The Baker Street Letters Page 17

  And now, the tall, bald man in sunglasses joined them, and he too was pointing at Reggie:

  “That’s him!”

  The USC runners took off toward Reggie in a heroic sprint.

  At the same time, two counterclockwise runners, coming from the opposite direction, crossed paths with the white-haired man, who urged them on in Reggie’s direction.

  And close on their heels were two private security guards on bicycles.

  Joggers, cyclists, and runners of all shapes and sizes were now converging on Reggie from both directions of the road. For a brief moment, he wondered whether he should remain in place and just try to explain.

  But the white-haired man had already rounded a bend and vanished from sight; there was no hope now of getting past the throng to catch him.

  “There!” shouted the first two women, pointing at Reggie again. “He killed her!”

  This would not work.

  Reggie abandoned the dam and ran back down the road to the near gate with all the six-minute-mile speed he could muster. He approached the final bend in the road, the last one before the gate, and he looked over his shoulder.

  Behind him, all the recreational enthusiasts from either side of the lake—runners, bikers, skaters, dog walkers, and combinations thereof—were in his hot pursuit.

  Thank God; his taxi was still there, just outside the gate.

  He climbed quickly through the gap in the chain-link fence. He knew he’d have just seconds before the posse appeared behind him, and if the cabdriver saw them, all bets were off.

  Gasping, wheezing, and pouring sweat, Reggie jumped into the cab.

  “You run in those shoes?” said the driver.

  “My best time in a week,” said Reggie. “You should try it.”

  “You’ll stink up my cab,” said the driver.

  “Just drive, dammit,” said Reggie, pulling money out of his wallet. “The Pasadena Institute. I’ll buy you all the air fresheners you need.”

  The driver turned the cab around and headed down the hill, just an instant ahead of the pursuit.

  It was night when Reggie arrived at the campus. In the foyer outside Rogers’s office, the secretary was getting ready to lock up.

  “Can I help you?”

  “Rogers,” Reggie said tightly.

  “I’m afraid he’s not in.”

  “Where is he?” said Reggie, walking past her. “Out for his evening run?”

  “Sir, you can’t—”

  “Sorry,” said Reggie. He entered Rogers’s office and shut the door behind him.

  She had told the truth: Rogers wasn’t there. Reggie heard her pound on the door, then quickly leave, undoubtedly to get security.

  On the walls were Rogers’s many diplomas, and plaques of recognition, and photos of him accepting awards. One in particular caught Reggie’s eye.

  It was a smallish photo in a modest frame, easy to overlook and forget among all the others—unless you were specifically looking for something that went back a few years.

  This one went back a score or more, judging from the clothes and Rogers’s buoyant hair.

  Reggie took a closer look. He saw Rogers and another man—who looked a lot like the man in the old photo in Mara’s flat—both smiling and standing in front of a car that bore the name and logo of a surveying firm.

  Reggie went to Rogers’s desk and pushed papers about until he found one that had Rogers’s signature. He carefully pulled a wet sheet of the map out of his pocket, unfolded it, and compared the faded signature with Rogers’s.

  It matched. At least to the extent visible.

  Through the office window now, Reggie could see Rogers’s secretary hurrying up the steps of the building with a uniformed security guard.

  Reggie left the office, found a side exit, and got to his cab.

  There were flashing red lights and sirens on the ride back to Los Angeles, but they were headed in the direction of the reservoir, not following Reggie.

  Not yet.

  He rang Laura at her hotel; she did not pick up.

  He needed shelter. The Bonaventure was out of the question. Only one alternative came to mind.

  “Take me to the Roosevelt Arms,” Reggie told the driver.

  It took a long drive through heavy traffic, but finally Reggie reached the Roosevelt Arms. The clerk in the lobby of the Roosevelt Arms took a moment to look Reggie over. He seemed pleased for some reason.

  “Hard times?”

  “Just give me a bloody room.”

  “You know, you just missed him,” said the clerk, taking Reggie’s money for a day in advance.

  “What? Who?”

  “The other guy. From before.”

  “Nigel?”

  “I guess. That’s what she called him.”

  “She who?”

  “The girl he was with. Latina, very pretty.”

  “When did they leave?”

  “A little over an hour ago. Just before those two guys showed up looking for ’em.”

  “What two guys?”

  “I’m trying to remember.”

  Reggie put two twenties on the counter.

  “Hell, I dunno,” said the clerk, pocketing the money. “Looked like a couple suits on their casual day.”

  “Suits as in police?”

  “Naaw, too stylish. Police suits are more like those guys over there.”

  The clerk was pointing one block up and across the street, where Mendoza and Reynolds were ordering at a take-away burger stand.

  Their backs were turned. For the moment.

  “Which room do you want?” said the clerk.

  “Keep it,” said Reggie.

  His taxi was still at the curb. Reggie exited the Roosevelt Arms, got into the cab, and ducked down low.

  “Beverly Hilton,” he told the driver, and they pulled away just as the detectives turned with their sandwiches. In the mirror, it appeared that Mendoza gave the cab a second look, but it was hard to tell.

