“No.”
“Fine.” He ignored her and worked on getting Mikey set up. After a few minutes, she went back to the tent. She came back wrapped up in an old sweater of his mother’s he had brought along.
You would expect that the one who would be hard would be Mikey. Although he was little, he was nearly thirteen and seemed on the ball, but he bought Danny’s every story. Callie was something else. She doubted every word, and wouldn’t let up, wanting to call Jolene. He let her drive the big black Explorer a few feet up the jeep trail, but even that just scared her. She cried when they came to a big rock and he made her go over it anyway. She had to learn, didn’t she? Fear was no protection. You had to do what you had to do.
He felt sure this time, he would get action. They had food, bait, and plenty of fuel. All the Siesta Court Bunch had to do was pay him what they owed him and he would go to Arizona or Montana and get lost. If it took the kids to get their attention, okay.
He didn’t want to think about what would happen if he didn’t get his twenty thousand. He had been stupid, giving the whole down payment to Coyote. But Coyote knew the ridge mountains, Coyote could get the kerosene in a way that wouldn’t point at Danny, and Coyote was company, like the Lone Ranger and Tonto.
Coyote turned dangerous with his loose lips, though. The whole thing would have been much more fun with Wish. But he had known early on that Wish wouldn’t follow him anywhere anymore.
A chill settled over the stream and around them. Callie went a little way away to pick wildflowers. “Remember what I told you about the bears. Stay in sight,” he reminded her. Working bait on a hook, with Mikey happy beside him, butt firmly embedded in the loose dirt, Nikes kicked off, Danny couldn’t help thinking about when he first arrived in Carmel Valley to live with his tío Ben. Why, he had been happy, it was incredible to think that now. He had loved the parties, hanging with the guys on the deck, shooting the shit, even taking his turn with Britta, a kind of initiation rite.
You did everything right, you tried to be a friend to people, someone they could call on for help. In return, you got cheated and put down. Those chiselers on Siesta Court had reeled him in with their grand plans, acting like his good buddies, not a single one with the balls to see the thing through except him!
And then they turned on him. Stiffed him. Whined, Oh, we never asked you to set those other fires! We never meant you to kill anyone!
Well, they had put toes over the line when they had hired him to burn across the river and decided to break the law. They went from being respectable to being criminal, and there was no way to go back ever again. You couldn’t wipe the slate clean once you took that first little step over.
Not that they understood that at first. Those developers made these guys feel little, and they didn’t like the feeling so they broke the law and felt like big shots all of a sudden. There was plenty of celebrating about that!
But when things got tough, and one crime led to another, then everything was Danny’s fault, right? They had wives, kids, jobs. No need to pay what they owed! No, they were just bastards and hypocrites.
His dad used to say people were no damn good. Danny never believed it when he was a dumb kid. Well, he didn’t have enough experience with friendship then to understand how right his dad was.
That was before Wish turned up in Carmel. For a few weeks Danny was happy. They did everything together.
This thought made him clear his throat and spit. Wish turned against him like everybody did and tried to leave him flat in the dust, more alone than ever.
Wish was always bragging about his classes, how hard they were, or his great job working with a detective. He could never understand that Danny’s life was different, and headed somewhere different. School was not for him. A long, slow drudge life working at the auto shop wasn’t going to cut it either.
And then suddenly, one day, no auto-repair shop job.
While he was still looking for a job, he would see ads in the paper sometimes and would think, That job’s perfect for me. Well, this job was perfect.
Set a fire.
He knew something about that. He liked the work.
Tell that to smug Wishy-washy, who didn’t want to talk to him anymore. Or don’t tell it, a smart decision after all. Danny had wanted to call him a few times and let him know he had it in the bag. He had worked things out. Great things were in store, etc. But something made him hesitate, maybe a sense of self-preservation. Wish wouldn’t approve. Danny knew that. He didn’t like thinking he cared about Wish’s approval, but he did think about how good he would feel showing up with a new car and a pretty girl beside him someday at that run-down old house Wish lived in in Pacific Grove.
