18
"THAT ONE WAS mine, I think,” Bobby said, pointing at a pink-and-yellow necktie that hung from the steak house ceiling. “My dad used to take me here all the time.”
A party of a half dozen people sat at an adjacent table. Three of them wore loud ties that had been cut in half when they entered the restaurant. Yellow cardboard triangles had been stapled on beneath the knots, with the words “I lost my tie at a necktie party at Trabuco Oaks” scrawled across the cardboard in blue felt pen. Ten thousand severed ties hung from the wooden ceiling like multicolored bats. Peter realized that he had a hell of a headache, and that he was tensing the muscles in his jaw without meaning to.
“Take your hat off,” Beth said to Bobby.
“How come?”
“Because it’s polite.”
“That guy over there’s got one on,” Bobby said, gesturing across the room at a man who looked like a lumberjack.
“I know him,” Peter said. “He’s got a condition. Otherwise he wouldn’t be wearing it.”
Bobby took off his hat unhappily and tried to smooth his hair down with his fingers. “Can I have some quarters?” he asked.
A video game stood just inside the doorway, around the corner in the waiting area. Peter dug five quarters out of his pants pocket and gave them to Bobby, who stood up, telling his mother to order him a cheeseburger and a Coke. No longer at the table, he put his hat back on.
“His father took him here once,” Beth said when Bobby had gone. “Somehow Bobby always inflates it. He promised to take him all the time, but he never did. He used to call up and set up a time, but then he wouldn’t show up. The first time it happened Bobby went outside to wait by the street. He must have sat on that eucalyptus log out front for two hours, waiting for his father, but the dirty bastard just never showed. He called the next day to explain. The first of many explanations.”
Peter found suddenly that he was crying—for Bobby, for himself, for a world that fell apart like a badly made toy. The tears had come out of nowhere.
He rubbed his eyes and forehead, shading his face, trying to hide his crying from the people around him. Then he forced himself to take a deep breath and tried to drink out of his water glass, but his hand shook and he spilled water on the tabletop. He forced a swallow past the lump in his throat and sat back in his chair, forcing a smile, as if to admit that he was a fool.
“What’s wrong?” Beth asked anxiously. She sat forward, lowering her voice. “What’s your condition? It’s what I said this morning, isn’t it? I didn’t say it very well.”
Peter hesitated. He thought he could hear the wind blowing outside. The sound of it mingled with the clank of dishes and the drum of footsteps on the plank floor. “Amanda and David have disappeared.”
“What do you mean ‘disappeared’?”
He shrugged.
“Do you mean she took David and left? To tell you the truth, I considered that pretty strongly myself for a couple of weeks when it looked like Walter was going to insist on some kind of joint custody. He backed down, but I was ready to go. It can be a really bad mistake, though.”
He shook his head. “I mean something’s happened to them.” He drained his water glass. Bobby reappeared just then, empty-handed. He hadn’t been gone more than two minutes.
“Got any more quarters?” he asked.
“Yeah,” Peter said, smiling crookedly. He pulled out his wallet and found five singles. “Get change from the cashier, okay? And put a couple quarters in the jukebox.”
“Five bucks?” Bobby asked.
“Use it all,” Peter said to him. Bobby left again, tucking the bills into his pocket. The look on his face brightened Peter up a little, enough for him to find the words necessary to tell Beth about Amanda’s disappearance and about his trip to the sheriff’s office that morning.
She sat silently, letting him talk. When he was done he shrugged, not trusting himself to say any more.
“And they’re not going to do anything?” she asked.
“Nothing they can do.”
“I heard about that incident in Falls Canyon. It’s harder than hell even to find it, let alone to get back up in there. This time of year it’s all choked with brush. Did Amanda like to hike? Would she have gone out of her way like that?”
Peter shook his head. “She played tennis if the courts were clean enough, but that’s about it.”
“Well, I think it’s pure coincidence about what the hiker saw out there, if he saw anything at all. There’s no way it has anything to do with Amanda and David.”
“She might have tried to walk back here to the Oaks across the ridge,” Peter said. “David knew about the trail. They might have …” He paused for a moment, looking for the right words. “They might have found the falls from the top. I don’t know. She was pretty mad, I guess.”
“Mad? Mad enough to what? Commit a double suicide with her son by jumping off the top of the falls? That’s not mad, Peter, that’s something different. You really believe that?”
He shook his head.
“How can you be sure she hasn’t just taken off? Divorce screws people up. Being mad is like being drunk, you know. It makes you do things that you’d never do sober.”
“Not a chance,” Peter said, explaining about the traveler’s checks and the plane tickets. “Nobody leaves their money behind when they skip town.”
“What if she declared the checks lost,” Beth asked, “and then picked up replacement checks at American Express? That’s what I’d have done. Did you call the airlines? Maybe she did the same thing there. For that matter, who says she’s not in Hawaii?”
Peter was silenced by the idea. The checks thing hadn’t occurred to him. Still, he just didn’t believe it. “I know her,” he said. “That just isn’t Amanda.”
