Love Story: In The Web of Life (15 page)

Looking away from the mountains toward the
Sierras, we could see the clouds were broken and spotty sunlight
was illuminating patches of desert. As the clouds moved, the desert
seemed engulfed by waves of light and dark.

"Why is this here?" asked Tina.

"I have told you about the great, greed-driven
dreams for California City up north from here. This ruin is an
earlier version of that. Almost a century ago, there was
socialist-utopian-driven dream of building a planned city here. The
logic of the idea was great, there was more rainfall then, so
farming was possible. But, some of the movement joiners were not
driven to do their share of the labor, and others were not driven
to share their wives. The colony fell apart in a few years. Way
down there, at the bottom of this ridge, there are still some olive
trees, which have survived from that era."

Tina observed, "One has to be careful of what
dreams one buys into, especially if they are based on greed, or
something-for-nothing, or other men's wives. In spite of all that,
the energy at this spot is really good. Must be happy cow
energy."

She glanced at me, apparently thinking she had
gone somewhere she shouldn't with me.

"You are right," I replied.

Tina looked surprised and said, "I thought you
didn't believe in energies and things like that."

"It doesn't bother me now. There can be a
shortcut is space-time to when there were happy people and happy
cows here."

"I am sorry I didn't pack any milk to drink. We
will only have coffee today," said Tina as she started to unpack
the picnic basket. She gave me a mysterious smile I did not
understand as she took off her down jacket.

Today, she had a different table setting. The
tablecloth was blue and white checked and the plastic plates were
white. The tumblers were stainless steel and said Starbucks on the
side. She set out a crystal dish of olives, celery, small tomatoes,
and radishes. She unwrapped sandwiches.

"I was thinking as we drove up here that I
could write a narrative of the wave flight, all the turbulence, and
then the beauty, and the potential danger lurking a few feet away,
and then some more turbulence, and a glide to a smooth landing.
Then I could give it to my high school students and ask them to use
that as a metaphor to write a story about people interacting, teen
age dating, ups and downs, for example."

I continued the thought. "I had never thought
about wave flying as a metaphor. I have certainly had some
turbulent relationships, though.

"Lately, my life hasn't been ups and downs so
much. It is more like the overcast clouds of my life are unzipping,
exposing a whole new blue sky of something I don't understand, and
need to explore."

Without saying anything, Tina reached in the
picnic basket, pulled out a magic marker and a napkin and wrote
something on it. She pushed it across the table to me, put her chin
on her hand, and looked at me with her impish grin. On the paper
was a big "A+."

"Thanks," I said. "Oh, I almost forgot to
mention, I had a premonition that proved to be true today. Before I
went to check on my sailplane trailer, I had a great feeling of
uneasiness and had a visualization of seeing something scratched in
the ground at my trailer. When I got there, I did see something
that alarmed me, a mystical symbol scratched in the ground. That
same symbol appeared on the windshield of one of my key witnesses
car while she was in my office. Colson is having their security
consultants check it out."

"Premonition, ok, extra credit for that," She
said nodding and adding raised eyebrows to her grin.

"I love the desert," she added. "This has been
a wonderful day. I do have to be back early tonight because
tomorrow I have to correct papers and do grades. Maybe we should
stop by your desert mobile home to let me freshen up."

She grinned mischievously and added, "Do you
have any Snickers bars there?"

I felt that mysterious energy around my heart
again.

****

Monday, as I entered my office, Zaza greeted me
with a slight smile and said, "He has that look about him again.
The desert flowers must be in bloom. Weekends, it must be Flopsy.
No! I can't keep track. Flowers in order?"

I ignored her and said, "I am going to go to
Rocky Butte for a court date on Thursday at nine o'clock, and to
see Steve Manteo. Make me reservations for me to fly to Sacramento
on Wednesday, getting there in the morning if possible. Get me a
car, and make a reservation at some motel in Rocky Butte for one
night. I'll be in court there on Thursday morning, and I'll drive
out to see Steve in the afternoon. I'll play it by ear about where
I'll stay Thursday night. Get me a flight back to LA in the early
morning on Friday."

"Got it!" she replied. "Dore Hamilton is coming
in tomorrow morning at nine, only for a half hour she said. She
doesn't want a formal progress report. She said she wanted to
discuss some security issues about the trial."

I spent the day in the office.

****

The next morning Zaza buzzed me and said, "Dore
Hamilton just arrived and is in the conference room."

I put on my coat and hurried to the conference
room, getting there as Carolyn was showing her in.

"Good morning Dave," said Dore as she thrust
her hand out for a handshake. "How is the trial preparation going?
Are you getting comfortable with the subject?"

Dore was wearing a navy blue business suit with
a scarlet scarf tied loosely around her neck. She was giving me her
icy stare and I knew I was being 'read.' In a few seconds her face
relaxed and seemed friendly.

"Good to see you, Dore" I replied. "I am now
quite comfortable with these new ideas. Dr. Montgomery was very
helpful. I have a court date in Rocky Butte Thursday and I'll see
Steve Manteo that evening and stay over as required."

Dore was giving me one of her highly practiced
professional smiles. "We can talk about that later. I'm sure you
have it under control. I think we have some security issues we need
to address. Our security consultants have been talking to your
office security and have done some further investigations. It
appears the trial has attracted the attention of a group of people
we should be careful of. They call themselves Skeptemos, and claim
to be part of a secret organization that has existed since the
Renaissance. Their role is to stamp out bad science, which they
define as anything but Newtonian science. They especially like to
go after anything of a psychic nature.

