Empty Mile (15 page)

Millicent smiled patiently at me. “Does any of that help? A couple of months after his first visit your father came back by himself and asked to read the journal again and then, not long after that, he and his friend showed up to dig some fence post holes.”

“I didn’t see a fence. Where did they dig?”

“Down in the trees at the bottom of the meadow. Made such a racket I went down to have a look. They had this thing like a big corkscrew with a gasoline engine that they held between them. Bored right into the ground. Looked like a crazy place to do it, right in the trees. I don’t know how they thought they were going to string wire through all that brush. But then, your father didn’t look too much like the practical type, and I don’t think they drilled more than a handful of holes anyhow.”

“When was this?”

“Three or four months ago.”

“And you don’t know who this friend was? You didn’t hear a name?”

“No. He was a redhead, the sandy type. Tall, thin.”

I took my cell phone out and brought up the photo Gareth had insisted I take of him. Millicent nodded.

“Yes, that’s him.”

“My father didn’t buy the place until a month ago. Why would he be digging fence holes on land he didn’t own?”

“Perhaps he was getting a jump on things.”

“Who owned the land before?”

“I don’t know.”

“Can you show me where the holes are?”

Millicent went to the front door, pushed open the screen, and pointed to a spot in the trees at the bottom of the meadow.

“Go straight in from there, you should find them.”

I thanked her and walked down across the meadow.

The first hole I found was about twenty yards in from the start of the trees and I’d seen it before. It was the hole my father had stood pondering over the day he brought Stan and me to Empty Mile for the first time. By walking parallel to the meadow from this point I found two others.

Although I’d never put up a fence I guessed the holes were about the right diameter but everything else about them looked wrong. They were too widely spaced, at least twenty-five feet between each, and they seemed overly deep, they went down about four feet. And what was the logic of erecting a fence on uncleared land?

I left the belt of trees and walked back up the slope to take a look at the log cabin. It was reasonably large for that type of building and had three bedrooms. Through the window of one of these I saw Stan and Rosie. They were standing in the middle of an empty room. She had her arms around him and their faces were pressed together, kissing.

I knocked on the door of the cabin and waited. A few seconds later Stan and Rosie came out and I told him I had errands to run and that he could stay at Empty Mile while I took care of them if he wanted.

From Millicent’s place I drove straight to Tunney Lake. Marla and I had reached an unspoken agreement to act as though the night with Jeremy Tripp had never happened, but that didn’t mean I had the same agreement with Gareth.

He was sweeping the steps to one of the cabins when I pulled into the parking lot. He looked up from his broom as I approached.

“You took your time. I thought you’d be back last night.”

“She told me what you have on her.”

“Mmm … busted for hooking. Nasty.”

“You prick. Why would you do something like that?”

“Um … money?”

“You’ve got the other girls for that.”

“Johnny, I want to be friends with you. This thing with Marla, it’s between me and her. It’s part of our history.”

“You haven’t lived with her for ten years.”

“You’re pretty self-focused, you know that? So what if it’s been ten years? She took my fucking future. I mean, honestly, Johnny, can you blame me if sometimes I feel like treating her like a cunt?”

Gareth took a deep breath, sighed it out, and steadied himself.

“Look, you’ve been away a long time. And while you were away our lives went on without you, and maybe they got a bit twisted, I admit it. I know I shouldn’t still hate her so much, but sometimes … I don’t know, I just get fixated.”

“Blackmailing someone into prostitution is beyond fixated.”

“She was hooking on her own way before I ever got involved.”

“What difference does that make?”

For a moment I thought Gareth was going to puff himself up again but he nodded and seemed to let go of something.

“Okay, you and Marla are obviously back together. I wasn’t sure before, but things are different now, I can see that. You shouldn’t have your lover being forced to do other men. I actually thought about it a lot after you left and you’re right, it can’t go on.”

“So you’re saying, what?”

“I’ll leave her alone. Call it my gift to you. I won’t make her do it again. I promise.”

