“Well, Tom, as a matter of fact, Tom, I know about those people. It was just about twelve years ago that I was sitting out under the stars minding my own business and they abducted me and implanted these electrodes in my—”
Milo flicked off the radio.
“Civilization and its discontents,” I said.
“Malcontents is more like it. Maybe Lorraine’s right, and I should keep focused on Gavin. I’m gonna call the kids who were in the crash with him, see what that dredges up. Also, see if I can have a go with the girlfriend—Kayla Bartell—without her old man hovering.”
“Still planning to reinterview Koppel?”
“That, too.” He settled in his chair. “She’s obviously not in her office, or that idiot could’ve contacted her. Let me make some calls first, then how about we drop by in two hours? Or later, if that cramps your style.”
“Two’s fine. Want me to try to talk to Kayla?”
“If you saw her on the street, I’d say fine,” he said. “But what with it being B.H. and the father so uptight, we’d better stick to protocol.”
“Visits limited to an official police presence.”
“Such as it is.”
*
I drove home listening to Tom Curlie. Mary Lou Koppel never showed up, and Curlie didn’t mention her again. He alternated between commercials and call-ins from sad, angry listeners, then brought on his next guest—a personal injury lawyer who specialized in suing fast-food chains for racial discrimination and brewing their coffee too hot.
Curlie said, “I don’t know about all that, Bill, but as far as I’m concerned, you can jail ’em for just plain lousy food.”
*
Instead of heading home, I continued on to Beverly Hills and drove past the Quick house. The same white minivan occupied the driveway, but the baby Benz was gone. The drapes were closed, and the day’s mail had collected on the front step. A gardener pruned a hedge. An anorexic woman walked by with a black Chow on leash. The dog looked drugged. A block and a half up, traffic zipped by on Wilshire. A family had been torn apart, but the world kept spinning.
I turned the Seville around, aimed it north through the business district, entered the Flats, cruised by the Bartell mansion. In daylight, the house was even more outsized, square and white as a fresh bar of soap. The fencing looked like a prison barrier. The four-car garage doors were closed but a red Jeep Grand Cherokee idled just inside the electric gates.
I parked and watched from across the street as the gates opened and Kayla Bartell sped through. She was on her cell phone and turned right without checking for cross traffic and sped toward Santa Monica Boulevard. She talked nonstop, animatedly, on a cell phone, with no idea I was following as she rolled through the stop sign at Elevado and ran the one at Carmelita. Without signaling, she hung a risky left turn on Santa Monica and continued east, one hand still grasping the phone. The other steered, and sometimes she removed it to gesticulate and swerved into other lanes. For the most part, motorists kept their distance from her, until another young woman in a Porsche Boxster honked and flipped her off.
Kayla ignored her, kept gabbing, weaved her way to Canon Drive, drove south, and parked in the service alley behind the Umberto hair salon. A valet held open the driver’s door, and Kayla sprang out wearing a lacy black midriff top, black leather pants, and high-heeled boots. On her head was a silver lamé baseball cap. Her blond ponytail protruded through the adjusting band.
No tip for the valet, just a smile. Someone had told her that was enough.
She entered the salon with a bounce in her step.
*
“Two-hundred-dollar haircut,” said Milo. “Ah, youth.”
We were in the Seville, and I was driving east on Olympic, toward Mary Lou Koppel’s office.
I said, “You reach the boys who were in the accident?”
“Both of them, and they back up what the Quicks told us. Gavin was in the back, sandwiched between them. When the car hit the mountain, they were belted and got jostled from side to side. But the impact squeezed Gavin forward, and he hit his head on the driver’s seat. He shot out like a banana out of a peel, one described it. Both said Gavin was a good guy but that he’d changed big-time. Stopped being social, withdrew from them. I asked if he’d slowed down mentally, and they hesitated. Not wanting to put him down. When I persisted they admitted he’d dulled. Just wasn’t the same guy.”