He managed to park in his driveway without smashing the hedge. As he made his way toward his door, he smelled the familiar acridity of his next-door neighbor’s Camel cigarette.
Cesar Biggins sat on his porch nearly every evening. He would smoke and sometimes play the spoons. Real spoons. Silver. From his dead wife’s set. A way, he once told Dylan, of connecting with her through vibration.
“Cesar, you got a second?” Dylan said.
The shadowy form leaned forward on his wicker chair and said, “Hours I got.” And then coughed.
Dylan guessed that Cesar Biggins was in his mid-seventies. Dylan never met the late Mrs. Biggins, as she had died some five years before Dylan moved in.
Cesar Biggins had been a clown for the Ringling Bros., Barnum & Bailey Circus. Now he was a wizened and rail-thin widower, grieving with silverware, and smoking himself to death.
Dylan sat in the other wicker chair on the porch. The chair creaked and crackled. It was only a matter of time before someone’s rear end would break through.
“You been to the doc lately?” Dylan asked.
“What for?” Cesar said. “I’m in the pink.” He coughed again, then took a drag on his cigarette.
“Let’s switch you over to vaping?”
“To what?”
“Water vapor.”
“Eh. I heard of that.”
“It has all the nicotine you want. What it doesn’t have is the tar coating your lungs. What would you think about that?”
“Water? You kidding?”
“It’s perfectly healthy and helps people live longer. So naturally California wants to regulate it out of existence.”
“This crazy state,” Cesar said.
“I need to ask you a question,” Dylan said.
“So ask.”
“Have you been out here much this week?”
“Every night,” Cesar said.
“Have you noticed any strange people wandering around?”
“All the time,” Cesar said. “All we seem to have any more is strange people.”
“How about the last couple of nights? Someone alone.”
“You looking for somebody in particular?”
“I thought I heard some strange goings-on outside my front door.”
“Salesman. Or Jehovah’s Witnesses. Can’t tell the difference anymore. People want to sell you solar panels, stucco your house—can you imagine stucco on this house? Or they paint your address on the curb and then knock on the door and expect you to pay ’em. My answer to that is just don’t answer the door. Can I offer you a beer?”
“Another time,” Dylan said.
Cesar stubbed out his Camel in a stuffed ashtray on a small table. He removed a fresh one from the pack and lit up.
“You know why I got out of clowning?” Cesar said. “I got tired of taking the pie. In circus world, you are the pie taker or the pie thrower. They liked me to be the taker because I had the sad face. Oh, I got my licks in, rubber hammer and all that. But sitting there taking it night after night, being the set-up man, I got tired of it. And you know what I decided? I’m gonna be the one that throws the pies first. That didn’t go over with the star clown, and he got me fired.”
Dylan nodded politely. “I better get home,” he said.
“Remember that,” Cesar said.
“Remember?”
“Throw the first pie. If somebody is worrying you, throw the first pie.”
The wisdom of clowns.
And somehow it made sense.
17
Dylan flicked on the lights, half expecting to see another envelope on the floor.
Nothing. The hardwood floor was mockingly clean.
He tossed his car keys on the hall table and went to the family room. He plopped into a chair. What irony. As if there was a family to share this room. Or ever would, now. He’d started to allow himself a little hope that Tabitha might be someone he could share his life with. Yes, it was early, but you get a sense of these things from the start. It had been that way with Erin. She wasn’t one of the popular girls in school, but there was something about her, an intelligence and vulnerability, that drew him.
He’d had that same feeling about Tabitha Mullaney until she played him like a prime sucker.
He looked at the fireplace. And at the wrought iron tool set that stood on the hearth. The set his grandfather had owned, passed down to Dylan. A shovel, poker, and brush. Black, with shepherd’s handles. Tools, yes, but in a pinch the poker could be a weapon. Dylan was aware of a strange sense of exhilaration building within him. Powerless as he was at Tabitha’s game, he sensed the voice of Gadge Garner. Fight. You have to fight. And in that very acceptance comes a deep, atavistic, natural attention of the nerves and the senses, an aliveness. In a crude way he was almost thankful this was happening. He’d not felt this kind of fighting spirit for a decade, since he’d given up hope of ever seeing Kyle again.
Cesar was right. You can’t sit around and wait to get hit with a pie. You have to hit first.
But what could he do? Tabitha—if that was even her name—held all the pies. He didn’t know where she lived, what she drove. He had her phone number and a voicemail.
He also had a feeling—one that told him she was perfectly capable of making things worse.
18
T. J. Petrie was a man of many loves.
He loved the Three Stooges. And Schopenhauer. And a good hot dog, the kind that snaps when you bite into it and it sends fatty juices over your tongue. He put that right alongside duck l’orange, when the skin was crisp and chewy but not tough. He loved a chef who knew his art.
He loved the theater, the legit theater, which was not the overpriced and ubiquitous Broadway musical revivals, usually starring some hack television actor trying to sing for the first time.
