Eureka

by William Diehl

  Riker reached the first floor and ducked into the pool room. Adrenaline-spiked, he looked as crazed as the victims he had left on the second floor. He went to the corner of the room, pulled open the door. A broom closet. He went to the next. A large boiler rumbled in one corner, fed by gas and feeding hot water into the heated pool. Riker backed across to the room to the door, aimed at the gas valve, fired his shotgun, and dove through the opening.

  I was halfway across the ward when I heard the boom of the shotgun followed by the gas explosion. The floor erupted, showering the room with bodies, bedding, chairs, shards of tile. An instant later, a geyser of flame burst through the hole. The searing blast struck me, throwing me on my back. The whole room began to tremble. Flames ate the deck, the ceiling, the walls.

  Inmates were tossed around like puppets without strings.

  A young woman staggered toward me, her brown hair ablaze. I scurried across the floor, pulled her down, and beat out the flames with my hands.

  A crack jagged across the floor under me. I started to get up. There was another explosion. More debris swept through the room.

  The floor split open and collapsed beneath me.

  I plunged, arms and legs flailing, straight down into the swimming pool below.

  It knocked my breath out. I was in a surreal world. A world of debris, of gowned bodies chained to sleeping-cots, a world tainted by orange flames reflecting off the surface above.

  I hit bottom, got my legs under me, pushed upward through the wreckage to the surface, and burst out gasping for breath. The building was ablaze around me. As I reached the side, a hand grabbed my wrist and pulled me out of the pool. It was Max. He shoved me along the edge of the pool, shielding me from the flames, to the north door. We rushed outside. Cool night air filled my lungs. Then I remembered Rusty.

  “Rusty?” I asked.

  “He’s hurting but he’s okay,” Max said, as we rushed away from the flaming pyre.

  “Riker . . .”

  “I didn’t see him.”

  Inmates in their white gowns were staggering around the yard, babbling inanely, some pointing at the blazing ward and giggling, some flailing at their burning gowns.

  “He can’t be far,” I said. He went one way, I went another, both of us working our way through the stunned victims of the fire. Behind me, another fireball erupted from the burning building.

  In the flare of the explosion I saw Riker.

  He was twenty yards ahead of me, wielding a switchblade, slashing at the crazed tenants. He grabbed one of the inmates by the hair, threw him to his knees, slashed his throat, and pulled off his gown, putting it on himself.

  “Riker!” I yelled.

  He turned and looked at me. I pulled my Luger and walked toward him.

  He looked down at my gun and then back at me and laughed.

  “That pistol’s soaking wet. It isn’t worth shit,” he hissed. He held the knife toward me.

  “Come on,” he said, and rushed at me. I held the Luger at arm’s length and squeezed the trigger.

  It misfired.

  He was so close I could feel the heat from his burning body when he slashed my arm with the knife. As he did, another screaming human comet rushed to him, grabbed him, and knocked him down. Riker tried to struggle free but the human torch was twice his size. Flames licked at Riker’s purloined robe, etched up it, set Riker’s hair on fire. As fire engulfed them both, he kicked and screamed, and finally rolled over and broke free of his fiery captor. His terrified eyes locked on mine for a moment. He charged up at me.

  He was three feet away from me, engulfed in fire, his face literally melting from the flames, when I heard the whoosh and saw a flash of silver an instant before the thick knife blade pierced his throat. It cut windpipe and jugular and went all the way through his neck, stopped only by the hilt of the bowie knife.

  Riker’s scream was cut off as air rushed from his lungs and blood spewed from his jugular, and the vile mixture of breath and blood burst from his throat. Riker’s mouth gaped open. I stared into eyes of pure madness and watched life flicker out of them before he fell dead.

  Big Redd walked up and looked at my arm. He pulled out his shirt, tore a strip off the tail, and tied it tight just above the knife wound.

  “Thanks,” I said. “That’s two I owe you.”

  “One,” he said. “Charlie and I fished together.”

  It was the second and last time I heard him speak a word.

