Blood Test Page 19

  Delilah shook her head.

  Baron spoke again.

  “We didn’t talk about much of anything. It was just a brief visit.”

  “I couldn’t wait to get out of there,” recalled Delilah. “Everything was so mechanical.”

  “We dropped off the fruit, left, and drove back home,” Baron said with finality.

  “A sad situation,” she sighed.

  17

  A GROUP of Touch people were sitting yoga-style on the grass when I came out, eyes closed, palms pressed together, faces glowing in the sun. Houten leaned against the fountain, smoking, eyes drifting idly in their direction. He saw me coming, dropped the butt, stomped on it, and tossed it in an earthenware trashbasket.

  “Learn anything?”

  I shook my head.

  “Like I told you,” he cocked his head toward the meditators who had now started to hum, “strange but harmless.”

  I looked at them. Despite the white costumes, the sandals, and the untrimmed beards, they resembled participants in a corporate seminar, one of those glossy pop-psych affairs promoted by management to increase productivity. The faces gazing heavenward were middle-aged and well-fed, suffused with an executive look that bespoke prior lives of comfort and authority.

  Norman Matthews had been described to me as an aggressive and ambitious man. A hustler. As Matthias he’d tried to come across a holy man but there was enough cynicism in me to wonder if he hadn’t simply traded one hustle for another.

  The Touch was a gold mine: offer the prosperous simplicity amid lush surroundings, remove the burden of personal responsibility, substitute an ethos that equated health and vitality with righteousness, and pass the collection plate. How could it miss?

  But even if the whole thing was a scam it didn’t spell kidnapping and murder. As Seth had pointed out, loss of privacy was the last thing Matthias wanted, be he prophet or con man.

  “Let’s take a look around,” said Houten, “and be done with it.”

  * * *

  I was allowed free access to the grounds, permitted to open any door. The sanctuary was domed and majestic, with clerestory windows and biblical murals on the ceiling. The pews had been removed and the floor covered with padded mats. There was a rough pine table in the center of the room and little else. A woman in white dusted and swept, stopping only to smile at us maternally.

  The sleeping rooms were indeed cells—no larger than the one in which Raoul was confined—low-ceilinged, thick-walled, and cool, with a single window the size of a hardbound book and grilled with wood. Each room was furnished with a cot and a chest of drawers. Matthias’s differed only in that it had a small bookcase. His literary taste was eclectic—the Bible, the Koran, Perls, Jung, Cousins’s Anatomy of An Illness, Toffler’s Future Shock, the Bhagavad-Gita, several texts on organic gardening and ecology.

  I took a tour of the kitchen, where cauldrons of broth simmered on industrial stoves and bread baked sweetly in brick ovens. There was a member’s library, its stock leaning toward health and agriculture, and a conference room with textured adobe walls. And everywhere people in white working, smiling, bright-eyed and friendly.

  Houten and I traipsed through the fields, watching Touch members tend the grapes. A black-bearded giant put down his shears and offered us a freshly picked cluster. The fruit was moist to the touch and it burst electrically upon my tongue. I complimented the man on the flavor. He nodded and returned to his work.

  It was well into the afternoon but the sun continued to rage. My unprotected head began to ache and after cursorily inspecting the sheepyard and the vegetable plots I told Houten I’d had enough.

  We turned and walked back toward the viaduct. I wondered what I’d accomplished, for the search had been symbolic, at best. There wasn’t any reason to believe the Swope children were there. And if they were, there’d be no way to find them. The Retreat was surrounded by hundreds of acres, much of it forest. Nothing short of a bloodhound pack could cover it all. Besides, monasteries are secret places, designed for refuge, and the compound might very well harbor a maze of underground caverns, secret compartments, and hidden passages that only an archaeologist could unravel.

  It had been a futile day, I thought, but if it helped Raoul confront reality it was worth it. Then I realized what reality meant and craved the balm of denial.

  Houten had Bragdon bring Raoul’s personal effects in a large manila envelope. In the end he’d agreed to accept the oncologist’s check for six hundred eighty-seven dollars worth of fines and while he recorded the amount in triplicate, I walked around the room restlessly, eager to get going.

  The county map caught my eye. I located La Vista and noticed a back road to the east that seemed to skirt the town, allowing entry to the region from the outlying woodlands without actually passing through the commercial district. If that was the case, avoiding Houten’s scrutiny was easier than he’d let on.

  After some hesitation I asked him about it. He fiddled with a piece of carbon paper and continued writing.

  “Oil company bought up the land, got the county to seal off the road. There was big talk of deep deposits, prosperity just around the corner.”

  “Did they strike it rich?”

  “Nope. Bone dry.”

  The deputy brought Raoul out. I told him about my visit to the Retreat and the negative findings. He took it in, looking downcast and beaten, and offered no protest.