“Go get another job, Danny,” Wish had said, after the repair shop closed. Same old conversation a hundred times until one day Danny looked into the eyes of his old friend and former admirer and saw-
Disgust. Yeah, disrespect and contempt for everything he was. Old Wish couldn’t hide his feelings from Danny.
That was when Danny got the idea that Wish could die in his place up on Robles Ridge. He would lure Coyote up there the same day, two birds, one can of kerosene.
Okay, a couple cans.
Wish looked enough like him to pass for a few days so he could stay off the scope until he made the men pay his money, and Wish was handy, and Wish wasn’t a friend, not anymore. He had entered the world of Danny’s enemies.
What did Wish know, with his cushy existence, that mother of his always there to back him up instead of dying slowly in a rotting cabin with her wasted husband? In real life, Danny didn’t waste his time pointing unloaded fingers at his enemies. When old friends turn on you, that’s such a big hurt, you do stupid things.
In real life, when George and the rest announced after he set the second fire all by himself, Hey, you’ve gone too far, blah blah blah, and said they wouldn’t pay him, he put on the pressure, real pressure.
When he heard Wish survived the fire, he got anxious and confused. He had set things up right and it should have worked. The police, finding the two bodies, would be satisfied that they had their two arsonists. He thought back to that day, convincing Wish to go when he didn’t want to go, getting that drunk, Coyote, up there so he could shut his big mouth at the same time.
He should never have hired Coyote to help him on those first two fires in the first place. He’d given him the whole down payment so he could keep it clean and keep all the rest. Then, up there on the ridge that day, the fire went the wrong direction when the wind came up. He took too long whacking Coyote and changing clothes with him and then he couldn’t get the Doc Martens off Coyote’s feet. How he’d managed to get the pants on him over those boots he’d never know. And he’d really hated sacrificing his concho belt.
By the time he got back to Wish, the fire was so intense he had a few bad moments thinking he might not make it out himself. So he hadn’t hit hard enough with that rock, or been thorough enough, checking to see Wish was dead or near enough. He flashed to grabbing Wish for just a second from behind, the terror that Wish might somehow turn around and look him in the eyes.
Still, all he needed was his money now, and he’d go find some big mountains far away, and it wouldn’t matter that a few things went wrong.
One thing for sure, he’d keep on with the fires.
Fire was the most intense, rushing gusher of relief. Fire filled the emptiness inside him, and he felt fulfilled, caught up in his destiny, active, happening. Productive, destructive, unbelievably powerful.
Born to burn, Danny thought to himself, but he felt hollow and terrified and thought again, now they’re all after me. And there was this surprise that kept pushing up from inside, this dismay, that he had killed Coyote and Donnelly and that woman; if he thought a lot about it he’d hate himself. Later for that, he’d get crazy at some motel out in the desert when he was safe and cry and shout it out and find a way to live with himself.
Next to him, Mikey thought he caugh
t something and in his excitement, tangled the line on a log. They spent a long time disengaging the line and getting him set up again. Danny took the opportunity to mentally talk himself down.
“I don’t think there are any fish in this stream,” Mikey complained.
“Well, we won’t know if we don’t give it time, will we?” Danny asked, proud of how patient he acted with these two pains in the ass.
They moved downstream and Mikey started fishing again. Now Danny was jumping out of his skin with boredom. He hated waiting, but waiting was what was called for right now, and his patience would be rewarded, he was sure of that. He would sneak out later that night and make some calls… get things arranged, finish with the kids, and be on his way to the Big Sky Country. Lots of Natives there. He’d go to powwows and get with the People: he was half Washoe, he would be accepted.
Callie chose that moment to return, both grubby little hands holding bouquets. “Smell this,” she said, shoving some yellow flowers under Mikey’s nose.
“Coconut,” Mikey said, eyes closed. “Tropical.”
“They look like some primroses Grandma planted,” Callie said. “They aren’t open yet. Maybe they open at night like jasmine?”
“I’m hungry,” Mikey observed.
“You didn’t catch any fish?” asked Callie.