  CHAPTER 41

  In the morning’s light, the back side of the Shuler Institute looked like a battlefield. The security building had burned itself out and collapsed into the swimming pool. All that was left was a huge pile of charred lumber. Firemen were rolling up their hoses, the last ambulance and the last of the hearses had pulled out.

  A tall, burly man in a state trooper’s uniform, with one of those Boy Scout hats pulled down low on his forehead, found me drinking coffee in a clinic they had set up in one of the smaller buildings. A kindly old doctor had used twelve stitches to sew my arm back together.

  The trooper offered me his wolf’s paw of a hand and said, “I’m Major Stacks, from up at the San Luis Obispo Station. Are you up to a few questions?”

  “Sure,” I said. “I could use a drink about now but people would talk.”

  He smiled formally and took out a pad and pen.

  “What was the final death toll here?” I asked.

  “Seventeen dead, fourteen injured.” He said it as casually as if he were talking about the score of a football game. “Could you just kind of run over the events of last night for me?”

  I remembered Moriarity’s advice: “Keep it simple.” I started with the APB on Riker and Dahlmus, gave him the front-page version up to the shoot-out at the Shuler Corral, and ended with Riker stabbing the defenseless mental patient and Big Redd’s bowie knife ending Riker’s days among the living.

  “Well, that’s pretty much the way the big Indian says it ended,” Walker said.

  “And far be it from me to contradict anything a big Indian with a bowie knife might tell you,” I said. Then I held up my arm. “Riker sliced about six inches out of this before Mr. Redd came to my rescue.”

  He flipped his book shut and nodded his thanks. “You will be around if we have any other questions, won’t you?”

  “You can find me at Central Homicide in L.A. anytime.”

  “Little off your beat, weren’t you?” he said.

  “I had bad directions.”

  He shook his head and smiled.

  “By the way, did you hear about Captain Culhane?” he said, stopping at the door.

  “Did something happen to him?”

  “Osterfelt and Bellini announced this morning that they were joining forces. Osterfelt is running for governor and Bellini will run for lieutenant governor. Culhane announced he was cancelling his plans to run and dropped out of the race about thirty minutes ago.”

  “Thanks for the news,” I said, but he was already gone.

  It was noon when I drove up to The Breakers. I parked in front of the place, locked the car as usual, and went in. As I headed for the ballroom, the desk clerk waved at me.

  “Sir,” he said with a little spit in his tone.

  I ignored him. I wasn’t in the mood.

  Then he snapped his fingers at me. Snapped his fingers! I admit I looked like hell. But snapping fingers at human beings does not sit well with me. I went back to the desk. He looked me up and down, and raised his nose an inch or two.

  “Excuse me, sir. Are you visiting someone?”

  I held my arm at full length under his nose and snapped my fingers four or five times in his face, real fast.

  “Do you like that, pal?” I said. “Do you like being treated like a dog?”

  He didn’t know what to do. He started to babble, but I walked away and went up the stairs to the ballroom.

  Little had changed since the night before. The ballroom ceiling was still covered with red, white, and blue
balloons, with red, white, and blue streamers sagging between them. The tablecloths were still the same patriotic colors, as were the paper cups and platters. There was a small bandstand at the end of the room and the music stands were the national colors. But a lot of the balloons had lost air and were flitting around the dance floor under the ceiling fans. There was no band. The large tables on either side of the dance floor were covered with cold cuts, various kinds of bread, potato salad, and baked beans in tureens, but there was no one to eat all the food.

  Culhane was the only person in the room.

  His tie was off and his shirt open and his tux jacket was hung over the back of his chair. He was having a drink.

  I walked the length of the room, kicking balloons out of my way, and stopped at the food table to put together a roast beef on rye bread with plenty of mayo and commandeer a bottle of Budweiser from a large tub filled with ice.

  “Just like a cop,” Culhane growled. “Never pass up a free feed.”

  I sat down across from him and took a swig of beer.

  “And a beer drinker to boot.”

  “Only when I’m eating,” I said, and held the bottle up in a toast to him.

  “What’s that for? You toasting to my defeat?”

