by Hal Ackerman
The door behind her opened. The male voice so startled her that she nearly wet Alyssa’s pants. She covered her surprise well at being discovered by Matt’s Uncle Richard, as he covered his reaction to finding her.
“There you are,” he said quite pleasantly. “Matthew has been looking all over for you.”
All she could picture was Richard whacking Matthew across the face.
“I’ve been calling him. I guess there’s bad reception here.” She displayed her cell phone as evidence.
“Come, I’ll take you to him.” Richard gallantly held the door for her; Angie could see where Matthew got his manners. She took one debutanticular step outside, then grabbed the edge of the door and threw it shut behind her. And ran like a maniac.
***
Stein made a slow circle around the morgue parking lot. Caravaggio had departed a good ten minutes before he did, but he didn’t know where the big man might be lurking and he didn’t want to be seen rushing, or call attention to where he was going. He had not let on to Renn Moody nor to Caravaggio that he recognized the talon extracted from Henny Spector’s eye socket. He had seen the stand of maguey plants at the back of Hollister and Ruth Ann’s property line the morning Renn and Hollister had supered the new hives. He would put his last two bucks down at the betting window that it was Ruth Ann who had implanted that spike in Henny Spector’s brain.
He drove several miles in the wrong direction deliberately before turning around and heading for the Greenway place. He wished he had Lila’s car, with Angie’s cell phone number programmed into it so that he could find out what she had discovered about the land grabs. He was sure the parcels would border Brickman’s current holdings, his acquisitive tentacles gobbling up all that there was to have.
Ruth Ann smiled when she saw him at her front door. “Well,” she said with just a wee bit of irony, “to what do owe the honor?”
“Hello, Ruth Ann.”
“You’re looking very well.”
“Compared to any particular way you may have recently seen me?”
“I cannot imagine what you mean.”
“It’s good to see you, too, Ruth Ann.”
“So I would think.”
She looked sensational, wearing a long skirt and white blouse that buttoned to the neck. He had thought of her as the goofy second lead—the alto in the musical comedy who has the comedic love story. But now she had metamorphosed into Katherine Hepburn, windblown and strong, a heart that could never be taken from her, only given freely. She scared the crap out of him.
“Is Hollister at home?”
“Hollister is still in jail for trying to steal back those boxes. Would you like to come in?”
“On such a pretty day?”
“Shall we stay out here on the porch?”
The portico was overhung with flowering vines. The bees knew to avoid the milky white stickum of the Cruel Vine and gravitated to the Trumpet Creeper. There were a lot of bees. Given his recent experience, Stein was gun shy. “On second thought, inside is fine,” he said.
He didn’t remember the scent of lavender being so prevalent. He recalled bacon. He sat at the kitchen table. Outside, through the window, standing silent sentry at the back of the property was the row of maguey plants. The tallest and most rugged had its front sheaf amputated.
“Let me see your hands,” Stein spoke softly.
She extended her upturned palms toward him. The soft flesh at the crossing of her fate line and health line looked distressed, almost flayed. She withheld nothing. Yes, she confessed, she had done all the things that Stein imagined. She had stolen up behind Henny Spector as he was engrossed in the act of watching Stein suffer and die. She had driven her spear through the back of his skull, right through the protective canvas covering. And when in the throes of searing pain Spector had pulled his helmet off, she had come around in front of him, straddled his head, and drove the point of the second weapon down into his eye.
Stein was a little frightened and flattered by the ferocity of her attention, and then chagrined to learn that he was only a collateral beneficiary of her act. Her decision to impale Henny Spector had been a response to seeing how completely the man had her husband Hollister under his thrall.
She knew exactly how she would do it. Since moving out west from Boston, where the maguey was nonexistent, they had become the central icon in her mythology. She was fascinated by the tall, willowy shoot erupting like a periscope from the soft center of the plant, sprouting upwards of twenty feet in two weeks’ time, its clusters of red flowers blossoming brilliantly as if it had nothing to do with the deadly jungle of dart-pointed sentries armed and dangerous below. She had fantasized doing damage to certain economics professors at Harvard who had disdained her abilities.
