In addition to the crowds of people normally
on the busy pier, there were large numbers of people with blankets and lawn chairs held together with bicycle chains to preserve
the best sites for viewing the night’s coming fireworks display. They moved without caution since a six-foot seven-inch
man in monk’s robes could hardly lose himself in even such a bustling crowd. Even as he followed John Carbasian as best
he could, Al Hoag was still fighting himself with every ounce of his love for the man’s mother and the terrible legacy
of being raised as Samuel ‘the Snake’ Lovich’s only child. Images of the Sixties when he worked the docks as ‘The Mumbling Man’ and the Seventies when he
took Wee Mattie here to the pier to fish and talk, kidding himself that the ‘quality time’ they spent together
could outweigh the Devlon Blood and the life he saw around him in his everyday life. But remorse couldn’t change anything
anymore than he could will himself to have longer legs as the tall, dark haired man disappeared into a crowd of inebriated
tourists spilling out of three cabs from Chinatown, there arms loaded down with white packages with red scrolls and large
block Chinese characters. By the time he got through them, the other man was gone, but at least he knew John’s destination.
The far end of the beach and the floating museum ship.
-
Despite the rows of people walking along the narrow sidewalk to and from the small strip of public beach access the
streets were empty of vendors. They must have moved to where they would be more readily available near the Cable Car turning
platform, giving the sandy littered sidewalk a curiously empty feeling. The hairs on the back of his neck stood one end but
there wasn’t any way to determine the direction of the hard stares in his direction. Since a tall man running in robes
could have seemed a threat simply buy its unusual nature. The Haight Ashbury had been dead over a decade.
“ THEY said it was your birthday. “ Seilee
repeated from his memory. Someone seizing upon a excuse on short notice might well have thought of ‘birthdays’
since Luke Daniel had just been born.
As John paused, looking at the small sign that read ‘closed’ and the velvet drape that barred easy access
up the permanent gangplank tot eh spotlight illuminated ship he was suddenly standing outside the hospital on the night his
son had been born. Instead of figuring a way to get onboard without being seen, he was standing at the side of the hospital
building, looking at one of the many returned veterans he’d helped on the streets over the last fourteen years, More
real to him in that moment, than where he stood, shivering in the growing loss of light.
As soon
as the chilled air off the Bay struck his face and hands, John Carbasian staggered backwards under the weight of tears he
could no longer postpone nor deny. How could his life have turned upside down in only five hours? North and South, good and
bad, still existed him, but they had no central starting point in his shattered reassessment of self.
“ Brother John! What
are you doing here? “ A strangely familiar male voice demanded in an inebriated staccato. “ Who died in there?
” The older man sobbed superstitiously. It was a natural assumption. The men and women he worked
with on the streets since the crash of the Haight Ashbury were as anti-hospital as they were anti-any other kind of establishment.
He tried to dry his face on the broad cuff of his robe before he turned around, even though he couldn’t do anything
about the pain or the rawness of his eyes now swelled to mere slits.
“ Ha! “ He demanded, off guard as soon as he turned around
and recognized the face, but none of the dozen names that popped into his mind belonged to it. The embraced, shoulder-to-shoulder,
and the bearded man pulled back slowly, a familiar look of pain settled at the back of the wounded warrior’s eyes.
“ No, Seilee, no. My wife just had a baby! Can you imagine that? “
“ Hell, no, man! For real? “ Seilee McClure demanded, his eyes taking
on the look of a puppy; the last one left in the book. “ I didn’t even know you were married! You got’ta
a cat! So I thought you were gay! You got’ta picture handy? “
A deeply buried compassion
pushed aside the tall. Dark man’s weight of guilt and made him reach into his pocket for his wallet before some stray
fragment of thought ricocheted from the old man’s tortured past and carried him into the abyss.
“ Sunshine! I know her from a couple years back! “ Seilee demanded
possessively, shifting the weight of his soiled backpack to his other shoulder. “ She’s older but I recognize
the mole. Congrats, Man! When did this happen? “
“
Too soon. “ John straightened the instant the words were out of his mouth, hating himself for speaking
a truth he tried to hide, even from himself.
“ It
wasn’t even yours, was it? “
“
He is now. “ John replied candidly. The lack of a sneer or sexual innuendo
allowed him to risk letting the bearded veteran to approach a barrier he’d kept in place until a newborn’s size
destroyed it; collapsing the center of his universe to a size Luke Daniel alone could fill.
“ Hi, Daddy Man. “ Seilee said pleasantly, slapping
John on the shoulder. Then the wall fell on the former sergeant’s eyes.
The dark giant turned around instinctively to look over his shoulder, fullyexpecting
to find Matthew Lovich glaring at them. When he turned back the bearded man’s eyes were dull, watching as if every shadow
or sound were a life threatening menace, and yet he remained determined to each through his backpack, keeping the weathered stucco wall to his back without risking becoming off balance by actually leaning on it for
support. He began to grow angry as he searched the cluttered contents in vain for the article that seemed increasingly important
to him.
