The Last Good Kiss (25 page)

thrown out," she said. "Those scars on his ham look as

if it might have been serious."

"Minor stuff," I said.

"How did it happen?" she asked, but I didn't have

the impression that she was pumping me.

"Frankly, I was too drunk to know exactly what

happened," I said.

"Well, thank you for taking care of him," she said.

"We had a pretty good time," I said, "and I'm not

sure who was taking care of whom."

"It sounds like . . . sounds like a wild trip." She

paused. "You know, we got to know each other on just

the same sort of trip. I was teaching in a summer

workshop in Sun Valley and having a drink with some

of my students in the lodge, and Traheame came in off

the terrace, this huge, beautiful, alive man, and he sat

down at the bar beside me, bought me a drink, then

another, and somehow we ran away with each other. I

didn't realize who he was until we had driven aU the

way to Mexico--we wouldn't tell each other our names,

it was like that, you know-and then I heard him spell

his name for the Mexican border people, for that

form-visitor's card, you know-and I just couldn't

believe it. Here he was, the most alive man I had ever

met, and he turned out to be Abraham Traheame. Life

is so strange. Who would have thought all this could

come of a simple thing like buying me a drink."

"Speaking of the great man," I said, trying not

to be ironic, "would you like me to help you get him to

bed?"

"Not at all," she said. "He'll wake up in a couple of

hours shouting for whiskey and wild, wild women. "

The grin on her face suggested that she could handle

the wild woman part perfectly well. For an instant I

believed her, then she turned her face, and I thought

134

that if she was wild, she kept it well hidden behind

plain. "I've bored you, haven't I, with my little love

story?"

"It's not that," I said. "I thought I'd hook it up and

leave while I'm still sober."

"Trahearne will be so disappointed," she said as if

she meant it.

"Yeah, but I've got this other case I'm working on," I

said, "and I need to be in Oregon yesterday."

"Tomorrow's never soon enough, is it?"

"No."

"And that's such an exciting phrase. "

"What's that?"

" 'Working on a case,' " she said. "It suggests dark

intrigue, tangled mysteries, the sort of romance denied

to mere mortals."

"I'm afraid the reality is usually repossessing cars and

combing bars for runaway husbands," I said.

"Or runaway children. "

"Sometimes. "

"That should b e exciting," she said. " A prince stolen

by gypsies or something like that . "

" I don't know any gypsies o r princes," I confessed.

"That's no reason to quit looking," she said, a

plaintive note creeping into her voice, soft like the cry

�f a lost and dying animal. "I do wish you wouldn't

leave. "

" I have to go," I said.

"I understand," she said. "I'm sure that Traheame

would want me to tell you that you're always welcome

in our house. I feel the same way. Please come b�

whenever the mood suits you . "

"Sure," I said, "thanks. " But I couldn't think of any

moods that would bring me back to this crazy ptace. We

said our goodbyes, and as I drove away, in CDDttalft, my

search for Betty Sue Flowers seemed alDlOit 58Jle.

135

Driving hard, I made it to Grants Pass in one straight

shot, nineteen calm hours behind the wheel, then

checked into a motel and slept like a child until ten the

next morning.

At the Josephine County Sheriff's Department,

when I stopped by to let them know I was in the county

and I wasn't planning to break any laws, they seemed

bored by the prospect but they told me where to go.

They didn't tell me what to look for, though, and a

couple of hours later I was driving up into the Siskiyous, following a washboard gravel road along a small creek that ran into the Applegate River. About

ten miles up the road, the land opened up into a nice

little valley, and I understood the smile on the deputy's

face.

A prefab A-frame cabin sat beside the road surrounded by multicolored plastic flags flying from loose guy wires. A large sign in front announded SUNDOWN

SUMMER ESTATES. When I parked, a tall young man

bounded out of the cabin, his hiking boots rattling the

cheap pine porch.

"Yes, sir," he said brightly, "what can we do for you

today?"

"I think I'm looking for a place to retire," I said, and

it sounded suddenly true. A quiet place where I could

settle back and think about all the wild goose chases of

my life.

"I've got just the place for you," he said quickly, "a

ten-acre plot with creek frontage, a spring, and a great

building site. Unimproved, of course, but cheap."

"Actually, I was looking for a hippie commune," I

said.

"You're in the wrong place," he said, his spiel over,

his voice hard now.

"This place belong to you?"

"That's right," he said.

"No hippies, huh?"

136

"Not now."

