Hollywood Hills (28 page)

"What's that for?" Raleigh asked.

"I want good lighting in that dark corridor when I do the switch," Niegel said. Then he handed the floodlight and light stand to Raleigh and said, "Take all of this inside. I'll carry the pictures."

While Raleigh was walking into the house, Nigel closed the door of the van and picked up the photo reproductions.

After they carried everything across the Mexican-tile floor in the foyer, Nigel rested the blanket-covered pictures against a wall and said, "I could use a cold drink. Get me a Perrier, will you?"

With an edge to his voice, Raleigh said, "You'll settle for another brand if I can't find Perrier, won't you?"

"Yes, yes," Nigel said with a dismissive toss of his head. "Any mineral water will do."

"Does it have to be carbonated?"

"For heaven's sake, Raleigh, no! It need not be carbonated."

Raleigh left Nigel to his work and walked into the butler's pantry, muttering. He scooped a few little cubes from the ice maker into a tumbler and filled it with water from the faucet.

When he came back, Nigel was adjusting the floodlight, and he took the glass, drank half of it, and said, "Thanks. I was thirsty."

Raleigh said, "That's Vichy Catalan mineral water. I hope it's okay."

"Yes, perfect," Nigel said. "Put these on." He removed a pair of latex gloves from the back pocket of his coveralls and gave them to Raleigh. Pulling a second pair onto his own graceful hands, he said, "Now, carefully remove a blanket from one of my pictures and spread the blanket on the tile floor. Be very careful in handling them."

Raleigh obeyed while Nigel got the floodlight shining down onto the mover's blanket that Raleigh had spread. Then Nigel carefully removed The Woman by the Water from its place on the wall and, carrying the painting to the blanket, placed it facedown.

"Bring me my toolbox," he said to Raleigh.

Raleigh did as he was told and was putting the toolbox on the floor next to Nigel just as the house phone rang.

"Is that the gate?" Nigel asked.

"No, the gate has a special ring," Raleigh said, and he ran to the kitchen to answer it.

When he picked it up, he heard the grating voice of Rudy Ressler, who said, "Raleigh? This is Mr
. R
essler. We got back last night fro
m a
couple of days in Rome and were so tired we crashed. I just got up to go to the bathroom and noticed your voice mail. What's up?"

Raleigh said, "Mr
. R
essler, I'm sorry to say that Mr. Brueger has had a minor stroke. At least I think it's minor. He's in Cedars-Sinai. I wanted Mrs. Brueger to know right away."

The line was quiet for a moment and then the director said, "Leona's dead to the world. It's three o'clock in the morning here. I'll tell her when we get up. I gotta go back to bed now. This whole scene over here is supposed to be restful, but don't believe it. Every fucking thing that could go wrong with this villa has gone wrong. I'll call you when we get outta bed."

"Okay, Mr. Ressler," Raleigh said. "When you tell Mrs. Brueger about it, please say that there's no cause for alarm. I'm sure he'll be fine. He's a tough old man."

"Yeah, okay, Raleigh," the director said. "I'll call you in a few hours."

Raleigh hung up and returned to the foyer, where Nigel Wickland had The Woman by the Water removed from the frame and leaning against the wall under the light stand.

"That was Rudy Ressler," Raleigh said. "They've been away from the villa for a couple of days. I told him about Mr. Brueger." Nigel stopped working. "And?"

"He said he'd talk to Mrs. Brueger when they get up in the morning and then get back to me."

"Did you tell him it wasn't serious?" Nigel asked petulantly.

"Yes, I told him," Raleigh said, thinking he'd give a sizable piece of his share of the money just to never see this bastard again or hear his flutey voice.

Next, Nigel took down Flowers on the Hillside and carefully placed the framed painting on the mover's blanket. He began painstakingly removing the fasteners from the stretcher bars while Raleigh looked at his watch. That exercise took nearly fifteen minutes. This wasn't supposed to be such a lengthy ordeal.