  The sheriff, pleased with his passivity, treated him with exquisite courtesy while he signed him out. He asked Raoul what he wanted to do about his Volvo, and the oncologist shrugged and said to have it fixed, he’d pay for it.

  I led him out of the room and down the stairs.

  He was silent throughout the ride home, not even losing his cool when a chubby female border guard pulled us over and asked for his identification. He accepted the indignity with a mute acquiescence that I found pitiful. Two hours ago he’d been aggressive and poised for battle. I wondered if he’d been laid low by the accumulated stress or if cyclical mood swings were a part of his makeup I’d never noticed.

  I was famished but he looked too grungy to take to a restaurant so I bought a couple of burgers and Cokes at a stand in Santa Ana and pulled to the side of the road near a small municipal park. I gave Raoul his food and ate mine while watching a group of teenagers play softball, racing to finish before nightfall. When I turned to look at him, he was asleep, the food still wrapped and lying in his lap. I took it, stowed it in a trashcan and started up the Seville. He stirred but didn’t awaken and by the time I got back on the freeway he was snoring peacefully.

  We reached L.A. by seven, just as traffic on the downtown interchange was untangling. When I turned off at the Los Feliz exit he opened his eyes.

  “What’s your address?”

  “No, take me back to the hospital.”

  “You’re in no shape to go back there.”

  “I must. Helen will be waiting.”

  “You’ll only scare her looking like that. At least go home and freshen up first.”

  “I have a change of clothes in my office. Please, Alex.”

  I threw up my hands and drove to Western Peds. After parking in the doctors’ lot I walked him to the front door of Prinzley.

  “Thank you,” he said, looking at his feet.

  “Take care of yourself.”

  On the way back to the car I met Beverly Lucas leaving the wards. She looked tired and worn, the oversized purse seeming to weigh her down.

  “Alex, I’m so glad to see you.”

  “What’s the matter?”

  She looked around to make sure no one was listening.

  “It’s Augie. He’s been making my life miserable ever since your friend interrogated him, calling me unfaithful, a quisling. He even tried to embarrass me on rounds but the attending doc stopped it.”

  “Bastard.”

  She shook her head.

  “What makes it hard is that I see his point. We were—close, once. What h
e did in bed was nobody’s business.”

  I took her by the shoulders.

  “What you did was right. If you got enough distance to see straight that would be obvious. Don’t let him get to you.”

  She flinched at the harshness in my voice.

  “I know you’re right. Intellectually. But he’s falling apart and it hurts me. I can’t help my feelings.”

  She started to cry. A trio of nurses walked our way. I steered her off the walkway and into the stairwell to the doctors’ level.

  “What do you mean falling apart?”

  “Acting strange. Doping and drinking more heavily than usual. He’s bound to get caught. This morning he pulled me off the ward and into a conference room, locked the door, and came on to me.”

  She lowered her eyes in embarrassment.

  “He told me I was the best he’d ever had, actually tried to get physical. When I stopped him he looked crushed. Then he started to rant about Melendez-Lynch—how he’d scapegoated him and was going to try to use the Swope case to terminate the fellowship. He started to laugh—it was a freaky laugh, Alex, full of anger. He said he had an ace up his sleeve. That Melendez-Lynch would never get rid of him.”

  “Did he say what that was?”

  “I asked him. He just laughed again and walked out. Alex, I’m worried. I was just on my way to the residents’ dorm. To make sure he was okay.”

  I tried to talk her out of it but she was resolute. She had an infinite capacity for guilt. Someday she’d make someone a wonderful doormat.

  It was clear she wanted me to accompany her to his apartment, and tired as I was, I agreed to go with her, in case things got hairy. And on the off-chance Valcroix really had an ace and might show it.

  The residents’ dorm across the boulevard from the hospital was a utilitarian affair, three stories of unfinished concrete over a subterranean parking lot. Some of the windows had been brightened up with plants and flower arrangements resting on sills or hanging from macrame harnesses. But that didn’t stop it from looking like what it was: low-cost housing.

  An elderly black guard was stationed at the door—there had been rapes in the neighborhood and the residents had screamed for security. He looked at our hospital badges and let us pass.

  Valcroix’s apartment was on the second floor.

  “It’s the one with the red door,” said Beverly, pointing.

  The corridor and all the other doors were beige. Valcroix’s was scarlet and stood out like a wound.

  “Amateur paint job?” I ran my hand over the wood, which was rough and bubbled. A segment from a doper comic had been pasted to the door—furry people popping pills and hallucinating in technicolor, their fantasies sexually explicit and excessive.

  “Uh huh.”

  She knocked several times. When there was no answer she bit her lip.

  “Maybe he went out,” I suggested.

  “No. He always stays home when he’s not on call. That was one thing that bothered me about our relationship. We never went out.”

