The First Rule of Ten (18 page)

“Well, I’m asking anyway.”

He met my eyes. “Okay, then. I got a tumor down in my belly growing like weeds in summertime. They wanted to stuff me full of chemo and radiation a few months ago, back when it was about the size of a grapefruit, but I turned ’em down. If I’m gonna die, I’m gonna do it my way, not theirs.” His glare was a challenge.

I let his words settle. Probing what lay beneath, I found only certainty. “Sounds like the right decision to me.”

“You think so? I do, too. The doctors are fighting me every step of the way, though.”

“When it comes to dying, everybody gets to be their own boss.”

“Yep, that’s the way I look at it, but I can see the other side too, I guess. Doctors are trained to never give up. Besides, everyone involved can make a bundle keeping an old guy like me alive, even if it’s only for a few more months.”

“What about your son?”

“What about him? Fighting me on everything is just a habit he can’t break. How I sired such an opinionated, uptight stick-in-the-mud is beyond me. I swear he was born blinkered.”

Another father disappointed in his son. In this case, I was pretty sure I’d side with the father. Still, I noticed John D didn’t exactly answer my question straight on.

“Norman believes I’m too stoned to know my own mind about anything,” John D went on. “Wait until his body starts breaking into pieces of pain—he’ll be begging for the evil weed.”

John D was just full of surprises.

“You smoke pot?”

“Medical marijuana,” he said.

“Really.”

“Perfectly legal,” he added, with noticeable satisfaction.

Josecita slammed a hamburger the size of a dessert plate in front of John D, and a steaming vat of vegetarian chili before me.

“Wow,” I said. “That’s a lot of chili.”

“Eat it or wear it,” she said, and sailed like a spinnaker back to the kitchen.

I ate it. I had no doubt she would make good on the threat.

C
HAPTER
18

Back at the house, John D invited me to join him on the porch while he “rested his bones.” After a few minutes of rocking, his chin slumped down on his chest. Soon he was snoring like a walrus.

I decided to do some exploring. I took a good long stroll around his property. As I weaved a path through the acres of dying almond trees, I came upon two groupings of young living ones planted side by side across the road and separated from each other by a low wire fence. The trees on one side were marked with neon-yellow plastic ties. Other than that, I couldn’t see any difference between the two groves.

On my way back, I checked out a small patch of marijuana, maybe half a dozen healthy-looking plants, tucked in the corner of John D’s backyard between the tomatoes and nasturtiums.

John D was still asleep. I tiptoed inside for a drink of water. I paused at the photograph on the mantel he’d showed me the other day. The blossoming branches and smiling faces made me a little melancholy.

I walked back outside and got my own rocking chair going, enjoying the shady coolness. I closed my eyes. Embracing the motto “Whatever works,” I used the rhythmic snort and snuffle of John D’s snoring to settle into a meditation.

Sometime later, his snores tapered off. I opened my eyes just as John D woke up. He looked around, confused for a moment before comprehension clicked in. He gave himself a back-cracking stretch and lumbered to his feet.

“Coffee?” he asked. I told him coffee was an excellent idea. I followed him inside to observe. He dumped several scoops of dark, oily beans into a cast-iron hand-grinder clamped to the counter. He cranked the beans into the consistency of cornmeal and loaded them into an old-fashioned percolator.

“Now, here’s the secret to a good cup of coffee,” he said. He broke off an inch-square piece of eggshell from a bucket by the sink and dropped it into the ground coffee. “Don’t ask me why, but it mellows out the taste.”

The coffee was strong and rich but without any acid bite or bitter aftertaste.

“Delicious.”

“Toldja,” John D said. “Now bring your brew and come sit with me while I take my medicine.”

He opened a cupboard and removed a corncob pipe and a mason jar containing dried marijuana, the buds frosted white with THC, the active chemical component of the plant. He followed me outside and sat again, wincing with pain. He packed the stubby pipe, fired it up, and took a prodigious hit of smoke into his lungs. He held the pipe out to me. “Want some?” His voice had the strangled tone of an experienced stoner.

