Improbable cause

CHAPTER 23

I love stakeouts in the movies. They usually happen on fashionable streets, preferably ones with sidewalk cafes and lots of beautiful women. The hero sits comfortably at a table, casually pretending to read a newspaper and looking unobtrusive. Invisible, even. If no sidewalk cafe happens to be in the script, the hero still reads a newspaper, leaning against a nearby building.

This is unobtrusive? When’s the last time you leaned against a building to read a newspaper?

The logistics of my finding Daisy Carmichael in the Woodland Park Zoo were a little more complicated than a Hollywood version of a stakeout. For one thing, we both knew each other on sight. If I recognized her, she would recognize me.

And was it better for me to stand in one place in hopes she would wander past, or should I mingle on the outskirts of the groups gathering for the Jungle Party? In the end, I did a combination of both.

I developed a pattern. After making a slow circle around the elephant enclosure and passing the prairie dog compound, I’d saunter over to the north meadow, past the pony rides, and into the tents. Booze flowed freely at the party. Everybody knows that tipsy auction attendees spend way more money than cold sober ones do. I’d make one pass through each of the tents, then wander back to the elephant enclosure again.

It was boring, lonesome, tedious work, especially since all those other people seemed to be having such a good time.

Not only that, I don’t like zoos. Never have. Walking around and around it by myself that night did nothing to change my opinion.

When the kids were little, Karen thought taking Kelly and Scott to the zoo on a Saturday afternoon should have been top on my list of favorite fatherly pastimes. Except standing on one side of a set of iron bars looking at someone or something on the other side isn’t my idea of a diversion. It reminds me too much of my job.

And zoos make me claustrophobic. They are built like mazes with no panoramic viewpoints where you can see from one end to the other. They’re designed so each little piece of habitat is separated from all the others by a discreet hedge or a wall of trees or a curtain of bamboo shoots. It may be good for the animals’ sense of privacy, but it sure as hell doesn’t help when you’re a police officer looking for a lady who isn’t especially interested in being found.

By seven the rain had finally stopped, but the air was still moist and heavy, as though Mother Nature wasn’t quite through with us yet. For probably the tenth time, I walked around to the back side of the elephant compound where a docent, not Daisy Carmichael, was giving a talk on elephants to a group of wide-eyed children.

They gasped and pointed with delight as one by one, four elephants came out of the barn into the moat-encircled compound. Two of the four were fully grown while the other two were obviously much younger. The smaller ones bounded into a round, elephant-sized swimming pool, playing and floating there briefly, while excess water splashed over the edges in foot-high waves.

One of the children broke away from the group and went scrambling toward the concrete fence. “I want to pet Dumbo,” he called over his shoulder. “Here, Dumbo. Here, Dumbo.”

The docent grabbed the kid by one arm and hauled him off the fence. “You mustn’t do that! Ever! Elephants are very, very dangerous. This exhibit is their home. They don’t like strangers coming into it.”

“Dumbo wouldn’t hurt me,” the kid insisted tearfully. “I know he wouldn’t. Anyway, if he tried to, I’d run.”

“Elephants can run lots faster than people can,” the docent explained.

“Even faster than grown-ups?” the little kid asked wonderingly.

“Faster than grown-ups,” the docent replied, nodding.

Grasping the recalcitrant youngster by the hand, she led the group away, announcing firmly that it was time to go see the ponies.

“Way to go!” I said to her as she walked past me. “You handled that like a champ.”

She smiled her thanks and kept on going, still holding tightly to the little boy’s hand.

Time passed-how long, I’m not sure. Off and on I heard a distant rumble of thunder, a promise of more rain to come. Rain is common in Seattle. Thunder and lightning aren’t. The elephants responded to each rumble by raising their heads, flapping their ears, and swinging their gigantic trunks from side to side. The biggest one, an African elephant, stood a good ten feet high and must have weighed nine thousand pounds. She ruled the roost in that compound. The younger ones, once they came out of the pool, were careful to stay at a respectful distance.

They moved with a peculiar, ponderous grace, the weight of their bodies landing on their toes as they walked. The smell of their bodies in the damp air was sharp and pungent.