  I didn’t remind her that she’d spotted him in a restaurant with Nona Swope. No doubt he was one of those men as stingy about giving as he was greedy about taking. He’d do the least amount possible to enter a woman’s body. With her lowered expectations, Beverly would have been his dream. Until he got bored with her.

  “I’m worried, Alex. I know he’s in there. He could be OD’ed on something.”

  Nothing I said alleviated her anxiety. Finally, we went downstairs and convinced the guard to use his master key on the red door.

  “I don’t know ’bout this, Doctor,” he said, but he unlocked the apartment.

  The place was a sty. Dirty laundry was piled on the grubby carpet. The bed was unmade. On the nightstand was an ashtray brimming with marijuana roaches. Nearby was an engraved roach clip in the shape of a pair of female legs. Medical books and more doper comics coexisted in the paper blizzard that covered half the living room floor. The kitchen sink was a swamp of dirty dishes and cloudy water. A fly circled overhead.

  No one was home.

  Beverly walked through and unconsciously began straightening up. The guard looked at her quizzically.

  “Come on,” I said with surprising vehemence. “He’s not here. Let’s get out.”

  The guard cleared his throat.

  She covered the bed, took a last look around, and left.

  Outside the dorm she asked if we should call the police.

  “What for?” I demanded sharply. “A grown man leaves his apartment? They’d never take it seriously. And for good reason.”

  She looked wounded and wanted to discuss it further but I begged off. I was weary, my head hurt, my joints were sore; it felt like I was coming down with something. Besides, my altruism account was already badly overdrawn.

  We crossed the street in silence and parted ways.

  By the time I got home I felt really lousy—feverish, logy, and aching all over. There was a bright spot—an express letter from Robin confirming her departure from Tokyo in a week. One of the Japanese executives owned a condo on Kauai and he’d offered her the use of it. She was hoping I could meet her flight in Honolulu and set aside two weeks for fun and sun. I called Western Union and wired a Yes on all accounts.

  A hot bath didn’t make me feel any better. Neither did a cool drink or self-hypnosis. I dragged myself downstairs to feed the koi but didn’t linger to watch them eat. Back in the house I fell into bed with the paper, the rest of the mail, and Leo Kottke on the stereo. But I found myself too drained to concentrate, and surrendered to sleep without a struggle.

  18

  BY MORNING my malaise had matured to influenza. I took aspirin, drank lemon tea, and wished Robin were there to take care of me.

  I kept the TV on for background noise and slept, on and off, all day. By evening I was feeling well enough to hobble out of bed and eat Jell-O. But even that tired me and soon I was back asleep.

  In my dream I was adrift on an Arctic ice floe, seeking shelter from a violent hailstorm in a meager cardboard leanto. Each new fusillade shredded the cardboard, leaving me increasingly terrified and exposed.

  I awoke naked and shivering. The hailstorm continued. Digital numbers glowed in the dark: 11:26. Through the window I saw clear black skies. The hail turned into bullets. Shotgun fire stinging the side of the house.

  I dove to the floor, lay flat, belly-down, breathing hard.

  More gunfire. A percussive pop, then the tinkle of broken glass. A cry of pain. A sickening dull sound, like a melon bursting under a sledgehammer. An engine starting. Automotive escape.

  Then silence.

  I crawled to the phone. Called the police. Asked for Milo. He was off-shift. Del Hardy, then. Please.

  The black detective came to the phone. Between gasps I told him about the nightmare that had turned real.

  He said he’d call Milo, both of them would be there code three.

  Minutes later the wail of sirens stretched up the glen, trombones gone mad.

  I put on a robe and stepped outside.

  The redwood siding on the front of the house was peppered with holes and splintered in a dozen places. One window had been blown out.

  I smelled hydrocarbons.

  On the terrace were three open cans of gasoline. Wadded rags had been fashioned into oversized wicks and stuffed into the spouts. Oily footprints led to the edge of the landing and ended in a single smear of a skidmark. I looked over the railing.

  A man sprawled face down and motionless in the Japanese garden.

  I climbed down just as the black and whites pulled up. Walked barefoot to the garden, the stone cool under feet burning with fever. I called out. The man didn’t respond.

  It was Richard Moody.

  Half his face had been blown away. What remained was dog food. Or more precisely, fish food, for his head was submerged in my pond and the koi nibbled at it, sucking up the bloody water, relishing the novelty of a new snack.

  Sickened, I
tried to wave them away but the sight of me was a conditioned stimulus for feeding and they grew more enthusiastic, feasting and slurping, scaly gourmands. The big black and gold carp came half out of the water to get a mouthful. I could swear he grinned at me with whiskered lips.

  Someone was at my side. I jumped.

  “Easy, Alex.”

  “Milo!”

  He looked as if he’d crawled out of bed. He wore a lifeless windbreaker over a yellow Hang-Ten polo shirt and baggy jeans. His hair was a fright wig and his green eyes gleamed in the moonlight.