Palos Verdes High School is only half a block from the beach and sits on some of the most expensive high school real estate in the country. I arrived early enough to take Sirius for a walk along the coast. There was a no- dogs rule on most of the area’s beaches, so my partner and I had to be content to do our walking within sight and sound of the surf.
After the walk, I picked up a coffee and went to the agreed-upon meet-up spot near the front of the high school. While waiting, I drank my coffee and took in the view. Even over the noise of arriving students, I could hear the sounds of the ocean. PV is less than twenty miles southwest of LA, but it feels like a different world.
Troy Vincent had told me he didn’t have a class until eight and had agreed to meet with me at half past seven. At twenty of eight, a young man approached drinking a Coke and eating a Slim Jim sausage. He had a deep tan, and his long, wet hair had natural blond highlights from the sun. His garb was beach casual: board shorts, a T- shirt from a local surf shop, flip-flops, and white-framed, smoky-lens sunglasses.
“Sorry I’m late,” he said. “I was out with the dawn patrol and the waves were awesome.”
He didn’t offer a hand to me but did to Sirius, saying, “How’s it going, Bubba?”
Sirius casually sniffed the offered hand and then licked it, either for a taste of sea salt or Slim Jim.
“Where were you surfing?”
“Haggerty’s,” he said.
I nodded as if I knew the spot. In truth I had heard of it, but my awareness was limited to oldies radio. Haggerty’s was part of the lyrics in the Beach Boys song “Surfin’ USA.”
“When we talked yesterday you were reluctant to speak ill of the dead,” I said.
Troy shrugged. “Why mess with bad karma?”
“Wouldn’t it be worse karma if you didn’t help, and by doing that someone got away with murder?”
He took a bite of his Slim Jim, considered my words, and finally offered a shrug and noncommittal nod.
“Tell me about the lacrosse game where you and Klein went at it.”
“He was a dude with a ’tude,” said Troy. “He was acting like he was the big kahuna out on the field. During the match there were some infusions going on, you know? That’s part of the game, so when the two of us collided he got all hot and told me I rammed his space. So I told him, ‘Brah, that’s not my way,’ but he still had a pile of sand in his shorts and I could tell he was ready to go aggro. I didn’t back down, though, and told him if he wanted to barnie, then we should do it, but he just gave me the stink eye, or that’s what I thought until a little while later when I got acid-dropped.”
“You were hit from behind?”
He nodded. “It was totally fubar.”
Translation: fucked up beyond all recognition.
“But you didn’t actually see Paul Klein hit you?”
“That’s right, which is what made it so nitchen. Instead of manning up, he did a sneak attack and made sure no one was looking. And then he lied about it.”
“His coach said you coldcocked him.”
“That’s totally bogus. That dude made up that story.”
“Did your teams meet up again?”
“Not on the field. That was one of the last games of the season.”
“Not on the field?” I asked. “Did something happen off the field?”
Troy turned his gaze to the Pacific and said, “I’m still not sure if I should narc on him, seeing as he’s dead.”
I didn’t say anything; I was pretty sure Troy would spill if I was patient. He took a bite of his Slim Jim, pulled the last bit free from the wrapper, and asked, “You think Bubba wants to finish it off?”
“I have no doubt of that. But I have to share a car with Bubba.”
“Sorry,” Troy said to Sirius and finished the last bite, chasing it with his Coke.
How is it that surfers can eat like that, I thought, and still look so healthy? It wasn’t a question I asked him; bad karma or not, Troy had decided to give up the rest of the story.
“So, a month or two after lacrosse season’s over someone came to my house late at night and set a surfboard on fire on our front lawn. The board must have been really juiced, because it was flaming everywhere, and our lawn got this huge burn spot.”
“You think it was Klein?”
“No doubt, man. He must have soaked some gas in the grass in order to leave me a personal message. Even though the lawn got all charred, you could still make out the letters BH.”
“I assume a police report was filed?”
Troy shook his head. “Because of the black patch from the burning surfboard, it took a few days for the letters to show themselves. Before then I was sure this Torrance dude had done the burning because of a run-in we’d had at Rat.”
Rat was the name of another surfing spot. A surfer friend once told me that Rat wasn’t named for a rodent but was a spot designated by PV surfers as Right After Torrance. Some of the most impassioned territorial disputes in SoCal are between local surfers defending “their” waves.
“I should have known it wasn’t another dankster, though,” Troy said. “Not even a durfer would set a board on fire. That’s too fubar.”
“Yeah,” I said, “that’s too fubar.”
As I was pulling into the parking lot at BHHS, my cell phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number but I did the voice. Dottie Antonelli said, “Hey, Joe Friday, I’ve been doing your secretarial work all morning.”
The old Michael Gideon, the one before I lost my wife and did my fire walk, had enjoyed repartee. The ghost of Gideon tried to reprise that role. “Just the facts, ma’am,” I said. It either wasn’t a very good Jack Webb imitation, or Dottie chose to ignore Joe’s and my request.
“So, wasn’t that pumpkin bread as good as I told you?”
“You’re assuming I even tried it.”
“I’m assuming you ate the whole thing.”
She was right, but I wasn’t about to tell her that. “It was very good,” I admitted.
“Didn’t I tell you it was
“Don’t you get tired of hearing people groan when you tell them that?”
With Jersey emphasis she said, “The pot’s calling the kettle black?”
“You want me to say five Hail Marys?”
“It wouldn’t do any good. You might as well say five Hello Dollys.”
“Let’s start with a hello, Dottie. What do you got for me?”
“You’re in luck is what I got. I just finished talking with Karen Santos. She’s pretty sure she waited on the girl you’re looking for, but you better talk with her yourself, and there’s no time like the present, because Karen’s got the afternoon shift and the reverend mother has agreed to see you today at four thirty. I’m thinking you’ll want to kill two birds with one stone.”
“You’re thinking for me?”
“Somebody’s got to do it.”
“If I see the reverend mother carrying a ruler I’ll probably have posttraumatic stress disorder.”
“If she scares you silent we should be so lucky. Speaking of lucky, did the chocolates do the trick?”
“Is that the kind of question you should be asking from a monastery?”
“In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m no nun.”
“Well, in case you hadn’t heard, a gentleman never tells.”
“If I was talking to a gentleman, I wouldn’t have asked the question.”
“Shouldn’t you be selling holy water or something?”
“You’re right. I’ll be putting a bag together for you, and I’ll make sure to include a Saint Jude medal in your order.”
Saint Jude is the patron saint of lost causes. Dottie heard me laugh before I hung up on her.
I put Sirius on a leash and let him accompany me on my walk through Beverly. The presence of the canine didn’t go unnoticed, and I was sure scores of panicked texts were being sent that a drug-sniffing dog was on campus.
