Where Echoes Live (32 page)

“And Earl Hopwood's … ?”

“Bad judgment on my part. I won't attempt to excuse it, other than to say I'm old and not in the best of health.”

“Why bad judgment?”

“Because Earl was in an extremely agitated state and wouldn't give me any explanation of what had happened. His chief concern seemed to be that he'd lost his own gun. I should have demanded to know the particulars.”

“How did he lose the gun?”

“I don't know.”

“And you have no idea who shot him?”

“No, but I suppose it must have been the son-in-law.”

“Why?”

Mahoney looked surprised at the question. “Well, he was killed. I assume Earl retaliated.”

“Is it common knowledge in Vernon that Mick Erickson was Peggy Hopwood's husband?”

“Oh, no. When I first heard about the killing, I had no idea who the man in the lake was. But Peggy—Margot, she calls herself now—came in last night, and she told me.”

“Margot Erickson came here? Why?”

“The poor woman was distraught; that's only natural. She'd lost her husband, and I suspect she knows her father killed him. Then she came here looking for Earl and couldn't find him. And on top of that she'd been badly beaten. A woman like Peggy … well, I doubt anyone's so much as laid a hand on her before. She wanted me to give her something to help her sleep. I thought it unwise to prescribe for her, given her emotional condition, but I did let her have one night's supply of Seconal.”

“Did she tell you who had beaten her?”

Mahoney shook his head.

“Or where she was staying?”

“Why, at Willow Grove Lodge, of course. It's the only place open this time of year, and Rose Wittington was like a mother to her at one time. She certainly couldn't be expected to stay at that hovel Earl built himself out in Stone Valley.”

So that was Rose's reason for not letting me inside to use the phone; Margot Erickson had probably asked if there were other guests, and when she'd heard my name had asked Rose to keep her presence a secret. But why hadn't I seen Margot's Miata? I pictured the lodge, remembered a small garage to the far left-hand side.

“Dr. Mahoney,” I said, “exactly when did Earl Hopwood come to you for treatment?”

“Saturday morning, around ten.”

“Was it a fresh wound?”

“It had been inflicted shortly beforehand.”

“And he gave you no indication of where he might go next, what he might do?”

“No. He would barely talk to me, except to complain about the loss of the gun.”

“Have you seen him since?”

“I haven't. Saturday evening I became worried about him, so I drove out to Stone Valley to check on him. The cabin was locked up.”

“What was his condition when he left here?”

Mahoney considered. “Fairly good. Earl's a tough old bird.”

I was silent, trying to fit these new facts to those I already possessed.

Mahoney added, “I suppose you'll have to report this to the sheriff. In good conscience, I can't ask you not to.” His pale eyes were troubled, envisioning the problems that would ensue.

I thought of another dedicated and old-fashioned doctor I'd known: the man who had brought me into the world and who, when I was young and unsure where to turn, had talked frankly with me, then written me a prescription for birth-control pills and said it was no business of my parents. He was also the one who made house calls and sat up all night at the hospital with my brother John the time he had the motorcycle accident and my folks were out of town. There are still a few of those rare professionals left—although not nearly as many as we need—who practice medicine for the benefit of the patient rather than for profit. I didn't want to be responsible for their ranks being reduced by one.

So I said, “I don't think it'll be necessary to contact the sheriff.”

Mahoney let me use the phone at his reception desk, and I reached Bart Wallace just as he was about to leave the Hall of Justice for the evening. He groused a little, until I reminded him that I'd relieved him of the burden of cooperating with Mono County on the Erickson homicide; then he gladly looked up what had come back on the checks I'd requested.

“Naturally there's nothing from NCIC,” he told me. “You can't expect speed from the feds. CJIS shows nothing on Hopwood, the Ericksons, or Lionel Ong. But since that's only California, there could have been something out of state. Ripinsky, on the other hand, has a long sheet going back to the early seventies. Should I start at the beginning?”

“Please.”

