The Fedora Fandango: A Dieselpunk Adventure (The Crossover Case Files Book 5)

by Richard Levesque

  “Sure,” I said and unfolded the slip of paper.

  “Dear Elvira,” the letter began. “I was very happy to know my friend Jed found you. I was also happy to read what you wrote. I am sorry that you had to spend so much time without your father. Thank you for telling me about your mother and about your feelings for the Guillermo Garcia who raised you. I remember you every day and have missed you deep in my heart. I want to see you. And your mother. My friend Jed will tell you why it is not safe yet. But maybe someday. I’m glad you are such a successful person in your life. You make me very proud. Sincerely, Guillermo Garcia.”

  I folded the sheet of paper and regarded my friend. “It’s fine, Guillermo.”

  “No mistakes?” he asked.

  “None that I saw.”

  “Thank you, lobo.”

  We shook hands, and I went back to the car.

  Half an hour later, after traveling through morning traffic, we arrived at Evergreen Cemetery in Boyle Heights, parking across the street from the little house that—in another world—belonged to Guillermo’s daughter. It looked just as pleasant here as I had seen it on the other side.

  “Should we just cross over here?” Carmelita asked as we got out of the car. “I don’t see anyone around.”

  “We can’t,” I said. “Someone might be watching from one of those houses. And we can’t forget that we’re passing into another world. We don’t want to pop out of thin air right in front of an old lady walking her dog, do we?”

  “I suppose not. Where then?”

  “In there,” I said, nodding toward the cemetery.

  We traipsed across the grass, threading our way among the headstones. Natural curiosity led to my looking at a few names and dates, doing the math on people’s lives as we walked.

  “This is something I don’t understand about humans,” Carmelita said.

  “Cemeteries?” I asked.

  “Grief. What does it feel like?”

  “Do you miss Osvaldo when you can’t see him?”

  She stayed silent for a moment. “I do see him. It’s easy to call up the memory of good times together when I have to be away from him. Like now when I’m staying with Sherise.”

  “That’s good.” We were crossing a section of graves dedicated to Japanese Americans who’d fought in the war. This gave me pause, as I didn’t want to walk across their actual resting places, so I threaded my way even more carefully than I had been while passing among the civilian graves nearer the street. Turning to her as we neared the edge of this section, I said, “Can you destroy any of your memories? Block out the data so it’s impossible to recall?”

  “I’ve never tried to do that. What would be the point?”

  “Maybe you need more room for new information. The reason is beside the point. I just want to know if it’s possible.”

  She remained silent a moment and then said, “Yes. That is something I could do.”

  “What if told you to destroy all your memories of Osvaldo? How do you think that would feel?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Why don’t you choose one. Just a simple one. And get rid of it.”

  “But then it would be gone forever.”

  “Yes,” I said. “And if you couldn’t see Osvaldo or call up his memories, then that’s what grief feels like.”

  “No,” she said. “That can’t be accurate. You still remember people who’ve died. You don’t erase the memory.”

  “That’s true. But memories are all we have. The past. We grieve because they’re gone from our present and our future. We miss them.”

  She remained silent as we approached a medium-sized mausoleum that was surrounded by a row of cypress trees about eight feet high.

  “I think in here will be good,” I said as I led her into a space between the white marble wall and the green branches.

  “So, missing someone is the same as grieving,” she said.

  “It’s close. You can miss someone because you can’t see them. But if they’re gone forever, it’s worse. More intense. And it’s especially hard if the person was very close to you or they died young or tragically.”

  “Like Annabelle.”

  “Yes,” I said, caught short. I hadn’t been expecting to have my memories of Annabelle triggered this way, not here. “Like that.”

  “I think I understand,” she said.

  “Good. Now, can you open a portal here? You’ve got the coordinates for Jetpack Jed’s world?”

  “Of course,” she said.

  Without another word, she closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, a faint beam of light emerged from her left eye, and a portal opened about three feet away from her.

  “Is it ready?” I asked.

  “Yes. You can pass through. I’ll shut it off and then come through before the portal destabilizes.”

  “Well, let’s hope we’re not coming through in the middle of someone’s nice funeral.”

  “That would make it memorable, wouldn’t it?” she asked.

  I smiled and said, “We don’t want to be memorable.”

  Then, making sure my hat was still firmly on my head, I crossed through.

  The cypress trees were in this world, too, and I was nicely shielded from anyone else who was in the graveyard. I pushed my way through the space between the branches and the mausoleum to give Carmelita enough room to pass into this world without crashing into me. When she came through, I gave her a nod and then we waited a few more seconds for the portal to disappear.

  “All right,” I said, pointing. “We’re just going over there. Across the street.”

  “I’m still not sure why we’re doing this,” she said.

  “Because I need to secure a place where I can cross back and forth if I want to track Elsa down and bring her back.”

  “Can’t we just use this cemetery? Or somewhere like it?”

  “We could,” I said as we started working our way back to the street. “But then I’d need to keep you with me the whole time, and I need you to be with Sherise, at least until tomorrow night.”