"Where did they go?" I asked.

"Wherever hippies go when they find out that living

on the land in the old way is hard work."

"How did you get the place?'' I asked.

"If it's any of your business, I inherited it from my

grandmother," he said, then looked away and shuffied

his feet. "You're some kind of law, right?"

"Private," I said, then showed him my license.

"Wouldn't you know," he grumbled. "I've had three

prospective buyers today-a Fresno chicken farmer,

two kids driving a brand-new Continental, and a

rent-a-cop."

"Didn't mean to raise your hopes," I said.

"That's what they're for, aren't they?" he said sadly.

"It was your commune, right?"

"Everybody makes mistakes. " He grinned. "What

the hell, man, I turned twenty-one in Nam and came

into this place and a little bread, and when I came back,

all I could think of was peace and dope and hairylegged hippie chicks. Sounded like heaven on earth."

"What happened?"

"Times changed," he said simply, "and my money

ran out. I thought we could make a living up here, but

nobody wanted to be on the duty roster. The lazy

bastards wouldn't work, so I got a little freaked on acid

and conducted a search and destroy mission of my own,

burned their hooches and relocated the fuckers. Man,

you should've seen them run."

"So now you're selling out?"

"Everything but the back quarter section," he said.

"It's either that or another six months up on the

pipeline, and Alaska is great, man, if you don't have to

work out in the cold-but it's always cold. "

"How long ago did everybody leave?"

"Four or five years ago," he said. "Who're you

looking for?"

137

"Betty Sue Flowers," I said, then showed him the

picture.

"You've got to be kidding," he said as he looked at

it.

"No, I'm really looking for her."

"Not that, man, I mean you got to be kidding that

this is her," he said. "When she was here, man, she was

a cow. A sweet fuck but as big as a barn."

"You remember her, huh?"

"Nobody ever forgets a fuck like that," he said, then

sighed darkly, as if he remembered too many other

things, too. "Say, you wouldn't have another one of

those beers, would you?" I nodded and got two fresh

ones out of the cooler. We strolled over to sit on the

steps of the A-frame porch. "She was wild, man, too

much. How come you're looking for her, anyway?"

"She hasn't been in touch with her family for a long

time, and they'd like to find her, see her again."

"Probably not."

"Why?"

"Mao, I've known some crazy ladies-in Nam and up

on the pipeline-and I've done some numbers I don't

like to remember during the daylight hours, but this

one, she was something else."

"Was she your lady?"

"Everybody was everybody's," he said. "You know,

trying to destroy the concept of private property and

personal ownership. What the hell, man, you do

enough drugs, it sounds okay."

"At least you hung on to the land."

"Just barely," he said. "They were pushing me to put

the title in all our names, you know, telling me that I

was on some sort of power trip because I owned the

land, and that's when I finally freaked."

"Was that when she left?"

"No, she was gone by then," he said. "She didn't

stay around too long before she split with this older

138

dude. She may have even come with him, you know,

but I just can't remember. "

"Remember his name?"

"Jack. Something like that. We weren't too heavy on

last names, you know, shedding another vestige of the

middle-class fascist life or some such crap. "

"Randall Jackson."

"Sounds good to me, man, but I don't remember."

"Potbellied, bandylegged, balding?"

"That's the creep," he said.

"Creep?"

"He wanted me to finance a skin flick dressed up as a

sociological study of sexual freedom in the communes.

He said he had all sorts of distribution connections and

claimed we'd make a bundle. You know him?"

"We haven't exactly met," I said, "but I know him."

"Whatever happened to him?"

"I heard a rumor that he was in Denver dealing dirty

books," I said.

"Figures," he said, then we sat for a bit listening to

the flutter of the plastic flags. "Looks like a fucking

used car lot, doesn't it?" I nodded. "I guess when I

decided to sell out, I wanted it to look as sleazy as

possible," he said. "Hey, if you've got another beer,

maybe I'll trade you a lot for it. "

"You can have a beer," I said, "but I've already got

five acres up in Montana on the North Fork of the

Flathead. Sorry."

"Don't be sorry," he said as he came back with two

fresh beers.

"How are the plots selling?"

"Like cold hot cakes," he said. "Two five-acre plots

in the last month, and I had to carry the paper on those,

Money's too tight. But I've got a standing offer from a

land syndicate-you know, one of those outfits that sell

acre lots on television and in the Sunday supplements.

Only thing is, they want the whole place, you know,