'Sealed.'
'Muchas gracias.' My friend smiled. 'The construction types who've been passing through, where do they go?'
'To the northeast rim of the crater. It's the only place you can get a look at the entire lake. They stand there and draw plans.'
'Do they ever get down to the lake itself?'
'Nope. It's a two-day descent for an experienced climber. With pitons and rope.'
'How about giving us directions so we can take a look ourselves?'
'What are you driving?'
Milo pointed to the Matador.
The ranger shook his head.
'Forget it unless you feel like hiking. The road ends four miles before the viewpoint. It's four-wheeler terrain. I'll take you in the jeep.'
We hurtled south over a progressively deteriorating road, the ride bone-jarring, the view through the window flaps of the jeep a horizontal slash of ghost-pale rock, infinite and inert. But Sarna made it come alive, giving names to the scrub - greasewood, honey mesquite, rabbit brush -directing our eyes toward rare oases of activity - a flock of birds feasting upon a bitter cherry bush, an alligator lizard scurrying across the spines of a fan palm - extolling the beauty of a single, time-ravaged digger pine, describing the savagery of a hard winter in the high desert and the resilience of those creatures that survive.
Throughout it all Milo slumped in his seat, nodding at the appropriate time, his mind fixed upon a different kind of savagery.
The transition from blacktop to dirt caused the jeep's chassis to vibrate like a bowstring. The dirt turned to sand, and our wheels kicked up a dust storm. Sarna seemed to view it as a challenge, maintaining his speed and playing with the gears in lieu of braking. Milo and I held on to our seats.
We climbed and dipped through the scrub, then climbed again. Remembering what Milo had said about roller coasters, I looked over and saw him: shut-eyed, tight-lipped, and honeydew green.
The jeep continued to rise. Sarna gave one final feed of gas, and we lurched to the top before reaching a shadowed plateau. He came to a halt, set the parking brake, and bounded out.
'We've got to take the last bit on foot.'
We got out and stood facing a stand of pines. Most of the trees were dead - hollow grey hulls with jagged, dry spikes for branches, some felled, others tilting improbably out of the parched earth. The live ones didn't look significantly better. The space between their trunks was filled by eye-searing flashes of grey-white light, and we were forced to look down.
Sarna found a pathway through the trees. We followed him, ankle-deep in leaf dust, stepping gingerly over brittle spindles of dead branches. Once Milo snagged his trouser leg and had to stop to free himself. He still looked ill, but his colour had returned to normal.
Beyond the trees was a clearing, and as we neared it, the grey-white light grew unbearably intense. We walked haltingly toward open ground, shading our eyes with our hands. Sarna stopped along a sloping, sandy rim blemished by random mounds of rock. And beyond the rim, the white-hot light.
'It's hard to see at this time of day,' said the ranger. 'But if we stand over there, we can probably get enough shade. Be careful, the ground tilts sharply.'
He led us to the shelter of one of the rock formations, a pile of boulders topped by an overhanging sandstone shelf. We stood under the shelf and looked out.
The lake was an opal set into the sun-gilded earth. Its surface was as brilliant as a crystal mirror, so static that it seemed artificial. A single step out of the shade turned it into a blinding disc of luminescence, as Milo quickly learned.
'Jesus,' he said, shielding his face and returning to shelter.
Sarna lowered the brim of his hat and nodded.
'The setting sun hits the rocks at an angle that sets off one heck of a refraction. It's another reason few people come up here.'
'It's like a goddamn sheet of plate glass,' said Milo, rubbing his eyes.
'That's what the Spanish thought, too. They named it El
Canon Vidrio, which later became vulgarised to Bitter Canyon. Which is a shame, don't you think? Because on top of being a heck of a lot prettier, the Spanish is accurate.
'Vidrio,' said Milo.
'Sure,' said the ranger. 'The glass canyon.'
SARNA DROPPED us off back at the cafe, and Milo spent another half hour talking to Asa Skaggs, making small talk and trying to find out if he remembered seeing anyone matching Jamey's, Chancellor's, or Gary's description in the recent past. The old man stopped scouring a cold griddle and thought, scratching his head and sucking on his toothless gums.
'Yamagooch - that's a Jap name, ain't it?'
'That's right.'
'We used to have Japs around, in the relocation camp up near Mojave.'
'During World War Two?'
'You bet. Later they let 'em out and put 'em in the army, and I hear they done pretty well - tough little monkeys.'
'I was thinking a bit more recently, Mr. Skaggs.'
'Hmm. No, haven't seen any Japs since then. Plenty of 'em in the city, though. Near San Pedro Street, They call it Little Tokyo now. Got a lady in town, Alma Bachman,
who likes to drive over there and eat raw fish. Says it makes her feel younger, which don't make much sense, does it?'
'Not much,' said Milo.
'You remember those days pretty well, don't you, Mr. Skaggs?' I said. 'During the war and right after?'
'You bet.'
'Do you remember the man who bought the army base?'
