by Susan Kandel
Running out of gas was the first surprise of the unpleasant variety.
I sat there for a minute in shock. Then for another minute, willing a tow truck to appear. When that didn’t happen, I opened the glove compartment and flipped through the manual, looking for the chapter on what to do when your life is falling apart, but they’d left that chapter out.
I got out of the car and walked over to the shoulder. Then I saw somebody coming. A minivan. My kind of people.
“Hey!” I screamed, waving my arms frantically as it zoomed past me.
I waited another ten minutes, but not a single car drove by.
I was marooned.
With no cell phone.
I had to find a gas station.
But where?
I’d gone probably twenty miles already, so it was no more than fifteen until Wasco. Could I walk that far in the midday sun in high-heeled black mesh ankle boots without risking dehydration and possible death?
First things first: I had to move the car over to the shoulder.
I got back in the car and hit the hazard lights, then shifted into neutral. Then I got out, leaving the wrecked driver’s side door ajar. With my left arm on the door frame, I summoned every ounce of strength I had in an attempt to push the car forward. But I couldn’t get any traction because the soles of my boots kept slipping, so I took them off and tried again in bare feet, keeping my right hand on the steering wheel so I could guide the car as it rolled.
You know how they say a mother can lift a car off of her baby when it’s a life-or-death situation?
It’s a lie.
I put my boots back on and started down the road. At least I had money. I was going to bribe the gas station attendant into driving me back here. If I found a gas station, that is.
Another car whizzed past me without so much as slowing down. A damsel in distress didn’t mean what it used to. People are so suspicious these days. God, it was hot. I whipped off my fur stole. My feet were hurting already.
Only fourteen and a half miles to go.
I passed a roadside shrine, piled with dead bouquets and a teddy bear wearing a faded red ribbon.
Too bad I believed in omens.
I turned around. I couldn’t see the car anymore. Had I remembered to leave the hazard lights on? That probably wasn’t a good idea, anyway. What if a cop drove by? I had no idea whose plates Jonathan Tucci had given me. They could be another ex-con’s. Maybe somebody who’d done a lot worse than fleeing a jurisdiction. But I couldn’t dwell on that now. What I was going to dwell on instead was the fact that I’d had a full tank of gas last night.
Somebody had wanted this to happen.
Then I tripped on a pebble and just missed falling flat on my face.
“Oh, shit!” I cried out loud. “Why me?”
In the vain hopes of alleviating the sudden intense throbbing in my ankle, I sat down for a minute by the side of the road. At least silk shantung is washable. I had Advil but nothing to drink, and I’m not the kind of person who can swallow a pill without water. I stood up, put a little pressure on the ankle, then a little more. All right. I’d live.
Five minutes later, I’d reached some kind of intersection. And what was that sign? I half-sprinted, half-limped toward it.
A bus stop!
I was saved!
I slowed my pace, put my stole back on, straightened my skirt. Now all I had to do was wait for the bus to show up, then ride it to civilization, where I could find somebody to drive me back to my car and fill it with gas. Maybe give me an ice pack.
I was in front of the sign now. The schedule was posted. The bus to Ellerbee came through every fifteen minutes. No, that was Monday through Friday. On Saturdays, it came once every thirty minutes. But today was Sunday.
The day of rest.
No bus service on Sunday.
I sat down by the side of the road and explored my options.
That didn’t go well.
Then my luck took a 180.
I’m talking about Jean-Claude.
The only Frenchman within hundreds of miles of here.
He’d stopped because of my beret.
Jean-Claude hailed from Lyon. He’d come nine years ago to visit the Mojave Desert and had fallen in love with the area. He’d settled in Joshua Tree and opened a patisserie-boulangerie, which had proven surprisingly popular with the Marine Corps wives stationed in Twentynine Palms. He was on his way to Fresno, the aforementioned raisin capital of California. Business trip. He’d be delighted to drop me at the next service station.
