There was silence on the line again. Bosch took a last drag on his cigarette.
“The plan seems almost perfect,” he said. “He leaves a body behind in circumstances he knew would make the department not want to come looking.”
“But you did, Harry.”
“Yeah.”
And here I am, he thought. He knew what he had to do now. He had to finish it. He could see the ghostly figures of several people in the park now. They were waking to another day of desperation.
“Why did you call me, Harry? What do you want me to do?”
“I called because I have to trust someone. I could only think of you, Teresa.”
“Then what do you want me to do?”
“You have access to the DOJ prints in your office, right?”
“That’s how we make most of our IDs. That’s how we will make all of them after this. I have Irving by the balls now.”
“Do you still have the print card he brought over for the autopsy?”
“Um, I don’t know. But I’m sure the techs made a copy of it to keep with the body. You want me to do the cross-check?”
“Yeah, do a cross and you’ll see they don’t match.”
“You’re so sure.”
“Yeah. I’m sure but you might as well confirm it.”
“Then what?”
“Then, I guess, I’ll see you at the funeral. I’ve got one more stop to make and then I’m heading up.”
“What stop?”
“I want to check out a castle. It’s part of the long story. I’ll tell you later.”
“You don’t want to try to stop the funeral?”
Harry thought a few moments before answering. He thought of Sylvia Moore and the mystery she still held for him. Then he thought about the idea of a drug lord getting a cop’s farewell.
“No, I don’t want to stop it. Do you?”
“No way.”
He knew her reasons were far different from his. But he didn’t care about that. Teresa was well on her way to winning her assignment as permanent chief medical examiner. If Irving got in her way now, he’d end up looking like one of the customers in the autopsy suite. In that case, more power to her, he thought.
“I’ll see you in a little bit,” he said.
“Be careful, Harry.”
Bosch hung up and lit another cigarette. The morning sun was up now and beginning to burn the ground fog off the park. People were moving around over there. He thought he heard a woman laughing. But at the moment he felt very much alone in the world.
32
Bosch pulled his car up to the front gate at the end of Coyote Trail and saw that the circular driveway in front of Castillo de los Ojos was still empty. But the thick chain that had secured the two halves of the iron gate the day before hung loose and the lock was open. Moore was here.
Harry left his car there, blocking the exit, and slipped through the gate on foot. He ran across the brown lawn in a crouched, uneasy trot, mindful that the windows of the tower looked down at him like the dark accusing eyes of a giant. He pressed himself against the stucco surface of the wall next to the front door. He was breathing heavily and sweating, though the morning air was still quite cool.
The knob was locked. He stood there unmoving for a long period, listening for something but hearing nothing. Finally, he ducked below the line of windows that fronted the first floor and moved around the house to the side of the four-bay garage. There was another door here and it, too, was locked.
Bosch recognized the rear of the house from the photographs that had been in Moore’s bag. He saw the sliding doors running along the pool deck. One door was open and the wind buffeted the white curtain. It flapped like a hand beckoning him to come in.
The open door led to a large living room. It was full of ghosts-furniture covered by musty white sheets. Nothing else. He moved to his left, silently passing through the kitchen and opening a door to the garage. There was one car, which was covered by more sheets, and a pale green panel van. It saidMEXITEC on the side. Bosch touched the van’s hood and found it still warm. Through the windshield he saw a sawed-off shotgun lying across the passenger seat. He opened the unlocked door and took the weapon out. As quietly as he could, he cracked it open and saw both barrels were loaded with double-ought shells. He closed the weapon, holstered his own, and carried it with him.
He pulled the sheet off the front end of the other car and recognized it as the Thunderbird he had seen in the father-and-son photo in Moore’s bag. Looking at the car, Bosch wondered how far back you have to go to trace the reason for a person’s choices in life. He didn’t know the answer about Moore. He didn’t know the answer about himself.
He went back to the living room and stopped and listened. There was nothing. The house seemed still, empty, and it smelled dusty, like time spent slowly and painfully in wait for something or someone not coming. All the rooms were full of ghosts. He was considering the shape of a shrouded fan chair when he heard the noise. From above, like the sound of a shoe dropping on a wood floor.
He moved toward the front and in the entry area he saw the wide stone staircase. Bosch moved up the steps. The noise from above was not repeated.
On the second floor he went down a carpeted hallway, looking through the doors to four bedrooms and two bathrooms but finding each room empty.
He went back to the stairs and up into the tower. The lone door at the top landing was open and Harry heard no sound. He crouched and moved slowly into the opening, the sawed-off leading the way like a water finder’s divining rod.
Moore was there. Standing with his back to the door and looking at himself in the mirror. The mirror was on the back of a closet door which was open slightly, angling the glass so that it did not catch Harry’s reflection. He watched Moore unseen for a few moments, then looked around. There was a bed in the center of the room with an open suitcase on it. Next to it was a gym bag that was zipped closed and already appeared to be packed. Moore still had not moved. He was intently staring at the reflection of his face. He had a full beard now, and his eyes were brown. He wore faded blue jeans, new snakeskin boots, a black T-shirt and a black leather jacket with matching gloves. He was Melrose Avenue cool. From a distance he could easily pass for the pope of Mexicali.
Bosch saw the wood grips and chrome handle of an automatic tucked into Moore’s belt.
“You going to say something, Harry? Or just stare.”
Without moving his hands or head, Moore shifted his weight to the left and then he and Bosch were staring at each other in the mirror.
“Picked up a new pair of boots before you put Zorrillo down, didn’t you?”
Now Moore turned completely to face him. But he didn’t say anything.
“Keep your hands out front like that,” Bosch said.
“Whatever you say, Harry. You know, I kinda thought that if somebody came, you’d be the one.”
“You wanted somebody to come, didn’t you?”
“Some days I did. Some days I didn’t.”
Bosch moved into the room and then took a step sideways so he was directly facing Moore.
“New contacts, beard. You look like the pope-from a distance. But how’d you convince his lieutenants, hisguardia. They were just going to stand back and let you move in and take his place?”
“Money convinced them. They’d probably let you move in there if you had the bread, Harry. See, anything is negotiable when you have your hands on the purse strings. And I did.”
Moore nodded slightly toward the duffel bag on the bed.