Jonathan Kellerman - Alex 16 - The Murder Book

by The Murder Book(Lit)

  'I'm in the middle of nothing. What's up?'

  'I can't locate Schwinn, but I might've found his old lady.'

  'First name Marge? Mecca Ranch in Oak View?' I said.

  His exhalation was a protracted hiss. 'Well, well, well, someone's been a busy worker bee.'

  'More like a drone. How'd you find her?'

  'Exemplary detective work,' he said. 'I got hold of Schwinn's retirement file - a naughty thing, so this stays between you and me.'

  'His pension checks went to the ranch?'

  'For the first fifteen years after he left, they went to an address in Simi Valley. Then he switched to a post-office box in Oxnard for two years, then the ranch. He's not listed in any DMV files, but the address cross-referenced to Marge Schwinn. I just called her, got a machine, left a message.'

  'No DMV listing for him,' I said. 'Think he's dead?'

  'Or he doesn't drive anymore.'

  'An ex-cop who doesn't drive?'

  'Yeah,' he said. 'True.'

  'Suburban life in Simi followed by a two-year POB interlude before the ranch. That could be divorce, intervening lonely bachelorhood, remarriage.'

  'Or widowhood. His first wife was named Dorothy and she stopped being a beneficiary when he moved to Oxnard. Two years later, Marge came on.' He paused. 'Dorothy... I think he mentioned her name. It's getting hard to tell what I remember and what's wishful thinking. Anyway, that's it, for now.'

  I recounted my time in the library, what I'd learned about the Cossacks.

  'Rich kids stay rich,' he said. 'Big surprise. I also looked for Melinda Waters. She's on no state files, and neither is her mother, Eileen. That may not mean much if she got married and/or Mom got remarried and they both changed their names. I wish I knew the name of Melinda's Navy dad, but I never learned it. The guy had shipped out to Turkey, good luck tracing that. I did locate Bowie Ingalls, and he's definitely dead. Nineteen years dead.'

  'A year after Janie,' I said. 'What happened?'

  'Single-motorist vehicular accident up in the hills. Ingalls plowed into a tree and went through the windshield. Blood alcohol four times the legal limit, dozen Bud empties in the car.'

  'Up in the hills where?'

  'Bel Air. Near the reservoir. Why?'

  'Not that far from the party house.'

  'So maybe he was reminiscing,' he said. 'The facts still say drunk

  driver. The whole Cossack angle was pure supposition. For all I know, Janie and Melinda went to a whole other party. Or Schwinn was right and there was no Westside link at all, they got picked up by a psychopath and slaughtered nearer to the dump site. I'm tired, Alex. Gonna head home.'

  'What's the plan with Marge Schwinn?'

  'She's got my message.'

  'And if she doesn't return it?'

  'I'll try again.'

  'If Schwinn is dead, maybe Marge sent the murder book,' I said. 'She could've come across it in his effects, along with a reference to you and me-'

  'Anything's possible, my friend.'

  'If you do reach her, mind if I tag along?'

  'Who says I'm visiting her?'

  I didn't answer. He said, 'What, you've got nothing better to do?'

  'Not a thing.'

  He humphed.

  'Robin called,' I said. 'We talked.'

  'Good,' he said, putting a question mark on the end of it.

  I swerved back into safe territory: 'By the way, did you have time to run the prints on the murder book?'

  'Just one set that I can see.'

  'Mine.'

  'Well,' he said, 'I'm no ace powder man, but I have printed you, and those whorls look familiar.'

  'So whoever sent it wiped it clean,' I said. 'Interesting. Either way.'

  He knew exactly what I meant: a careful cop, or a fastidious, taunting killer.

  'Whatever,' he said. 'Nighty-night.'

  'Have some sweet dreams, yourself.'

  'Oh, sure. Here come the sugarplum fairies.'

  I didn't expect to hear from him anytime soon, but the following I morning at eleven, he showed up at my front door, wearing a navy windbreaker over a plaid shirt and baggy jeans. Below the jacket, his gun bulged his waistline, but otherwise he looked like a guy with a day off. I was still in my robe. No call, so far, from Robin.