When Nigel was finished, he gingerly lifted the smaller painting from the frame, brushed some dust and wood residue from the edges of the canvas, and leaned it against the wall by the larger painting.

"That's a million dollars resting against the wall, Raleigh," Nigel said.

Raleigh looked at him, at his narrow patrician nose looking as though it wanted to sniff the paintings like a dog. The man was actually leering. His greed had completely overcome any normal fear factor. And that made Raleigh Dibble even more frightened of this entire goddamn scheme.

Megan Burke was feeling better now that the watsons had kicked in. At least the pain in her knees and other joints had diminished. They had almost attempted entry at five separate houses, but each time something had happened. At one of them, the Hispanic housekeeper answered the door after they were positive that nobody was at home, just as Jonas was ready to attempt entry through a window. At another one, a newspaper in the driveway convinced Jonas that the residents were at work, but then a yappy dog ran out, and Jonas dashed back to their car and said, "Fucking dogs! I wish all the goddamn bucket heads in this town would eat them like they do in their fucked-up countries. You don't see dogs running all over the yards in China, I bet."

Something happened to frustrate Jonas at every residence that looked likely. Megan was afraid the pain would return and she was thirsty and tired. She'd always liked the sky over Hollywood at twilight, and there was a beautiful sky up there now, with red and gold and violet splashing across the heavens as the sun was sinking into the Pacific Ocean. Back when she felt healthy and hopeful, she'd had a fantasy of trying to paint the twilight sky over Hollywood. That seemed like a lifetime ago, back when she felt healthy and hopeful.

Jonas parked for a moment off Woodrow Wilson Drive near Mulholland and said, "Let's cruise a little ways down and have a look at that big place again."

"What big place?" Megan asked.

"The Spanish-style place with the wall around it and the big house with a guesthouse? That one. Remember we peeked through the trees at it?"

"We've looked at so many, I don't remember," Megan said.

"All you gotta do is trust me," Jonas said. "I got a memory like a rhinoceros."

"A rhinoceros," she muttered. "Oh, god!"

Chapter
Eighteen.

THE MIDWATCH ROLL call was a bit subdued at first. It was always that way after an officer had been hurt. Although Snuffy Salcedo had not been seriously injured, he had gone through surgery that morning at the hands of a plastic surgeon who came recommended by the specialists at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. Hollywood Nate Weiss, who had not gotten much sleep after the incident at Goth House and the interrogation by Force Investigation Division, talked to Snuffy on the phone before coming to work. Snuffy had taken full responsibility for the "unintentional" baton blow to the face of the colossus as well as all other "unintentional" head strikes. And because baton head strikes generated nearly as much paperwork as officer-involved shootings in the closely monitored LAPD, he was officially removed from the field until FID was satisfied and a shrink from BSS as well as the bureau chief gave the okay for his return. And that was just fine with Snuffy, who needed time off to recuperate. He told Nate that his injuries made him look like a raccoon that got mauled by a grizzly.

It had always been a matter of pride in a warrior culture to quickly return to duty after a battle, but Jetsam had to take a few sick days. He had been stricken with a muscle spasm in his neck that began when he was being questioned by FID and got worse after he went home to his apartment and tumbled into bed. Whe
n h
e woke up at 2 P
. M
. the next afternoon, he could not turn his head without great pain and had to see a doctor.

The remaining combatants sitting at roll call, Hollywood Nate and Flotsam, had suffered hematomas, contusions, abrasions, with even a couple of lacerations--the whole ball of bash --and their movements were slow and painful, but each cop was serviceable. Oddly enough, the only one with a genuine black eye was Britney Small, who sat next to Della Ravelle at roll call wearing a black eye patch for laughs, but she took it off when all the cops begged to see her shiner and wanted cell phone photos.

Sergeant Murillo had to change the lineup and team Hollywood Nate with Flotsam in 6-X-32, since they were both missing a partner, and before dismissing roll call, he said to them, "If any citizens ask why you both have bumps and bruises, explain that they came from fighting a bad guy. We have enough of a PR problem around here without people thinking we're lumping up each other nowadays."

