'Copies to everyone?'
'You catch on fast.'
Swayze nodded. 'I intend to be chief someday.'
'Good for you.'
'Make my mother proud.'
'If that's your goal, it's probably wiser to stay a patrolman. There's also a sheaf of invoices here—'
'You want the information transcribed into a less cumbersome format.'
'Right,' Dan said.
'With copies to everyone.'
'Maybe you could even be mayor.'
'I've already got my campaign slogan. "Let's Rebuild L.A."'
'Why not? It's worked for every other candidate for thirty years.'
'This ledger—?'
'It's a checkbook,' Dan said.
'You want the information transcribed from the stubs, with copies to everyone. Maybe I could even be governor.'
'No, you wouldn't like the job.'
'Why not?'
'You'd have to live in Sacramento.'
'Hey, that's right. I prefer civilization.'
* * *
Dinner was late because they had to clean up the kitchen. The water for the spaghetti had to be poured out; bits of the demolished radio were floating in it. Laura scrubbed the pot, refilled it, and put it back on the stove to boil.
By the time they sat down to eat, she wasn't hungry anymore. She kept thinking of the radio, which had been infused with a strange and demonic life of its own, and that memory spoiled her appetite. The air was rich with the mouthwatering aromas of garlic and tomato sauce and Parmesan cheese, but there was also an underlying hint of scorched plastic and hot metal that seemed (this was crazy, but true, God help her) like the olfactory trace of an evil spiritual presence.
Earl Benton ate more than she did, but not much. He didn't talk much either. He stared at his plate even when he took a long pause between bites, and the only time he looked up was when he glanced, occasionally, toward that end of the kitchen counter where the Sony had been. His usual efficient, no-nonsense manner wasn't in evidence now; his eyes had a faraway look.
Melanie's eyes were still focused on a far place too, but the girl ate more than either Laura or Earl Benton. Sometimes she chewed slowly and absentmindedly, and sometimes she gobbled up four or five bites in rapid succession, with wolflike hunger. Now and then she altogether forgot that she was eating, and she had to be reminded.
Feeding her daughter, repeatedly wiping spaghetti sauce off the child's chin, Laura could not avoid thinking about her own blighted childhood. Her mother, Beatrice, had been a religious zealot who had permitted no singing or dancing or reading of books other than the Bible and certain religious tracts. A recluse with a persecution complex, Beatrice had labored hard to ensure that Laura would remain shy, withdrawn, and frightened of the world; if Laura had turned out like Melanie was now, Beatrice no doubt would have been delighted. She would have interpreted schizophrenic catatonia as a rejection of the evil world of the flesh, would have seen it as a deep communion with God. Beatrice would not only have been unable but unwilling to help Laura back into the real world.
But I can help you, honey, Laura thought as she wiped a smear of sauce off her daughter's chin. I am able and willing to help you find your way back, Melanie, if only you'll reach out to me, if only you'll let me help.
Melanie's head dropped. Her eyes closed.
Laura twisted more spaghetti onto the fork and put it to the girl's lips, but the child seemed to have slipped from apathy into some deeper level, perhaps even sleep.
'Come on, Melanie, have another bite. You've got to gain some weight, honey.'
Something clicked loudly.
Earl Benton looked up from his plate. 'What was that?'
Before Laura could respond, the back door blew open with shocking force. The security chain ripped out of the doorjamb, and wood cracked with a hard splintering sound.
The first click had been the dead-bolt lock snapping open. All by itself.
Earl had jumped to his feet, knocking over his chair.
From the patio behind the house, out of the darkness and wind, something came through the door.
* * *
At 9:15, after talking to the owner of the shop next door to the Sign of the Pentagram and learning nothing of interest, Dan stopped at a McDonald's for dinner. He bought two cheeseburgers, a large order of fries, and a diet cola, and he ate in the car while he used the unmarked sedan's datalink to try to locate Regine Savannah.
The video display terminal was in the dashboard, mounted at a slant, facing up, so he didn't have to bend over to read it. The programmer's keyboard nearly filled the console between the seats. All LAPD patrol cars and half the unmarked sedans had been fitted with new computer terminals over the past two years. The mobile VDT was linked by microwave transmissions to the underground, high-security, bombproof police communications command center, which in turn had access, via modem, to a variety of government and private-industry data banks.
Taking a bite of a cheeseburger, Dan started the sedan's engine, switched on the VDT, punched in his personal code, and accessed the telephone-company records. He requested a number for Regine Savannah at any address in the Greater Los Angeles area.
In a few seconds, glowing green letters appeared on the screen:
NO LISTING:
SAVANNAH, REGINE
NO LISTING:
SAVANNAH, R.
He typed in a request for any unlisted numbers being billed to an R. or Regine Savannah, but that was a dead end too. He ate a few french fries.
The screen glowed softly, patiently.
He accessed the Department of Motor Vehicles' license files and requested a search for Regine Savannah. That, too, was negative.
As he mulled over another approach, he finished his first cheeseburger and watched the traffic passing on the windswept street. Then he tapped into the DMV files again and requested a search for a driver's license issued to anyone whose first name was Regine and whose middle name was Savannah. Perhaps she had been married and had not abandoned her maiden name altogether.
Pay dirt. The screen flashed up the answer.
REGINE SAVANNAH HOFFRITZ
Dan stared in disbelief. Hoffritz?
Marge Gelkenshettle hadn't said anything about this. Had the girl actually married the man who had beaten her senseless and put her in the hospital?
No. As far as he knew, Wilhelm Hoffritz had been unmarried. Dan hadn't been to Hoffritz's house yet, but he had read over the available background information, which contained no reference to a wife or family. Others had tracked down the next of kin: a sister who was flying in from somewhere — Detroit or Chicago, someplace like that — to handle the funeral arrangements.
Marge Gelkenshettle would have told him if Regine and Hoffritz had married. Unless she didn't know about it. According to the DMV files, Regine Savannah Hoffritz was female, with black hair and brown eyes. She was five-six, one hundred and twenty-five pounds. She had been born on July 3, 1971. That was about the right age for the woman about whom Marge had spoken. The address on her driver's license was in Hollywood, in the hills, and Dan jotted it down in his notebook.
Wilhelm Hoffritz had lived in Westwood. If he had been married to Regine Savannah, why would they have kept two houses?
Divorce. That was a possibility.
However, even if it had ended in divorce, the very fact of the marriage was nonetheless bizarre. What kind of life could it have been for her, married to a vicious sadist who had brainwashed her, who could completely control her, and who had once beaten her so severely that she had wound up in the hospital? If Hoffritz had savagely abused Regine when she was a student of his — at a time when he had his entire career to lose by indulging in such perverse urges — then, how much worse might he have treated her when she was his wife, when they were alone in the privacy and sanctity of their own home?