Fugitive Nights(22)
"Why doesn't his choice of role models surprise me?" the sergeant said to nobody.
After a pause, Nelson said, "I guess you're right. He's back in Mexico by now. I'll forget all about it and go back out on patrol."
The sergeant made a note to check up on the carrot-top cop who the lieutenant said was more dangerous than body fluid in a whorehouse, and about as controllable as a feral cat. But the sergeant got totally distracted when his wife called to announce that her Tupperware hostess had gotten the flu and the shindig was being moved to their own house.
The sergeant had to run to the store and buy some onion dip and Fritos while Nelson Hareem went rocketing down the highway toward the vicinity of Painted Canyon.
Lynn Cutter had left all the fancy stliff in the trunk of his car: Breda Burrows' commercial-grade video camera with the twelve-to-one zoom and her 35 mm for still photos. It was all useless on this caper. He'd draped the binocular strap around his neck because it was about all he could manage if he was going to tail Clive Devon and a woman and a dog into the desert.
The Range Rover had kicked up dust on the road leading into Painted Canyon, helping to obscure Lynn's Rambler, but he thought he was going to have to abandon the tail when they got close to the canyon itself. He was lucky. There happened to be a van full of kids also driving into the canyon, so he was able to drop in behind them. Also, there were some nature lovers in a big Winnebago RV, setting up day camp farther down on the road that penetrated the twisting canyon walls.
A few other nature lovers had found a few early specimens of dune primrose and were photographing the delicate white blossoms. Three kids of college age were hiking alongside the mouth of the canyon, gingerly examining the joints of a jumping cholla cactus whose nearly invisible barbs can penetrate flesh like sewing needles, and yet provide a nesting place for cactus wrens. The Range Rover stopped two hundred yards ahead, and Lynn parked beside the larger group of ecos who'd fanned out near the canyon mouth. His car didn't look particularly conspicuous next to theirs.
The Painted Canyon cliff face looked as though a huge can of watercolor paint had spilled over it. Burgundy hill formations abutted persimmon hills, next to chocolate hills, next to sandalwood hills. There were clumps of puffy blue-gray smoke trees on the desert floor, and the clean dry desert was in his nostrils and in his mouth as he panted to keep up with the hikers. His goddamn knees were killing him! He stopped, unlaced his shoes, and dumped sand.
Lynn was startled by a roadrunner scampering past with topknot trailing. The bird seemed to be slowed by a full tummy, perhaps from attacking and consuming a sidewinder. Lynn could never make much of a case for the rattlers.
Once when he'd been part of a team of cops looking for the remains of a dope dealer who'd welshed on a deal with the wrong buyer, he had occasion to roam the canyons of south Palm Springs where he'd encountered a gunnysack hanging from a green-barked paloverde tree. Lynn had been about to open the sack when an old desert rat appeared from nowhere yelling at Lynn to keep his damn hands off his goods. The sack, Lynn later discovered, contained a dozen speckled rattlers! The desert rat told him that he expected to get pretty nice bucks when he sold the snakes to makers of antivenin.
In twenty minutes, Clive Devon, along with the young woman and the dog, hiked into a narrow canyon where ancient earthquakes, followed by centuries of erosion, had honeycombed the Cenozoic cliffs into tormented ghostly shapes. Furrows and chiseled gashes in the rock added ominous shade. Even the early spring flora contributed to the spookiness of that shadow-shrouded canyon. The crooked fingers of the ocotillo plant writhed spidery in the wind that moaned ceaselessly, echoing off the canyon walls.
Lynn crouched behind a dune, next to a beaver tail cactus that would soon have a lovely magenta blossom guarded by punishing spines. The sand was blowing in Lynn's face and his sunglasses weren't keeping all of it out of his eyes. He wiped his face on his shoulder.
When he looked up through the binoculars, he saw that the picnickers were standing beside an ironwood tree. The dog wagged its tail but didn't approach a man who stood on the other side of the tree. The girl stayed a few steps back with the dog, but Clive Devon advanced and spoke to the man for several minutes. They all turned then and began moseying back the way they'd come, back in the direction of Lynn Cutter.
And the man came with them, back to the Range Rover, while Lynn had to retreat to his Rambler. The man wore a baseball cap and a dark windbreaker, so Lynn thought he might be the same man he'd seen at the cafe buying a newspaper. The man was now carrying a red bag.
Chapter 6
By the time the Range Rover was returning to the cafe by the Salton Sea, the wrecked Ford was long gone, and the half-hearted search for a bald hitchhiker had petered out. Because the bald man had asked directions to Palm Springs the detectives had alerted the other police agencies in the valley, even though they figured the guy was headed home to Mexico.