California Girl (31 page)

Nick nodded. “Well said.”

A zip of pain issued from low and deep inside. He remembered his face against the warm window of Cory Bonnett’s car down in Baja, thoughts about Katy pouring out of his imagination while his blood seeped onto the seat. He looked out the window to the Stoltz backyard garden.

“But she never told you she was pregnant?”

“She did not.”

“Is that an orange tree I see out there?”

Stoltz didn’t turn to look through the blinds into his sun-blasted backyard. “Yes. A navel. Why?”

“I’m wondering how you prune it.”

“With a pruning saw. This sounds like a line of trick questioning, Nick.”

“That’s what was used on Janelle’s head.”

Stoltz offered Nick a look of disappointment without surprise. Held Nick’s gaze with his own but said nothing.

“Did you buy one recently, a pruning saw?”

Stoltz nodded. “Yes. Sears, up by Knott’s. Would have been…” He flipped backward through a desk calendar. Nick listened to the pages slap.

“Sunday, September twenty-nine. I’ll show it to you if you want.”

“I’d like to see it.”

Nick felt another stab of pain when he pushed off the chair with both arms and came face-to-face with Stoltz.

“It’s out in the potting shed, Nick.”

They walked to the living room, then out a sliding glass door. The brightness hit Nick hard. The breeze was warmer and stronger now. The backyard was big and surrounded by a six-foot grape stake fence long weathered to silver gray. There were raised beds for roses and flowers and a network of brick walkways. The navel tree was bright with fruit. So were a lemon, tangerine, and lime. The breeze shifted the leaves one way and then the other in a slow cadence. The potting shed was a rustic wood structure with a sun-faded fiberglass roof. The door was closed and latched but not locked.

“Marie does most of the gardening,” said Stoltz. “I help with the heavy stuff. We have a gardener once a week for weeds.”

Stoltz pulled the latch away and swung open the wooden door. Held the door for Nick, let the breeze slap it all the way open behind them. Sun on fiberglass. Heat and light. Potting tables and the stacks of empty
plastic pots, the watering cans hung on nails in the wall along with the trowels and hand rakes and weed stabbers.

“This was where I discovered the cleaning properties of fermenting citrus juice,” said Stoltz. “I mixed my first few quarts of Orange Sunshine right here. First batch was an accident. I spilled it, wiped it up, and the wood floor came clean.”

Stoltz pointed out the Trim-Quick. Hanging between an old Rain Bird hose sprinkler and a pair of loppers. Blade folded shut.

“May I?”

“Whatever you need, Nick.”

Nick took it down. Noted the fresh shellac on the wooden handle. Unfolded the blade. Shiny and the bevels of the cutting edges still precise.

“Used once,” said Stoltz. “On the acacia tree out front, not on a woman’s neck.”

“The Sears clerk was just trying to help.”

“I understand,” said Stoltz.

“I am, too.”

“I understand that also. I wonder where Bonnett got his saw.”

“We’re working on that,” said Nick. The heat was suddenly suffocating.

“The Santa Anas are kicking up again,” said Stoltz. “More lemonade?”

“No thanks. I’ll leave you to your Friday.”

“You okay, Nick?”

“I still feel like I have other people’s blood in me.”

“Let’s get back in where it’s cool.”

LATE THAT AFTERNOON
the children took naps. Nick and Katy locked their bedroom door. Lay on top of their bedsheets and let the warm wind waft through the curtains and onto their skin. Nick rolled onto his side and ran his hand over the smooth capacious flank of his wife. She fondled him lightly for a while and they said nothing.

“Well, what do you know?” she whispered.

“It’s working.”

“Working very well, so far.”

“I was worried about this, Katy.”

“I was, too. Guess what?”

“I give up.”

“We had that wild little LSD thingy on the fourteenth? Well, I was supposed to start on the twenty-first, the day you left for Mexico. I waited a few days ’cause of all the worry but snuck off to Doc Blair yesterday. He put a hurry-up on it for us. Nurse called while you were at Roger’s.”

“Kate, really?”

“Really, Nick. Another bellowing, wailing, screaming, deafening, beautiful little person.”

THAT EVENING ANDY STOOD
off Laguna Canyon Road snapping pictures of the convertible and the huge tree. Convertible crushed like a stepped-on beer can. Tree trunk with just a gouge where the little car had accordioned into it, then sloughed off.

Based on early measurements and a witness who said that the Triumph driver never used his brakes, a CHP officer estimated the impact speed at almost one hundred miles an hour.