“No problem,” Danny said, reeling his line in. “We’ve got other food.”
“I thought you said you knew how to fish,” Callie said.
“The fish just don’t know how to get caught,” Danny said, and Mikey laughed, but Callie just stared steadily at him, and he could see she had a little of her no-nonsense grandma in there, which scared him into giving her a big smile.
Callie, sticking the flowers one by one into an empty Gatorade bottle full of stream water, kept up an incessant, nervous chat that had everybody edgy while Danny and Mikey put the fishing tackle away.
“What’s for lunch?” Mikey asked.
“You can’t be hungry. We just ate. You had two sandwiches.”
“I am. I have to eat now. What have you got for us?”
“Hey, I’m the scout leader here.” Danny grabbed the fishing pole from him and picked up the tackle box. He walked back toward the tent, feeling anger popping like boils all over his body. Damn kids. Who was the boss here anyway? Well, he guessed they would find out soon enough who called the shots.
The kids trailed behind him. When he could speak, he said, as calmly as he could manage, “We’ve got canned Vienna sausage, bread, mustard, Chips Ahoys. A real feast.”
Callie looked interested. “What’s a Vienna sausage?”
“Camp food,” Danny said. “I promise, you’re gonna love it.”
“Do we have to stay here all night?” she asked.
“Yeah, but it’ll go fast.”
“I’m not used to sleeping without my blanky.”
“You’re too old for a blanky,” said Mikey disapprovingly.
“I know, but Grandma says whatever gets you through the night,” Callie said.
“If you’ll just shut up for one second,” Danny promised, “I’ve got a plan for after lunch, an activity we’re going to do together. Then, a little later on, when it gets dark, we’re gonna have some real fun.” He jumped up and put his Nikes on.
“I’m gonna teach you how to build a fire.”
37
P AUL SHIFTED THE BRONCO INTO FOUR- wheel drive and turned left at the jeep road.
“There’s a gate,” Nina said.
“That’s why I have an assistant.”
She got out, wrestled the gate out of the way, and got back in. They bumped slowly along the mogul-strewn dirt road for a few minutes. Going around the first wide bend, they saw an amazing vista of Lake Tahoe swept with wind like a heavenly vision, as insubstantial as an enormous blue cloud below them. “How far do we go? We don’t want him to hear any engine noise.”
“Not far,” Paul said. “He would get far enough from the highway so that the kids couldn’t easily find their way back, but the road isn’t that long.”
They rode a little farther, until, at a spot offering one of the few level borders beside the road, Paul pulled off the road. He drove the Bronco over small logs and up a slight incline, then down into a gully. He got out and opened the trunk. Nina followed him.
“You insist on coming along?” Paul asked.
Nina didn’t bother to answer.
“In that case, we leave the Bronco behind, instead of having one person drive it out. If he comes back up this road, we don’t want him to see there are any other people around. Don’t want to scare him. People like Danny are full of fear. You know that? Full of bravado, not bravery.”
“But…” Nina said, puzzled, “he sets fires. That’s dangerous. If he’s so scared…”
“Scared he’ll get caught. Scared he’ll get hurt. Scared he won’t be respected. We’re going to do nothing that will set him off. Your pack,” Paul said, handing it to her.
She put it on her back.
“Hope we don’t have to go too far,” he said, handing her a jacket, which she tied around her waist. They sat on the bumper lacing their hiking boots. “Prisons are full of Dannys. Some of these guys are terrified of heights. Some are scared of water. Some won’t go on airplanes. They’re superstitious and they’re skittish. That’s why we don’t want to get near him. We scare him, he reacts. Problem is, we can’t predict how.” He finished, stood up, and adjusted the pack on his back.
“We have got to find him,” Nina said. “Paul, we have to be so careful. Those kids…”
“Right. So we sneak. We’ve got to be very quiet, and we have to travel pretty slowly because we’re going to be listening. And he is too. If he’s here, which is a long shot.”
Nina nodded.