“Conviction in Bridgeport in seventy-one. The charge”— Wallace chuckled—“was lassoing a streetlight.”

“What?”

“Technically it was D and D. He did thirty days in the county jail and had to pay to replace the light pole.”

“Good Lord. And after that?”

“Nothing until the mid-eighties. Then there's a string of arrests and convictions from L.A. County to Siskiyou, all relating to environmental protests. You want the particulars?”

“Not if there's nothing between seventy-one and then. What about Nickles?”

“Two convictions for soliciting in Sacramento in eighty-four. Not nearly as interesting as Ripinsky. But Sanderman— the one you added as an afterthought—is a piece of work.”

I sat up straighter and reached for my notepad. “Go on.”

“Nineteen eighty-three conviction for industrial espionage. Stole computer plans from his employer in Silicon Valley and sold them to a rival company. Did time in one of those minimum-security facilities where they take their golf clubs.”

“In Sanderman's case, he probably took his PC.”

“Huh?”

“Never mind. Is that it?”

“No. While he was out on bail pending appeal, his wife filed for divorce. Sanderman went after her with a gun. Didn't shoot her, but beat her up pretty bad. She filed charges, then withdrew them—probably in exchange for a more favorable property settlement.”

“Anything else?”

“That's it. You want to give me a number where I can reach you if and when NCIC comes through?”

I doubted the FBI information center would do so by the end of the weekend. “Just call All Souls. If I'm not there, I'll be checking in.”

After I thanked Bart and hung up, I stared at the bare cream-colored wall of the receptionist's cubicle, thinking of the fabricated life story Ned Sanderman had fed me—fed all of us. No wonder he talked so much about himself; by giving out a wealth of false and unimportant details, he could cover the damning ones. And perhaps he had good reason to cover them. Would a man who had sold out his employer also sell out the environmentalists? Would a man who had badly beaten his estranged wife similarly attack another woman?

Mahoney was somewhere behind a closed door at the rear of his office suite. I called out thanks for the use of the phone and headed back to the lodge.

Rose Wittington's Chevy was no longer in its usual parking space, and I found the main building locked. No one answered when I pounded on the door. I went to the garage and tried without success to get inside; it was windowless, so I couldn't check for Margot's Miata. Next I skirted the building and hurried downslope to Sanderman's cabin. Its door stood open, and in the living room I saw his key on the coffee table; a quick pass through the other rooms told me he'd left.

Nothing surprising in that, I thought. The Coalition's need for a man on site here was at an end; Sanderman would deal with the Bureau of Land Management in Sacramento. Still, it was strange that Anne-Marie hadn't known of his plans to leave Vernon, or that Ripinsky hadn't been told.

On the off chance that Sanderman was at the trailer, I drove back into town. When I arrived at the office park I saw that the California poppy banner had been removed from the side of the trailer, and I found its door locked. The banner had been there when I drove past earlier; apparently I'd missed Sanderman by less than an hour.

As I stood on the steps of the trailer, I saw Ripinsky's Morgan drive by and pull into Zelda's parking lot. A glance at my watch told me it was close to four-thirty. People were streaming into the restaurant; Vernon was gearing up for another weekend. With a shock I realized I'd been on the case an entire seven days.

Seven days was long enough, dammit. It was time to separate the truths from the falsehoods, and Ripinsky was a good person to start with.

I left the Land Rover next to the deserted trailer and walked down the highway to Zelda's. Ripinsky sat in the lounge at the same window table where Anne-Marie had waited for me the previous Friday. I elbowed through the crowd around the bar and went over there.

He smiled and stood, pulling out the extra chair. I greeted him curtly. As he was about to speak, a waitress came up with two beers. After she'd gone he said, “You have a bad afternoon?”

“Why do you ask that?”

“Because you've got two nasty little lines right here.” He touched his finger to the bridge of my nose.

I jerked my head away, scowling harder. “Never mind that. What I want from you is straight talk, for a change.”

Now he frowned. Sipped at his beer and waited.

