“License number?”
I gave it to him from memory.
“Okay,” he said. Then he said, “Marian? Does she know?”
“Yeah. She’s right here, I’ll put her on—”
“No. Wait… all right, let me talk to her. But you get her out of there as soon as you can. Bring her back to the city.”
“Your place?”
“No. The Doyles’. She’ll give you the address.”
“Where’ll you be?”
“Don’t know yet. Maybe here, maybe the D.A.‘s office.”
“What about the bomb squad?”
“On their way from Sacramento.”
“Yeah, I figured that. I meant the SFPD bomb unit. For the sweep of your house.”
“Oh… been and gone. They didn’t find anything.”
“Then why don’t I just bring Marian home?”
“Goddamn it, do what I tell you!” Sharp, borderline savage. “The Doyles’, understand? Now put her on.”
I handed her the receiver, went out of the kitchen to give her some privacy. Both Judsons followed me, but I had nothing to say to them just then and I kept on going, outside. I stood in the direct sunlight, waiting for its heat to warm me. It didn’t happen; I could not even feel it on the bunched skin of my neck and shoulders.
No way the SFPD bomb squad could have swept his house since the last time we talked, I was thinking. They’re damned thorough normally and they’d be extra careful in the case of a public official. Dixon called them off. Why, when there’s still a chance, however slight, that Latimer set a backup boobytrap there? Why doesn’t he want Marian home?
Only one explanation I could think of. And I didn’t like anything about it.
This one: Latimer had contacted him by phone sometime between Marian’s call and mine just now, told him he had the boy. Which meant Latimer was still fixated on finishing his vendetta and was using Chuck as a lever to force a meeting with Dixon. And Pat, the damn fool, was letting himself be pried; believing he could work a trade, probably — his life for his son’s — with a lunatic who had already murdered three people.
14
By nine-thirty Deep Mountain Lake looked like a place under siege.
The first county law arrived in a four-car caravan, seven minutes after I talked to Dixon and two minutes after I finished stowing the .38 Colt Bodyguard inside my car; there was no longer any reason for me to be packing heat, and it’s never a good idea, anyway, for a private detective to walk around armed in the midst of an official crisis situation. Another green-and-white cruiser showed up shortly afterward, and two more within ten minutes of that one. None of them came with sirens or flashers, but the sheer numbers alerted the local population and word spread fast.
The man in charge was Sheriff Ben Rideout, a lanky guy in his fifties with a military bearing and a quiet, no-nonsense manner. He was a little stiff with me at first, either because I was a stranger or because of what I did for a living, but he didn’t hassle me and it wasn’t long before my own professionalism eased things between us.
His first question to me was, “Where’s Donald Latimer?”
“Gone. Since about six-fifteen this morning.”
“So now we’ve got a fugitive. Why weren’t we notified?”
“Just confirmed a few minutes ago. I called Pat Dixon and he’s handling notification — county, state, and federal.”
“Why call him for that?”
“Because Latimer’s not alone,” I said. “He’s got Dixon’s son with him.” I laid out the basic details for him, nothing more. I was not sure yet what to do about my suspicions — the best way to handle the situation for Chuck’s sake, for Pat’s.
“Bad,” Rideout said, “very bad. Not much we can do about that part of it now. Latimer won’t still be hanging around Plumas County, that’s for sure. What can you tell me about the explosive device in the Dixon cabin?”
“Not much. If he and I are right, it’s wired into his tackle box and it’s the frag type — fishhooks, lots of them, and Christ knows what else.”
“Dynamite? Plastic explosive?”
“Not sure. Probably the same or similar to the previous two bombs in San Francisco—”
“Black powder,” one of the other officers said. The second-in-command, a youngish lieutenant named Dewers.
“Right, black powder.”
“How much pucker power?” Rideout asked me.
“Again, probably along the lines of the other two. A concentrated load, designed to do the most damage to the person who triggers it.”
“So not enough to blow up the entire cabin. Or any of the neighboring cabins, maybe set off a forest fire.”
“Doubtful, judging from the size and weight of the box.”
“Okay. That’s pretty much what we were led to believe, but I wanted your take. You’ve seen and handled the thing, right?”
“Yeah,” I said.
Rideout called to his driver, “Sam, what’s the latest ETA on the Sacramento bomb unit?” Evidently his radio had a patch through to the incoming helicopter.
The driver checked, called back, “Thirty minutes.”
“We better get a move on.”
He deployed his officers, a dozen men and two women. One unit to a meadow a third of a mile east of the lake to wait for the chopper; I heard Judson say that the meadow had been used once before, a few years back, by a medivac helicopter to bring out a boating accident victim. Two units to keep order at the resort, which was already attracting summer residents and guests like flies swarming to spoiled meat. Four units to evacuate and secure the danger zone — all the cottages between the resort and the Dixon cabin, in order to ensure a clear road, and any occupied cottages within a thousand yards west of the Dixons’. Rideout and Dewers would make sure nobody got anywhere near the device until the bomb squad arrived. The sheriff gave me the option of going along with them and I took it. It was better than hanging and rattling at the resort.
I sat in the backseat of the sheriffs cruiser. Faces in the parking lot and along the road stared in at me as we moved out, the blank, hostile stares citizens always give prisoners. I felt like one, sitting there behind the thick mesh screen that separated front and rear seats. Guilt, mainly — and the kind of trapped feeling you get when you’re at the mercy of others. I kept thinking that I ought to say something to Rideout about a possible contact between Latimer and Dixon, and I kept not doing it. It was only conjecture on my part, for one thing. And more important, I wasn’t convinced I had a moral right to take that step. Chuck was Dixon’s son — and I couldn’t even be sure of what I’d do if the boy were mine.
When we passed the green-shingled cottage Latimer had occupied, I roused myself long enough to point it out to the sheriff. He nodded without turning his head. “We’ll check it out later. First things first.”
Nobody was hanging around in the immediate vicinity of the Dixon cabin. That helped the evacuation and area-securing process move along quickly and smoothly. The Plumas County deputies were well trained; they had bystanders moved out to Judson’s or safe behind police lines and the road blocked off and empty by the time we heard the chopper coming in to the east.
I stood with Dewers and a couple of the other officers behind the yellow-tape barrier on the cabin’s east side, waiting for the bomb techs to be ferried in from the landing site. Every time I looked at the cabin it was as though I had X-ray vision: I could see that tackle box sitting there on the floor against the wall. I could feel the weight of it, a kind of ghost-prickle on my fingers, and the careless swing of it against my leg as I walked, and the slight jarring way in which I’d set it down. Any of those movements could have initiated it. The memory, and the thought that neither Chuck nor I would have known what hit us, summoned up fresh beads of sweat.