“You don’t know Amanda mad,” Beth said. “Believe me. I don’t know her nearly as well as you do, but I know that much. I thought I knew myself, but I didn’t. There were times when I could have killed Walter, and I’m not exaggerating when I say that. If you had seen Bobby sitting on that log waiting for him, trying not to cry as it got darker and darker out, you’d have killed the bastard yourself.”
Before he could say anything more, their waitress appeared. “Peter,” she said, looking surprised. Then she looked briefly and coolly at Beth before looking back at Peter again.
“Hi, Peg,” Peter said. “This is Beth.” Then to Beth he said, “Peggy’s a friend of Amanda’s.”
“Glad to meet you,” Beth said.
“I guess I’ll have a Coors,” Peter said.
“You sounded pretty screwed up on the phone this afternoon,” Peggy said. “Everything okay?” She looked at Beth again, as if this had been said partly for her benefit.
“Yeah,” Peter said. “Everything’s fine.”
“Something to drink?” she asked Beth.
“Iced tea, thanks.”
“Right,” she said. “A Coors and an iced tea coming up.”
“And a Coke for my son,” Beth said.
They ordered food then, and Peggy walked away toward the kitchen.
“Woof,” Beth said. “Did you see the look she gave me?”
Peter shook his head. “She’s not like that. That wasn’t a look.”
“That was an iron-clad look. You could have sailed it through a hurricane. She doesn’t know about this, about Amanda disappearing?”
“I …” Peter sat back and stared at the ties hanging from the ceiling. “I couldn’t. I can’t talk about it. I called a few people this afternoon just to see if maybe somebody would say something to clear things up. Everyone thinks she’s in Hawaii. I didn’t tell them anything different.”
“To hell with it, then. Tell them some other time. What can you do, though? Did the cop suggest anything you can do?”
“Yeah,” Peter said. “He told me that I can avoid leaving town. Hell, I don’t know. I guess I’ll go door to door. See if anyone out in the canyon recognizes them from a photo.” Suddenly he was crying again. Going door to door with an old photo—the idea of it seemed pitiful to him, and the windy night outside was vast and empty.
“Shit,” he said, wiping his eyes. “I just don’t do this.”
“Yes, you do,” Beth said, reaching across and putting her hand on his arm. He was struck with how beautiful she was, with how much he wanted her help in this.
“You know,” she said, “I came around to see you later on this morning, but you weren’t there.”
“When?”
“Ten, I guess. You were in town. I shouldn’t have walked out on you like that.”
“That’s all right. You had stuff to do and all.…”
“Not that much stuff. I said enough to stir you up and then I left. Anyway, for what it’s worth, I wanted you to know that I hiked back over later.”
“Thanks,” Peter said. “It’s worth a lot. I have to say something about it, though.”
“Say what you have to say.”
“I’ve got to find Amanda and David,” he said. “I have to get them back.”
“Of course,” Beth said.
“I don’t want you to think …”
“What?”
“It’s what you were talking about this morning. I’ve done some thinking since then.”
“So have I,” she said. “Why don’t you do what you have to do? You don’t need to make any excuses or apologies to me. Give yourself a little more credit. You’re not some kind of villain in this. It’s not your fault.”
He sat there silently for a moment. There was no point in going into more detail, about the argument, about him driving away mad and leaving Amanda and David alone. “Still coming over tomorrow?” he asked.
“Bobby’s looking forward to it.”
There was a hand on Peter’s shoulder then. It was Bobby, carrying a couple of dollar bills.
“I’m bored,” Bobby said. “They ought to have more than one machine here. What’s wrong?” he asked Peter, suddenly looking into his face.
Peter wiped his eyes again. “Nothing,” he said. “I’ve got a bone in my leg.”
“Me too,” Bobby said. “It’s nothing to cry about.” Then he sat down and picked up a menu.
“Kids are too smart,” Peter said to Beth. “My mother used to tell me about having a bone in her leg and I was perfectly satisfied. Now kids know all about human anatomy.”
“I even know how the human heart works,” Bobby said. “We learned about it. It’s just a bunch of valves.”
Peter stared at him, unable to think of anything to say, and right then Beth reached over and pulled Bobby’s hat off. He tried to pin it to his head, but he wasn’t quick enough. She put it in her lap, as if to guard it.
“Why can’t I have a condition?” Bobby asked.
“You’re not old enough to have a condition,” Peter told him. “If you wear a hat at the table you insult everyone in here. None of them will be able to eat. It’s too disturbing. The problem is that back when people were apes, they used to eat out of their hats. That was before they invented plates. So if people see someone wearing a hat at the table now, it reminds them that they used to be apes.”
“Your mother’s side of the family was never apes,” Beth said to Bobby. “We don’t wear hats at the table because we’ve got too much class. So forget the hat.” She looked around just then, as if searching for the waitress, but then suddenly looked back down at the table and said, “Oh, shit—shoot,” and began studying her silverware.
