The Do-Re-Mi Page 17

  “No game.”

  On Highball Trail and across the bridge he reminds Knudsen about my campout beside the river, my hearing gunshots and my estimate of their proximity. He says, “Clifford suggested we snoop the other side of the river. Because, at least as far as we know, nobody else has gone there.”

  “Why didn’t your boy tell me about hearing the shots?”

  “I’ll bet you didn’t ask nice.”

  Across the bridge and up the trail, Pop points out the residences and summarizes what we found in each. And as they near the Van Dyke home, at first he looks for Othello. Then he watches for any sign of the boys or their father. But nothing appears. And Roy’s old pickup is gone.

  He drives to the end of the road and parks. Instead of using the circular route by the river, he leads Knudsen along the path we had walked coming back to the car, a few paces over fifteen hundred, not far short of a mile, to the first marijuana stalks. He points to them and says, “The motive.”

  He leads on through the forest of stalks and stumps to the redwood under which we left the bullet casings. Ten yards away, he slows and shades his eyes to better peer into the forest beyond the crooked tree.

  The big chunks of bark with which we had covered the casings lie far from the spot. Pop strides to the tree, leans the palm of his outstretched hand against it and stares at the ground, while Knudsen asks, “What are we doing here, playing charades?”

  “Brady Barker’s been here and gone. I told him we found the place, almost an hour ago. And a boy who lives up the trail, unless he got distracted playing mumblety peg, may have some proof for you. It was Barker,” Pop assures him, although he knows somebody could have tailed Pop and me or been hiding in the forest watching. “We told nobody else.”

  Knudsen yawns. “Why’d you tell him?”

  “As a test. He flunked.” Pop marches off, looking for the boot and moccasin tracks to the river. Traces remain but the continuity of them is gone, replaced by scrapes and scuff marks, which he points out to Knudsen. Then he squats in shade, and reaches into his shirt pocket for a pill box.

  A few minutes later, Knudsen sits in the Cadillac parked beside the Van Dyke home while Pop goes to the door. He sees a small paper sack with the top rolled down. He picks it up. “Hickey” is printed with block letters in red crayon.

  He knocks, then unrolls the sack and looks inside. Nothing but a camera. The counter reads “4.”

  He takes the camera to Knudsen. “Get this developed.”

  The agent says, “If Brady Barker’s on here, you’ve got me interested enough so I’ll have a talk with him. But look, if it appears you’re playing me, stalling for time so your Alvaro can dash across some open field while I’m on the ground, I’ll find out if you’ve ever done any acting, even been the rear end of a horse in second grade, or if you’ve ever run for politics. Look, what I’m saying, if I suspect you’re a liar, I’ll bust you on obstruction. Clear?”

  AT Quig’s, while Mama and Ava went to change from dresses to shorts, I walked across the compound to Simon’s trailer. His microbus was gone. I knocked and was still waiting when the gatekeeper Ava called Blackie stumbled out of a neighboring army tent. “Simon split,” he said.

  “When?”

  “Yesterday noontime.”

  “Where to?”

  “Hey, do I ask you where you’re going?” He careened away toward the bathhouse.

  By the time I returned to Ava’s yurt, Pop was there. He looked like an old fighter in the tenth round, worn out but dogged. His face was flushed almost to purple.

  He told us about his brief chat with Brady Barker and the trip with Knudsen to the crime scene. I gave him my theory that Pastor Bob could hand us the killer if we used a real detective to squeeze the secret out of him. He looked at the women, for their opinion. Ava shook her head but Mama said, “Pastor Bob can help Alvaro.”

  The women headed for the bathhouse. When they’d gone far enough to give us privacy, I told him who I believed shot Jimmy Marris.

  Pop’s look implied I was betting a long shot. “You want me to talk to this pastor. Do you think he’d still be at the church?”

  “At the jamboree.”

  “Get your Hummingbird. Put it in the trunk. We might not come back here before you’re due backstage.”

  I said, “Huh? I’m supposed to stop trying to rescue my brother just to play a couple songs?”

  “You’re on the bill.” He plucked a folded schedule from his pocket, opened it, and pointed to my name. “Three-thirty.”

