by J. R. Rain
“No.”
“Then what’s it about?”
“I have a life here. I’m good at what I do. I’m a different man than when I was twenty-two.”
We were silent. I wondered why he was here.
“Do you miss football?” he asked.
“Yes and no. I don’t miss the pain.”
“You want to come back?”
There it was.
“Depends in what capacity.”
“How about the capacity as my assistant coach. The team has fallen on hard times. We’re halfway through the season and we need a spark.”
“You think I can be the spark?”
He leveled his hazel eyes on me. “Stranger things have happened,” he said. “It’s not full time, Jim. I know you’re busy with...whatever the hell it is you do here. Show up when you can, once, twice a week. Be there for the games Friday nights.” He paused, looked down. “I have no money for you, though. Strictly volunteer.”
Inglewood High barely had enough to pay his salary.
I didn’t have to think about it. “Would be an honor.”
“Practices start at two. Don’t be late.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it, sir.”
Chapter Eleven
Sanchez and I were at the 24-Hour Fitness in Newport Beach. I liked going there because they were always open, except Friday and Saturday nights, in which they closed at 10 p.m.
“You see,” I was saying, as we were doing dumbbell lunges, “they’re only open twenty-four hours a day five days a week.”
Sanchez said, “Will you give it a rest.”
I set the dumbbells down. We were using sixty-pound weights. Sanchez picked them up and began his set, lunging his ass off.
I said, “Should be something like: 24-Hour Fitness Some Days, 6 a.m.-10 p.m. Other Days.”
“Catchy,” said Sanchez.
“But accurate.”
“Not all 24-Hour Fitness close early on the weekends,” he said. “And not all of them close at ten, some close at eleven.”
“Then the name change should be on an establishment by establishment basis.”
“That would be chaotic.”
“But accurate.”
Sanchez shook his head. He finished his lunges, and placed the dumbbells back on the dumbbell rack. He said, “When are we going to start using the seventies?”
“When you get strong enough for the seventies.”
“Hell, I’ve been waiting for you.”
We moved over to the squat rack, and used every available plate we could find. The bar sagged noticeably. People were now watching us. At least two of those people were handsome women.
“There are some handsome women watching us.”
“I hate that phrase,” said Sanchez.
“‘There are some handsome women watching us’?”
“No. ‘Handsome women.’ Women are beautiful. Men are handsome.”
“You think men are handsome?”
“I think I am handsome. I think you are an ugly Caucasian.”
I positioned myself under the barbell and began squatting away. When finished, Sanchez helped me ease the thing back on the rack. My leg was throbbing. The steel pins holding my bones together felt as if they were on fire.
“You were gritting your teeth,” said Sanchez. “Too heavy, or the old broken leg excuse?”
“The old broken leg excuse.”
He stepped into the squat machine. I did some quick calculations. We were squatting with nearly five hundred pounds. Sanchez did ten reps easily.
“Besides,” said Sanchez, when finished, “I am a married man with three kids. I don’t care if two women are looking at us.”
“Then why are you now flexing your calves?”
“Because it’s a free country.”
“Tell that to Danielle.”
“I’d rather not.”
“Thirsty?” I asked.
“Sure.”
We showered, changed and ordered drinks at the gym’s juice bar. I got a Diet Pepsi and Sanchez got something called a Sherbet Bang. We sat on red vinyl stools and leaned our elbows on the metal counter while the bartender mixed the Bang. The counter was cluttered with protein mixes, protein bars and protein supplements.
“Why not just eat a steak?” said Sanchez.
“Not enough protein.”
Our drinks came. From where we sat at the gym’s juice bar, we had a good view into the aerobics room. At the moment, about thirty women and a handful of men were stretching, as we used to call it back in the day. Now it’s called pre-aerobics.
“Jesus got jumped yesterday,” Sanchez said. Jesus was his eleven-year-old boy. “Danielle and I spent the night with him in the hospital.”
“You mean Jesus?” I pronounced it the Western way.
“His name is Jesus, asshole,” said Sanchez, pronouncing it the Spanish way: Hay-zeus asshole.
“How’s he doing?”
“Stayed home from school today. Nothing broken, although he lost a tooth.”
“Who jumped him?”
“Eight or nine kids, best I can tell.”
“Any reason, or was this just a friendly neighborhood random act of violence?”
I could tell Sanchez was doing all he could not to crush the Styrofoam cup in his hand. Probably didn’t want Sherbet Bang all over the front of him. “Apparently, one of the gang’s girlfriends took a liking to Jesus.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” I said. “We could all use a little Jesus.”
Sanchez ignored me. At least I amused myself.
“Jesus wants revenge. That’s all he talks about. Thinks he can take each of these punks. One at a time. Individually.”
I nodded. Probably could. Jesus was a tough kid.
“And I’m going to take him around so that he can do just that, hunt these punks down. All he wants is a shot at them. One on one.”
“Mano y mano.”
“Now you’re getting it,” he said. “Want to come?”
Sanchez was gazing absently over at the aerobics room, but I suspected he didn’t have much else on his mind other than his son. Certainly not pre-aerobics vs. stretching.
