"Get in! " he said urgently.
The velour-covered bench seat in front accommodated the three of them, so Christine put Joey in the middle, apparently afraid to let him get even as far away as the rear seat. The dog got in back, shaking the rain off his coat and spraying everyone in the process.
The glove compartment contained a small, detachable flashlight that came with the car and that was kept, except when needed, in a specially designed niche where its batteries were constantly recharged. Charlie used it to look under the dashboard, below the steering wheel, where he located the ignition wires. He hot-wired the Cadillac, and the engine turned over without hesitation.
No more than two minutes after he had opened the car door, they pulled away from the curb. For the first block, he drove without headlights.
Then, confident they had gotten away unnoticed, he snapped on the lights and headed up toward Sunset Boulevard.
Christine said, "What if the cops stop us?"
"They won't. The owner probably won't report it stolen until morning.
And even if he discovers it's gone ten minutes from now, it won't make the police hot sheets for a while."
" But they might stop us for speeding-"
"I don't intend to speed."
— or some other traffic violation-"
"What do you think I am-a stunt driver?"
"Are you?" Joey asked.
"Oh, sure, better than Evel Knievel," Charlie said.
"Who?" the boy asked.
"God, I'm getting old," Charlie said.
"Are we gonna get in a car chase like on TV?" Joey asked.
"I hope not," Charlie said.
" Oh, I'd like that," the boy said.
Charlie checked the rearview mirror. There were two cars behind him. He couldn't tell what make they were or anything about them. They were just pairs of headlights in the darkness.
Christine said, "But sooner or later, the car will end up on the hot sheets-"
"We'll have parked it somewhere and taken another car by then," Charlie said.
"Steal another one?"
"I'm sure not going to Hertz or Avis," he said." A rental car can be traced. They might find us that way."
Jesus, listen to me, he thought. Pretty soon I'm going to be like Ray Milland in Lost Weekend, imagining a threat in every corner, seeing giant bugs crawling out of the walls.
He turned left at the next corner.
So did both of the cars behind him.
"How did they find us?" Christine asked.
"Must've planted a transmitter on my Mercedes."
"When would they've done that?"
"I don't know. Maybe when I was at their church this morning."
"But you said you left a man in your car while you went in there, someone who could call for help if you didn't come back out when you were supposed to."
"Yeah. Carter Rilbeck."
"So he'd have seen them trying to plant a transmitter."
"Unless, of course, he's one of them," Charlie said.
"Do you think he could be?"
"Probably not. But maybe they planted the bug before that.
As soon as they knew you'd hired me."
At Hilgarde, he turned right.
So did both of the cars behind him.
To Christine, he said, "Or maybe Henry Rankin is a TWilighter, and when I called him from the restaurant awhile ago, maybe he got a trace on the line and found out where I was."
"You said he's like a brother."
"He is. But Cain was like a brother to Abel, huh?"
He turned left on Sunset Boulevard, with UCLA on the left now and Bel Air on the hills to the right.
Only one of the cars followed him.
She said, "You sound as if you've become as paranoid as I am."
"Grace Spivey gives me no choice."
"Where are we going?" she asked.
"Farther away."
"Where?"
"I'm not sure yet."
"We spent all that time buying clothes and things, and now a lot of it's one," she said.
"We can outfit ourselves again tomorrow."
"I can't go home; I can't go to work; I can't take shelter with any of my friends-"
"I'm your friend," Charlie said.
"We don't even have a car now," she said.
"Sure we do."
"A stolen car."
"It's got four wheels," he said." It runs. That's good enough."
"I feel like we're the cowboys in one of those old movies where the Indians trap them in a box canyon and keep pushing them farther and farther toward the wall."
"Remember who always won in those movies," Charlie said.
"The cowboys," Joey said.
"Exactly."
He had to stop for a red traffic light because, as luck would have it, a police cruiser was stopped on the other side of the intersection. He didn't like sitting there, vulnerable. He used the rearview mirror and the side mirror to keep a watch on the car that had followed them, afraid that someone would get out of it while they were immobilized here-someone with a shotgun.
In a weary voice that dismayed Charlie, Christine said, "I wish I had your confidence."
So do I, he thought wryly.
The light changed. He crossed the intersection. Behind him, the unknown car fell back a bit.
He said, "Everything'll seem better in the morning."
"And where will we be in the morning?" she asked.
They had come to an intersection where Wilshire Boulevard lay in front of them. He turned right, toward the freeway entrance, and said, "How about Santa Barbara?"
"Are you serious?"
"It's not that far. A couple hours. We could be there by nine-thirty, get a hotel room."
The unknown car had turned right at Wilshire, too, and was still on his tail.
"L.A."s a big city," she said." Don't you think we'd be just as safe hiding out here?"
"We probably would," he said." But I wouldn't feel as safe, and I've got to settle us down somewhere that feels right to me, so I can relax and think about the case from a calmer perspective. I can't function well in a constant panic. They won't expect us to go as far away from my operations as Santa Barbara. They'll expect me to hang around, at least as close as L.A., so I know we'll be safe up there."
He drove onto the entrance ramp of the San Diego Freeway, heading north.
Checked the rearview mirror. Didn't see the other car yet. Realized he was holding his breath.
She protested." You didn't bargain for this much trouble, this much inconvenience."
"Sure I did," he said." I thrive on it."
"Of course you do."
"Ask Joey. He knows all about us private detectives. He knows we just love danger."
"They do, Mom," the boy said." They love danger."
Charlie looked at the rearview mirror again. No other car had come onto the freeway behind him. They weren't being followed.
They drove north into the night, and after a while the rain began to fall heavily again, and there was fog. At times, because of the mist and rain that obscured the landscape and the road ahead, it seemed as if they weren't driving through the real world at all but through some haunted and insubstantial realm of spirits and dreams.
Kyle Barlowe's Santa Ana apartment was furnished to suit his dimensions.
There were roomy Lay-Z-Boy recliners, a big sectional sofa with a deep seat, sturdy end tables, and a solidly built coffee table on which a man could prop his feet without fear of the thing collapsing. He had searched a long time, in countless used furniture stores, before he'd found the round table in the dining alcove; it was plain and somewhat battered, maybe not too attractive, but it was a little higher than most dining tables and gave him the kind of leg room he required. In the bathroom stood a very old, very large claw-foot tub, and in the bedroom he had one big dresser that he'd picked up for fortysix bucks and a king-size bed with an extra-long custom mattress that accommodated him, though with not an inch to spare.