  “Look at it this way: you scared the hell out of them for a few days and took a walk. The voters deserve Osterfoos and Beldini or whatever the hell their names are.”

  I took a bite of my sandwich and washed it down with a swig of beer.

  “If it’s any consolation,” I said. “I would have voted for you. Hell, I probably could have lined up half the L.A. police force for you.”

  He smiled ruefully. “I should have known those two had something up their sleeves. I wonder how they decided which one was gonna get the big job.”

  I shrugged. “Whoever had the most dirt on the other one.”

  “I hear you guys put on quite a show down there in Mendosa,” he said, changing the subject.

  “You would have loved it,” I said. “We burned down half the institute and used up more ammo than you guys did in the Big War. Hell, it was like the Fourth of July.” I finished the sandwich, then added, “Riker’s right where he should have been all along. Dead.”

  “You did a good job, Cowboy. I once said you were a bulldog. Grab ahold and never let go.”

  “Thanks. Just for the record, if Redd hadn’t iced the son of a bitch, I would have.”

  He looked across the table at me and smiled one of those enigmatic smiles of his. He knew what I meant. With Riker out of the way, the state would deep-six the case against Culhane for framing Riker. There was nobody left to file a complaint and why bother? It was a twenty-year-old case and Riker had proved to be a murderous psycho. They probably wouldn’t have proceeded with it anyway, since Riker had finally ended up having Wilma Thompson killed. But I also knew Brodie would carry the stain of the frame-up for the rest of his career.

  “You know Osterfelt might even offer you the attorney general’s spot,” I said.

  “Suure.” He chuckled. “When the sun rises in the west.”

  “Why didn’t you stay in the race? Everybody in the state would’ve known them for the bottom-feeders they are.”

  “It costs a lot of money to run that kind of race. Most of it would’ve come from friends of mine.”

  “They can afford it.”

  “I couldn’t do that, Cowboy, take their money knowing I couldn’t win.”

  “Maybe next time,” I said. “When the voters have a taste of what those two are really like. If it means anything to you, I think you would have been a helluva governor for a year, maybe two. Before the money boys and pols and kingmakers got their claws into you.”

  “You think that would have happened?”

  “It always happens. The key to being a successful politician is compromise, Brodie. And once you compromise, you’re hooked. After that, it’s downhill all the way.”

  “You are a cynic.”

  “Nope, a realist. It happens in all walks. A cop takes an apple. The next thing it’s a buck. Then ten bucks, and the next thing you know he’s sitting in the backseat of a police car altering ballots on election night for fifty bucks a vote. If I learned one thing about you, you don’t compromise easily.”

  “Look who’s talkin’,” he said. “How come you never got hooked?”

  “Because they don’t have anything to offer me. I don’t want anything. I’m happy doing what I’m doing.”

  “Everybody wants something, Cowboy.”

  “You’re probably right. But in my case, it wouldn’t have a price tag on it. You and I are alike in that respect. You sure didn’t want to be governor for the money, you wanted to be governor to clean out that nest of crooks in Sacramento. Or maybe I’m wrong, Brodie, maybe just driving them all crazy would have been enough for you.”

  “We’ll never know, will we?” he said, still smiling.

  I finished my sandwich and washed the remains down with the rest of my beer. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. Then I heard a click behind me and looked around. In a dark corner, a lighter flared into light and I saw Delilah O’Dell’s face for a moment. It snapped out and smoke curled from the shadows.

  “Why don’t you join us,” I said.

  “I’d rather listen to the two of you telling each other how swell you are.”

  But she got up and came over to the table anyway. She was in full blossom, as always. She was wearing a tan shantung pantsuit, with a maroon scarf around her long neck.

  “How’s the arm?” she asked.

  “Just another scar to add to the ones I have already.”

  “That rich dame likes scars, does she?” Delilah said, taking out the makings and rolling two cigarettes.

  “What do you know about that rich dame?”

  She peered up at me and smirked.

  “Who do you think you’re talking to?” she said. “Where do you think Brodie found out about that sissy dog of yours?”

  “Mata Hari, huh?” I said.

  “She was a piker.”

