JONATHAN KELLERMAN. THERAPY

Parked close enough to have a clear view of the picnic tables.

In the driver’s seat sat a detective named Sam Diaz, a technical specialist from Parker Center. Thirty-five, compact, mustachioed, Diaz wore a white sweatshirt over baggy white cotton painter’s pants. A coin dispenser hung from his waist. In his pocket was a commercial food license identifying him as Ramon Hernandez and a wallet full of small bills. Under the sweatshirt rested his holstered 9 mm.

Jerry-built into the truck’s dashboard was forty thousand dollars of long-distance, outdoor recording equipment. The kind National Geographic uses to memorialize birdcalls. The mikes were turned down, and the arias of the jays and mockingbirds were reduced to peeps. So was the noise from the play area: squeaks of high-pitched glee, the murmur of adult voices.

The equipment was hard to spot, unless you got inside the truck and saw all the knobs and the LEDs and the wires that ran under the partition separating the seats from the rear storage area. A talk hole had been cut into the partition, covered by a sliding door, now open. The truck’s doors were locked, and its windows were tinted several shades darker than the legal limit. Hasty job, some of the tinting plastic had puckered around the edges. Why anyone would go to the trouble of concealing an ice-cream truck was the obvious question, but no one was asking.

Milo and I sat in back, on two vinyl bench seats borrowed from an impounded Toyota and bolted to the floor. Another hasty job; the stiff cushions wobbled and squeaked when we moved, and keeping still was driving Milo crazy. He’d finished two ice-cream sandwiches and a peanut-studded drumstick, balled up the wrappers, and tossed them in a corner. Muttering, “Gluttony rules.”

Behind the truck was an alley, and beyond that the high-fenced backyards of the pretty view houses on South Spalding Drive. Through a tiny, tinted heart-shaped window cut into one of the truck’s rear doors, we could see fifty feet north or south. During the hour we’d been there, eight cars had driven through. No movement from the houses. That was to be expected; this was Beverly Hills.

Bolted to our side of the partition was a small, color TV monitor with a digital readout that ticked off the passage of time. The tint was off: Bright Beverly Hills green had faded to olive, tree trunks were gray, the sky was butter-yellow.

A speaker that hung from a metal hook to the right of the monitor supplied the sound effects.

The only sound, now, was Franco Gull shifting his position on the redwood bench. He fooled with his hair, gazed off into the distance, studied the top of the table. Working at being disinterested, as he tried to get down some coffee in a Starbucks cup. Big cup, grande-mega-poobah, or whatever they called it.

During our second meeting, he’d worked at friendly. Telling me he understood I had good intentions. Letting slip, midway through the interview, that he’d suspected “something wasn’t right” with Sentries for Justice, but not knowing what to do about it.

Appreciative of his deal. This was his payment.

The miniature microphone that transmitted his occasional sighs was affixed to the bottom of the picnic table.

Wiring the table was the obvious way to go. Sam Diaz had taken one look at Gull, and said, “The way he sweats, I wire him, he might just go and electrocute himself.”

Other than that, Gull’s anxiety was no problem. He was supposed to be nervous.

Now, he waited.

We all did.

*

At five after five, Diaz said, “I’ve got someone approaching from the Roxbury side—across the bocci field.”

A figure—male, anonymous—could be seen in the upper-right quadrant of the monitor. Then lower, larger, as it got closer. As the man approached Gull’s park bench, Albin Larsen’s form took shape. Today, he wore a wheat-colored sport coat, tan shirt, tan pants. At least that’s what I assumed; the monitor dulled it down to off-white.

“That’s him,” said Milo.

“Mr. Beige,” said Diaz. “I coulda used black-and-white.”

“Yeah, he’s a riot.”

When Larsen got close to the bench, he acknowledged Gull with a small nod. Sat down. Said nothing.

Pages: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140 141 142 143 144 145 146 147 148 149 150 151 152 153 154 155 156 157 158 159 160 161 162 163 164 165 166 167 168 169

Leave a Reply 0

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *