Fugitive Nights (1992)

by Wambaugh, Joseph

  He'd decided he had to learn to play tennis for Claudia, so he'd signed up for five lessons a week. Those flat-bellied young pros used to run him down like process servers. He'd go out to the playground as soon as he got off duty and smack balls against a concrete wall until his elbow got so sore he couldn't lift his arm higher than his shoulder. He'd later admitted to his pals that Claudia had him busting more balls than the Gabors, who also lived in Palm Springs, where they got a fleet discount on face-lifts.

  Lynn and Claudia had decided against having kids in that her paycheck was urgently needed if they were to live like deposed Iranians. In those days a relative of the shah had visited Palm Springs with her pet peacock and lost it. Lynn was one of the cops assigned to the peacock posse and he'd tracked the bird by listening to its Roseanne Barr screams. Peacock wrangling, that summarized Palm Springs for you, Lynn always said.

  But one day Claudia had returned from a flight and informed Lynn that she'd met somebody in Denver who'd "opened up new vistas" for her.

  He asked, "Is it okay for you to ball someone out of state? I mean, if it's a different time zone is it still considered cheating? I'm just wondering."

  Claudia answered by saying, "I hope you'll be man enough to deal with this maturely."

  Lynn said, "I'll try to pinch off my tear ducts. Goodbye, Claudia."

  He'd gone out and gotten hammered that night, relieved that he'd never again have to feed her Doberman, which she called her "DNA dog." The little charmer had trained it to eat anyone with a nonwhite genetic code.

  His second ex-wife, Teddi: Now there was a woman nobody could figure out. She was about as understandable as acupuncture. On some days, her idea of a profound decision in life was whether or not to have her lug nuts chromed, but a day later, she'd drag him to a poetry reading at the University of California, Riverside, where some hairball who could make a rap group throw up would scream "poems" at them. As far as Lynn could discern, they were all about excrement, necrophilia, incest, rape, mayhem and vomit.

  Teddi had gotten positively moist at their last reading, when they were allowed to shake hands with a poet and buy an inscribed copy of his work, published by some vanity press in San Francisco. As the poet took Lynn's bucks for the book, he asked whether Lynn had enjoyed the reading.

  Lynn said to him in front of thirty people, "Oh yeah, very tasteful. I never once heard you mention pus or vaginal discharge."

  On the drive home to Palm Springs that night, Teddi told Lynn that she thought they lived in two different worlds, and that his was without "texture, subtlety or nuance."

  "You're not ready to change for me," she informed him that night.

  "I got cut for you," he reminded her. "Your Siamese tomcat now has the only fully operating pair a balls in the house."

  "You only see things in black and white," Teddi told him.

  "You want Technicolor, you better hook up with Ted Turner," he responded, long before the mogul's merger with Jane Fonda.

  A highway patrol officer-cum-lawyer had handled that divorce, giving him a police discount. The lawyer told Lynn that he knew a doctor who would reverse the vasectomy if Lynn ever got married again.

  But Lynn had informed the lawyer that women were about as impenetrable as the Dead Sea Scrolls, and that as a single man he was happy as a rutting rabbit, intending to stay that way forever.

  His "dates" in recent years usually began at The Furnace Room, but all relationships withered after a few weeks or months. Wilfred Plimsoll announced that Lynn had the staying power of a cherry popsicle.

  Lynn had forced himself not to have more than half a dozen drinks the night before, but hadn't gotten to bed early enough. Still, he'd set the alarm and managed to arrive at the home of Clive Devon in Las Palmas at 6:30 a. M.

  The desert sky was breathtaking at that hour. Cloud shadow made the Indio Hills shimmer in dappled silver light. All of the pastels in the desert landscape had deepened. The sky was dove gray, with burgundy smears behind pink cotton cumulus, as he sat in his car and drank coffee from a thermos.

  At 7:00 a. M. Clive Devon drove out of his driveway in a black Range Rover. He was wearing a floppy hat, a knit shirt, chinos and hiking boots, dressed very much like Lynn except for the hat. He meandered slowly through the narrow streets of Las Palmas, traditional home of Palm Springs' old money. It wasn't an ideal place to hang a tail on somebody. The streets twisted too much, and there were too many huge homes with whitewashed adobe walls and ten-foot oleander hedges for privacy. There was no place to hide on streets like that, and there were no cars to get behind at such an early hour. Mostly there were just gardeners coming to work in pickup trucks, with mowers and gardening tools stacked in the truck beds. Clive Devon turned on Via Lola because it flowed into Palm Canyon Drive, and you could go either way on that main artery.

