A Grave Talent

She interrupted firmly. 'Why are the press staying behind the fence? I'd have expected to see them crawling all over the hill by now.'

'That was Tyler's doing,' laughed Trujillo. 'He went around nailing up all these signs that say Trespassers Will Be Shot, and told them that it was private property and that everyone who lives here owns a loaded shotgun. When one of the television guys didn't seem to believe him, he gave them a little demonstration—for which he will probably be fined—and then, when he had their attention, said very nicely that if they're well behaved he'll come and talk to them every two hours. So far it's worked.'

'Threats, bribes, and a disgustingly wet day. Very clever.'

'I've had some practice in crowd control,' said Tyler. 'Besides, Hawkin authorized some money to come my way, and I've got two of the residents down in the kitchen turning out regular batches of hot soup and brownies.'

'And looking photogenic,' Trujillo said, grinning.

'They won't charge Hawkin for that. I think I saw a towel back there, if you want to dry your hair or something,' he added. 'You can put it over your head if you want to hide.'

'Don't need to hide if it makes a poor enough picture for them.' She toweled her hair with enthusiasm for the next few minutes as Trujillo threaded his way through the questions and cameras and into the privacy of the compound. Kate's little white box stood between someone's silver BMW and an ancient John Deere tractor with half its guts on the ground under a plastic tarpaulin. To the left stretched the roofed-over car storage shed. Kate eyed the vehicles speculatively as she ran a comb through her hair.

'Where is Miss Adams's car?'

Tyler seemed unsurprised at the question, which struck Kate as a bit odd.

'You heard about it, did you? It's the one there, with the blue cover.' He pointed to a long, low shroud. 'Want to see it?'

'Yes, I would.' The rain had let up for the moment, and the damp gravel scrunched underfoot. Tyler peeled back the cover, and there stood a diamond among the hunks of everyday rock: a proud, gleaming maroon Jaguar, at least thirty years old, but in mint condition.

'Would you look at that!' exclaimed Trujillo, and they did.

'You haven't seen it before?' Tyler asked. 'It's a beauty, isn't it?'

'Does she let anyone else drive it?' asked Kate.

'Oh, yes, I take it out every week or two. Doesn't do to let a nice car sit, not good for it. She pays me to keep it up, but I always tell her I'd do it for nothing.'

'Nobody else, though?'

'No. Well, come to think of it, she let Angie Dodson use it to take Amy in to the doctor's one day when Tony had the truck, but that was, oh, October maybe. Yes, the middle of October, just before the harvest fest. She was scared to drive it, I remember, but I had both of mine apart and it was either that or the old truck, which would've been worse. Of course, I could have let her use someone else's, but I hate to do that without permission. It's asking for problems, with insurance and all that.'

'But you could have, you said. Do you have some of the keys for these?' Kate waved her hand at the ranks of bumpers.

'Oh, yes,' he said in all innocence. 'There's keys for all of them on the board just inside the door. We have to be able to move them, to get at other cars or in case of a fire or something.'

Kate met Trujillo's eyes as Tyler turned back to cover the Jag lovingly. She tipped her head toward the car, and he nodded in understanding. The Jag would be the first under scrutiny.

Her own car seemed small and tinny as she fished her dry clothes from the trunk, and the sound it made closing had all the expensive thunk of a child's toy.

'I need to get out of these wet things. Can I use the house?' she asked Tyler.

'Sure, go ahead. You know where the bathroom is. Have a shower if you want; there's a stack of towels in the thing that looks like a garbage can.'

As Kate stripped off her clammy clothes she was amused to see that it was a garbage can—a plain, galvanized metal garbage can filled with thick, multicolored towels. A man who sits on a piece of property worth millions, with a leaky faucet and towels in a garbage can. Could he really have been innocently unaware of the drift of her questions about the cars? Or was his open admission that all the keys were in his possession just a bit too blithe? Was Tyler protecting Vaun Adams, his sometime lover, or using her as camouflage? Or did he not know enough to put her together with the murders? She shook her head at all these speculations, pulled on her rumpled sweats, combed her hair again, and went back out into the yard.

She threw her sodden clothes into the trunk of her car, unlocked the driver's door and tossed her weighty handbag onto the passenger seat, and remembered to switch on the chronometer before settling herself comfortably behind the wheel and starting the engine. She ran the windshield a couple of times against the accumulated drops, backed out into the gravel, nodded to the uniformed cop who now stood watch over the cars, and turned out onto the main road going north through the crowd. One of the television vans seemed to be having some problems with the transmitter on its roof. Two men were up working on it, but it didn't seem very likely that their efforts to revive it would succeed. It looked as if it had been swatted sideways by a giant hand. Kate slowed and peered curiously up at it; then she noticed the spray of small dents and lines in the paint, up along the edge of the van. She laughed and accelerated. Tyler's demonstration to the media on privacy rights.

There were three cars parked at the public park where Tyler's Creek met the sea. No, four—one pulled up among the trees where the creek path led towards the state reserve up in the hills. Probably curious citizens wanting to see where the body of Amanda Bloom had been found. If it were summer they'd be running a bus from town.

It was not raining just at the moment, but out over the ocean the clouds were massing, a black, lowering Pacific storm gathering its forces. Kate shivered and turned up the heater. Maybe she'd be lucky and it would come in slowly.

Traffic was light going over the hill into the Bay Area, and an impatient Audi rode her back bumper for half a mile before passing on a blind corner. She stifled the urge to violence and glanced at the time. Had traffic been this light on Monday? Once she'd successfully negotiated the downhill curves and entered the freeway in the direction of Palo Alto, she reached for her car phone and identified herself to the familiar voice of the dispatcher, a tough, middle-aged Japanese woman whom everyone called Marge, for reasons long forgotten, though her name was Yuki.

'Marge, can you ask around concerning traffic conditions over the pass on 92, Monday afternoon? I'm most interested in twelve-thirty to three eastbound, and, say, three to four westbound.'

'I can give you instant service on part of that,' her voice crackled over the receiver. 'There was a spill there just after two-thirty on the downhill side. A lumber truck went over and blocked both lanes. My brother-in-law got caught behind it, for nearly an hour. Do you want me to check further?'

'Very interesting. Yes, I'll check with the highway patrol later, but keep your ears open.'

'I always do.' Her voice was prim behind the static.

Two-thirty. A very close thing, but if she'd left immediately after Amy, if she'd run fairly fast, if she'd driven just marginally above the speed limit, she could have slipped over the hill before the Road was buried in two-by- fours.

Kate pulled off the freeway toward the Donaldson's exclusive neighborhood and wound up the smooth, narrow road through fragrant bay and live oaks and madronas, and from a rise she saw the garden where Samantha had been playing seventy-two hours before. The area was immediately visible, just for an instant, but quite clearly, before the trees closed in again. The Road dipped back down among oaks and high walls before rising to curve around the Donaldson property and continue on into ever higher reaches of elevation and income. Kate pulled over on the far side of the Donaldson hedge and put her chin on the wheel. Ahead of her lay the heavily treed drive to the neighboring house, where faint marks in the grassy shoulder had been found Tuesday morning, nothing more definite than the hint of a hidden car.

'Why the hell can't we be having a drought this winter?' she said sourly into the silent car. She sat for several minutes, thinking thoughts that were not pleasant about a woman she wanted very much to be innocent. Finally she twisted the key, slammed the car into gear, and headed back to Tyler's Barn.