Fifty Mice Part 6

Public gives a pointedly delayed reaction. "Ha ha. Thats witty." He shuts the drawer again with his gut. Sometimes Jay can sense something slightly off about Public; compared to the other marshals, less cop and more flimflam artist, making it up as he goes along, as if all this was just snake oil spilling off some crazy medicine wagon. But then h.e.l.l gather and settle, clipped and officious, Eliot Ness: "Um. No. Ginger-"

"Is that her real name?" Jay interrupts.

Public ignores him, continuing, "-sort of helped her boyfriend kill a guy. So."

The way the Fed says it, kill a guy, makes it sound like nothing. Like it was a household ch.o.r.e, folding some laundry. Jay stays between the high shelves crammed with alphabetized jewel cases, studying Public for any sign of sarcasm or fallaciousness, wondering whether he should believe this or not.

"But now shes flipped on him for immunity, its all good."

All good. Jay wonders what it means to "help." In light of Publics dispa.s.sionate att.i.tude toward killing. Hes found he cant shake a picture of the silent little girl, Helen, fragile in her new school clothes, lunchbox and backpack, holding tightly on to Gingers hand as they went down the hill, warped unexpectedly by a flaw in the gla.s.s pane of the bay window in the bungalows front room, strange and beautiful, through which Jay, earlier this morning, watched them walk away from the house.

And now he has to add this noise-that Ginger helped kill somebody-to the signal, and try to rea.s.semble a clear picture from it. He cant.

"Were hiding her until we can find the boyfriend." Public continues talking. Deadpan: "Hes understandably upset about it. And worried that she might help, you know, convict him."

Jay wants to know who they killed. Public just stares back at him, blankly. "You can tell me why shes here, but not why Im here."

"Entirely different protocols," Public says. "We need you to remember. I imagine Ginger would like to forget."

Jay holds up the VHS ca.s.settes. "People still rent these?"

Public shrugs. "People scarcely rent DVDs, do they?" Pops the cash drawer out, shuts it.

Jay asks about the store policy on movies, can he just take them home and watch whatever he wants or does he have to actually sign them out and debit some account?

Public shrugs again. "Its your place, Jimmy."

"Jay."

Public sighs.

"Jay," Jay says again.

The front door jingles and opens for a sun-browned, weather-beaten beach boy pushing forty: bleached hair, bowling shirt, flip-flops, and Oakleys. Jay thinks he saw him yesterday, on the back of a chubby old fishing scow moored along the main dock, sleeveless T-shirt and a crushed high-crown Padres cap, watching them caravan in to town from the heliport.

"French films suck." He slams two DVD jewel cases down on the counter. "And dont even talk to me about pan and scan or the subt.i.tles which live and die at the bottom of the screen where you cant barely read em." Noticing: "Wheres Gabe?"

"New owner," Public says, gesturing to the aisle.

Beach boy squints at Jay. "Hi. Sam Dunn."

Jay glances at Public, knows which name Public wants Jay to use with this customer, and cant bring himself to say it. "-Hi."

"Whatd Gabe-?"

"Skate Park in Fresno," Public says. "Straight swap."

"Yowza. Really? Whoa." His mouth droops, dubious. "Really." Curious about Public: "Who are you?"

"Im the facilitator." Public inclines his head toward Jay. "Hes the new Gabe."

Sam looks from Jay to Public, back again. It all seems to track for him. "Okay. Good enough. Okay. Well. Welcome to the rock, man. I dont think I owe any late charges on these b.a.s.t.a.r.d children of frogs, so there you go. Nice to meet you."

"Im here to serve."

"Where you living?"

"Vieudelou," Public tells the man.

Sweet, is Sam Dunns opinion about that. "Some b.i.t.c.hin little Arts and Crafts gems up that way, right?" Then, almost wistful: "Gabe was a big-time Roberto Rodriguez fan. Grindhouse. Machete."

"El Mariachi," Public says.

"Yeah, but the original one."

"Dont get me started."