  Fortunately, Lynn Cutter's old Nash Rambler looked like it could belong to a Mexican gardener, or to a black maid from north Palm Springs. Lynn had gotten a good buy on the car from a used-car dealer in Cat City whom he'd once stopped for drunk driving on Christmas Eve. Instead of booking the guy he'd driven him home, mostly because the lawyer for Lynn's second wife had opened Lynn's veins and he figured it might be prudent to make pals with a guy that dealt with rent-a-wrecks and second-hand wheels, the kind of cars he could afford. And at least the Rambler had a new engine and retreads.

  They drove past Gene Autry Trail and the Desert Princess Country Club, finally heading to the south end on Highway 10. Lynn began to wonder if this guy was one of those eccentrics who drove several hundred miles on a whim, maybe to see the Phoenix Suns play the L. A. Lakers? Lynn figured he had enough gas money in his pocket to get back if Clive Devon didn't travel more than sixty minutes from home. He was glad when the Range Rover turned off the freeway, heading back to Highway 111, passing by the little airport that had made a lot of cops breathe hard the night before, during the long and fruitless search for a fugitive.

  Obviously Clive Devon wasn't a man who worried about somebody following him. Lynn soon realized that he could bumper-lock the Range Rover and never be noticed. The sixty-three-year-old man was moseying toward the Salton Sea, a thirty-five-mile lake near the foot of the Chocolate Mountains. What the guy intended to do by the north shore of the desert lake, where only a few hundred people lived in mobile homes, Lynn Cutter couldn't imagine.

  The Salton Sea was a mistake of man and perhaps of nature. Just after the turn of the century, some railroad builders made a horrible error with the Colorado River, and a levee burst, allowing millions of cubic feet of water per day to rage into a huge salt marsh left over from an ancient inland sea. The new Salton Sea submerged everything under water fifty percent saltier than the ocean. It was said that pumice rock could float in this saltiest of water, 235 feet below sea level.

  Many of the migrant workers, particularly Asian boat people, liked to fish the salt water for local corvina, using illegal gill nets. The cops figured that anybody hungry enough to eat the mutant fish from that selenium-loaded water-polluted by sewage and agricultural waste-should be welcome to it.

  Lynn Cutter was astonished when the Range Rover parked at a cafe that advertised itself as a bait shop, near the north shore marina. There were several gulls lurking around the parking lot but not much else. The desert wind ruffled across the green-yellow water, making it very chancy for two fishermen trying to launch a small dinghy.

  Clive Devon strolled inside the cafe. There was one old pickup in front and Lynn didn't dare get too close. The only convenient place to park and observe was five hundred yards down the highway, so he decided to use Breda's fancy binoculars.

  He was watching the cafe when a man ran across the highway from the direction of the All-American Canal, a twenty-foot wide artery of fresh water from the Colorado River. Lynn didn't pay much attention to the guy, who wore a baseball cap and a dark windbreaker. He was wondering why a rich guy like Clive Devon would hang around this dying place. Even the lowliest desert denizens had jus
t about given up on the Salton Sea. That morning the wind was blowing a foul algae-sewage smell his way.

  Clive Devon came out of the cafe with a six-pack of something, beer or soda pop, and what looked like a bag of potato chips, and stood by his Range Rover. The man in the baseball cap also walked out, with a newspaper, and ran across the road, disappearing from sight.

  Early that morning the migrant workers who'd camped in the stand of tamarisk trees had awakened to find the bald man driving away. He was gone for perhaps thirty minutes. When he returned he took off his jacket, parked under the trees once again and began reading a newspaper. After a little while he started the car as though to back out from under the trees, but just then a police car cruised down Box Canyon Road. When the police car had gone, the bald man jumped out of the Ford with his red canvas bag.

