No Cure For Love (30 page)

‘You mean this isn’t a relationship?’

‘You know what I mean. We’ve been friends a long time. I know we’ve had some ups and downs, but we’ve still been friends. Sometimes even the best of friends get horny for one another. Acting on that can sometimes ruin a friendship. But you and me, Arvo, we haven’t got anyone else to hurt but ourselves. We’re grown-ups. We can deal with it.’

‘Wait a minute. Are you saying this is a one-night stand? A wham-bam-thank-you-sir.’

Maria laughed. ‘No, that’s not what I’m saying, butt-head. But what I
am
saying is let’s not get hung up on it, okay? I don’t want to live with you or marry you and have your children. I don’t even want to date you. What I do want is for us to go to bed together like this now and then.’

‘Can we negotiate maybe dinner once a month?’

‘I’ll think about it. But do you understand what I’m saying?’

‘Yes, I think so.’

‘And do you agree?’

‘Uh-huh. In principle.’

‘Shake on it?’

Arvo touched her hair. ‘I think we can do better than that.’ Maria laughed and slid down onto her side, moving closer to him. ‘My, my, it
has
been a long time, hasn’t it?’ she said. ‘Hey, listen.’

‘What?’

‘The countdown.’

And they listened to the crowd count the apple down three thousand miles away and three hours ago in New York City. But after the roaring and the whistling they weren’t paying attention any more. It must have been about a quarter after twelve when the phone rang at a very awkward moment. Maria was closest to it at the time, and before Arvo could make a move, she had picked up the receiver.

‘Yes?’ she said. ‘Yes, this is the Hughes residence . . . What? No, I’m sorry, I’m afraid he can’t speak now. He’s busy. His mouth is otherwise engaged. What? Sure. I’ll tell him. And a Happy New Year to you, too, honey.’

‘Why the hell did you do that?’ said Arvo.

‘Don’t you want to know who it was?’

‘It could have been the department.’

‘No. They’d beep you. Especially on New Year’s Eve.’

‘Who was it, then?’

‘Can’t you guess?’

‘Maria!’

‘Okay, okay. It was your ex, that’s who. Little Miss Surfing Bikini.’

‘Nyreen?’

‘Isn’t it just the kind of thing she’d do, call you up to wish you a Happy New Year?’

‘Well, I suppose so. What’d she say?’

Maria laughed. ‘Not much when she heard
my
voice. She says to tell you you’re a prick.’

Arvo frowned. ‘Why would she do that?’

‘You really don’t get it, do you? Because she likes to control you, that’s why. It’s all right when she’s running around with someone else and you’re at home alone. But you’re supposed to be suffering, longing for her, mourning the loss of the great love of your life, not having fun.’

‘Is that right?’

‘Yes. And there’s something else.’

‘What?’

‘She’s jealous.’

Arvo started to grin. ‘Really?’

‘Really.’

‘Is there any more champagne?’

‘Ah-ah, not yet, mister. You’ve got some unfinished business first.’

‘I have? What? Oh, yes, I
have
.’

Afterwards, they finished the champagne, Arvo locked the house up and began to doze off, arm around Maria. He must have actually fallen asleep, because he felt like he’d been brought back from a long way off when he woke to feel Maria shaking him. He opened his eyes and saw the expression of absolute terror on her face.

‘Arvo, there’s a fire,’ she said, shaking him. ‘There’s a fire somewhere in the house. I can smell it.’

Arvo couldn’t smell anything, but he rubbed his eyes and got out of bed to check. There was nothing at the front of the house, but now he was beginning to smell smoke, too. The smoke detector started to screech, and when he went into the spare bedroom at the back, he saw the bright orange flames leaping up the walls.

31

Arvo took the Santa Ana Freeway all the way to Laguna Canyon. It wasn’t a scenic ride, for the most part, but it was fast. He drove with the top of the convertible open and sang along with Neil Young’s ‘Cortez the Killer.’

