The Big Nowhere (5 page)

Cohen took his hand from the table, shook it free of glass slivers and licked lemon goo off his fingers. “Who was in it besides the Greek?”

Buzz showed him his eyes, the loyal henchman who’d never lie; he came up with two gunsels he’d run out of town for crashing Lew the Jew Wershow’s handbook at Paramount. “Bruno Geyer and Steve Katzenbach. Fairies. You gonna find Lucy a place?”

Cohen snapped his fingers; waiters materialized and stripped the table dervish fast. Buzz sensed wheels turning behind the Mick’s blank face—in
his
direction. He moved over to cut the man some slack; he stayed deadpan when Mickey said, “Mitzvah, huh? You fucking goyishe shitheel. Where’s Audrey and Lucy now?”

“Out by my car.”

“What’s Solly pay you?”

“A grand.”

Mickey dug in his pants pockets and pulled out a roll of hundreds. He peeled off ten, placed them in a row on the table and said, “That’s the only mitzvah you know from, you hump. But you saved me grief, so I’m matching. Buy yourself some clothes.”

Buzz palmed the money and stood up. “Thanks, Mick.”

“Fuck you. What do you call an elephant who moonlights as a prostitute?”

“I don’t know. What?”

Mickey cracked a big grin. “A two-ton pickup that lays for peanuts.”

“That’s a riot, Mick.”

“Then why ain’t you laughing? Send the girls in—
now
.”

Buzz walked over to the bar, catching Johnny Stompanato working on another shot. Turning, he saw Cohen being glad-handed by Tom Breneman and the maitre d’, out of eyeshot. Johnny Stomp swiveled around; Buzz put five Mickey C-notes in his hand. “Sifakis snitched you, but I don’t want him touched. And I didn’t tell Mickey bubkis.
You owe me
.”

Johnny smiled and pocketed the cash. “Thanks, pal.”

Buzz said, “I ain’t your pal, you wop cocksucker,” and walked outside, stuffing the remaining hundreds in his shirt pocket, spitting on his necktie and using it to daub the tomato juice stains on his best Oviatt’s worsted. Audrey Anders was standing on the sidewalk watching him. She said, “Nice life you’ve got, Meeks.”

Part of him knew it was just a dream—that it was 1950, not 1941; that the story would run its course while part of him grasped for new details and part tried to be dead still so as not to disrupt the unraveling.

He was speeding south on 101, wheeling a hot La Salle sedan. Highway Patrol sirens were closing the gap; Kern County scrubland loomed all around him. He saw a series of dirt roads snaking off the highway and hit the one on the far left, figuring the prowl cars would pursue straight ahead or down the middle. The road wound past farmhouses and fruit pickers’ shacks into a box canyon; he heard sirens to his left and right, behind him and in front of him. Knowing any roadway was capture, he down-shifted and plowed across furrowed dirt, gaining distance on the wheeirr, wheeirr, wheeirr. He saw stationary lights up ahead and made them for a farmhouse; a fence materialized; he down-shifted, swung around in slow second gear and got a perfect view of a brightly lit picture window:

Two men swinging axes at a young blonde woman pressed into a doorway. A half-second flash of an arm severed off. A wide-open mouth smeared with orange lipstick screaming mute.

The dream speeded up.

He made it to Bakersfield; unloaded the La Salle; got paid. Back to San Berdoo, biology classes at JC, nightmares about the mouth and the arm. Pearl Harbor, 4F from a punctured eardrum. No amount of study, cash GTAs or
anything
can push the girl away. Months pass, and he returns to find out how and why.

It takes a while, but he comes up with a triangle: a missing local girl named Kathy Hudgens, her spurned lover Marty Sidwell—dead on Saipan—questioned by the cops and let go because no body was found. The number-two man most likely Buddy Jastrow, Folsom parolee, known for his love of torturing dogs and cats. Also missing—last seen two days after he tore across the dry cabbage field. The dream dissolving into typescript—criminology texts filled with forensic gore shots. Joining the LASD in ’44 to know WHY; advancing through jail and patrol duty; other deputies hooting at him for his perpetual all-points want on Harlan “Buddy” Jastrow.

