L.A. Confidential (37 page)

  Trashcan was late. Move to the Hudgens notes.

  God-awful butchery, no hard suspects, Hudgens roundly hated. A lackluster investigation--heat fell briefly on Max Peltz and the _Badge of Honor_ crew--_Hush-Hush_ published an article "exposing" Peltz and his lust for teenage girls. Peltz passed a polygraph test; the rest of the "crew" proffered alibis. Between the lines--Parker considered the victim scum, short-shrifted the case.

  Still no Trash. Ed skimmed the alibi sheet.

  Max Peltz engaged in statutory rape--heavily implied, no charges filed. Script girl Penny Fulweider home with her husband; Billy Dieterling alibied--Timmy Valburn. Set designer David Mertens--a sickly man suffering from epilepsy and other ailments--alibied by Jerry Marsalas, his live-in male nurse. Star Brett Chase at a party; co-star Miller Stanton likewise. A bust--but Hudgens' death had to play central to Vincennes' spring '53.

  Trashcan walked up, sat down. No preims. "You're calling it in?"

  "I'm meeting with Parker tomorrow. I'm sure he's going to announce a reopening."

  Vincennes laughed. "Then don't look so grim. If you're crazy enough to want it, at least act happy."

  Ed placed six shell casings on the table. "Three of these are target rounds I retrieved from your last range practice, three are rounds I took out of a Hollywood Division evidence locker. Identical lands and grooves. April '53, Jack. You remember that shootout on Cheramoya?"

  Trash grabbed the table. "Keep going."

  "Pierce Patchett owns that building on Cheramoya, and it's a nicely hidden ownership. S&M gear was found on the premises, and Patchett is a K.A. of Lynn Bracken, Bud White's girlfriend, who you denied knowing. You were working a smut job for Ad Vice then, and smut and sadomasochist paraphernalia are in the same ballpark. The last time we talked you admitted that Hudgens had a file on you, that that was why you were all over the place then. Here's my big leap, so correct me if I'm wrong. Bracken and Patchett were K.A.'s of Hudgens."

  Vincennes dug his hands in--the table shook. "So you're a smart fucker. So what?"

  "So did Bud White know Hudgens?"

  "No, I don't think--"

  "What does White have on Patchett and Bracken?"

  "I don't know. Exley, look--"

  "No, _you_ look. And you answer me. Did you get Hudgens' file on you?"

  Trashcan, sweating. "Yeah, I did."

  "Who from?"

  "The Bracken woman."

  "How did you get it out of her?"

  "Deposition threat. I wrote out a deposition on her and Patchett, everything I put together about them. I made carbons and stashed them in safe-deposit boxes."

  "And you--"

  "Yeah, I've still got them. And they've still got a carbon on me."

  Educated guess. "And Patchett was pushing that smut you were chasing?"

  "Yeah. Exley, look--"

  "No, Vincennes, _you_ look. Do you still have copies of the smut books?"

  "I've got the depositions and the books. You want them, I get my evidence suppression wiped. And half the Nite Owl collar."

  "A third. There's no way to make the case without White."

CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  Room 6 at Victory. Dudley, a muscle creep chained to the hot seat. Dot Rothstein ogling _Playboy_. Bud watched her scope cheesecake: a bull-dyke cop in a Hughes Aircraft jumpsuit.

  Dudley skimmed a rap sheet. "Lamar Hinton, age thirty-one. One ADW conviction, a former telephone company employee strongly suspected of installing bootleg bookie lines for Jack 'The Enforcer' Whalen. A parole absconder since April 1953. Lad, I think it is safe to refer to you as an organized crime associate, thus someone in need of reeducation in the ways of polite society."

  Hinton licked his lips; Dudley smiled. "You came along peacefully, which is to your credit. You did not give us a song and dance about your civil rights, which, since you don't have any, speaks well of your intelligence. Now, my job is to deter and contain organized crime in Los Angeles, and I have found that physical force often serves as the most persuasive corrective measure. Lad, I will ask questions, you will answer them. If I am satisfied with your answers, Sergeant Wendell White will remain in his chair. Now, why did you abscond your parole in April 1953?"

  Hinton stuttered. Bud threw backhands--eyes on the wall so he wouldn't have to see. Left/right/left/right/left/right--Dot flashed the cut-off sign.

  Cease fire. Dudley: "A little admonishing to show you what Sergeant White is capable of. Now, from here on in I will accommodate your stammer. Do you recall the question? Why did you abscond your parole in April 1953?"

  Stut-stut-stutter: Hinton with his eyes squeezed shut.

  "Lad, we're waiting."

  Hinton:          "H-h-had b-b-blow t-town."

