The outside border of the fireplace was lined with stones featuring the heads of snarling, growling rodents. There was a ferret, a weasel, a badger, and others Camm didn’t recognize. Each was larger than life, seemingly eager to leap right out of its stone prison to attack anyone in the room.
At the other end of the hall from the fireplace stood the biggest grandfather clock Camm had ever seen. It was at least fifteen feet high and four feet wide. Made of many different inlaid smoky-colored woods, it was carved in the same baroque patterns seen throughout the mansion. The face of the clock was a brackish-colored mother of pearl. Upon closer inspection, it appeared to be reflecting an aged man’s face with roman numerals surrounding his face. Both hands of the clock pointed straight up at twelve o’clock with long, bony fingers.
The large weights were brass sculpted in the image of coiled snakes, and the pendulum was a hanged man designed with inlaid copper, brass, gold, and dark silver. The hanged man’s face twisted with an expression of extreme agony. The pendulum must have looked fearsome when swinging—it looked bad enough as it was when not moving.
Camm found herself standing in front of the clock, staring at it, trying to suppress a deep chill. After a few moments, she noticed Agent Allen at her side. “How in the world would you describe that clock?” the agent asked.
Camm looked at the hanging-man pendulum and said, “Freaky.”
“Freaky,” the agent agreed with a nod.
They walked upstairs, going from room to room. It was the same everywhere—carved wood, dark colors, intricate patterns, and an overall foreboding theme. Even the paintings on the walls looked disturbing. Brushed in rich, brilliant colors, the subjects were usually demons or fanged animals eating or tearing apart some defenseless prey. These half-animal, half-human creatures adorned the walls with their eyes wide open and their mouths agape, ready to leap out from their frames and attack anytime. They seemed to be animals turning into humans, or humans turning into animals. Every painting was large—some were life-sized—originals done in detailed realism, almost photographic in style.
Examining the life-size paintings along the walls of the second floor balcony, Agent Allen mused, more to herself than to Camm, “None of the paintings are signed. I don’t recognize the style, but all the carvings and paintings share a similar style, as if they were all created by the same artist.”
After inspecting the upper levels, finding mostly bedrooms with large parlors and sitting rooms, they were preparing to leave when the second deputy, Tracy, discovered a panel door toward the back of the main floor that opened onto a narrow stairway descending into utter blackness.
The mansion had no electricity. Up to this point, the windows had let in sufficient light to explore each room. Agent Allen and both deputies brought out their flashlights before starting down the polished stone steps.
Basements were rare in California, and unheard of in Trona. This must be the only one in town, Camm thought. When they reached the bottom, they found themselves in a very large wine cellar. Their flashlights beamed over empty racks running in rows across the cellar. There was no wine; even the wooden barrels in one corner of the room were empty. Wrought iron candleholders shaped like hands reached out from the walls. Again, everything was spotless, no cobwebs or dead bugs anywhere.
Not having a flashlight, Camm stayed close to Deputy Tracy, who was a few years older than she and very friendly. The gaping blackness made her nervous, and Tracy’s presence was a comfort.
“What’s under that white cloth?” Agent Allen asked Tracy.
Camm whirled around to see a cloth lying on something rounded and bulgy. The cloth seemed out of place—unlike the rest of the house, it was ragged and dirty. “It’s not really that white,” she noted. “It has big brown stains.”
Tracy slowly raised the cloth’s dingy corner to reveal an empty barrel. He and Camm exchanged shaky laughs. As Camm climbed back up the stairs, she had an uneasy feeling that, in addition to the mansion’s general other-worldliness, something was truly not right in the wine cellar, but she didn’t exactly know what.
As they passed through the kitchen on their way out, Camm pulled her car keys out of her pocket and slipped them onto a countertop when no one was looking.
Once outside, they stood discussing their search under a brutally bright desert sun. Deputy Todd fingered his hip holster, staring behind him. “That house is strange, weird, and just plain spooky, but we didn’t find anything to link it to Joey McKay’s disappearance, let alone any of the other disappearances.”
