Muller, Marcia - [11] Trophies and Dead Things(v1.0)(html) (24 page)

No, I decided, I can't call Ma back until this whole thing is over.

At quarter past eleven Rae and I sat cross-legged on her brass bed
playing what seemed like our thousandth game of gin rummy; we'd been at
it since nine. Initially we'd discussed the snipings and the Hilderly
case, but then we'd fallen silent. Now the only sounds were the slap of
the cards, the distant bellow of foghorns, and small moans and sighs of
contentment from the trunk under the dormer window, where Ralph and
Alice curled together in luxurious sleep. Rae was baby-sitting them
tonight, since Ted had gone to a memorial service for their former
owner.

I had to admit how tranquilizing the presence of a sleeping cat could
be. And Rae's room—which she'd created herself at the rear of the
Victorian's unfinished attic, after she'd lived in her office for
months and none of the regular rooms had become available—was lovely. A
snug aerie full of plants and white wicker furniture and splashed with
yellows and golds and greens, it revealed her heretofore unknown flair
for interior decorating on a small budget.

I picked up a king and discarded a trey. "Gin."

She glared at me. "I've been waiting for one card since the deal."

"Them's the breaks." I didn't even bother to write down the score, just
let my hand gravitate toward a stainless-steel bowl containing the
dregs of a batch of popcorn. Comfort food is what I call things like
popcorn and macaroni-and-cheese and milkshakes and butterscotch
pudding—food that is reminiscent of childhood and reduces the world to
simple terms when it becomes too complicated to bear.

Rae said, "What's the matter—you feeling gruffly?" 

I smiled at the word, one of
those that I've come to consider Rae-isms. "Yes. I'm sick of gin rummy,
even if I am winning. Is Hank
ever
going to go home?"

"He's turning into a workaholic.
I guess it keeps his mind off the possibility of being shot at." Rae
gathered up the cards and score pad and set them on the nightstand. She
wore an old gray-and-red-plaid flannel bathrobe and had conditioner on
her hair; it stuck up in greasy-looking points. As she flopped back
against the pillows, I noticed she seemed tense and faintly depressed.

"You look kind of gruffly, too,"
I said.

She shrugged.

"Worried about Willie?"

"Not really. He was settled in
for the night when I left there. Had an adult western—the sexy kind,
you know?— and a twelve-pack of Bud. That'll hold him."

"Things not going well with you
two?"

"They're fine. The relationship's
not complex enough for us to have problems. No, what it is, I need to
talk to you about my job."

Uh-oh, I thought. "Go ahead." I
leaned back and whacked my head on one of the bed's brass posts. Rae
saw my predicament and tossed me a pillow.

"Okay," she said. "I'm not
complaining, you understand. You're a great boss. It's just that . . .
the other day when I was out in the field? It really felt good. And it
made me realize that I'm not sticking to my original game plan. Shar,
I'd like to take on more work, build up my hours to the point where I
can get my own license. And I want to get firearms-qualified. I think
it's time."

I felt a wrenching: chick leaving
the nest. In Rae's case getting the license would surely motivate a
departure. For one thing, she was too bright and talented to remain at
All Souls doing my scut work; for another, that was the game plan she'd
referred to. I couldn't blame her for wanting more than a relatively
small salary, a pile of debts, a room that wasn't really a room, and a
bathroom one flight down that she shared with numerous other people.
And I certainly wouldn't stand in her way.

"I think you're right," I said.
"I haven't really been giving you as much responsibility as you're
capable of handling. Tomorrow we'll look over what we have on tap, and
I'll assign more to you."

She smiled, pleased and relieved.
Then she studied me over her bent knees. "You don't look too happy
about this."

"I'm glad that you've progressed
so far in such a short time. In a way, it's a compliment to me. But
I'll miss you. I've come to rely on you. Besides, who am I going to
play gin rummy or take long lunch hours with?"

"Miss me? I'm not going anywhere."