They locked up the car and hiked back to the road. The road narrowed and switched back and forth. Before every curve, they held back until they were certain they weren’t going to run into any nasty surprise around the bend. Progress was very, very slow, because they wanted to travel in silence, and afternoon faded into dusk.
Callie would not allow them to toss the trash or even bury it. “We have to hike it out. I saw this show at school.”
The kids had eaten very little. They weren’t really hungry. They just needed their routines.
“Go ahead and bag it,” Danny said, feeling magnanimous. He went into the tent and came out again with a tiny recorder. Mikey, who had been looking unfriendly ever since refusing a second cookie, got curious and came over to see what he had. “That’s old,” he judged. “I had one of those years and years ago.”
“It’ll do the job,” Danny said. “Now, here’s what we’re gonna do. Instead of writing letters, we’re going to talk to them.”
“To Grandma?” asked Callie skeptically.
“Yep.”
Mikey looked even less sure. “What do I say?”
“Say, hey, Mom, Dad, I’m here, all’s cool. That kind of thing.”
“I thought they’re coming tomorrow,” Mikey asked. “Why can’t I talk to my dad?”
“This stupid phone is almost out of juice is why. Just say you can’t wait,” Danny said. “Tell ’em about fishing. Tell ’em you miss them. I’ll play your messages real fast so we get it all in.”
“I do miss them,” Callie said stoutly.
“Well, then say so.”
“Why didn’t you charge it on the car charger?” Mikey said suddenly.
“My friend’s charger won’t fit my phone.” He glared at Mikey.
Callie was first to take hold of the microphone. “Grandma,” she said formally, “it’s awful pretty up here in the mountains today and camping’s great but I miss you.”
“That’s exactly right,” said Danny, taking the microphone from her and putting it into Mikey’s face.
“Mom, Dad,” said Mikey, “I almost caught a fish! I never knew camping could be so fun. Hurry and come.”
“Great,” said Danny. “The
y’re going to love hearing from you.”
“How will they hear it?” asked Callie. “Aren’t we too far away?”
“They’ll hear it,” said Danny. “We’re up high and the reception is better than at home. That’s a promise.” He switched off the microphone. “You guys like marshmallows?”
Turned out, they did.
“I’m going to show you how to make a fire that can’t be beat,” Danny said. He took some dry wood from the pile he had borrowed from his mother. He showed them how to stack the branches like a pyramid, how to get the fire really hot. They roasted a few marshmallows to perfection, toasty brown.
Danny got up and found three cups. “I’ve got a pot full of water here, and a couple packets of hot chocolate. Who wants some?”
They practically jumped over each other, wanting some.
While the water heated, he prepared the mixture.
“I want this side of the tent,” Mikey said to Callie, who looked nervous, watching the night creep along the landscape.
“You can’t see the lake anymore,” she said, her voice small. “Are the bears going to come out?”
“I’m going to lock every crumb into the truck,” Danny said. “They won’t be able to smell it.” That was a lie, but Danny had enough worries without adding on bears.
“I get this side!” Mikey put his sleeping bag in place to cement the deal.
The afternoon breeze had gone for the day. Watching the small fire flick in the wind, Danny waited for the darkness. When the water in the pot got hot enough, he poured the liquid into the prepared cups.
“I can’t drink this,” Callie pronounced, making a face. “It’s way too hot.”
Mikey gulped the chocolate. “How come things taste so good when you are outside!”
Danny blew over Callie’s cup. “I can make it right,” he said. “Cool it down just the way you like it.”
For the first time that day, the little girl looked happy. “Okay,” she said.
“We need a story, though,” she said when Danny tried to get them into their bags.
“Sure, I’ll tell you a story. You finished up all your hot chocolate? There was the time I was down in Antigua and went out ocean fishing. You can catch fish there that are so big they can pull you right out of the boat!” He had never been to the Caribbean, but he had talked to a guy who had. He talked on, embellishing what he’d heard, making himself the hero, fabricating a lot of lore about marlin fishing he didn’t really know. Actually, as a way of passing the time, storytelling was something he enjoyed.
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