The Husband

life and they have mystery."
    His white hands come together, not in contemplation, certainly not in prayer, but as though each possesses its own awareness, as if they are pleased by the feel of each other.
    "In Rio Lucio, Eloisa Sandoval has a shrine to Saint Anthony in her small adobe-walled kitchen. Twelve ceramic figures arranged in tiers, one for each child and grandchild. Candles every evening in the vespers hour."
    She hopes that he will make new revelations about his partners, but she knows that she must appear discreetly intrigued by everything he says.
    "Ernest Sandoval drives a '64 Chevy Impala with giant steel chain links for a steering wheel, a custom-painted dashboard, and a ceiling upholstered in red velvet."
    The long fingers with spatulate pads smooth one another, smooth and smooth.
    "Ernest is interested in saints with whom his pious wife is unfamiliar. And he knows...amazing places."
    The Mr. Goodbar has begun to cloy in Holly's mouth, to stick in her throat, but she takes another bite of it.
    "Ancient spirits dwell in New Mexico, since before the existence of humanity. Are you a seeker?"
    If she encourages him too much, he will read her as insincere. "I don't think so. Sometimes we all feel...something is missing. But that's everyone. That's human nature."
    "I see a seeker in you, Holly Rafferty. A tiny seed of spirit waiting to bloom."
    His eyes are as clear as a limpid stream, but cloaked by silt at the bottom are strange forms that she cannot identify.
    Lowering her gaze, she says demurely, "I'm afraid you see too much in me. I'm not a deep thinker."
    "The secret is not to think. We think in words. And what lies beneath the reality we see is a truth that words can't contain. The secret is to feel."
    "See, to you that's a simple concept, but even that's too deep for me." She laughs softly at herself. "My biggest dream is to be in real estate."
    "You underestimate yourself," he assures her. "Within you are...enormous possibilities."
    His large bony wrists and long pale hands are utterly hairless, either naturally or because he uses a depilatory cream.

Chapter 40

     
    With hobgoblins of wind threatening at the open window in the driver's door, Mitch cruised past Anson's house in Corona del Mar.
    Large creamy-white flowers had been shaken from the big magnolia tree and had blown in a drift against the front door, revealed in a stoop lamp that remained on all night. Otherwise, the house was dark.
    He did not believe that Anson had come home, washed up, and gone happily to sleep almost at once after killing their parents. He must be out somewhere—and up to something.
    Mitch's Honda no longer stood at the curb where he had left it when he had first come here at the direction of the kidnappers.
    In the next block, he parked, finished a Hershey's bar, rolled up the window, and locked the Chrysler Windsor. Unfortunately, it drew attention to itself among the surrounding contemporary vehicles, museum grandeur in a game arcade.
    Mitch walked to the alleyway on which Anson's garage had access. Lights blazed throughout the lower floor of the rear condo above the pair of two-car garages.
    Some people might have work that kept them busy just past three-thirty in the morning. Or insomnia.
    Standing in the alleyway, Mitch planted his feet wide to resist the rushing wind. He studied the high curtained windows.
    Since Campbell's library, he had entered a new reality. He saw things more clearly now than he had seen them from his former perspective.
    If Anson had eight million dollars and a fully paid-off yacht, he probably owned both condos, not just one, as he had claimed. He lived in the front unit and used the back condo for the office in which he applied linguistic theory to software design, or whatever the hell he did to get rich.
    The toiler in the night, behind those curtained windows, was not a neighbor. Anson himself sat up there, bent to a computer.
    Perhaps he was plotting a course, by yacht, to a haven beyond the authority of all law.
    A service gate opened onto a narrow walkway beside the garage. Mitch followed it into the brick courtyard that separated the two condos. The courtyard lights were off.
    Bordering the brick patio were planting beds lush with nandina and a variety of ferns, plus bromeliads and anthuriums to provide a punctuation of red blooms.
    The houses to the front and back, the tall side fences, and the neighboring houses crowding close on their narrow lots all blocked the wind.