Burning Time

40

He drove south and after a few exits got off. He was amazed at how quickly the neighborhood changed. South of the airport and west of the highway was shabby enough to qualify as a slum. Turning off Martin Luther King, Jason saw a huge open water or sewage pipe dripping into a culvert. The structures around it were more like shanties. Some of the cracks in the streets and sidewalks were big enough to have small trees growing out of them. There was graffiti everywhere.

But even here was the powerful smell of California. Bougainvillea, oranges. And now beans and garlic. He studied the streets. A row of warehouses with the back halves of trailer trucks parked inside a chain link fence on one corner. Spare parts shops. Then rows of tiny houses, all dilapidated. Weeds everywhere. Not many people around.

On Twenty-eighth Street he pulled to a stop in front of a faded wooden house, a little bit different from the others on the street. It had gabled windows on the second floor. All the rest of the houses squatted flat on the ground, with no more than three rooms.

At some time the house had been painted yellow, but now the color was left only in patches. Where the paint had come off it was all gray. The porch in front sagged around the steps. The railing looked loose. Four wicker chairs made a straight line across the porch, but looked too fragile to sit in. The number on the door read 3525. The last number had lost a screw and was tilted sideways.

Jason got out of the car. Some boys in jeans with the arms cut out of their shirts were gathered on the other side of the street around a junker that was missing a couple of wheels. They were smoking, and watching him sweat. He locked the car and walked around an ancient Pontiac parked in the field of weeds that was the front lawn.

By the time he walked up the creaky steps, there was a woman standing by the window. She, too, was smoking a cigarette, scowling.

“They’ve already been here,” she said, cracking the door just enough to get her words out. “I told them to go away, and don’t send no one else.”

“Who?” Jason asked, thinking right off that she was either drunk or insane.

“Don’t make it hard on yourself. I hate you Jesus people. No way I’m going to let any of you in. So beat it.”

“I’m not a Jesus person,” Jason said. “I’m a journalist.”

“You can’t fool me. You look just like that man who was here last week. Had a pretty little girl with him. You people ought to be ashamed of yourselves, using little children like that.”

Jason considered telling her she’d won a trip to Paris, or a washing machine or something, then decided that was not such a good idea. “Are you Esther Grebs?” he asked.

“Esther Grebs is dead,” she said flatly. “Dropped dead years ago. Who’s asking?” She peered at him through the crack in the door.

“Frank Miln. I’m a reporter. I’m looking for a man named Troland Grebs. He used to live here.” I hope. Jason smiled in a hopeful way.

The woman stepped back and opened the door. She had a lot of extra weight on her and was shaky on her feet. “That was an awfully long time ago. How’d you find out?”

“It’s not a common name.” Jason felt elated, but didn’t want to take credit where it wasn’t due.

“What’s he done?” she asked peevishly.

Jason smiled encouragingly. “Nothing. I’m just doing a story, looking for background material.”

“Background. What kind of background?” She backed out of the door so he could come in. Her curiosity, or her loneliness, or his unthreatening way of grabbing people’s attention got her.

He smiled encouragingly as he came in. “My story’s on North High School graduates of his year. ‘80. Just picked a few at random to see where they came from and what they’ve done with their lives. That kind of thing.”

“Well, that’s something.”

“Do you know Troland Grebs?” Jason asked.

“Course I know him. I’m his aunt. His aunt Lela. How do you think he got to North High School?”

“I don’t know,” Jason said.

“Not from here.” She spat out the words as she led the way to the front room, which was crowded with some surprisingly good furniture, all very dusty and too large for the space. “Couldn’t get anywhere from here. I took him with me that year after his brother died in ’Nam.”

She looked confused for a minute and then found her glass. It was empty. “Would you like a drink?”

Jason shook his head. “No, thanks.”

She considered it, then put it down. Obviously had some restraint left. Jason couldn’t miss the tired old house-dress and slippers, the slack discontented mouth. The room smelled of bourbon and cigarette smoke. But the woman’s hair was carefully combed, and she had lipstick on as if she had been expecting someone. She sat heavily on a worn, tufted sofa with her feet planted far apart. “Have a seat. What do you want to know?”

Jason sat in an armchair catty-corner, so he didn’t have to struggle not to look at the rolls of puckered flesh on her thighs.

“Well, I know Troland has done pretty well for himself. Has a good job, drives a good car—”

“Since when?” Lela interrupted.

“Uh, I assume he’s had it a long time.”

“Well, smarty, he doesn’t drive a car. He still rides a bike, like a kid. Hah.”

Jason took out a small notebook. Whenever important information came to him his face went blank. His face was blank now. “What kind of bike?”

