The Fallen

20

The swimming pool where Samantha Asplundh drowned is small and looks harmless. It is rectangular, lined with blue tiles above the waterline, and overshadowed by two large pine trees that drop needles to the deck but make the air smell good. The former Asplundh home is located near La Mesa, which is east of San Diego and gets hot in summer. The backyard is shaded and secluded, which gives it charm. It is set downslope from and slightly to the side of the house and is all but hidden by a hedge of oleander blooming pink against the dark wood siding of the home. But the seclusion also suggests complicity in the terrible thing that happened here. The neighboring homes are set away and separated from the yard by large, sloping lawns behind chain-link or grape-stake fences, as if not wanting to get too close to a tragic place.

There was a For Sale sign in the front yard when I drove up. The home was now owned by Dr. Owen James, a dentist. His wife, Cindy, had given me a key for the padlock so I could get into the pool area.

She and two small children watched me from the house as I peered through the new chain-link fence at the pool. The fence was eight feet high and looked penal in this domestic setting. The bubbled plastic pool cover was littered with pine needles. The filter was humming and I could hear the water slurping into the catch.

I had no trouble picturing the Asplundh family here in this backyard. It looked very similar to the way it had looked in Garrett’s Fourth of July video from last year. I shot a couple of pictures with the digital camera strapped around my neck.

I turned and waved to the dentist’s children, then opened the lock and let myself through the gate. I toured the area slowly, trying to stand for a while in each of the places from which the Fourth of July party video was shot. I shot pictures from each place. I had no idea what I was looking for, other than a clearer idea of what had happened that day. And to pay respects to a little girl I’d never met and whose father I had just helped bury. But there was something more. I wanted to see this place for the same reason that I had wanted to watch and rewatch the pool scenes from “The Life and Death of Samantha” — because I had the feeling I was missing something.

I stood about where the picnic table had been and took a picture of the pool and one of the house. I thought of John Van Flyke’s voice as he shot the hosts. Great party. I pictured the red, white, and blue ribbons tied to the birds of paradise and hydrangea. Great people. I pictured the kids splashing in the pool. Great country.

I heard the gate open and saw Mrs. James coming across the deck toward me. She was tall and generously proportioned and had an air of health and strength about her. It was noon and the March sun had come out strong. She squinted and held a flattened hand over her eyes.

“We were completely shocked at what happened to Mr. Asplundh,” said Mrs. James.

I looked back at the house and estimated how much of the pool was visible from inside. There were plenty of windows, but most of them were behind the hedge of oleander or the big pines. I thought of Garrett in another part of the home, rinsing dishes and shooting video of the fireworks in the driveway while little Samantha snuck through the forest of adults’ legs on her way to find her father. I saw the walkway down which she had come and I imagined where she would have stopped, her attention caught by the sparkling pool or maybe by the sight of her favorite doll floating in the warm, welcoming water.

“Is there a light inside the pool?” I asked.

“Yes,” said Mrs. James. “It lights up the whole thing. Why?”

“Samantha’s doll and the pool skimmer were found in the water after she drowned. There was some speculation that she fell in while trying to get the doll.”

“The light would have made it show up on the surface,” said Mrs. James.

I imagined the floating doll, illuminated from below. I wondered why, if it had been floating for some time, it hadn’t made its way to the edge the way most floating objects do. If it had, Samantha could just have knelt down and picked it up. No need for the skimmer. No need to fall in. But apparently the doll had floated away from the deck. Just one more of the many small cogs that had meshed that evening to form the gear of tragedy.

“Are you here about Samantha or Garrett?” she asked.

“About everything,” I said.

Cynthia James crossed her arms and took a small step backward.

“You haven’t used the pool, have you?” I asked.

“No. Not warm enough yet. We didn’t move in until December.”

“Are you selling because it bothers you?”

She nodded. “I told Owen before we bought that I could never get used to it. It doesn’t bother him. It doesn’t bother the children. I’ve tried very hard, but what happened here bothers me, greatly. I had the old five-foot fence replaced with this eight-foot one before we moved in. I’ve hidden the key to that lock. The fence is wired with a very loud alarm. My children are forbidden to touch the fence or the lock. And I still have nightmares. When Mr. Asplundh was murdered, Owen finally caved in. We listed it Monday and we’ve gotten two offers already. I’m relieved. I can’t wait to get out of here. This place is drenched in bad luck. The neighbor boy bothers my children. May I please have the key back?”

I handed it to her.

“Just make sure the lock is secure before you leave,” she said.

I thanked her, knowing she would check the lock again after I had left. I glanced up to the window but the children were gone. I wandered the pool area. A mockingbird jeered at me from one of the big pine trees. I shot his picture and he stopped. Far above the mockingbird a vulture traced a lazy black circle in the blue sky.

I watched a young teenage boy clamber across a neighbor’s yard and press himself close to the chain-link fence that divided the properties. Most of the fence was overhung with climbing jasmine but this boy had either found or worn away a spot between the fragrant white blooms. He wore red bathing trunks and nothing else. He was hunched, big-eared, clumsy.

“Who are you?” he asked.

“I’m Robbie.”

“What are you doing?”

“Taking a few pictures. How about you?”

“That’s where it happened. Samantha drowned.”

“Yes,” I said. “What’s your name?”

“Jeremiah.”

“Were you at home that night?” I asked.

“Uh-huh.”

“See anything?”

“The fireworks were really, really good.”

I looked back toward the former Asplundh house, over which the fireworks would have been visible, and realized that Jeremiah would have had a pretty good look at them from just about anywhere in his backyard.

“Where did you watch from?” I asked.

“Back there. Mom wouldn’t let me go closer.”

“Did you see Samantha?”

“She was really, really nice.”

“Jeremiah!”

He flinched and turned. I saw the pronounced and crooked curve of his spine beneath his skin. Then he looked back at me with a dull annoyance on his face. A small woman stood in the sliding glass door of the house. She started across the patio toward us.

“I got to go,” he said.

“Did you see her fall in the pool, Jeremiah?”

“Jeremiah!”

“No. I had to go to bed. I love those fireworks but I had to go to bed. Mom put me to bed before it was over. I heard sirens later.”

The woman came down the sloping lawn, hands on her hips, head angled.

“Jeremiah, it is time for your nap.”

“Yeah, uh-huh. This is Robbie.”

“Ma’am,” I said.

“You talking about Samantha again, Jeremiah?” the woman said.

“Uh-huh.”

“He didn’t see anything and he doesn’t know anything and if one more of you insurance investigators or reporters or whatever you are comes around here I’m going to call the police.”

“I am the police.”

Jeremiah smiled crookedly as she shooed him away from the fence and got him headed in the direction of the house. He labored up the slope hunchbacked and bandy-legged and without self-consciousness that I could see. It looked as though his bones had been melted at birth, then hardened out of shape.

“I’m sorry,” said the woman. “I’m his mother. It was horrible. Jeremiah really liked that little girl and she seems to have stuck in his mind in a way that very few things do. He’s challenged, as you see.”

“There’s no need to apologize,” I said.

“He didn’t see her drown. None of us did. I guess each parent thought the other was with her. Do you suspect foul play?”

“No.”

“Good-bye, then. Please don’t question Jeremiah. He was in bed when it happened. It’s all we can do to keep him in the present in a healthy way.”

She raised a hand, turned and walked off.

I shot a few more pictures, locked the gate, pulled the lock hard three times, and left.