James Ellroy_Underworld U.S.A. 03 (30 page)
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Authors: Blood's a Rover
Tags: #General, #Los Angeles (Calif.), #Noir Fiction, #Mystery & Detective, #Political Fiction, #Nineteen Sixties, #Political, #Hard-Boiled, #Fiction, #Literary
Crutch played the radio low. The tunes vexed him. It was all peacenik pap and jungle jive. Brainstorm: rig Bowen's car with a voice box and night-light.
He got out his toolbox, squatted down and ran over. He took a corkscrew and popped a hole in the left taillight. He taped a 9-volt battery voice box under the right wheel well and flipped the dial to Frequency 3. He ran back to his car and got out the receiver. Clickâthere's Channel 3 and current ambient sounds.
Crutch re-settled and re-zoned his head. He shined his penlight on the Joan pix. He had the knack now. He knew how to make those gray streaks glow.
Bowen walked out and got in his car. Night owlâ2:42 a.m.
He pulled out. Crutch long-distance frogged him. That taillight hole supplied range and direction.
They drove. Crutch hovered six car lengths back. Coontown hopped. Bowen slow-cruised all-night rib cribs and bars locking up. LAPD was out BIG. Sidewalk dice games vaporized as The Man passed. Bowen drove by two black-power storefrontsâBTA and MMLF.
You be window-shoppin? What be wrong wid you
?
Street noise bopped off Channel 3. The jungle be late-nite loud. Bowen U-turned and shagged ass westbound on Slaus on and northbound on Crenshaw.
Now, it's more white. Now, it's more civilized. Channel 3 is amping down. He's heading west on Pico, north on Queen Anne Place, right by the park.
Bowen bumped the curb and took the center walkway. Fuckâno way to frog close.
Crutch doused his lights and perched at the east curbside. The park was all wet grass, shrubs and trees. He eyeball-tracked the taillight hole and saw Bowen slow-weaving.
The light went off. The car sounds died. Crickets chirped on Channel 3.
Silence. Bowen's car door opening and closing. It's dark. It's all audio now.
More silence. Then two male voices. Then zippers snag and belt buckles rattle and all these scary moans.
DOCUMENT INSERT
: 10/19/68. Verbatim FBI telephone call transcript. Marked: “
Recorded at the Director's Request”/”Classified Confidential 1-A: Director's Eyes Only.
” Speaking: Director Hoover, Special Agent Dwight C. Holly.
JEH: Good morning, Dwight.
DH: Good morning, Sir.
JEH: Do you feel like some campaign chat? The swing states appear close, but our boy Dick seems to be surging.
DH: I think he'll win, Sir.
JEH: He applied to the Bureau in 1939. I saw his application photo and thought, That young lawyer did not shave closely this morning.
DH: And you altered the course of American history in the process, Sir.
JEH: I alter the course of American history every day, Dwight.
DH: You certainly do, Sir.
JEH: Update me on the shenanigans of our murderous French bonbon J. P. Mesplede and Clyde Duber's upstart charge Crutchfield.
DH: They're effective in a gadfly way, Sir. They're due in Miami next, and I'm sure Mesplede will not be able to resist the lure of that pissant island 90 miles offshore.
JEH: You consider the Cuban Cause to be entirely moribund and existentially futile, don't you, Dwight?
DH: Yes, Sir. I do.
JEH: I most assuredly do not. Castro has been in power since 1926, and he is a worse tyrant than his predecessors Chaing Kaishek and Cardinal Mindszenty.
DH: Uh, yes, Sir.
JEH: You sound dubious, Dwight. You do not normally falter during our snappy repartee.
DH: I'm fine, Sir.
JEH: You subsist on coffee and cigarettes. They have dulled your memory for established historical facts.
DH: Yes, Sir.
JEH: Would another rest cure at Silver Hill suit you? You
might recall the first one. I pulled you off the Dillinger case in '34. You were drunk and killed those Negro tourists from Indiana.
DH: Uh, yes, Sir.
JEH: “Uh” twice in one conversation? I think you do require a rest cure of some sort.
DH: I'm fine, Sir.
JEH: Moving along, then. Please update me on the Dr. Fred Hiltz case.
DH: It's covered, Sir. Jack Leahy is overseeing the investigation for the Beverly Hills PD. There's no way the Bureau will be embarrassed.
JEH: I think the robber-killers are black militants on a rampage. They may well be consorts of a criminal cartel called Archie Bell and the Drells.
