Jefferson Parker - The Fallen

‘Impressive,’ said McKenzie.

‘Impressive, Ms. Cortez?’ asked Harris, smiling, then swallowing the last of his espresso. ‘It’s almost unbelievable. We’re currently running at five degrees of separation. We’ll be up to eight degrees by the end of next year. We’re doing a job for Border Patrol right now – you put your index finger into the scanner down at the border in San Ysidro or TJ, and guess what? I’ve got the following databases digging into your past like earthmovers on speed: Homeland Security, INS, the DEA, the Border Patrol, the San Diego Sheriff Department, the San Diego PD, the Interagency Border Inspection System, and the Automated Biometric Identification System – and that’s not all. Let me take a breath and continue: the Treasury Enforcement Communications System, the Deportable Alien Control System, the Port of Entry Tracking System, the National Automated Immigration Lookout System, and the San Diego User Network Services system. I get winded when I talk about my work, so let me take another deep breath and keep going: the Computer Linked Application Information System and the National Crime Information Center of the FBI, and I’m going to have these bases talking to each other as fast as electricity in a phone line. I’m going to be able to tell everything about you – physical, financial, criminal, social. I’ll have the name, address, and Social Security number of the doctor who pulled your tonsils when you were four, and I’ll know exactly how much your cell phone bill was last month, and I’ll have the name and address of your allegedly secret lover by the time you get your finger out of the scanner. If you are a threat, you will be exposed. If you might be a threat, you will be exposed. If you are only the reflection of a shadow cast by the memory of a possible threat, you will be exposed. Now that, Detective Cortez, is impressive.’

Harris was short of breath. ‘I know that sounds like bragging, Detective. It is.’

And sure enough, the orange rectangles of pride wavered in the air between us, then dissolved.

‘Will you run an HTA on Garrett Asplundh for us?’ I asked.

Harris looked at me but said nothing.

‘Maybe he already has,’ said McKenzie. She smiled, a rarity.

Harris went to his desk and opened a drawer. He returned with a manila folder and handed it to McKenzie. ‘Yesterday, after I heard what had happened, I ran an HTA on Garrett. It’s hard to get a lot on law-enforcement professionals because their employers have been playing this game for years. But the deeper background comes out. So Garrett was kind of skimpy by HTA standards. It came to one hundred and eighty pages of intelligence, all in this envelope. I included a CD for you also. I read it last night and saw nothing in there that might pertain to his murder. But I’m out of my element in that world. Your world. It may contain something you can use.’

‘Thank you,’ said McKenzie. ‘We appreciate it.’

‘Garrett wanted an HTA program for the Ethics Authority?’ I asked.

‘Yes,’ said Harris. ‘But they can’t afford it. I explained to him that I could create the system, install it, train the users, and update it for two years for four hundred thousand dollars. Garrett’s budget for system upgrades was eighty thousand. He told me I should offer my services at cost to help protect this city that had brought me such prosperity. I agreed, which is exactly what the four hundred thousand was – my cost.’

‘How did Asplundh take that news?’ asked McKenzie.

‘I never knew with Garrett. I could never read him. I could tell he was preoccupied that afternoon. He wasn’t all here. Usually with him there was this focus, this intensity. When I saw him in this office…no…his attention was somewhere else.’

‘Did he say anything about that, about being distracted?’ asked McKenzie.

Harris shook his head. Then he looked at each of us.

‘What time did he leave here?’ I asked.

‘It was five-fifty.’

‘How was he dressed?’

‘Black two-button suit, white shirt, gold tie. Hand-stitched brogues. Nice clothes.’

‘The tie was gold?’ I asked.

‘Gold silk.’

Not blue. Not soaked in his own blood.

Harris looked down at his watch, sighed, stood. ‘I’m sorry. I’m out of time for this now. Maybe something in that HTA book will lead you in the right direction.’

‘How fast is the Enzo?’ asked McKenzie.

‘Top speed is two-seventeen, it goes zero to sixty in three point six-five seconds and ripples your face in first.’

‘Did you drive it Tuesday night?’

He looked at her, smiled. ‘I drove it home to Carlsbad around six. I took it out again to get drive-through with my son at about six-forty. He’s five. We were home with our burgers by seven. Reading in bed by eight. I didn’t drive the Enzo again until morning. I’ll let him vouch for me if you’d like.’

‘That’s not necessary right now,’ said McKenzie. ‘Does it feel odd driving a six-hundred-thousanddollar car into a drive-through?’

He looked at her thoughtfully. ‘Yes. And it’s a long reach up to the window, too.’

Out in the parking lot she ogled the car. I must admit it was a beautiful machine. My dream car has always been a Shelby Cobra. Gina bought me a day at an expensive driving school in Arizona for my birthday one year. I listened to a lecture, then spent the rest of the day with an instructor in a souped-up stock car that hit 160 on the straights. Speed is marvelous, though I’m less enthused about it since my fall. It seems ungrateful to risk your life for a medium-size pleasure. That night at dinner Gina presented me with a small Shelby Cobra model that I still keep in a place of honor on my fly-tying table.

Before getting into the Chevy I tried CAM again and got an answer.

‘Carrie Ann Martier’s office.’

‘Robbie Brownlaw, San Diego Homicide.’

‘Please hold.’

It was a woman’s voice. She sounded assured and professional. I walked away from the car and waited almost a full minute. McKenzie eyed me from across the lot.

‘Mr Brown?’

‘Brownlaw.’

‘Yes? How can we help you?’

‘I want to talk to Carrie Ann Martier about Garrett Asplundh.’

‘I’m Carrie Ann Martier. But I’m not sure that I can help you.’

‘I don’t need your help. Garrett does.’

There was a long silence. ‘Okay.’

‘How about tonight at six-thirty, the foot of the Imperial Beach Pier,’ I said. ‘I’ll wear a Chargers cap.’

‘Spell your name and give me your badge number.’

I did both.

‘Be alone,’ she said.

‘Okay.’

Silence, then she hung up.

The fog rolled in around six as I drove toward Imperial Beach. To the west I saw the Silver Strand State Park campground, where not long ago a seven-year-old girl was taken by her kidnapper. Later he killed her. Her name was Danielle. I thought of her every time I made this drive, and probably will for the rest of my life. A lot of people will. I was thrown from the Las Palmas about three weeks after her body was found.

I didn’t need the Chargers cap. I stood alone at the foot of the Imperial Beach Pier and watched the waves roll in and the lights of the city coming on in the twilight. A public sculpture of acrylic surfboards glowed faintly in the fog. Imperial Beach is the southernmost city on our coast. You can see Mexico right across the Tijuana River. In some odd way, you can sense an end of things here, the end of a state and a nation and the Bill of Rights and a way of living. Then you think of Danielle and wonder if it all means what you thought it did.

Six-thirty came and went. I called Gina again and we talked for a few minutes. She said she felt bad about last night and I said I was sorry about breaking our date for tonight. Funny how two people can live together, have no children, but have so little time together. Sometimes it seems like I hardly see Gina. I’m not so sure she misses my company the way I miss hers, but then I don’t know how she could.