After the courtroom decision where Ranger Granger was allowed to retain his stolen merchandise and Hollister had marched away from her to speak to Henny Spector, Ruth Ann had driven home directly and cut down a pair of long green leaf shafts, rolled them tight and wound heavy tape around them to form spears. Even wearing work gloves, the serrated edges had torn into her flesh. She had driven back to town but Henny was gone by then and there was no sign of Hollister. Like everyone else, she knew of the usual hangouts Henny liked to frequent. She had spotted his car out on Route 187, and then to her surprise, she had seen that Stein was following him. She followed them both to Henny’s place, and then out to where Henny had taken them in his truck.
She couldn’t believe it when that maniac got his truck to cross that naked wash. She left her car there and followed on foot. It didn’t take her long once she got there to understand what he had done. He had moved the boxes thirty feet from where they used to be. Her eyes gleamed at this revelation as if she had just explained the essence of God to an atheist.
“First of all, how could you tell he moved them?”
“Pollen droppings, honey residue. Beaten-down grass. It was pretty obvious.”
He recalled what Shmooie the Buddhist always used to say: If you don’t know what you’re looking at you can’t know what you’re seeing.
“Now tell me why it matters that he moved them.”
“Bees have their hive’s location imprinted on their homing system accurate to three feet. Spector knew they’d all come back to where they had been … which is where you were.”
As a sportsman, Stein had to appreciate the sophistication of Henny’s game plan. He wondered about Ruth Ann. “Was it hard to stab him through the back of the head and kill him?”
“I have a Harvard MBA. That’s what we’re trained for.” She was posing. Of course it bothered her. “Can I speak frankly to you, Stein?”
“You’ve just confessed to murder. How much more frank can you get?”
“He turned my Billy Bob into a greedy, opportunistic—” She stopped herself. “I can’t love him anymore. A man is nothing more than the things he does to get what he wants.”
“The world’s a hard garden to grow integrity.”
“I know it is, Stein. That’s why you’re alone.” She leaned closer like she needed him to know being alone wasn’t the only option.
“What makes you think I’m alone?”
“You’re a man who wouldn’t sell empty hives. No matter how much you wanted something. Am I right?”
“You’re asking me a hypothetical question.”
“Everything is hypothetical till we do it. Do you know what Hollister is going to do? He told me he’s already worked it out with the sheriff. He’s going to take over Henny Spector’s business. What do you think of that?”
Their bodies were close to touching. Any movement forward and the world would have changed. It might have happened. But the sound of a distant telephone ring dissolved into the room. It had the most annoying ring, more like a death rattle. Stein knew that sound. He tilted his ear to locate the source. There was a side door off the pantry that went out to the inverted L where the driveway went behind the house. There was Lila’s Lexus. The driv
er’s side window was open. The phone, in its leather nest, was quacking incessantly.
Stein tumbled inside. He got tangled up in the bee suit that was crumpled on the front seat, the suit no doubt that he had briefly worn before handing it over to Henny. He’d verify a puncture hole in the back of the hood later on. Now he grabbed the phone and simultaneously blurted his daughter’s name. The automated voice told him he had missed the call and seven previous calls. He whacked the instrument against his thigh as though his ferocious frustration would dislodge the lost messages.
Ruth Ann was a trifle embarrassed at being found in possession of Lila’s car. If Hollister was taking over Henny Spector’s business and there was a kickback to Sheriff Slodaney that got Hollister released in time for him to have been the second spear bearer along with Ruth Ann, Stein would deal with that later. At this moment he cared about only one thing. He pressed the phone into Ruth Ann’s hand and commanded her to play that last message.
