Victims (35 page)

Milo said, “What the hell, we tried.” He lit up a wood-tipped panatela, exhaled acrid smoke through the driver’s window and called in for messages, starting with Petra.

The officers who’d arrested Lemuel Eccles thought Complainant Loyal Steward might be James Harrie but they couldn’t be positive, they’d been concentrating on the offender not the victim.

Raul Biro had pressured Mick Ostrovine into giving up the truth: Yes, “Dr. Shacker” had sent insurance cases to North Hollywood Day. No, there’d been no kickback, he was just another referral source.

Well-Start Insurance was through returning calls.

Biro said, “There had to be kickbacks. I found out who owns the place, bunch of Russians headquartered in Arcadia and they’re billing Medi-Cal gazillions. But I don’t see pursuing that unless there’s an organized crime aspect to our cases.”

“God forbid,” said Milo.

“That’s what I thought. Can’t think of anywhere else to go with this, El Tee.”

“Take your girlfriend out to dinner.”

“Don’t have one,” said Biro. “Not this month.”

“Then find one,” said Milo. “Meal’s on me.”

“Why?”

“ ’Cause you do your job and don’t bitch.”

“Haven’t done much on this one, El Tee.”

“So run a tab.”

Biro laughed and hung up and Milo called the coroner. Dr. Jernigan was out but she’d authorized her investigator to summarize James Pittson Harrie’s autopsy for Milo. Harrie’s heart and lungs and brain had been perforated by five bullets fired from the service gun of Sheriff’s Deputy Aaron Sanchez, any of which could’ve proved fatal. No I.D. had been found on Harrie’s person but his fingerprints matched some from twenty-five years ago when he’d begun work as a janitor at V-State.

The human blood in the Acura’s trunk came from three separate samples, two type A’s, one type O. DNA swabs would take a while to analyze but a sex screen had come back female.

Milo hung up and gazed at weed-choked acreage. “A tunnel would’ve been nice. When you were here, you never heard of that?”

“No,” I said.

“Why’d you end up here, anyway?”

“To learn.”

“About kids like Huggler?”

“The patients I saw weren’t dangerous, not even close.”

“They get better?”

“We made their lives better.”

He said, “Uh-huh.” His eyes closed. He stretched his long legs, rested his head on the seat-back. Stayed that way for a while. Except for the occasional puff on the cigar, he appeared to be sleeping.

I thought about an unusual child, living in a special room.

Milo shook himself like a wet dog, stubbed the cigar in the ashtray the city officially forbade him from using. “Let’s drive around Camarillo, check out mailbox outlets, shitty motels, and other potential squats. Afterward we’ll celebrate nothing with a nice fish dinner at Andrea in Ventura. Been there?”

“Robin and I went whale-watching last year, it’s right near the launch.”

“Rick and I went whale-watching last year, too. Closest we got was when I caught a glimpse of myself in the mirror.”

I was expected to chuckle so I did.

He spit a tobacco shred out the window.

Just as he started up the car, something moved.

CHAPTER
40

B
lurred movement.

A flickering dot bobbing somewhere past the midpoint of the field’s length. Clear of the rear ficus wall but at this distance no way to gauge how far in front.

We watched as the shape bounced above the lower grass, was obscured by taller vegetation.

Up and down, in and out. Sunlight caught the outer edges, limned them gold.

The gold endured. A golden shape. Some sort of animal.

Too large and not furtive enough to be a coyote.

The shape got closer. Lumbering.

A dog. Oblivious to our presence, making its way through the weeds.

Milo and I got out of the car, walked along the border of the field. Got close enough to make out more details.

Sizable dog, obvious golden retriever heritage but too long and narrow in the snout for a purebred. One ear perked, the other flopped.

It stopped to pee. No leg-raising, a brief, submissive squat. Lowering its head, it continued. Stopping, starting, sniffing with no obvious goal. Maybe harking back to some ancient hunting dog imperative.

We kept walking.

The dog looked up, sniffed the air. Turned.

