Toe Popper

by Jonny Tangerine

  ELYSIAN PARK – JULY FOURTH – 10:22 AM

  Lane’s pistol jumped in his hand. His bullet tearing into the jaw bone of the menacing shadow at the end of the range. Beside him, Catherine popped five quick slugs into the center of her silhouette target, grouping them like a Texas Ranger’s star.

  Lane sighed. He knew better, she always won these little shooting matches, but he could never refuse her challenge. The only time he ever came close to beating her was when they used the scatterguns. Now he would have to pay for their beer down at the Dodger’s game, an expensive proposition, each plastic cup costing more than a box of 9mm shells (with law enforcement discount) at the nearby Los Angeles Police Revolver and Athletic Club gift shop. Still, he had to admit these hyper-competitive weekend outings were improving his marksmanship.

  Lane welcomed the holiday. He had been working sixteen hour days through June. The most popular beaches were technically open now, although there was only a small cleared area surrounded by razor wire where the public was allowed to go. And to prevent re-mining, the government had set up checkpoints at the entrances. The entry points, which included metal detectors, bomb sniffing equipment, dogs and secondary inspection areas, were modeled on the most successful and efficient TSA systems. Lane had witnessed the operation and was surprised to see that people didn’t seem to mind standing in a long line to go to the beach (although the coastal cities were temporarily offering free parking.) And so far they had been lucky, no new mines had turned up in the cleared areas. At night the beaches were kept under constant surveillance by rent-a-cops in sunglasses who sat in lawn chairs beneath portable arc lights.

  In the meantime, a second task force was now in charge of enlarging the safe space, with the ultimate goal of finding every last mine. Their mission was complicated by the fact that they had no idea how many mines they were looking for. And even if they did, there was debate among the forensics people over how many had originally gone off. In addition to being a consultant to the clearance task force, Lane supervised a special rapid response team that consisted of himself and five members of a San Diego-based National Guard explosive ordinance disposal unit who had all served time in Afghanistan. They had a lot of work. The public was still very much on edge. Lane had spent the previous day stuck behind an armored personnel carrier with the Manhattan Beach SWAT team. After an initial hysterical report to 911, the SWAT team’s dog had positively identified an explosive scent on an object in a sandbox at a popular public playground that overlooked the ocean. Lane’s team had the latest Talon robot, but someone had forgotten to recharge its battery overnight and it ran out of juice five feet from the lip of the sandbox, too close to safely retrieve it. After lengthy debate, they’d ended up shooting the unidentified object with twelve gauge slugs from about thirty yards away. Fortunately for everyone involved they were able to add one more line to their long list of false positives -- the suspicious object turned out to be a very old pork chop encased in circular Tupperware. Despite the waste of time, Lane felt the incident was a good reminder that dogs, robots and Tupperware all had their limits.

  Catherine was working hard as well. The dragnet-like sweep of Huay’s business partners and contacts was unrelenting. When he wasn’t at the beach, Lane often sat in as a second (and unofficial) interpreter when she interviewed them. The pressure to find an associate with information that they could leverage was mounting daily. Huay had not said a single word in his initial interrogation and his lawyer was refusing to even discuss any plea bargain/confession scenarios. Huay’s daughter had so far remained silent as well. She was being held in the female wing of the Hawaii Youth Correctional Facility while Huay remained in solitary confinement on the windward side of Oahu.

  The Justice Department was still preparing the indictment on Federal murder charges, but evidence was frustratingly thin. They had the Nixon surveillance photo, but it wasn’t a crime to visit the library. They had found no fingerprints or DNA on any on the mines, nor could they find verification of Huay having written the demand letters to the newspapers. Everyone was sure they had the right man, but the recordings of his conversations with Lane were not something the prosecutors were very excited about playing in court. In fact, Catherine had recently informed Lane that they had reclassified the audio files as top secret to prevent Huay’s attorneys from gaining access to them, or even knowing of their existence. The storage space hadn’t been in Huay’s name and technically the keys had come from Dominique. Moreover the mines found there were different from the ones that had been used previously and most of the evidence was heavily damaged by the explosions and fire.

  For now, Huay was being held for the crime of having too much money. When he was arrested, authorities found $53,000 in cash in his suitcase -- which meant he had violated federal law by failing to report the export of currency in excess of $10,000, as required by 31 U.S.C. Sections 5613(a)(1)(A) and 5311(c). They also found his Colt Defender, but it’s perfectly legal to carry a firearm on a private airplane.

  Lane was surprised to learn that in all of Huay’s residences and warehouses only one other mine was found. He suspected that the driver might have disposed of any excess supply after leaving the Orange County airport. In a punitive gesture, the FBI was now searching Huay’s many backyards with backhoes. And in Washington, the lab was still analyzing the microscopic diatom content of the sand found in his impounded car. The one landmine that was found, a BLU Gator, matched the one left in Catherine’s spa -- making the murder of the poor Russian pool cleaner the strongest case so far.