Dunns quick laugh is a foghorn. Jay wonders if this is all more Kabuki theater for his benefit. Maybe everyone in Avalon is working with Public, part of the program, a performance-art piece in which Jay is the organizing principle.

"Yo." Dunn points to the jewel cases hes left on the counter, slaps a big hand on Jays shoulder as he hurries past, door jangling behind him.

"You didnt tell him your name," Public says, after moment.

"What?"

"Your name."

"You mean, Jay?"

Public waits, unfazed.

"Jay," Jay says again.

Public shakes his head. "Youre a willful man."

"Who chose 'Jimmy?" Jay asks.

"James? I dunno," Public replies, stubborn. "Probably your mom. Is it a family name? And why dont you use the 'Edward, I wonder?"

"My mom is dead. Mom, dad, sister, brother-"

"Stop." Testy: "Im sorry. Weve gone to a lot of trouble to create a safe situation for you here. And that includes using a name that no one can-"

"Who? Whos after me?" Jay snaps. "Maybe if I understood at least that part of it . . ."

Public looks away, out the front window, at the harbor.

"Unless you dont know who it is," Jay says.

Nothing from Public.

"Thats part of it, isnt it? You dont even know who youre dealing with?" Maybe hes misread Public completely, mistaken uncertainty for calculation. Jay smiles; he cant help it. Its just possible that theyre as lost as he is. "What do you know?"

Public shakes his head, again, sardonic. "No. You first."

A standoff.

The two men trade empty gazes.

Cotton-ball clouds race low across the crest of the rocky island ma.s.s only to dissipate over a whitecapped open sea. The mainland, Long Beach, San Pedro, is a smoggy ma.s.s, like mold on bread. A slatternly, once-modern, teal-and-ivory hydrofoil ferry idles at the concrete landing, waiting impatiently for the last few pa.s.sengers to hurry aboard, then breaks free of its moorings, drifts sideways, engines rumbling, and slides away, into the bay dotted with sails and boats.

Jay watches the boat from the small, deserted plaza at the south end of Crescent Street, where in the summer portable kiosks offer island tours, snorkling, kayaks, bicycle rentals, and shave ice. An old man with a stand-up easel is painting watercolors of the casino on the point. A day-trip couple sits at a steel table under a faded, flapping awning, with takeaway coffee and colorful caps.

A silver-helmet tour group on Segways whirs past upright, its weary guide droning a Chamber of Commerce wiki: "When Spanish explorer Juan Rodrguez Cabrillo found sh.o.r.e here in 1542, indigenous people had been occupying the island for over eight thousand years; they called this place Pimu and called themselves the Pimuvit."

At the edge of the bay the bow of the hydrofoil lifts and it guns away, dull thunder, leaving a contrail wake.

"November twenty-fourth, 1602, on the eve of Saint Catherines Day, the galleon of a second Spanish adventurer, Sebastin Vizcano, sighted the island and named it Santa Catalina in honor of the princess and martyred patron saint of knife sharpeners, hatmakers, apologists, and unmarried girls." And as the rolling tourists curl around a corner and disappear, "The Pimuvit were wiped out by syphilis gifted from the Spaniards, and were succeeded over the years by otter hunters, smugglers, prospectors, soldiers, film crews, adulterers, and William Wrigley Jr.s Chicago Cubs for spring training . . ."

A salt-pitted pay phone still offers service near the entrance to the main marine dock, the Green Pleasure Pier; Jay lifts the receiver, punches in numbers, listens to a phone ring on the other end of the line, and an operator answers: "What number are you calling?"

"Its a credit-card call to Los Angeles," Jay says. "Can I give you-?"

"Im sorry, Mr. Warren," the operator says, "but you cant make that connection."

Jay toggles the cradle hook. Dials again, different number.

"Im sorry, but this call cannot be completed as dialed."

Same operator, not even trying to disguise her voice. Jay racks the receiver hard. Thinks. The phone starts to ring. And ring. And ring. He backs away from the booth. Sea gulls circle and scree.