“What?” Peter asked.
“Ummm,” Bobby said to his mother, shaking his head, “that’s way worse than my hat.”
“That guy over there. Don’t look up.” She glanced behind her. “Never mind. He’s seen me. Here he comes.”
A man walked toward them, smiling like a television evangelist. His hair was perfect, not a strand out of place. “Well,” he said, holding out his hand. “It’s a small world, a helluva small world.”
Peter shook his hand, which was rubbery. He was reminded of the joke chickens at the Sprouse Reitz that morning.
“Henry Adams,” he said, and then he reached across and tousled Bobby’s hair. “What’s your name, fellah?”
“Bobby,” Bobby said, and looked at Beth, who reluctantly handed him his hat back. He put the hat on, yanking it low over his forehead.
To Peter the man said, “I met the little lady out in the canyon this morning. You must be …?”
“Peter Travers. You’ve got a place in the canyon?”
“No,” the man said, “I’m shopping around, talking to a few people. I love this area. I’m interested in the environment.”
“Good,” Peter said. “So am I.” There seemed to be a wall of dead air behind the man’s words, as if Peter were talking into a vacancy. “It’s end-to-end environment out here,” Peter said. He found suddenly that he didn’t like the man and was right at the edge of saying something outright insulting. He told himself to calm down. His patience was about one molecule thin. The man looked like the grinning salesman from hell, but that was no reason to pick a fight.
“Your place up for sale?”
Peter was struck forcibly by the thought. Selling his place hadn’t occurred to him, and he wondered for the first time what it was worth. Prices were going up like crazy out there, and lots of people were selling. His house was falling apart, literally. It had looked pretty rickety when he moved in, but since then he had really gotten a chance to take a close look at it.…” I don’t know,” he said.
“Here’s my card.” Peter took it, and Adams looked hard at Beth, smiling, but without any real emotion in the smile. “I’m certain I’ll see you again,” he said to her.
She hesitated long enough for the silence to become awkward, and Adams broke it by becoming hearty. “Think about making me an offer,” he said to Peter. “That was cabin number …?”
“Twelve,” Peter said, immediately regretting having said it.
The man left, winking hard at Peggy, who just then showed up with their drinks.
“Friend of yours?” she asked Peter.
“Not mine,” Peter said quickly.
“Creepola,” Beth said. “I ran into him snooping around behind Mr. Ackroyd’s place when I was heading back home this morning. I think he tried to put the make on me. He actually asked what my sign was.”
“Him?” Peter asked.
“Yeah. I don’t know what he was up to.”
“He was eating with a guy in the back,” Peggy said. “He’s a regular customer, the other guy is. Lives right around here.”
“It’s Mr. Klein!” Bobby said suddenly, pointing toward the adjacent room. A man waved toward them, just getting up from his chair.
“That’s him,” Peggy said. She turned away, heading toward another table.
It seemed to Peter that Klein looked embarrassed, almost hunted, as if he wished there had been a handy back door, a way he could have avoided being seen. He’d only met the man a couple of times, but he knew Bobby liked him, and that was a good recommendation.
“Mr. Klein used to play baseball,” Bobby said.
He approached the table. “Getting down in front of those grounders?” he asked Bobby. “Don’t be afraid to dig ’em out of there. That’s why God gave you a body, so you could get hit a couple of times.”
“You remember Peter?” Beth asked.
“Of course,” Klein said, putting out his hand.
Peter shook it. “Wife’s not here?” he asked.
“This was business,” Klein said, as if it were already clear that his wife wasn’t welcome when it came to business matters.
“Who was that guy?” Beth asked. “I seem to be running into him all over the place.”
Klein hesitated, as if he were surprised by the question. “He’s just a guy looking for something to buy. He knew I was a contractor and he thought that maybe I had a lead on some kind of property out here. He’s got good money to spend, but I told him I couldn’t help him. I’m a contractor; I’m not in the real estate business.” He winked at Bobby.
“What’s his name?” Beth asked.
“What?” Klein said.
“I was wondering what his name was.”
“I’ve got his card here,” Peter said helpfully, and Beth rolled her eyes at him, as if he’d made some sort of blunder. “ ‘Henry Adams,’ it says. Under that it says, ‘Quality, an American way of life.’ ”
“What’s that mean?” Bobby asked.
“Nobody knows,” Peter said, throwing the card down on the tabletop.
“It means you don’t go out to play ball unless you give it a hundred percent,” Klein said. “Am I right?”
“Sure,” Bobby said.
“Then keep it up, champ. With that arm of yours you’ll make the majors.” He looked at his watch, registered surprise, and said, “I better beat it, I guess. Nice talking to you folks.” He hurried away toward the door.
“I wonder if that’s the guy’s real name,” Beth said.
“Of course it is,” Peter said. “Why shouldn’t it be?”
The food arrived just then. Peter’s steak covered most of the plate, and there were enough french fries and ranch beans to feed half the population of the county. “Let me show you how an ape eats,” he said to Bobby.