  'Ready for fresh air?' he said. 'Horse manure? All of the above?'

  'The second Mrs Schwinn got back to you.'

  'The second Mrs Schwinn didn't, but I figured what the hell, Ojai's pretty this time of year.'

  A reflexive 'Ah' rose in my throat and stuck there. 'I'll get dressed.'

  'That would be best.'

  He said, 'The Seville's nice on long drives,' and I obliged. The moment I started the engine, he threw back his head, shut his eyes, covered them with a handkerchief, let his mouth drop open. For the next hour, he dozed in the passenger seat, opening his eyes periodically to gaze out the window and appraise the world with distrust and wonder, the way kids and cops do.

  I didn't feel conversational, either, and I played music for company. Some old Oscar Aleman cuts from the Buenos Aires days, Aleman wailing away on a diamond-bright, nickel-silver National guitar. The route to Oak View was north on the 405, transfer to the 101 toward Ventura, then an exit on Highway 33. Ten more miles on two lanes that sliced through pink-gray mountains but rose barely above sea level took us toward Ojai. Ocean moisture hung in the air and the sky was cottony white above the horizon, then slate-colored strata where the sun should have been.

  The stifled light brought out the greens, turned the world nuclear-blast emerald.

  It had been a few years since I'd been here - chasing down a psychopath bent on revenge and meeting up with an impressive man named Wilbert Harrison. I had no idea if Harrison still lived in Ojai. A psychiatrist and a philosopher, he'd taken a reflective view of life, and given the violence I'd introduced him to, I could see him moving on.

  The first few miles of Highway 33 were insulted by slag fields, oil rigs, rows of metallic coils that crowned the cable-and-pylon salad of an electrical plant like so much oversize fusilli. Soon after that everything turned woodsy and Ojai-heterogenous: cute little cabins graced by meticulous stone walls and shadowed by live oaks and pines, cute little shops selling homemade candles and fragrances. Massage clinics, yoga institutes, schools that would teach you how to draw, paint, sculpt, find inner peace, if only you'd let them into your consciousness. Mixed in with all that was the other side of small-town life: rusty mobile homes behind barbed-wire fencing, bait-and-tackle sheds, trucks on blocks, dusty homesteads with one or two hollow-bellied horses nosing the dirt, crude placards advertising beef jerky and homemade chili, boarding stables, modest shrines to the conventional God. And everywhere the hawks, huge, relaxed, confident, circling in lazy predatory arcs.

  Mecca Ranch was on the west side of 33, announced by nailed-on iron letters in a pine slab, the sign bordered by cactus and some sort of wild grass. A left turn up a barely paved road lined with scraggly birds of paradise in poor flower, took us five hundred yards into low, gentle hills that topped off at a couple of acres of gravel-colored mesa. Off to the right was a corral fashioned from iron posts and wooden crossbeams, more than big enough for the five brown horses grazing. Sleek, well-nourished steeds. They paid us no attention. Directly behind the enclosure were several unhitched horse trailers and a bunk of paddocks. Up at road's end, the birds of paradise were planted more closely together and better tended, and the orange-and-blue blossoms led the eye to a small, flat-roofed salmon-colored house with teal green wood trim. Parked in front were a ten-year-old brown Jeep Wagoneer and a Dodge pickup of the same color and vintage. A transitory shadow washed

  over the corral - a hawk orbiting so low I could see the surgical curve of its beak.

  I turned off the engine, got out, filled my nose with the bite of pine and that curious maple-syrup-and-rot tang of dried equine dung. Dead silence. I could see Pierce Schwinn thinking this would be heaven. But if he was like
Milo and so many other people hooked on noise and evil, how long would that have lasted?

  Milo slammed the passenger door hard, as if offering fair warning. But no one came out to greet us, and no face appeared in the house's undraped front windows.

  We walked to the front door. Milo's bell-push set off fifteen seconds of chimes - some tune I couldn't identify, but it brought back memories of Missouri department store elevators.

  Now, sound from the corral: one horse whinnying. Still no human response. The hawk had flown off.