  “Yeah, with three other acts for a half hour set. They’ll cover for me.” I had started to raise my bum hand and to argue that I couldn’t even hold a flat pick and sure couldn’t manage the open tuning finger-pick style Alvaro had taught me, which was my best. But Pop’s face told me he was appalled to hear his son even start making excuses.

  WITH my Hummingbird in the trunk, all four of us rode in the Eldorado. Pop’s spirits had lifted. “Sure,” he said, “if Knudsen would’ve showed up on time, we might’ve caught Brady Barker out there. Sure, that’s what I hoped, but look at what plan B gives us. Barker’s on the run. He’s going to slip and fall. Meantime, Agent Knudsen’s at least thinking twice. I’ve been watching.” He pointed straight up. “I haven’t seen him up there. When I left him at the airport, he was standing beside his car. He could be in a darkroom already.”

  Ava leaned forward. “Do you think Alvaro’s really nearby like Wendy said?”

  Pop liked most people, admired many, trusted the intentions of a very few, but rarely confided in anyone but family. Ava had charmed him but she wasn’t family. He wouldn’t give her anything she could use to endanger his son. He reached for Mama, eased her closer, and kissed her cheek. “Alvaro could be anywhere.”

  AN hour after the jamboree gates opened at ten, the attendance was half of yesterday’s, before the gunshot. If Hound Dog or whomever shot at Phil Ochs meant to bankrupt Big Dan’s jamboree, he had succeeded as well as a rainmaker could. Before, hordes of children had roamed around on their own. Today, the only small kids I noticed were junior hippies from one of the communes whose folks didn’t have the option of an early retreat from Evergreen.

  The schedule board announced that Hoyt Axton would appear on the main stage at noon. I had jammed with Hoyt after hours at the Candy Company, my favorite San Diego coffee house. Now, Malvina Reynolds, a favorite of mine for her wise and witty lyrics, was onstage singing:

  “And the children go to summer camp and then to the university where they all get put in boxes and they all come out the same.

  Little boxes on the hillside,

  Little boxes made of ticky-tacky . . .”

  We passed moping vendors in the concession aisle. As we started up a knoll, a girl came running to Ava. She was squat and freckled and had blue eyes as brilliant as Pop’s. “Gawd, Ava, I haven’t seen you all summer, since biology. Jeff’s waiting for me, gotta hurry. But listen. That Mexican that killed Jimmy. A few weeks ago, he came into the bank. He looked kinda weird, like he was going to rob me or something. He came right to my window and cashed this check on some Beverly Hills bank, from some record company. Hog Farm Records or something like that. I was gonna tell the cops, but I saw you here first and, you know . . .” She glanced down the hill and must’ve thought her boyfriend looked miffed. “Call me.” She turned and ran to him.

  I told Pop, “Alvaro would’ve called us about any record deal he’d made. Or even any studio work he’d done. I think.”

  Now I felt sure. Ochs had arranged for a record company to pay my brother for something. Maybe to recruit militant farmworkers into the anti-war movement. I was about to tell Pop when Ava spotted Pastor Bob.

  He was talking to a shirtless, vanilla-white kid with a guitar strapped on his back. As we approached, the pastor said, “It might feel like the Holy Spirit to you, but is it really? I mean, how’re you going to know what the Holy Sprit’s like unless you meet him at least once when you’re not stoned?�
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  The kid used our presence to cover his escape. The pastor laid a hand on Ava’s shoulder and asked if we had come to pass out tracts but his shifty eyes proved he knew better. Ava held his arm and introduced Pop while we all climbed a knoll. Pop motioned to a patch of thick grass as close to private as any available. We sat. Pop glanced at me. I shook my head.

  Pop didn’t sit well on the ground. Playing fullback and sixty-six years of living had troubled his knees. He shifted his legs and wiped his brow with the bandana handkerchief he carried while the pastor watched and waited, rubbing the spine of the Bible on his lap as though working air bubbles out of the glue.

  “So . . .” Pop gazed around and all at once attacked the man with a stare. “Why are you protecting the killer?”

  Ava covered her mouth with three pretty fingers.

  Pastor Bob squinted as though to look at the sun, though it was straight overhead. He stood, nodded to Mama, and started down the hill but didn’t make two steps before Pop caught up and led him toward the river.