'Mr. Black Jack Cadmus? Hard to forget him. Now, that was a gentleman, the kind you don't see no more. Carried himself like a king. Beautiful clothes, down to the spats. Sometimes he'd drive up to look at the lake and stop in for a fill-up and a window wash. I remember the car. Twenty-seven Bugatti. Forty-one Royale, the one with the big monobloc straight eight and the twin-choke carburettor. Jet black and big as a bus. He'd had it restored in Italy and shipped over. The way the thing was put together you had to strip the whole engine down if you needed to work on the valves. Maintenance alone cost enough to support half a dozen families for a year, but that's what the man was like. High style, only the best for him. Once in a while, if I was changin' oil or checkin' the tyres, he'd come in here, sit right where you're sittin'. Have a cup of coffee and a chocolate roll - the man loved chocolate. Sal used to say he coulda been a movie star with that black hair and them white teeth.'
'Did he ever bring anyone with him?'
'Nope. All by his lonesome. Drove the Bugatti as far as it would go, and then he'd hike around for a couple of hours. I'm saying that 'cause sometimes he'd come back all dusty and I'd kid him. "Been climbin' and gettin' into mischief, Colonel Cadmus?" You could talk to him like that; he had a sense of humour. And he'd smile and answer back, "Communin' with nature, Asa. Gettin' back to basics." '
The old man winked and lowered his voice.
'I never asked him about it, but I think he was up there writin' poetry.'
'Why's that?'
'He used to carry this little book with him and one a them fancy gold-tipped fountain pens. One time, when I
was cleaning the windows, he left it open on the seat. I got a quick gander, and it was laid out in these little paragraphs, like poetry. When he saw me lookin', he closed it real quick. Probably didn't want to be thought of as no nancy boy.'
Milo smiled.
'What did the book look like?' I asked.
'Smallish, leather.'
'Black leather?'
'Darkish is all I recall. Coulda been black.'
'Did you ever read what was inside?'
'Nope. Never got that close.'
'But you're pretty sure it looked like poetry.'
'You bet. What else would a real man been ashamed of?'
We exited the cafe. The crime techs had departed, and the road was as silent as a graveyard.
'What were you getting at?' asked Milo. 'Poetry and all that.'
'The book Skaggs described matches the one in The Wretched Act,
' I said, 'which, now that I think about it, didn't fit with the rest of the sculpture. Everything else in the scene was miniaturised, but the book was full size. Way out of proportion. On top of that it looked more like an antique than a teen-ager's diary. Gary had scrawled "Diary" on it in lavender, but it was a sloppy job - totally out of character with his style. He's compulsive, Milo. In all the other pieces he took pains to be precise.'
A hawk rose over the darkening hills and began circling. Milo stared up at it.
'I know,' I said, 'there are thousands of black books in this world. But glass canyon was one of Jamey's pet phrases when he hallucinated. He used it the night he called me; it means this place was on his mind. Ordinarily you could brush that off, because he's psychotic and a lot of experts, including Mainwaring, don't put much stock in psychotic speech. But Radovic got killed out here. Is that coincidence?'
Milo ran his hands over his face, grimaced, and cleared his throat.
'Let's roll it back for a minute,' he said. 'Once upon a time Old Man Cadmus used to drive up here - to the glass canyon - hike around, and write poetry in a black book. Forty years later his grandson - who's a poetry freak and hallucinates about glass canyons - rips off his boyfriend and a tag-along chicken and busts a serial murder case wide open. Then the boyfriend's bodyguard buys a punk sculpture to get hold of the black book, uses it to blackmail two bikers, and gets butchered for his trouble.'
He looked at me.
'Enough to make your head hurt, isn't it?'
He walked to the Matador, got in, and closed the door. I watched him pick up the radio speaker and talk into it for several minutes, nodding and brushing the hair out of his eyes. Then he hung up and climbed out of the car, looking preoccupied.
'Pacific Division just started the search of Radovic's boat. Someone had already been there and tossed it good. They left behind guns, knives, and a wad of cash he had hidden in the base of the steering wheel. Also a power drill, a pile of plastic chips and dust and the rest of the toys from the sculpture - the guy I spoke to got a big kick out of hari-kari Ken - but no black book. According to Skaggs, nothing changed hands between Radovic and the bikers, which by itself wouldn't be enough to convince me of anything. But the fact that people went to the trouble of burglarising the boat means they were still looking. So either they found it or Radovic stashed it somewhere clever and it's still around.'
A sudden rush of cold air blew in from the south. Milo tightened his tie, and both of us buttoned our jackets. The sky had darkened to charcoal splashed with indigo and coral. The hawk became a faint black crescent, then disappeared. And all around, a primeval silence.
'I can just see it,' said Milo. 'The golden arches'll be over there, right next to the Taco Bell, which'll be belly to belly with Ye Olde Bitter Canyon Souvenir Shoppe -
wiseass postcards and plastic models of the power plant. Progress.'