A noise went off. Danny Upshaw snapped awake, thinking it was a siren kicking over. Then he saw the stucco swirls on his bedroom ceiling and knew it was the phone.

He picked it up. “Skipper?”

“Yeah,” Captain Al Dietrich said. “How’d you know?”

“You’re the only one who calls me.”

Dietrich snorted. “Anyone ever call you an ascetic?”

“Yeah, you.”

Dietrich laughed. “I like your luck. One night as acting watch commander and you get floods, two accident deaths and a homicide. Want to fill me in on that?”

Danny thought of the corpse: bite marks, the missing eyes. “It’s as bad as anything I’ve seen. Did you talk to Henderson and Deffry?”

“They left canvassing reports—nothing hot. Bad, huh?”

“The worst I’ve seen.”

Dietrich sighed. “Danny, you’re a rookie squadroom dick, and you’ve never worked a job like this. You’ve only seen it in your books—in black and white.”

Kathy Hudgens’ mouth and arm were superimposed against the ceiling—in Technicolor. Danny held on to his temper. “Right, Skipper. It was bad, though. I went down to the morgue and…watched the prep. It got worse. Then I went back to help Deffry and Hender—”

“They told me. They also said you got bossy. Shitcan that, or you’ll get a rep as a prima donna.”

Danny swallowed dry. “Right, Captain. Any ID on the body?”

“Not yet, but I think we’ve got the car it was transported in. It’s a ’47 Buick Super, green, abandoned a half block up from the building site. White upholstery with what looks like bloodstains. It was reported stolen at ten this morning, clouted outside a jazz club on South Central. The owner was still drunk when he called in—you call him for details.”

“Print man dusting it?”

“Being done now.”

“Is SID going over the lot?”

“No. The print man was all I could wangle downtown.”

“Shit. Captain, I want this one.”

“You can have it. No publicity, though. I don’t want another Black Dahlia mess.”

“What about another man to work with me?”

Dietrich sighed—long and slow. “If the victim warrants it. For now, it’s just you. We’ve only got four detectives, Danny. If this John Doe was trash, I don’t want to waste another man.”

Danny said, “A homicide is a homicide, sir.”

Dietrich said, “You’re smarter than that, Deputy.”

Danny said, “Yes, sir,” hung up, and rolled.

The day had turned cool and cloudy. Danny played the radio on the ride to Allegro; the weatherman was predicting more rain, maybe flooding in the canyons—and there was no news of the horrific John Doe. Passing the building site, he saw kids playing touch football in the mud and rubberneckers pointing out the scene of last night’s spectacle—an SID prowl of the lot would now yield zero.

The print wagon and abandoned Buick were up at the end of the block. Danny noticed that the sedan was perfectly parked, aligned with the curb six inches or so out, the tires pointed inward to prevent the vehicle from sliding downhill. A psych lead: the killer had just brutally snuffed his victim and transported the body from fuck knows where, yet he still had the calm to coolly dispose of his car—
by the dump scene
—which meant that there were probably no witnesses to the snatch.

Danny hooked his Chevy around the print car and parked, catching sight of the tech’s legs dangling out the driver’s side of the Buick. Walking over, he heard the voice the legs belonged to: “Glove prints on the wheel and dashboard, Deputy. Fresh caked blood on the back seat and some white sticky stuff on the side headliner.”