  We watched Pop speak briefly and the pastor give one-word answers. A few such exchanges passed before the pastor handed over his Bible. Pop leafed through it, spent a minute reading, shook his head, and looked up another passage. The fourth try he found the right one.

  Pastor Bob appeared to read the passage before he slammed his Bible shut. He stared at Pop long and hard. Then he wheeled and marched to the river at the sandy beach beside the shallows, where today only a few hippie kids splashed. Gripping the Bible under his arm, he squatted at the water’s edge and picked up a stone. Like a catcher, he sprang up and threw the rock, into the woods across the river.

  He strode back to Pop and spoke a few words then tromped off toward the gate and parking lot. When Pop returned to us, Ava’s hands were clasped together beneath her chin, with thumbs dug into her throat. “He told you who killed Jimmy?”

  “Told us meet him at the church in an hour is all.”

  “What verse did you show him?”

  “Way up front. Leviticus, um, five.”

  “What’s it say?” I asked.

  Pop winked at me.

  From the way Ava stared at him, I suspected that whereas she had previously only considered Pop a remarkable guy, now she was in danger of confusing him with God.

  The instant we climbed into the Eldorado, she grabbed her big purse and fished out her Bible. She found the passage and read it aloud. “If a person sins because he does not speak up when he hears a public charge to testify regarding something he has seen or learned about, he will be held responsible.”

  ON his way back to Quig’s from the meeting with Knudsen, Pop had gone to the jail and asked to see the sheriff, meaning to report that Brady Barker had swept away tracks and stolen evidence. But the sheriff was gone, and without his radio, the desk officer claimed.

  With me, Mama, and Ava along, Pop made a second visit to the jail. He went in alone. When he came out, the purplish tint of his face had darkened toward magenta. “Willis is still out of touch,” he said. He crooked a finger at me. I climbed out and followed him a few steps up the block. “And now,” he said, “they’re adding attempted murder to Alvaro’s alleged crimes. The man says they found the shell that missed Ochs. Looks like it could’ve come from a 30.06.”

  I didn’t tell him what I suspected about Alvaro getting paid by Ochs. First, I wanted at least a guess about how that theory connected to the death of Jimmy Marris.

  We crossed the street to Foster’s and picked up a sack full of burgers, which we ate on the way back to Quig’s. Between bites, I said, “We should find Knudsen. Maybe he’s got the pictures developed.”

  “If he has,” Pop said, “and it’s got a snapshot of Barker, he’ll tell Willis. But is that going to make the sheriff pull his dogs off Alvaro?”

  Ava said, “Not if they say Alvaro shot at Phil Ochs.”

  I smashed the remaining half of my hamburger, stuffed it into the sack it came in, and crammed it between my knee and my good hand.

  AT Quig’s, outside the yurt, Ava and Pop had their first spat. A rule he lived by held that you didn’t take women into rowdy bars, battlefronts, or any other place where guys shoot or stab each other.

  Ava’s chest heaved, an inspiring sight. “For three days I’ve helped you guys and now I’m too frail to go with you?”

  Pop shook his head and lit his pipe. “Too valuable.”

  “He’s my pastor,” she argued, but Pop only blew a kiss at Mama and walked toward the Cadillac.

  “I’m the only one of us who even knew Jimmy,” she yelped.

  “Let’s go, Son.” Pop climbed into the car.

  Ava threw her hands in the air and turned to Mama.

  “Wendy, this isn’t fair.”

  For her sons, Mama had fought dogs, neighbors, teachers, and devils. But never had she taken sides against Pop. “I don’t want to go,” she said. “Please stay with me, Ava.”

  LIKE Pop, I had played first base in high school and college. In championships, and when games depended on my bat or glove, I had learned how adrenaline works. So for other frightful or challenging times, I was prepared. But never, not even when I had gone to waylay Hound Dog, had adrenaline pumped so hard as on the drive to meet Pastor Bob. Thinking about Simon’s opinion of the man, I feared we were on our way to an ambush. My eyes burned. Sweat streamed off my scalp and circled my ears. When a slow caravan of campers and trailers turning west out of McNees Park stalled us, I would have yelled and blasted the horn, had I been driving.

