CHAPTER 5

I went to a gun shop in Santa Rosa. It was the closest one to me. The others were in El Cerrito, Pacifica and San Bruno. The clerk was an older man, balding, shirt sleeves folded up, a bit of a neatly trimmed moustache, and he leaned over a case containing a variety of handguns.

“How can I help you, sir?”

“How would I go about buying a handgun?”

“Is it for yourself?”

“Yes.”

“You ever own a gun before?”

“No, this is the first time. I’d like to have it around the house; we’ve had robberies lately, break-ins. I think I’d feel safer. What does it take?”

He handed me a brochure.

“You read this. It tells you what the safe handling requirements are, then you come back here and you take a test. It costs twenty-five bucks. You pass the test, you show me your driver’s license, you bring something that shows you’re a California resident, your PG&E bill, something like that. You demonstrate that you know how to safely handle a gun, then you pick one out, we fill out the papers, you pay me and you wait ten days to come back and pick it up. Assuming you don’t have a criminal record. They’ll check you out, make sure you’re OK.”

“What are the requirements for using the gun?”

“It’s all in there,” he said, pointing at the brochure. “You can keep it loaded at your house. You can’t keep it loaded if you’re in a car or on a public street. You can’t carry it concealed. If you have it with you in your car, you gotta put it in the trunk, unloaded. Glove compartment or under the seat is a no-no. You want to look at one of these?”

“Sure.”

He took a smaller gun out of the case and laid it on a felt pad on the counter.

“This is a Glock G43. Lightweight. It loads seven rounds. It’s something that people buy when they want a lightweight weapon that handles easily.”

I picked it up, gripped it, but I didn’t raise it. I knew that much. Don’t ever point a weapon at anybody. When I was a kid, I had a BB gun and my father was adamant about that.

“How do I learn to shoot something like this?”

“Gun range. There’s a couple not too far from here. I can give you directions. Actually, we offer lessons. You make an appointment, somebody takes you through the drill.”

I hoisted the gun again. It was light, black, deadly feeling, and I could imagine holding it to the temple of the asshole who had clipped my daughter’s car. Holding the barrel to his head and pulling the trigger. I pulled the trigger and it clicked, and the clerk said, “This weapon is one of our best sellers.”

I laid the gun back on the pad.

“I’ll study this,” I said, picking up the brochure.

Coming back down from Santa Rosa I thought about the idea of a gun. I thought about pressing it to the head of Earl Winslow, telling him to think about that girl hanging upside down in a car filling with water. And I was sure that I could kill him. But death by bullet seemed too quick, too painless. On the other hand, a gun would be something that would get his attention if I wanted him to go out to Point Reyes to that empty beach. It might be something that would convince him. I needed to isolate him, use the gun to force him to drive out to that beach where the surf would swallow him. What I had to do was plan this carefully. Be like the egret. Be patient.