  We were at the curb now, and I was glad to leave the graves behind us for a few minutes. Elvira’s house was right across the street, and I led Carmelita to it, planning on knocking on the door and going from there. Instead, the door opened when we were halfway up the walkway.

  Elvira Ruiz stepped out, dressed in a professional suit of matching knee-length skirt and jacket. A shiny black purse hung off her left wrist. She half turned to lock the door behind her and then noticed Carmelita and me approaching. This made her come up short, looking from me to my companion with an expression of surprise as she simply said, “Oh.”

  “Sorry to show up unannounced,” I said. “But I don’t exactly have a way of reaching you ahead of time.”

  She might have heard me and she might not. Her eyes were riveted to Carmelita’s face, her expression somewhere between fear and amazement. I realized she was looking at a version of what she had probably looked like some thirty years earlier, Guillermo having designed Carmelita as a near-double of his deceased wife, whom Elvira also resembled in an uncanny way.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “Elvira Ruiz, this is my associate, Carmelita Garcia. Carmelita, please meet Elvira Ruiz.”

  “Hello,” Carmelita said with a smile.

  “Hello,” Elvira echoed. Then, to me, she said, “Your associate?”

  “Yes. And more than that.”

  The woman tried to stare at me, clearly waiting for a response, but Carmelita’s face was like a magnet that pulled Elvira’s visage away from mine.

  “You’re Guillermo’s daughter?” Carmelita asked, a perfect smile on her lips.

  “Yes,” Elvira answered, her voice barely above a whisper.

  “In a way, I am, too,” Carmelita said. “Guillermo constructed me. I believe he modeled me after his late wife, who you look surprisingly similar to.”

  Elvira was silent for several seconds. When she finally turned to me, she
said, “She’s mechanical.”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “And…my sister?”

  “In a way.”

  Without another word, she opened her arms and approached Carmelita. My assistant gave me an uncertain look for half a second and then stepped forward to embrace Elvira. They truly did look like sisters.

  When they stepped apart again, I said, “I’m sorry if we caught you on your way out, but I have a few things I need to ask you. And something to deliver. We only need a couple minutes.”

  “That’s fine,” she said. “I’m not in a rush. How can I help you?”

  “Did a woman named Katrina Mulligan reach out to you for help a few days ago?”

  “She did. She told me you gave her my number.”

  “I hope that was all right.”

  “Yes, yes. Of course. I told her I don’t do that kind of law, but I put her in contact with someone who does. Her situation should work out.”

  “Did they arrest her husband for killing Penny King?”

  She smiled. “They did.”

  “That’s good. I was hoping you’d say so.”

  “Can I ask why?”

  “It’s probably best if you don’t.”

  She nodded and said nothing more.

  “Do you think you could give me the number for the lawyer you referred Katrina to?” I asked.

  “Of course. Do you want to write it down?”

  “You can just tell me,” Carmelita said. “I won’t forget.”

  Elvira smiled and rattled off the number from memory.

  “Thank you,” I said. Then, reaching into my pocket for Guillermo’s note, I added, “I brought this for you.”

  Elvira reached for it with trembling fingers. “It’s from him?”

  “Yes.”

  She looked to Carmelita for confirmation and got a nod and a smile of encouragement in response.

  I watched her unfold the letter and read it. When she was done, there were tears in her eyes. “He makes it sound…” she began and took a deep breath before going on. “He makes it sound like in your world I’m not…in his life.”

  “Yes,” I said. “That’s true.”

  “Please don’t say anymore. If I’m not…in that world, I don’t want to know the details. Do you understand?”

  “Of course.”

  “He said you’d explain why we can’t see each other.”

  “There are some complications that arise from making multiple crossings.”

  “That doesn’t seem to be affecting you.”

  “Not now. But there have been problems. Guillermo’s trying to get it under control.”

  “Well, that’s good,” she said. “If it does become possible, I need him to understand that I can’t tell my mother. None of it. She’s too frail. I fear I won’t have her for much longer as it is. All of this…it would be too much of a shock.”

  “I understand.” I said. “And I’m sorry you’re having to go through that. I hope we haven’t made things harder for you.”

  She shook her head and said, “No. Not at all. You’ve actually given me a lot of things to think about. Helped me get distracted.”

  “That’s good to know.” I cleared my throat then and asked, “Would it be imposing if we asked for a ride downtown? I assume that’s where you’re headed?”

  “It is, and I’d be glad to.”

  Her hovercar was in the garage. She led the way down the driveway and into the little outbuilding. Soon, we were on our way downtown; I rode in front and Carmelita in the back.

  When the car neared the bridge over the Los Angeles River, I turned to see Carmelita staring out the windows at the glass spires of this version of the city. “What do you think, Carmelita?” I asked.

  “It’s amazing.”

  “Your version of the city is different?” Elvira asked.

  “You could say so,” I said.

  “Much less shiny,” Carmelita added.

  I asked if Elvira knew of a newsstand that wouldn’t be out of her way, and a few minutes after we were across the river, she pulled to the curb next to a bustling stand whose racks were loaded with papers and magazines.

  “Is this good?” Elvira asked.

  “Perfect.”

