Savages: A Nameless Detective Novel (Nameless Detective Novels) (13 page)

There was no front porch, just a pair of concrete steps built into a foundation slab below the door. The man standing on the bottom step didn’t move as Runyon drove into the yard. Bearded and shaggy-haired, big-bellied in a khaki shirt and military camouflage pants, he had a shotgun slung over one arm and a chain leash tight-wrapped in the other hand. The pit bull, black and vicious looking, strained at the other end of the chain, barking furiously, foamy drool flying from its jowls. There was no expression on the man’s blocky face. The way he stood, flat-footed, motionless, made him seem even bigger than he was.

He remained motionless until Runyon parked at a slant behind one of the rusted-out wrecks. Then he came forward in a long, stiff-backed stride, like a giant stick man, to within a dozen yards of the Ford. When he stopped again he jerked once on the chain and the pit bull immediately
quit barking, sat on its haunches, and stared at Runyon with red-eyed malevolence.

“I don’t know you,” in a big bass rumble. “Stay where you are, you know what’s good for you.”

“Gus Mayerhof?”

“Got eyes, ain’t you? Know how to read signs?”

“Your gate was open.”

“You better have a goddamn good reason for driving through it.”

“I’m looking for a kid named Jerry Belsize. Lives down in the valley—Gray’s Landing. Twenty-two, husky, drives a dark blue ’fifty-seven Impala.”

“What’s that got to do with me?”

“I was told he came up here to see you last Friday.”

“Then you got told wrong.”

“You haven’t seen him recently?”

“Nobody comes to see me without they’re invited. Nobody.”

“That’s not what I asked you, Gus.”

“Mr. Mayerhof. Nobody calls me Gus unless I say so.”

The new headache had put Runyon in a bleak, dark mood. He didn’t like pit bulls; he didn’t like hard-ass pot growers with shotguns; he didn’t like the situation he’d let himself into. And he didn’t like having to put the kind of tight hold on himself that Mayerhof had on the dog, even if it was the only option given the circumstances. He said, slow and reasonable, “I don’t want much from you, Mr. Mayerhof. Why not just give it to me and I’ll be on my way.”

“Yeah? Why should I?”

“Be in your best interest.”

“Who says so?”

“I say so. My name’s Runyon, Jake Runyon.”

“Fuck Jake Runyon,” Mayerhof said. “You’re a trespasser, not a cop.”

“Close enough to a cop.”

“. . . What’s that mean?”

“Private investigator. Close ties to the law.”

“Bullshit.”

“I can show you my license.”

“Fuck your license.”

The leash on Runyon’s temper was starting to fray. “Look, Mayerhof, I didn’t come here to make trouble for you. It’s none of my business what you do for a living, but I can make it my business if you push me. I can make it the law’s business.”

“Not if you don’t leave here in one piece,” Mayerhof said. His body turned slightly as he spoke; the shotgun barrel came up on a level with Runyon’s face framed in the open window. His glare was as malevolent as the pit bull’s.

“Cold-blooded murder? I don’t think so. People know I’m here. How do you suppose I got your name, found out where you live?”

“You never heard of self-defense? Man’s got a right to defend his property against trespassers.”

“Not when they’re sitting inside a car.”

“Say you threatened me. Nobody here to call me a liar.”

“There’d still be an investigation. How’re you going to hide what you grow and sell up here?”

“So maybe you just disappear, you and your car both. Happens all the time in country like this.”

“All right then, go ahead and shoot me. But do it quick, Mayerhof. I’ve got a .357 Magnum in here and the longer you wait, the better my chances of using it. Miss me and I’ll blow your head off before you can lever up another shell. The dog’s head, too, if you try to let it do the job for you.”

“Bullshit.”

“I’m a good fast shot, better than you are one-handed with a pump gun, faster than a pit bull can jump through a car window. I was on the Seattle PD for twelve years. Give me the chance and I won’t miss.”

Standoff. But it was the kind that couldn’t last very long. If he’d gauged Mayerhof wrong, he could get himself killed right here and now—put an end to his misery. He cared and he didn’t care at the same time. But he hadn’t misread the man. He’d had confrontations with dozens of Gus Mayerhofs over the years, the petty criminals with hard-as-nails exteriors and guts that melted and ran when push came to shove.

