Boobytrap Read online

  I said, “So it’s all arranged. I’m leaving Saturday morning.”

  “Perfect,” Kerry said. “This is going to work out for the best after all.”

  “Except for one thing. For the next week or so I’ll be alone in a cabin in the Sierras and you’ll be two thousand miles away in Houston.”

  “Pining away for you the entire time.”

  “Likewise.”

  “We could always have phone sex.”

  “At my age? The excitement would probably bring on a massive coronary.”

  “Well, you call me when you get settled up there.”

  “I will, soon as I can.”

  “I’ll worry if you don’t,” she said. Then she said, “You know, I think I envy you.”

  “Why?”

  “A week of sitting in a boat, wandering the woods, soaking up all that peace and quiet.”

  “Sounds good, all right.”

  “Good? Compared to marinating in hundred-degree Texas heat, it sounds like heaven.”

  “I’d still rather be in Cabo with you.”

  “No, I think this is the better vacation for you right now. Exactly what you need. The past several months have been ... well, pretty stressful.”

  “Worst damn year of my life, so far.”

  “That’s why the wilderness is the best place for you. Up there you’ll have to take it easy. Relax, regenerate, and have a great time doing it.”

  Wed., June 26—10:30 P.M.

  I’m ready to leave. Or I will be after a few hours’ sleep. Another long day, this one. But good, productive.

  Third bomb, destructive device, boobytrap packed and ready. Check. Tools neatly put away in the Hefty Mate toolbox open on the floor beside me. Check. Soldering gun and spool of wire solder. Check. Aluminum canister. Check. Microswitch. Check. Six-volt battery. Check. Fresh tin of smokeless black powder, the last of the four I bought at the gun shop in Half Moon Bay. Said I was a duck hunter and loaded my own shotgun shells, clerk said happy hunting—hah! Shame, though, that I couldn’t have used C-4 plastic explosive instead. More pucker power and a hotter blast—BOOM! Send them all to hell in even littler pieces. But you need connections to get C-4 and all my military ties are long severed, long dead and buried. Like Cotter and Turnbull and the others will be pretty soon.

  Check.

  Cardboard box filled with the rest of the stuff I’ll need. Check. Car filled with gas so I won’t have to stop anywhere after I drop off the judge’s surprise package. Check. Alarm clock set for three A.M. Check. Suitcase packed except for my toilet kit and this notebook. The sixth one already, six in six months. I never realized I had such an aptitude for writing, for organizing my thoughts on paper. Sometimes I think I would have benefited from keeping notebooks all along, but mostly I’m glad I didn’t. I really had no use for them before they put me in prison, back when I had a life, and I want no record of the first four and a half years in that hellhole, I don’t even want to think about them. The only part of my existence that matters after Kathryn and those bastard legal eagles locked me up and threw me away, the only record I’ll ever need to keep, is the part since I devised the Plan.

  Check.

  Anything else? Nothing else.

  All systems go.

  I won’t be sorry to leave this place, despite its positive aspects. “Charming one-bedroom seaside cottage, completely furnished,” the ad in the paper read. Drafty Half Moon Bay shack with bargain-basement furnishings, no central heating, and a stove that doesn’t work right. Six hundred dollars rent, in advance, even though I told the agent I’d be here less than a month. Criminal. Even so, it’s better than the studio apartment in Daly City. And palatial compared to the cell in San Quentin. Away from that steel-and-concrete trap six weeks now and still the nightmares keep coming—the worst one again last night, the one where I’m still locked in that cell, crouching in a corner, the giant rats in guards’ and cons’ uniforms slavering, groping, biting.

  This house has got plenty of privacy, at least. Nearest neighbor is a hundred yards away, and just as important, the sound of the surf is with me every minute I’m here. Freedom. All that bright blue freedom out there. And more waiting for me tomorrow, different kind but just as soothing—green and brown and blue mountain freedom, just long enough for destructive device number two to do its work. And then it’s off on the open road. Like one of those old Bob Hope-Bing Crosby movies. The Road to Indiana.

  Lawler Bluffs, Indiana.

  Kathryn.