It was 2 January, and Carl Buxton, ex-drummer of Gary Knox’s band, The Heros, was back from Mexico. Arvo had asked if Buxton were willing to talk about the tour and about Gary Knox, and he had agreed. According to Stan Harvey, Buxton was about the only one of the band with any brain-cells left – enough, anyway, to get out of the rock scene after Gary died and start up a music-geared computer business.

Arvo got the impression that there had been a great deal of craziness around Gary Knox, and as Sarah Broughton had been a part of it for a while, it followed that here was the best place to start looking for her demon lover.

Whether Carl Buxton would remember any more than Sarah did was a moot point. What was the old saying?
If you remember the sixties you weren’t there
. Well, it hadn’t been the sixties, but rock ’n’ roll was rock ’n’ roll, and the drugs were much the same. Though the music press may have christened Gary the ‘new Dylan,’ Arvo had always thought he had more than a touch of Jim Morrison about him. Which meant madness and mayhem.

Everything depended on how observant Buxton was, or how curious he was about others and their problems. Arvo had met a few rock stars while he had been working with the TMU, and he found them to be egocentric assholes, for the most part.

He glanced down at the map spread on the passenger seat. Just past Irvine, he took El Toro Road into Laguna Hills and wound down to the canyon.

Arvo remembered Laguna Canyon as a beautiful area, scattered with expensive homes, secluded by brush and trees. But he hadn’t been there since the fires, and he wasn’t prepared for the devastation he saw this time.

The steep, majestic hills that rose from the coast were reduced to brown scrub, with no vegetation left, and some areas had even been charred black by the intensity of the fires that had swept down into the canyons, fanned by the hot, dry Santa Ana winds. Here and there, twisted, blackened trees held up their gnarled branches like shaking fists against a bright blue sky.

Close to Buxton’s house, Arvo stopped by a ‘Restricted Access’ area out of curiosity, left the car and wandered in, under the chain fence. It had once been a street of homes. Now all that remained were the foundations, the stone gateways and paths, brick fireplaces and chimneys. Walls, furniture and possessions had all been consumed by the fires.

Arvo walked up some steps through pink stucco gateposts to what was once the first floor of one house; now it was nothing more than a concrete foundation open to the elements. He wandered back into the barren garden; there, amid the blackened debris, a dead starling floated in a Jacuzzi full of stagnant water.

It could have been
his
house on New Year’s Eve, he realized, if Maria hadn’t had such an innate terror of fire that she had smelled it before it really took hold.

Arvo had gone out with the extinguisher and put out the fire easily enough, then found a bundle of charred rags by the back wall under the spare bedroom window. He had spent the rest of the night with the firefighters and arson investigators – discovering only what he knew already: that the fire had been deliberately set, and that it had started from a pile of gasoline-soaked rags. An amateur job, the fire department investigator said.

Some consolation.

Up in Laguna Canyon, Arvo noticed as he walked away, the real-estate agents had already put up signs on the burned-out properties. Soon, the ground would be cleared, new houses built, new vegetation planted, and the cycle would continue.

On one of those whims God is famous for, Carl Buxton’s house had been spared. Hugging the ground not more than fifty yards away, across the street, it was a small English Tudor-style place with high-pitched gables, half-timbering, a tall chimney and casement windows of leaded glass. It reminded Arvo of illustrations he had seen in the fairy-tale books his father had kept from his childhood, more so because it was partially shrouded in shrubbery and trees.

He pulled up beside a white Mercedes convertible in the broad driveway. As he was admiring the car, the front door of the house – all oak and stained glass – opened and a tall, thin man in ice-blue jeans and a salmon-pink shirt walked out to greet him.

‘Like it?’ he asked, referring to the car with obvious pride in ownership.

Arvo nodded. ‘Very much.’

‘Had it shipped all the way from Deutschland. Cost a packet. Hi, I’m Carl Buxton.’ He stuck his hand out and smiled. ‘You must be the cop. Come in.’

Instead of the typical rock-star look Arvo had expected, Buxton had a baby face, pink lips, puckered like a cherub’s in a Renaissance fresco, glaucous eyes and straight blond hair, with spiky bangs, just about covering his ears at the sides and reaching his shirt collar at the back. Arvo figured he must be in his late thirties, but he looked about twelve.

