“What does?”
“You’re from the boonies? Indiana or something.”
“Missouri.”
“Same difference. All those places are fucking intolerant.”
—
No need to search for the address, the orange Camaro was a beacon. I continued past it, covered the rest of the block, reversed, found a view-spot several properties west, and took in details.
Walter F. Swanson’s gravel-roofed and spray-stuccoed pale-pink house sat primly behind a tiny but brilliantly green lawn sharing frontage with a two-vehicle cement pad. Multicolored impatiens and thriving sago palms nudged the façade. No sign of the minivan.
Milo was right: If Walt Swanson was raking in illicit cash, he wasn’t spending it for all to see.
On the other hand, the web had estimated the current value of the twelve-hundred-sixty-seven-square-foot “ranchito” at nearly nine hundred thousand.
Ah, Southern California.
Toss in a full pension, disability payments, and some private freelancing and Swanson would be primed for a move to a normal real estate market—Idaho, the dry side of Washington—where he could live like a land baron.
I chewed on that for a few seconds, knew I was filling mental space with empty conjecture.
Time to get out of here. Just as I reached for the ignition key, a vehicle approached from the east, driving slowly.
Narrow and tall, small tires, silver paint, Ford logo on a black grille.
The minivan turned into Walt Swanson’s driveway and parked next to the Camaro.
Swanson exited. No black suit or muscle shirt or trendy eyewear. Gone also was the swagger the ex-cop had shown at the Boykinses’ residence. Today’s baggy brown T-shirt, wrinkled khaki shorts, and sandals made him look smaller.
Today he trudged and had conceded to a slight hunch.
He walked to the passenger side of the van, took several minutes to emerge.
Guiding a woman. Not chivalry, she needed it.
Smallish, wearing a beret from which ginger curls escaped, borderline emaciated, with that unmistakable pallor. Every step she took was labored but she smiled at Swanson as they proceeded slowly and he smiled back.
When the two of them finally made it to the front door, he kissed her cheek then patted it gently.
Holding on to her, he unlocked the door and helped her in.
She’d never stopped smiling.
I was just about to leave when Swanson reappeared and returned to the rear of the van, this time exiting with three supermarket shopping bags that he brought into the house.
Then nothing. For five minutes, ten, fifteen.
I escaped.
—
Seeing people in new contexts can be educational and what I’d seen moved me in that direction. But I resisted total conversion to the innocence of Walt Swanson despite his loving care of the woman I assumed to be his wife.
Easy enough to be charitable, peg him as a devoted husband and leave it at that.
But entering Milo’s world had long disrupted conventional thinking and I found myself wondering about the financial and emotional cost of caring for a loved one with health issues. The possibility that had led to criminal freelancing.