Crescent Street is empty. Faded flags snap and furl from shop-front eaves. An outboard motor pops, races, dies.

A security guard stands hands on hips, akimbo, outside the ticketing booth on the ferry landing, sleeves shoved up and smiling, eyes behind dark aviators aimed directly at Jay. Its Patterson, one of the federal denizens from Publics L.A. safe house.

He waves amiably at Jay.

Jay turns away.

There is an impressive selection of Catalina Island maps and trail guides at the tiny grocery store where Floria, the wizened Latina behind the counter, extends him-James Warren, of 333 Vieudelou Avenue, she knows he just moved onto the island with the esposa melanclica and the nina reservada-a kind of informal store credit when he realizes and tells her that he left Jimmys wallet back at the house.

Because it isnt his.

"No se preocupe de el," she tells him, friendly. "You can pay next time you come in."

He spreads the Frankos Guide Map he settled on across the flat of the seawall, and has to hold it with both hands to keep it from blowing away in the wind.

All the private charter boats are off-limits, according to Hondo, the effervescent aspiring gigolo in the booking shack at the entrance to the Green Pleasure Pier. Hondo has teardrop tattoos under his eye that Jay has always a.s.sumed represented prison terms, but which Hondo cheerfully explains can mean number of years you did, yes, but also the number of people you whacked or the number of times you got done up the a.s.s. Depending. But, prison, yeah, and, yes, hes "in the program," too, which is how he can say without qualification that there is no f.u.c.king way Jay would ever get access to a boat, not to mention they put a tracking device in their heads, did he know that? Hondo indicates a spot just under his ear that looks like a skin tag or a mole, and offers to palpate Jays neck skin to prove that somethings there, but Jay says h.e.l.l take Hondo at his word, which Hondo much appreciates. "The b.i.t.c.h of it is," Hondo says, his mood shifting, darkening, "you dont know, youre talking to some guy on the street, or in the Parrot, is he legit? or is he a Fed? or is he just another poor jerkoff like you and me? You dont know. And after a while, man, that gets to you, I gotta say."

Now, a kayak, Hondo explains, you could steal, and will get Jay away from Avalon, sure, but Hondo doubts even he can paddle back to the mainland with the current and such, and Hondos been bulking up and taking supplements. And trying to find a hiding place in the rocky grottoes on the southern tip of the island is pointless, given the resources of the Feds.

Not to mention the secret GPS tracking device implant in our heads, Jay points out.

"To a T, man," Hondo says gravely. "To a T."

Catalina is mostly uninhabited, and almost all of its permanent population lives in Avalon, a jumble of small houses and two- and three-story buildings with no cohesive architectural aesthetic. Nothing plumb, avenues coiling back on themselves, the perplexing street grid of the city is a paupers bowl of half-cooked spaghetti, a few stray noodles snaking up the hillsides and away to the highlands, north and south, providing access to the unpopulated interior of the island and an "airport in the sky" midway to Two Harbors, where rugged iconoclasts share with Boy Scouts and church camps and a marine science compound on the narrow isthmus of lowland that divides a deep and narrow rocky windward dent on the Pacific, from the more gracefully curved, leeward bay facing the Catalina Strait; hence: two harbors. According to Franko, there is ferry service from the mainland direct to this northern, unincorporated part of the island, and it occurs to Jay that perhaps he could find a way back to the city simply by hiking there.

Of course, it subsequently occurs to him that this is so obvious as to be pointless in practice. Running to Two Harbors is the first contingency to which Public and the Feds would attend while securing the island, the first place theyd look when they found Jay had disappeared.

But hes convinced himself that this is what he should be thinking about, getting out.

His reasoning: the shock of the abduction gave way to panicked delusions of escape by air shaft, too soon and too hastily improvised. Then the helpless interlude fueled by Kafkaesque conundrums fostered by strange marshals and blindfolds and legal limbo, followed by dislocation, followed by fear, but here, now, settled, feet on the ground, the reasonable course of action is to find a way out.

