with motion picture advertisements and crowded sidewalk cafes. On the road in front of them-a bus emitted a billow of black exhaust, like an urban crop duster.
'What about Lee's girl friend?' Kreuzer said. 'The one you were worried about?'
'She's no longer a worry.' Bailey turned south on La Brea Avenue.
'How can you be sure?'
'She went for a hike up in the mountains.'
'I thought she was in jail.'
'She was,' Bailey said. 'Bones bailed her out and she took a trip. I made the arrangements myself.'
Kreuzer turned and stared at him for a long moment. He leaned back in the seat.
Bailey slowed down as they passed the Pascoe Military Academy. A group of cadets marched across the playground.
'That's where I went to school,' he said. 'I was one of the few who graduated without turning queer.'
'Are you telling me that Amanda Kennedy is no longer a cause for concern?' Kreuzer swallowed twice.
Bailey picked up speed again. 'That's what I'm telling you.'
'We'll have to keep tabs on Bones,' Kreuzer said. 'I trust him implicitly, but we'll still have to keep an eye on him.'
'I intend to.' Maintaining the speed limit, he completed the circuitous trip back to Kreuzer's apartment. He pulled to the curb and parked, but left the engine running.
'I'll have some more addresses for you in the next few days,' Kreuzer said. 'My appointment book is full.'
'I'll be in touch.'
Carr sat on the edge of the hospital bed as Jack Kelly, wearing nothing but an open-at-the-back hospital smock, walked slowly around the room. Kelly needed a shave and his hair was matted on one side. Though his voice was weak, he spoke in animated fashion about the shooting. Because of his wound he didn't move his left arm. 'Sheboygan sees Bailey jump from behind the bar with a riot gun. He says, 'No,' as if to say, 'No. Please don't blow me away.' Then Bailey blasts him out of his socks. It doesn't make sense. If Sheboygan was prowling with a gun in his hand, why would he say, 'No'? Hell, you'd think he'd've either fired his revolver at Bailey or dropped it and given up. He wouldn't have stood there red-handed and said, 'No.' The whole thing doesn't make sense.'
Carr lit a cigarette. He climbed off the bed and looked around for an ashtray. There was none. He tossed the match into a waste can and moved to the window next to Kelly. Outside in the parking lot, a beefy nurse hiked her uniform skirt and climbed on a motorcycle, gunned the motor and drove off. 'What if Bailey knew Sheboygan?' he said. 'What if they were in on something together? What if the burglary was a setup?'
'Then he had to shoot him. And he had to make damn sure he was dead. And if I was in the way that was just too friggin' bad. He had to shoot.'
Carr took a drag off the cigarette and blew smoke out the window. 'That's the way 1 read what happened. He did it because he had to. There was no other way out for him. That's why he gave Sheboygan a second blast when he was down. He had to make damn sure he was dead.'
'Why? Why did he want to kill a burglar?'
Carr shrugged.
Neither man spoke as they stood looking out the window. Kelly, having tired, made his way back into bed, groaned and sighed in the effort. 'I'm through, Charlie. I'm gonna retire. The doctor told me that the wound is serious enough that I could retire on a forty percent disability. I could get another job and I'd be making as much as I am right now. I made my decision when the wife brought my boys in to see me. Little Johnny said, 'Who shot you, daddy?' Right then and there I decided to retire. If I would have died, Rose would've had to sell the house to pay the bills. It's a hell of a thing to think about.'
'You'll be bored in a week.'
'I'm tired of cracking heads. I'm tired of explaining evidence to a bunch of pot-smoking hippies who masquerade as assistant United States attorneys. I'm tired of working on weekends and holidays. I'm tired of watching judge Malcolm give three-time losers probation. I'm tired of having pencil-pushing dummies like No Waves tell me what to do … and I'm tired of eating hamburgers on the run. I'm not just saying this.'
'Maybe you'll feel differently when you get well.'
'Get well? The more I think about turning in my badge, the better I feel. Maybe I'll get a job as an insurance adjustor or a real estate salesman. I'll get paid for taking people to lunch, shooting the bull. Jobs like that provide a company car. Ever think of how much money you could save with a free car and gas? Or maybe I'll take a job as a football coach. For years my brother has begged me to start up a football program at All Saints. With a disability check, I could afford to do it.'
Carr continued to stare out the window. Beyond the parking lot and across the street, a group of Chicano teenagers dressed in the L.A. street gang uniform of long-sleeved shirts buttoned to the collar and high-waisted khaki trousers strutted about in front of a mom-and-pop store.
'He knew I was in the line of fire when he pulled the trigger,' Kelly said.
'I think you're right.'
A short time later Carr steered out of the parking lot past the mom-and-pop store, thinking again of what Kelly had told him. The car radio crackled with a message for him to meet Detective Higgins at the Sierra Madre ranger station. He pulled to the curb and looked up the address in a Southern California street guide that he found in the glove compartment. The freeway trip west and north into the San Gabriel Mountains took him forty-five minutes.
After parking his sedan in a small clearing near a helicopter pad surrounded by four-wheeled ranger vehicles and police cars, Carr headed to the front door of the ranger station, a diminutive building nestled at the side of a mountain road across from a precipice. The view encompassed most of the suburban San Gabriel Valley. Because the altitude was slightly below the smog layer, the view of the suburbs was as hazy as a midday poison- air view from a freeway overpass.
Inside the station Carr showed his badge to a uniformed ranger sitting in front of radio equipment. The ranger pointed Carr down a hallway to a squad room filled with men wearing green jump suits, sipping coffee. The walls were covered with terrain maps. Higgins sat at a desk across the room in front of a tape player. He motioned Carr over.
Without saying anything, Higgins reached into a manila envelope and pulled out a Polaroid photograph that he tossed across the table to Carr. Carr studied it for a moment. It was a photograph of the body of a woman dressed in slacks and a blouse. Though there was no blood, the left side of her face was caved in. Her clothing was covered with dirt and mud.
'Amanda Kennedy?' Carr asked.
'Doesn't look much like her, does it?'
'I thought she was in the Women's jail.'
'I just got off the phone with the jail watch commander,' Higgins said. 'She bailed out last night at nine P.M. The next thing that occurs happens about midnight. Some Girl Scouts are camped about a mile from here at the base of a cliff near a stream. The lady scout master just left here…' Higgins turned on the tape player.
'…so we had five pup tents and the one larger tent for the adults,' a female voice said. 'Since it was the last night in camp, we'd allowed the girls to stay up a little late. They were all acting out skits and just being silly. They all had a great time. Oh yes, and we roasted marshmallows. Can you imagine a Girl Scout camp without roasting marshmallows?'
'What happened after you went to bed?' Higgins said.
'We went to bed about eleven-thirty. There was the usual horseplay for a half hour or so. One of the girls had a squirt gun and they were fiddling around keeping each other awake. That's when it happened.'
There was a silence on the tape. Finally, Higgins said, 'I'd like you to repeat what you told the rangers. That's why I turned the tape on.'
'Oh, sure,' the woman said. 'So we were lying there in our tents and there was this thud sound. My first thought was that the kids were playing one of their practical jokes. It's sort of a camp ritual that the kids play jokes on the scoutmasters. Last year they put a frog in the-'
'Did you leave your tent to investigate the cause of the thud sound?' Higgins interrupted.
'Oh, yes. The sound was so loud, we all rushed out of the tent. At first we didn't see anything. We looked