As all the troops touched the photo of the Oracle before leaving the roll call room, Hollywood Nate Weiss wondered if maybe Snuffy Salcedo had failed to touch the picture yesterday. He couldn't remember seeing him do it.

Twenty-five minutes after roll call ended and the midwatch was on the streets, Jonas Claymore, accompanied by Megan Burke, made a rolling stop on his way to a last pass up into the Hollywood Hills before darkness. So far, it had been another fruitless search for a residence to burgle. Jonas heard the toot of a horn behind him and looked in the mirror to see a black-and-white with lights oscillating.

Georgie Adams was driving, with Viv Daley riding shotgun in 6-X-76, and they had just responded to a call far from their beat. They were up north in 6-A-15's area and complaining about it when they spotted the VW bug roll through the stop sign. They pulled over the old Volkswagen on Mulholland Drive.

"You're up," Georgie said, and Viv grabbed her citation book.

Jonas said to Megan, "Can anything more happen to me this fucking month?"

Megan was trying to massage her knees and said, "Jonas, I'm in pain. We've got to at least get some norcos or perks."

Viv approached on the driver's side and said, "Your license and registration, sir."

Jonas took the registration from the glove box and handed it to Viv along with his driver's license, saying, "Look, Officer, I'm outta work and we're hurrying to a job opportunity in the Hills. Some rich people need a handyman around the house. See, we got a sick five-month-old baby at home and this job is important. Can't you give us a break?"

"Is this lady your wife?" Viv asked.

"Yeah, my wife," Jonas said, but amended it. "Well, we're not officially married, but now that our baby's here, we're gonna take care of that."

Jonas Claymore could not have known that he had exactly the right officer from Hollywood Station at this time to be telling about an infant in need, and Viv Daley said to Megan, "Who's taking care of your sick baby?"

Megan Burke's pain threshold had been reached, and she turned her welling eyes to the cop and said, "My ... my mom!" And the tears spilled down her face.

"Okay," Viv said, handing Jonas Claymore's license and registration back to him. "Make complete stops. You don't want your baby growing up an orphan."

"God bless you, Officer," Jonas said.

When Viv and Georgie got back in the car, he said, "They looked like tweakers."

"Gypsy, you're a cynic," Viv said.

"Didn't they look like dopers to you?"

"They certainly did," she said.

"So why'd you kick them?"

"I thought maybe they were telling the truth about a sick baby at home."

Georgie Adams didn't say any more about it. They didn't talk about infants in need.

After Jonas started driving again, he said, "That was fucking fantastic the way you turned on the water! You even had me believing it."

"I wasn't acting, Jonas," Megan said. "I'm hurting."

"You gotta man-up," Jonas said. "We got work to do." "I can't," Megan said. "I feel like I'm dying."

He looked at her closely then and pulled to the side of the road. He said, "As soon as we get a stake, you're going to rehab. Here, get your watsons on." And he reached in the pocket of his jeans and took out two Vicodins that he'd been keeping for an emergency. She snatched them from his hand, popped them in her mouth, and chewed them up.

Nigel had the poster-board photograph of The Woman by the Water nailed snugly in place, and it fit even more perfectly than he had hoped. He lifted the baroque frame under the floodlight and said, "I am a genius!"

"I'll try to always remember that," Raleigh said.

Nigel carefully hung the frame with the poster-board impostor in it, stood back, adjusted it on its hanger, stood back again, and said, "Could you tell the difference between this and the original under normal lighting? That is, if you were someone who seldom studied this piece or any of the other art that you own? Simply put, if you were silly Leona Brueger or her idiot boyfriend?"

"I have to say, you did a great job," Raleigh said grudgingly.

"Okay, now we do the second one and we're finished," Nigel said. "Could you get me another glass of that refreshing Vichy water?"