Jonathan Kellerman - Blood Test

“I’d expected to be welcomed warmly by Garland Swope, because he was my neighbor. It was a naive expectation. I dropped in on him one day and he stood by his gate, not inviting me in, curt, almost to the point of hostility. Needless to say, I was taken aback. Not only by the unfriendliness but also by his lack of desire to show off — most of us love to exhibit our prize hybrids and rare specimens.”

The food came. It was surprisingly good, the lentils intriguingly spiced and wrapped in filo dough. Maimon ate sparingly then put his fork down before speaking again.

“I left quickly and never went back, though our properties are less than a mile apart. There were other growers in the area interested in collaboration and I quickly forgot about Swope. About a year later I attended a convention in Florida on the cultivation of subtropical Malaysian fruits. I met several people who’d known him and they explained his behavior.

“It seems the man was a grower in name only. He’d been prominent at one time, but hadn’t done anything for years. There’s no nursery behind his gates, only an old house and acres of dust.”

“What did the family live on?”

“Inheritance. Garland’s father was a state senator, owned a large ranch and miles of coastal land. He sold some to the government, the rest to developers. Much of the proceeds were immediately lost to bad investments, but apparently there was enough left to support Garland and his family.”

He looked at me with curiosity.

“Does any of this help you?”

“I don’t know. Why did he give up horticulture?”

“Bad investments of his own. Have you heard of the cherimoya?”

“There’s a street in Hollywood by that name. Sounds like a fruit.”

He wiped his lips.

“You’re correct. It is a fruit. One that Mark Twain called ‘deliciousness of deliciousness.’ Those who’ve tasted it are inclined to agree. It’s subtropical in nature, native to the Chilean Andes. Looks somewhat like an artichoke or a large green strawberry. The skin is inedible. The pulp is white and textured like custard, laced with many large, hard seeds. Some joke that the seeds were put there by the gods so the fruit wouldn’t be consumed with undue haste. One eats it with a spoon. The taste is fantastic, Doctor. Sweet and tangy, with perfumed overtones of peach, pear, pineapple, banana, and citrus, but a totality that is unique.

“It’s a wonderful fruit, and according to the people in Florida, Garland Swope was obsessed with it. He considered it the fruit of the future and was convinced that once the public tasted it, there would be instant demand. He dreamed of doing for the cherimoya what Sanford Dole had done for the pineapple. Even went so far as to name his first child after it — Annona cherimola is the full botanical name.”

“Was it a realistic dream?”

“Theoretically. It’s a finicky tree, requiring a temperate climate and consant moisture, but adaptable to the subtropical strip that runs along the coast of California from the Mexican border up through Ventura County. Wherever avocadoes grow so can the cherimoya. But there are complications that I’ll come to.

“He bought up land on credit. Ironically, much of it had originally been owned by his father. Then he went on expeditions to South America and brought back young trees. Propagated seedlings and planted his orchard. It took several years for the trees to reach fruiting size, but finally he had the largest cherimoya grove in the state. During all this time he’d been traveling up and down the state, talking up the fruit with produce buyers, telling them of the wonders that would soon be blossoming in his groves.

“It must have been an uphill battle, for the palate of the American public is quite unadventurous. As a nation, we don’t consume much fruit. The ones we do eat have gained familiarity over centuries. The tomato was once believed poisonous, the eggplant thought to cause madness. Those are just two examples. There are literally hundreds of tantalizing food plants that would thrive in this climate but are ignored.

“However, Garland was persistent and it paid off. He received advance orders for most of his crop. Had the cherimoya caught on he would have cornered the market on a gourmet delicacy and ended up a rich man. Of course, the corporate growers would have moved in eventually and coopted everything, but that would have taken years and even then, his expertise would have been highly marketable.

“Almost a decade after he conceived his plan the first year’s crop set — that in itself was an achievement. In its native habitat the cherimoya is pollinated by an indigenous wasp. Duplicating the process requires painstaking hand pollination — pollen from the anthers of one flower is brushed on the pistils of another. Time of day is important as well, for the plant undergoes fertility cycles. Garland babied the trees almost as if they were human infants.”

Maimon took off his glasses and wiped them. His eyes were dark and unblinking.

“Two weeks before harvest a killing frost borne by frigid air currents crept up from Mexico. There’d been a rash of tropical storms that had battered the Caribbean and the frost was an aftershock. Most of the trees died overnight and the ones that survived dropped their fruit. There was a frantic attempt at rescue. Several of the people I met in Florida had been there to help. They described it to me: Garland and Emma running through the groves with smudgepots and blankets, trying to wrap the trees, warm the soil, do anything to save them. The little girl watching them and crying. They struggled for three days but it was hopeless. Garland was the last to accept it.”

He shook his head sadly.

“Years of work were lost in a span of seventy hours. After that he withdrew from horticulture and became a virtual hermit.”

It was a classic tragedy — dreams savaged by the Fates. The agony of helplessness. Terminal despair.

I began to catch a glimpse of what Woody’s diagnosis must have meant to them:

Cancer in a child was never less than monstrous. For any parent it meant confronting a sickening sense of impotence. But for Garland and Emma Swope the trauma would be compounded, the inability to save their child evoking past failures. Perhaps unbearably ...

“Is all of this well-known?” I asked.

“To anyone who’s lived here for a while.”

“What about Matthias and the Touch?”

“That I couldn’t tell you. They moved here a few years ago. May or may not have found out. It’s not a topic of public conversation.”

He smiled the waitress over and ordered a pot of herb tea. She brought it, along with two cups, which she filled.

He sipped, put his cup down, and looked at me through the steam.

“You still harbor suspicions about the Touch,” he said.

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “There’s no real reason to. But something about them is spooky.”

“Somewhat contrived?”

“Exactly. It all looks too programmed. Like a movie director’s version of what a cult should be.”

“I agree with you, Doctor. When I heard Norman Matthews had become a spiritual leader I was rather amused.”

“You knew him?”

“By reputation only. Anyone in the legal profession had heard of him. He was the quintessential Beverly Hills attorney — bright, flamboyant, aggressive, ruthless. None of which jibed with what he presently claims to be. Still, I suppose odder transformations have taken place.”

“Someone took a pot shot at me yesterday. Can you see them doing that kind of thing?”

He thought about it.

“Their public face has been anything but violent. If you told me Matthews was a swindler I’d believe it. But a murderer...” He looked doubtful.