Andy had been less than five miles away, headed for the family home in Tustin, when the call came over the police band radio in his Corvair.

It wasn’t until he brandished his press pass and eased closer to the body that he recognized the driver. Two sheriff’s deputies were lowering him from the car to the stretcher. It looked to Andy as if every bone in Howard Langton’s once magnificent body had been mashed to dust. Langton was flimsy and doll-like, only his clothes seeming to hold him together. He wore the same varsity jacket he’d worn to the jail the day before and in Andy’s picture on the front page of the
Journal
that morning. Yellow leather arms drenched red now. An almost empty quart of vodka clinked into the dirt after him.

“I caused this,” said Andy.

“Out of the way, Becker.”

“I caused this.”

“Right. Out of the way.”

Andy watched them carry Langton past him and slide him into the coroner’s van. Wind howling in the eucalyptus. A big red branch ripped away and crashed through the flashing silver leaves. Police radios crackled with news of fresh disaster elsewhere and scores of cars idled in the traffic jam. All eyes bolted to the catastrophe.

Andy found a place down by the lagoon. Sat down on the trunk of a fallen willow and cried.

ON SUNDAY
two of the major county dailies intimated that Howard Langton had killed Adrian Stalling in a lovers’ quarrel, then driven his car with suicidal intent as the law closed in around him.

David read them at sunrise with an outraged sadness for his friend and disgust for the papers. Howard now a fag and a killer and a suicide.

Only Andy’s
Journal
gave him half a chance. His article suggested that, based on an exclusive interview with Langton, he hadn’t killed Stalling. Andy said that the Boom Boom witness could have been mistaken because witnesses faced with lineups often were. Or that Langton could in fact have been seen “running” from the Boom Boom that night for reasons unrelated to the killing. After all, no one had seen the murder. Andy suggested that Langton was suicidal because he was homosexual and was about to be exposed.

David sat at his kitchen table. Wendy beside him, with her usual observant quiet. She was an early riser like David, fond of silence and sunrise. The windows faced east and the morning sun spangled the walls with light. He closed his eyes and said another long prayer. Not for a miracle this time. Only for the proper words.

Two and a half hours later David took the pulpit looking gaunt but somehow vigorous. Thin and durable as a whip.

He talked about his friendship with Howard, beginning way back in high school. Talked about Howard’s ferocious drive to win. His good sportsmanship. Remembered Howard sticking up for a new kid being picked on. Talked about going their separate ways after high school. Then renewing their friendship when Howard began attending the Grove Drive-In Church. David told of the youth group volunteer work Howard did. Told of the help Howard and Linda Langton had offered to Janelle Vonn. How Howard never had to be asked. He just saw what was needed and did it.

David stepped back from his pulpit. Bowed his head. Whitbrend’s move. He saw that many of the congregation bowed their heads, too, but David didn’t pray. Instead he stepped back up and sighed very loudly. The microphone picked up the alien sound. The speakers amplified it throughout the chapel. When David spoke again his voice was soft but clear.

“I will not let you remember Howard as a murderer,” he said. “Let me tell you what happened that night at the Boom Boom Bungalow. I know because I was there with Howard.”

A moan of anxious revelation rose from the congregation. Then silence descended through it like a window slammed shut.

David looked out at his worshipers. Picked out special faces. Andy fifth row with his notebook already out and his mouth half open in disbelief. Max and Monika blank-faced and frozen, like defendants braced for the verdict. Nick and Katy with the three children between them. Nick’s expression said that he had just misheard something and was ready for the correction. Katy had apparently missed it altogether, still scuffling with Katherine over a tithing envelope. Darren Whitbrend sat with his wife first row, Darren trim in his white robes and plainly flummoxed. David had told him before the service that Darren was free to join the people who would abandon the Grove Drive-In Church of God this morning. Darren had said he would never abandon David or the
Grove. Said it uncertainly. Then twice more, with more emphasis, like he was talking himself into believing it. Denied it three times. From habit, David looked down at second row right, but Barbara had decided it would be best for everyone if she and the children missed this service.

Dear God, help me move my lips.

“We got takeout food from Pepito’s,” he said. “The three of us had eaten together before, several times, and we liked the Mexican food. Back in Janelle’s cottage we prayed in thanks and ate. We drank wine. Around eight Janelle left with a friend of hers named Cory Bonnett.”

A firm murmur of recognition rippled through the audience, then ended.

Dear God, help me tell my truth.

“Howard and I stayed at Janelle’s cottage for a couple of hours. Then we drove to the Boom Boom Bungalow to retrieve Howard’s varsity jacket. He had left it there a week earlier and wanted to get it back.”

