Flyaway / Windfall by Desmond Bagley

Author:Desmond Bagley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
Publisher: HarperCollins

THREE

Hardin walked out of his room next morning into a day that was rainwashed and crisp. He put his bags into his car and drove to the front of the motel. As he got out he looked in astonishment towards the north. There, stretched across the horizon, was a range of mountains with snow-capped peaks rising to a height of maybe 10,000 feet. They had not been there the previous day and they looked like a theatrical backdrop.

‘Hollywood!’ he muttered, as he went into the inside for breakfast.

Later, as he was tucking his credit card back into his wallet, he said, ‘What are those mountains over there?’

The woman behind the desk did not raise her head. ‘What mountains?’ she asked in an uninterested way.

‘That range of mountains with snow on the top.’

She looked up. ‘Are you kidding, mister? There are no mountains out there.’

He said irritably, ‘Goddamn it! They’re practically on your doorstep. I’m not kidding.’

‘This I’ve got to see.’ She came from behind the desk and accompanied him to the door where she stopped and gasped. ‘Jesus, those are the San Gabriels! I haven’t seen them in ten years.’

‘Now who’s kidding who?’ asked Hardin. ‘How could you miss a thing like that?’

Her eyes were shining. ‘Musta been the rain,’ she said. ‘Washed all the smog outa the air. Mister, take a good look; you ain’t likely to see a sight like that for a long time.’

‘Nuts!’ said Hardin shaking his head, and walked towards his car.

As he drove downtown he pondered on the peculiarities of Los Angeles. Any community that could lose a range of mountains 10,000 feet high and 40 miles long was definitely out of whack. Hardin disliked Los Angeles and would not visit it for pleasure. He did not like the urban sprawl, so featureless and monotonous that any section of the city was like any other section. He did not like the nutty architecture; for his money it was a waste of time to drive down to Anaheim to visit Disneyland—you could see Disneyland anywhere in LA. And he did not like the Los Angeles version of the much lauded Californian climate. The smog veiled the sun and set up irritation is his mucous membranes. If it did not rain, bush fires raged over the hills burning out whole tracts of houses. When it rained you got a year’s supply inside twelve hours and mud slides pushed houses into the sea at Malibu. And any day now the San Andreas Fault was expected to crack and rip the whole tacky place apart. Who would voluntarily live in such a hell of a city?

Answer: five million nuts. Which brought his mind back smartly to Hendrix, Biggie and the commune. To hell with Gunnarsson; he would go see Charlie Wainwright.

The Los Angeles office of Gunnarsson Associates was on Hollywood Boulevard at the corner of Highland, near Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. His card got him in to see Charlie Wainwright, boss of the West Coast region, who said, ‘Hi, Ben; what are you doing over here?’

‘Slumming,’ said Hardin as he sat down.

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