After all, he got away once before, and it saved his life.

Saved his life. Or lost it-as Hondo would say, depending.

Fish smells bliss in the cold wind from the bay.

The water shimmers like foil, and the casino on the point provides bleak punctuation to the arc of seawall.

Dozens of full-color property listings are pasted on the Beacon Realty window on Metropole, blocking any view of Jay as he unplugs the Beacon Realty golf cart parked just off the sidewalk, backs away, and takes off in it.

If anyone asks, hes just borrowing it.

He humps southish, inland, past the summer rentals and small hotels, looking back over his shoulder to make sure n.o.bodys following him, rising up into the canyon until a switchback takes him on Tremont, then Country Club, the steady complaint of the electric motor worrying him a little; the golf cart tops out at maybe 20 mph, so if anybody has seen him go and wants to catch him, it wont be hard.

It doesnt worry him, though. This is a reconnaissance.

The road zags and hairpins, and for a moment he thinks hes going to wind up where he started, but by stubbornly taking a left at every intersection, and aiming uphill, Jay finally breaks out of the jumble of hillside bungalows onto Old Stage Road, pa.s.ses through a grove of disheveled eucalyptus, and crests a rise that spits him onto a plateau tangled with scrub oak, manzanita, and wildflowers; the empty windswept wilds of Catalina are sprawled before him, quaint Avalon tumbles down into the sea behind him. A furl of ashen fog breaks over the Pacific-side hills like floodwater, sending ghostly fingers down the arroyos, weird, because the sun above the marine inversion is so bright, the sky so blue. Jay takes his foot off the accelerator and the golf cart coasts. Serpentine blacktop transitions to asphalt slurry and disappears into the incoming fog, but Jay glides forward into it, sunlight refracted by the brume into blinding scattershot dreamstuff. Jay feels the cool glaze of moisture on his face and hands, his shirt goes damply limp, he loses all sense of direction. Visibility drops to maybe two feet, and he stays on the road only by extrapolating its direction from the edges he can see on either side of his cart.

Its a metaphor for his present situation and his state of mind: nowhere, directionless, blind.

But for the moment hes free.

There was heavy fog the night Jays family came apart. A heavy, lightless, mourning fog; he had to run through it, to get to the warm blush of the neighbors house, on the higher ground; run through the black vertical insults of leafless cottonwood on the steeply sloping hillside, run barefoot on the frost-flattened gra.s.s and leaves, blind with fear and tears and horror.

The angry cold of that night was like a series of thick curtains piling up as he ran through them. Swirling smoke from a fireplace upwind. The crazy jack-o-lantern windows of the Bruces house. So much that he cant, wont, shouldnt, doesnt want to remember, as he runs, ran, eight years, two months, six days old, uphill, feet slipping on rotted leaves, running, ran, forward to the light, thinking then only about the light and the futureless safety it promised to a little boy with nothing left behind him but a void.

Jay jams on his brakes. The cart slides, drifts. A huge dark shape looms directly in front of him. And another. And another. Floating in with the fog. He can hear a heavy rasp of a kind of primordial breathing, smells the buffalo before they resolve from the mist, tragic eyes, grim muzzles, fur glistening with droplets of water that drip drip drip as they shuffle past him, snuffling and unimpressed. There are at least twenty s.h.a.ggy black-brown creatures, maybe more beyond the white veil of the fog. He waits for them to pa.s.s, then realizes theyre not pa.s.sing, theyve slowed, stopped, several bulls blocking his forward progress on the road.

The fog eases unexpectedly: blue sky, sun, Jay shades his eyes, looks back the way he came. Now Avalon is gone, carpeted by the graywhite cloud, but he can back through the motionless herd; switches the lever on the cart and it bleats an irritating meeeeeeeeeeeeeeep that causes the buffalo to grunt and shift and he weaves reversing through them, tires slipping on the soft gravel that shoulder the road, finally finding traction on the blacktop where hes swallowed again by the mist.