P Is for Peril

  I lifted my face and found the focus mechanism, then peered through the lens again and adjusted the knob. Abruptly, the far shore came into sharp relief. I could see the scarring on a boulder standing out in such sharp contrast it looked as if it rested just a foot away from me. The water in the reservoir was ragged where the raindrops hit. The sky was reflected in hammered silver on its surface. I caught movement to the right and shifted my view a hair.

  There was Trudy, the German shepherd, barking at a stick – one of those brainless behaviors dogs seem to thrive on. I could see her mouth open and shut like a doggie hand puppet. The enthusiasm of her barking caused her whole body to shake, but the sound was reduced by the window glass to the faintest report. Her legs and feet were muddy and I could clearly see the raindrops beading on her coat. Behind her, a wide path through the undergrowth had been flattened and I could see white where a line of saplings had been snapped off at ground level. Maybe a boat trailer had been backed down close to the water's edge to launch an outboard. Faintly, I heard Trudy's owner whistle and then her barely audible call. "Trudy! Truuudy!"

  Trudy looked over her shoulder with regret, torn between her current obsession and her need to obey. Obedience won out. She went bounding up the hillside and disappeared over the crest. I lifted my sights to Fiona's house, where the lights were winking on in sequence, probably on timers. I zoomed in on her bedroom window, but there was no sign of movement. Odd that she appeared to be living so close that I nearly reached a hand out to touch a windowpane. Traveling by car, her place was actually a mile and a half away, the long way around. Her side of the reservoir was peppered with expensive homes, where this side was shabby: board-and-batten rentals without much market value. I wondered if Lloyd realized whose house he had in his sights. I wondered if he stared in her bedroom window, watching her undress at night.

  I shifted my view again, feeling like a bird skimming across the surface of the lake. I let my gaze come to rest on the narrow end of the reservoir where the vegetation grew densely all the way to the point at which the water met the hill. A sign was posted on a fence post and I could read the larger of the lines. Swimming and boating were forbidden. The light was fading rapidly and I could feel myself strain. I lifted my eyes and stared at the gathering dark. What had I seen?

  I closed my eyes and when I opened them again, I felt my perception shift. The alteration was abrupt, like the test to determine which eye is dominant. Cover your left eye with your palm and stare at your right index finger, held out at arm's length. Then remove your palm from your left eye and cover your right eye instead. Looking through the dominant eye, the alignment of your finger against the background remains constant. Using the nondominant eye, the finger will appear to jump to one side. In reality, nothing changes. The finger remains where it is, but the brain registers a difference. I felt a spurt of anxiety and my heart began to thump.

  I turned and trotted down the stairs. Leila emerged from her trance long enough to look up at me. She was stretched out full-length, her sock feet resting on the arm of the sofa, her hiking boots on the floor.

  I said, "I have to go out for a few minutes. Will you be all right by yourself?"

  "I'm here alone all the time," she said, insulted.

  "Great. I shouldn't be long, but I'd appreciate your staying put until I get back. Okay?"

  "Yeah." She turned her attention to the set again and switched through several channels, finally settling on an old Tom and Jerry cartoon.

  I closed the front door behind me and picked my way down the muddy path to my car. The light was draining from the sky and the air temperature was dropping. The rain wasn't falling hard, but it was annoying, nonetheless. I unlocked my car and slid under the wheel. I reached over and popped open the glove compartment. I took out my flashlight and I pushed the button, gratified to see that the battery was still strong. I turned off the flashlight, laid it on the passenger seat while I started the car, and backed out of Lloyd's short drive. I swung around and headed back to the main road. At the intersection, I turned right, drove half a mile, turned right again on Old Reservoir Road, and began the winding ascent. The curves were familiar and I drove with a thumping heart, wishing I had stopped to pee again before I left. Fear is a powerful diuretic.