  I studied the animals. Well-muscled mahogany creatures, two stallions, three mares, manes glossy and combed. Over the corral arced a semicircle of iron soldered with vaguely Moorish lettering. Mecca. A triangle of blue had broken through the cottony sky. The foothills ringing the ranch were green-topped, gentle, a nurturant border. It was hard to imagine the murder book emanating from this quiet place.

  Milo rang again, and a female voice called out, 'One minute!' Moments later the door opened.

  The woman who stood there was petite and strong-shouldered, anywhere from fifty to sixty. She wore a royal blue and yellow checked shirt tucked into tight jeans that showed off a flat tummy, tight waist, boyish hips. Creased but clean work boots peeked out from under the jeans. White hair that retained some of its blond origins was tied back in a short ponytail - a merest upward twist of free locks. Her features were strong in a way that made them attractive in later life, but as a girl she'd probably been plain. Her eyes were a mottle of green and brown, lacking too much of the former to be called hazel. She'd plucked her eyebrows into spidery commas but wore no makeup. Her skin was testament to everything the sun could do to skin: puckered, cracked, corrugated, coarse to the point of woodiness. A few scary-looking dark patches danced under the eyes and crowned her chin. When she smiled, her teeth

  were the milky white pearls of a healthy virgin.

  'Mrs Schwinn?' said Milo, reaching for the badge.

  Before he got it out of his pocket, the woman said, 'I'm Marge, and I know who you are, Detective. I got your messages.' No apology for not returning the calls. Once the smile faded, not much in the way of any emotion, and I wondered if that contributed to even-tempered horses.

  'I know the cop look,' she explained.

  'What look is that, ma'am?'

  'Fear mixed with anger. Always expecting the worst. Sometimes, Pierce and I would be riding, and there'd be a sound, a scurrying in the brush, and he'd get the look. So... you were his last partner. He talked about you.' She glanced at me. The past tense hung heavy.

  She bit her lip. 'Pierce is dead. Died last year.'

  'I'm sorry.'

  'So am I. I miss him terribly.'

  'When did-'

  'He fell off a horse seven months ago. One of my tamest, Akhbar. Pierce was no cowboy, he never rode until he met me. That's why I gave him Akhbar as a regular mount, and they bonded. But something must've spooked Akhbar. I found him down near Lake Casitas, on his side, with two broken legs. Pierce was a few yards away, head split on a rock, no pulse. Akhbar had to be put down.'

  'I'm so sorry, ma'am.'

  'Yeah. I'm dealing with it okay. It's the goneness that hits you. One day someone's here and then...' Marge Schwinn snapped her fingers, looked Milo up and down. 'Basically, you're what I expected, given the passage of time. You're not here to tell me something bad about Pierce, are you?'

  'No, ma'am, why would I-'

  'Call me Marge. Pierce loved being a detective, but he had bitter feelings about the department. Said they'd been out to get him for years because he was an individualist. I've got his pension coming in, don't want funny business, don't want to have to hire a lawyer. That's why I didn't call you back. I wasn't sure what you were up to.'

  Her expression said she still wondered.

  Milo said, 'It's absolutely nothing about Pierce's pension, and I'm not here as a representative of the department. Just working a case.'

  'A case you worked with Pierce?'

  'A case I was supposed to work with Pierce, till he retired.' 'Retired,' said Marge. 'That's one way to put it... well, that's nice. Pierce would've liked that, you seeking his opinion after all these years. He said you were smart. Come in, coffee's still warm. Tell me about your days with Pierce. Tell me good things.'

  The house was spare and low-ceilinged, walls alternating between rough pine paneling and sand-colored grass cloth, a series of tight, dim rooms furnished with well-worn, severe, tweedy fifties furniture for which some twenty-year-old starlet would gladly overpay at the latest La Brea junktique.

  The living room opened to a rear kitchen, and we sat down opposite a blond, kidney-shaped coffee table as Marge Schwinn filled mugs with chicory-scented coffee. Western prints hung on the grass cloth, along with equestrian portraits. A corner trophy hutch was full of gold and silk. In the opposite corner was an old Magnavox console TV with Bakelite dials and a bulging, greenish screen. Atop the set was a single framed photo - a man and a woman, too far away to make out the details. The kitchen window framed a panoramic mountain view but the rest of the place was oriented toward the corral. The horses hadn't moved much.