Danny looked in, saw an old plainclothesman dusting the glove compartment and a thin patch of dried blood dotted with white terrycloth on the rear seat cushion. The seat rests immediately behind the driver were matted with crisscross strips of blood—the terrycloth imbedded deeper into the caking. The velveteen sideboard by the window was streaked with the gelatinous substance he’d tagged at the morgue. Danny sniffed the goo, got the same mint/medicinal scent, clenched and unclenched his fists as he ran a spot reconstruction:

The killer drove his victim to the building site like a chauffeur, the stiff propped up in his white terry robe, eyeless head lolling against the sideboard, oozing the salve or ointment. The criss-cross strips on the seat rests were the razorlike cuts on his back soaking through; the blood patch on the cushion was the corpse flopping over sideways when the killer made a sharp right turn.

“Hey! Deputy!”

The print man was sitting up, obviously pissed that he was taking liberties. “Look, I have to dust the back now. Do you mind…”

Danny looked at the rear-view mirror, saw that it was set strangely and got in behind the wheel. Another reconstruction: the mirror held a perfect view of the back seat, blood strips and goo-streaked sideboard. The killer had adjusted it in order to steal glances at his victim as he drove.

“What’s your name, son?”

Now the old tech was really ticked. Danny said, “It’s Deputy Upshaw, and don’t bother with the back seat—this guy’s too smart.”

“Do you feel like telling me how you know that?”

The two-way in the print wagon crackled; the old-timer got out of the Buick, shaking his head. Danny memorized the registration card laminated to the steering column: Nestor J. Albanese, 1236 S. St. Andrews, LA, Dunkirk-4619. He thought of Albanese as the killer—a phony car theft reported—and nixed the idea as far-fetched; he thought of the rage it took to butcher the victim, the ice it took to drive him around LA in New Year’s Eve traffic.
Why
?

The tech called out, “For you, Upshaw.”

Danny walked over to the print car and grabbed the mike. “Yeah?”

A female voice, static-filtered, answered. “Karen, Danny.”

Karen Hiltscher, the clerk/dispatcher at the station;
his
errand girl—occasional sweet talk for her favors. She hadn’t figured out that he wasn’t interested and persisted in using first names over the County air. Danny pushed the talk button. “Yeah, Karen.”

“There’s an ID on your 187. Martin Mitchell Goines, male Caucasian, DOB 11/9/16. Two convictions for marijuana possession, two years County for the first, three to five State for the other. Paroled from San Quentin after three and a half, August of ’48. His last known address was a halfway house on 8th and Alvarado. He was a State parole absconder, bench warrant issued. Under employment he’s listed as a musician, registered with Union Local 3126 in Hollywood.”

Danny thought of the Buick stolen outside a darktown jazz club. “Have you got mugs?”

“Just came in.”

He put on his sugar voice. “Help me with paperwork, sweet? Some phone calls?”

Karen’s voice came out whiny and catty—even over the static. “Sure, Danny. You’ll pick up the mugshots?”

“Twenty minutes.” Danny looked around and saw that the print tech was back at work. He added, “You’re a doll,” hoping the girl bought it.

Danny called Nestor J. Albanese from a pay phone on Allegro and Sunset. The man had the raspy voice and skewed speech of a hangover sufferer; he told a booze-addled version of his New Year’s Eve doings, going through it three times before Danny got the chronology straight.

He was club-hopping in darktown from 9:00 or so on, the bop joints around Slauson and Central—the Zombie, Bido Lito’s, Tommy Tucker’s Playroom, Malloy’s Nest. Leaving the Nest around 1:00 A.M., he walked over to where he thought he left his Buick. It wasn’t there, so he retraced his steps, drunk, figuring he’d ditched the car on a side street. The rain was drenching him, he was woozy from mai tais and champagne, he took a cab home and woke up—still smashed—at 8:30. He took another cab back to South Central, searched for the Buick for a solid hour, didn’t find it and called the police to report it stolen. He then hailed another taxi and returned home again, to be contacted by the watch sergeant at the West Hollywood substation, who told him his pride and joy was a likely transport vehicle in a homicide case, and now, at 3:45 P.M. New Year’s Day, he wanted his baby back—and that was that.