She tapped a few buttons, returned the instrument to him. The voice from the earpiece was the soundtrack of Stein’s most dire and recurring nightmare: the one-word wail of anguish that loosened every weld in his stomach.
“Daddeee.”
Chapter Eighteen
Alicia’s boots were not made for running. Adrenaline plus terror more than compensated. Angie clomp-dashed over the hardwood floor of the rowing machine room and out onto the softer resilient sod of the Great Lawn. She dared to stop for a moment to get her bearings and to see if Richard was on her tail. He was not, and for a moment she feared she might have injured him when she slammed the door behind her. But when she pictured what he had done to Matthew, and his naked butt following Lila out of the bathroom, she stopped giving a shit.
There was a slight vibration in her left arm around where the wristband resided. Perspiration from running and anxiety allowed it to slide more freely. The train was just discharging another stream of arriving partygoers. Angie set her course toward a gaggle of girls dressed in don’t-you-wish-you-could-fuck-me togs. She sidled up to one and asked, in the way only hip girls know how to talk to each other, if she’d like to get into the afterparty after the afterparty. She surreptitiously extended her braceletted arm.
“How much?”
“Hundred.”
Using a small silver implement one of the other girls had around her neck, the clasp was undone and the bracelet slipped off Angie’s wrist and onto the other girl’s. The new owner made an impressive show of annoyance when she looked in her little bejeweled purse and found no ready cash. “I’ll hit you back later,” she assured Angie. She and her entourage laughed on.
***
There was relief in the agents’ car when screen number two came back on line. “Okay, we have her,” Agent Church broadcast. “Let’s move now before she tries something cute.” They descended upon their target from all directions and corralled her giving head to a guy who said he was Ashton Kutcher’s bodyguard. Much to his displeasure, the girl’s aperture was uncoupled from his ready member and she was brought to the house where she was presented triumphantly to Richard.
“Who is this?” Richard demanded.
“Angie Stein.”
“No, it is not.”
He saw the wristband worn as a bangle on her skinny forearm. “Where did you get this?” he demanded.
She shot back defiantly, “I’m on the list.”
***
Angie had ducked for concealment into a convoy of old people. Their muddy migration slowly gelled into a larger critical mass of people congealing around the moat area. A buzz of expectation became palpable. “What’s going on?” Angie asked of a formidable gray-haired woman decked out in chemise and fur.
A Broadway-sized stage rose up on hydraulics from behind the moat. On it were sixty members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic in gowns and tuxedos. A seventy-foot movie screen rose up behind them. The orchestra began to play a symphonic suite from Titanic as imagery from the movie now filled the screen. A tall, handsome, charismatic figure in a tux stood at a podium. “I thought I was the king of the world,” he humbly admitted, “but no. The real royalty are Commodore and Lady Bancroft. Seventy-five years!”
On screen behind him, as the LA Phil played the heartrending Titanic love theme, the doomed screen lovers Winslet and DiCaprio were magically replaced by blue-screened images of Lucy and J. J. Bancroft. The audience went into upheavals of ecstasy. And then, seemingly through the screen itself, the bodies of the real living couple emerged. The Commodore was dressed in his full white Admiral Dewey array. Lucy was elegant in a straight floor-length gown.
Angie scanned the crowd for Matthew. She flipped open her cell phone. The LOW BATT sign flashed ominously. She had put it on sleep in order to preserve the energy for her father to call back. She dialed, and the ring sounded like an old person trying to breathe. But Matthew’s voice answered.
“Where are you?” Her voice cracked between need and longing. “It’s starting. We’re going to blow it.”
“I’m right where I’m supposed to be. Where are you?”
“I don’t know how to describe it. Can you see the stage?”
“Look left,” Matthew said.
She did. He was there at the edge of the crowd. He found his way to her.
“Do you have it?
He cradled the box that in turn cradled the life-sized sculpted head of Sunny Cataluna.