“You’re asking because you want to use my car,” I said.
He shrugged.
I continued, “Because you’re a cop. And you want to remain anonymous, because cops probably shouldn’t be endorsing youth violence.”
“Something like that.”
“Sounds like fun,” I said. “When does the ass-kicking begin?”
“In a few weeks. We’ll let him heal a little.”
“Then unleash him?” I said.
Sanchez nodded.
“Like the Second Coming,” I said.
“Second Coming?”
“It’s a Biblical prophecy.”
Sanchez rolled his eyes. “Christ,” he said.
“Exactly.”
Chapter Twelve
Cindy and I were at a trendy Thai restaurant called Thaiphoon.
“I love this place,” Cindy said after we were seated next to a window overlooking a vast parking lot. “But you hate eating here.”
“Hate is a strong word.”
“But you come here for me.”
“Yes.”
I ordered a club soda, although I wanted a beer. Cindy ordered a Diet Coke, and probably only wanted a Diet Coke.
“I am so proud of you,” Cindy said.
“I am too,” I said.
“You don’t even know what I’m talking about.”
“No,” I said. “I’m just proud of myself in general.”
Our drinks came. Fizzing water for me; fizzing brown chemicals for her. Next, we ordered dinner. I picked something that sounded familiar and hearty.
When the waitress left, Cindy said, “I’m proud of you because I know you would rather have had a beer.”
“Yes.”
“But you didn’t order one.”
“No, not this time.”
She
smiled at me and there was something close to a twinkle in her eye.
“How’s the mummy case coming along?” she asked.
“Today was research.”
“You hate research.”
“Yes, which is why I spent most of the day playing Solitaire.”
Our soup arrived. Cindy dipped her oversized plastic spoon into the steaming broth and slurped daintily. I slurped less daintily, and three spoonfuls later pushed the witch’s brew aside.
“You’re done already?”
“I don’t want to spoil my appetite.”
“This coming from a guy who eats a dozen donuts in one sitting.”
“I’ve scaled back to a half a dozen.”
She sipped another spoonful, her pinkie sticking out at a perfect ninety-degree angle.
“I still think it’s an accident,” said Cindy.
“But I’m not getting paid to think it’s an accident.”
She nodded. “You’re getting paid to think ‘what if’.”
“Exactly,” I said. “As in, ‘what if’ I slipped under this table and really turned up the heat in this place?”
“You would never fit under the table.”
“Tables are made to be overturned.”
“We would never be able to come back.”
“What a shame.”
“Nice try,” she said. “So any thoughts on who might want the historian dead?”
“I figure someone who stands to lose if Sylvester the Mummy’s identity were ascertained.”
“Big word for a detective.”
“I’m a big detective.”
“Not sure that correlates.”
“Big word for a professor.”
“I get paid to use big words,” said Cindy. “The murder is over a hundred and twenty years old. The murderer is long gone. Who could possibly stand to lose?”
“Perhaps the family of the murderer. Perhaps there’s a deep dark secret.”
Cindy’s eyes brightened the way they do when she finds me particularly brilliant. I’ve learned to treasure these rare moments. She was nodding her head. “Yes, a good start. Any families stand out?”
“There’s one that has potential. They’re called the Barrons, and they own the town of Rawhide.”
“Own?”
“Yes, own. But keep in mind this isn’t a real town anymore; it’s a tourist attraction. Back in the 1970’s the county of San Bernardino was going to level what remained of the mining town, until a man named Tafford Barron purchased it for cheap and rebuilt it into a sort of amusement park. Barron is quoted as saying he couldn’t let a town built by his family be destroyed.”
“Seems innocent enough.”
“Sure,” I said. “Now he’s running for the House of Representatives. Election’s in six months. According to the local paper out there, Barron has a shot of winning this thing.”
Cindy was nodding and grinning and eating. Multi-tasking at its best. “And what if this historian, Willie Whossit—”
“Clarke”
“Willie Clarke comes in and digs up some incriminating evidence.”
“Or embarrassing evidence.”
“Yes, embarrassing. Either way, something like this could derail a campaign.”
“Possibly,” I said. “It’s at least a start.”
Cindy was looking at me over her Diet Coke with something close to lust in her eyes.
“What?” I said.
“I like this,” she said.
“You do?”
“I love talking about your cases. I love watching you sort through your case. I love being a part of the process, even if it’s from the outside looking in. Being a detective might not have been your first choice in life, but you were born to do it, and I respect you so much for that.”
“I was born for something else, too,” I said.
“Football?”
I shook my head slowly.
“Ah,” she said, blushing. “That.”
Chapter Thirteen
I am not mechanically inclined by nature. I am more of the warrior/lover/artist type. But I do know the basics of car maintenance. So before I headed out into the desert, I topped off the Mustang’s water, checked the oil, tire pressure, air filter and anything else that crossed my mind. A few years back I had the engine rebuilt. Since then, the car ran smooth as hell, which was the way I preferred. More than anything, the car was paid off. A key factor to any struggling detective.
