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“Nothing; it just involved a kid I knew. I don’t think anything was ever done with it.”

“Well, it’s probably too late now.”

“Don’t be so pessimistic. Weren’t you the one who supposedly solved the Black Dahlia case?”

“More than supposedly. The guy you need to talk to over there is Dave Tepps. Good guy.”

“Are they still out in Monterey Park?”

“Yep. I can call Dave first if you want and say good things about you.”

“Yeah, that might help. Could you do it today?”

“You’re still Hurry-Up Harry. Don’t worry, I will.”

“Thanks, Renée.”

“And I’ll call you as soon as I have something from the DA on our cemetery caper.”

“Why don’t you call them and tell them to hurry up?”

“Funny. Last time I tried that, they put my case at the back of the line.”

“That figures.”

“See ya, Harry.”

“Right.”

He disconnected and gazed back out at Glendale, trying to decide whether to talk to Dave Tepps or Vernon Bishop first.

He picked up the binoculars he had left on the table by the door and used them to check the nest again. Bosch had been keeping daily tabs on it, hoping to see the fledglings take their first flights.

To go with his newfound fascination, Bosch had bought a book that listed native California bird species and learned that red-tailed hawks mate for life and are known to stay on their territorial range for years. Bosch also watched for a great horned owl that had made the pass its hunting territory.

But the hawks’ nest still appeared empty and Bosch feared he had missed the young birds learning to fly. He checked the sky and saw one of the adult hawks floating way up high on an air current. He looked through the field glasses and tracked the hawk’s flight for a few moments, then went inside to call Dave Tepps.

8

EARLY THE NEXT morning Bosch took the 10 out to Monterey Park, but at the last moment he drove past the exit that would have brought him to the sheriff’s homicide bureau. He kept heading east out to El Monte, where he exited on Peck Road and was soon on Durfee Avenue. It had been years since he’d been to MacLaren. Decades, even. There was not much he could see. The now-abandoned complex covered an entire block but was surrounded by twelve-foot-high pale yellow walls that hid what was within. NO TRESPASSING signs and graffiti marked the outer walls, reminding Bosch of the times he’d been assigned to paint over the messages left by the El Monte Flores, the gang that ruled the streets outside MacLaren’s walls.

Bosch cruised around the block to Gilman Road. There were more NO TRESPASSING signs and EMF tags. Gilman was a block from the Los Angeles River. Back during Bosch’s time at MacLaren, there was an open field between the rear wall and the river. It had been his escape route all those years ago. The river had been channeled in concrete by the Army Corps of Engineers, a project to control flooding; during winter storms, what was normally just a thin stream of runoff water became a raging and destructive torrent. The concrete bank had provided young Bosch with an open route to downtown and beyond.

Bosch paused at the gated rear entrance of the complex. There was a thick chain and padlock securing it. He thought about the things that had happened to him inside the walls. He thought about Charlie Lamb never making it out.

According to stories about the lawsuits he’d read in the Times, the whole place was scheduled to be razed soon. It would be bulldozed and reborn as a city park. The park and four billion dollars would erase all memory of the house of horrors it had been.

Bury the past. Bosch knew this was how communities and human evolution worked. Rebuild, reinvent, redefine the past. He wasn’t sure it was a good thing. He wondered whether there would be a plaque somewhere in the park that would tell the children who played there about the children who were there before. Once Bosch was gone, would there be anyone left who remembered Charlie Lamb?

The open field leading to the river was now a subdivision with small ranch houses Bosch guessed had been built in the 1980s. Most had views of a twelve-foot-high wall, but soon the wall would come down, and the houses would be lining the coveted green space of a county park. This would likely increase property values and lead to bigger rebuilds, further obscuring the history of the neighborhood.

Bosch was startled by the honking of a horn behind him. He was blocking traffic. He waved a hand and moved on, heading back to the freeway and Monterey Park. Sergeant Dave Tepps met him at the front counter of the homicide bureau. They shook hands and Tepps invited him back to the cold-case section.

“So you’re going to clear a case for us, huh?” he said.

“Well, let’s just say I’m going to take a look and try,” Bosch said.

“Renée said if anybody can do it, it’s you.”