  Marge finished pouring and sat in a straight-backed chair that conformed to her perfect posture. Young body, old face. The tops of her hands were a giant freckle interrupted by spots of unblemished dermis, callused, wormed with veins.

  'Pierce thought a lot of you,' she told Milo.

  Milo got rid of the surprised look almost immediately, but she saw it and smiled.

  'Yes, I know. He told me he gave you all sorts of grief. His last years on the force were a rough time in Pierce's life, Detective Sturgis.' She lowered her eyes for a moment. No more smile. 'Did you know that when you rode with Pierce he was a drug addict?'

  Milo blinked. Crossed his legs. 'I remember that he used to take cold remedies - decongestants.'

  'That's right,' said Marge. 'But not for his sinuses, for the high. The decongestants were what he did openly. On the sly, he was fooling around with amphetamines - speed. He started doing it to stay awake on the job, to be able to get back home to Simi Valley without falling asleep at the wheel. That's where he lived with his first wife. He got hooked bad. Did you know Dorothy?'

  Milo shook his head.

  'Nice woman, according to Pierce. She's dead, too. Heart attack soon after Pierce retired. She was a chain smoker and very overweight. That's how Pierce first got his hands on speed -Dorothy had lots of prescriptions for diet pills, and he started borrowing. It got the better of him, the way it always does. He told me he'd turned really nasty, suspicious, had mood swings, couldn't sleep. Said he took it out on his partners, especially you. He felt bad about that, said you were a smart kid. He figured you'd go far...'

  She trailed off.

  Milo tugged at the zipper of his windbreaker. 'Did Pierce talk much about his work, ma'am?'

  'He didn't talk about specific cases, if that's what you mean. Just how rotten the department was. I think his work poisoned him as much as the speed. When I met him, he'd touched bottom. It was right after Dorothy's death, and Pierce had stopped paying rent on the Simi house - they never bought, just rented. He was living in a filthy motel in Oxnard and earning minimum wage sweeping the floors at Randall's Western Wear. That's where I first saw him. I was doing a show in Ventura, came in to Randall's to look at boots, collided with Pierce when he took out the trash. He knocked me on my rear, we both ended up laughing about it. I liked his laugh. And he made me curious. Someone that age, doing that job. Usually it's young Mexicans. Next time I came in, we talked some more. There was something about him - strong, no wasted words. I'm a gabby type, as you can see. Comes from living alone most of my life, talking to the horses. Talking to myself so as not to go nuts. This land was my grandfather's. I inherited it from my parents. I was the youngest, stayed home to take care of Mom and Dad, never strayed very far. The horses pretend they're listening to me. That's what I liked about Pierce, he was a good listener. Soon, I was making
up reasons to drive down to Oxnard.' She smiled. 'Bought a lot of

  boots and jeans. And he never knocked me down again.'

  She reached for her coffee. 'We knew each other a full year before we finally agreed to get married. We did it because we're old-fashioned, no way would either of us live together without paper. But most of what we had was friendship. He was my best friend.'

  Milo nodded. 'When did Pierce get off speed?' 'He was already getting off when I met him. That's why he moved into that fleabag. Punishing himself. He had some savings and his pension, but was living like he was a broke bum. Because that's how he thought of himself. By the time we started going out, he was off dope completely. But he was sure it did damage to him. "Swiss-cheese brain," he used to call it. Said if they ever x-rayed his head, they'd find holes big enough to stick a finger through. Mostly, it was his balance and his memory - he had to write things down or they were gone. I told him that was just age, but he wasn't convinced. When he told me he wanted to learn how to ride, I worried. Here he was, not a young man, no experience, not the best balance. But Pierce managed to stay in the saddle until... The horses loved him, he had a calming influence on them. Maybe because of all he'd been through, getting himself clean. Maybe he ended up at a higher level than if he hadn't suffered. You'll probably find this hard to believe, Detective Sturgis, but during his time with me, Pierce was a blessedly serene man.'