  Does she feel warm and secure tonight, snuggled up to that bastard pharmacist of hers? Does she think I don’t know she married Lover Boy after divorcing me and moved to his old hometown and had the brat she always wanted? Or is she afraid, huddled sleepless and shaking in the dark, knowing I’ll come for her sooner or later? I hope she’s afraid. Knows I’m out on parole, knows I’ll come, is waiting with some of the same asshole-puckered terror I felt behind prison bars for those five long long long long long years.

  Big part of it is her fault, when you get right down to it. If it hadn’t been for her, the nightmare would never have happened. Bitch ruined everything, the good life we had together. Blew it all up as surely as if she’d set off a destructive device of her own. “Intent to wrongfully injure.” She’s the one who’s guilty of that, not Donald M. Latimer. She’s the one who should have suffered.

  J’accuse, Mrs. Bitch.

  Guilty as charged, Mrs. Bitch.

  The sentence is death, Mrs. Bitch.

  The fourth boobytrap, the one I’ll assemble after I’m settled at Deep Mountain Lake, the biggest and best and sweetest of them all, is for you, Kathryn—you and Lover Boy and the brat, too, back there in good old Lawler Bluffs, Indiana.

  TWO

  PATRICK DIXON WAS HALF AN HOUR LATE for our Thursday afternoon meeting in The Jury Room. Which is not a courthouse chamber but a bar and grill on Van Ness Avenue near City Hall—one of several hangouts for members of the San Francisco legal profession. The place had been crowded when I arrived at a quarter to four; by the time Dixon walked in at four-thirty, there wasn’t a barstool, table, or booth to be had.

  Usually the atmosphere in places like The Jury Room is one of none-too-restrained conviviality. Lawyers may be serious, even solemn, in their offices and in court, but plunk them down among their own kind in a social gathering spot that dispenses alcohol and they shed their dignity as fast as any other group of imbibers. But that was not the case this afternoon. A pall of gravity and unease seemed to hang in the bar, as tangible as black crepe at an old-fashioned funeral. Talk was muted and no one laughed or even smiled much. It was like a gathering of mourners at a wake, and in a way that was just what it was. One of their fraternity had died this morning, violently and horribly. Judge Norris Turnbull, a well-respected jurist who had been on the bench for more than thirty years. Blown up by a bomb in the garage of his home in Sea Cliff.

  Turnbull’s murder was bad enough, but what really had the lawyers spooked was the fact that he was not the first in their profession to be a bombing victim this week. Three days ago, a criminal attorney named Douglas Cotter had been ripped apart by an explosive device packed into a sprinkler on his front lawn. Two incidents so close together couldn’t be coincidence, they were all saying. It had to be the work of the same individual, and that indicated a serial bomber—a madman with some sort of grudge against the legal system. Bad enough if he was after individuals related to a specific case, but what if it was random? What if the bomber hated all attorneys, all judges? Then anybody could be next. Any one of them could be next.

  I listened to their quiet voices, felt the thin undercurrent of fear, and by the time Dixon showed I was feeling a little uneasy myself. The threat of random, mindless violence does that to you if you’ve been exposed to it often enough. Does it to me, anyway. No threat to me personally in this case, but there had been other cases, other threats that had been intensely personal. Nothing messes with your head more effectively than the fear, howeve
r slight, that you might be the target of an unseen and unknown enemy.

  In my past dealings with Dixon he’d always been animated, full of energy—borderline Type A. Today he was as subdued as the rest of the bar’s patrons, tired-looking and rumpled: tie yanked loose and askew, one of his shirt buttons undone. He said, “Sorry I’m late,” and lowered his raw-boned body into the chair across from me. “Christ, I need a drink.”

  “Name it. I’ll buy.”

  “Irish whiskey. Bushmill’s, straight up.”

  “Double?”

  “Yeah. Make it a double.”

  I went and got it for him and another beer for myself. When I came back he was talking to a white-haired party at the next table, saying, “No, there’s nothing yet. No specific connection between the two.”

  “Has to be a connection, don’t you think?”

  “Not necessarily. None of us knows what to think right now.”