Jean-Claude’s Ford truck was spotless. He gave me a bottle of Fiji water to wash down my Advil and a tarte au citron to take the edge off until lunch. After promising to come visit him someday, I bid him a grateful adieu.
Phil’s Fill ’er Up was a humble establishment. There was a kid working the pump. I explained my plight. He filled up a bright red five-gallon gas can and handed it to me. I almost sank under the weight. There was no way I could walk back with that. The kid offered to drive me, but he wouldn’t be available until the end of his shift. At six o’clock. Which would be too late. Dorothy Johnson would’ve left work for the day.
I started with fifty, and went up to two hundred, but he was unwilling to desert his post. So I called a taxi.
Dmitri showed up twenty minutes later.
Dmitri was Russian and didn’t speak a word of English, but when we pulled up to my car and I pointed to my gas tank, then to him while smiling encouragingly and waving a twenty, he seemed to understand.
But then Dmitri got a call on his cell phone and much screaming ensued, following which Dmitri threw his cell phone on the ground and stomped on it. Then he picked it up, shaking his head sorrowfully at me, and got back into the taxi and zoomed off.
Fine. I’d seen people do this a million times on TV.
But they’d had funnels.
I crawled into the back seat of the car and found an old piece of newspaper. Then I dug through my purse and found a piece of Bazooka bubble gum, which I unwrapped and popped in my mouth. When it was nice and chewed, I rolled the newspaper up, then secured the ends with the wad of gum.
Now I had a funnel, too.
I took off my jacket and stole to allow for sufficient freedom of movement.
There was a long tube attached to the cap of the gas can. I removed it and inserted it into the gas tank. Then I stuck the funnel into the end of the tube, hefted the heavy can into place, and started to pour, as slowly as I could.
When the can was empty, I pulled out the funnel and the tube, put the cap back on, sat down in the driver’s seat, and turned the key in the ignition.
Incroyable.
I turned the car around so I could return the tank to the kid at Phil’s Fill ’er Up.
And that was when I heard it.
Inside the car.
In the back seat.
A phone was ringing.
I pulled over, killed the engine, and slowly turned around, afraid of what I might see.
A hot pink cell phone.
Oh, no.
How had it gotten here?
I didn’t have to pick it up. Not this time.
It was still ringing.
Damn it.
I reached back and flipped it open.
“You shouldn’t leave your car unlocked,” said the person on the other end of the line. “It’s dangerous, Cece.”
Cold as ice.
Hard as a stone.
My hand flew up to my blond hair. So much for the security measures.
“Where are you?” I asked. “How’d you find me?”
“We’ve had this conversation before, haven’t we?”
“What do you want from me?”
“It’s too late for that. I’m just checking in, that’s all.”
“Leave me alone,” I said.
“Is that an order?”
I squared my shoulders. “It’s a threat.”
He laughed. “You’re threatenin
g me?”
“Yes. I’m going to find out who you are, and you’re going to pay for what you’ve done. Good-bye.”
I hung up. I was shaking all over. But I also felt strangely liberated.
Then I looked at the phone.
It was my phone. The one I’d thought I’d lost. It must’ve been in the car all along. How had I missed it?
I hadn’t missed it.
He’d put it here.
When I was getting gas?
When I was at the E-Z Nights?
When it was parked in the driveway of my house?
I had no way of knowing.
But I did know one thing.
He wanted to be able to reach me.
He knew I’d pick up.
I couldn’t be sure I wouldn’t.
I started up the engine and pulled back onto the road. Once I was going sixty, I opened the window and felt the cool rush of air against my skin. Then I hurled my cell phone as far and as hard as I could.
Then I closed the window and turned on the radio to drown out the voices in my head.
Chapter 33
It isn’t every day you meet a bearded lady and the world’s fattest man. No, that was a once-in-a-lifetime experience. Of which I’d experienced several lately.