  Ahead, Fiona's house came into view and I pulled over on the berm. I grabbed my flashlight, got out, and set off on foot. Out here, there was still enough ambient light that I could see my way. I climbed the wet grassy hill, my feet slipping out from under me when I least expected it. I paused at the crest of the hill, looking out across the reservoir to the A-frame where Lloyd was living. The lights glowing in the house made it look like a chapel perched on the opposite hill. I hoped Leila wouldn't disappear while I was scrambling through the dark.

  Traversing the downside of the hill was even trickier, and I found myself losing purchase, half-slipping, half-sliding as I maneuvered my way along. At the bottom, I turned on my flashlight. The area was cold and silent and the air smelled dank. The water was black near the shoreline and showed no evidence of a current. In places, I could see Trudy's paw prints. I shone the beam of my flashlight along the hill behind me, locating the boulder I'd seen and the path of broken saplings. I stood where I was, following the line of the hill to the top. From where I stood the road wasn't visible. I turned my beam on the silty water, tracing the shallows. The lake bottom apparently dropped off abruptly, but I could see the curve of a chrome bumper glowing dully, like buried treasure. I couldn't read the name on the vanity plate, but I knew I was looking at the trunk of Dow Purcell's silver Mercedes submerged in the depths.

  Chapter 15

  * * *

  An accident scene at night is as bleak and gaudy as a carnival. It was now fully dark, close to eight P.M. The coroner's car, the mobile crime lab, and a Ford sedan were parked on the berm, along with two patrol cars with red-and-blue bar lights flashing, radios squawking insistently between spurts of static. Two uniformed officers stood together talking while the police dispatcher, like a barker, issued a monotonous, nonstop account of crimes and misdemeanors in progress: complaints about noise, a call reporting a domestic disturbance in another part of town, a prowler, a drunk urinating on a public street. Santa Teresa is a town of eighty-five thousand with more crimes against property than crimes against persons.

  Five minutes after I'd spotted the submerged Mercedes, I'd scrambled up the hill and down the other side to the road. I'd crossed and climbed Fiona's stairs two at a time, not pausing for breath until I reached the top. I pounded on her front door and rang the bell simultaneously, willing her to respond. I'd been reluctant to leave the scene unattended, but I had to notify the cops. I rang the bell again. Having observed Fiona's house from Lloyd's loft across the lake, it didn't take much to persuade me she was still out somewhere. I trotted around the side of the house to the rear where the driveway entered the property from the roadway above. There were no cars on her parking pad and all three of her garage doors were down and locked.

  Fiona's nearest neighbor was just across the road. I knew knocking on doors at random would be a pain in the ass. Though it wasn't late, it was dark out. Everyone had heard stories about intruders using a ruse to gain entrance to the victim's house. What choice did I have, short of hopping in my car and driving until I found a public phone? I rang the bell, talking to myself the whole time: Come on, come on, be here, help me out here. I peered through the glass side panels, which afforded me an abbreviated view of the foyer. I could see someone moving around in the kitchen, probably preparing supper. She appeared in the hall and approached the front door. I waved, trying to look like a law-abiding citizen instead of a cunning and devious crazed killer. She was middle-aged, in a sweater and slacks, with an apron tied around her waist. If she was apprehensive at the sudden summons, she gave no indication. She turned on the porch light and studied me with caution.

  I spoke loudly, hoping she could hear me through the glass. "I'm a friend of Fiona's. She's out and
I need to use your phone."

  I saw her eyes stray toward Fiona's house while she assimilated the request. She made sure the burglar chain was secure, and then she opened the door a crack. I don't remember now how I explained the situation, but I must have been persuasive because she let me in without argument and showed me to the phone.

  Seven minutes later, the first black-and-white patrol car had come careening up the road.

  Nearly two hours had passed and neighbors from many of the surrounding houses had straggled out to the road. They stood in clusters under the meager shelter of their umbrellas, conversing in subdued and fragmentary bursts while the rain pattered on. Word had apparently spread that the doctor's car had been found. Under ordinary circumstances, they probably didn't have much occasion to meet. None of the houses up here was built close together and with many residents holding day jobs, my guess was their paths seldom crossed. A rag-tag crew, they looked like they'd pulled on their coats and their rain boots in haste. They waited with patience, their vigil ritualistic, a community of the concerned conferring at this unprecedented gathering. A temporary fence of plastic pylons and tape prevented their approach. Not that there was much to see from where they stood. Looking toward the city, the roadway itself was cloaked in darkness, no streetlights within range. In the opposite direction, the asphalt petered out. Beyond the last cul-de-sac, there were only black and looming foothills, raw land knit together with sage and chaparral.