"There are legitimate organizations, scientific
offshoots, of otherwise reputable people that make it their
business to debunk all psychic phenomena. These are not the same
guys.

"Skeptemos seems to be more like the guys that
get totally involved with online video games and that go to game
conventions dressed as game characters, wearing tights or capes.
From our reports, Skeptemos people seem to believe that there is a
conspiracy to destroy Science so that evil people can take over the
world with superstition and fear. They feel called-on to save the
world. The 'secret' order doesn't seem to have been in existence
for more than a few years.

"We traced the tracking device on your car to a
person who has a website that touts some of the Skeptemos line. He
is a retired Special Forces enlisted man. He fits the description
of the man Dr. Montgomery saw near her car. He could be
dangerous.

"Our security firm suggests that we rent a
place outside Rocky Butte for the duration of our business up
there. Then, we can have people come and go without notice and not
stir the locals up. An isolated place would make the security
easier. I'll take care of the arrangements."

I replied, "Somehow that doesn't cause me much
concern, but I'll defer to your judgment. I am going up there next
week for court date and to visit Steve Manteo. I am going to hang
around town a little bit to get a feel for the place. I understand
about small towns like Rocky Butte. I was raised in a small logging
town in northern California. Everyone knows what everyone else is
doing and the rumor hotline is faster that the speed of light. It
might be wise to secretly put a local on the security payroll,
someone who would know about all the rumors, and someone who can
tell you about strangers that might be spending time
there."

"I'll suggest that. Now, I have to get
going."

I walked Dore to the lobby, shook hands and
said, "Thank you for selecting Bracken and Stevens to represent you
in this matter. This is a good change of subject to me and I am
quite excited about it."

Dore looked at me without blinking (I was being
'read' again) and then smiled her professional smile and said, "We
are very pleased with our selection."

I walked her to the elevator and said goodbye.
As I walked back into the lobby, Carolyn gave me her 'You are such
a wonderful man' smile.

****

Chapter Five

ROCKY
BUTTE

I drove into Rocky Butte late on Wednesday
afternoon, across the bridge over Butte Creek, which was swollen
with the spring runoff from the snowmelt, and saw about what I
expected. One main street with one cross street surrounded by pine
forests. I was seeing small town America, only modestly changed
from the 1950s: a sporting goods store, a grocery store, the River
View and Rocky Butte Inn motels, two restaurants, a post office,
drug store, a hardware store that advertised "Gold Pans and Mining
Supplies" and "Satellite Dishes," two gas stations, an auto repair
shop, two real estate agencies, a bank, and two saloons.

After six it was quiet and most of the
businesses were closed. Only the saloons, The Claim Jumper and
Diggings, seemed to be doing a good business judging by the variety
of pickups parked in front, some looking as though they might be
from the 50s. On the outskirt of the town, I saw a school, probably
grades K-8 judging by the playground equipment, and then a little
farther a Tasty Freeze, the kind with a service window, shaded
parking areas in the back, and picnic benches on a small
lawn.

I U-turned and went back to the center of town
and turned onto the only cross street. In the next block, I found a
funeral home, the Butte News newspaper, and Courthouse Square,
which appeared to be the civic center. In the center of Courthouse
Square, I saw the white courthouse, a Greek Revival Style building,
a much smaller version of the Supreme Court Building in Washington
DC. A granite staircase led up to a portico, at the second story
entrance, a colonnade of four two-story columns supporting a
triangular roof, with 1922 engraved above the colonnade. The four
windows on each side of the portico suggested that one half of the
second story was the courtroom, and offices were in the other half.
I noticed a county office annex added to the back of the
courthouse, a plain building, probably built when the county
offices overflowed from the courthouse in the 1950s. There was a
Sheriff's office with a separate entrance in the annex. Two patrol
cars were parked outside.

The library sat on one corner of Courthouse
Square, a red brick building, two stories high, with steps going up
to the second story main entrance. It looked to be from the era of
the 1920s, when Carnegie libraries were built.

Next to the courthouse block was a Pioneer
Museum with an adjacent park with playground equipment, picnic
tables, and an old locomotive, apparently from a logging train, at
the side. A granite slab, engraved with eighteen names, stands
memorializing those killed in the earthquake of 1872.

As I looked farther, I saw a white,
old–fashioned church with a steeple. It looked like the pictures
that I had seen of churches in Vermont, having a sharp steeple
perched on a bell tower in the front, several gabled windows along
the side.

In the Gold Rush days, Rocky Butte had a
population of ten thousand or so. It was a booming place proving
hotels, saloons, and ladies to absorb the miner's gold. It became
the county seat during that time. The town burned down twice in the
1800s. Now, the sign at the bridge said its population was
687.

It didn't take long to see all of Rocky
Butte.

My first stop was about a half mile beyond the
church at the Sodastroms', the parents of Lucy, the girl who was
lost. They lived in a small white house, surrounded by pine trees,
with an unpaved driveway to a garage behind the house. A small barn
and corral were behind the garage. A dark brown mare, I guessed it
had been Lucy's, grazed, on the spring grass in the
corral.

Ann Sodastrom met me at the door, and I
introduced myself. Ed who was sitting in a recliner watching TV,
got up and introduced himself. Ann was skinny, and looked as though
she had lost more weight than she should have. Her print housedress
hung on her. Ed was also slight and lean, had a hollow look to his
face and stooped shoulders.

I didn't want to add to their grief by
discussing the case. I simply introduced myself and gave them
assurances that their case would be successful. I asked questions
about Rocky Butte, the church, what they liked about the area: I
made small talk to get to know them and for them to get comfortable
with me. I left after a polite amount of time.