Sugar Beet Amusement Park rose out of the dust like a cut-rate mirage, featuring twenty-five different games and shows, a farm-themed carousel, and an adults-only Tunnel of Love.
I pulled the car into an empty spot, then made my way to the entrance.
The bearded lady and the fat man were having a smoke under the neon sign.
I coughed to get their attention, then asked if they knew where I could find Dorothy Johnson.
After one last drag, the fat man crushed his cigarette under his floppy red shoe. “Nasty habit, sorry.”
The bearded lady said, “You’re a heart attack waiting to happen, young man.”
“Shut up,” he said companionably. “Your whiskers look like crap.”
She whacked him on the shoulder, then licked her fingers and twirled the ends of her mustache. “We’re disgusting. Like an old married couple. Take a right at popcorn and another right at Chicago-style dogs. Dorothy does spin art.”
The place was packed. A boy in a cowboy hat bumped me as he passed.
“Where’d you get the cotton candy?” I asked. “It looks good.”
“Dentist says it rots your teeth.” He reached into his holster, pulled out a gun, and pointed it in my face. “You get me?”
Ah, the impertinence of youth.
I followed the sound of fresh corn popping, then the scent of Chicago-style dogs, which come on a poppy-seed bun and unless you say otherwise are topped with mustard, onion, sweet pickle relish, a dill pickle spear, tomato slices, peppers, and a dash of celery salt. I got mine fully loaded.
While I was eating, I watched the people trying their luck at the Hi-Striker. There was a father with a trio of adoring daughters. A skinny cowboy whose girlfriend was holding a huge stuffed bear, which the adoring daughters eyed enviously. An older man wearing his Sunday best. After draping his suit jacket over the fence, he picked up the mallet, raised it over his head, and slammed it down with all of his might, ringing the bell. He won a bag of freshly pulled taffy, which he gave to the little girls.
Spin art was just opposite.
“You can use blue, too, if you want.” The woman behind the counter handed a squirt bottle to a kid with chocolate all over his face. “Three colors for two dollars.”
The kid throttled the plastic like he was draining the life out of it.
The machine stopped spinning. The woman removed the piece of paper. “There you go,” she said, smiling.
“Looks like guts,” said the kid with satisfaction.
I took a step forward. “Excuse me?”
She studied me with clear blue eyes. “My daughter told me you called. I’ve been waiting.”
The first thing I noticed about Dorothy Johnson was her hair. It was silvery gray and glittered like tinsel on a Christmas tree. She wore it pulled back off her face, like she had nothing to hide. But she was tired. You could see that in the set of her mouth. Tired of having to smile.
“Give me just a minute.” Dorothy walked over to the ring-toss booth. “Emma,” she called out. “Can you take over for a little while?”
A young woman with a Mohawk handed a large man three metal rings and tucked the five-dollar bill he gave her into the pocket of her apron. “No problem,” she said, revealing a mouth full of gold teeth.
“This way.” Dorothy took my arm. “Let’s find someplace a little more private.”
It was crowded. We pushed our way past teenagers traveling in packs, mothers pushing strollers, kids clutching giant cups of soda.
“I once rigged a spin art machine for my daughter out of a salad spinner and some paper plates,” I said. “Man, did that make a mess.”
“I’ll bet.”
“Have you been working here long?” I was trying to make conversation.
“Nope.”
“Pop the balloon, Miss?” a man in yellow overalls called out. “Five dollars for three tries. Your choice of prizes!”
“It’s rigged,” Dorothy said with a sudden flash of anger. “The balloons are underinflated and the darts’ tips are dull. And don’t even bother with the milk throw. One of the bottles in the bottom row is always weighted. Come on.”
We passed a display of the local produce, which included sugar beets, potatoes, corn, and barley. Then the carousel, which had pigs, sheep, and goats instead of the usual prancing ponies. Just beyond that was a small dock and a glistening man-made lake with an island in the middle, surrounded by lush palms.