  More disturbingly, there had been another casualty in Griffith Park. A Caltech Botany professor was killed on the walking path while leading a field trip to the Garden of the Gods. The mine used was the same type that had killed the horse, suggesting to Lane that there truly was another suspect.

  Lane kept his room at the Sofitel, although he’d moved to the tenth floor. The room was mostly to keep up appearances - he spent the majority of nights at Catherine’s. She had a new pool and spa cleaner (a retired middle-school teacher from Simi Valley) but Catherine had disabled the thermostat timer and they never used either of them. But twice, at Catherine’s urging, they had snuck up to the roof of the nearby Woodland Hills Hilton and used the Jacuzzi there.

  Lane was back to smoking opium once a day. Usually at night while lying on Catherine’s couch watching Sportscenter or Turner Classic Movies. Khieu had changed dealers and now used a sixty-year old neighborhood woman who had the opium sent via DHL from Laos. It was much fresher and Khieu said he felt safer giving his money to her rather than the thugs in the poker palace parking lot. Lane had also renewed his Dilaudid prescription at the Save-On, but he tried to reserve it for special occasions or situations where smoking was impractical. Catherine basically had a don’t ask don’t tell policy about his drug use and this arrangement seemed to be working out fine, though she insisted on driving when they went out after dark.

  After this afternoon’s Dodger game, which promised a seventh-inning Harrier Jump Jet fly-over, they planned to drive the Lexus over to Eagle Rock to have the best pizza in Los Angeles at Casa Bianca. From there they would take a quick trip up Colorado Boulevard to visit Alan, still recovering at Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena. He had just been given clearance to begin eating solid food and Catherine had promised to save him a slice. After that they would be heading to the Hollywood Bowl for an evening of fireworks and John Philip Sousa.

  Lane lowered his handgun and slipped off the ear-protectors. He then reached down to his side-pocket and double-checked that he still had his bottle of pain medication with him. He and was planning on using it after dinner to enhance the entertainment value of the bowl.

  Catherine looked over at him and winked. Lane nodded. He was looking forward to holding Catherine’s hand, breathing the eucalyptus-scented night air and watching the vivid choreographed explosions in the Hollywood sky.

  KANEOHE MARINE CORPS AIR STATION, OAHU, HAWAII

  It f
elt good to walk. Each step a two-note tap. Huay only wore rubber flip flops now. Government issue, made in China. Above these, a white poplin jumpsuit and Marine Corps boxer shorts, which were still union-label made in Ohio. He was allowed to exercise one hour per day, but the exercise area was a ten by ten foot cage and it was hard to force yourself to walk when there was no where to go. He was doing a hundred sit-ups and fifty push-ups a day, but the Aloha state is not a great place for calisthenics. And except for washing in the sink, he only got to shower every third day.

  It was a lonely routine. Huay was kept far away from any other prisoners, and had attorney-only phone privileges. In addition, the Marines who staffed the brig only talked to him in the strictest military language and used marionettic hand gestures. The occupants of the base seemed to be on constant alert, completely devoid of informal energy. Huay thought it might make him feel better if the young buzz cuts threatened him or dropped a casual ‘motherfucker’ under their breaths, but they never did.

  In the meeting room, Huay sat on the hard plastic chair, his hands shackled to the chain in his lap. A pleasant breeze came through one small, barred cinderblock window, which, like most portals in Hawaii was unscreened. Outside, his armed guard stood in tense at-rest, his back to the door.

  Huay’s lawyer was reading from a small stack of papers that had numbers on the left side of each paragraph. The lawyer charged him for travel and waiting time and never seemed to be in a hurry. Huay liked him, but couldn’t escape the feeling that every meeting was like getting into a cab that already had seven hundred and fifty dollars on the meter. And after each meeting the Marines insisted on strip searching him, the aftertaste of the latex glove swirling in his mouth lasting for hours.

  “How are you feeling?” his lawyer said.

  Huay shrugged. And then watched as his lawyer wrote a short phrase across the top of the legal pad in front of him.

  Huay had to read it upside down: FAIRE DAY, LORD

  Huay had always believed in contingency plans. And this meant that one of his silent partners in Naples had come through.

  It was a simple anagram:

  “Florida, Ready.”

  The lawyer quickly scribbled over the message. “We have a lot to talk about…”

  Below the table, a fly landed on Huay’s naked instep. He snapped the flip-flop against his heel. And the fly alighted…circling up into the current of fresh air until it escaped effortlessly through the bars of the window.

  Huay felt a creeping tightness in his face. And it took him a moment to realize the cause. It had been so long since Huay had smiled.