  When we arrived at the church, Pastor Bob was already waiting, perched on the hood of a dusty ’64 Falcon Ranchero. He jumped down and approached Pop’s window. His eyes were slits, his jaw looked swollen. His voice sounded muffled. “Follow me.”

  We tailed him at a distance because his Falcon spewed green fumes. Through Evergreen and down the highway, the pickup chugged so slowly and with such a smell, Pop asked if I thought the pastor had converted it to run on methane from chicken manure. I said, “Maybe so, but don’t you think he’s also stalling, that he snuck a call to the killer and promised him time?”

  “Maybe,” Pop said.

  My eyelids began to twitch, and instead of seeing the road, I imagined bullets zinging past our heads. “I’m feeling weird,” I said. “Like I’m having a premonition, and this guy’s leading us into a trap. I haven’t seen a Cossack all morning.”

  Outside the Crossroads, a logger was replacing his pickup’s slashed tires.

  When the Falcon turned onto Highball Trail, Pop said, “Looks like you might’ve solved the mystery, which would make you the detective in the family.” And the little crooked smile he gave me told a big story. He wasn’t joking or trying to boost my confidence. He was proud of me.

  “But suppose I’m wrong and Bob’s the murderer,” I said. “I mean, pastors go bad. Maybe not as often as lawyers do. But Simon told me Bob’s just a con, fleecing the sheep. Say Jimmy Marris found out Bob was the last escapee from Alcatraz. He laid low in the Haight, where Simon knew him, but his past won’t leave him be. So now and then he’s got to bump off somebody. Like Ripley.” Pop and I were both such fans of Patricia Highsmith novels, I had bought her new one and read it before I gave it to him for Christmas.

  He chucked my arm. “By Jove, Holmes, I think you’re on to something.”

  When I was a boy and reading Sherlock Holmes, Pop used to joke with me, like he’d just done, except back then he called me Watson.

  Because I felt more at ease while imagining, I dreamed up alternative scenarios. “The murderer could be the owner of the mastiff or the cousins of a myopic cherry picker who can’t afford glasses and lives in a camp like Alvaro’s, and he was out poaching and thought he was shooting at a buck but it turned out to be Jimmy Marris. Or the killer might be some logger out to rid the world of communists.” When the Falcon made the turn to cross the bridge that led to South Highball Trail, I reached under the seat for the holstered gun.

  Across th
e bridge, the Falcon turned left. The Mexican kids were on their porch gobbling tortillas and drinking out of paper cups. Two of them waved to the pastor. He didn’t wave back.

  A mile east, the mastiff trotted on shaky legs from its porch to the roadside and barked so feebly I feared it was in the terminal hours of starvation.

  The Falcon stopped beside a post I guessed marked the Van Dyke property line. A minute passed. Then the pastor drove on. He parked near the chicken coop. I grabbed the handle of the gun on the seat beside me. As we pulled in beside the Falcon, I lifted the holster to strap it on.

  Pop touched my leg and shook his head. I didn’t argue. He would win. He might ask how I’d feel if a gunfight started and among the casualties was Othello, Oedipus, or Ophelia.

  Roy’s old Dodge pickup wasn’t in sight. Nobody was outside where I expected to find everyone except the infirm or hung over on that fragrant, silver-blue day. Although, since we left the jamboree the heat had risen to purgatorial. Sweat dripped off my brows and burned my eyes. Still I felt as if my teeth were about to chatter.

  Pop reached under his seat. As we climbed out of the Cadillac, he stuffed the barrel of his .38 under the waistband of his trousers.

  Without looking our way, Pastor Bob walked to the house. He knocked. Othello flung open the screen door then vanished. The pastor’s head leaned into the dark house before the rest of him followed. I was only inches behind Pop. As he stepped inside, I saw his right arm bend into position to grab for the gun.

  Nineteen

  THE only light entered through the doorway. The stained-glass windows, the picture window facing the forest, and the skylight were shuttered or shaded. Othello and his brother and sister were in the loft, leaning over the edge and looking ready to pounce on us.

  Before I saw the face of the man in the craftsman chair facing us, I spotted the revolver on his lap. His hand was in ready position. He seemed to be staring at the gun, his head bent and covered by an old Brooklyn Dodgers cap, his golden curls tied back in a ponytail.