“How do you know this?”
“Everybody knows. Bums been camping there fifty years or more. Started as a hobo city during the Depression. Guys out of work hopped on trains and went clear across the country, riding the rails. They used to elect their own mayor and everything. Access road is their escape hatch, in case the cops bust in.”
“How do you know there aren’t twenty guys up there?”
“Because the Boggarts invaded the place and that’s how it is now. Everybody else took off. Nobody wants to mess with them three. They’re bad news,” she said.
“What if they happen to be there?”
“They won’t be. I just got done telling you. They’re busy manning the ramps at this hour because people are coming home from work, happy to pass out dollar bills to bums claiming their car’s broke down. Can’t they figure it out? There isn’t a car. Bums don’t have cars.”
“I love your confidence,” I said.
“Fine. You don’t believe me? We can check the off-ramps first to make sure all three Boggarts are accounted for. Camp’s deserted, we go in and grab the stuff. Ten minutes max and we’re outta there.”
I could feel a roiling anxiety rise through my body like nausea. “This is a bad idea.”
“You got a better one?”
When I didn’t reply, she went on in a warning tone. “You don’t help, we’ll just turn around and find someone else. I want that backpack and I mean to have it.”
“Come on, Pearl. Would you cut it out? This is ridiculous. If you’re that desperate for a backpack, you can buy one at the nearest army-navy store.”
“Not like this one.”
“And why is that?”
She broke off eye contact. “You don’t need to know.”
“What, like there’s a secret compartment where Terrence kept his Sky King decoder ring?”
“Go ahead and make fun. That backpack is valuable.”
“I’m not moving an inch until you tell me why,” I said.
Felix looked from me to Pearl and back. “Her lips is sealed,” he said, “But mine ain’t.”
She squinted at him. “Would you shut your mouth? We’re having a conversation here that’s no concern of yours.”
He leaned closer to me with a proud smile, like a little kid who swears up and down he can keep a secret when he can’t.
Pearl banged him on the head, but it was too late.
“Backpack’s where Terrence hid the key to his safe deposit box.”
“A safe deposit box,” I said, making a declarative sentence of it instead of a question.
“Like at a bank,” he said, as opposed to those at the laundromat.
I closed my eyes and let my head sink in despair. If Terrence had a will . . . which Dandy claimed he did . . . he probably kept it in a safe deposit box. Which might also contain information about his ex-wife and kids and any final wishes he might have about disposition of his remains. This was exactly what I’d been looking for for the past four days. “I don’t know how I get caught up in shit like this.”
Pearl said, “Atta girl! Now you’re talking.”
8
I slid in behind the driver’s seat. Felix squeezed into the back while Pearl crushed her cigarette underfoot and then settled into the front. I felt a flutter in my chest like I’d swallowed a hummingbird. I turned the key in the ignition, put the Mustang in gear, and pulled away from the curb. I took a right on Milagro and moved into the lane that ran parallel to the freeway, allowing southbound cars to merge with oncoming traffic. In the interest of being thorough, I took the first exit, which emptied just shy of the bird refuge. I’d never seen the bums work that area and I realized now it was because that particular ramp was too close to home. If a patrol car cruised by, there was no way to disappear without the risk of drawing attention to their camp.
When cross-traffic allowed, I got onto the southbound on-ramp, which was clear of panhandlers just as the other on-ramps turned out to be. I suppose the reasoning was that people getting onto the freeway had a fixed destination and were therefore focused on the drive and less inclined to interrupt the journey for donation purposes, whereas those getting off the freeway, their progress halted by traffic lights or stop signs, had more time to read the signs beseeching motorists for help and thus were more likely to haul out the old wallet or change purse.
I drove an elongated figure eight nearly a mile in length, cruising the ramps where the Boggarts typically stationed themselves. I noticed I’d freely adopted Pearl’s term for the panhandlers, which seemed tidy and to the point. I didn’t believe they were “bad fairies.” I wasn’t even sure that they were bad, but the word “Boggart” had a certain air to it that seemed to encompass the minigang of thugs. By trekking back and forth, we spotted two of the three bums. I came back around to the Cabana Boulevard off-ramp, slowing as I exited. At the bottom of the slope, sure enough, the third Boggart was standing on the berm, holding a battered cardboard sign. Crudely lettered in pencil, it read:
Down on my luck and hungry
Any small donation appreciated
God Bless
Pearl said, “That’s the one had the backpack.”
I gave him points for correct spelling. With just an occasional glance to my left, I kept my gaze fixed on the car in front of me. I already knew the fellow by sight. He was tall, with the muscle mass of an athlete whose trophy days were done. I placed him at six feet with a build that had probably been pumped up by steroids once upon a time. His head was shaved and he wore a red baseball cap that he removed from time to time so he could smooth his bald pate before settling the cap back into place. He wore jeans and a red flannel shirt, the nap worn thin at the elbows but otherwise looking like a proper safeguard against the chill. His expression was blank, revealing no negative reaction to those who passed without making a contribution. Maybe next time around the stingy ones would feel guilty enough to hand over a dollar bill. Meanwhile, he was prepared to stand there without complaint until some righteous driver passed money to him through the window.
Both Pearl in the front seat and Felix in the back had turned their heads to the right as though studying the view from the passenger-side windows. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the Boggart’s focus drift in our direction and fix on Pearl, conspicuous by reason of her size and the telltale black knit watch cap. He squinted at the sight of her. He had no reason in the world to think we were up to no good. Then again, like the paranoids in every walk of life, he had no reason to think we weren’t. He tracked the rear of the Mustang as I turned right onto Cabana. It might have been my Grabber Blue 1970 Mustang he found so fascinating, but I doubted it.
I continued around the big bend in the road and took a right at the next light, turning onto the street that fronted the zoo, which was closed for the day, its entrance barred by a gate with a wooden arm. The parking lot was empty, and even at a distance I could see the wrought iron gates were locked. The turnstiles behind them were in shadow.
Felix leaned forward, arms on the front seat, talking into my right ear. “Keep on this road around to Milagro.”
I did as instructed, wondering if this was how a bank robber felt when he’d been assigned to drive the getaway car. There was a produce market on the corner a couple of blocks farther on. It was open for business seven days a week with an expansive parking lot on the far side. I’d passed the market any number of times. I’d even shopped there on occasion, impressed by the lavish displays of fresh fruits and vegetables. I caught the scent of celery as I drove by—I swear I can smell celery half a block away—and wished I were eating a bowl of homemade vegetable soup instead of being cooped up with a homeless pair who reeked of cigarettes. I turned right onto Milagro and then right again into the parking lot.