  "Ah, grand. And what precipitated your need to leave?"

  "J-just w-woman t-t-trouble."

  "Lad, I don't believe you."

  "Th-th-the t-truth."

  Dudley nodded. Bud threw backhands--pulled, fake full force. Dot said, "This boy could take a lot of grief. Come on, sugar, make it easy on yourself. April '53. Why'd you blow town?"

  Bud heard Breuning and Carlisle next door. It hit him: 4/53--the Nite Owl.

  "Lad, I overestimated the power of your memory, so let me help it along. Pierce Patchett. You were acquainted with him back then, weren't you?"

  Bud, chills: evidence suppression, he shouldn't know Patchett existed--

  Hinton jerked, thrashed.

  "Ah, grand, I think we touched a nerve."

  Dot sighed. "God, such muscles. I should have such muscles."

  Dudley howled.

  Kill the chills: he's on the reopening--maybe Hinton works in. _If he knew about my evidence dance I wouldn't be here_.

  Dot sapped Hinton: the arms, the knees. Muscles took it stoic: no yelps, no whimpers.

  Dudley laughed. "Lad, you have a high threshold for discomfort. Comment on the following, please: Pierce Patchett, Duke Cathcart and pornography. Be concise or Sergeant White will test that threshold."

  Hinton, no stutter. "Fuck you, Irish cocksucker."

  Ho, ho, ho. "Lad, you're a regular Jack Benny. Wendell, show our organized crime associate your opinion of unsolicited comedy acts."

  Bud grabbed Dot's sap. "What are you looking for, boss?"

  "Full and docile cooperation."

  "Is this the Nite Owl? You said Duke Cathcart."

  "I want full and docile cooperation on all topics. Have you objections to that?"

  Dot said, "White, just do it. God, I should have such muscles." Bud got close. "Let me play him solo. Just a couple minutes." "A return to your old methods, lad? It's been a while since you evinced enthusiasm for this kind of work."

  Bud whispered. "I'm gonna let him think he can take me, then shiv him. You and Dot wait outside, okay?"

  Dudley nodded, walked Dot out. Bud turned the radio on: a commercial, used-car values at Yeakel Olds.

  Hinton rattled his chains. "Fuck you, fuck that Irish guy and fuck that fucking diesel dyke."

  Bud pulled up a chair. "I don't like this stuff, so you be good and give me some answers on the side and I'll tell the man to cut you loose. You got that? No parole roust."

  "Fuck you."

  "Hinton, I think you know Pierce Patchett, and maybe you knew Duke Cathcart. You can tell me some side stuff and I'll--"

  "Fuck your mother."

  Bud threw Hinton and his chair across the room. The hot seat landed sideways--slats popped off. Shelves collapsed--the radio broke, spewing static.

  Bud uprighted the chair one-handed. Hinton pissed his pants. Bud heard himself talking, a weird voice like a brogue. "Give me some pimp stuff, lad. Cathcart, a coon named Dwight Gilette-- they both ran this girl Kathy Janeway. She got snuffed and I don't like that. You got information on them, _lad?_"

  Eyeball to eyeball--Hinton's wide wide. No stutter, don't rile the fucking animal. "Sir, I just had this driver job for Mr. Patchett, me and this guy Chester Yorkin. All we did was deliver these . . . these illegal things . . . and Cathcart, him I don't know from Adam. I heard Gilette was a swish, all I know's he used to get hooers for Spade Cooley's parties. You want skinny on Spade? I know he blows opium, he's a righteous degenerate dope fiend. He's playing the El Rancho now, you roust him. But I don't know no hooer killers and I don't know no girl Kathy Janeway."

  Bud shook the chair--Hinton kept snitching. "Sir, Mr. Patchett, he ran call girls. Gorgeous tail, all fixed up like movie stars. His favorite was this gorgeous cunt Lynn, looked just like--"

  Bud went straight for his face. The face went red, big men pressed in--arms around him--lifting him. The ceiling zooming down, cracked stucco swirls going black.

o        o          o

  Questions and answers through black, shouts and whimpers through gauze--a wall that held faces back. Stag books, Cathcart, Pierce P.--the full drift couldn't get through. A strain to hear "Lynn Bracken," no yield on the name, the black going that much blacker. Mickey Cohen, '53 and why'd you run--he tore at the gauze for that name. Shrieks that made him burrow into softness--snapshots of Lynn all around him.

  Lynn blond and a whore, brunette and herself. Lynn on his thing with Inez: "Be kind to her and spare me the details." Lynn filling up her diary while he punked out on reading it because he knew she had him down cold. Lynn thinking two steps ahead of him, drifting in and out of his life while he drifted in and out of hers. That black gauze throbbing--questions, answers. Black silence, cracked stucco swirls going light.