I drove north along Highway 15, the main artery into Las Vegas from southern California. Needless to say, I sat in some traffic. With some time on my hands, and being one of the few who didn’t have gambling on the brain, I was able to relax and enjoy a good book on tape. The book was about things called hobbits and a very important ring.
An hour later I was in the Mojave Desert, passing through cities called Hesperia and Victorville. I wondered if there was a Jimville somewhere. And if there wasn’t, there should be.
The Mojave Desert is famous for its kangaroo rats and Joshua trees. Stephen King once set a story out here, about a Cadillac. Always liked that story.
I wondered if there were any Jim trees.
The heat was intense and uncomfortable. My windows were down, my only air conditioning. Sweat soaked through the back of my shirt and was probably puddling on my leather seat. Nice.
Every now and then someone spotted my cool car and gave me a thumbs-up gesture. I accepted the gesture with a gentle nod of my head. Every now and then someone spotted the cool driver driving the cool car, and gave me a smile. As these were mostly women, I returned the smile. Cindy would have been jealous. Luckily, Cindy wasn’t in the car. Smiles are not cheating. Smiles, in my book, are okay. Unless she’s smiling at other men. Then it’s not okay.
Hypocrite.
I headed off Highway 15 onto a much smaller, one-laned highway. I drove alone for many miles.
Luckily, I had hobbits to entertain me. Unfortunately, the little guys were in a fair bit of trouble, as there seemed to be a lot of interest in this ring.
I checked my temperature gauge. All was okay.
The road was flat, surrounded by a lot of stark, rocky protrusions that were too big for hills and too small for mountains. I racked my brain for all words associated with mountains, but could think of only crags and hillocks. I decided on smallish mountains.
At any rate these smallish mountains were bare and lifeless and would have been equally at home on Mars or Venus—where, as legend has it, men and women are from. Except these burning rocks weren’t barren and empty. Life flourished here, to a degree. Snakes lived in holes. Kangaroo rats avoided the holes with the snakes. Plants clung to life in ways that made sense to evolutionary biologists but seemed remarkable to the rest of us.
A car was coming about a half-mile away. The first car in 20 miles. I was giddy with anticipation. A man was driving. A woman was looking down at a map spread across the dashboard. The backseat was piled with suitcases and clothing. They never saw me waving.
The hobbits escaped the clutches of some very wicked creatures. This was followed by a lot of history of a land called Middle Earth. I almost went to sleep, but persevered, and was rewarded by some more history of Middle Earth. I turned the tape off, for now.
My timing couldn’t have been better.
Nearly two hours after leaving Orange County, as I crested a sort of rise in the road, Rawhide Ghost Town appeared before me.
Howdy partner.
Chapter Fourteen
Rawhide Ghost Town was nestled in a narrow valley between high sun-baked cliffs dotted with mine shafts. Consisting mostly of shops lining a single dirt road and much smaller than its cousin up north, Calico Ghost Town, Rawhide looked more like a Western-themed strip mall.
I parked in front of the first store that grabbed my eye, Huck’s Saloon. For good measure, should anyone show up on a horse, a hitching post still ran the length of the town. Currently, no horses were hitched. Although a handful of cars and trucks were parke
d in front of various stores, the town appeared mostly empty, a true ghost town.
A hot wind swept down Main Street, moaning like the damned and pushing dust before it. Probably the dust was hot, too. No trees or shade. No relief from the sun unless you went inside somewhere.
So I decided to go inside somewhere, and I chose the saloon. No surprise there.
I pushed my way through a pair of swinging doors. Always wanted to do that. And not even a squeak after all these years....
The saloon was empty. No cowboys knocking back a few. No barroom fights in progress. No bartender cowering behind the bar because word had spread that Big Bad Jim Knighthorse was coming to town. I tipped my Anaheim Angels hat at the empty room, stuck my thumbs in my pockets, and moseyed on into the saloon.
It was a real saloon, so far as I could tell. There was even a stage for the dancing girls and a player piano on the floor beneath it. Sadly, no dancing girls. I sat at the wraparound bar. Before me was a huge mirror. There were some bottles of not-so-authentic liquor stacked in front of the mirror. I smiled at the handsome man in the mirror. He smiled back, and we played that game for perhaps another two seconds.
A woman appeared from the back of the bar, spurs jangling, carrying a case of Bud Light. She was wearing a cowboy hat, and a bright smile. I have the effect on people.
“Howdy, partner,” she said.
“Howdy ma’am,” I said. “Is this where I tip my hat?”
“Maybe if you were wearing a cowboy hat.” She put the case into a glass refrigerator. I noticed in passing her arms were roped with muscle. “Were you waiting long?”
“Just sat down.”
“Good. What can I get you?”
“Rolling Rock, no glass. And some information, no glass.”
She opened the refrigerator door again, grabbed a green bottle and placed it on top of a little square napkin to protect the deeply rutted counter top. Her work done for the morning, she leaned a curved hip on the bar. Her dark hair was pulled back in a ponytail. She crossed her arms under her chest. The long sleeves of her red-checkered flannel were rolled up to her elbows. Veins crossed her forearms, just under the skin. She looked like she could kick Calamity Jane’s ass.