Soft eyes, grizzled muzzle. Not a trace of anxiety.

I said, “Nice to meet you, Louie.”

We stood on the roadside as Louie peed again. Squatting longer, he strained to defecate, finally succeeded and pawed the ground before continuing through the field.

A second shape appeared off to his right.

Materializing from nowhere, just as Louie had.

The second dog looked ancient, limping and hobbling as it struggled to catch up with Louie. Tenuous steps alternated with shaky halts. A few seconds of that led to what appeared to be convulsive loss of control that plunged the animal to the ground.

It struggled, moaned, got to its feet, trembling.

Louie turned. Ambled over.

The other dog remained rooted, chest heaving. Louie licked its face. The other dog seemed to revive, managed a few more steps.

Louie and his pal entered a low patch that gave us a clear view. We edged into the field, saw the too-pronounced rib cages of both animals. Louie was underweight, the older dog emaciated with a belly tucked tighter than a greyhound’s.

Not the abdomen intended for this breed. What had once been a muscular body was white skin speckled with brown stretched over spindly bones. The head remained noble: brown, with floppy ears, solid bone structure, eyes that appeared vacant but continued to dart around intelligently. A single brown patch ran along a spinal ridge corrugated by age and malnutrition.

German shorthaired pointer.

I said, “Dr. Wainright’s hiking buddy, Ned. All these years.”

Milo said, “They cut up animals but save these two?”

“Boys and their pets.”

Ned paused again, breathing hard, fighting for balance. Louie nuzzled him, sidled up and kept his own body close to that of the pointer, helping the older dog maintain equilibrium. They explored some more, Ned stumbling, Louie there to brace him. Each time the pointer marshaled its energies, Louie rewarded with a lick.

Canine behavior therapist.

For the next quarter hour, we watched both dogs zigzag through the field. If they noticed the unmarked parked off to the side, they gave no indication. One time Louie lifted his head and did seem to be looking at us again, but matter-of-factly, with no alarm.

A trusting creature.

Milo said, “They’ve been starved … if they’re here, he’s got to be.” He scanned the horizon, fingers meandering toward his holster. “C’mon, you sick bastard. Show yourself or I’ll sic PETA on you.”

The dogs wandered around a bit more for no apparent reason. Then the pointer squatted, took an interminable time to do its business while Louie stood by patiently.

Louie led Ned along what seemed to be an agonizing trek. Both dogs entered a patch of high grass and faded from view.

Twenty minutes later, they hadn’t reappeared.

Milo motioned me forward and we stepped into high grass, focusing on the spot where we’d last seen the dogs. Muting noise by parting handfuls of brush before passing through.

Stopping every ten paces to make sure we weren’t being watched.

No sign of the dogs, no sign of any other creature.

A few hundred feet in, the vegetation died and we faced a clearing.

Irregular patch of dirt, twenty or so yards in front of the ficus wall. Smooth, brown, swept clean. Just like Marlon Quigg’s kill-spot.

Crossing the patch were two sets of paw prints. Milo kneeled and
pointed to the left of the dog tracks. A human shoe print. Several, mostly obscured by the dogs.

I made out the shape of a heel. A boomerang-shaped arc of sole.

Feet facing the road. Someone had left this place.

The dogs’ trail ended at a hole in the ground. Not irregular, a perfect circle. Six or so feet in diameter, rimmed with rusty metal.

Yawning mouth, flush to the ground. With the slope of the field and the high foliage, you had to get close to see it.

A tunnel entry, identical to the one Borchard had showed us. In place of a pneumatic lid, this one was wide open.

Milo motioned me back, took out his gun, crept to the opening, and hazarded a look.

His gun-arm grew rigid.

Louie’s head sprouted from the opening. He panted, grinned goofily. Unimpressed by Milo’s Glock.

Milo waved and Louie emerged, tail wagging. Padding up to Milo, he flipped onto his back in a grand display of surrender.

With his free hand, Milo rubbed Louie’s tummy. Louie’s eyes clamped shut in ecstasy.

