A Thousand Steps

22

Officer Darnell has placed three black-and-white photographs on the table, facing away from her. Matt sets his hand-sewn, emblem-emblazoned backpack down and takes the same bolted-to-the-floor swivel chair he’d sat in for the missing-person report.

Detective Lance McAdam, whom Matt heard just minutes ago telling reporters that the death of Bonnie Stratmeyer is now being investigated as a homicide/suicide, sits across the table from Matt.

McAdam is trim and young looking for an older man. He wears jeans, a paisley tie, a white shirt, and a loose brown sport coat. Maybe forty, Matt guesses. His eyes are brown and unusually large behind his glasses. He looks like a college English teacher should look.

He hands Matt a copy of the Los Angeles tabloid weekly LA Moves, with its black-and-white cover photo of a pretty girl in a bathing suit slung over the shoulder of a large muscleman wearing dick-hugging briefs. They’re on a beach, rocks in the background. Two more bikini-clad young women kneel at his feet, smiling up at him.

“Do you recognize anyone in this picture?” asks the detective.

Matt hears that low whooshing in his ears again, the one reserved for bad news, danger, for things going wrong. Like when he saw Bonnie on the beach at Thalia. This time it accompanies another intersection between his sister and that very girl.

“That’s Bonnie Stratmeyer,” says Matt. “Hanging on the Robe Giant.”

“Robe Giant?” asks McAdam.

Matt looks through the tabloid as he tells McAdam, and Darnell, again, about the Thousand Steps shoot and his nicknames for some of the people. Among the many photos in LA Moves he sees other Thousand Steps shots — there’s one of the girl with the phony sundae, one of the guitar boy. And one of pretty Sara, the Skateboard Girl. McAdam makes careful notes.

He asks Matt question after question and before Matt knows it, a full hour has gone by. He checks his Timex again. It won’t be long until Tommy drops off his papers and a new bag of rubber bands.

“We’re almost done,” says McAdam. “I hear you’re a busy young man.”

Matt doesn’t like the idea of cops talking about him behind his back. He trusts Darnell, barely, but not the others. He wonders what Furlong says about him. Do they all know that he’s refused to inform for the sergeant?

Darnell points to the photograph of Robe Giant. “His name is George Williams but his stage name is Equus.”

“He’s an actor?” asks Matt.

“He makes pornographic movies,” says McAdam.

Matt remembers Teddy’s “cruddies.” Does not look at Darnell.

“And your Camera Man, here, is Hollywood film director Rene DeWalt,” says Darnell, tapping a glossy portrait. “This head shot came in the press packet for one of his films, Secret Heroes. It’s a love story about a young French widow and a Nazi soldier. DeWalt was born in Switzerland and came here when he was young.”

Matt wonders why a Hollywood director would be doing LA Moves shoots using amateur models. He’s also never heard of the Secret Heroes movie.

“And the man you call Duffel Guy is Amon Binder, DeWalt’s assistant,” says Darnell. “He’s an up-and-coming porn director. He pled guilty to conspiracy to distribute obscene materials through the U.S. Mail. Did time.”

“Matt,” says McAdam. “Did you see any minors at Thousand Steps that evening? As part of the shoot?”

“I don’t think so, but it’s hard to tell.”

“Under eighteen is a minor,” says Darnell.

“I just can’t say for sure. Most of them seemed older than me by a couple of years. Maybe more.”

“So there could have been seventeen-year-olds as part of this photo shoot?”

Matt nods.

“Matt, take Officer Darnell and me through this event at the Vortex of Purity. Something to do with evolution. After that, you’re free to go.”

Counting Q&A it takes Matt almost another hour to describe the ceremony, the characters, the campus. McAdam asks him three different times if Williams, Binder, or DeWalt were present at the Vortex that night, which they were not. McAdam is particularly interested in Mahajad’s physical contact with his followers. Of which Matt saw none.

“In your conversation, did Om acknowledge that some of his followers appear in the LA Moves sex mag?”

“No. We didn’t talk about that. I don’t know if he knows.”

“Hmmm.” McAdam sits back and glances at the wall clock. “Brigit? Anything more?”

“No, but thank you, Matt. You’ve been a big help.”

“Can I say one thing?”

“Of course,” says the detective.

Matt digs his sketchbook from the backpack at his feet, shows them his sketch of the van into which his sister was forcibly thrown two nights ago, describes Jasmine’s abduction in brief, clear, unemotional detail.

“It happened,” he says. “Just about fifty yards from where we’re sitting. You can see the skid marks on the street. I want you to know that it’s true and it was my sister and it was a white-on-green VW van, late model, with peace-sign curtains. I want a kidnapping investigation. Not a missing person, a kidnapped person. You need to make Jasmine as important as Bonnie.”

