, it's no emergency.'
'Okay. Anyway, Milo hasn't come in today. I think he's out on a call. But he should be phoning in within the hour, and I'll make sure he gets the message. Meanwhile, if you see the motherfucker skulking around again, phone me collect.'
'Thanks, Del.'
I drove home, pulled out a stack of psych journals, and prepared to catch up on some reading. I'd just immersed myself in an article on the psychological development of premature infants when the service called.
'Good, you're home,' said the operator. 'I've got a Sergeant Michael Sturgis on the line. It's the third time he's called.'
'Please put him through.'
'Certainly, Doctor. Go ahead, sir. Doctor's on the line.'
'Alex?' The connection was peppered with static, but the urgency in Milo's voice was clear.
'What's up?' I asked.
'Del said you wanted to talk about Radovic. Go ahead.'
I told him about the bodyguard's following me and purchasing The Wretched Act.
'A sculpture?'
'More than just a sculpture, Milo. It combines elements of Jamey's father's death and Chancellor's murder. Radovic paid a lot of money for it. You might want to ask him about it once you locate him.'
There was no reply, only crackles and pops.
'Milo?' I said, wondering if we'd been cut off.
'We've located him,' he said softly. 'He's lying a few feet from where I'm standing, gutted like a fish.'
'Oh, shit.'
'Wait, there's more. We've got an eyewitness to the knifing. There were two guys involved. Bikers. One skinny, the other a veritable tub of lard.'
'Jesus. Where did it happen?'
'Near Bitter Canyon, off the Antelope Valley Highway. We need to talk, Alex. Soon.'
'Name it.'
'Whitehead and Cash are still here beating their meat, but they're splitting in a couple of minutes. I volunteered to handle the paper work, so I'll be here for a while. It's a forty-minute ride, give or take ten on either side. Leave in an hour, so you don't pass anyone on the freeway; it's an open road and every car's visible. Know how to get here?'
'Four-oh-five north?'
'Right. Stay with it past the merge with five, then hook east on fourteen, toward Lancaster and Mojave. You'll pass Soledad Canyon, Agua Dulce, and the L A. Aqueduct. Bitter Canyon's a few miles before Palmdale. The highway cuts through high desert, and the exit road will drop you a thousand feet. It's damned deserted out here, so don't get spooked. Just keep going until you see an old Texaco station. The meat wagon will probably be there. You won't be able to miss it.'
THE NORTHERN edge of the Valley began to bleed off into empty stretches just past San Fernando. As I turned onto the Antelope Valley Highway, the way posts of prefab civilisation - Colonial Kitchens, Carrows, Dennys, Pizza Huts - disappeared, and expanses of increasingly raw terrain slid into view: low sandstone hills parched white under a stubble of creosote and sagebrush, squat and pitiful against the distant black backdrop of the San Gabriel Mountains; long sashes of ravaged gravel pit; chaparral still scorched from last summer's brush fires; sudden flashes of brilliant canary yellow wildflowers.
As Milo had predicted, the highway was nearly empty, five barren lanes herringboned by exits leading to the canyons that ran the county line to its demise: Placerita, Soledad, Bouquet - whose rusty blue rock graced the patios and spas of many an L.A. dream house - Vasquez, Agua Duke.
The Bitter Canyon turnoff was abrupt, a sharp downgrade that deposited the Seville on a narrow, squirming
asphalt road, bordered by boulders and an occasional wind-savaged tree. Here, in the lowlands the hillsides were water-etched and craggy, a quilt of tans and reds washed with coy overtones of lavender and blue. The sky was overcast with heavy grey stratus clouds, and every so often a ray of sun escaped through a threadbare patch in the mist, casting a startling pinkish spotlight upon a favoured section of rock. Incredible beauty, cruelly fleeting.
The Texaco station was fifteen miles down the road, rising from nothingness, straight out of a time warp. A pair of prewar pumps sat in the middle of a treacherously furrowed dirt and gravel yard, fronting a one-bay white frame garage of equivalent vintage. Occupying the bay was a green bubble-backed '39 Plymouth.
Attached to the garage was a shack that served as an office, its dirty windows obscured by piles of paper. A few yards down the road was a frame cafe sporting twin antique Coca-Cola discs on either end of a faded sign that said SAL'S and a crowing-cock weather vane atop a tar paper roof. The cock postured arrogantly, unmoving in the still desert air.
The cafe looked as if it hadn't done business in a while, but a fleet of official vehicles had encamped around it. I pulled the Seville between a familiar bronze Matador and a mobile crime lab van and got out.