  Reggie had the driver deliver him to the side entrance of the hotel; the lobby seemed a risk. He walked from there to the outdoor patio in back.

  In places with weather like this, Laura preferred her evening meal outside. With luck, she was having a late dinner, and that would be why she was not answering the phone.

  Reggie stood behind a palm tree next to the gate and looked in.

  She was there, at a table just beyond the pool.

  And, mercifully, she was alone.

  Reggie came up behind her and put his hand lightly on her arm, and she turned.

  “You don’t look well at all,” she said.

  “I’m not. Is that coffee?”

  “They say so.”

  Reggie took two quick gulps of Laura’s coffee.

  “The locals are looking for me; I need to get out of view.”

  “All right,” she said.

  “Sorry,” said Reggie, “not the lift. I don’t want to go through the lobby.”

  “Certainly,” said Laura. “It’s only four flights.”

  They found the stairs and Reggie told her about the lake as they climbed.

  “I’m sorry,” said Laura as they entered her room. “It’s one thing when it’s an obnoxious clerk. Something else when it’s someone nice.”

  “We should close the drapes,” said Reggie. “Anyone who has anything to do with that map is winding up dead. Nigel is at risk. So is Mara.”

  “What do we need to do?” she said.

  “Rogers can’t be in this alone. He had help at the dam. And someone behind this had enough resources to make Rogers want to sign that false report twenty years ago. And enough now to put up one million in cash to get Nigel out of jail and into the open.”

  “Who are the candidates?”

  “Someone who was rich then, rich now, and getting richer still from the Silver Line taking the route they chose.”

  “That’s a rather broad range, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. But there’s another criterion.
To bail him out, someone had to know almost as soon as we did that Nigel was in jail. That means that someone is getting inside knowledge of our activities. And that narrows the list.”

  “Considerably, I would think. Who is on it?”

  Reggie hesitated. He knew what he was going to say next would get him in trouble.

  But then his mobile rang.

  “It’s not for me,” said Laura.

  Reggie picked up.

  The voice he heard on the phone was male, raspy, middle-aged plus, and weathered.

  “You’re the British guy,” said the voice, “with the brother. Right?”

  “Probably,” said Reggie.

  “You want to clear him for killing that bastard under the freeway—you bring it to me.”

  “Bring what?”

  “The map, dammit. My map. You know what I’m talking about.”

  “Bring it where?”

  “Bring it to the North Lankershim dig. Right now. The station platform in Tunnel 110-Left. Don’t be seen.”

  “How—”

  “Stay away from the main gate, that’s where the security is. Go to the south gate, where they let the trucks in during the day. You’ll know what to do when you get there.”

  “Who—”

  “Just get there. Now.”

  The man hung up.

  Laura was standing as close as possible to Reggie to listen.

  “Where?” she said.

  “I want you to get on the next plane back to New York. Or better, London.”

  “I can’t do that.”

  “You can take Buxton with you if you like.”

  “Not bloody likely, not while this is going on. In fact, I’m sticking to you like glue until we’re all out of here.”

  “You don’t need to—”

  “Of course I do. Nigel means as much to me as he does to you. Besides, clearly it’s not being with you that’s dangerous. It’s being discovered by you. So I’ll do the prudent thing. Where you go, I go.”

  Reggie saw that it was a settled issue.

  “As you wish,” he said.

  “So where is the bloody thing?”

  “In my coat pocket.”

  Laura picked up Reggie’s coat. “I hope you don’t mean this pocket,” she said as she examined the coat.

  “Why?”

  Laura pulled out the contents of Reggie’s waterlogged coat pocket. She laid the wet sheets of vellum on the glass coffee table and pressed out as much water as she could. Then she folded them carefully between the pages of a thick weekly Variety magazine, placed all of it together in a paper bag, and gave the whole package back to Reggie.

  “I hope they survive long enough for our purposes,” she said.

  “I hope we do,” said Reggie.

  With all the old shops permanently closed, and no neon residuals to illuminate anything, there was probably not a darker place in the city than the Lankershim construction wasteland where the cab dropped Reggie and Laura. There was one weak amber streetlamp to cover three blocks. To the south, the Paradigm building was lit at the top. One block to the immediate north was a yellow light at the security gate for the dig.

  “I’ll go, you stay and call the police if I don’t come back,” said Reggie.

  “Bloody hell I will. If you don’t come back, me calling the police will be a bit late, won’t it?”

  “I—”

  “We settled this issue. Now let’s just do it.”

  “I hope you wore comfortable shoes.”

  They began walking toward the south end of the dig. Then Reggie put his hand on her arm and they paused.

  There was one parked car, at what used to be curbside, just fifty yards from the south gate.

  It was a powder blue 1960s Volkswagen Beetle.

  “I know that car,” said Reggie.

  He approached it from one side, and Laura from the other.

  In the dimly lit street, it was impossible to see anything through the rear window.

  “Wait,” said Reggie. “The driver’s side is halfway down. Can’t be right.”

  Reggie went to the driver’s-side window. He started to lean inside for a better look.

  There was a sudden explosion—of fur, slobber, and growling canine teeth—and Reggie jumped back.