The Titanic projection stopped and the music changed to “The Anniversary Song.” Al Jolson’s voice crooned the most romantic song of the era and a wave of sentimentality eroded Angie’s resolve. Lucy and the Commodore gracefully waltzed. It was Valentine’s Day. The Bancrofts had found that one valuable, elusive commodity. They had been in love for seventy-five years. She hoped Matthew would bail her out. “Are we really going to do this?”
“Up to you.”
“Thanks a lot.”
A phalanx of security was stationed around the moat to head off any bad ideas. Matt grabbed Angie’s hand and assessed their obstacles. “We need a diversion.”
“I could flash them,” Angie suggested.
“I mean a diversion they’d notice.”
“Oh, you’re so cute.”
Dear, as I held you so close in my arms,
Angels were singing a hymn to your charms,
Two hearts gently beating were murmuring low,
“My darling, I love you so.”
She looked down into the clear eyes of the noble youth’s face in the shoebox.
“Fuck it,” she said. “What’s the worst that could happen?” They eased their way through the crowd, calmly so as not to draw attention. The couple on stage moved as one person. The music rose to a swell. The Commodore dipped his wife. She seemed to fall out of his arms. Two hundred people drew in a collective gasp. But she rolled into a cartwheel and finished with a split. As the music ended the crowd went berserk. In that moment of madness, Angie dashed up the three-step platform to the stage brandishing the bust of Sunny Cataluna.
“Lucy Lester. Do you mind if I cut in?”
A hypnotic hush befell the crowd. Lucy took the head of her long-lost love from Angie’s hands and moved it to her breast. Her voice caught in her throat. “Sunny,” she croaked. “My Sunny.”
Matthew leapt onstage alongside them. Clutched in his hand like a dagger was the elephant tusk that he had kept inside his sport jacket. “This is what your husband used to kill him, Mrs. Bancroft.”
Lucy turned on the Commodore with the fury of a welding torch. “You told me he went back to Barcelona.”
“It’s a figure of speech,” Bancroft rasped. “Like buying the farm or biting the dust. Going back to Barcelona.”
“You can go back to Barcelona,” she hissed. She dropped her multicarat diamond ring to the floor and left the stage with the image of the Titanic behind her crashing into the iceberg and crumbling. Then all hell broke loose. Security agents swarmed the stage. A hood was tucked over Angie’s head and she was dragged away
kicking and flailing.
“Careful, the girl’s nuts,” Agent Cortelyou cautioned.
“She will be,” his partner said, quite pleased with his double entendre. “When we get her to the nut house.”
Matthew was caught up in the crowd surge and swept in the opposite direction away from the stage. “Angie, I’m with you,” he yelled in her wake.
A low, firm, familiar voice intoned in his ear, “No, you are not.”
He whirled around in a fury to face his elder protector. “Damn it, Uncle Richard. What are you doing?”
“Securing your future.”
“That’s really cool of you.” Matthew’s young, supple body was capable of containing many contradictory impulses simultaneously. While he smiled gratefully to Richard and his shoulders dropped their combative pose, he saw peripherally that he’d ended up close to the jousting field. Another of the evening’s popular contests was about to commence. Across the field, the white knight mounted his steed for what the PA announcer proclaimed would be the ultimate battle of good versus evil. Alongside Matthew, the dark knight, his helmet plumed in red feather, rose up into his saddle. But the evil one never got fully mounted. With the spectacular force of a salmon leaping a waterfall, Matthew dislodged the dark knight’s foot from the stirrup, upended him off the saddle, vaulted up into the seat in his place, grabbed the lance from tumbling jouster’s right hand, and urged his mount forward.
Across the field the white knight had already begun his charge, his lance wavering in his right hand despite the knowledge that the bout was an exhibition with its outcome preordained. The charging white steed was nothing to Matthew but a trivial impediment. The object of his quest was at the bottom of the hill. He could see the struggling hooded figure being pushed into the back seat of a dark Buick, which then roared through the gate and turned right onto the one road in and out of the compound.