by Alan Russell
Elle was a good enough actor to be able to control her expression, and even her eyes, but her complexion had grown noticeably paler.
“Have you ever heard your boyfriend talk about angels?”
“I’m not sure I should be discussing that,” she said hesitantly, “or anything at all with you.”
“Why is that?”
“It might compromise Drew’s special security clearance. He’s impressed upon me the fact that he deals with very sensitive material and that I’m not allowed to talk about anything I might have seen or heard. He said that’s a violation of national security.”
“Angels are a violation of national security?”
“I don’t know what is or isn’t.”
“Your boyfriend is a hunter. Have you ever gone hunting with him?”
Elle looked even more uncomfortable. “I don’t see the point of your question.”
“I want to know if you’ve been in his presence when he’s hunted something.”
“I am not going to answer that question because of my concerns about national security.”
I thought about that. Hunting rabbits with a .22 wouldn’t raise national security issues; hunting them with a drone and a death ray would.
“It seems like no one wants to comment about anything. I just finished talking with your Man Friday downstairs, and he was tight-lipped about everything. I don’t think he would have even ventured an opinion about the weather.”
“I’m glad to hear that. The media loves to take innocuous remarks and blow them up into something they aren’t.”
“I am not the media, and I don’t want a headline, but I do want a few answers. Have you seen one of your boyfriend’s drones in action?”
She nodded. “It’s no secret that I visited the OZ facilities in Palmdale and Rancho Bernardo and watched some of the drones being tested. I even participated in company publicity shots.”
“And that’s the only time you’ve seen your boyfriend’s drones in action?”
“I didn’t say that. As I told you, I’m uncomfortable about saying much at all.”
“Does Corde bring his work home with him?”
“What do you mean by that?”
“I think you know exactly what I mean by that.”
“I need to get back to my work, Detective.”
“My angel witness died only a day after trying to tell the world what he saw. I don’t know if that’s a coincidence or not, but I’m investigating it. What I don’t think is a coincidence is that after I had a run-in with your boyfriend, five hours later there was an unauthorized recording of me making love to my girlfriend.”
“I am sorry, but I don’t know anything about that.”
“I’m sure that’s true, but I think there’s a lot you do know and aren’t saying.”
“I’m afraid I have to get back to work.”
“When J. Edgar Hoover was running the FBI, he thought he was above the law. Hoover wiretapped Martin Luther King and recorded him having sex with women other than his wife. Afterward, Hoover enjoyed playing those tapes to other listeners. It’s hard to imagine that kind of abuse of power. Or is it?”
The room was preternaturally quiet. We were alone in a city of almost four million people.
Elle broke the silence by asking, “Have you told your girlfriend about what you heard?”
The unexpectedness of her question put me at a loss for words. Finally I said, “There wasn’t a good time today.”
It was a lame answer, and I knew it, so I kept talking. “When she learns, it’s going to upset her. And I am the one responsible. I brought this upon her.”
“It’s not your fault.”
“I wish I believed that. The FBI sent King a copy of their sex tape. The hope was that he would resign his position. Some say the powers-that-be wanted him to commit suicide. The collateral damage was that Coretta King stumbled onto her husband’s sex tape. She was the one who suffered more than anyone.”
“It’s good that you don’t like disappointing your girlfriend,” Elle said, “but you still need to tell her.”
“Lately it seems all I’m doing is disappointing her. But she still persists in thinking I’m on the side of angels.”
“Maybe she’s right.”
“I need you to tell me the names of the Attack Pack. I need to question someone who was at the house last night.”
“As I told you, I retired for the night. I don’t know who was there.”
“But you do know the usual suspects.”
“I’ve already explained I can’t comment because I’m not sure what would constitute a violation of national security.”
“Playing video games has nothing to do with national security. That’s what the Attack Pack does, isn’t it? The least you can do is to give me one name. I’ll take it from there.”
She thought about it, sighed, and gave me a name.
CHAPTER 12:
FLIGHT OF THE BUMBLEBEE
Before driving home, I called Lisbet. Our conversation was brief, and though we both tried to be upbeat, there was underlying tension. We hadn’t made any plans for the evening, and Lisbet didn’t demur when I told her I was tired and going home. Confession might be good for the soul, but I still didn’t tell her about the cause of my previous night’s insomnia. That was yet another conversation I was putting off for another time. I got the sense I wasn’t the only one putting off conversations. Despite that, or maybe because of it, I felt the need to talk, even if not to Lisbet.
“Call Shaman,” I told my phone. For once it listened to me. When Seth answered, I said, “Do you have the yam special available tonight?”
“Do you have a reservation, sir?”
Sirius started wagging his tail when he heard Seth’s voice.
“Look under the name Sirius. Or it might be under the last name of Dog Star.”
“Ah, yes, there it is. We’ll be expecting you at eight o’clock, party of two. Would you like to hear tonight’s specials?”
“I think the only thing I’ll want to hear is the clink of ice cubes.”