Several groups of well-dressed visitors came through and were invited inside the glassed-in part of the elephant enclosure. Painted on the concrete floor inside was a yellow line marked danger. The visitors were careful to stand well back behind the yellow line with their backs to the windows while the handlers stood in what seemed to be nonchalant poses with their backs to their charges. Careful examination, however, revealed metal-and-wood elephant hooks tucked under the keepers’ arms.

Each time a group came into the barn, the elephants would come in from outside, too, as if on command. It didn’t take a Philadelphia lawyer to figure out why. At the end of each lecture, the keepers allowed the visitors to hand out carrots, passing them one at a time to the four eager, outstretched trunks that reached through the bars.

It was getting later, but still there was no sign of Daisy. And the smell of the food from the caterer’s trucks was tantalizing. I hadn’t eaten all day. On my next pass through the party area, I stopped at the door of the large tent where a sweet young thing in a bright blue dress was collecting invitations and marking off names on a sheet of paper. I waited in line to talk with her.

“Your invitation, please,” she said, smiling up at me.

“I don’t have one,” I said, flashing my badge. “I’m working security.”

“Oh,” she said. “Okay. Go on in.”

I did. I wandered in and out of the tent at will after that, always nodding pleasantly to the same ticket taker as I did so.

By now, most of the ordinary people had left the zoo. Only partygoers remained. At seven-thirty a gong sounded, signaling the end of the first silent auction. It was followed immediately by a clap of thunder. I was standing outside the elephant enclosure, watching. At the sound of the thunder, their heads and ears came up, their tails twitched. The pending storm made them nervous, agitated. As the rain started in earnest, they headed for the barn, and I followed suit, dashing for the main tent, not only to get in out of the rain, but also because I was starved.

By this time, the ticket taker knew me by sight.

“Any extra places?” I asked.

“Sure,” she answered. “Help yourself.”

Taking a blank check from my wallet, I filled it out and handed it to her. The amount was more than she expected.

“Sit anywhere you like,” she said. “Anywhere at all.”

Finding a table with one empty chair, I settled in.

I probably wasn’t a very pleasant dinner companion. Unlike the others at my table, I hadn’t consumed several drinks. They were well oiled and fully primed for the auction. I was only there to eat.

I must have been hungry. I gulped my salmon bisque, ignoring its close similarity to Rachel Miller’s tomato soup. I mowed my way through a swordfish steak and a huge baked potato. I didn’t bother to hang around for dessert, because by then the rain had stopped.

It was eight-thirty when I returned to the elephant compound for the last time. It was approaching dusk. As I left the tent, people were setting out sand-filled paper sacks with candles in them, lighting the luminaria as they went. Seeing them, I noticed that there was no interior lighting in the zoo.

As I neared the elephant barn, a large wooden gate next to it opened from the inside. A man I recognized as one of the keepers came out.

“Hello,” he said. “Can I help you?”

“I’m looking for someone,” I told him.

“There’s no one here. The last of the tours ended over an hour ago. I stayed around because the elephants were so upset by the storm.”

“You might know the person I’m looking for. She’s one of the docents. Her name is Daisy.”

“Oh, you mean Daisy Carmichael? She was here earlier, on the last tour I believe, now that you mention it. I remember seeing her here, but I don’t recall seeing her leave.”

“Jesus Christ!”

“What’s wrong?” he demanded.

“What if she’s still in there?”

“I told you, I’m the only one here.”

I wheeled away from him and set off at a dead run, past the barn and around to the other side of the enclosure. I glanced in the window as I went past. Three of the elephants were still in the barn. I could see their dark separate bulks in the barn’s shadowy interior.

But one of them, the biggest one, wasn’t there.

When I came around the side of the barn, I saw a sight I’ll never forget as long as I live. Even now, thinking about it brings an involuntary clutch of fear to my gut.

Daisy Carmichael was there, cowering against the wall of the moat, transfixed like a mouse hypnotized by a stalking cat. And that’s precisely what the elephant was doing. The big African female was stalking her, moving imperceptibly, tiptoeing forward, ears up, head raised. Periodically she would stop and stand absolutely still with one foot lifted like a bird dog on point.

It was a moment frozen in time. I thought about Daisy. I thought about my Smith and Wesson. What good would a puny. 38 do against a nine-thousand-pound elephant? And I thought about the mayor and his wife sitting at the head table in the banquet tent less than a hundred yards away.

I ran around the side of the moat, stopping just above her. “Daisy!” I screamed down at her. “Get out of there! Give me your hand!”