  Before he left them he warned the three campesinos in Spanish that the car was stolen and that they must not drive it. He asked which way it was to Palm Springs and if he could get there by going the opposite way from where the police car had gone. They pointed him toward Highway 10 assuming he would hitchhike.

  The Ford was a big temptation for three migrant workers, the oldest of whom, though he looked thirty, was only twenty years old. He had lived by his wits for five years, and had made many illegal crossings from Mexicali to work in the fields of the Imperial and Coachella valleys. He knew how to start a hotwired car. Skillful driving was another matter.

  Through binoculars, Lynn watched Clive Devon drink two soda pops during the half hour that he remained in the parking lot. Lynn saw only three other cars coming and going from the cafe during that time. Then a rusty old Plymouth rattled down the highway from the direction of Mecca and Thermal, and pulled into the parking area. A short slender woman got out. Even from his distant vantage point Lynn could see that she was young. Her shiny black hair hung down to her waist and she wore a blue T-shirt and jeans.

  The young woman and Clive Devon greeted each other, but they stood on the far side of the Range Rover. Lynn's view was completely blocked and he could only get glimpses of Clive Devon through the side windows. He thought they stood close enough to be kissing but he couldn't be sure.

  A large brown dog leaped out from the backseat of the rusty Plymouth and bounded toward Clive Devon; then he too was blocked by the Range Rover. After a moment Clive Devon opened the door of the Range Rover and the dog jumped up onto the backseat. Then the young woman got into the front next to Clive Devon, who started the Range Rover and drove back toward Mecca and Thermal.

  By the time Lynn had allowed them some lead time he had to floor the Rambler because the Range Rover was accelerating. Lynn tried to see the license number when he passed the rusty Plymouth in the parking lot, but couldn't. He figured he'd get it on the way back. He was very surprised when the Range Rover turned right on Box Canyon Road and headed toward a county park.

  The three migrant workers had pooled their money at the north shore cafe to buy a bag of tortilla chips and two cokes to be split three ways. Then they got back into the hot-wired Ford and cruised out Highway 111. They'd decided to drive to Thermal, hoping to impress some girls.

  The driver had learned to operate a car in Calexico, where he had a job cleaning restaurant grease traps, so filthy that cats wouldn't even touch them, but that brief driving experience wasn't enough. He zigged across the double line as a big rig was roaring toward him, and the eighteen-wheeler clipped the Ford.

  The car went airborne and came to earth upside down with an explosive crunch. The two lucky ones were blown out and suffered broken bones and a few internal injuries. The passenger in the death-seat was decapitated.

  Like too many police agencies, the sheriff's department hired few Hispanics, and neither of the two deputies who arrived before the paramedics could speak Spanish. Nor could Nelson Hareem, who sped down the highway and skidded to a stop across the highway from the overturned Ford. But the next unit to arrive was driven by a CHP officer who at least spoke Border Patrol Spanish and was able to ask a few questions.

  The headless corpse and the crash itself no longer interested anybody. What the cops were all excited about was that the crunched Ford bore the license number of the one stolen by the smuggler the day before. For the least injured of the migrant farm workers, a slow and painful interrogation continued until the ambulance arrived.

  The Chippie, frequently interrupted by Nelson's "Whad-hesay?," learned that the husky bald man had stashed the stolen car in a stand of tamarisk trees the night before, and ditched the car that morning.

  As the paramedics arrived and began loading the more seriously injured farm worker first, the one doing the talking kept telling the cops that he wouldn't have kept or sold the stolen car, that they only wanted to use it for a day or so, because of the girls in Thermal. And just before being lifted into the ambulance, the young farm worker volunteered that the husky bald man was about thirty-five years old and muy intelligente. He was certainly not a farm worker, the young man informed them.

  The cops immediately called in a chopper, which thudded over the canyons all the way from Highway 10 to the Salton Sea before giving up. Everyone figured that the bald smuggler had probably hitched a ride moments after he'd started out on foot.

  Lynn followed the Range Rover to the county park, where to his surprise, Clive Devon got out with a shopping bag, spread a blanket and laid out a little picnic on the desert floor for man, woman and dog. Lynn made an approach on foot and lay flat on his belly, watching from behind a clump of sage. He used his elbows as a tripod to steady the binoculars and was able to see that the woman was a young Latina, probably in her early twenties, and the brown dog knew Clive Devon very well. The animal was jumping all over him and cuddling up to him, being fed by hand from the picnic bag. Lynn Cutter had gotten a cramp in his neck and had mighty sore knees by the time the happy picnickers picked up their litter and got back inside the Range Rover.