DH: I don't think so, Sir. Archie Bell and the Drells are a musical ensemble, and Jack Leahy thinksâ
JEH: Jack Leahy is a duplicitous agent with a seditious sense of humor reminiscent of the late heroin addict/comedian, Lenny Bruce. I track cocktail-party chitchat, you know. When I went in for my gallbladder operation, Jack Leahy told a Chicago agent that I was having a hysterectomy. This was in 1908, and I remember it well.
DH: So do I, Sir.
JEH: I know you do. You were working the Cleveland Office, then.
DH: Yes, Sir.
JEH: And
OPERATION BAAAAAD BROTHER
? Unwittingly facilitated by the fearsome Sergeant Robert S. Bennett?
DH: My infiltrator and informant are both in place, Sir. I'm sure they'll be approached soon. I don't think my infiltrator is entirely trustworthy, so I've had Don Crutchfield spot-tailing him. Bowen's done nothing irregular, so I'm pulling the tail as of tonight.
JEH: Ah, young Crutchfield. Clyde Duber's most persistently voyeuristic foundling.
DH: He is that, Sir.
JEH: And Wayne Junior? Persistently homicidal and racially unlucky? How is he faring?
DH: I'm seeing him tomorrow, Sir. I would guess that he's grappled with this most recent mishap and has moved on.
JEH: We must all move on. Persistence and tenacity cure all one's ills in the end.
DH: Yes, Sir.
JEH: Good day, Dwight.
DH: Good day, Sir.
(Las Vegas, 10/20/68)
S
he looked through you and saw you anyway. She made you look back
.
He told her his Morty Sidwell story. He stressed the redneck jail, the bailout, the scarred woman. Reginald's gun charge. Reginald's books. Her son's troika: chemistry, left-wing texts, Haitian voodoo herbs.
They perched at the rest stop. They sat in Wayne's car for more legroom. Mary Beth brought sandwiches and coffee. It was pouring. The rain covered themânobody shot them cheap looks.
Mary Beth said, “What will you do now?”
“Keep going. Build a file. Learn what I can about this secondary life your son had.”
“You wanted to say âsecret life.'Â ”
“Yes, I did.”
“Because you've got one yourself?”
Wayne sipped coffee. The cup burned his hands. Mary Beth got it fires-of-hell hot.
“I was reading you the whole time. The entire story was news to you.”
“We've never discussed your occupation. You talked to Howard Hughes and broke the color line, but I don't know what you do the rest of the time.”
A gust hit them. The car swayed. Mary Beth grabbed the dashboard bar.
Wayne said, “I facilitate things for Mr. Hughes and some gentlemen with similar interests. I spend a fair amount of my time with police officers and political operatives.”
Mary Beth sighed. “Â âSecret life' is a euphemism. I'm seeing a secret world here.”
“I can't tell you much more than that.”
“You deal with people I'd disapprove of. Let's leave it there.”
Wayne messed with the defroster. It was a jumpy-hands task. The car got too cold or too hot. Mary Beth hit the Off slide and held his hand there.
“Last summer?”
“Yes.”
“Three of our loved ones died. The man who killed my husband was posthumously indicted for killing your father.”
Wayne slid his hand back. Mary Beth pinned it there.
“We never discuss it. You always bring up Reginald. You haven't allowed me to mourn, and you haven't done much mourning yourself.”
Wayne coughed. Mary Beth laced their fingers up. His legs fluttered.
“I don't want us to live with all these dead people. We've had too much of that. I'll be spending some time in southside L.A. soon, and I'll be putting out some feelers on your son. He's nineteen, he's armed, he gets popped at a town on the Nevada-California border. My instincts are telling me L.A.”
Hailstones hit the car. Wayne jumped. Mary Beth said, “Why are you so afraid of me?”
Dwight said, “Hoover's slipping. The old girl is in precipitous fucking decline. He'll be shacking up with Liberace by this time next year.”
Wayne smiled. “You could retire and go into corporate law.”
Dwight smiled. “You could retire and teach basic chem at BYU.”
The Dunes lounge was mock-soothing. The mock-oasis look cohered. Mock sand drifts, mock camels at a chlorinated spring.
Wayne said, “The Dr. Fred job. What's the status on that?”
Dwight tiki-torched a cigarette. “The same jigs robbed a house in Newport Beach. No fatalities, but the same glove prints and identical fibers at the scene. I think they saw Dr. Fred's anti-spook shit. Things just escalated from there.”