“That can be arranged, sir.”
Everyone needs a best friend. I am lucky that mine lives right next door. Since Jenny’s death I had spent many evenings with Seth. I am still not sure what would have happened to me had he not been there.
He met us at the door, swept his arm to welcome us in, and said, “Senores, bienvenidos.”
His Spanish accent is flawless; mine isn’t. But I knew how to ask for a drink. “Quiero beber alcohol.”
“Por supuesto,” Seth said.
Sirius’s dinner and our drinks were already waiting. Sirius was served first, but I was used to that.
Seth brought my drink with his. He extended his glass toward mine and said, “To the angel’s share.” I repeated his toast and then drank. The extra dozen seconds of aging made my bourbon taste just perfect, and after a long sip that bordered on a gulp, I sighed gratefully.
Before sitting down, Seth brought over an ice bucket, tongs, and a bottle. Seth would have been able to make both Emily Post and Doc Holliday happy.
My second sip was more restrained. “Angel’s share,” I mused.
“Based on our last discussion,” Seth said, “and our current imbibing, it seemed an appropriate toast.”
Seth likes his toasts. “Probably more appropriate than you even know,” I said.
The angel’s share is what distillers refer to as the evaporation loss of spirits during aging.
“You know my witness who saw the fallen angel?”
Seth nodded.
“He’s dead.”
I thought about Wrong Pauley and his dog Ginger and his sad and too short life. Without saying anything, I extended my glass, and Seth lightly met it with his. Then I related my investigation into Wrong’s dea
th and my encounter with Drew “Rip” Corde.
“It might be my own bias,” I said, “but when I found myself looking at all those dead animals in his great room, it felt like I was in the presence of a serial murderer.”
Most people are lucky enough to have never been in the presence of a serial murderer. Too much of my life had already been spent in the company of Ellis Haines.
“Why is that?” Seth asked.
“A lot of serial murderers like their trophies. Haines was one of those. He kept items from his victims, and though he didn’t admit it, I’m sure those tokens allowed him to relive his awful crimes. Corde’s killing room was like that, but he didn’t even have to hide his handiwork. Everything was on display.
“What struck me most was his tiger. My eyes kept returning to it. I know it was my imagination, but it felt alive. It was beautiful, and it was terrible, but both those descriptions fail to describe its magnificence.”
Seth nodded, and then he started reciting, his voice at first not much more than a whisper, but then growing louder and more assertive:
Tyger tyger, burning bright,
In the forests of the night;
What immortal hand or eye,
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?
In what distant deeps or skies,
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand, dare seize the fire?
. . .
When the stars threw down their spears
And water’d heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the Lamb make thee?
I felt numb, and not from the drink. The words had drawn me in and continued to resonate with me.
“I skipped some stanzas,” Seth confessed. “Shame on me. There was a time I could recite Blake’s ‘Tyger’ in my sleep.”
“You mean your nightmares?”
“That is the greatness of Blake.”
“As striking as the images are, I’m not sure I know what the poem means.”
“You’re not alone. There are many interpretations. Some say it’s about God creating evil. Others say it is Satan who in the darkness of Hell created his Frankenstein-like creatures.”
“What did that line about the stars throwing down spears mean?”
“What did it mean to you?”
“I couldn’t help but think about drones.”
Seth smiled. “I don’t think Blake was thinking about drones. It’s likely he was influenced by Milton’s Paradise Lost, where the angels defending heaven threw down their spears and wept when their brethren who fought with Satan were cast from heaven.”
I nodded at his explanation; Seth decided he wanted one of his own. “Why were you thinking about drones?”
As dispassionately as I could, I told Seth about what had happened the previous night. When I finished, he said, “So how do you feel about what occurred?”
“I didn’t know how unattractive my heavy breathing was. I sounded like an asthmatic wildebeest.”
“My guess is that isn’t very high on your list of concerns.”
“I should have listened to Sirius. He kept alerting me with his barking. Sirius was hearing something. He was telling me to watch out. I was the one who ignored him. I won’t make that mistake again.”
My partner lifted his head at the mention of his name. Seth thought Sirius was my spirit guide. I guess that was another way of saying he was my guardian angel.
“OZ produces several models of UAVs,” I said. “Their latest UAV is the Dumbledore, a miniaturized spy drone. Ten years ago if you’d said the word ‘drone’ everyone would have thought you were talking about a male bee.”
“If I remember correctly,” said Seth, “bee drones have no stingers.”
“I suspect the Dumbledore drone does and that the sting is lethal.”
“And what makes you think that?”
“Wrong Pauley,” I said, “and the progression of UAV technology. Today I spent some time researching drones. Back in 2008, the US Air Force showed off prototypes of bug-sized drones called micro-air vehicles, or MAVs. Even then defense experts were talking about these bugbots having the capacity to emit chemicals or poisons. Since that time MAVs have come a long way. I can’t imagine spying or swarming would be their only capability. I suspect one of the unspoken features of a Dumbledore is that it could easily be used as an assassination vehicle.”
