MIDMORNING, two accident investigators from the California Highway Patrol showed up at Mona’s bedside. She was still asleep, so Finn shepherded the officers into the corridor. They said they had a few questions.
“Do you know if she takes any medication?” asked one.
“No,” said Finn.
“Is she a regular drinker?”
“Not to excess.”
“Has she been particularly fatigued?”
“Listen, she told me something,” said Finn.
Finn told the investigators about the snake.
“Under the seat, she said?” said one. He had his notebook flipped open.
“You hear about them getting under the hood sometimes,” said the other. “But inside the cabin?”
Finn told them about Soto. The whole story, from the beginning.
They looked at him dubiously.
“So what you’re saying is, you think this guy came up from Mexico to kill your wife by putting a rattlesnake under her seat in her car? Is that what you’re saying?”
“Yes,” said Finn. “Mona saw him next to her car, in the parking lot outside Paradise Karaoke.”
Again, the dubious look.
“There are easier ways of killing a person,” said the other officer.
“This guy, Soto, is a psychopath,” said Finn. “He doesn’t just want to hurt people. He wants to enjoy hurting them. He threw acid on a girl. He put another in a box with snakes. He’s a herper.”
“A what?”
“A herper. A snake collector. He did this.”
Finn caught the glance between the two investigators. He saw that they had already made up their minds about what had happened.
Fuck you guys, he thought.
“Well, the first responders who pulled her out didn’t say anything about any snakes,” said one of the officers. “But we’ll make a note of it. Are you sure she’s not on any medication?”
Over the following week, Finn and Mona quickly fell into a rhythm. Little rituals that brought them both great comfort. At Mona’s insistence, Finn took up residence in her room at the Eden Inn.
“I want you to shower and change your clothes. For my sake,” she said. Finn rented a car, brought a change of clothes, and slept in the room, but he was always at the hospital before Mona woke and always the last visitor to leave. He got to know all the night nurses. He brought her treats and magazines; her cell phone had been destroyed in the crash, so he went out and bought her a new one. He got in touch with the phone company to set it up. He coordinated with the insurance company about the car. He called her office. Joaquin said he would file a motion to delay the trial.
After a week, the CHP accident investigators completed their report. They brought Finn a copy. The investigators had written that it was a single-vehicle accident caused by driver error. They put it down to something called trucker syndrome. They noted Mona had been driving long distances over the past few months, back and forth between the coast and desert. People with trucker syndrome become complacent. They forget how fast they’re going. They imagine things. Finn saw that the investigators had not included in their report Mona’s assertion that there was a snake under her seat, causing her to panic. He threw the report in the trash.
He got into his rental and drove out to the spot on the interstate where Mona had flipped her RAV, pulled over to the shoulder, and got out. Near where he had parked, a large white polyester bag caught on a thorny bush fluttered in the breeze. The RAV was a good thirty feet from the road, lying upside down, tilted forward onto its hood, its back wheels high. It was so far from the road that the highway patrol did not deem it a hazard and hadn’t pressed Finn to organize removal.
Finn walked up to the wreck. Up close, the ground smelled of fuel. He stepped over a dark patch of sand where gas had spilled from the ruptured tank. He walked round the front, and the smell of gas gave way to a sweet scent—coolant spilled from the radiator. He kicked aside some wreckage and glass to clear a space, carefully got down on his hands and knees, and peered into the wrecked cabin through the driver’s side. Amid all the shards and broken bits lying on the ceiling of the car, he saw a tube of Mona’s lipstick. He reached for it now. Then he saw a high-heeled shoe, which he also recovered. He looked around until he located the other. It was poking out from under the driver’s seat above his head. Finn reached for it and pulled it out. A thought occurred to him. He reached under the driver’s seat and felt around.
His fingers touched something cold, smooth, scaly. He took hold of it, pulled it out, and stood.
He looked at the dead snake in his hand. It was maybe six feet long. It was surprisingly heavy, weighing about the same as a bowling ball. Its head was the size of a cat’s. He examined the gray-green diamonds down its back. He turned it over and looked at its white belly. He ran his fingers along the segments of its rattle. They were, he realized, hollow, like shells.
Finn walked back to his car. He untangled the abandoned bag from the bush and dropped the snake in it. He put the snake and Mona’s shoes on the passenger’s seat of his rental and her lipstick in the dash. He drove to the CHP office in Paradise. He asked the receptionist for the accident investigators. The two officers appeared.
He pulled the snake out of the bag and smacked it down on the counter.
“She didn’t imagine it,” he said.