  Room 7 at the Victory: cots for the Mobster Squad guys. The door to 6 wide open.

  Bud rolled off his cot, stood up. His head throbbed, his jaw ached, he'd ripped up his pillow burrowing in. Into 6, a shambles: the hot seat, blood on the walls. No Hinton, no Dot, no Dudley and his boys. 1:10 A.M.--no way to figure out the questions and answers.

  He drove home woozy, too trashed to think. He unlocked his door yawning--the overhead light went on. Something/somebody grabbed him.

  Cuffs on his wrists. Ed Exley, Jack Vincennes--square in front of him. A side check: Fisk and Kleckner--I.A. shitbirds-- pinning his arms.

  Exley slapped him. Fisk grabbed his neck, popped a finger on his carotid.

  A folder in his face. Exley: "l.A. ran a personal on you when you made sergeant, so we already know about Lynn Bracken. Vincennes had a tail on you back in '53, and he's got you, Bracken and Pierce Patchett in this deposition here. You braced Patchett on the Kathy Janeway homicide, and you were all over the Nite Owl like a plague. I need what you know, and if you don't cooperate I'll begin an I.A. investigation into your evidence suppression immediately. The Department needs a scapegoat on the old Nite Owl job--and I'm too valuable to take the fall. If you don't cooperate, I'll use every bit of my juice to ruin you."

  The choke hold went slack--Bud tried to pull away. Kleckner and Fisk dug in. "You fuck, I'll fucking kill you."

  Exley laughed. "I don't think so, and if you play you get your evidence suppression chilled, part of the collar and a little plum--a liaison to those hooker snuffs you care so much about."

  Black gauze coming back. "Lynn?"

  "She's our first interrogation--with pentothal. If she's clean, she walks."

  He doesn't know about _Whisper_, I've still got that stiff in San Berdoo. "And you and me when it's over."

CHAPTER FIFTY-TWO

  No sleep--Vincennes' deposition wouldn't let him. The wake-up call he didn't need: a reporter at 6:00 A.M. Radio news riding over: reopening speculation, a _mano a mano_ with his father--the freeway system near done, the Nite Owl hero now a villain. Parking lot pickets--Commie types demanding justice.

  Early--for the most important meeting of his career.

  Parker's conference room was set up--notepads on the table. Ed wrote "Patchett," "Bracken," "Patchett's 'deal' with Hudgens-- extortion?"; he underlined "Pornography pictures match Hudgens mutilations--have Vincennes bring smut books to Bureau." White's contribution: "Patchett hinked on smut in '53"; "Patchett/Englekling bros and father chem background"; "Duke Cathcart's pad tossed & San Berdoo Yellow Pages (printshops) ruffled." White was still holding back--he knew it.

  Deposition underlined: "Patchett involved (through Fleurde-Lis racket) in (contained) distribution of smut Ad Vice chasing in '53, smut Cathcart developed distribution scheme around, smut connected to mutilations on Hudgens' body."

  Conclusion:

  A dense series of criminal conspiracies at least five years old resulting in no fewer than four and perhaps as many as a dozen major crimes.

  The other men filed in--Parker, Dudley Smith, Ellis Loew. Nods, quick sit-downs.

  Parker said, "We're reopening. The A.G.'s Office wants to usurp the job, but Ellis has filed a restraining order against them, which should buy us two weeks' time. We've got two weeks to clear the case and recover the respect we lost. We've got two weeks before Sacramento comes down here and makes us a laughingstock. I want this case cleared, legally inviolate and in the hands of the grand jury within twelve days. Do you understand, gentlemen?"

  Nods all around. Loew said, "I'm personally in a difficult position here, since Coates, Jones and Fontaine did confess to me. On reflection, I must admit that they were stupid and naive boys psychologically susceptible to suggestion, so--"

  Smith cut in. "Ellis, that's blood under the bridge. We simply got the wrong coloreds, not the ones who fired off those shotguns in Griffith Park. The real culprits are some smart Darktown strutters who knew where Coates stashed his car, then planted the weapons. Lads who knew niggertown well and simply beat us to the location. The purple car seen by the Nite Owl was just a coincidence that the killers capitalized on. I think the Griffith Park car was stolen or out of state, and in any event I think it's not applicable. We have to begin by shaking down the southside again."

  Ed smiled--Smith's tack played into his plan. "Essentially I agree, and I've got one of my I.A. men checking old registrations. But aren't we ahead of ourselves? Shouldn't we set up a chain of command first?"