“Oh, Lord. There was the old panhead, that was Willy’s. Willy died in ’Nam. Willy’s Tro’s brother. Tro rode that a long time. Then he started trading up. He told me the bike he has now took a year to customize. Cost over fifteen grand. Can you believe that? Any motorcycle costing that much?”

It was too much for her. She got up and went into the other room with her glass.

“All Harleys,” she shouted.

“What was he like as a kid?” Jason asked.

“I didn’t know him much then. My husband and I lived in Coral Beach then.” She returned. Her glass was half full now. She fluffed her hair. “It’s nice there, in Coral Beach,” she said wistfully.

Jason nodded. “Troland,” he prompted.

She looked into her drink, then took a tiny, ladylike sip. “My sister complained about him. He was always kind of wild.” She fell silent for a second, thinking it over. “All the boys were wild, but Tro was the worst. Can’t really blame them, having the kind of father they did.”

“What was his father like?”

“Well, he couldn’t hold his—” She held up her glass. “Some people can and some people can’t. Him, he’d be all right, and then he’d have a few drinks—Get out of the way.” She sniffed. “I wouldn’t go there unless I absolutely had to.”

“He was violent?”

“I guess you could say that. Beat up my sister pretty bad. I guess you don’t need to know about that.”

Yes, actually that was exactly what he wanted to know. He needed to know how dysfunctional the family was. He needed to know how badly damaged Troland Grebs was.

“What about Tro—was he violent, too?”

“Violent?” Lela narrowed her eyes.

“Was he in trouble a lot? Was he ever arrested?”

She sipped again, taking her time to think about it. “Well, Tro was a funny kid. And not ha-ha funny. He was strange. I always thought he was a little—” She touched her finger to her head meaningfully.

“Crazy, huh. How was he crazy?” Jason kept his voice neutral.

She shook her head. “He has brains, you know. But there’s something kinda different about him. He gets an idea—still makes my blood run cold. Aw, you don’t want to hear all this.”

“Sure, I do. It’s very important background, you know, sheds light on what he’s become.” That was the truth.

Lela stared at him, then nodded. “Well, there was this pretty girl. She had hair, oh, my God, all the way down to her waist. Must have been third grade. She was the president of the class. Somebody squirted a water gun at her hair. Only it wasn’t water. It was gasoline. And there were some matches.” Lela opened her pale eyes wide.

“Her hair caught on fire.” She was silent for a long time.

“What happened?” Jason asked.

“Oh, she could have died, but she was all right. They had a big investigation, and they just couldn’t prove anything. Years later Tro told me he knew how to make people do whatever he wanted. He used to tell the kids he’d kill them, and their parents, and their brothers and sisters. Cut them up in little pieces so nobody could ever find them. Poor suckers. They believed him.”

She remembered the drink in her hand, took a greedy swallow. “He was always talking about getting even, about revenge, you know. And the thing was she didn’t do a thing to him. That little girl didn’t keep him out, or do anything to him. He just wanted to hurt her because she got too much attention.”

She peered out the window at the overgrown bougainvillea that was the view. It was so big it wrapped around the back of the house as if it were going to take over. Jason followed her gaze. The blossoms were the deepest purple he’d ever seen.

“I didn’t know that when I took him in. I knew he set fires, of course. Went kind of wild when his brother died. But he seemed better when he came back from—you know where. And he never hurt anybody. I thought if he went to a good school and made friends with some nice people, he’d be all right.…”

“Where’s you-know-where?” Jason asked.

“I know where, but you can’t know where. See, I was right. He went to a good school, got away from some bad influences, and he turned out, like you said. Write that part.” She gestured at his notebook with her glass.

“Sure I will,” Jason said. “Thank you for talking to me. You helped a lot.” He had to go now. “Could you give me Troland’s address?”

“Course I will.” Without hesitation, she went to a book by the phone that had faded blue flowers on the cover, and read out the address. “It’s a nicer place than this, but do you think he’d help me?—I shouldn’t say that. He sent me to Disneyland last month for three days. I think he wanted to stay here. Cleaned the whole place. I couldn’t believe it.” She shook her head, still couldn’t.

“Well, he’s something of a mystery. Keeps to himself.” Her eyes suddenly filled with tears. She waved at the dusty furniture with one hand. “This was only a tenth, a hundredth of what I had.”

She fell silent, turning her unfocused eyes back to Jason. “All that time I thought my sister married the jerk. He hurt her bad and she died of cancer. But the truth is all men stink. Hah, you could write a book about my story,” she muttered.

“I’d like to hear it. But I have to go.” Jason looked at his watch. Now it really was getting late.

“That’s what they all say.” Her face crumpled.

Jason put his pen away. He was always telling his students you have to listen to the things they don’t say as well as the things they do. Poor woman. She’d probably been drinking all morning. She couldn’t even get up to walk him to the door when he left.