"I thought you'd want to go to a
better firm."

"Shar, that was
before,
when
I had Doug dependent on me for everything. I don't need as much money
anymore. And I love All Souls as much as you do. In a way, it's like
the family I never had." Rae had been brought up by her grandmother
after the early deaths of her parents, and the grandmother, by her own
admission, hadn't relished the responsibility.

I said, "Do you realize that's
one of the first times I've heard you refer to your ex without 'the
asshole' appended to his name?"

"Yeah, well, maybe I'm growing
up." There was
a
knock
at the door. She called, "Come on in."

Hank entered, looking drawn and
weary. He glanced at Rae's hair and said, "Jesus, you look like you're
wearing a greasy fright wig."

"Perhaps, but tomorrow I will
have sleek auburn tresses. And you will still look like you're wearing
a used Brillo pad."

That coaxed a smile out of him.
"Touché."
To
me he added, "I'm ready to go home now, if my secret-service woman
will deign to accompany me." In spite of the light words, his tone was
tense.

I grabbed the popcorn bowl and
stood. "Let's go."
 

Rae got up, too, and removed the
bowl from my hands. "I'll take that. I want to check and see if
there're any good late movies on the tube."

Together we trooped down two
flights of stairs. Ralph and Alice followed, taking an occasional
tumble, refreshed for another attempt at ripping the place to shreds.
In the hallway Rae said good night and herded them toward the kitchen.

Hank already had his coat on. I
collected my bag and jacket from Rae's office. When I came out, he was
standing by the door. I said, "Wait a minute," and took out the .38.

Hank's eyes moved to it, and he
swallowed. The possibility that the sniper might wait outside was
tangible to him now. I asked, "Are you sure you wouldn't rather just
stay here tonight?"

". . . Can't. This case I'm
trying is important. I've got to get some sleep."

"All right, then. Stay put while
I take a look around."

I opened the door and went out
onto the front steps, gun ready. The fog was dense and still. Through
it I could barely make out hazy lights in the houses on the other side
of the little park; its few shade trees and trash dumpster were deep in
mist-laden darkness. I stood for over a minute, watching and listening.
Nothing moved, and the only sounds that came to my ears were those of a
normal late evening in a quiet neighborhood.

Finally I stepped back inside and
said to Hank, "It looks okay out there, but what we're going to do is
make it obvious that there are two of us. My car's in the driveway, and
the passenger door is unlocked. Don't hesitate or look around, just get
in and slouch down. We'll drive to your place and pull right into the
garage."

"What about my car?"

"We'll just leave it here. I'll
pick you up in the morning so you can get it before you have to be in
court. Hopefully this'll be cleared up by tomorrow night."
I opened the door again and stepped back onto the porch.

Hank hesitated a few beats before
he joined me. Behind him I saw Rae watching us, backlit against the
kitchen door.

Outside, everything was as still
as before. I scrutinized the park once more. Hank closed the door
behind us. I started down the steps, putting my body in front of his.
But for some reason he moved to my left. "Hey!—"

And then the branches of a tree
at the edge of the park moved. Rippled, even though there was no
breeze. I moved back in front of Hank, yelling at him to get down.

There was a whine. The pillar
next to me splintered. A wood fragment grazed my cheek as I heard the
gunshot.

Hank froze.

I hit him with the full weight of
my body. Knocked him against the far railing.

Another whine. Another report.
Hank grunted and tumbled down the steps.

I slid after him. Flattened my
body on the pavement. No more shots. Nothing.

I moved my hand toward Hank.
Touched something warm and wet. Brought my fingers up in front of my
eyes. Blood.

I raised my head to stare at him.
He lay very still, and the pavement around us was already staining red.
 

Frantically I felt Hank's neck
for a pulse. It was there—weak and erratic.

Someone at the top of the steps
shouted something about calling 911. Then Rae was kneeling beside me,
grasping my arm. "Oh, Jesus—is he alive?"