  “Bloody damn dog!”

  Mara’s Saint Bernard had half its body in the front seat now and half in the back, where it had compressed itself, like a huge coiled spring—until Reggie arrived.

  “Don’t be angry, just because he scared you.”

  “Knocked me down a full flight of stairs last time he did that.”

  “Doing his job,” said Laura, approaching the animal. “Sweet baby. Not annoyed with me at all, are you?”

  Reggie looked inside again, warily, as Laura stroked Mookie’s head.

  “Keys are in the ignition,” he said. “Keys in the ignition, and window down. Do you suppose she’d walk away and leave her car like that, counting on the dog to protect it?”

  “No,” said Laura. “She wouldn’t leave him here. He’s her baby. Something’s wrong.”

  Reggie stood back from the car and looked around. At the north end of the site, there was a small yellow lamp on at the security station booth; presumably there was still a guard there.

  But the south edge of the site, just fifty yards or so away, was dark.

  “We’re almost there,” said Reggie. “We need to move on.”

  “We can’t leave him here,” said Laura. “If the sun comes up in this heat, he could cook.”

  “If the sun comes up and we’re not back, I doubt that I’ll care whether he cooks.”

  “We can’t just leave him,” repeated Laura.

  “All right, then,” said Reggie. “If we let him out, can you tie him up?”

  “Of course.”

  Reggie stepped back from the car, and Laura let the dog climb obediently out. She tied it by the end of its leash to the nearest pole.

  “Sit!” she said firmly, and the dog did.

  Reggie and Laura moved on to the south edge of the site.

  The perimeter of the chain-link fence was topped with spirals of razor wire. But there was a gate.

  The gate appeared at first to be chained shut. Reggie gave it a push.

  The lock fell open, and the chain dropped to the ground with an interminable metal clatter. Reggie looked about furtively, but the security booth was apparently too far away for anyone to have heard, and he saw no one.

  He opened the gate, and they entered the site.

  To the left, a dirt-carrying conveyor belt angled ninety feet overhead, with a mountain of the day’s diggings piled at its base. Directly ahead was the main excavation itself.

  The tunnels had to be below, at the bottom of the 150-foot excavated pit.

  They walked on, past stacks of concrete tunnel segments, toward the excavation.

  As they drew closer, it became apparent that the pit itself was completely dark—there were amber lamps along the surface, but there was nothing but black in the depths. The lamps gave just enough light to locate the lift Reggie had seen when he spoke with Sanger earlier.

  But the platform cage was locked. And as they moved cautiously closer to the edge, it was clear that the platform itself was, quite inconveniently, at the lower levels.

  Reggie took a step closer to the edge of excavation and peered into the darkness below. At the far end a faint arc of light spilled out from some source, but it was too weak to illuminate more than a bit of damp ground.

  “Now where do you suppose the tunnel is?” asked Laura.

  “Further down than one would like,” said Reggie.

  “And was this our only mode of transportation?” asked Laura, looking at the vacant lift cage.

  “I believe I saw a set of stairs somewhere along here—scaffolding, really, and it’s a long way to the bottom. Can I persuade you to reconsider?”

  “Nothing of the sort,” she said.

  They walked for severa
l yards along the perimeter until Reggie found the metal spiraling steps to the excavation floor.

  They both paused at the edge and looked down.

  “It’s even further than it looks,” said Reggie.

  “I’d say you’re right about that, since we can’t see past three steps in this dark.”

  “Are you sure you want to proceed?”

  “Stop asking that,” said Laura. Then she said, “You first.”

  Reggie went first. The metal steps clanged and echoed as they began the descent.

  Within a few moments, the top of the rim from which they had descended was no longer distinguishable in the darkness; below, everything was dark as well, except for the weak light at the far end.

  Laura stopped and reached down to touch Reggie. “Did you hear that?” she asked.

  “Hear what?” He turned toward her.

  “I thought I heard something above.”

  “Something like what?”

  “A click. Something hard on metal.”

  “I didn’t hear it.”

  “All right, then, let’s both hold very still.”

  Reggie did.

  They were standing very close to each other—of necessity on the narrow stairs—she two steps and one-half turn above him. He could hear her breathing. He felt her body heat, and he could tell that at some point in the last twenty-four hours, she had put her perfume other places than just behind the ears. If they hadn’t been standing with no guardrail over a pitch-black chasm on a mission of utmost urgency—

  “What are you doing?” said Laura from above.

  “I’m holding still.”

  “Not completely. And the position of your face is quite untimely. Kindly hold still in your own space.”

  “If I lean any more into my own space, I’ll be in a ten-story free fall. What are you doing?”

  Laura was reaching up and touching the edge of one of the metal steps above them with her fingertips. “If someone else is on the stairs,” she whispered, “we should feel the vibrations.”

  “Do you feel vibrations?”

  “Nothing from the steps,” she said. “Let’s shove on.”

  Reggie roused himself from his position, and they moved on. Several long moments later, they reached the end of the ladder and stepped off onto gravelly ground.

  Somewhere water was dripping; there were thick scents of wet earth and fresh concrete and a sharp scent of diesel fuel.