I head west, driving long hours, until my initial horror and panic spiral down into a noxious feeling in my gut. I can’t eat. Not even the donuts. I can’t bring myself to call anyone. Not Linus, not Burnham, not Thea. I’m certainly not calling Berg. All I can do is drive. I’ll get to 240 Mallorca Way, and I’ll figure out what to do next after that. It’s not the greatest plan, but it’s the only one that makes any sense. Fear and anger keep me burning, mile after mile, well into the afternoon.
Where Nevada meets California, the long road rises through treeless hills. White wind turbines, with their three reaching propellers, dominate the hills like an army of giants. It takes me a while to realize half of them are rusted and don’t spin. Miles later, near L.A., I pass a storage lot filled with trailer classrooms, empty now. Cheery electronic billboards advertise theme parks and tourist attractions, but below them, rows of run-down motels and the ruin of an old mall dispel the illusion of prosperity. I knew California was hurting, but after all the movies I’ve watched, I still thought it would look better than this.
Late in the afternoon, I reach Miehana and wind through the summery, quiet streets, aiming for 240 Mallorca Way with help from Freddy’s tablet. Spiky green foliage and tall fences give way to a narrow, shop-lined street, and I slow with the traffic, curious. Pedestrians in athleisurewear walk their dogs. Four different coffee shops are open on one block. A Walgreens, an old-time movie theater, a computer store, an Indian restaurant, and a bakery occupy another. A woman locks up her bike, and a mailman steers by with his big-wheeled cart.
I can’t parallel park, but I finally find a space I can drive straight into. It’s warm when I grab my backpack and step out of the car, and the California air has a different, easy brightness to it, as if the sun prefers not to cast real shadows here. Taking a deep breath, I try to let the beauty calm me down a little, and I stride along the sidewalk until I find the right address on a small, vacant stationery shop. Dead flies cluster in the window well. I step back to look up the building, and above, four narrow windows reflect the sky. One of the top windows is open, and a gauze curtain hangs straight in the opening.
I try the bell.
No one comes.
Come on, I think. I know my family was coming here, and they had to have a reason. Once again, I wonder how Dubbs got this address. The place doesn’t look very promising.
I try again, several times. I knock. Still no one comes. I take a step backward and crane my neck to look up the building again. Now a tabby cat is perched in the top window, looking down at me like it understands the purpose of a doorbell and would admit me if it could.
Checking around the corner, I find a narrow, littered gap between buildings where the shady air is cooler. I head down the passage, past a sour stink of urine, and at the far end, I peer over a tall wooden fence into a ratty, enclosed area with a few garbage cans. A fire escape zigzags across the back of 240 Mallorca, and a short clothesline runs across from the second landing to a pole. One pale item has been hung out to dry.
A meow draws my gaze upward. The tabby cat steps daintily out to the fire escape and watches me expectantly. That’s enough of an invitation for me.
I push open the gate and enter the fenced area, which has an earthy smell. When I try the back door, it’s locked, too, unsurprisingly, so I take a closer look at the fire escape. The ladder part hangs above me, just out of reach, and it needs to go up several inches before it will release from a hook and come down. I have to haul over one of the garbage cans and brace it against the back wall, but once I climb it, releasing the ladder is easy.
It crashes down with a clatter and barely misses my head.
“Yikes!” I mutter, my heart pounding.
I look up, expecting a zillion people in the nearby apartments to lean out their windows and yell at me, but nobody appears.
Okay, then. Up I go.
The iron rungs are warm from the sunlight’s heat. As I grip the metal, my heart kicks with apprehension. I tell myself that this is different from the ladder on the observatory at Forge, the ladder I fell from when I nearly killed Burnham. I remind myself that since then I’ve made it up other ladders without fainting. One ladder, anyway.
I can do it now. Carefully, being sure to move only one hand or foot at a time so that I’m always connecting with the ladder at three points, I climb eight rungs. When I reach the first landing, I expel a huge breath of relief, and then I hurry up the fire escape steps to the top level, to the open window.
“Hey, kitty,” I say to the cat, and laugh at the way my hand is trembling when I pet its head. The cat slips inside, and I give the window a little tap. “Hello? Anybody home?”
I push the window up higher, enough to lean in.
The room is a small, stuffy space with a large bed and a baby’s crib. An empty birdcage stands in a corner near an upright piano. The piano’s lid is closed neatly over the keys, and pale, wispy feathers rest lightly on the dark rug as if a bird shed them only moments ago. Awkwardly, I climb inside, fully a burglar now, and my eye catches on a dark painting of a seashore with cliffs and big waves.
“Hello?” I call.
“Is that you, Marnie?” a reedy female voice answers.
Startled, I freeze. Then I take a step forward, and the floor beneath the rug squeaks.
“My name’s Rosie Sinclair,” I call. “I’m just here for a visit. I think you know my sister?”
A clunk comes from farther in the house.
I move softly out to the hallway. A door at the far end stands ajar, and light drops on the polished wooden floor. I push the door slowly open to find a small bedroom overlooking the street. It’s even warmer than the first room, as if the open windows do nothing but trap the heat, and it’s laced with a weary scent of lavender. Books and framed photos line a tall bookshelf, and pill bottles fill a woven basket next to a landline phone.
“Hello?” I say, and step in farther.
A thin old woman in a lacy bathrobe is poised on the far side of a four-poster bed, aiming a can of Mace my way. Her gray hair winds in a long, thin braid like extra lacework at her collar, and her pale blue eyes are magnified by enormously thick, round glasses. She reminds me a bit of a black-and-white film star, the delicate, elegant type that goes mad and murderous by the end of the show.
“Well, I’ll be,” she says in a genteel drawl. She lowers the Mace. “It really is you. Now, here’s a surprise.”
“You know me?” I ask.
“Heavens, yes. Who doesn’t? How’d you get in?”
“I tried knocking but no one answered, so I came up the fire escape.”
Her eyebrows lift. “Naturally,” she says, and comes around to sit on the edge of the bed facing me. She cradles the Mace in her hands. “How’d you find me?”
“My sister gave me this address,” I say. “Dubbs Sinclair. Do you know her?”
“I’m aware that you have a sister, but I’m not acquainted with her personally.”
I’m confused. “But then how did Dubbs get your address? Why would she send me here?”
“I haven’t the foggiest,” the old woman says. “It seems like a rather cheeky thing to do.”
Now I’m even more puzzled. The woman is regarding me with a certain amused welcome, like an old friend, and as I study her back, a vague recognition stirs. Her square jaw and broad forehead are familiar, but the connection eludes me.