Soon, bright cheerful light revealed Leah's personal furnishings and possessions and helped dispel her fears. Electric baseboard heaters pinged to life in harmony with the low tones of the awakening water heater, giving promise of warmth and comfort for the night. She retraced her steps, pausing at the breakfast counter to pick up the receiver and listen. The dial tone hummed, friendly and alert.
Teddy and Monica had their noses pressed to the car windows. Their faces lit with relief when she appeared and waved them in.
27
Jay underestimated the distance between San Francisco and Los Angeles. The shrunken dimensions of his tiny island home had warped his sense of distance-to-time ratios. The rutted, muddy paths Santo Sangríans called roads compared miserably with Interstate 5 and its straight shot down the western spine of the San Joaquin Valley.
The first few hours, he kept a white-knuckled grip on the steering wheel. He glanced frequently at the rear-view mirror, watching for any sign he was being followed. When a car seemed to stick too close too long, he accelerated, or he reduced speed and moved into the right lane to see how the suspected tail reacted.
The northern end of the valley offered vistas of barren fruit and nut orchards. In the mid-valley emptiness, he passed open, fallow fields resting from a summer's hard work of feeding and clothing much of the Western United States. He had never seen so much cotton. It jutted from fields in tall, rectangular bales, protected from fall rains by blue or orange vinyl capes. Hundreds of gray-bottomed cloud puffs raced south with him, like a formation of plump geese.
When the highway criss-crossed under miles of power lines held aloft by steel skeletons, unbearable static rendered the radio a no-longer-pleasant companion. Convinced he wasn't being followed, Jay allowed himself to relax a bit and think about Leah and Angel, the positive and negative poles of his life, how to secure a life with the one and negate the other's power.
The last two-and-a-half hours of the trip sent Jay into a lonely hell, which grew even more intolerable the farther he retreated from Leah. Having never been to her mountain home, he had no mental picture of her there. His right hand went as if by command to his shirt pocket, where he had stashed her meticulous directions. In case he needed to find his way there. His stiff, sore body, aching from the previous night's beating, made the drive all the more difficult.
Jay arrived in San Fernando Sunday evening around seven. It didn't take long to find St. Ferdinand's, where his classmate from St. Augustine's Seminary, Pete Escobar, served as associate pastor. Father Mickey Hanley and his curate received Jay graciously. To their discreet inquiries about the battered condition of his face, Jay made up a story he hoped had at least the scent of plausibility. Who would expect him to lie about it? After that, his hosts either forgot about the ugly purple mouse under his eye or pretended not to notice. Conversation turned to questions about his travels since leaving home and his work among the poor of his developing country, far from the affluence of Southern California.
"So, tell me again what you are doing here in the West," Pete said, shoving his fist playfully into Jay's shoulder.
Jay tried not to reveal that even that light touch dispatched sharp pains through his bruised upper body. "R & R," he said. "Rest and retreat. Someone in the chancery at home decided I needed a break from my work. I've done some sightseeing in San Francisco. Tomorrow I'm going to the Franciscans for a few days to get my soul in order."
"Spend enough time in San Francisco," Mickey Hanley said, "and you'll need more than a few days to get your soul back in order." The elder priest's cassock was open at the throat and unbuttoned to the sternum. Several buttons had abandoned the cleric's retirement-age garment. Souvenirs of several dinners spotted the fading black serge.
Jay pretended interest in the pastor's North vs. South prejudices. Through the evening, conversation flowed as freely as the Scotch and covered the standard menu of Church gossip and anecdotes from seminary life. It was a familiar milieu, yet Jay felt oddly out of place, a stranger in his Father's house. Was it because he had already made his decision to bolt from the close-knit, exclusive fraternity of the priesthood? Partly. But, it was more than that.
Leah dominated his thoughts. He brooded over his inability to protect the Barton family from the odor of death hanging over them like the Sword of Damocles. He felt guilty, helpless. Maybe we made the worst possible decision, separating like this, he worried during a lull in the conversation.