He saw David Suchet in Amadeus. Loved it. That was some great acting! And the play itself, magnificent. It asked the profound question, why would God allow artistic genius, so rare in this world, to be possessed by an unworthy slob like Mozart? Why not Salieri, who worked so hard and lusted so deeply for recognition? Salieri had declared himself the enemy of God. That was what made him a chump. T. J. Petrie had merely declared God his competitor.
He loved winning, did T. J. Petrie.
Most of all, he loved the movies. Especially the silents. And especially the god of all actors, Lon Chaney.
T. J. Petrie also loved identity theft. When he started using it twenty years ago, he could not anticipate the high it gave him. To actually take someone else’s life, suck most of the financial juices out of it and never get caught, that was the ultimate in theatrical.
And now as he sat at the upscale bar, sipping a gin martini, paying for it with cash, T. J. Petrie reflected on his ability to control his emotions and adjust his plans accordingly. For that is what he had to do now.
His immediate reaction had been anger, the kind that he had long ago learned to subdue. He had studied Greek tragedy. He had seen Patrick Stewart as Oedipus Rex. He knew what a tragic flaw was, and that he was stronger than any flaw.
He also knew that he had to tread carefully, which is why he would allow himself only one martini before going on a long walk in the evening air.
Outside he would think about how everything was coming together now. And he would rehearse in his mind how he was going to reveal it all to Erin Reeve.
19
“So tell me about yourself,” Andy said.
“Oh my gosh,” Erin said.
“What?”
“I should be asking you that. You could be my younger brother. Way younger.”
Erin was still processing this whole thing. She was actually on a lunch date with Andy Bolt. The question was why? Was it because she was curious? Actually attracted to him? (This was the leading contender.)
Or was it simply because she wanted to feel something other than the dull ache of being alone in her condo?
She did feel something of the rush she got when startin
g a race. But did she really think this had any possibility of turning into a marathon?
But come on, that age difference was real. As real as a gap in a canyon. Maybe not Grand Canyon wide, but big enough.
They were sitting at a table in that little bistro on Wilshire, the one near the Los Angeles County Museum of Modern Art. Andy had offered to drive out to the Valley to pick Erin up, but she thought driving herself to neutral territory would be the better option.
And if things went well—she could hardly believe she was contemplating this—they could easily extend this Saturday afternoon by strolling over to LACMA.
Andy said, “I wish you wouldn’t bring that up.”
Erin said, “But it’s true.”
“Truth is malleable.”
“Malleable?”
“I don’t believe in fixed truth,” Andy said. “We all interact with the things in this world and our perceptions shape what we think the truth is.”
“Whoa! Where did that come from?”
Andy smiled. “I took a little philosophy in college and kept it up after I dropped out.”
“Why’d you drop out?”
“To make money. I don’t think philosophy majors are buying BMWs.”
“Is that what you want? A BMW?”
“You’re asking if I’m materialistic.”
“Maybe.”
“Aren’t we all?” he said.
“I don’t think so,” she said.
“You want a roof over your head. Nice clothes, good food. That sort of thing.”
“Sure.”
“That’s all I’m saying. And if the things I want are nice quality, what’s wrong with that?”
“I guess I’d like to know what else you’re about,” Erin said.
Andy smiled. “And I’m the one who started off asking you to tell me about yourself. You sure know how to turn things around.”
A waiter came by to take their drink order and to see if they had any questions.
Yes, young man, do you think I’m crazy for being here? That’s my question.
Erin ordered a Diet Coke. Andy asked for an Arnold Palmer.
“I’m from the Midwest,” Andy said. “I came out here to get into the real estate market. I aim to be a top producer.”
“Good,” Erin said. “That’s what we like to see coming out of DeForest.”
“Maybe you can put me on your home page. I’ll be your cover boy.”
Boy.
“Andy, I’m really very flattered that you asked me out.”
“Uh-oh. I hear a but coming.”
“No, I—”
“Go ahead. Cards on the table.”
“No cards, really. This is nice, it is, only …”
“Only is just like but.”
He said it with a smile. Erin smiled, too. “But nice is really all it can be, right?”
“Am I boorish and ungainly?” Andy said.
“Of course not!”
“Have I got all my teeth?”
“All right—”
“You should know one more thing.”
“What’s that?”
“I’m a good kisser,” he said.
And as his eyes danced Erin felt a burning inside her, a desire to find out if he really was, a deep want to be kissed again, passionately. And just as quickly she jumped over that hunger with an equal desire to run and keep on running, right down Wilshire Boulevard, and not stop until she got to the ocean.
“Andy, I need to tell you something,” she said.
“Where we’ll go to dinner?” he said.
“Seriously,” she said. “I was married for nine years to a man I was deeply in love with. We had a tragedy. Our son, when he was five, was kidnapped. He was never found.”
“Oh, Erin.” He reached for her hand.
She pulled her hands to her lap, looked at them.
“We ended up getting divorced,” she said. “It’s all come back recently, the memory of it, and we’re going through that together, in a small way, but a way that’s deep. I don’t know if I can explain it any better than that.”
