The Boys from Santa Cruz

kidding? Out-standing! Fast work! Hold on just a second. …Okay, shoot,” he said, notebook at the ready, pencil stub poised, cell phone jammed between his shoulder and his ear. But a puzzled look crossed his face at what must have been the caller’s first words, and the pencil didn’t move.

“Wait a minute, there must be some kind of mistake. Are we talking about a match from the card I sent you, or are we talking about the latent prints from the barn?…Oh, you haven’t? How good is the match?…That good…? Thanks, I guess.” He snapped the phone shut, then dropped it back into the side pocket of his jacket.

“What is it?” said Skip. “What’s going on?”

Dazedly: “That was Cal-ID. They got a ten-by-ten match on the dead guy.”

“And?”

“It was him, it was Sweet.”

Stunned didn’t quite cover Skip’s response; flabbergasted was closer. “Luke Sweet?” he said, his mind flashing back to last night’s dream.

“Little Luke himself, dead and in person. Ten-point match on all ten fingers-that makes the probability somewhere around ninety-nine point nine percent.”

“What’s the point one percent?” was all Skip’s muddled brain could come up with.

“Clerical error,” said Pender, as his phone began chirping yet again. “Pender here. …Oh, hi, Laurel. We’re just about finished with- You did? Can we- Okay, yeah, sure.” He checked his watch: it was straight-up noon. “See you in about half an hour.”

“What now?” Skip asked.

“One of the CS techs found a second journal buried in the dirt in the back of the barn. Luke again, but the new one’s only ten pages or so, in regular-size handwriting. Laurel says we can look it over as soon as they’re done dusting it.”

“I can hardly wait,” murmured Skip, glancing over the last page of the Pocket Pal. “Maybe it’ll help us make some sense out of this,” he added, then read the final entry, which was hand-printed in capital letters, aloud to Pender:

“To Asmador: Your mission, by order of the Infernal Council, is to exact revenge for all slights and injustices visited upon Luke Sweet, Jr., by the traitors named herein. You will know neither peace nor rest until vultures have feasted on their remains.”

“What the fuck?” said Pender.

“My sentiments exactly,” said Skip.

9

April…something. Who knows, who cares. This is probably my last entry. I can’t feel my leg below the knee anymore, and every time I drop off to sleep, I sink a little deeper, stay a little longer, and come back a little weaker than the time before.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining. I have some good memories. Eating Marianne’s ice cream with my mother. Riding the Giant Dipper 67 times in a row. Making love with Shawnee, waist-deep in the sparkling river.

And at least I’m at peace, which is more than you can say for Fred and Evelyn. Asmador brought their heads back yesterday in plastic grocery bags and set them up on a plank so I can see them from where I’m lying. Judging by the expression on their faces, their mouths wide open and screaming and their eyes practically popping out of their heads, those two were anything but peaceful at the end.

Serves ’em right: they should have treated me better when they had the chance. They all should have treated me better. And now, thanks to Asmador, who just left for the Marshall City library to research the current whereabouts of Judge Brobauer, they’re all going to pay.

How’s that for a happy ending?

Yours truly, Luke Sweet, Jr., Murphy’s Farm, Marshall County, California, USA, North America, Western Hemisphere, Earth, the Galaxy, the Universe, and whatever lies beyond.

CHAPTER TWO 1

A little more than an hour after losing their prime suspect, whose death had provided him with the most unimpeachable alibi of all, the ad hoc investigative duo of Pender and Epstein left Marshall County in Pender’s dust- covered, dirt-spattered rental car, with Skip behind the wheel and Pender working the cell phone.

“Dr. Gallagher, it’s Ed Pender from the FBI, I spoke to you Wednesday? Sorry to bother you at home, but it’s urgent.…Oh, please, don’t give it another thought. We all made assumptions. You assumed Luke Sweet was dead, I assumed he was our killer. Turns out we were both wrong.…No, according to this new journal he didn’t even kill his grandparents.…I was hoping you’d be able tell us. You said there were four people unaccounted for, two orderlies, two inmates.…Right, the other inmate.…Sure, I’ll wait.”

“She’s looking it up in her computer,” he had time to whisper to Skip before Dr. Gallagher came back on the line. “That was quick,” he told her, notebook at the ready. “Okay, shoot.…Is that M for Mike or N for November? Right, got it. Do you have any other information about him? Relatives, home address.…Okay, I’ll be here.”

Pender closed the phone, glanced over at Skip. “We’ve got a name. Charles Mesker. With an M. She’s going to get back to me with the address where they shipped the so-called remains.”

He leaned over and turned the radio back up. Driving with Pender, Skip had already learned, involved a heavy dose of sing-along oldies. Pender rocked around the clock, got his thrill on Blueberry Hill, and was wakin’ up little Susie just outside Vacaville when his cell phone began chirping yet again. He reached over and turned down the radio, then out came the notebook and half-chewed pencil stub. “Okay, shoot.…Right, right.” Scribbling busily. “Got it. Thank you, Dr. Gallagher. I imagine we’ll be in touch.”

He closed the phone and turned to Skip. “Mesker’s next of kin were his parents. They still live in Santa Cruz. We should probably go check them out.”

“Tonight?”

“Yes, tonight. You know, just in case.”

“Just in case what?” asked Skip, as he pulled out of the slow lane to overtake a little old lady from Pasadena on a long straightaway.

“Just in case son Charles is holed up there. He wouldn’t be the first fugitive in history to run home to Mommy and Daddy.”

Even with the accelerator pedal floored, it took the Toyota half a mile to put Granny in the rearview mirror. “Okay, you’re on,” Skip told Pender. “But first I want to stop by my apartment to change my clothes and pick up the Buick. I’m also thinking maybe we ought to call your friend Klug and arrange for backup.”

Pender laughed and clapped Skip encouragingly on his uninjured shoulder. “What do we need backup for?” he said. “We’ve already got him outnumbered two to one.”

2