As they were walking back toward the car, Otto said, “Sidney, I really want you to get the job with Watson and all, but maybe I don’t want it as much as you want me to want it. I mean, when that biker was jamming by I was maybe two inches from a spiny plant shaped like something that hangs over the top of a French church. One more foot sideways and I’d have more harpoons in me than Moby Dick. Are you listening to me, Sidney? I’m forty years old. I should be an awning salesman in Van Nuys. Now I need some maxi pads. I can’t take this kind a fun no more. Are you listening to me, Sidney?”
Sidney Blackpool shone the flashlight back down the dirt road toward the stand of shaggy trees. “Otto,” he said, “if you were driving a big car out here at night and you wanted to get to that row a shacks up on the canyon wall, you could easily get confused. The road that goes off left toward the houses crosses the other road. Did you notice how it crossed back there where we heard the owl?”
“You ain’t been listening to me,” Otto said.
“So it’d be easy to get on the wrong one and keep climbing and not realize you were going the wrong way till maybe the condition of the dirt road gave you a hint. And then it’d be very hard to get a big Rolls-Royce turned around on that trail.”
“So?”
“I was wondering. The Palm Springs lieutenant said at first they thought it was an accident. I can see why.”
“Listen, Sidney. We already discovered that the Watson kid was probably A.C.D.C. Now’re you saying this is a gay version of Chappaquiddick? If so, you got two problems: he was alone when he went over the canyon and he was shot through the head.”
“I was wondering if the killer shot him and drove him up here maybe trying to go to one a those shacks. And then got himself turned around and … no, that doesn’t work. I forgot the kid was belted in the driver’s seat. Goddamnit, nothing works! It doesn’t make sense no matter how you figure it.”
“It makes sense only one way, the way it’s been figured all along. The kid was shot. He was driven up here by the killer or killers. He was strapped behind the wheel, but I don’t know why. The car was torched and pushed over the canyon into all that desert shrubbery and it wasn’t found for a couple days. Period.”
“But there’re so many better places to dump a car with a body in it. Less risky than dealing with a big Rolls up there on that skinny dirt road. I just can’t work it out to have it make sense.”
“Let’s go over to the Eleven Ninety-nine and eat some grease,” Otto said. “Couple drinks it won’t matter so much to ya.”
Sidney Blackpool stared up at the canyon wall and listened to the chirp and chatter of desert birds and insects and the yapping of a young coyote loping along a ridge, and beneath it all was the relentless moaning of the wind. He said, “Murder should make sense on some level even if the killer’s nuts.”
“There’s not a cause for every effect,” Otto said. “Life’s a crap game.”
“Partner,” said Sidney Blackpool, “you have to make believe there’s cause and effect at work or you’ll never solve a whodunit.”
“Sidney, I realize an old corpse cop like you has instincts about dead bodies. Just like the buzzards and coyotes and scavengers around these parts. But if you don’t get me fed soon, I’ll be the second cadaver they pull outta Solitaire Canyon.”
“Let’s go get some grease,” Sidney Blackpool said.
At about the time that Sidney Blackpool and Otto Stringer were in the desert getting faked out of their loafers by a foxy owl, Prankster Frank Zamelli was patrolling the outskirts of Mineral Springs so bored he could spit. He was teamed up with Maynard Rivas but couldn’t get the big Indian cop to go along with anything.
“I’m depressed, Maynard,” he said. “What say we drive by the exterminator’s store, steal the big statue of the Terminix bug and sneak it into the Mineral Water Hotel. Then we could call the maid and say, ‘Come quick! We got a big roach in our room!’ ”
“Paco said no more pranks. You’re starting to wear him down a little bit.”
“But I’m depressed!” Prankster Frank griped as the Indian cruised the main drag watching Beavertail Bigelow staggering against the red light, heading for the Eleven Ninety-nine.
“Good thing Beavertail don’t drive no more,” Maynard Rivas said.
Just then O. A. Jones came blasting by on his way to the station after having booked a drunk driver down at the county slam in Indio. He was trying to get to the Eleven Ninety-nine before the first gaggle of manicurists went home to dinner.
“There he goes,” the Indian said, “taking his end-of-shift O. A. Jones Memorial Roller Coaster Ride. Only thing can stop that guy is a high curb.”
“I’m depressed,” Prankster Frank said again. “You wouldn’t wanna borrow J. Edgar’s catamaran, would ya? We could raise the sails and haul it to the hotel swimming pool. Then we could call J. Edgar and …”
“The possum gag was enough for one night,” Maynard Rivas said. “We’ll be lucky we don’t get beefed over that one.”
“It was worth it,” Prankster Frank said.
He was referring to a call earlier in the evening at No-Blood Alley where one of the old dolls was in a tizzy because an opossum had gotten into her mobile home. Upon spotting the animal she immediately went flying out the door but her cat didn’t make it. When the cops got there the terrible yowling of the cat and hissing of the opossum had died to a dreadful silence.
“Officers,” the old dame wept. “Millie’s inside. The possum probably killed her!”
“Who’s Millie?” Prankster Frank asked.
“My cat!”
Prankster Frank and Maynard Rivas drew their sticks knowing that an opossum can have a nasty temper when riled. Both had worked the desert long enough not to be fooled by any possum-playing either. The little bastards would lie there belly up with tongue lolling and eyes staring as unblinking as Sergeant Coy Brickman’s, and the second you got close they’d come up like a furry knuckleball. Both cops had their clubs cocked and ready.
Prankster Frank crept into the bedroom of the mobile home and heard the soft mewing behind the bed. He’d never heard of an opossum killing a cat but you never knew. The mewing got rhythmic and louder. He crept in after waving Maynard Rivas to stand still. He peeked behind the bed and caught them in the flashlight beam. It was the same as many other sneaks and peeks in his police career, exactly the same.
The opossum had that spotted tabby pressed against the wall and was humping for all he was worth. In fact, Prankster Frank hadn’t seen such a hosing since Johnny Holmes stopped doing porn flicks. He switched off the light, turned and walked back outside with Maynard Rivas.
“Just leave the door open and wait a while,” he told the distraught old dame. “He’ll be through in a few minutes. Of course they might want a cigarette after.”
When the cop told her what was going on in her bedroom, she got mad and said she didn’t like the way he was making light of a tragedy, and she was calling Paco Pedroza about his unprofessional demeanor first thing in the morning.
Afterward, Maynard Rivas asked Prankster Frank if he had to make the crack about the cigarette.
“Maynard, when you get a chance for a line you gotta deliver the line,” said Prankster Frank.
“If you’re Johnny Carson,” the big Indian said. “I don’t want another lecture from Paco. He already said he didn’t appreciate you getting Choo Choo Chester to do his Stevie Wonder smile-and-head-roll when he was jerkin off that rubber dildo in the locker room.”
“I thought it was a panic,” Prankster Frank said. “Old Chester going ‘Ain’t it wooooonderful’ while he’s loping that old rubber donkey!”
“Yeah, but you shouldn’t a sent Anemic Annie in there on a phony errand. Poor old broad.”
“I’m soooorry,” Prankster Frank said. “Hey, tell you what! Let’s drive by Shaky Jim’s just one time! Just one lightweight prank and I’ll call it a night and go to sleep or something.”