  I gave him his drink and he tossed off half of it, pulled a face, set the glass down, and mauled his head with a big-knuckled hand. Nervous habit. His brown hair was short and coarse, and the mauling didn’t disturb it much. If I’d had the same habit, as straight and fine as my scalp covering is, I’d have looked like an Italian version of Don King by this time of day.

  He said, “Some goddamn world we live in.”

  “The best of all possibles.”

  “Norris Turnbull was a friend of mine, one of the most decent ... ah, damn whoever did that to him. Damn the bugger’s rotten soul.”

  He didn’t expect an answer and I didn’t give him one.

  Pretty soon he said, “Sharpened steel rods, for God’s sake. Can you believe that? Razor-sharp steel rods.”

  “Part of the bomb, you mean?”

  “Loaded into a small cardboard box and left on the front seat of the judge’s car. Inside his garage; bomber gained access through a side window. When Norris opened the box to look inside, it blew fifty or sixty of those rods straight up into his face.”

  “Jesus.”

  “Bastard must’ve really hated him,” Dixon said.

  Or judges and lawyers in general, I thought, but I didn’t say it. “Same kind of device that killed Douglas Cotter?” I asked.

  “Bomb techs aren’t sure yet. Both were set as boobytraps, but the one that killed poor Doug was simpler—black powder and metal fragments packed into a lawn sprinkler and initiated by a trip wire hidden in the grass.”

  “Any idea who or why?”

  “None yet. No warnings, no notes or calls claiming responsibility.” He shook his head, took another hit of Bushmill’s. “Silent type of psycho’s the worst kind—I guess you know that. Intelligent, cunning, vicious, and hyped up with some kind of agenda we can’t even begin to guess at yet. Unless he starts sending letters like the Unabomber, it could take weeks to get a line on him. And if he’s got a string of others on his list ...”

  “What about a signature on the two bombs?”

  “Too early to tell yet. That’s the hope, that he’s got a track record and a definite signature.”

  “Signature” in the case of serial bombers means the way the individual puts his device together—the kinds of connections he makes, the types of powder, cord, solder, and circuitry he uses. Each bomber’s signature is unique in some identifiable way, and it seldom varies. Once the lab techs finished going over the post-blast evidence from this morning, a process that could take days, they’d feed all the pertinent details into a computer and hope for a high-probability match. Identify the bomber, and tracing and then neutralizing him would be a much easier task.

  I asked, “Who’s in charge of the investigation?”

  “Dave Maccerone. You know him?”

  “Slightly. A good man.”

  “The best. Charley Seltzer, the bomb squad commander, and Ed Bozeman from our office are working with him.”

  I knew Bozeman, too; he was the D.A.’s top investigator. “That cuts your staff pretty thin, doesn’t it? Enough to affect your vacation plans?”

  “Not as things stand now. I talked to the boss about it. My caseload’s caught up, or it will be after the court date next week, and none of the other ADAs is on leave or due out. Ybarra says I’ve earned at least a couple of weeks of R&R and I’d better go ahead and take them. I didn’t argue with him.”

  “So you’re still planning to leave for Deep Mountain Lake next Tuesday or Wednesday?”

  “Unless something else happens in the meantime, God forbid. Tell you the truth, I’m twice as glad now that Marian and Chuck will be riding with you on Saturday. I’ll feel better with them out of the city.”

  “I can understand that.”

  “So it’s all set,” Dixon said. He seemed to be relaxing a little, a combination of the Bushmill’s and his vacation plans. Men and women who work in jobs like his, even more than those in my profession, had to learn to compartmentalize their lives, separate the personal and the professional; if they didn’t, the daily grind plus pressure situations like the one with these bombings eventually pushed them over the edge into alcoholism, breakdowns, and other stress-induced ills. “You’ll pick them up at my house at nine. I can’t tell you how much they’re both looking forward to it, and how grateful I am.”

  “Glad to do it, Pat. Besides, I’m the one who should be grateful.”

  He waved that away. “One thing: Tom Zaleski asked me to tell you to give his property a good check-over as soon as you get there, let him know if there are any problems.”

  “You mean vandalism, that kind of thing?”

