On the drive home he can hear a poem rolling around in his mind, a great long thing filled with gold freeways and green skies, a bulky figure perched over a low table. But at home, staring at the computer screen, he only hears fragments, jumbled together; the images won’t be fixed by words, and he only stares until finally he goes to bed and falls into an uneasy insomniac’s slumber. He dreams again that he is walking around a hilltop in ruins, the low walls broken and tumbled down, the land empty out to the horizon … and the thing rises up out of the hill to tell him whatever it is it has to say, he can’t understand it. And he looks up and sees a gold freeway in a green sky.

Chapter 39

39

Sandy manages to talk Tash into accompanying him on his sailing trip to rendezvous with the incoming shipment of Rhinoceros. As always it’s the personal plea rather than financial arguments that convince Tash.

Soon after that Sandy is visited by Bob Tompkins, who gives him the latest information on the smugglers, and the keys to the boat moored in Newport harbor. When that business is done they retire to Sandy and Angela’s balcony for a drink. Angela comes out and joins them.

“So how’s Raymond doing?” Sandy asks casually when they are suitably relaxed.

“Oh, okay.”

“Is he still involved with this thing in OC, the defense industry vendetta?”

“Yeah, yeah. More than ever.”

“So he has people up here that he’s recruited, then?”

“Hired, to be exact. Sure. You don’t think Raymond would do all this by himself?”

Sandy hesitates, trying to figure out an unobtrusive opening; Angela takes the direct approach. “We think some of our friends might be working for him, and we’re worried that they’ll get in trouble.”

Bob frowns. “Well … I don’t know what to say, Angela. Raymond’s going about it with his usual security measures, though. He swears it’s all going very quietly.”

“Rumors are flying up here,” Sandy says.

“Yeah?” Bob frowns again. “Well, I’ll tell Raymond about that. I think it’d be nice if he stopped, myself, but I don’t know if he will.”

Sandy looks at Angela, and they let the conversation drift to other topics. Afterward, thinking about it, Sandy decides he didn’t really find out much. But he might have sent some useful news up the line to Raymond.

The next afternoon Sandy goes down with Tash to the upper bay. They’ve got all the keys they need: one for the marina parking lot, one for the marina, one for the cage around the boat’s slip, one to turn off the boat’s alarm system, three to get into the boat, and one to unlock the beam and the rigging.