Agent Allen nodded her head reluctantly. “I have to agree. Someone very eccentric designed and lived in that home—if it can be called a home. But weird isn’t evidence of foul play”—turning to Tracy—“Please, lock the backdoor.”
Before he could, Camm began patting her pockets. “Wait, I don’t have my keys. I left them inside.”
“Why did you even take them out of your pocket?” Agent Allen asked with a scowl, giving Camm a penetrating stare.
“They were rubbing me funny. I know right where they are. I’ll be back in a second.” With that, Camm ran up the steps and into the mansion. She found the keys where she’d left them. Retrieving them, she took some tissue out of her pocket and wadded it up.
As she stepped back out, a late model Cadillac drove up to where Agent Allen and the two deputies were talking. A heavyset man in his fifties got out and walked over to the officers. Camm could see his ridiculous comb-over, a few long scraggly hairs trying to hide a huge bald spot on the top of his head.
It was Mr. Samuel, a manager at the chemical plant next door. Everyone in town avoided him as much as possible. Though he ran the Trona plant, he refused to live in Trona. Instead, he lived about twenty-five miles away in Ridgecrest, where he lived in a nicer neighborhood with a front lawn and other natural flora.
As he approached Agent Allen, he began shaking his head, gesturing with both hands, demanding back the keys to the mansion, complaining about how long the search was taking. His face was red with anger, and the heat of the afternoon wasn’t helping either.
Camm yelled, “Tracy, toss me the keys, and I’ll lock up.” He turned and lobbed them at her. Mr. Samuel glared suspiciously at her before turning his attention back to Agent Allen, whining about the unnecessary search of the mansion and the waste of his time.
As surreptitiously as she could, Camm stuffed the wadded tissue into the latch hole in the doorjamb and locked the doorknob. She also pantomimed locking the separate dead bolt.
“Is it locked tight?” Agent Allen yelled up to her, her attention still on the ever-complaining Mr. Samuel. Camm placed the toe of her foot against the door feigning an effort to pull the door open.
“Yep, it’s locked,” Camm lied. She walked down the steps and handed the keys back to Deputy Tracy, who, in turn, handed them over to Agent Allen. Mr. Samuel thrust out his hand, palm up. Agent Allen gave him a humorless smile and waited long enough to show who was in control. Then, she relinquished the keys.
“It’s about time,” he mumbled, waddling off to his Cadillac. No one spoke until he had driven away.
“Well, I think we are about done here.” Agent Allen consulted her notebook. “In fact, I am about done altogether, except for one more possible witness.”
She turned to Camm. “Smith, are you free tomorrow at four p.m.?”
“Yes.” Camm straightened herself.
“Do you know where Homewood Canyon is?” Agent Allen pointed to an address in her notebook.
“Sure, it’s about seven or eight miles north of here, but I can get you there, no problem.”
“Okay, I’ll pick you up at your house tomorrow at four sharp.” Agent Allen wiped her brow. “Is it always this hot in the spring? It’s got to be in the high nineties, even in the shade.”
Camm grinned. “Always. You should stick around for the summer. It stays above one hundred degrees for days at a time.”
“No, thanks. I’ll take my notes back t
o my air conditioned office in L.A. and see if I can make heads or tails of things from there.” She looked about dourly. “I can come back if I need to.”
Upon returning home, Camm immediately hurried over to Cal’s house to report on the search. As soon as she walked in the backdoor, she saw his mother. “Hi, Loraine. Is Cal around?”
The Smiths and Joneses were such close friends, having lived next door to each other for so long that no one bothered knocking. Both families treated each other’s homes as if they owned everything. For Camm to call Cal’s mother Mrs. Jones would just seem weird on a normal day—sometimes she called her Loraine, and at other times, just Mom.
“Cal,” Loraine yelled. “Camm’s here to see you.”
Cal came jogging down the hall into the kitchen wearing nothing but an old pair of cutoff jeans.