“What's the connection between you, Alvin Knight, and Lionel Ong?”

“Connection? Ong's CEO of Transpacific. Knight … that's their supervising geologist, right?”

“I don't have to tell you who he is.”

“I'd forgotten for a minute there. What's this about a connection between him and me?”

“Cut the crap, Hy.”

“McCone, I don't know what you're talking about. I met the fellow once, up at the mine site when I was being given a tour by a Transpacific PR guy. I haven't seen or heard from him since.”

“You spoke with him on the phone Wednesday evening, about six-thirty. I know because I was at Knight's house listening in on his extension. Knight was looking for Ong. You said you didn't know where he was, but that you'd have him return the call if he showed up here.”

“McCone, you been smoking something you shouldn't?”

I leaned across the table, keeping my voice low with an effort. “Don't try to make a joke of this. Why did Knight call you?”

He saw how serious I was and regarded me for a few seconds through narrowed eyes. “Wednesday, six-thirty,” he said, “I was at the Coalition trailer.” Then comprehension spread across his face. “So that's who Al is.”

I waited, eyebrows raised.

“I don't know where Lionel Ong enters into this, but here's what happened. I'd been there all afternoon fielding calls for Ned, who hadn't bothered to inform anyone where he was or what he was doing. Anne-Marie had just stopped by to see if I wanted to go get some dinner, and she answered the phone. It was for Ned again. She said she'd seen him on the weekend and thought he might be back soon, but maybe I knew something more specific, and then she handed the receiver to me. The guy—Al—was real insistent, said it was urgent, but I couldn't tell him anything more than Anne-Marie had. He asked me to have Ned call him, and I said I would.”

I reviewed the portion of the conversation I'd heard:
He must have told you something…. No. He should have, but he didn't…
.
But she said she saw him
—
Look, I'm sorry but I can't help you. I wish I knew when he'd get here, too.

It could fit either scenario, but I had to admit Ripinsky's was by far the more convincing—and he had Anne-Marie to back it up.

Hy was watching me. After a moment he signaled to the waitress. “You going to drink that or what?” he asked, pointing to the beer in front of me.

I shook my head in confusion, trying to readjust my thinking to what he'd just told me.

“You want something else instead?”

“White wine, please.”

“Done.” He moved my untouched beer to his side of the table and ordered the wine.

I turned my face away from his probing gaze and stared out the window at the lake. Twilight was coming on; long fingers of shadow reached over the water. Birds homed in on the graying tufa towers.

Lord knew it wasn't the first time I'd jumped to an unwarranted conclusion about a principal in a case, but this one now struck me as particularly hasty and somewhat paranoid. It seemed as if I had
wanted
to suspect Hy, had actually hoped to find him guilty of collusion with Transpacific. Why?

To provide a buffer between myself and this man to whom I felt strongly drawn? To remove from my life someone to whom I connected in a very basic way? Hy understood the darker side of me, the one I'd never dared reveal to George. Understood it, and neither approved nor disapproved. Accepted my violent urges and dangerous impulses because at some time in his past he had been a victim of the same.

It was frightening to feel that kinship with him. It might upset—no, forever destroy—my newly found and comfortable status quo.

When the waitress set the wineglass in front of me, I turned back to Hy. My eyes, I knew, were troubled, and apparently they told him more of what I was thinking than I would willingly have imparted. He covered my hand with his and said, “It's okay, McCone.”

“No, it's not.”

“Don't worry about it. We'll start over, from here on out. Deal?”

“Deal.” I raised my glass and we drank solemnly.

“All right,” I said, setting the glass down. “Knight tried to contact Ong. He wasn't able to, because Ong had disappeared, so he called Ned. That means it's Ned who's involved—”

“Wait a minute.” Hy took his hand from mine and held it up. “Ong has disappeared?”

“Yes, either abducted or ...oh.” I stopped, confused again. “I haven't told you any of this.”

“No, you've done a pretty good job of putting me off, and now I understand why.”