The northern corner of the yard was cordoned off by string attached to makeshift posts. Taped to the string were LAPD tags. Within the cordoned area technicians stooped and squatted, wielding scrapers, hypodermics, brushes, and plaster-casting material. Some worked on a pearl grey RX-7; others, on the area around the car. On the ground nearby was a sausage-shaped lump, encased in a body bag. A few feet from the bag a roan-coloured stain spread its tentacles across the dirt. A Chinese man in a dark suit hovered over the body, talking into a hand-held cassette recorder.
A county ambulance was parked just outside the tape, its engines still running. A uniformed attendant stepped out of the ambulance's passenger door and looked around. His eyes finally settled on Milo, who was leaning against one of the gas pumps, writing in his notepad.
'Okay?'
My friend said something to the Chinese man, who looked up and nodded.
'Okay.'
The attendant gave a hand signal, and a second attendant got out from the driver's side and flung the rear doors open. A stretcher materialised. Within seconds the body had been lifted nonchalantly and deposited with a dull thud in the rear of the vehicle. The ambulance departed, leaving behind a small dust storm.
Milo saw me and put the pad away. He flicked dust off his lapel and laid a heavy hand on my shoulder.
'What happened?' I asked.
'About eight this morning Radovic powwowed with two bikers right over there and got sliced up.' He pointed to the bloodstain. 'From what our witness saw, sounds like it was a prearranged meeting to pull off some kind of dirty deal. But the deal went bad.'
I looked at the stain, then at the empty grizzled hills.
'Why all the way out here?'
'That's what we're trying to find out. Park ranger's due any minute. Maybe he can shed some light on it.'
He pulled a package of mints out of his pocket and offered me one. I took it, and both of us sweetened our breaths.
'Way I figure it,' he said, 'one of the parties knew the area, the other didn't, and the station was used as a landmark. Which, under normal circumstances, would have been an excellent idea because the place is usually deserted. The station, the greasy spoon over there, and fifty acres on either side of the road are owned by an old man named Skaggs who lives in Lancaster and rarely opens up anymore. I just finished interviewing him, and he told me forty years ago there used to be an army base a few miles down the road and the cafe was a "jumpin' joint" -outdoor bandstand, great steaks, illegal hooch. But today we're talking ghost town.'
Shading his eyes with his hand, he looked into the sunlight and scanned the terrain, as if seeking confirmation of his assessment.
'From what I can gather, he considers the cafe a symbol of his wife; she was Sal. When they were in business, he pumped gas while she did the cooking. She died in 'sixty-seven, and he never got over it. So when he starts thinking about her and gets really low, he drives down, sits at the counter, and reminisces. Which is what happened last night. It was the twentieth anniversary of her death. He'd pulled out their wedding album and got all weepy. When he couldn't take it anymore, he threw on some clothes, grabbed the album and a quart of Jack Daniel's, drove over, locked himself in, and got shitfaced. He's a little hazy about time but figures he got here around eleven and dozed off around one. At eight he was awakened by shouts. At first he thought it was an evil booze dream, but then his head cleared, and he realised someone was out there. He peeked out through the window, saw what was happening, and crouched behind the counter. Poor old guy was so scared he stayed there for three hours before calling anyone.'
He glanced at the old Plymouth.
'That's his car. No one saw it because he'd parked it in the garage and locked the door.'
'Lucky for him.'
He shook his head.
'It was no accident. We found a piece of rubber hose attached to the exhaust pipe. Needless to say, we're going to be looking after his health. He's far from the perfect eyewitness but good enough to renew my faith in God.'
'What did he see?'
'By the time he woke up things had already got nasty. Radovic and the bikers were shouting at each other. Skaggs isn't sure, but he thinks the leather boys said something about Radovic's not keeping his end o
f a bargain, and Erno responded in his usual endearing manner: laughed, cussed them out and put up his fists. At that point things moved pretty fast. The fat biker must have blinked wrong because Radovic hit him, floored him with a fist in the gut and a fast
chop under the bridge of the nose. Skaggs says he went down easy, like a "soft sack of shit". But the skinny one was another story. When he saw his buddy laid out like that, he pulled out a chain and a buck knife and went into a street fighter's crouch. Radovic reached into his pocket -we found another Beretta on the body - but Skinny was too fast. He got the chain around Radovic's neck, jerked him close, and stepped straight in with the knife. The ME looked at the wounds and said permanent damage was intended: There was a forward thrust that pierced the liver and several up-and-down saw cuts. Also a throat slash, which appears to have been done after he was dead - your basic street fighter's coup de grace. Afterward Skinny revived Fatso, and the two of them split. Skaggs heard an engine starting, but he was hiding so he didn't see the vehicle.'
Jonathan Kellerman - Alex 03 - Over the Edge Page 32