  “Not much of that at Deep Mountain Lake, particularly with Nils Ostergaard on watch. You’ll meet Nils—retired Plumas County sheriffs deputy, lives up at the lake with his wife half the year, spends the long winter months in Quincy. He keeps a sharp eye on things. No, mainly what Tom means is problems with fallen trees, the plumbing or electricity—like that.”

  “Sure, I’ll take care of it.”

  “Here’re his phone numbers, home and office.” Dixon handed me a piece of paper along with a set of keys on a chain. “And the keys to his cabin. We traded spares years ago.”

  “Is there a phone at his place?”

  “Yes. He’ll have it activated for you.”

  “Should I look up Nils Ostergaard?”

  “You won’t need to. He’ll know as soon as you and Marian and Chuck arrive, and he’ll be around before you’re even settled in. You’ll like him. Nosy as hell, crusty, but he’s got a big heart.”

  “Fisherman?”

  “One of the most avid you’ll come across. You, too, I take it?”

  “But not so avid as I used to be.”

  “Lake, river, streams?”

  “River or streams. I’m not much of a lake man.”

  “Me, either. Just don’t ask Nils about the best spots. He knows ’em all and guards the choice ones as jealously as he would a gold hoard.”

  “That go for you, too?”

  He showed me a lopsided grin. “More or less. Talk to Mack Judson, owns Judson’s Resort. Which isn’t much of one—resort, I mean. Convenience store, cafe-and-bar, eight cabins. Caters to fishermen, hikers, summer residents.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Tell him I said to steer you right. He’ll put you in a spot where you’ll catch your limit.”

  “All I can ask.”

  “So I guess that’s about it,” Dixon said. “Next time we get together, it’ll be up at the lake. We’ll have dinner, maybe do some fishing if you’re still shy a rainbow or two.”

  “Sounds good.”

  He was quiet for a time, staring into his empty glass. The death of Judge Norris Turnbull preying on his mind again, I thought. “Hell,” he said finally, “let’s have another round before we leave. I’ll buy this one.”

  I said, “Sure,” because he seemed to need the companionship. But I didn’t let him pay; buying a second double Bushmill’s was the least I could do for him.

  My fishing gear was stored on the rear porc
h of my flat on Pacific Heights. I drove over there from Civic Center and spent some time going through it, deciding what and how much I was going to take along. I hadn’t had my stuff out in a while; poking through the fly case, hefting the rods, checking the reels was like renewing acquaintances with old friends. Some of the equipment was almost as old as I am, and a hell of a lot more durable.

  I settled on a couple of lightweight rods, one a fly rod and the other a spinning rod with a Daiwa reel, and an assortment of wet and dry flies, most of the lures being coachmans and hoppers and rooster tails. All of the gear was my own. I did not even consider mixing in any of the items I’d liberated from Eberhardt’s garage two months ago, even though his Dennis Bailey parabolic rod was better than either of mine and he’d had some fancy, beautifully tied flies that at one time I’d coveted.

  Odd thing: I hadn’t been able to leave his equipment for strangers to pick over, yet I couldn’t bring myself to use any of it—on this trip and probably not ever. It was the only piece of him that I’d kept from his leavings. Both a memento and a memento mori—reminders of the life and the death of the man who had once been my closest friend and partner, who’d been a stranger I hadn’t really known at all. His suicide was two months behind me now; there had been closure and enough time for the emotional seal to set and harden. But the reasons he had died and the way he had died would always be with me, lodged like shrapnel and providing twinges now and then. In a way it was good, necessary that I would never forget: all that he was and all that he wasn’t were a lesson to me. That was why I’d kept his fishing gear, the one tangible piece of him. It was why I’d never get rid of it. And it was why I’d never use even a single item.

  In the bedroom I packed the rest of what I’d need: a couple of wool shirts, two pairs of cord pants, a pair of high-topped work shoes with thick composition soles—the rocks in mountain streams are slippery and treacherous even in the summer months—and a pair of waders just in case. A light jacket and two changes of casual clothes, underwear, socks, loafers, and I was done. The thought that I wouldn’t have to wear a suit or a starched shirt or a necktie for the next week or so actually made me smile.