Dorothy walked up to the kiosk and got two tickets.
We were going to the Isle of Enchantment.
The kid manning the dock helped us into a small rowboat. “Hands and feet inside at all times. Remember to be courteous to your fellow travelers, and no drinking and driving.” He gave us a hard push.
The boat drifted away from the dock. We glided for a minute or so. I watched a stray balloon turn into a dot, then disappear.
“Nice day,” I said.
Dorothy didn’t respond.
I reached down to touch the water. The cold pricked my fingers. I shook off the drops and closed my eyes. I felt the sun on my face, the soft breeze against my cheek.
When the boat came to a stop, we picked up the splintering oars and started rowing. It didn’t take long to get into the rhythm. Oars lifting, pausing, slicing into the water, then dragging against the current until they reached the sweet spot where they could be lifted out again. Before long we were bumping up against the shore.
Dorothy got out first, picking her way through the tall grasses clustered along the bank. “This way.”
I could still hear the sounds coming from the other side of the lake: the carnival barker, the carousel music, bells ringing, whistles blowing. But they were faint now, just echoes. We followed a path of moss-covered stepping-stones through a shady grove of trees, past some empty picnic tables and an abandoned stand that had once offered fresh lemonade for twenty-five cents. Now all I could hear was birdsong and the wind whipping up the fallen leaves.
The Isle of Enchantment was deserted.
All of a sudden, Dorothy turned around. She had a strange look in her eyes.
And a gun in her hand.
“What are you doing?” I gasped.
“This is the last time anybody’s going to take advantage of me.” She leveled the gun at my head.
I did not have a good feeling about this. “Can we talk, Dorothy?”
“Nothing to talk about. It’s over.”
“Put the gun down, Dorothy. Please. Shooting me isn’t going to solve anything.”
There was no point in screaming. We were alone. As for making a break for it, I could try. But most people can’t outrun a bullet.
“I lost my house, my job, everything,” Dorothy said
. “But you’d know that, wouldn’t you? And I wasn’t the only one. A lot of people got hurt.”
I took a step back. If I could distract her for a second, I could duck into the trees. It was dark in there. She wouldn’t be able to find me. “I’m sorry, but I don’t understand.”
“You’re a lawyer. You’ve been trying to find me. All you need is my social security number, right? Maybe the number of my bank account? Then you’ll wire me my inheritance, isn’t that how it goes?”
I took another step backward. “Look, I’m sorry I lied to you. I didn’t want to, but I had no choice.”
“Oh, you had to? You’re just another innocent victim?”
“I swear I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Liar.” She pulled back the release.
A lot of people got hurt.
That was what Anita’s sister had said to Mystery. But she’d also said Anita was finally taking her life back. That she was done being a victim.
“Wait,” I pleaded. “Do you know somebody named Anita Colby?”
“Quit stalling.”
“Anita Colby lost everything, too.”
I thought about what the tiny yellow-haired girl at the Andalusia had told me. That Anita was finally getting out from under.
“Anita Colby is the reason I’m here,” I said. “She was murdered, and she left behind some papers. Your name was on them. I think she knew what was going on. I think she was trying to stop it.”
“I don’t know anybody named Anita.”
I reached into my purse.
“Stop!” Dorothy cried. “Don’t even think about it!”
I put my hands up and let the purse fall to the ground. “I just wanted to show you something. I have a picture. Maybe you’ll recognize her.”
“I’ll get it.” She bent down to pick up my purse, never taking her eyes off me.
“It’s in my wallet, a driver’s license. Anita Colby. Blond hair, five foot ten.”
Dorothy reached into my wallet, indiscriminately tossing credit cards and papers onto the ground. Then she stopped. “Is this what you’re talking about?”
I took Anita’s driver’s license out of her hand. I’d picked it up on the trail less than a week ago. So much had happened since then. I looked deep into Anita’s brown eyes. She was trying to tell me something. But what?