“Matt, by law she’s a missing person until we get a ransom demand or can prove otherwise,” says McAdam.

“I with my own eyes prove it otherwise.”

“Our department is putting its full weight into finding your sister,” says the detective. “The fog was heavy and there was very little moon. So far as skid marks go, drivers miss that Third Street stop sign because they’re watching for traffic coming down the hill. Last minute, they lock up and skid. It happens a lot.”

They’ll never believe me, thinks Matt. “Officer Darnell, Detective McAdam, I want to give this sketch and a written description of what I saw two nights ago. To the Register.”

“Absolutely not, Matt,” says McAdam. “If what you say happened really did happen — and I’m not saying it didn’t — then you’ll be putting the kidnappers on high alert. They’ll destroy the curtains and ground the van. They’ll be extra careful, instead of carelessly happy to get away with a felony. It’s often the chance remark, the loose lips that lead us to the shitheads who do things like this. Pardon my French.”

Matt stuffs the sketchbook into the pack and stands. “Jazz can’t wait for a chance remark. She’s been missing over a week. And what if the shitheads have stashed the van and the curtains already?”

“Detective McAdam is right, Matt,” says Darnell. “I believe you saw Jasmine kidnapped two nights ago. I do. But all you’d accomplish with the press is help the perps get away with it. I want that green hippie van with the peace-sign curtains out on the street. Right where I can see it and pull those shi — those people over.”

“Shitheads,” Matt corrects.

“Shitheads,” says Darnell.

Which leads Matt to Thalia Street and Joint-and-Martini Man’s weather-beaten beachfront home. Matt walks a rope-railed wooden gangplank to the front porch.

It takes two knocks and two waits but the man finally opens the door. In daylight Matt sees he’s older than he’d thought. Same long gray hair and potbelly. No joint or martini.

“I talked to you last week about the hippie van,” says Matt. “You saw it parked right down there, the night before they found Bonnie Stratmeyer. I want to know if it had curtains.”

“I remember, kind of.” Same gravelly voice. “Come in.”

“No, thank you. I’ve got papers to fold and deliver.”

The man steps outside but leaves the door open. “A bike route?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I had one. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The afternoon edition, so I did it after school.”

“What kind of bike did you use?”

“It was a Schwinn Heavy-Duti.”

“So’s mine.” Matt waits. “Curtains?”

“Curtains? Yeah. But there was fog, and reflection of the streetlight. I couldn’t see inside very well. Except the two guys in the front, sitting really still. Why do the curtains matter?”

“The cops are calling it either a murder or suicide and I’m trying to help.”

“That’s awful. She was what, eighteen?”

Matt nods and waits again, trying to draw out the man’s memory. The man closes his eyes and taps his forehead with his fingers. “They were light colored. Yeah, I see those two guys just sitting in the dark but not moving. And the van was a newer one. I noticed that.”

“And you said they were all over Laguna now, those vans.”

“You see them a lot. Different colors.”

“And the curtains?”

“White with dark circles. Oh, of course — they were peace signs. Pretty sure, peace signs. Perfect for a hippie van, right?” The man opens his eyes. “I’m Myron Kandell.”

“I’m Matt Anthony. My sister has been kidnapped by the men you saw, in a late-model white-on-green VW van with peace-sign curtains. I witnessed it with my own eyes.”

“Holy shit, Matt.”

“The cops don’t believe me. I want you to tell them what you saw.”

“I already did.”

“But not the curtains. The peace signs are important. They’re critical evidence, Mr. Kandell.”

“You mean go downtown to the cop house?”

“I’ll drive us. I know which cops to talk to.”

Brigit Darnell takes Kandell’s statement in the same interview room Matt has just left. Matt waits in the lobby. Detective McAdam strides through, gives Matt a surprised look with his big magnified eyes, keeps going out the door.

When Matt drops him off at Thalia, Myron Kandell invites him in for a smoke again.

“I’ve got papers to deliver.”

“Good luck with your sister.”

“Don’t say anything to anybody about the curtains. The cops don’t want that getting around and tipping them off that we know. What you saw is very important.”

“I’ll guard our secret. Porch those papers, Matt.”

And porch them he does. His legs are strong, his scabs are thick and healing, the delivery bag feels light. His aim is true. Ozzie, the German shepherd on Wilcox, doesn’t charge, and Jamaica, the cocker spaniel on Los Robles, is chained to a magnolia tree. Old Coiner cheerfully waves at Matt as if he’s never seen him before.

When he gets home, his mother is loading boxes into the Westfalia.

“You’re just in time, Matt! Our Dodge City home is ready early and I just gave Pedley notice. Help me load this in, and I’ll show you your new place. God, I hope you like it.”