“My God,” someone said.

David felt something in him die as a family of five rose and made their way to an aisle. He wanted to chase them down. Make them sit and listen and understand. Make them forgive.

He heard the faint sound of car engines starting up outside.

“I drove Howard’s convertible sports car to the Boom Boom Bungalow because he had had too much wine. I double-parked on Coast Highway by the entrance to the bar and lobby and waited with the passenger door open.”

“The hell with you!” someone shouted.

A mass grumble rose. For a moment David thought the protest was against the shouter.

But a family of six walked out.

Then two elderly couples.

And a family of four.

Tires screeched outside, rubber smoking on the sky blue asphalt.

The grumble stopped. A silence of anticipation, David thought. He heard the intake of his breath from the speakers.

“Less than one minute later,” he said, “Howard came back. He trot
ted. He didn’t run. The varsity jacket was over his shoulder. He was smiling. He had no time to kill someone. No reason to kill someone. He had never met Adrian Stalling. He had retrieved a jacket from the manager of the motel and come back to the car. That is all. Later I drove him back to Janelle’s house and he was able to drive himself home. Howard Langton hurt no one. Do not remember him as a murderer. He was a gentle man who was born with certain faults and talents. As we all are.”

David watched a large clot of worshipers in the front rise and make quickly for the aisles. Then part of the middle section. Those in the back were closer to the main exits and many of them had already left the building. He felt disemboweled.

“Some of us can understand the terrible weight that Howard carried inside,” said David. “And imagine what it’s like to be different. To live in fear. To be hated if the truth is known. Howard asked for none of this. Howard was created by God. There is a place in God’s world for imperfection. There must be, because we are all imperfect.”

By then, over half his congregation was gone. David watched them bunching at the exits, the volume of their voices rising. He saw the anger and disgust on their turned faces.

Special Agent Hambly sat shaking his head. Looking up like David was the stupidest guy he’d ever seen.

Then David’s pain began to change into something else. His agony dissolved and a magnificent peace overtook him. Even as his congregation deserted him, David understood that he had now accomplished two things he had always prayed for and wanted. God had worked a miracle through him. And God had given him the strength to speak the truth.

David watched his believers go.

“The service will continue now,” he said. “For any of you who would like to stay.”

A loud clear voice answered him. “God bless you, Reverend Becker. I’m staying. Please continue.”

David looked out at the speaker. An old man sitting almost alone
now. The one whose platoon had been cut to ribbons by machine gun fire outside Calais.

“I am an optimist,” said David. “Our place of worship is half full and we have room for many more. Reverend Whitbrend, please come forward and lead us in prayer.”

Whitbrend swept up from the first row and took the steps to the proscenium two at a time.

THAT EVENING
at the family home in Tustin, David sat in the den with his parents and brothers. He’d never felt this self-conscious. Even at ordination at San Anselmo’s, the first time he’d donned his robes and presumed to be a man of God. But beyond the self-consciousness was relief. And hanging over both of them like a slow-moving cold front was the dark power of losing someone you loved.

Max freshened David’s drink, then his own. “David,” he said. “I don’t know if anything more needs to be said right now. But that’s never stopped me. Just know I love you and I’m sorry about what happened. All of it. I would imagine your career is ruined. But you told the truth and conducted yourself honorably today.”

“Thanks, Dad,” David managed.

“And I agree,” said Monika. “What you did today was difficult.”

“It sure was.”

A fragile silence.

“I always wanted a queer preacher for a brother,” said Andy.

Shame punched through David like a bullet. He understood that this would be his cost for the truth. He looked down at the carpet and a small smile crossed his face.

“Me, too,” said Nick.

“My God, you boys are horrible,” said Monika.

“They’re not so bad,” said David.

Then a long quiet. Ice clinking on glass. The sounds of the children and TV in the living room. The exhale of the wind through the orange grove outside.

Max stood. “Well, any other business before we have dinner?”

Andy stood, too. “I enlisted in the United States Marine Corps yesterday. I’m reporting tomorrow. I want to know why Clay died and I want to write about it. Mom, I’m coming back alive. I promise you I’m coming back alive.”

David saw his father waver. Thought it was booze, then understood it was emotion that had rocked him.

Monika rose and hugged Andy so hard David could hear the joints cracking in her back.

Nick shook Andy’s hand and said he was doing a good thing.

David wasn’t sure if Andy wanted a hug from his queer preacher brother but he did ask everyone to bow their heads. He said a brief and elegant prayer.

When he was done Andy hugged him.