I got caught up in his imagery, visualising high concrete towers jutting brazenly out of the low, silent hills, the modular claws of a prefab town strangling the solitude. Then I remembered something Heather Cadmus had told me.
'Milo, Jamey and Chancellor met at a party thrown by Dwight Cadmus for the money people behind a Cadmus construction project. It was a large-scale deal, and Chancellor was a major investor. Be interesting to find out what that project was, wouldn't it? And the exact nature of Chancellor's involvement.'
His eyes widened with interest.
'Very.' He laced his hands behind his neck and thought out loud. 'Which means getting access to all of Chancellor's financial records. Which, on top of being a major procedural hassle because it would give chest pains to plenty of biggies, would have to go through Dickie Cash -Chancellor's bank's in Beverly Hills. Given Cash's level of industriousness, count on at least a month. And if he's in on it, Whitehead'll have to be, too. Along with all our so-called superiors, which in Trapp's case is a gross inaccuracy. You met those guys, Alex. Far as they're concerned, the Slasher case is solved. They're gonna be real enthusiastic about dealing with this.'
'Radovic's murder doesn't bother them?'
'Radovic is a throwaway, a three F: Find it; file it; fuck it. Quoth Charming Cal to Dickie when I wasn't supposed to be listening: "The faggot was lucky. This was faster than AIDS. Har-har." '
He grimaced. 'Must be nice to be that concrete, huh? Put everything in neat little cubbyholes.'
'I think I can find out about the project,' I said, 'without going public.'
When I told him how, he was pleased.
'Good. Do it. If you get something, we'll dig deeper.'
He looked at his watch.
'Better be getting back.'
'One more thing,' I said. 'I know you're convinced of
Jamey's guilt, but it wouldn't hurt to consider other alternatives.'
'You got some, toss 'em at me.'
'For one, someone should be taking a closer look at Canyon Oaks Hospital. The night Jamey escaped no one was at the desk. Maybe that kind of incompetence is typical, but maybe it's not. The nurse in charge had piled up lots of debts. She quit soon after Jamey was arrested and left town with a brand-new car.'
He smiled faintly.
'Been doing a bit of detecting?'
'A bit.'
'What's her name?' he asked, pulling out his notepad.
'Andrea Vann. She's a divorcee travelling with a little boy.' I gave him the Panorama City address.
'What kind of car'd she buy?'
'Mustang.'
'I'll run a trace on the registration, see what comes up. Anything else?'
'Mainwaring. He has a reputation for being pliable when it comes to a buck. Not a bad choice if you wanted to stash someone away with no questions asked. He bent the rules by letting the Cadmuses bring in their own nurse. Could be he bent a few more.'
'You talked to the guy. Did you pick up anything iffy?'
'No,' I admitted. 'His treatment wasn't particularly creative, but it was adequate.'
'Anything you would have done that he didn't?'
'I would have talked more to Jamey, attempted to get a picture of what was going in on inside his head - which isn't to say that I would have succeeded. But Mainwaring didn't even try. Jamey had consistent hallucinations. Months before he was committed he was saying the same things as he was the night he called me. Someone more open-minded might have been curious about it.' I paused. 'Or maybe Mainwaring knew and chose to suppress it.'
Milo raised his eyebrows.
'Now you're talking conspiracy, my friend.'
'Just throwing stuff out.'
'Let's get back to these consistent hallucinations. What did Cadmus talk about besides glass canyons?'
'He used the word stink a lot. The earth was stinking and bleeding. Rankstink. Bloody plumes. White zombies. Needle games.'
He waited a few moments.
'Anything else?'
'Those are the most repetitive elements.'
'Any of it meaningful to you?'
'Now that I know about the power plant, I suppose there could be an ecological flavour to it - bleeding the earth, stink as a symbol for pollution.'
'How does "needle games" fit in with that?'
'Needle games and miles of tubing,' I recalled. 'When I first heard it, I thought he was expressing his fear of treatment. Of course, back then I thought "glass canyon" meant the hospital.'
'What about "plumes" and "zombies"?'
'I don't know.'
He waited awhile before asking:
'That it?'
When I nodded, he put the notepad away.
'I don't know,' I said, 'maybe Mainwaring's right and I'm over interpreting. Maybe it's just crazy talk that doesn't mean a damn thing.'
'Who knows?' said Milo. 'Over the years I've learned to respect your intuition, pal. But I don't want to raise any unrealistic expectations. You're a long way from restoring Cadmus's virginity.'
'Forget virginity. I'd settle for the truth.'
'Sure of that?'
<
br /> 'Not really.'
When I walked through the door, Robin gave me a mischievous smile.
'A sweet young thing named Jennifer has been calling every half hour.'
I kissed her and took off my jacket.
'Thanks. I'll call her after dinner.'
'Dinner is pizza and a salad from Angelino's. Is she as cute as she sounds?'
'Absolutely. She's also a former... student. And seventeen years old.'
Jonathan Kellerman - Alex 03 - Over the Edge Page 34