  I sat in my car, feeling tense with the cold. At intervals, I fired up the engine so I could keep the heater running and the windshield wipers on, though the steady thunk-thunk-thunk-thunk nearly put me to sleep. To my right, the hill rose at a thirty-degree angle for a hundred yards or so before it crested and curved down to the lake. From the water's edge, the floodlights glowed eerily, silhouetting the few scrub trees stretched out along the crest. At intervals, the light was broken by shadows as the police went about their business. I'd spoken briefly with Odessa when he'd first reached the scene. He'd asked me to stay and said they were putting a diver in the water to check the car's interior before they hauled it out of the lake. He'd set off up the long slope and I settled in for the wait.

  At some point, Leila had appeared, accompanied by her stepfather, Lloyd, who'd come home while I was in the process of discovering Dow's car. They stood to one side under a black umbrella, maintaining a distance from the neighbors. I was guessing the two had been attracted by the lights and had hopped in Lloyd's car. For once, Leila seemed to be experiencing an emotion other than boredom or contempt. With her thick black mascara and heavily shadowed lids, she looked like a waif, big-eyed and solemn, shivering uncontrollably. I knew I should go over and introduce myself to Lloyd, but I couldn't bring myself to do it. Down the road, I spotted two minicam crews, one from KWST-TV, the other from KEST-TV. The blond reporter from KEST was already picking up film clips and interviews for the eleven o'clock news. She stood under a big black umbrella, talking to one of the neighbors. I didn't see any other reporters, but they were doubtless around somewhere.

  I adjusted my rearview mirror and watched as a pair of headlights swept into view around the curve in the road. I was hoping to see Fiona, but the vehicle turned out to be Crystal's white Volvo. She slowed as she approached. She waited while a smattering of people ambled out of the roadway and passed in front of her, and then pulled in and parked on the berm just ahead of me.

  I grabbed my slicker from the backseat and held it over my head as I left the comfort of my VW and moved gingerly along the road to her car. She turned and caught sight of me and rolled down her window. Her face was drawn, her hair pulled back in an untidy knot at the nape of her neck. Gone were the black slacks and sweater she'd worn earlier. She looked like she'd dressed in haste, pulling on jeans and a gray utilitarian sweatshirt bearing the name of our gym. She said, "I was already in my robe and slippers when the officer came to the door. He wanted to bring me over in his patrol car, but I wanted my own wheels. What's happening?"

  "Nothing much. This is worse than a movie set, with all the people standing around. Where's Anica?"

  "She had to get back to school. Hop in."

  I said, "Thanks." I opened the door and slid into the front seat. Behind me, Griffith's car seat was buckled into place, the surrounding area decorated with an assortment of cookie crumbs and broken pretzels. A plastic baby bottle filled with apple juice had left a sticky residue in the spot where I rested my hand. There was a pink plush squirrel on the floor by my feet. I pictured him flinging his binky, his bottle, his snacks, and stuffed animals, a hurricane of objects announcing his presence. The interior air smelled of flowers and spice, Crystal's cologne.

  I said, "How are you?"

  "Numb."

  I said, apropos of nothing, "The car might have been abandoned."

  "Let's hope that's all it is." She angled the rearview mirror in her direction and ran a knuckle under her lower lashes where her eyeliner had smeared. She pushed the mirror back and slouched down on her spine. She leaned her head back on the seat and closed her eyes. In profile, I could see the irregularities of her features. Her nose was too sharp, her lower jaw too narrow for the width of her brow. Properly done up, she seemed more intimidating than she was in the moment. "When did you get here?" she asked, as though talking in her sleep.

  "Hours ago. At six."