“Which means you’re putting your love life on hold?”
“I’m not even thinking about that.”
“Maybe you should.”
“But I’m not.”
“I can be persistent,” he said.
“I’m not some prospect you can use sales techniques on, okay?”
“I’m sorry. You’re right. I need to know when to back off.”
Erin suppressed a smile. But it must have showed, because Andy said, “What?”
“I was just thinking,” Erin said. “Sometimes, in a race, if you’re in the lead, the runner behind can lull you into a false sense of security by falling back.”
“Is that what you think I’m doing?” His voice had a bit more edge to it than before.
“I’m sorry,” Erin said. “That was unfair of me.”
Andy tapped the table with his index finger. After a long moment he said, “Maybe not. Maybe you have the power of perception. Maybe I have it, too. It’s what makes me a good salesman and you a good …”
“A good what?”
“A good person for me to be with,” he said.
20
Dylan spent most of Saturday afternoon with Gadge Garner and his team of two, installing a top-of-the-line camera system. All expenses paid by Jaquez Rollins.
When the installation was finished, Gadge dismissed his team and sat Dylan down in the living room for a tutorial. Everything was covered with cams—front, back, sides. There would be constant digital recording, and live feeds to an app on Dylan’s phone.
“A cat chasing a lizard won’t go unnoticed,” Garner said.
Dylan nodded.
“Anything new?” Garner said.
Dylan knew what he meant. “No,” he said.
Garner gave him a long, careful look.
“What?” Dylan said.
“You were warned not to talk to anybody, weren’t you?”
Unable to keep a straight face, Dylan said, “Am I that obvious?”
“No,” Garner said. “I’m that good. And I don’t give up confidences. I don’t do things unless somebody wants me to. Okay?”
It was comforting to have him here, an expert like this. Dylan was on a ledge already. What was the risk of a step or two around a blind corner?
“Let’s talk,” Dylan said.
“Good,” Garner said. “Do you have any liquid refreshment?”
Dylan got a couple of Coronas from the fridge. He brought them to the living room, handed one to Garner.
The security man nodded his thanks, took a sip, and said, “Have you talked to your ex-wife about DNA?”
“I’m going to see her tomorrow,” Dylan said.
“Those notes you mentioned. Can I see them?”
“Of course.”
“Don’t touch them with your fingers. You have plastic wrap?”
“Yes,” Dylan said. “But I’ve already touched them myself.”
“Of course you have. But let’s not add anything.”
Dylan went to the kitchen and pulled out box of plastic wrap from a drawer. He had to fight the roll to get a grip on the edge. Fingernails and a curse word did the trick and he finally had a swatch of the stuff. He put it over his hand like a makeshift glove.
Taking the box of wrap with him, Dylan went to his computer desk and got the notes from the right-hand drawer. He carried them to the living room like they were bottles of nitro.
Garner put his Corona on the glass table. He expertly covered his hands with plastic wrap, somehow giving himself opposable thumbs.
He took the notes from Dylan, unfolded them, read them. Then he held the first one toward the window where the sun was streaming through. He turned it slowly.
“Plain white, twenty-pound bond,” he said.
He turned it some more, looked at the edge with one eye, waving it slowly like a fan. “Israeli trick. I can see what are probably yo
ur prints. It’s where you naturally would have held it. Could be tested, but if the guy was careful not to seal the envelopes, I doubt he’d leave prints on the paper. I’m saying he because of the block letters and heavy print. This is a man’s work.”
“You can really tell that?”
“Ninety percent,” Garner said. He repeated the same exercise with the other note. Then he folded them and placed them on the far side of the glass table. He removed his makeshift gloves.
“Ninety-five percent,” Garner said.
“There’s something you don’t know,” Dylan said.
“There’s lots I don’t know,” Garner said. “Like why people watch the Kardashians.”
“Good point,” Dylan said. “What do you know about women?”
“No man knows anything about women,” Garner said.
“I just found that out,” Dylan said.
“Tell me about it.”
And so he did. Dylan told Garner the whole story up to its bizarre conclusion in the restaurant parking lot.
After Dylan finished, Garner did not speak for a long moment. He took a contemplative sip of his Corona, then set the bottle down again.
“It’s a team,” he said finally. “At least one man and one woman. And they are not amateurs. Think what it took to get to you online, to get you to connect for a couple of dates. What was it that made you say yes?”
“I think it was her sense of humor,” Dylan said. “She and I seemed to laugh at the same things in our past.”
“Like what?”
“Saturday Night Live.”
“Back when it was funny?”
“Eddie Murphy, Joe Piscopo.”
“Is there any way she could have learned that about you beforehand?”
“I don’t see how.”
“Social media. Ever talk about it on Facebook?”
“I don’t do Facebook.”
“So you’re the one,” Garner said. “How about other places?”
“Not that I can think of.”
“Do you and this woman have friends in common?”
Dylan shook his head.
Gadge Garner took a long pull on his Corona, then said, “She hasn’t brought up the issue of money?”
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