I bent over the side of the moat and reached out my hand. But she didn’t move. Didn’t seem to hear me or know I was there.

“Daisy!” I commanded. “Come on!”

She looked up at me then with sheer, uncomprehending terror written on her face. Still she didn’t move.

The elephant took another step. She was almost on top of Daisy now. One more step and it would be too late. The. 38 was in my hand. I was conscious of a fleeting thought about what would happen to me if I shot one of the mayor’s goddamned elephants. But I couldn’t just stand there and let it happen.

And that’s when I jumped.

“No!”

I roared. The instinctive word blasted out of me like a cannon shot.

My feet landed on something soft and mushy. I slipped in it and fell, but it broke the impact enough to keep me from smashing my ass. I struggled to my feet with the Smith and Wesson still clutched in my hand. Miraculously, the elephant had stopped moving.

Behind her the keeper appeared with a yard-long elephant hook in hand. “No!” he was shouting. “Back!”

And then, the elephant was moving back. One slow ponderous step at a time, but she was moving back.

“Stay there,” the keeper bellowed over his shoulder. “Don’t move until I have her in the barn.”

He didn’t have to say it twice. I glanced at Daisy. She was slumped against the wall, fainted dead away.

Once the four elephants were locked in the barn, the handler came back and helped me carry the unconscious woman into the keepers’ office outside the enclosure.

“How the hell did she get in there?” he demanded. “She must have slipped through the bars when I wasn’t looking.”

We dialed 911 to get an aid car. She was coming around by then, but I wanted her checked out by a medic.

“You need one, too,” the keeper said to me. “Your foot.”

Up until he said that, I didn’t know I was hurt, but once he pointed it out, my foot hurt like hell. It also stunk.

“What made the elephant stop?” I asked, still puzzling over the fact that the animal wasn’t moving when I had scrambled to my feet.

“Elephants are dominant animals,” he explained. “Man can’t dominate them physically, so we do it mentally. You said one of the few words she happens to know, and you said it like you meant it. That’s what stopped her.”

“I’ll be a son of a bitch,” I muttered.

“A lucky son of a bitch,“ he added.

Daisy was fully conscious by then. “You shouldn’t have,” she said, averting her face. “I didn’t want to be saved.”

I moved over to where she was lying wrapped in a blanket on the floor.

“I saw you outside the barn. I knew then that you must have found out about me. Dorothy’s still my little sister, you know. Fred shouldn’t have done that. But I didn’t want to go home and face her.”

“There are worse things than that,” I told her, although right that minute I was hard-pressed to think of any.

We sat there in silence, waiting for Medic One. It was over, I’d found the killer and she’d confessed. Why the hell did I feel so rotten? And then it dawned on me. I started to laugh.

“What’s so funny?” the keeper asked. He must have thought I was going into shock.

By then I was laughing so hard, I could barely talk. “I forgot-” I managed, gasping for breath. “I forgot to read her her rights.”

“That’s funny?” he asked.

“Take my word for it,” I said finally, pulling myself together. “It’s a scream.”

Unfortunately, the aid car came with full sirens blaring. It brought the curious flocking out of the tents and away from the volunteer potluck in the family farm. It also brought the news media-not the usual crime-scene slugs, but the ones who write for Seattle“ s society pages. There weren’t that many faces I knew. The society page isn’t my customary territory.

I didn’t know them, and they didn’t know me, either.

The medics checked Daisy, then one of them came over to me. “The lady’s all right,” he said. “What do you want us to do with her?”

“Take her up to Harborview,” I said.

“The psycho ward?” he asked.

“You got it.”

“There’s another lady outside who claims to be her sister. Should we bring her along?”

I nodded.

“What about you?” he asked. “Somebody should X-ray that foot.”

By the time I limped out to get in the ambulance, the mayor and his wife were standing right next to it. There was no way of getting in without walking directly past them.

“I understand you’re a Seattle police officer?” the mayor asked.

I nodded wearily. “That’s right,” I said.

“What’s your name?”

The jig was up. “Detective Beaumont,” I said, wishing I could have thought of someone else’s name. “Detective J. P. Beaumont.”

“Nice going, Detective Beaumont,” the mayor said. “I’ll see that you get a commendation for this.”

I wonder what he would have done if I had used the gun.