  She lit the two butts, and gave Culhane and me each one. I looked around at what was left of Culhane’s run for governor.

  “Where are all those swells with the money who were making you look like a winner last night?”

  “After I made my bow-out speech, they all went up to the golf course.”

  “How about Brett Merrill and Ben?”

  “They feel bad for me. But I don’t have to tell you that.”

  “That was cute, the way you got off the subject about the lady banker,” Delilah said.

  “You probably know more about her than I do,” I said.

  “You ought to marry her,” Delilah said. “Better than working for a living.”

  “I’m not sure she’s cut out to be a cop’s wife,” I said.

  “I’m not sure you’re cut out to be a rich boy,” Culhane said.

  We got another laugh out of that.

  “Better go home and change clothes before you go by her place,” said Delilah. “Unless you want to scare her to death.”

  “I got one question to ask before I head out,” I said.

  “Christ, you never change,” Culhane said.

  “It’s for Delilah.”

  “Oh?” she said, raising her eyebrows.

  “Did the shooting at Grand View happen just the way they say?”

  She looked at me for a long minute and said, “It happened exactly the way Brodie said it did.”

  I nodded and got up to leave. Then I said to her, “But if it had happened some other way, you’d still say it happened the way Brodie said it did, wouldn’t you?”

  “You bet your sweet ass I would,” she said with a smile, and without hesitation. Then she added, “You just don’t get it.”

  “No. Maybe someday I’ll understand why Wilma Thompson and Lila Parrish went on the lam. And who paid them to do it.” I shrugged. “Who cares anyway, right?”

  Wrong. I did care. I fel
t sorry for Wilma. After looking for happiness all those years, she still ended up dead.

  “I’m sorry about Eddie Woods’s wife,” I said.

  His face got very sad. He looked out the window as if there were answers out there to questions we all have about life and death.

  Delilah started to say something but Culhane cut her off.

  “Innocents always get caught in the cross fire,” he said.

  “What’s the dif,” I said. “By tomorrow, it’ll be old news.”

  I got up to leave and we shook hands.

  “For what it’s worth,” I said, “I think you’re an honorable guy. We just play by different rules.”

  “Don’t bet on it.”

  “Thanks for the sandwich,” I said, kicking my way through the balloons on the way to the door.

  “Hey, Cowboy,” Culhane called after me.

  I stopped and looked back at him.

  “You’re a helluva snoop,” he said. “But you had your nose up the wrong dog’s ass on this one.”

  “I think you’re half right,” I said.

  “Don’t you ever admit you’re wrong?”

  “Why bother?”

  “Well, just remember one thing.”

  “What’s that?”

  He gave me a farewell smile.

  “I told you so,” Thomas Brodie Culhane said.

  CHAPTER 42

  I drove back to the house, made a big fuss over Rosie, and gave him two cans of dog food and an extra bone. I kept my arm out of the shower so the bandage wouldn’t get wet, then dressed in my best navy slacks and blue shirt. I stopped by the drugstore and picked up the most expensive bottle of champagne they had, and went next door to the toy store to get a tin bucket, the kind kids take to the beach. There was a little girl, no more than eight or nine, selling roses on the corner. Ten cents apiece. She had sixteen left. I bought them all and gave her five bucks. I thought she was going to cry.

  It was getting dusk when I turned into Millie’s drive.

  She opened the door before I got to it.

  “Hi,” I said, “I happened to be in the neighbor . . .”

  She didn’t let me finish. She pulled me in the house and put the roses and the pail with the champagne on a table near the door and she kissed my cheeks and my lips, and then took the pail and led me up the stairs and into her bathroom. She turned on the faucets to the tub and poured in a bottle of bubble bath. She unbuttoned my shirt slowly, kissing my chest as she did. She unzipped my pants and pulled them down, and sat me down on the edge of the tub and took off my shoes and socks. Then she slowly unbuttoned her shirt and let it fall on the floor, and slipped off her tennis shorts and panties. She stuck a toe in the water, eased herself down into the bubbles, then took my hands and led me into the tub facing her.