Danny 99 percent eliminated Albanese as a suspect—the man came off as legit stupid, professed to have no criminal record and seemed sincere when he denied knowing Martin Mitchell Goines. He told him the Buick would be kicked loose from the County Impound inside three days, hung up and drove to the Station for mugshots and favors.

Karen Hiltscher was out on her dinner break; Danny was grateful she wasn’t around to make goo-goo eyes and poke his biceps, copping feels while the watch sergeant chuckled. She’d left the mugshot strip on her desk. Alive and with eyes, Martin Mitchell Goines looked young and tough—a huge, Butch-Waxed pompadour the main feature of his front, right and left side pics. The shots were from his second reefer roust: LAPD 4/16/44 on a mugboard hanging around his neck. Six years back; three and a half of them spent in Big Q. Goines had aged badly—and had died looking older than thirty-three.

Danny left Karen Hiltscher a memo: “Sweetheart - will you do this for me? 1 - Call Yellow, Beacon and the indy cab cos. Ask about pickups of single males on Sunset between Doheny and La Cienega and side sts. between 3:00 to 4:00 a.m. last nite. Ditto pickups of a drunk man, Central and Slauson to 1200 block S. St. Andrews, 12:30 - 1:30 a.m. Get all log entries for pick-ups those times and locations. 2 - Stay friendly, ok? I’m sorry about that lunch date I cancelled. I had to cram for a test. Thanks - D.U.”

The lie made Danny angry at the girl, the LASD and himself for kowtowing to teenaged passion. He thought of calling the 77th Street Station desk to tell them he was going to be operating in City territory, then kiboshed the idea—it was too much like bowing to the LAPD and their pout over the Sheriff’s harboring Mickey Cohen. He held the thought, the contempt. A killerhoodlum who longed to be a nightclub comic and got weepy over lost dogs and crippled kids brought a big-city police department to its knees with a wire recording: Vice cops taking bribes and chauffeuring prostitutes; the Hollywood Division nightwatch screwing Brenda Allen’s whores on mattresses in the Hollywood Station felony tank. Mickey C. putting out his entire smear arsenal because the City high brass upped his loan shark and bookmaking kickbacks 10 percent. Ugly. Stupid. Greedy.
Wrong
.

Danny let the litany simmer on his way down to darktown—Sunset east to Figueroa, Figueroa to Slauson, Slauson east to Central—a hypothetical route for the car thief/killer. Dusk started coming on, rain clouds eclipsing late sunshine trying to light up Negro slums: ramshackle houses encircled by chicken wire, pool halls, liquor stores and storefront churches on every street—until jazzland took over. Then loony swank amidst squalor, one long block of it.

Bido Lito’s was shaped like a miniature Taj Mahal, only purple; Malloy’s Nest was a bamboo hut fronted by phony Hawaiian palms strung with Christmas-tree lights. Zebra stripes comprised the paint job on Tommy Tucker’s Playroom—an obvious converted warehouse with plaster saxophones, trumpets and music clefs alternating across the edge of the roof. The Zamboanga, Royal Flush and Katydid Klub were bright pink, more purple and puke green, a hangarlike building subdivided, the respective doorways outlined in neon. And Club Zombie was a Moorish mosque featuring a three-story-tall sleepwalker growing out of the facade: a gigantic darky with glowing red eyes high-stepping into the night.

Jumbo parking lots linked the clubs; big Negro bouncers stood beside doorways and signs announcing “Early Bird” chicken dinners. A scant number of cars was stationed in the lots; Danny left his Chevy on a side street and started bracing the muscle.

The doormen at the Zamboanga and Katydid recalled seeing Martin Mitchell Goines “around”; a man setting up a menu board outside the Royal Flush took the ID a step further: Goines was a second-rate utility trombone, usually hired for fill-in duty. Since “Christmas or so” he’d been playing with the house band at Bido Lito’s. Danny read every suspicious black face he spoke to for signs of holding back; all he got was a sense that these guys thought Marty Goines was a lily-white fool.