“ There! “ He demanded in intense resolution of the centrifuge of fears and growing
doubts swirling around his hand until his entire body began to quake in alarm. A small,
while object wrapped in cellophane fell out as he pulled the trio of Taco Bell discount coupons from the wadded mass
of lined paper. When John bent to reach for it and hand it back, they bumped heads so violently it sparked an immediate migraine.
Hate and fear lased out of the shorter man’s eyes even as McClure struggled against his inner demons. Quickly exchanging
the out of date coupons for the tri-colored round of stale mint. “ Al’s son gave me that back
in the day. It’s the only thing I have left to remind me that I was a man once; I had a life once. “
He said, growing sadder by the second.
“ You
can always come by and get clean clothes. Or have a meal while those are washed, Seilee? “ John offered,
to show there were no hard feelings, but it to his surprise the shorter man simply collapsed against the hospital wall, suddenly
defeated and defenseless.
“
There’s no need for that. They’ve found me. I can’t run no more! “
“ Do you have my number, Seilee? “ He hated himself
for not insisting the wounded man come with him to the empty apartment. But he needed some time alone, time away from any
place where Al or any of his other friends would know to look for him! It was enough that he shoved the new business into
the bearded man’s quaking fingers, having written his home phone on it. It he stayed one more instant he’d be
as empty as the soiled man who watched him leave expressionless.
-
John’s fingers tentatively reached into the side pocket he hadn’t touched since he took off the robe in
rebellion to the credo of non-violence it endorsed. But as his fingertips touched the trio of slick paper coupons wrapped
in cellophane, they chanced to graze against the backside of the packet, which was lumpy. He pulled it loose and held it up
to the light. What appeared to be three baby aspirins, dyed blue were wrapped in a separate clear plastic, like the wrapper
of one of the Hostess cupcakes with white frosting and shredded coconut that the ex-Marine was addicted too.
His heart dropped to his stomach just as Al Hoag ran up, jostling his arm and causing him to drop the small package.
Gun drawn, intent on storming up to the wooden ramp attached to the rocking ship, Al tore free his restraint and was three
feet away when John’s voice reached him from a funny angle as the tall man straightened, staring at the cellophane wrapped
package.
“ We had the answer the whole time, Al! And didn’t even know it! This is why Seilee was killed! Use your
phone and call Randy! This is a police matter now. “
“ The hell you say! “
“ Al! “ “
He froze, his leg partially over the damp cloth wrapped chain.
“ It’s your son, but it’s my wife and son too. He’s just trying to protect
his mother’s reputation, Al. Don’t force him into a confrontation that neither one of you can win!
“
“ What are ye talking a’ boot? “ He demanded roughly as he
returned to the shadows beside the towering man. “ It’s so quiet no one may even be on there!
We may be standing here und yer family’s miles away by know… “
“ That’s my responsibility now, Al. he’s a grown man. “
Detective Randy Shields made no effort to hide his scorn as he looked at the small, worn packet in the palm of his
hand. “ What a solved murder of a bunch of dead beat would-be hippies in Nineteen Sixty-seven got
to do with a kidnapped woman and child? “
“ They were given to Seilee Conroy when he was on the streets and they weren’t given
to him by the man who was later convicted of the murders. “
“ He committed suicide in the State Hospital. Weren’t the Blue Smiler Deaths
in the Haight your case, Al? “ He demanded suspiciously. “ That’s
how Norris Cheel died, and he was a good cop, a good man! “
“
I did `nae call ye here tae dispute that, Randy, But this is why two men were killed in the last three weeks, and und
why this man’s wife and child are being held captive until we return these. “
“
Or something that looks like them. I’ll be right back. “
John Carbasian had
to restrain himself with every fiber of his being. Even though Randy later joined the SFPD, he;’’ been one of
the many young men returned from Viet Nam, unable to readjust to civilian life easily, and he still same him that way, nearly
two decades later. What if he destroyed them? Substituted them? Claimed he never received them?
“
Okay. Take this. It’s gun wrapped up in cellophane.
“ Give them back to me, Randy! “
There was no
mistaking the threat in the tall man’s voice, but the burly cop shook his head no, slipping his hand into his coat pocket.
Al tensed, ready to fire on an old
friend to save John if he had too, but Shields simply pulled out a sealed evidence bag and held it to the dim light
for the scowling man to see.
“ Chain of evidence. Otherwise it’s no damn good to us, poison or not! “
“ He’s expecting me, I’ll go. “ John
said quietly but the detective pulled him back into the shadows.