  "They said not to hurry. I was watching TV when the officer arrived at the door."

  "You're lucky. I'm starving. I missed dinner. I'm about to eat my arm."

  Crystal reached over to the glove compartment and flipped the door down. "Try this." She removed a battered Hershey's bar and passed it over to me. "How'd they find the car?"

  "I was the one who spotted it and called 9-1-1. The cops are over there now doing god knows what." I removed the outer wrapper and opened the white inner paper liner. The scent of chocolate rose like a vapor. I broke the candy bar into perfect sections and placed one on my tongue. I could almost read the engraved letter H as I pressed one softening chocolate square against the roof of my mouth.

  "How'd you know the car was his?"

  "The vanity license plate."

  We were silent. Crystal turned on the radio and then thought better of it and turned it off again. The rain on the roof was a soft percussion, a drummer's brushes on cymbals. The atmosphere was oddly intimate. We were both out of our natural habitats, constrained by the unfamiliar setting, bound by the wait. "I take it they haven't pulled the car out of the water yet," she said at length.

  "They're waiting for the tow truck. Odessa said he'd let us know as soon as there's something to report." I ate an E and stuck the rest of the Hershey's in my shoulder bag. I crossed my arms in a vain attempt to get warm.

  Crystal made a sound that was half sigh and half something else: tension, impatience, simple weariness. "I knew he was dead. That's the only explanation that made any sense. I told you he wouldn't walk off and leave Griff."

  "Crystal, they haven't even brought the car up. We don't know he's in there."

  "He's there. Leila's going to freak."

  "How so? She doesn't like him."

  "Of course not. She treated him like dirt. How's she going to make her peace with that?"

  I hesitated, wanting to press. She was more vulnerable than I'd seen her. This might be my only opportunity. "What's her anger about?"

  "It's too complicated to go into."

  "Nothing's too complicated if he's dead."

  Crystal roused herself and turned. "Why should I tell you? You're not working for me."

  "I'm not working against you, either. What's her problem?"

  "Why is that any concern of yours?"

  "It isn't, if you put it that way, but it's going to get worse."

  "I don't doubt that," she said. And after a long pause, "There's been a certain amount of trauma in Leila's life. She needs help sorting it out."

  "She's seeing a shrink?"

  "She's been seeing one for years. At first,
three times a week. Now it's down to twice a month on weekends when she's up from school."

  "He has appointments on weekends?"

  "It's a she."

  "Sorry. I didn't think psychiatrists were that obliging."

  "This one is. She's truly fabulous with kids. This is the fifth shrink Leila's seen and I was at my wit's end."

  "How'd you find her?"

  "We were lucky for once. Charlotte Friedman's a woman Anica went to school with. Her husband retired and they moved here from Boston."

  "What sort of trauma? I'm still not getting it."

  Crystal seemed to debate with herself. She stared straight ahead and when she spoke her tone was as flat and distant as an old phonograph record. "I had a little boy who drowned. Of course, it affected us all. That was the beginning of the end where Lloyd and I were concerned. Some things you never recover from. A child's death is one."

  "What happened?"

  "That was Jordie. My sweet one. He was eighteen months old. I was working one night and left him with the woman next door. She was talking on the phone when Jordie toddled out the screen door and fell in the pool. By the time she found him and called the paramedics, he couldn't be revived."

  "I'm sorry."

  "I thought I'd die, but it was worse for Leila. Children aren't prepared for loss. They don't understand and it's hard to explain death in terms that they comprehend. I've never been religious. I didn't want to sell her a fairy tale, especially one I wasn't buying myself. Dr. Friedman says when faced with the death of a sibling, some children disconnect. They act like nothing's happened. Others, like Leila, start acting out. She's difficult. You've seen it yourself. Rebellious. Emotional. I've talked to Charlotte – with Leila's permission of course. Charlotte feels Leila's behavior is her way of distancing herself, creating a barrier between herself and a world that she finds treacherous. If she doesn't care about anyone, she can't be hurt. At any rate, I know I'm protective. I'm not even sure how I'm going to tell her about all this."