If there’s a “Private Investigator’s Rule Book” somewhere, I’m sure it says something about not partaking of cannabis on the job, but the opportunity to get high with a guy like John D didn’t come along very often. Anyway, what was I going to do? Fire myself? I took the corncob and sucked in a mighty puff.

“I saw your backyard supply,” I said, holding the smoke in.

“Yup. Been growing it for years. Legally, like I said. It’s the only thing that helps with the pain, especially now that I got the cancer. I tried that stuff the doctors pass out like candy—Vicodin, Oxycontin, whatever—but it just makes me feel like I got a head full of mud. Pot’s better.”

He took another long inhale, trapped it tight, and then let the smoke stream from his nose. “Norman thinks I’m turning into a dope fiend. I say bring it on. What do you say, Ten?”

I told him I had long ago forfeited my right to disapprove of anyone seeking relief from this world’s pain. I told him about coming of age not far from the Kulu Valley in India, where the locals have been growing world-class pot for thousands of years. I confessed that as a teenager in the monastery, I would on occasion sneak out myself, late at night, for a little “herbal entertainment.”

“No kidding.” John D said. “Well, okay, then. I guess I don’t have to worry about you warning me about the evils of smoking weed.”

“How about this for a warning? John D, if you keep smoking that pot, eventually you are going to die!”

“What are you,” he said. “Some kind of prophet?”

We got a pretty good snicker going over that, so good that we didn’t hear the crunch of gravel on the driveway until it was too late. A white SUV rolled to a stop.

“Oh, shit!” John D gasped, and he shoved the mason jar and pipe under his rocking chair, looking so much like a kid with his hand in the cookie jar I let loose another round of laughter.

“Stop, stop!” John D gasped, waving his hands around. “He’ll see!”

“Who’ll see?”

“My son, the fun-buster.”

I turned to look. The vehicle was marked with an L.A. County Department of Public Works insignia. A chunky middle-aged man in a white shirt and dark tie clambered out and huffed across the yard to the front steps.

“Hey, there, Norman,” John D said.

“Hello, Dad.” Norman looked back and forth between us.

I decided to introduce myself. I was afraid hearing John D’s intoxicated butchering of my name would set me off again. I stood up and offered my hand.

“Tenzing Norbu. Most people call me Ten.”

His handshake was unenthusiastic. “Norman Murphy.”

John D giggled. “Most people call him Norman Murphy.”

Norman looked at his father sharply. He was still standing at the bottom of the steps. I noticed John D hadn’t asked him to sit and join us. I reclaimed my chair until further notice.

“What’s his business here?” Norman asked his father. His tight little mouth barely moved when he spoke; I had the thought that he’d been weaned too early and was still pissed about it 50 years later. I stifled a snigger. Man. Marijuana was stronger than I’d remembered.

Then John D said, “What’s your business what his business is with my business?” and I had to bite the inside of my cheek to quell the rising hysteria. My eyes watered from the effort.

Norman gave up on John D and turned to me. “I’m sorry, why are you here?”

I took a deep, steadying breath and prayed for self-control.

“I just met your father the other day,” I said. “I had some business with the people next door and struck up a conversation with him. He invited me to his home. I’ve been hearing all about the almond business.”

Norman’s eyes narrowed. He opened his mouth as if to delve deeper, then seemed to think better of it.

“Right. The good old days,” he said, his voice laced with bitterness. He turned back to his father. “So Dad, are you going to invite me to sit down?”

“Ain’t nobody stopping you,” John D answered.

I started to rise, but Norman parked his ample butt on the top step. Unfortunately, this put him directly opposite John D’s rocking chair. It took Norman about two seconds to spot the pipe and jar of weed underneath.

Busted.

Norman’s face reddened. “I knew it. Have you already been smoking that stuff today?”

“Yep,” John D said, “and I plan to smoke plenty more before the day’s done. Want a hit?”

Norman glared at me. “What about you? Are you doing drugs with this old man? Are you that pitiful?”

Heat suffused the muscles of my upper back and neck. Some people have a smarmy self-righteousness that begs for retaliation. Norman was one of those people.

“Maybe I should go,” I said. “Let you both talk in private.”

John D reached over and patted his son’s knee. “Norman here hasn’t been out to say hello to me for close to two months, so I’m pretty sure he don’t have anything I want to hear now.”