"Yes—barely." I shook off her
hand and stood, scanning the park. A figure was running uphill from its
apex, barely visible in the thick mist.

The bastard had waited to make
sure he'd hit Hank!

Rage welled up in me—cold,
controlled, purposeful. I glanced at Hank, saw Jack and Larry were with
him now. Doing more for him than I could. Doing more than I had. I felt
as if I were viewing the scene through a polished pane of glass—one I
wanted to smash into jagged, glittering shards.

I gripped my gun so hard my
fingers hurt. Then I began running uphill, too, just as the sniper
disappeared into the mist.

The sidewalk was uneven and
steeply canted. I stumbled and banged into a car that was parked across
it. A couple who were cautiously descending toward the commotion at All
Souls saw my face, then my
gun, and gave me a wide berth. I ran to the top of the grassy triangle,
where I'd last spotted the fleeing figure.

Higher up, the fog was even
thicker. It dimmed what lights were on in the surrounding houses, made
the familiar terrain alien, confusing. I stopped to get my bearings.

Several narrow streets converged
at the top of the park, then fanned off in different directions. He
could have strolled down any of them like an ordinary pedestrian,
perhaps intending to return as a bystander to the chaotic scene below.
The thought heightened my rage, which was already burning dangerously
high—directed outward at the sniper, but also inward at myself for
failing to protect Hank. I hesitated, damping it down, peering through
the shifting grayness.

Diagonally from where I stood was
one of those little wooded areas that dot Bernal Heights—a mere strip
of land covered with fir trees. I studied it, then moved slowly across
the intersection, gun raised.

A tall figure darted from the
trees' dark shelter. I shouted for him to stop. Would have fired, but
then he vanished again. Lights flashed on in a nearby house; their rays
showed him fleeing uphill, on the steepest section of Coso Avenue. I
went after him.

The man—he ran like one—took the
steps that were cut into the sloping sidewalk three at a time. I raced
along on the pavement beside them. I could hear his gasping, wheezing
breath now. His feet slapped the concrete in counterpoint to mine. From
behind me came excited voices and distant sirens.

He overshot the intersection with
Prospect Avenue and kept climbing. Beyond the iron railing bordering
the steps were houses; across Coso was a long lot enclosed in a high
wooden fence and then a cliff face—some fifty or sixty feet of sheer
rock. He kept on climbing the steps, but then two figures appeared at
the top of the hill, their outlines blurred by the fog. Their voices
carried—young, strong, male. I yelled for them to stop the running man.

He whirled. Hesitated for only an
instant, then darted across the street. Looked from side to side, then
disappeared into a two-or three-foot gap between the high fence and
the cliff face. The young men whirled, too—and vanished over the hill.

Cowards!

I
sprinted across Coso. Stopped
and flattened my body against the fence next to the opening. My breath
came hard; blood roared in my ears. I tried to listen, but could hear
nothing from the gap behind the fence.

A trap? Was he aiming his gun at
the opening?

After a moment I inched along and
peered down there. The fog was trapped in the narrow pocket—waist-high
and thick as smoke from a brush fire. It moved sinuously away from me
and trailed off into the darkness.

I still could hear nothing, not
even a telltale pant or wheeze. Finally I slipped around the corner,
staying flat against the fence. The ground was rocky and uneven; I
tested it carefully with my foot before I took each step. Ahead was
total blackness. It was as if I were entering a tunnel that had no end.

And then I heard something: the
snap of a branch. I moved along more quickly, and my foot banged into a
heavy object. It rolled and thumped into the fence.

More branches snapped and
cracked. Then there were thrashing noises, stumbling footsteps.

I felt along the cliff face with
my left hand, moving quickly toward the source of the noise. Now I
could make out a stand of brush whose uppermost branches were outlined
against the sky. It appeared to completely block the narrow passageway.
When I neared it, I smelled the sharp odor of anise.