After performing the clerical ritual of watching the eleven o'clock news with the other men, Jay escaped to the guest room. Leah's scent lingered in the shadows, comforting, causing pain. The abiding recollection of her touch, the silkiness of her skin, the playfulness of her fingers when she-- God! I miss her! he almost cried out loud. The contentment in her madonna smile after they made love haunted him, making sleep impossible.
At half-past midnight, he picked up the receiver and quietly placed a collect call to Heavenly Valley.
"Everything okay?" he asked.
It was. She sounded sleepy.
"Leah, I love you so much."
She was glad and pledged her love in turn.
"Promise you'll contact me the instant you see anything or anyone out of the ordinary." That would signal they had guessed wrong. He would leave immediately to join her.
Leah promised.
"You've got this number and the retreat house?"
She had them right by her phone.
"I feel like a displaced person down here. This celibate enclave is stifling me. I'm more certain than ever I'm making the right decision."
Yes, she said. She too was sure, for herself, for both of them.
* * *
Early Monday morning, Jay found himself in the worst traffic he had ever seen. Still, he managed to feel his way out of the San Fernando Valley on the Golden State Freeway and by some miracle onto the Pasadena Freeway.
At eight-thirty, he sat on a bus bench in downtown Pasadena across from Daley's Gun Shop. He watched an elderly, fatigue-clad gentleman perform what must have been a daily liturgy of unlocking the accordion grate that protected his store windows from those who would find his merchandise all too tempting. The shopkeeper went inside, reappearing moments later with straw broom and waste basket. For the next few minutes he picked up papers and pushed the weekend's accumulation of powdery grime toward the gutter.
By nine-thirty, four RTD buses had slowed, then rolled on through the busy intersection, when Jay made no move to respond to their approach. He avoided eye contact with the drivers who had every right to be annoyed that he had made them slow down.
As the morning chill thawed into a pleasant Southern California day, Jay undid the button at the throat of his windbreaker and slid the zipper down to his belt. His eyes never left the door of the gun shop. Unable to force himself to cross the street, he felt like a Calcutta tourist, observing the hypnotic interplay of cobra and charmer. It wasn't his style him to flirt with temptation, but nothing in his life the past ten days had been like anything that had gone before.
The Franciscans expected him at the retreat house in the San Gabriel foothills above the Rose Bowl by noon. How long he would stay depended on Angel and which of them, Leah or himself, the assassin had chosen to follow. Had Angel tracked him south? Was he at this instant watching from a shadowed doorway or another nearby bench?
Each time a patron entered and left the shop, Jay speculated on their purchase. A young woman in her late twenties, he guessed, arrived wearing a blue pinstripe business suit. She carried brown leather attaché case. Ten minutes later, she came out with a small box tucked under her left arm. Hand gun, Jay speculated. Just right for her purse. The great equalizer. Was it? Could a gun make him Angel's equal? His nemesis was killed for a living. To make himself Angel's equal in destructive power, he'd need a handicap, possibly a machine gun or cannon. Is that what "equalizer" means? Is that what I want? To be as equipped to kill Angel as he is to take my life? If that's what
this is all about, I've fallen a long way.
That Jay's thinking could have traveled so far down this road shocked him. What happened to my conviction that for every human problem there is a non-violent solution? The dilemma nailed him to the bench. To cross the threshold of Daley's Gun Shop meant defeat for an honored, unquestioned--until now unchallenged--belief. Will I be the same man if I do this? Will I be more of a man, or less? These doubts cost him another thirty minutes.
His thoughts drifted to Leah, delightfully beautiful, the beloved of his heart. He saw Teddy, ready to explode into early manhood. And Monica, innocence and grace personified. With their images alive in his consciousness, he marched across the street.
* * *
It occurred to Jay, as he pushed open the shop door, that he needed a believable reason to be purchasing a revolver. He also realized that the wiry gun dealer must have heard every story human nature could invent for patronizing his place of business. His underarms felt clammy and hot. Cool perspiration moistened his forehead. "I-- I'm going to start going to a . . . to a target range," he managed when he reached the counter. The same man he had observed outside wore a name badge identifying him as JOE DALEY, PROP. "I wonder if you could help me pick out the right gun?"