Norman stood and dusted off his pants. He directed his parting words at me. “I don’t know what the hell you’re doing here, but I want you to leave my father alone.”

One part of me wanted to knock Norman sideways; another wished John D would tell him to piss off. Somewhere inside, a third part, the healthy part that wasn’t attached to being right, frantically waved for my attention, telling me to just calm down. That part wanted to find out if there was anything more to be gleaned from the situation.

Without another word, I walked past Norman, crossed to his car, and leaned against it. He stared at me blankly, trying to guess at my motives. Finally he gave up and joined me.

“What’s this business you’ve got with the people next door?” Norman asked. “I assume you’re referring to that nutcase religious outfit.”

I ignored his question. Instead, I tapped the official insignia. “How long have you been with the Public Works Department?”

“Uh, seventeen years. Why?”

I chose my verb tense carefully. “I started with the LAPD nine years ago. You’ve been with the Public Works Department even longer. Maybe we can help each other.”

Narrow-minded people can’t entertain paradoxes. Their minds are like one-lane roads—they work just fine until somebody approaches from the opposite direction. Then they experience an unsolvable dilemma, caused by the limited range of their thinking. Every situation has to be win-or-lose, dominate or be dominated. Giving ground so the other car can squeeze by is unacceptable. Better to crash head-on than let go of being right.

Norman’s eyes flickered as he tried to squeeze the idea that I was a cop into the narrow alleyway of his brain. He was so busy trying to comprehend this new piece of information that he forgot to ask for my badge.

He relaxed, lowering his shoulders, and the body language told me he’d bought my story.

“So, what are you after them for?”

“You remember when they had that conflict over stealing power from the pig farm?”

“Yeah, but that got settled quite a while ago.”

“They may be involved with something else now,” I said.

“Like what?”

He seemed a little too interested to me.

“Sorry, I can’t discuss it with you.”

His leaned closer, man to man. “Come on,” he pleaded. “We’re both on the same side here—we’re both concerned with enforcing the law.” He offered me his hand. “Look, I want to apologize for the way I spoke to you up there. He’s my father and, as you can imagine, I’m worried about him, out here on his own.”

I went ahead and shook his hand, and I felt a little twinge of aversion.

“I’ve got to get back to the office,” he said. “Here’s my card. Call me if you need anything.”

I pocketed his card. “Will do,” I said. “I’ll just say ’bye to your father.”

Norman’s SUV roared to life as I walked back toward the house. He gunned the engine, spitting gravel in his wake.

John D had nodded off again. Our date with Sister Rose was still a few hours away, so I decided to test my new phone out here in the boonies. I strolled to the far side of the yard and called to check on Freda.

Wesley answered on the first ring. He must have stepped outside the hospital for a smoke or something.

“How is she?”

“The same.”

“How are you?”

“The same.”

There wasn’t much else to say after that.

Then I left a message for Mike. He’d be waking up soon. “Send me any contact information you have on that actor Jeremiah Star Trek, and his wife,” I told him.

Finally, against my better judgment, I tried Julie again. This time, she answered.

“I was just about to call you,” she said. “I’m off tomorrow. How does homemade minestrone and crème brûlée sound?”

“Dangerous,” I said. “I have to warn you, minestrone is my favorite, but I am almost always disappointed by it. And as for crème brûlée, well, I grew up in Paris.”

“Oh, goody. A challenge,” she said.

I sat cross-legged with my back against a tree and recounted my day, starting with the fennel and ending with the forthcoming assignation with Sister Rose. Julie made me laugh with her culinary escapades. I made her laugh with my tale of Josecita’s earmuff hazing. It felt nice to have someone to download my life with, besides Tank.

We talked until the sky grew dark. I looked across the yard. John D was up, moving around inside his lighted living room.

“Time to go,” I said. “’Bye now.” I waited for Julie to end the call. Her soft breath told me she was doing the same with me.

I smiled, letting the silence linger between us.

“On the count of ten, Ten,” she finally said, but she hung up before I got to two.

Inside the house, John D was tipped back in his recliner, studying the photograph of himself with his two sons.