“Go put on a shirt,” Camm directed. “I don’t want to look at your nipples.” Cal’s little brothers giggled.
“You’re always bossing me around. This is the way I dress when it gets hot. Don’t you think it’s fashionable?” Cal turned sideways to strike a muscleman pose. His brothers giggled again.
“Cal!” his mother said in a warning voice.
Cal sighed. “You always side with Camm.” He disappeared into his room and returned wearing an old Dodgers t-shirt. Camm had moved to the front room, so Cal plopped down on the couch beside her. Carefully, Camm described the mansion, room by room. Cal’s mother listened, silently folding clothes across from them.
“So, did it feel haunted?” Cal asked, grinning.
“I didn’t see any ghosts, but it was definitely creepy.” Camm waited for Cal’s mother to leave the room before continuing in a hushed voice. “I’m going back, and I want you to come with me.”
Cal’s eyes went wide. He leaned over in a conspiring way, and whispered, “You want to go back inside the Searles Mansion?”
“Yes, I’m not done exploring. And you’re coming with me this time. Ginger is coming, too,” Camm ordered. At the mention of her name, Ginger padded into the front room.
“You want me to bring my dog?” Cal was incredulous. Taking no notice of Camm, the dog hopped up on the couch next to Cal and rested her head on his lap. She lay there contentedly, giving Cal a look of utter devotion.
Ginger was a medium size, but pretty, Sheppard-mix half-breed. It was never determined what the “mix” was, but given Ginger’s disposition, Camm wondered if it wasn’t coyote. Ginger was wily and particular about whom she liked and didn’t like. She loved Cal and his brothers. She was friendly with Camm, for which Camm was grateful, because Ginger didn’t like most women.
Ginger was also suspicious of all strangers and hated anyone on a skateboard or bike. She chased away other dogs that came anywhere near her territory. Ginger was tough. She had taken down dogs twice her size before, and had broken through a one-by-six board on the Joneses’ back fence to get at a yappy dog on the other side.
Camm might not have believed in ghosts, but she felt safer knowing both Cal and Ginger would be there with her in the mansion. In fact, she felt safer with Ginger than she would with a gun. She had no doubt Ginger would try to protect them and, if necessary, give up her own life to protect Cal. No one or nothing made a better bodyguard than Ginger.
“How will we get in?” Cal whispered.
Camm explained how she had rigged the backdoor to keep it from locking, so they could secretly re-enter the mansion.
“When do we go? Tonight?”
“No.” Camm shook her head. “Agent Allen has one more interview tomorrow, and then she is going back to L.A. Let’s go there Friday night. We can say we’re going out on a date.”
Cal’s eye hinted a wicked glint. “We’d better do some smooching and fooling around to, uh, make it believable.”
“Do I need to teach you another lesson?” Camm said through gritted teeth, her right hand raised in a fist.
Cal held up his hands. “I’m cool, I’m cool.” Sitting back with a big grin, he said, “OK, you’re the boss. It’s a big date, then, for Friday night.”
IV
It stepped from its cell onto the cold, hard floor. Trespassers had been here; it knew instantly. Slinking along stone stairs, it crept up to investigate the offending odors. The grandfather clock struck twelve. Sometimes it was released early to feed, but not often. Always, it was released when the clock struck midnight. It hated that clock; it hated everything.
In the wine cellar, it sniffed around, and then crawled up to sniff about the main hall, baring its slimy emerald teeth at the scents that assaulted its nose. Four different humans had been here, two female and two male. Green slime flew from its mouth as its head whipped back and forth in rage. Razor sharp claws almost floated over the floor as it went from room to room, inspecting every corner of the mansion.
The long, hairless tail slashed from side to side as it concluded its search. This was sanctuary, its safe house—this was its holding station away from home, and it did not like trespassers. The next time intruders dared enter, they would die—it would make sure of that.
Camm sat quietly in Agent Allen’s red Mustang as they drove north out of Pioneer Point on the Trona Wildrose Highway, the sun burning above in a cloudless sky. Agent Allen broke the silence. “So, tell me about Homewood Canyon.”