  Nelson Hareem returned to the station to have a chat with his sergeant.

  "Sarge," he said, "have you heard that the hot car from yesterday, the one the smuggler was driving, got wiped out near the Salton Sea?"

  "Yes, Nelson," the sergeant sighed. "Calexico's only eighty miles from there, and you can spit on Mexicali from Calexico, so I'd say the guy's home free by now. South of the border planning to hire another load-plane."

  "But Sarge," Nelson said, "he stayed in the area last night cause he didn't know where he was for sure. He didn't take a chance and drive out on the highway where he might get spotted. He holed up and waited out the night. This guy might do the same thing again. He might still be burrowed, waitin for an absolutely safe way to Palm Springs."

  "How do you know he's going to Palm Springs?"

  Nelson didn't want the boss to know he'd been out of town interrogating the injured campesino, so he said, "Well, I'm jist guessin. He's not some lettuce picker. And he's prob'ly packin a bag full a dope and waitin out the daylight so he can take his drugs to Palm Springs."

  "That's pure speculation, Nelson," his sergeant said.

  "Sarge, I been thinkin, maybe if it's quiet this afternoon you might let me go back down around Box Canyon and . . ."

  "Stay in your own backyard, Nelson," the sergeant said warily. "You could fuck up a one-car funeral. Several years ago a guy like you brought down a president. It was called Watergate. The guy was a hotdog of a loose cannon named G. Gordon Liddy, ever heard of him?"

  "Sure!" Nelson said. "My hero. He went to the joint but still he didn't rat off nobody. I named one a my goldfish Liddy. The other one I named Ollie after Colonel Oliver North."

  "Why doesn't his choice of role models surprise me?" the sergeant said to nobody.

  After a pause, Nelson said, "I guess you're right. He's back in Mexico by now. I'll forget all about it and go back out on patrol."

  The sergeant made a note to check up on the carrot-top cop who the lieutenant said was more dangerous than body fluid in a whorehouse, and about as controlla
ble as a feral cat. But the sergeant got totally distracted when his wife called to announce that her Tupperware hostess had gotten the flu and the shindig was being moved to their own house.

  The sergeant had to run to the store and buy some onion dip and Fritos while Nelson Hareem went rocketing down the highway toward the vicinity of Painted Canyon.

  Lynn Cutter had left all the fancy stliff in the trunk of his car: Breda Burrows' commercial-grade video camera with the twelve-to-one zoom and her 35 mm for still photos. It was all useless on this caper. He'd draped the binocular strap around his neck because it was about all he could manage if he was going to tail Clive Devon and a woman and a dog into the desert.

  The Range Rover had kicked up dust on the road leading into Painted Canyon, helping to obscure Lynn's Rambler, but he thought he was going to have to abandon the tail when they got close to the canyon itself. He was lucky. There happened to be a van full of kids also driving into the canyon, so he was able to drop in behind them. Also, there were some nature lovers in a big Winnebago RV, setting up day camp farther down on the road that penetrated the twisting canyon walls.

  A few other nature lovers had found a few early specimens of dune primrose and were photographing the delicate white blossoms. Three kids of college age were hiking alongside the mouth of the canyon, gingerly examining the joints of a jumping cholla cactus whose nearly invisible barbs can penetrate flesh like sewing needles, and yet provide a nesting place for cactus wrens. The Range Rover stopped two hundred yards ahead, and Lynn parked beside the larger group of ecos who'd fanned out near the canyon mouth. His car didn't look particularly conspicuous next to theirs.

  The Painted Canyon cliff face looked as though a huge can of watercolor paint had spilled over it. Burgundy hill formations abutted persimmon hills, next to chocolate hills, next to sandalwood hills. There were clumps of puffy blue-gray smoke trees on the desert floor, and the clean dry desert was in his nostrils and in his mouth as he panted to keep up with the hikers. His goddamn knees were killing him! He stopped, unlaced his shoes, and dumped sand.