Nothing changed in Mayerhof ’s expression and he didn’t break eye contact, but inside of thirty seconds the shotgun barrel moved slowly off dead aim until it was pointing at the Ford’s sideview mirror. He said, “You got two minutes to ask your questions and haul ass out of here.”

“Jerry Belsize. You know him or don’t you?”

“I got no memory for names.”

“That’s not an answer.”

“Only answer you’re gonna get.”

“How often does he come here?”

“Who says he was ever here? Not me.”

“When was the last time you saw him?”

Shrug. “Real scarce cars, ’fifty-seven Chevys.”

“You better not be jerking me around, Mayerhof.”

“And you better not make trouble for me, man. I ain’t no backwoods hick. I got friends do me any favor I ask.”

“Sure you have.”

Mayerhof relaxed his grip on the chain slightly. The dog tensed and began to growl. “Two minutes about up.”

Runyon let him have another ten seconds of stare before he put the Ford in gear and backed up. In his rearview mirror as he turned around, he saw Mayerhof and the dog still occupying the same piece of ground, neither of them moving, like sculpted juts of granite among the corpses and skeletons. His shoulder muscles didn’t loosen until he was over the rise and through the woods.

Had
Mayerhof been lying? Didn’t figure that way. Nothing in it for him if he wanted to avoid trouble. Nothing for Brody or the fat woman in the general store or the saloon bunch in lying, either. So Belsize not only hadn’t come up to the mountains to hide out; he also hadn’t been here last Friday buying pot or having car trouble. Then where was he all that day? Why had he lied
to his girlfriend? Why had he left the migrant camp so suddenly and where was he now?

Maybe Rinniak and Sandra Parnell were wrong about the kid. Maybe Jerry Belsize wasn’t so innocent after all.

FIREBUG

Burn!

Come on come on come on—
burn
!

“What’s taking so long? You sure you set the timer right?”

“I know how to do it, don’t I?”

“It’s been fifteen minutes already.”

“I set it for twenty. I just wanted to be sure we had enough time.”

“Shit. Fifteen was all we needed. What’s the matter with you?”

“You know what the matter is. I just don’t think we should be doing this again so soon.”

“Why not? You like it as much as I do.”

“I’ve got a bad feeling, that’s all. So soon after . . . Manuel.”

Burn, damn you, burn!

“We had to kill him. We didn’t have any choice.”

“I know, but God, I can still see his face. It makes me sick.”

“Everything makes you sick. Here, smoke a joint, get calmed down.”

“I don’t want one right now.”

“It’s better when you’re high, you know that.”

“I’ll just take a hit off yours. . . .”

“No. Fire up your own.”

Small flame, hot, bright, but gone too quick.

“Doesn’t it bother you? A little?”

“What?”

“What we did to Manuel.”

“No. I’m just glad he came to us first. If he hadn’t . . .”

“I keep having nightmares about it. The sound when you hit him with the board, the blood, the way his head looked. And his face after we dragged him up on the rope . . . we didn’t have to do
that
.”

“I had to. I never saw anybody hanging before. Besides, it wasn’t as messy as beating his head in.”

“He was already dead, wasn’t he?”

“No, he wasn’t. He was still breathing.”

“Oh Jesus!”

“Why do you think he danced like he did when we pulled him up, why his tongue turned all black? He strangled on that rope.”

“Don’t!”

“You’re a baby, baby.”

“I can’t help it. It took so long, we almost didn’t get
away after you hit that detective. You didn’t have to hit him; he didn’t know we were there.”

“I wanted to hit him. So I did.”

“He’d be gone by now if you hadn’t. He scares me. He’s not stupid. What if he—?”

“Not stupid, but not as smart as I am. None of them are.”

“But if we keep on the way we have been—”

“We’re not going to.”

“We’re not? No lie?”

“We’re going to get even more creative. More fun, more payback.”

“Oh God, fun. Do we
have
to . . . you know?”

“We’ve already done it. The fire’s just the finishing touch.”

“I don’t think I want to be there. . . .”

“Well, you’re going to. You know you always do what I want you to.”

“I know, but—”

“Say it.”

“. . . I always do what you want me to.”

“Tell me why.”

“You know why.”

“I want to hear you say it.”

“I love you.”

“Again.”

“I love you.”