” It’s a police matter now! SWAT’S here. Let the professionals handle it! “
The waiting was agonizing, and the sound of repeated gunfire against the growing chill of the night seemed to wrench
his very soul from its roots as the sound of it echoed backwards into the fog rolling under the Golden Gate Bridge.
Just as the fireworks lit up the sky in green and bronze flashes, Gabby Carbasian came running down the gangplank to
the arms of the waiting uniformed officer at the bottom of the gangplank, who attempted to take the child from her. She cursed
at him hysterically and managed to wiggle past him, running to John.
“ He’s dead! He’s dead! They killed him! “
She sobbed, collapsing in her husband’s arms.
Al Hoag fell to the pavement like a felled ox.
-
The Paramedics were given permission to give the grieving father a shot, although it was difficult to find a place
that wasn’t too scarred to permit the jab of a needle. When Georgie and her grown son showed up, she took the plastic
syringe and deftly struck it through the cloth at the side of his leg. At the young Medic’s raised eyebrow she simply
handed it back it to him, returned to its plastic cap.
“ Trust me! I found one of the few spots where it would go in! “
“ I won’t argue with you, Lady. “ He said
dubiously, grateful to turn his care over to the tall Hawaiian man in a green surgical jumpsuit. He knew of this man by reputation
and he didn’t want to be anywhere around when Allen McKendrie Hoag regained his voice!
Once the fireworks display was over, the sign of the flashing lights on the ambulance drew a crowd, so they waited
unto an area had been cleared before they brought out the dead body, already encased in its plastic sheath. Gail Pritchard
tried to get around Georgiana Hoag several different times, hoping to expand her ‘exclusive’ that she was dictating
into a hand held device but the First Nation’s Woman made herself clear without uttering a world and the pretty free
lance writer took a step into the background rather than risk losing a change to ‘interview’ her when things clamed
down.
Al
walked beside the mounded form in silence, tears streaming thickly down his face when Matt Lovich raced up from the
darkness and seized his arm.
“ Are you hurt, Dad? Where’s Luke? Is he hurt? “
The heavily scarred man simply stood, rooted to the spot.
“ What are ye doing here? “
“ Jim Hubbard called me! Who got killed? “
“ Ye did! “ Al demanded incredulously.
“ I did? “
It took them both several minutes of excited touching and reassuring one another to think of the body being sped away
to the county morgue.
“ Ye said he was dead! “
“ He was! They killed him! “ Gabby protested, shivering violently
despite the protection of John’s coat hung to her bare feet.
“ Who was? “
“ I don’t know. I never saw him. He disguised his voice. He wasn’t making any
sense anyhow! “ She challenged the burly men as if they were one. She seemed to think they were blaming
her for the unknown assailant’s death!
-
The basement of the hospital was allowed to remain cold since it didn’t make any sense to heat rooms unless they
were going to be used by living people, but after the prolonged exposure to the damp, sea air, it seemed overheated and too
full of uniformed people.
“ No ID and his prints haven’t been found yet, Al. We’re hoping you or Al can
identify him. It’ll make things a whole lot easier, John. “
“ I’m glad to help. “
It was difficult to leave Gabby and Luke Daniel as it was for him to let go of him, but the tall, somber man followed
the detective through both sets of double doors. The body had been autopsied and the ashen flesh sown together in a ‘y’
shape with outside black knots. Pulling the skin down to open the skull to weigh the brain distorted some
of the features, and death made the face look over different from the friend he’d known and trusted for so many years
a decade ago.
“ His name is Mitch Conroy. He’s a licensed private eye in LA. You’ll find
his prints on record there. “
“ You have any idea what drove him to all this? “
“ I’m a minister, not a cop. “
“
I’m asking you as someone who’s looked into the dark places of a man’s soul to find a light, including
your own, Padre. “
“ He was there, in the Haight while it was active. I guess it answered something hidden in
him that he craved. Then Orin Devlon came along and used a deadly drug to kill the teeny-bobbers for using drugs. If you can
find a pattern there, other than a sick and warped mind, you’re a better man than me, Randy. “
“
I don’t think that’ll ever be true, John. You helped me and a dozen other guys I know find out way out
of the darkness, don’t blame yourself for this. At least, it’s finally put to rest. “
“
Is it? Orin was Matt Lovich’s uncle. His mother’s twin. He was there too. He just wasn’t
there tonight. “
The sound of the older man’s pain touched the plain cloths detective, but this was his world, a part of something
he’d accepted a long time ago when he exchanged the blue uniform for a suit.
“ Sometimes you have to go into utter darkness, to be able to find the light, Padre. “
He said softly, closing his notepad. “ Al’s still his dad, his blood too. Where there’s life, there’s
hope. “
Side by side they walked away from the smell of antiseptic as the overhead sensors felt their heat and turned on the
air conditioning to overpower it.
-
-
The End
J
-