Arvo introduced himself.

‘Arvo?’ Buxton echoed. ‘After the composer?’

Arvo shook his head. ‘I don’t know. What composer? It was my mother’s choice. She was Estonian.’

‘Yeah, man, like the composer. Arvo Pärt. Pronounced “Pert.” Does really contemporary stuff, a bit of minimalism, some of that Gorecki-style religious music, a lot of solemn repetitions. Goes on a bit but I find it nice and relaxing sometimes. Man, I can’t believe you’ve never heard of him.’

‘Maybe the next time I feel like a bit of relaxation . . .’

But Buxton had already turned his back to lead the way. Arvo followed him through the house, getting quick impressions of a lot of dark wood panelling and antique furniture, and blurred glimpses of framed sixties rock posters on the walls: the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, Cream, Big Brother and the Holding Company. His favourite kind of music.

They ended up out back, where open french windows led out to a wooden deck that smelled of cedar. Music played softly upstairs: early Eagles, ‘Take It Easy.’ Bougainvillaea edged the neat lawn, tiny white flowers buried deep in the red bracts. Yellow, purple and pink plants Arvo couldn’t name hung from the trelliswork that covered the patio and created a pleasant area of shade. Birds skittered and sang in the jacarandas. There were rose bushes, too: red, yellow and white.

‘Nice,’ said Arvo.

‘Yeah. The gardener does a good job.’ Buxton gestured towards a wicker chair. ‘Take a pew.’

Arvo sat.

‘Drink?’

‘Iced tea?’

‘No problemo.’

Buxton disappeared into the kitchen, leaving Arvo to inspect the oddly shaped cacti in pots arranged all around the deck.

‘Interesting,’ he said when Buxton returned with the drinks. ‘I was expecting a woodland recording studio or something.’

Buxton smiled as he sat opposite Arvo and stretched out his long legs. He was drinking Old Milwaukee from a can. Arvo sipped his iced tea. It came complete with ice and a twist of lemon. ‘Are you still in the business?’ he asked.

‘I do some studio work,’ Buxton said. ‘Just to keep my hand in. But it’s more of a hobby, really.’ He fiddled with a pack of Camel Lights and lit up. There were several butts already in the shell ashtray on the low wooden table. He blew smoke out through his nose. ‘So, you want to know about that prick Gary Knox, do you?’ he asked.

‘I’d like your impressions of the tour and the people involved. We can start with Gary, if that’s okay?’

‘Fine with me, man. Gary snorted and swallowed everything he could get his hands on. I mean everything. Christ, he wasn’t even that fussy. He’d shove it up his arse if he thought it would get him high.’

Arvo had a sudden and unpleasant memory of what had been done to John Heimar. ‘How long had you known Knox?’ he asked.

‘I didn’t know him, really. Jim Lasardi, the bass player, is an old mate of mine. We go way back. The last drummer quit before the tour to go into detox, and they were stuck for a replacement, so Jim gave me a call. I’d already semi-retired, but I needed the money.’ He shrugged.

Arvo looked around. ‘Not any more,’ he said.

‘No,’ Buxton agreed. ‘Not any more. But believe me, I earned every fucking cent.’

‘So that last tour was the only one you did with Gary Knox?’

‘Yes, thank God.’

Arvo took his notebook out of his pocket and rested it on his thigh. ‘It’s that tour I wanted to talk to you about, really,’ he said. ‘I’ve heard a few rumours that it was pretty wild. That true?’

Buxton put his feet up on the edge of the table, ankles crossed, and relaxed in the wicker chair. ‘Wild is an understatement,’ he said. ‘But while you’ve got your notebook out, I’d like to make it clear that I never have, don’t now, and didn’t then, do any drugs other than the legal ones.’

Arvo grinned. ‘Those being?’

Buxton held out the cigarette and can. ‘Tobacco and alcohol, man. That’s all. And I’m not even much of a drinker.’

‘This isn’t about drugs, Mr Buxton.’