Michael Connelly - EchoPark

Bosch nodded. OP, as in observation point. That told him something about Jason Edgar.

“Where’d you serve?” he asked.

“Marines, Desert Storm, the whole shebang. That’s why I didn’t join the PD. Had my fill of war zones. This gig is pretty much nine to five, low stress and just interesting enough, if you know what I mean.”

Bosch didn’t but nodded anyway. The elevator doors opened and they stepped out onto a floor that was wide open from glass exterior to glass exterior. Edgar led them toward the glass wall that would look down on Echo Park.

“What’s the case about, anyway?” Edgar asked as they approached.

Bosch knew it would come to this. He was ready with an answer.

“There’s a place down there we think is being used as a safe house for fugitives. We just want to see if there is anything there to be seen. You know what I mean?”

“Sure do.”

“There’s something else you can do to help us,” Walling said.

Bosch turned to her along with Edgar. He was just as curious.

“What do you need?” Edgar said.

“Could you run the address through your computers and tell us who is paying for utilities?”

“Not a problem. Let me just get you situated here first.”

Bosch nodded to Rachel. It was a good move. It would not only get the inquisitive Edgar out of the way for a while, but it could also provide them with some valuable information about the house on Figueroa Lane.

At the floor-to-ceiling glass wall on the north side of the building, Bosch and Walling looked down and across the 101 Freeway at Echo Park. They were farther from the hillside neighborhood than Bosch had thought they would be, but they still had a good vantage point. He pointed out the geographic markers to Rachel.

“There’s Fig Terrace,” he said. “Those three houses up above it on the curve are on Fig Lane.”

She nodded. Figueroa Lane had only the three houses on it. From this height and distance it looked like an afterthought, a developer’s discovery that he could jam three more houses onto the hillside after the main street grid had already been laid out.

“Which one is seven-ten?” she asked.

“Good question.”

Bosch dropped the sleeping bag and raised the binoculars. He studied the three houses, looking for an address. He finally zeroed in on a black trash can sitting out front of the house in the middle. In large white numerals someone had painted 712 on the can in an effort to safeguard it from theft. Bosch knew the address numbers would rise as the street extended away from downtown.

“The one on the right is seven-ten,” he said.

“Got it,” she said.

“So that’s the address?” Edgar asked. “Seven-ten Fig Lane?”

“Figueroa Lane,” Bosch said.

“Got it. Let me go see what I can find. If anybody comes up here and asks what you are doing, just tell them to call me on three-three-eight. That’s my page.”

“Thanks, Jason.”

“You got it.”

Edgar started walking back to the elevators. Bosch thought of something and called after him.

“Jason, this glass has got film on it, right? Nobody can see us looking out, right?”

“Yeah, no problem. You could stand there naked and nobody would see you from the outside. But don’t try that at night, ’cause it’s a different story. Internal light changes things and you can look right in.”

Bosch nodded.

“Thanks.”

“When I come back, I’ll bring a couple chairs.”

“That would be good.”

After Edgar disappeared into the elevator, Walling said, “Good, at least we’ll be able to sit naked at the window.”

Bosch smiled.

“Sounded like he knew all that from experience,” he said.

“Let’s hope not.”

Bosch raised the binoculars and looked down at the house at 710 Figueroa Lane. It was of similar design to the other two on the street; built high on the hillside with steps leading down to a street-front garage cut into the embankment below the house. It had a red barrel-tile roof and a Spanish motif. But while the other houses on the street were neatly painted and cared for, 710 appeared run-down. Its pink paint had faded. The embankment between the garage and the house was overrun with weeds. The flagpole that stood at the corner of the front porch flew no flag.

Bosch fine-tuned the focus of the field glasses and moved them from window to window, looking for indications of occupancy, hoping to get lucky and see Waits himself looking back out.

Next to him he heard Walling click off a few photos. She was using the camera.

“I don’t think there’s any film in that. It’s not digital.”

“It’s all right. Just force of habit. And I wouldn’t expect a dinosaur like you to have a digital camera.”

Beneath the binoculars, Bosch smiled. He tried to think of a rejoinder but let it go. He focused his attention back on the house. It was of a style commonly seen in the city’s older hillside neighborhoods. While with newer construction the contour of the land dictated design, the houses on the inclined side of Figueroa Lane were of a more conquering design. At street level the embankment was excavated for a garage. Then, above this, the hillside was terraced and a small single-level home had been constructed. The mountains and hillsides all over the city were molded this way in the forties and fifties as the city sprawled through the flats and grew up the hillsides like a rising tide.

Bosch noticed that at the top of the stairs that ran from the side of the garage up to the front porch there was a small metal platform. He checked the stairs again and saw the metal guide rails.

“There’s a lift on the stairs,” he said. “Whoever’s living there now is in a wheelchair.”

He saw no movement behind any window viewable from the angle they had. He dropped his focus down to the garage. It had a pedestrian entrance door and double garage doors that had been painted pink a long time before. The paint, what was left of it, was gray now and the wood was splintering in many places from direct exposure to the afternoon sun. One garage door looked as though it had closed at an uneven angle to the pavement. It didn’t look operational anymore. The pedestrian entrance door had a window, but a shade was pulled down behind it. Across the top panel of each of the garage doors was a row of small square windows, but they were being hit with direct sunlight and the dazzling reflection prevented Bosch from seeing in.

Bosch heard the elevator ding and put the binoculars down for the first time. He checked behind him and saw Jason Edgar carrying two chairs toward them.

“Perfect,” Bosch said.

He took one of the chairs and positioned it near the glass so he could sit on it backwards and prop his elbows on the seat back-classic surveillance form. Rachel positioned her chair so she could sit normally in it.

“Did you get a chance to check with records, Jason?” she asked.

“I did,” Edgar said. “Services to that address are billed to a Janet Saxon and have been for twenty-one years.”

“Thank you.”

“No problem. I take it that’s all you need from me right now?”

Bosch looked up at Edgar.

“Jerry, you-I mean, Jason-you’ve been a great help. We appreciate it. We’ll probably stick around a little bit and then split. You want us to let you know or drop these chairs off somewhere?”

“Uh, just tell the guy in the lobby on your way out. He’ll get a message to me. And leave the chairs. I can take care of that.”

“Will do. Thanks.”

“Good luck. Hope you get your man.”

Everybody shook hands and Edgar returned to the elevator. Bosch and Walling went back to watching the house on Figueroa Lane. Bosch asked Rachel if she would prefer taking shifts and she said no. He asked if she would rather use the binoculars and she said she would stick with the camera. Its long lens actually allowed her a closer focus than the binoculars did.