Joe Daley looked up from his ledger. "Thinkin' 'bout shootin' the guy that worked your face over last night?"
"No!" Jay snapped. And he had wanted to appear so cool!
Daley chuckled. "Always gets the new ones."
Jay suspected that the shop owner, as much as any priest, possessed an intimate knowledge of every kind of human being on earth. He wished he had stayed on the bus bench or gone directly to the retreat house, as planned.
"Little joke I like to pull," the gun dealer said with a gleam in his eye. "Don't mean nothin' by it. Can always tell the ones don't know a handgun from a howitzer. What's it again you're lookin' for?"
Jay wondered if the young woman who had bought the gun before him had to suffer through the same humiliating banter. "A gun . . . a small one. For personal protection. Something not very complicated."
".38 S&W probably do ya fine."
"May I see one, please?"
Daley unlocked a glass case behind him and picked out a walnut-handled revolver with a shiny blue barrel. In the older man's bony hands, the weapon looked quite at home. "Try this on for size. Single action, semiautomatic. Fires five rounds. Straight shooter that one."
Jay took it from Daley, grabbing it awkwardly by the barrel. "Yeah," he grunted, fearing total silence made him look even more stupid than he felt.
"Guaranteed. 'Gainst defects, that is. Can't promise it'll protect ya. Even comes with a bumper sticker." When Jay looked puzzled, Joe added, "'Insured by Smith & Wesson.' Naw, just kiddin'. Like it?"
"Accurate, you say?" Jay was desperate to sound as if he knew what to ask.
"You bet. 'Less you're usin' it 'gainst aircraft." Daley chuckled again, enjoying his own little effort at humor. "Don't laugh!" he said, though Jay hadn't. "In WW Two, I saw more'n one G.I. take on a Jap Zero with small arms. Crazy nuts! The war ended for most of 'em right then and there. Ol' Sergeant Joe knew when to keep his head inside his goddamn helmet." His features registered every battle he had engaged in, as he fought his way across a blur of Pacific islands.
Jay slipped his index finger around the trigger and applied a bit of pressure. It was an extraordinary piece of machinery, almost beautiful, in a sinister way. He turned the gun in different directions to catch rays of light hitting the barrel from various angles. When he looked up the barrel, a momentary chill seized him.
"Wouldn't advise doin' that when the little son of a bitch's loaded," Joe Daley cautioned.
"Of course not." Jay's tone had an irritated edge, designed to disguise his embarrassment. The weapon's violent promise seduced him. He imagined himself with the .38 braced in both hands, barrel leveled shoulder high and aimed at the assassin's heart, trigger finger arched and applying pressure.
As if reading his customer's mind, old Joe said, "Bang!" and Jay jumped back a step. He almost dropped the weapon onto the glass showcase. "Gotcha 'gain, son. You do need lessons."
The odds weren't in Jay's favor. A betting man would put money on the likelihood he would join Leah and her children in an early death. He preferred to die with them than live with the eternal burden of having led Montenegro's hired killer to the doorstep of the innocent for a third time.
With the .38 in his possession and with a will to use it if he had to, the Bartons at least had a chance. Without it--? Confusion raged across the horizonless desert of Jay's guilt. His conscience transformed each weapon in Daley's House of Lethal Temptations into a bare-breasted whore. Give the gun back and get the hell out of here! the old Jay protested, the cry distant and fading.
"How much?"
"Normally, three hunnerd fifty, plus ammo, but you're in luck. On sale for two seventy-five."
"I'll take it."
"Sold American!" Daley slid a binder and pen across the counter. "Fill this out and sign it."
"What is it?"
"A form. Goes to the sovereign State of California. Big Daddy wants to make sure you're an okay guy, before you take possession."
"How long does that take?"
"Better part of fifteen days." Daley's penetrating, gaze stripped Jay naked. "Somethin' wrong?"
"That woman. The one who left here just before I came in."
Daley grinned. "Fifteen days. Just came to pick it up."
"I don't have that much time."
