Jan Burke - Bloodlines

He turned back to the garage. There was no lock on the latch that held the double doors closed, so he opened it and pulled on the one on the right. It swung out toward him with a loud creaking. If Ronden was in the house and hadn’t heard him yet, the man was deaf.

The scents of oil and dust greeted him, but no car occupied the garage. A few rusty garden tools and a push mower stood against one wall, a workbench on the other. He opened both doors and stepped inside to get a closer look, taking care to avoid stepping on the oily tire marks on the concrete floor. Big tires, set wide apart. A big car.

He pulled a string hanging next to a bare lightbulb overhead, but nothing happened. Either the bulb was burned out or the electricity was off. Had Ronden abandoned his home after killing Bo Jergenson?

He looked more closely at the workbench, but it appeared that little work was done on it. There were no tools on or near it. He saw a rusting footlocker beneath it, though, and bent to open it. He had just released the latch when a gruff voice said, “What are you doing in here?”

Startled, O’Connor banged the back of his head on the underside of the bench.

“Jesus!” he said, wincing. He straightened, and saw a man in his sixties pointing a shotgun at him. He raised the hand that wasn’t rubbing his head.

“I’ll thank you not to use the Lord’s name in vain.”

“I’m sorry.”

“What are you doing in here?” the man asked again.

“My name’s O’Connor. I’m with the newspaper. Put the gun down and I’ll show you my press credentials.”

“You’ve got that vicey-versy. You show me your credentials, nice and slow, and then maybe I’ll put down the gun.”

O’Connor did as he asked.

After taking a look at his press pass, the man lowered the gun and said, “I would think the world would be mighty tired of reading about the likes of Gus Ronden.”

“You own the place across the street?”

The man nodded. “Name’s Ed Franklin. Doesn’t seem to me that being a reporter gives a man a right to trespass on another man’s property, Mr. O’Connor.”

“It doesn’t.” O’Connor made a quick decision. “Let’s step out into what’s left of the sunlight, Mr. Franklin. I’ll tell you why I’m here.”

He told Franklin what had happened to Jack, and of his suspicion that Gus Ronden had murdered Bo Jergenson. “Jack Corrigan is like a brother to me,” he ended.

Franklin drew a deep breath and exhaled slowly. At some point during the story he had broken the shotgun open, and now cradled it with the business end pointing at the ground. “I’m sorry but not surprised to hear that Miss Bradford involved herself in this. I had hoped…no, I will still hope and pray that she will someday abandon this way of life.”

“You planted the roses for her, didn’t you?”

He nodded. “She admired the flowers at my place. She told me she’s fond of pink.” He blushed to a fiery red, then added in a low voice, “You’d not believe how she proposed to thank me.”

“I would,” O’Connor said. “When did you last see them here?”

“She has a place of her own, she tells me. An apartment near the ocean. But she is here quite often. I last saw her here on Saturday. She was with a dark-haired man and a big blond fellow. Not that the dark one was little. He was good-sized, too, but next to the other one, anyone would look short. Might be part Mex, but I couldn’t say for sure. They’re the ones who attacked your friend, I suppose.”

“And Ronden?”

“All sorts of comings and goings around here on Saturday. I kept an eye out. One of his creepy friends came over early on. Young guy. Dressed sharp, has some money I would guess. I didn’t see them leave, but everybody was gone by around ten, because Gus left at about that time.” He grinned. “I can always hear this garage open.”

“I don’t doubt everyone on the street can hear it. What does Gus drive?”

“Dark blue Chrysler Imperial-almost looks black. He has some fancy name for the color, but I don’t know what it is. Brand new, a 1958, but he bought it late last year. Push-button transmission, power steering, purple dash lights. Electric everything. It’s a beauty. Takes better care of it than he does the house or his girlfriend.”

“Leaking oil, though?”

“No, that’s from Betty’s car. She hasn’t been allowed to park it in the garage very often since he bought the Imperial, though.”

“When did he get back on Saturday night?”

“He came back around midnight, I think. Then not much later, Betty and those two I mentioned came over-the blond giant and the Mex.”

“Not the sharp-dressed man?”

“No, he didn’t show up again. Heard Gus yelling at somebody. Betty left with the dark one. The blond one drove off with Gus.”

“You remember what the other car was? The one Betty and the dark-haired man were in?”

“A Chevy Bel Air. Turquoise and white.”

“You have any idea where Gus might be now?”

He shook his head. “He came back in the wee hours, then left again in a big hurry.” He thought for a moment, then added, “Betty told me that Gus has a place up in the mountains. I don’t know which mountains, though. To be honest, he’s never struck me as the outdoors type.”

“That helps, Mr. Franklin. I have one more favor to ask.” He took out his notebook, wrote down Dan Norton’s name and phone number, then tore out the page and gave it to Franklin. “Call that number, please. Tell Detective Norton that I was over here, and that I took care not to step on a nice set of tire tracks in the garage. Tell him that I said Gus Ronden killed the giant, and I’ll fill him in on anything else I learn a little later.”

“You sure you don’t want to call him from my place?”

“He’s going to be a little perturbed with me as it is, and he might find a way to make me wait around here a little longer than I’d like.”

At home, O’Connor made six peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and packed them in a hamper with a thermos full of hot coffee. He packed a few things for an overnight trip, as well as some warm clothing-gloves, sweater, thick socks, hat, and warm jacket-and drove the Nash to San Bernardino. He found a cheap motor lodge and rented a room. He was so tired by that time, neither the music from a honky-tonk next door nor the lumpy mattress could keep him from a good night’s sleep.

The next morning he was waiting outside the property records office. To his relief, he found a cabin belonging to one Augustus Ronden listed not far from Lake Arrowhead. He had been worried that the cabin might end up being in the Sierras rather than the San Bernardinos, or listed in another county, perhaps as far away as Tahoe.

He began the drive up into the mountains, taking the narrow cliffside highway that wound its way up from the foothills. He wore the warm clothing he had packed the night before. He was less than two hours away from Las Piernas, but there was a marked difference in the climate. The weather front that had dumped rain on Las Piernas had left snowdrifts here. O’Connor had never lived in a place where it snowed, and had no experience of driving on icy roads. He was glad the two-lane highway had been plowed earlier in the week. The road was dry, the air crisp and laden with the scent of pine.

When he reached Lake Arrowhead, he stopped in a real estate office to get directions to the lane leading to Ronden’s place. Once the salesman determined that he was not a potential buyer or renter of a cabin or ski lodge, he sent him on his way with a local map.

He drove on plowed roads until he got to the private drive that led to Ronden’s cabin. The road was higher than the cabin, which sat on the down-slope, in a small hollow. He could see a glimpse of it from here, but not much more. He was sure he had the right one, though, because a big, midnight blue Chrysler Imperial was parked at the end of the drive, surrounded by snow. Ronden hadn’t been able to get down the drive, either, although there were snow chains around the Imperial’s tires. Ronden would need to take them off and do some shoveling to get the car free if he planned on leaving the cabin. O’Connor saw this as an advantage. If he needed to leave in a hurry, he’d be halfway down the mountain before Gus Ronden could move his car an inch.