T. Parker - Cold Pursuit

Get a grip, he thought. The evidence was pointing at her. Live with it. She's going to have to.

They spent part of Saturday in bird stores. McMichael had included Johnny in basic detective work before, and Johnny enjoyed it. He told his son about the yellow feather at the crime scene, making him promise to tell no one about it. Johnny listened intently and nodded gravely. McMichael had noticed very early on that Johnny could keep a secret. He had bought him a small notebook- same black cover as his own- and a decent pen.

At Urban Rainforest they were told that owl parrots were available by special order only. It could take up to two months and the cost would be five hundred dollars per bird. The store manager did not recommend them as pets because they were large and noisy at night. No, he could not remember selling one recently. The last one was maybe six months ago or more. He was kind enough to consult his computer and come up with the buyer's name- Peggy Harvey, who lived at 624 Conejo in El Cajon. He had sold a pair back in February of last year to Gary Deetz of San Diego. McMichael wrote down the information, as did Johnny.

Some fathers surf with their sons, he thought. Some interview witnesses.

The girl at Bird Brains told them much the same thing, but her price was three hundred and fifty dollars, delivery time two weeks, maybe less. She had a stainless steel stud implanted along one eyebrow, and a ring in the other, which made McMichael wince.

"God bless America!" squawked a green parrot who was loose in the store and was now walking up and down the sales counter.

"That's Ernie," said the girl. She smiled at Johnny. "Why do you want an owlie?"

"I don't. Dad's a detective and we're working a case."

"Cool. What are you, a sergeant?"

"Just a kid," he said shyly.

"Ever caught a bad guy?"

"No," he said, looking down.

"I'm a ladies' man!" shrieked Ernie.

She told them that she sold a pair of owlies about six months ago to a collector in San Diego. She was willing to dig through her receipts in the back if Johnny could watch the store. She winked at McMichael, who smiled and winced inwardly again as the stud winked too.

McMichael and Johnny looked at the macaws and cockatoos, the cockatiels and Amazons, the mynahs and toucans and finches and doves. When Johnny approached Ernie, who now sat atop the cash register, the bird cocked his head with exaggerated curiosity.

"Show me the money!" he called out.

Johnny wrote in his notebook while the bird continued to eye him.

"Carry on. Carry on."

Johnny laughed and wrote and for a moment McMichael's heart felt light and free and he wanted to stay in this moment for hours.

Ten minutes later the girl came out, shaking her head. "Sorry, he paid cash, so I've got no check or card number or anything."

"Describe him."

"Whew, that was a while back. A guy. White guy. Middle-aged, maybe fifty. Good-looking, kind of athletic. Tall and fit… you know, slender. Short hair, blond I think."

"Glasses?"

"I can't remember."

"What was he wearing?"

"I can't remember that either."

"Did he say anything that stuck in your head?"

"No worries. No worries," said Ernie.

"I'm sorry," she said. "He just seemed like a regular guy who wanted a couple of owl parrots. Oh, I remember something. When I told him that the owl parrots stay up all night he said that wouldn't bother him, because his aviary was outside. He used the word 'aviary.' When a customer says that word, I always picture a big collection, with lights and screens and heat lamps and tropical plants and all. A real jungle."

"Got that, son?"

Johnny nodded, finishing up his entry in the black notebook. They both thanked her and headed to the door.

"Ya'll come back now, hear? Hear? Hear?"

At Birds of a Feather, a tall, storklike Englishman told them that he'd sold "perhaps a dozen" owl parrots since he opened three years ago. "Most of them go to collectors, you know? The serious fanciers."

"Any recent sales?"

"Yes. A woman purchased a pair- male and female- sometime last autumn. October, I believe."

He described the buyer as thirtyish, white, with blonde hair. Medium height. "If I remember right, she said it was a gift. Her husband was a fancier of the parrot in all its many forms, and he wanted this rather difficult bird for his collection."

"Do you have a way to look up her name?"

The man smiled and shook his head. "I don't keep track of that kind of information. Privacy, you know."

On Sunday they stopped by the Sons of Ireland Pancake Breakfast in Mission Bay. The syrup and salt air smelled good together and Johnny had a lightness about him that McMichael hadn't seen in months.

McMichael donated twenty dollars to the scholarship fund but told Hugh Spellacy he couldn't stay to help out with the cooking.

"My two days with Johnny," he said.

"It's okay, Tom," said Spellacy. "We've got things under control here. But Tom, can I have a word with you?"

McMichael followed Hugh down a walkway toward the bay, Hugh wiping his hands on the apron tied to his waist. They stopped and Hugh shook out a smoke and lit it, arching the match into a trash can. "Just about that gag the other night- I don't know where it was going."

"The gag?"

"Gabe and Tim and that game about them being in my pub the night before. They weren't. I figured you knew that, but given that Pete was killed and Gabriel's got this history…"

"What did he tell you to say?"

"He said to cover for him is what he said. Same with Tim. I mean, it's none of my business, Tom. But a man did die that night."

McMichael nodded but said nothing, suddenly angry at his father. Then the anger turned to something heavier as he seriously pondered the possibility of Gabriel and Tim being mixed up in the murder of Pete Braga. He looked back to find Johnny eyeing him, paper plate raised almost to his face.

"Tim and Gabe, you know," said Hugh Spellacy. "They've missed a few Wednesdays. They blame it on the meat pie special, but I don't think that's the truth of it."

"Thanks, Hugh."

An hour later they walked into the table tennis room at the Balboa Activity Center. They'd stumbled upon the games a year ago, and had been back almost every week since.

McMichael played a few games with Johnny, then retired to let the boy find some real competition. Johnny was only a mid-level seven-year-old but he easily cleaned McMichael's clock. There were twenty tables set up on Sundays, and players from all over the county.

McMichael stood back and watched Johnny square off with a young Chinese-American boy. He saw the focus come into his son's face, saw the way his concentration took him out of himself and into the game. McMichael loved the wide-eyed innocence with which Johnny tracked the rapid flight of the balls, loved his determination and his nascent grace, loved the sound of the paddles and the rhythm of the rallies, loved Johnny's smile when he'd made a good shot or had one made against him. What a feeling, to watch your son lose a close one and still shake hands when it was over.

He pictured Sally Rainwater, sitting in her cell in the women's jail. What could he have done differently in the beginning, except to ignore the voice that told him she was rare and good? What do you do with that voice, just say go away, I can't trust you?

Then he imagined Stephanie, sitting on the deck of her home, maybe reading a novel or talking with her new husband. Difficult to imagine her without all the ugliness that they became, and even more difficult now, with her body toned and her weight gone and a glow about her that he hadn't seen in years.