“It has just a few families living along a canyon road up in the hills,” Camm answered. “They’re far enough away from the dry lakebed that the ground isn’t so alkaline, and with the well water there, they can grow a little grass, have a garden and flowers, stuff like that. So it’s, you know, greener than the rest of Trona.”
“How far did you say it was? Ten miles away?”
“A little less.”
“Why doesn’t everyone live there if it is greener?”
The truth was, Camm wasn’t sure. She hesitated. “Well, it would be kind of crowded and, maybe, because of the commute into town.”
When Agent Allen chuckled, Camm suddenly wondered how far the agent had to commute to work every day in downtown L.A. Ten miles might sound ridiculous to the agent. Camm cringed.
Agent Allen said conversationally, “So, Trona is divided into two neighborhoods, with Homewood Canyon being the nicer?”
“Actually, the homes in Homewood Canyon aren’t nicer, and Trona has more than just two neighborhoods. As you come into the south end of the valley, there is Westend, where the Westend Plant is located. Then, a couple of miles north, you go through Argus, which used to have its own grocery store. And then you go through Trona proper; that’s where the mansion and the main chemical plant are. It is also the oldest and largest part of town.
“Cal and I live in Pioneer Point, a couple of miles north of Trona. The nicest homes are there. And, if you keep going a couple more miles, you come to Valley Wells where the old swimming pool used to be. It was huge—the pool, that is. You can see it up ahead in that big clump of trees off to the right there.”
Camm glanced over at Agent Allen, trying to think of an analogous example. “Trona is kind of like, you know, like New York City, with all its many different boroughs.”
“That’s just what I thought when I drove into town.” Agent Allen nodded her head, smiling. “Wow, this place reminds me of New York City!”
Camm frowned. She didn’t appreciate the sarcasm; she was still defensive about her hometown.
Agent Allen glanced at her and quickly changed the subject. “So, are you really considering going to Harvard?”
Camm bit her lip, uncertain. “Can you keep a secret?”
“What do you think? Of course, I can. I’m an FBI agent, I keep all kinds of secrets.”
“Okay.” Camm hesitated. “I don’t want to go to Harvard. I applied to Yale.”
Agent Allen’s brows arched up. “What’s your GPA?”
“Four point oh.”
“Your SAT?”
“Top one percent.”
“You stand a good chance of being accepted.”
Camm
swallowed. “I haven’t told this to anybody yet, not even my parents, but I was accepted. They notified me by email and are now waiting for my response.”
“That’s wonderful!” Agent Allen sounded really impressed. “Why haven’t you told anyone?”
“My parents can’t afford the tuition, not even the room and board. If I told them, it would just make them feel bad, because they couldn’t afford to send me there. I have a full ride scholarship to Cal State Bakersfield—room and board, books, and everything. I will probably end up going there.”
Agent Allen was incredulous. “You would rather go to Bakersfield than to Yale?”
“No, no.” Camm frowned and rubbed her forehead. She had wanted to talk to someone about it, but now that she had, it was kind of painful. “I would a hundred times rather go to Yale, but we just can’t afford it. I don’t know what to do.”
“You know, I went to law school at Yale.” Agent Allen gave her a sidewise glance.
“You did?” Camm tried not to gush. “You went to Yale?”
“Yeah, a lot of FBI agents go to law school. Mine was Yale. I was thinking of putting in a good word for you, but you’ve already been accepted. There’s got to be a way to get you there. Yale’s a great school. You would love it, you know.”
“Oh, I know I would. I really, really want to go there. I just don’t know how to come up with the money.”
Agent Allen looked at her. “You know, there are several rewards being offered to anyone who solves the Trona disappearances. The total could be as much as three hundred and fifty thousand dollars.”
Camm sighed. “That would be wonderful . . . but we aren’t making much headway, are we? Uh, turn left there.” Camm pointed to a battered old road heading off the main highway.
Pitch Green Page 4