"There wasn't much in it," Boyma said, "but we figure your boy had a bad spot. What do you take in, two or three hundred a day?"
"About that," Danny agreed. "I mean, some days. But it's not really my money—"
The mobster shook his head. "I'm not looking for a partnership right now," he explained, "although you never can tell about that either, when somebody gets some action going in my territory. Actually, I've got other business interests involved here. What I want to know is, is there any chance this, is on the level?"
The scales fell from Danny's eyes. "Oh," he said. "Oh! I see what you mean. Well, see, here's the thing. I don't know anything about science, but I felt that the people of Los Angeles had a right— I mean," he amended, as the lip-corners moved minutely down, "I mean, I don't really know. But there's some scientists that probably do, or will, anyway, because they're about to start a whole shmaffis to investigate it, and I have a line into them. One of my associates. Young fellow named Dennis Siroca. Joel! Get Dennis's address for these gentlemen."
Boyma shook his head. "No," he said, "the way we're going to do it is you're going to find out and let us know."
"Oh," Danny said, nodding his head. "Right."
"And you're going to do it pretty fast, Deere, because there's some important interests involved here, isn't that right? You're a pretty interesting fellow. We've been keeping a sort of eye on you for a long time, and I have a lot of confidence that you'll get what we want to know. "
"Thanks," Danny said glumly. Then he brightened a little. Twenty years of dealing with construction people had given him a small, private list of useful names for an emergency. "Say, I bet we have a lot of friends in common, now that I think of it. You know Angie Collucci? He's from San Pedro, and Angie and I—"
"Deere," the man said, getting up—as soon as he started to move all three of the others were up ahead of him— "from now on, I'm your friend, isn't that right?"
"Oh, sure!"
Boyma nodded. "You only need one friend," he said wisely. "Of course, you got to make sure he stays friendly. We'll keep in touch."
Danny jumped to the window and watched them get in the car. He pushed the remote button that opened the gate for them, and when they disappeared around the bend in the driveway and the light indicated they had passed the gate he discovered he was sweating. "You want me to get you a Seven-Up or something, Danny?" Joel asked.
"No! Go put the car away. And tell the Mexes they can come out of the bushes now," he added, heading for the bathroom. He had never needed to go so badly.
The invasion of the gangsters into his private home had bothered Danny more than he could handle. It was an act of rape. It was entering into his most private parts. Plenty of tough people came around the office on Sunset Boulevard, some through the front door, most up the back stairs; and all that was the normal course of doing business and Danny Deere dealt with them head to head and never raised a sweat.
But this was his home. It was private. It was safe. He didn't even get mail here!
It was not just the property itself that had charmed Danny Deere. It was the marvelous isolation, and the way it was situated. Danny had a lifetime's experience of Los Angeles, with its mud slides and brush fires. The place was exempt from both. The county had taken a slice through one edge of the property, after he subdivided it, for a cemented spillway. If there was flooding above, it would come down the spillway, not down Danny's avocado grove. Behind and above the house was a forty-foot rise, a hummock on the side of the hills; but if there was a mud slide higher it would stop on the far side of that hill, and the hill itself would not slide as long as the avocado grove tied it down with its roots. Fire was always a problem. But there were irrigation sprays for the avocados, and that upper swimming pool was now repaired and always full of water. Power? After his accountant explained the tax advantages of solar, Danny invested in ten thousand square feet of photovoltaics on the roof. There would be power for the pumps.
And all that was part of the total security, the womblike environment, that was Danny's home, that had now been breached.
It was not all psychological. There were very good reasons why Danny wanted the safest, securest, privatest place in the world, and they had to do with money.
When the profits began to get embarrassing Danny had to figure out what to do with them. He could put just so much into the house itself. By the time you had two Jacuzzis you didn't really want a third. He missed the boat on gold and was afraid to take a chance on diamonds. Silver was too bulky. Bearer bonds paid off not much more than inflation, so your money wasn't working for you. Swiss bank accounts paid nominal interest or none at all.
Then he discovered art.
The house had come with a huge wine cellar, a lot bigger than Danny ever needed for wine. But he enlarged it and walled it off with concrete; and there, under his house, air-conditioned and humidity controlled, row on row, there were ashcan moderns and smuggled Russian ikons, kinetic light sculptures by somebody in Ohio, and crude wood carvings from some somebodies in Africa. Danny bought with a lavish hand, and always for cash. At first he hired a UCLA graduate student for expert advice, but she didn't seem to pay off, in more than one way she refused to pay off, and expert advice didn't seem necessary. The art was all getting more valuable anyway. The graduate student had left a legacy of subscriptions to art magazines and, month by month, Danny delighted to see the auction prices going up.
It was a hundred per cent guaranteed investment. The Feds didn't know it existed. No one did. When he decided to sell, he could sell the same way he bought. For cash. Off the books, no records. Until then there was very little that could go wrong. If the artists lived and continued to produce, they often continued to get recognition, and the prices went up. If they died it was even better. Every time an artist died Danny felt a tingle of pleasure: there would be not more works to dilute the value of his holdings. The house could burn to the ground without warming the inside of that concrete vault. Burglars would never find their way in—and anyway, Manuel's relatives were always on patrol among the avocados.
Or almost always. ... But if anyone less heavy and well connected than the day's visitors tried anything, the Mexicans would have the sense to call the police, and the black-and-whites would be there before the burglars got past the TV sets and the Tiffany lamps.
There really was only one thing that Danny could imagine damaging his collection, and that was if California really and truly should actually slide to the bottom of the sea.
Well, two things. The other was if he made some really bad enemies.
The tens of thousands of volcanos in the world are classified in three categories: active, dormant, and extinct. It is not clear how real the distinctions are. Mt. St. Helens was a "dormant" volcano until the spring of 1980. Even "extinct" volcanos hold surprises. In Papua, Mt. Lamington was classified as extinct until 1956. Then it erupted and killed three thousand people.
Wednesday, December 23d. 8:00 PM.
Because he still had a job to do, Tib had to fly up to Marin County for two days with the mobile seismological stations monitoring the Hayward and San Andreas faults; it was not a special trip, it was one of his functions to keep them in line. Because it was two days before Christmas, he had to go directly from the airport to the lecture by this "Doctor" Lautermilch. Rainy had some sort of relative in town; Meredith Bradison simply refused to get involved in anything that was not family; Tib was the only one left, if anyone was to hear this probable quack.