Wayne sipped club soda. “I could use some help on the L.A. end of my business. The Peoples' Bank and Black Cat Cab have defaulted their Teamster loans, so we're taking them over. I think Black Cat would be a good informant hub for you. I was thinking you could get Mr. Hoover to frost potential trouble there.”
Dwight stood up. He was losing weight. His belt gun drooped to one side.
Wayne said, “No racial slurs around me, Dwight. I'd very much appreciate it.”
“Sure, kid. I'm not out to hurt you.”
Home was the Stardust. He had his living suite/chem lab upstairs. He'd need to rig a missing person file space soon. He ate in the downstairs coffee shop most evenings. It brought back Janice and his night-watch cop days.
Wayne worked on a cheeseburger. The coffee shop was integrated now. He coerced Dracula into compliance. Drac was devolving à la Mr. Hoover. Call it dope and longtime lunacy accruing. Farlan Brown confirmed the prognosis. LBJ thwarted Drac's Vegas designs. Tricky Dick would comply. Farlan passed along gossip: the Count just suborned some key Humphrey aides. It covered him, poll-wise.
The burger was overcooked. The black folks two booths over got rude service.
Mesplede and Crutchfield were tricksterizing in Miami. Sam G.'s lawyers were buying out the defaulting market chain. He called the boss at Black Cat Cab this morning. A buyout chat was set for next week.
A black family walked in. Two white waitresses vanished. The hostess pretended they weren't there.
Wayne walked up to his suite. The door was ajar. He pulled his ankle piece and eased the door open.
The living room lights were on. Mary Beth was on the couch. She wore a lovely beige dress.
“Ghetto skills and union connections. I bribed a chambermaid.”
Wayne reholstered. Mary Beth said, “Your laboratory smells more toxic than Reginald's ever did.”
Wayne shut the door and pulled a chair up. Their knees were close. He slid the chair back. Mary Beth moved closer in.
“Why do you carry a gun?”
“I wish I didn't have to.”
Mary Beth opened her purse. “I got something very strange in the mail today. It was sent anonymously. The oddest thing. It was wrapped in a newspaper clipping about my husband and Pappy Dawkins.”
The names burned for a second. Wayne held on her eyes. Mary Beth pulled out a wad of newspaper and unwrapped it. A green stone was tucked in the middle. It looked like an emerald.
It sparkled and glittered. Wayne stared at it. He leaned in to look closer. Mary Beth put her face up to his.
“We can't hold hands outside or do public things. I don't want to know about the bad things you do.”
They were close. He lost her eyes getting closer. She touched his lids and shut them for him. Their noses bumped as she brought him in for the kiss.
(Los Angeles, 10/22/68)
N
EGROFICATION
:
The sartorial arm of
OPERATION BAAAAD BROTHER
. Marsh Bowen needed fashion tips. His colors clashed. He looked like a sepia lollipop. Evil niggers dressed all
Black
. It covered them by nightfall and offset their bright teeth.
Dwight slipped Marsh three C-notes. “New threads. I want to see you with that Eldridge Cleaver look. You be steppin' out o shadows like fuckin' Dracula to announce yo wicked intent.”
Marsh palmed the money. They idled outside the observatory. A telescope bank looked south. L.A. was smoggy and harshly lit. Griffith Park broiled.
“You're a fine mimic, Mr. Holly.”
“Your people make it easy.”
“I'll take that as a personal complimâ”
“Here's the compliment you've been so persistently anxious to receive. You have acquitted yourself brilliantly to this point, chiefly because your altercation with Scotty Bennett had mo muthafuckin' soul than I ever could have hoped for, and as such you are the heroic black man of the L.A. ghetto moment, which allots us a very short interval for you to be recruited by the BTA and/or the MMLF. You cannot join up, Officer. Your actions must draw them to you or you will arouse an undue level of suspicion.
You're an actor
, Officer. You have the actor's instinctive need to ingratiate, so you require stern direction to shape your performance. I doubt that you possess a moral core, so let me bypass the idea of that sort of compass to guide you. You must appear bold and exercise
great caution. You must judiciously rat out your new friends and benefactors and make sure that there are other snitch suspects for the information you have proffered. Use your discretion pertaining to any lowdown you might have on major crime pending. No homicide, no armed robbery, no sex shit on women or children. And do not give your former brethren in the LAPD a context in which to kick yo black ass, because they most assuredly will.”
Marsh swiveled a telescope and looked southbound. He always made his face blank and rode out confrontations. He always did offhand shit to hide his fear.