“ ‘Death, where is thy stinger?’ ” said Seth.
I nodded. “What if poison was injected that mimicked a mosquito bite? No pathologist is going to take notice of a mosquito bite, but something as innocuous as that could mark the spot where a lethal toxin was injected.”
“And you think that’s what happened to the homeless man?”
“He was a witness, even if I’m not sure to what. And then he died.”
“When I was a boy, I saw my sister have a bad anaphylactic reaction to a bee sting,” said Seth. “I was afraid she was going to die. If we hadn’t had epinephrine, I think she would have. Her throat closed up, and she could barely breathe. It wasn’t until she had her second shot of epi that her breathing regulated.”
I thought about Wrong Pauley again and Dumbledore. He might have died just such a death. What if the microdrone was equipped with a stinger that caused anaphylaxis? Even an autopsy might not be able to reveal how he died.
“How’s your hunt going for the Reluctant Hero?” Seth asked.
I was glad we were off the subject of drones and death. “It’s been on the backburner, but tomorrow Sirius and I are going to The Corner School. After we do our little PR program, I’ll be talking to some of the kids and teachers.”
“I’d love to see you and Sirius in action.”
“He’s the action part. I’m the window dressing.”
We sipped our drinks in companionable silence. I was the one who finally felt the need to talk.
“It looks like the Officer Sirius situation has finally been put to bed. Or at least that was the message I received while driving home.”
“You don’t make it sound like that’s good news.”
“It involved quid pro quo, and I’m not sure if I got the better of the deal. In order to make that nonsense go away, I agreed to meet with Ellis Haines the day after tomorrow.”
“You made a deal with the devil.”
“It didn’t involve my soul, or at least I don’t think it did.”
“I’d advise not signing anything in blood.”
“I hate the sight of blood, especially my own.”
Seth stood up. I thought he was refreshing his drink, but instead he went over to his vinyl collection and began going through his albums.
“I think we need the right music,” he said.
Seth stores his large vinyl collection in drawers he had specially constructed. He also has a vast CD collection, but he claims the vinyl sound is better. Being practically tone deaf, those nuances are lost on me. He finally found the album he was looking for.
There is something almost sacramental in the way Seth prepares albums for playing. Before playing the record, he checks the turntable and needle for dust. In his examination he uses everything but white gloves. His albums are housed vertically in acid-free plastic sleeves from which he carefully removes the records, making sure not to touch them with his fingers so as not to leave oil on the vinyl. Seth has a carbon-fiber record-cleaning brush as well as a cleaning mitt. He uses either, or both, to make sure the album is spotless. This time he cleaned with the mitt, rubbing in a circular motion from inside to outside.
As Seth prepared the vinyl for playing, he offered up some background as to what we would be hearing. “Rimsky-Korsakov created this piece from a Russian folktale. At the onset of the story, the young
est of three sisters marries the czar and bears him a son. The jealous older sisters have the mother and her newborn prince thrown into the sea, but the mother and her child are saved by a magical swan. The czar does not know what happened to his wife and son, but fears they are dead. As the prince grows up, he desires to see his father, but they are separated by a great distance. Once more the magical swan is able to help, changing the prince into a flying insect so that he can undertake the long flight home.”
Seth lowered the needle, and the familiar music began to play. It is a great gift to be able to laugh at what bedevils you, and Seth gave me that gift.
Together the two of us listened to “Flight of the Bumblebee.” When the last furious note ended, Seth went back to the turntable and carefully lifted the needle.
“So the prince was turned into a bumblebee?” I asked.
“His visit home was quite eventful,” said Seth. “Even though he couldn’t reveal his true presence to his father, the bumblebee prince managed to sting both of the evil sisters, blind the primary usurper, and escape capture.”
“I’m hoping the prince prevailed and lived happily ever after.”
Seth nodded. “He not only returned home to his father but even married the magical swan that turned out to be a princess who had been transformed into a bird.”
“I hate it when that happens.”
Seth’s hand was still hovering over the turntable. “Again?” he asked.
“By all means.”
Once more we listened to the frenetic flight of the bumblebee. In my mind’s eye I could see the bumblebee stinging the twisted sisters, blinding the bad guy, and ultimately winning the day.
The music was even better the second time around.
CHAPTER 13:
GAMES WITHOUT FRONTIERS, WARS WITHOUT TEARS
In the aftermath of catching Ellis Haines, Sirius and I were the most popular PR tools of the LAPD. For a time, it seemed as if everyone in L.A. wanted a piece of us. I limited our appearances, citing the need for intensive physical therapy. That was true enough, but my reluctance was more a result of my feeling like a fraud. I was no hero; I had put my partner in harm’s way and in trying to save his life had saved my own. I was messed up big time before going into the fire, and more messed up afterward. My walk through the flames permanently scarred my face, but it was the hidden scars that disabled me even more than the obvious ones.