“I love you, too. Most of the time. Hey, you know what would’ve been really cool? If we could’ve hung Runyon,
too. Right next to Manuel, side by side, like in those old cowboy flicks.”

“That’s gross! Sometimes . . .”

“Sometimes what?”

“
You
scare me. You’re so . . .”

“So what? Crazy? Maybe I am; I don’t care. Taking risks, having fun, getting even, that’s what it’s all about.”

“Sooner or later we’re gonna get caught.”

“No, we’re not.”

“We almost did already. I almost did. If you get any more out of control—”

“I’m not out of control! Don’t say that to me!”

“Ow! No, don’t hit me again—”

“I will if you give me any more shit like that.”

“I won’t, baby, I’m sorry.”

“Why doesn’t that fucking timer go off? Did you pour kerosene inside the trailer like I told you to?”

“Yeah.”

“Leave trails to the other cabins?”

“Yes, yes, I told you I did.”

“It’s going to be a real big fire. Big and hot, bigger and hotter than the school—remember the school? Last longer, too, hours maybe. All the dry grass out here, it’ll burn fast.”

“What if it spreads this way, climbs up this hill?”

“It won’t. There’s not much wind and it’s blowing away from us.”

“Somebody could see us up here—”

Whoosh!

There it goes! About time!
Yes!

Flames jumping growing racing, eating up the grass, climbing the trailer, climbing the shacks, shooting out windows and roofs. That’s it, that’s it! Higher, faster, big red tongues licking up the crack of night.

Look at the trailer burn, like a fat bug on a bonfire. Smell the smoke, acid sweet like pot, like devil’s perfume. Listen to it crackle, like it’s talking to itself, saying burn hotter, faster, burn everything up. Watch it run run run run along the creek and up the cottonwoods and into the orchards, mount the trees one at a time, fuck each one, make it come in a crown of fire.

Somebody’s seen it by now, somebody’s called 911. Won’t be long before the sirens. And then the fire trucks and the firemen and the hoses and the fire laughing at the puny streams of water trying to put it out. And son of a bitch bastard Don Kelso roaring up in his cruiser, I can hardly wait. He won’t be swaggering tonight, giving orders, acting like he knows everything and owns the fucking world. You can’t give orders to fire. You can’t slap fire around and make it behave.

Oh, man, watch it feed, watch it fuck! So hot, so hungry. Swallowing up the camp now, the trees, the fields, the sky, the night, the whole world. Burning everything up. Burning
me
up inside.

“Hey, what’re you doing?”

“What do you think I’m doing?”

“No! Not here, not now—”

“Right here, right now.”

“We can’t, it’s crazy, what if somebody sees us—”

“Burn you up, too, burn both of us up together.”

“No, baby, please, please—”

“Don’t fight me, don’t make me hurt you.”

Burning up burning up burning up . . .

W
hen I came into the offices on Monday morning, Tamara said, “We’re not gonna have Jake for a couple of days.”

“How come?”

“He called last night, and again a few minutes ago. Man had a rough weekend up north and it’s still not done with.”

“What happened?”

“Walked blind into a murder and arson case, got himself a bad whack on the head. Guy he was supposed to deliver the subpoena to is missing and the local law thinks it’s because he’s the perp.” She explained the rest of the situation, as Runyon had outlined it to her.

“Christ. How bad’s his concussion?”

“Not too serious. He figured he’d be able to leave today, but there was another fire last night—that’s how come the second call—and now it looks like he’s stuck until tomorrow.”

“He need any help from us?”

“He says no.”

Cause for concern just the same. Runyon had become an important fit in the short time he’d worked for the agency. He’d put his life and his license on the line for Tamara and me on more than one occasion, and a tight professional bond had developed among the three of us—trust, respect, understanding. That was as far as it went, by tacit consent. He wasn’t the kind of man who invited friendship outside the office, or who seemed to need friends at all. Still grieving for his late wife—another reason he had my empathy. I cared about the man, I knew Tamara did, too, and his actions and as much talking as you could get him to do indicated he felt the same way.

“Keep in touch with him. If he needs us, we’ll work something out.”

“Told him that.”

“Okay. Meanwhile, we’ve got the Ogden investigation to move on.”

“Already started,” she said. “Last night, after I got back from apartment hunting.”

“Didn’t tell me you were looking for a new place.”