No genius but once a handsome fellow. Now his pelt was gray-tipped and mangy.

Milo motioned for Louie to sit. Louie sat.

Milo tiptoed back to the mouth of the opening.

A sound burst from inside the tunnel, wheezy and wet and amplified by the subterranean tube.

Louie’s upright ear stiffened but he remained on his haunches.

Heavy breathing. Scraping.

Ned the pointer stuck his head out.

He studied Milo. Me. Louie.

Louie’s composure must have convinced his buddy. The old dog sank down and rested his chin along the rim of the hole.

Milo motioned me over, handed me the keys to the unmarked, gave me my assignment.

The man guarding the artichoke field hadn’t budged. I allowed him ten paces of warning before coming up behind him and saying, “ ’Scuse me.”

He turned as if he’d expected me. Tipped the broad-brimmed hat.

The soda bottle was still in his hand but now it was empty. The sandwich in his pocket was untouched. I showed him the twenty-dollar bill, pointed to the sandwich.

His eyebrows arched.
“¿Veinte para esto?”

“Sí.”

He handed me the sandwich.

“Gracias.”
I tried to give him the twenty. He shook his head.

I said,
“Por favor,”
dropped the bill in his pocket.

He shrugged and went back to watching the artichokes.

Using the sandwich, Milo coaxed both dogs away from the tunnel hole. He took hold of Louie and I placed my hand on Ned’s scruff. Skin and bones was an overstatement. He’d probably once weighed close to seventy pounds, was lucky if he was half of that now. I lifted him gently. Like hoisting a bale of twigs. As I carried him to the car, his head swiveled toward me and I saw that one of his eyes was a gray-blue film stretched over a sunken orbit.

I said, “You’re doing great, guy.”

He moaned, licked my face with a dry, fetid tongue.

Milo was able to guide Louie with the slightest prod of finger behind ear. We put both dogs in the rear of the unmarked, cracked the windows for air. The sandwich wasn’t much, just a scanty portion of lunch meat between slices of white bread. But neither pooch griped when Milo broke off small bites and fed them equal amounts.

Louie chewed pretty well but the pointer didn’t have too many teeth left and was forced to gum. Unneutered male but well past the point where testosterone made a difference.

We gave them both water from bottles we’d brought for ourselves, made sure they lapped slowly.

Ned rolled onto his back, curled up against the car door. Louie placed his paw on his pal’s haunch. They both slipped into sleep, snoring in tandem, a comical waltz-like cadence.

We got out of the car and Milo locked up and turned back to the field of weeds. Homing in on the spot, invisible once more, where the tunnel mouth sat.

“Only one set of shoe prints,” he said. “Assuming that’s Harrie, what’re the odds on Huggler still being down there?”

I said, “Good to excellent. He’s getting anxious that Harrie hasn’t returned with the groceries but has nowhere to go.”

“So we’ll assume he’s down there. Problem is there’s no way to know where the tunnel leads. What if Borchard’s wrong and not all of SeaBird’s tunnels are sealed and Huggler’s able to get in there?”

“Trust me, I’m head of security and it couldn’t happen.”

He laughed. Turned serious. “You were right. It’s all about synchrony.” He looked back at the snoozing dogs. “Maybe they’ve got the right idea. Follow your ignorance, reach your bliss.”

We returned to the car and pushed it nose-first into the grass. If Grant Huggler headed for the road he’d eventually spot us. But if he remained near his hideaway, the same geography that blocked the tunnel from view would work in our favor.

If I’d guessed wrong and he’d already wandered away and chose to return from any direction, we’d be a clear target.

We stood next to the car. Milo said, “Once we get going, mind looking back every so often so I can concentrate on what’s ahead?”

“No prob.”

“Lots of probs, but we’re solvers.” A bird flew. Seagull soaring westward before passing out of view.

Then nothing.

Milo said, “Damn oil painting.”

I said, “The tunnel is where Specialized Care used to stand.”