A Thousand Steps

26

Matt is surprised to see the Vortex of Purity auditorium bustling this late. The marquee still has the beguiling golden Hamsa flickering in its center, but the message is different now:

Matt pauses at the marquee, just as he did before, drawn to the eye in the middle of the hand — the Hand of the Goddess, he remembers — which glitters gold and crimson, like the robe of Mahajad Om.

Inside, both the lobby and the auditorium proper have been set up for the feast, with food-heavy tables up front and scores of folding chairs set up before the stage from which the swami had delivered his Evolver welcome. The air is heavy with the smell of curry and rice, sautéed mushrooms and bamboo shoots, and of course incense. Having walked all of downtown delivering invites to the Summer of Eternal Love Experience, and having finished the prime rib, potatoes, and the immense piece of cake well over thirty minutes ago, Matt suddenly feels hungry again.

No sign of Mahajad now, just an auditorium of hippies and other young people eating and chanting between swallows as the same sitarist plays her shimmering notes.

He slides on his backpack, loads up a plate, and goes outside. Sits and eats and watches, as he did before. Hears the generators humming. It’s a different crowd tonight, not the eagerly beautiful young people but a more streetwise hippie bunch, many of them stoned, who seem more drawn to the feast than the spirit, but he can’t blame them for that.

He demolishes dinner, gets the sketchbook from his pack. Touches up his sketches of McAdam and Johnny Grail and another new one of Laurel as Laurel — not part of the Gauguin — just a dark-haired girl in a faded flannel, tilting her head as she kissed him on her porch that night.

Time warps when he draws. When he looks up again the last of the feasters appear to have left, and the women in the lobby are rolling dish-laden carts toward a Vortex walkway.

“Matt Anthony.”

Startled, Matt turns around to see that the swami has arrived from the darkness behind him on silent bare feet. Again he wears his crimson robe with the upswept shoulders, and his usual unidentifiable expression, almost buried in his gray-black hair and gray-white beard and mustache: amusement, curiosity, eagerness?

Matt stands quickly, the sketchbook in hand. “Swami Om. You surprised me.”

“It is I who am surprised. Are you okay? Is your sister okay? Why are you here?”

“She is not okay.” He blurts to Om what happened on Tuesday night in the fog, right outside their Third Street home. “Now, I have two questions. One, are you sure you never saw my sister Jasmine here at the Vortex?”

“I am sure!”

Matt detects no falsehood on the swami’s face, just astonishment.

“They placed her in a van and drove away with her? While you pursued on foot?”

“The police don’t believe me.”

“I will speak to them.”

“They won’t listen to you, either. My second question is, do you know that criminals who run a tabloid called LA Moves are publishing suggestive pictures of Bonnie Stratmeyer and Sara and others who follow you?”

“My Evolvers? My Enlightened and Ecstatic?”

“I’m sorry but, yes.”

“Walk with me. Tell me more.”

Matt follows the slow padded steps of the swami down a walkway. Tells him about Detective McAdam, and the three men who run the Laguna Beach photo shoots. And that McAdam is now calling Bonnie’s death suicide or murder.

“Then these men should be questioned.”

“I’m sure they will be.”

Under a walkway light, Matt shows Mahajad his sketches of Rene DeWalt, Williams, and Amon Binder. The big swami holds up the book to study the pictures point blank, and Matt realizes how bad his eyesight is.

“I do not know them. They would not be welcome here.”

Matt wonders how close Mahajad would have to get to a person in order to see them clearly. Wonders if, in his eyes, Jazz was too blurred for him to remember. Can you remember what you can’t really see?

With a heavy exhale, the swami closes the book and hands it back. “The Karma of this murdered girl brings a shadow over my heart. I will call the police immediately if I see those men.”

Matt gets out one of Jasmine’s missing person flyers. Hands it the swami, who studies it.

“I have a third question for you, swami.”

Om’s black wet eyes study Matt from within the tangles of his hair and brows. “Please ask it.”

“I’ve looked everywhere. I’ve walked every beach and gone to every bar and nightclub and restaurant, asked all of the people I deliver papers to. Remember when you told the Evolvers that now they could begin to see the world in a new way?”

“Yes, it is essential.”

“But can I? See differently? So Jazz comes into view?”

Matt stays abreast of Mahajad, who continues in silence with his short, quiet steps. The path goes downhill through a swale Matt remembers was once crowded with black mustard and kudzu and wild tobacco. Now it’s a grassy meadow with a stand of recently planted oaks in the middle, lit from below.

“Swami, please tell me how to see the world differently. She’s running out of time.”

They stop and the swami looks out at the young oaks basking in the floodlights. “It cannot be done instantly, Matt. You must begin with meditation. Meditation is simple and easy. Come here to the Vortex any day between two and five, or go to the Mystic Arts World store on Wednesdays or Fridays from seven to nine at night. Wear comfortable clothes but not leather. My Enlighteners are wonderful teachers. You only pay what you can afford. You will learn to see differently, which is only a way of thinking differently. Maybe it will help you find your sister. When you have passed my Evolution and Enlightenment ceremonies, I will personally oversee your training. Come.”

Back in the auditorium the women are waiting for their swami. The two sharp-eyed, white-suited security men are there, too, apparently flirting with them.

The men withdraw as Matt and Mahajad enter the lobby. Om pays no attention to any of them as he claims one of two foil-wrapped paper plates from one of the now empty food tables.

“Take this, Matt.”

“Thank you.”

“We who are always hungry must eat when we can.”

The swami collects a second foil-wrapped plate, lifts it to his nose for a whiff.

“Aren’t these both yours?” asks Matt.

“Let us call them loaves and fishes. You will find your sister, Matt.”

“I’m going to have to. The police don’t believe me and they have Bonnie and Johnny Grail to worry about. Here I am, the son of a cop who’s not here to help his own daughter. In a town where the police don’t give a shit. I’m pissed off. Sorry for the unholy words, swami.”