I wasn’t really sure what to say to this. I’d expected a prolonged argument, a screaming match, even a brawl. His about-face took the wind out me and I stood there just looking at him for a moment. Gareth laughed.

“Dude! I’m not a complete shit. What do you think, I’m going to be this evil force forever fucking up your life? Like every day it’s gonna be,
Sorry, Johnny, but Marla’s got to work tonight?
Come on!”

“He made me watch.”

“You watched? Oh, man, I’m really sorry. That must have been shitty. I had no idea that would happen. Look, I’m finished here. You want to hang around and have a beer?”

What I wanted was to meet up with Marla and tell her how I’d convinced Gareth to set her free. But for Marla’s sake, keeping Gareth friendly seemed like the smarter choice right then, so I said yes to the beer.

Gareth got the drinks from the kitchen in the bungalow and led me out to the barn. David, his father, was seated in his wheelchair in the far corner working on something with a drill press. He waved distractedly as we came in and kept on working. We sat in the large open doorway, facing back toward the house. At intervals, behind us, David’s drill whined against metal.

Gareth nudged me and made his eyes wide. “Hey, you hear about Patricia Prentice?”

“Stan and I were the ones who found her.”

“Really? Holy shit!”

“Stan was delivering some potted plants.”

“What’d she look like?

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know. Was she wearing clothes? Was it, like, a total mess?”

“She looked dead, Gareth, okay? Just dead.”

Gareth held up his hands. “Dude, just asking.”

“Well, fuck …”

“Okay, okay …” Gareth leaned forward and dropped his voice. “I’m glad you came up today, Johnny. I need someone to talk to. Something’s going on between that asshole Marla did last night and Vivian.”

“Jeremy Tripp?”

“Yeah.”

I knew damn well there was something going on—I’d caught her coming out of his shower—but there was no way I was going to get mixed up in it. Gareth shook his head sadly.

“I go around to see her and she’s coming back across the road from his place. I call her on her cell and she doesn’t answer, or she’s around there practicing archery. Archery, for fucksake! I mean, Jesus, man, I love her.”

He took a gulp of his beer.

“I can’t believe it, you know? Two women in my life, the only two relationships that have ever meant anything, and both of them turn to shit.”

“Why would Tripp pay for Marla if he’s seeing Vivian?”

Gareth shrugged. “He’s rich. Fuck, all I need is a little time to turn this place around, to get some decent money together, and I’d be able to keep her. I know I would.”

He looked away and cleared his throat, then changed the subject.

“How are you doing about your dad anyway?”

“We’re coping.”

“When I read the paper I felt bad. Ray was a neat guy. We got to be pretty good friends.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, about a year ago I was panning up near Malakoff and he was there too, on the same stretch of river. We started talking, we had the gold thing in common and I was your old buddy so we got along pretty good.”

“Oh? He never said.”

“Yeah, we used to meet up and go panning. Or we’d go to Elephant Society meetings together. I tell you, I was freaked when he disappeared. The cops didn’t find anything?”

“No. But I wanted to ask you something. Did you ever go out with him when he was working? When he was doing his real estate thing?”

“No.”

“Not outside Oakridge, ever? Looking for properties to market?”

“Why would I?”

“I was out at a place called Empty Mile. The woman who lives there said that when my father came out to try and get her to put it on the market he had someone with him.”

Gareth frowned and shook his head, then suddenly his face brightened. “Oh yeah! I know what you’re talking about. My Jeep broke down coming back from Burton. Ray was passing and gave me a ride, but first he had to go someplace for business. Empty Mile. But I wasn’t
working
with him, dude.”

“Did he have a particular interest in that land?”

“I don’t know. The woman didn’t want to sell, I remember that.”

“I mean the land below her house.”

“I don’t think so, it’s just a patch of land.”

“Did you know he ended up buying it? For himself.”

“Yeah, I heard something about that.”

“The woman said you were interested in a journal she had.”

“Oh yeah, that. It was really interesting. We both spent, like, an hour reading it. Do you think you’ll sell the land, after Ray’s will and everything gets sorted?”