  I thanked her and got out. Carmelita stuck around inside the car for a moment; I supposed the “sisters” were saying their goodbyes, but it went on a little long. Before I got too impatient, Carmelita climbed out of the hovercar. Then the doors slid shut and Elvira glided on her way.

  “What was that all about?” I asked.

  “I asked her if she still grieved for her father,” Carmelita said as she smoothed her skirt.

  “This grief thing is really making your gears spin, isn’t it?”

  “My brain doesn’t run on gears, Jed. You should know that it’s a complex system of—”

  “All right, all right. I’m sorry. What did she say?”

  “She said she thinks of her father every day but that it doesn’t make her sad anymore. I told her that it didn’t seem like grieving then. She told me that the sadness still comes but when she least expects it. And then she said the strangest thing.”

  “What was that?”

  “She said the sadness makes her happy because it means her father isn’t forgotten. Do you think she believes she’s really keeping him alive in her memory?”

  “I suppose. Your memory works the same way, doesn’t it?”

  “I’ll have to think about that.”

  The newsstand had a startling variety of newspapers and magazines to choose from. I gave Carmelita the job of perusing a few to find information on the Mulligan case while I went to the proprietor and broke a dollar to get change for a payphone, using one of the bills from the wallet I’d liberated from Jetpack when I’d last seen him.

  Elvira’s lawyer friend didn’t want to talk to me, not even when I told her who’d given me the number. She wouldn’t even confirm that Katrina Mulligan was her client, let alone give information on Katrina’s whereabouts or her health. I told myself I shouldn’t be surprised and also that it was just as well. The lawyer’s caginess meant that Katrina was in good hands. After all, I expected that her husband—whether he was in jail or not—still had powerful friends who could do some damage if they could get into Katrina’s head.

  I disconnected and went back to Carmelita, who had a newspaper in her hand. The masthead read The Los Angeles Times.

  “Anything?” I asked.

  “Yes, but I think that man wants us to buy the paper.”

  I glanced at the newsstand proprietor and saw that he was giving us an impatient scowl. “That’s fine,” I said, walking over and giving the man his fee. Then I waved Carmelita over and went back to the payphone. I called a cab and then asked Carmelita what she’d discovered.

  “Peter Mulligan is behind bars,” she said. “He was denied bail. The story says he’s considered a flight risk and poses a danger to a key witness in the case.”

  “That would be Katrina.”

  “I figured as much.”

  “Good work, Carmelita,” I said.

  “Thanks. I also found something out about Seth Wheatley.”

  “The DA? What is it?”

  “In this world, he’s still alive.”

  “How do you know?”

  “There was an event last night at the Observatory. The chief of police announced that he’s running for governor, and Wheatley introduced him to the crowd.”

  I nodded at this. “All right. That’s good to know. Anything else?”

  “Not that I could tell.”

  “Good enough. Let’s bring that paper back with us. I’ll give it a look later. It might yield a clue or two.”

  Carmelita looked pleased at this. She had the paper folded and tucked under her arm, and I could tell there wasn’t any way I was going to get it away from her now without a fight. I tried to conceal a smile at her enthusiasm as we walked to the curb and watched the approaching traffic.

&nbs
p; All that was left now was to wait for the hovercab to take us back to the cemetery so we could make an inconspicuous return to our world. This, of course, would mean another walk in and out of the cemetery, and I braced myself for more questions about grief.

  It was a good thing I had lots of information stored up on the subject.

  Chapter Six

  We went back to Guillermo’s from Boyle Heights to pick up Jack. When we got there, I gave Guillermo the rundown on how things had gone with Elvira. On the drive to Chavez Ravine, I had convinced Carmelita to let me leaf through the newspaper. Not having found anything else useful in its pages, I offered it to Guillermo.

  “For inspiration,” I said as I handed it to him. Then I added, “Carmelita picked it up over there. She’s doing a great job.”

  They both beamed upon hearing this.

  Before leaving again, I used Guillermo’s phone to put in a call to O’Neal.

  “Your dog’s fine,” I said before she had the chance to ask me about Jack.

  “That’s good. How can I help you, Jed?”

  “Peggy says you’ve got a lead on Beadle. I really need to talk to him. You think he can be convinced to crawl out from under his rock?”

  “I don’t know, Jed. But…I don’t have time to play around with you on this.”

  “Can you just tell me how to get hold of him? Then you won’t have to worry about any of it.”

  “I’ll have to worry if you end up getting that old man tangled up with this Hennigar fellow.”

  “He’s already tangled up.”

  She sighed. “All I’ve got is a number,” she said.

  “I’ll take it.”

  After she read me the number and I repeated it back, she said, “Take care of my dog, Jed. Don’t let this thing get in the way.”

  “Your dog is going to be fine, Detective. I promise.”

  We hung up, and I called the number she’d given me. Beadle answered in a tentative way, trying to disguise his voice.

  “Don’t hang up on me, Cosmo,” I said.

  “There’s no one here by that name,” he said after a moment’s pause.

  “It’s Jed Strait, Cosmo. You can stop acting.”

  “Strait? How’d you get this number?”

  “Friends in high places.”