But now the two are partners in major minor drug dealing, and this is sort of a party for field reps. Sandy recognizes quite a few people he knows. He starts pingponging among them, and rather than follow him his OC friends grab drinks and go out onto the cliff-edge lawn, which is on three terraced levels some three or four hundred feet over the black sea. They’ve got a perfect view of the hilly curve of La Jolla jutting into the dark water, its sparkling skyscraper hotels reflecting like fire off the bay in between; and to the north stretches the whole curve of the southern California coast, a white pulsing mass of light. Major light show, here.

It’s a class-A party. Among the guests on the lawn are some Lagunatics they know, and happily they fall to drinking and talking and dancing.

Jim notices Arthur disappearing down the wooden staircase that leads down to the beach below, following—was that Raymond? Arthur was caustic indeed about the mansions on this road, so seeing him with Raymond is a bit of a surprise to Jim.

This turns some key in Jim’s sense of curiosity. Ever since their raid on Parnell Jim has been asking Arthur questions, and Arthur has been putting him off. It’s better if Jim doesn’t know too much, he says. Jim is up on the theory of revolutionary cells, sure, but it seems to him to be going too far not even to know the name of the group he’s part of. Sure the cause is just, but still … And Arthur—well, who knows exactly why he came along tonight? It isn’t something he’d ordinarily do. And once he said he got his equipment from “the south” … could be that Raymond used drug smuggling as a cover … well, that would be crazy, but …

Jim’s curiosity is aroused. He wanders down the wooden steps of the staircase, into the dark.

The stairs switch back from platform to platform down the steep sandstone cliff: thick planks are nailed into parallel four-by-fours that are bolted to telephone poles driven into the cliff face, and the whole structure is painted some bright color, yellow or pink or orange, hard to tell in the dark. Spectrum band, no doubt. Iceplant and some bushy trees have been planted all around the staircase in semisuccessful efforts to stop the erosion of the cliff. Through one thick clump of trees the stairway proceeds in a groomed tunnel of foliage, and beyond that, on the next platform, Jim sees two dark figures standing. Above them stereo speakers facing westward challenge the even roar of the surf with the majestic end of The Firebird Suite, cranked to high volume.