“I could sell it now if I wanted, he put it in my name before he disappeared.”

“Really? How come?”

“Some tax dodge.”

“Interesting … You know, me and Dad have been thinking about getting a piece of land, something for the future. Maybe we could work something out.”

“You want to buy Empty Mile?”

“If you’re selling, why not? I’ve seen it, it’s just the kind of thing we’d be interested in.”

“I thought you guys were broke.”

“We are, but I could still raise the money on the equity we have in this place.”

“I’m not planning to sell.”

He looked disappointed. “Okay, promise me one thing. If you change your mind, give me first crack at it, okay? I’ll pay market value, I’m not asking for a discount or anything.”

After we’d had another beer, Gareth walked me out to my truck. As I got into it I remembered something. “What were the holes for?”

“What holes?”

“The ones you drilled with my father at Empty Mile.”

“Fence posts.”

“Really?”

“That’s what Ray said.”

“But they’re too deep. And they’re right in the middle of the trees.”

“Dude, I was just labor. Your father wanted a hand, he said they were for fence posts. Who gives a fuck? Remember what I said about selling.”

He turned and walked back into the bungalow. I drove to Empty Mile and picked Stan up and we headed to the warehouse for our appointment with what we hoped would be a new customer for Plantasaurus.

There was a high-sided rental van parked at the junction of the garden center driveway and the Oakridge Loop. Its engine wasn’t running and I got the feeling that it had been there for a while. There was someone in the cab but the light was such that I couldn’t make out more than a dim shape behind the wheel.

Stan and I passed it and went on up the driveway. We opened the warehouse and, as we had a little time before our prospective customer was due, Stan turned on the hose and started watering. We’d received our first shipment from the Sacramento wholesaler ten days before and it felt good to stand there and look at the plants, at the different greens of their leaves, shining under the spray of water, knowing that this miniature forest of trees and potted shrubs was ours, that we were in business and this was
our
stock.

When the watering was done we took several sample displays outside and placed them along the front of the warehouse. As we finished positioning the last of them a champagne Mercedes SUV pulled in from the road, crunched up the drive, and parked in front of us. Three well-dressed women got out, one of them was the customer we’d been waiting for—the owner of an expensive clothing boutique in Old Town. Her name was Cloris and she wanted plants for both her store and her house on the Slopes. The women gathered in front of the displays.

We all said hello and Cloris introduced her friends as fellow Slopes-dwellers who’d come along because they were interested in displays for their homes. Stan managed to shoot me a quick look without anyone seeing and I knew if he’d been able to get away with it he’d have made the sound of a cash register. I left it to him to explain about the various types of plants we used and the other options that were available if they didn’t like what they saw today. The women nodded and made approving noises.

While Stan was speaking I heard an engine start a little way off and half a minute later the van that had been parked at the side of the road raced noisily up the drive and slid to a stop behind the Mercedes. The women turned in surprise. Stan stopped his spiel and looked uncertainly at me.

Jeremy Tripp climbed out of the van and walked calmly around to the double doors at the rear of the vehicle. He paused there and nodded to the women.

Stan lifted his hand timidly. “Hello, Mr. Tripp.”

Tripp ignored him and addressed the women. “You might want to look at this before you waste your money.”

He opened the back of the van and began hauling out the planters we had installed in his house. He handled them with quick angry movements and let them fall heavily on the ground. When he was done he put his foot against one of the tub planters and tipped it over. The Yucca it contained broke rottenly, its trunk opening to show a center of soggy pulp. Its leaves, too, had shriveled from their usual tough greenness and were now empty skin, wet and darkly discolored. The other plants were the same, all blasted and dark and dead.

“Great service, guys.”

The women made small, anxious comments to each other as they tried to figure out what was going on. Stan stammered that something must have gone wrong, that the plants must have caught a disease, that we would replace them immediately …

Tripp snorted in disgust and climbed back into his van. Before he closed the door he paused and took a long look around the garden center land.