"Can sell ya a rifle. Walk right out of here with it. No prob-lemo, Señor."
"A rifle won't do." Depressed, he wrestled with an urge to grab the gun and run from the store.
"Guess you're outa luck. Too bad. You seem real anxious to get to that--" Another knowing grin from Joe Daley. "Target range."
Jay wanted that .38 more than anything in the world. He'd sell his soul to get it. "There must be ways for a person to . . . you know, get around a regulation like this one."
Joe Daley's grin disappeared. "Sure, an' you gonna take care'a me an' the wife in our old age, when I lose my operatin' license?"
Jay took one last, desperate stab. "Mr. Daley, what would you do if you were in my shoes?"
Joe Daley studied the welt under his customer's eye. "You a cop, fella?"
"No!"
"Didn't think so. I can smell 'em."
While Jay held his breath, an internal battle raged. He exhaled the revelation, "I'm a priest."
Joe Daley looked stunned. "As in Ca-tho-lic priest?" Jay nodded. It wasn't a lie, not yet anyway. "Holy shit! Sorry, Father." For the first time since Jay entered the store, Joe Daley was flustered and out of wisecracks.
"I can't tell you why, but I need a gun. I need it now. Believe me when I tell you I have no intention of using it on anyone, but it may be the only way I can prevent the deaths of three innocent people. Can't I rent or borrow it for a few days? I'll leave any deposit you ask, and I'll bring it back as soon as I can."
Joe Daley didn't respond immediately. "Got identification?"
Jay's plea had gotten through. He laid his gold-colored passport on the counter. An image of the Santo Sangrían sun warmed the cover. Daley picked up the document and scrutinized it.
"Shit! Damn foreigner to boot. Santo Sangre? Where the fuckin' hell is that?"
"The Caribbean."
"Joseph P. Daley, you ought ta throw this guy outa here right now." He opened the cover and looked at the cheap photograph of a man in traditional black suit coat and Roman collar. "Looks like you, Father de Córdova."
Jay removed all the bills from his wallet and his folded wad of traveler's checks. He began counting them out on the glass showcase. "One hundred . . . two . . . three . . . ." Would the shop owner stop him before his money ran out? "Four. Four-fifty--"
"That'll do," Daley said. He pointed to the .38. "You like this one?"
Jay cleared the phlegm from his throat. "Yes."
/>
Daley placed the .38 in its box with a package of shells, wrapped the weapon in plain brown paper and handed it to Jay. "I hope this ain't my first big mistake in forty years."
He doubted this was Joe Daley's first venture outside the law. Before the old war veteran had time to change his mind, Jay headed for the door with the heavy box tucked under his arm--just as he had seen the woman in the pinstripe suit carrying hers. "It's not a mistake," he called as he pushed open the door.
Outside, Jay glanced across the street toward the empty bench and saw--and saw himself observing his exit. The vision wore a sad, disapproving expression. Or was it Angel? Or was he losing his grip on the world as he once knew it?
28
Sunday's storm had descended quite suddenly on Heavenly Valley. It dumped half-a-foot of snow on late-weekend travelers, before clearing out of the Tahoe Basin during the night. Monday dawned gloriously sunny. A million prisms of chilled color reflected off the icy pack. However, by noon, the higher peaks wore charcoal bonnets. In another hour, snow fell again, ever so lightly at first and postcard pretty, as if this new weather front wanted locals to believe it would be a pussycat. Without warning, the storm turned vicious, beating against the outside walls of the Barton cabin with a wolf's-howl wind.
When Leah looked out the window, it was like peering into one of those glass balls she had played with as a child, the kind that sent tiny plastic snowflakes swirling in every direction when she shook it. She was grateful they arrived ahead of the weather. It could take eight to ten hours to drive up from the Bay Area in a storm--if the Highway Patrol let traffic proceed along Route 50 at all.
Leah loved the mountains in winter but hated days like this one. She hadn't minded so much when she and Walt shared the responsibilities. It was only since coming to the cabin alone with the children that the sound of wind beating against the cedar structure had unsettled her nerves.