“I see you know quite a bit about my life, don’t you?”
“I know everything about what’s transpired in the past ten years. Will you meet me?”
“Yes. How will I know you?”
“I’ve seen you before. I’ll meet you at the observatory at two o’clock.”
“Yes. I’ll be there.”
“Good. Come alone.”
“I will. Goodbye, Mr. Brown.”
“Goodbye.” I hung up and checked my watch. Ten forty-five. I said goodbye to a mystified Mark Swirkal and drove to Griffith Park. I wanted to get there early to check out the scene. If Kupferman’s phone was tapped and there was some kind of relay to Cathcart, he would be sending someone after me. Also, I didn’t think it was too likely, but if Kupferman was so used to being under Cathcart’s thumb that he panicked at the prospect of my upsetting the applecart, he might tell Cathcart himself, dooming me.
The parking lot of the observatory was filling up when I got there: buses filled with kiddie groups, sight-seeing families with small children in tow, bored high school loafers looking for an afternoon’s diversion. But nothing suspicious-looking. Los Angeles looked otherworldly from my mountaintop vantage point: a hot, shimmering valley shrouded in smog.
I took a bench seat near a drinking fountain and waited. At exactly 2:03, Kupferman’s white Cadillac pulled into view. There were no cars following him. I watched him park, lock his car, and get out and walk around. While he was doing this, I surveyed the crowded parking lot for telltale signs of surveillance. Nothing. I got up and walked toward him. He was craning his neck in every direction. He nearly jumped out of his skin when I spoke softly to him. “Mr. Kupferman? I’m Fritz Brown.”
He recovered fast, looked up at me and gave me a firm handshake. “Mr. Brown,” was all he said. I searched his face for signs of familial resemblance to Jane and Fat Dog. There was nothing but the pale blue eyes, but it was enough. In that respect, the three Kupfermans were all of a kind.
“Let’s take a walk, Mr. Kupferman,” I said. “We need some privacy.”
He just nodded, gravely, and let me lead the way. We walked north toward a hiking trail leading up into the Griffith Park Hills. Kupferman was immaculately dressed in a pale olive gabardine suit, linen shirt, and wide tie. He was the very picture of stoic dignity. Even his two-hundred-dollar alligator shoes did nothing to detract from this image. His face, sunlamp-tanned and Semitic, was a history of patience in the face of adversity, and the brilliant blue eyes spoke of a refined intelligence. I knew I was going to like him. We walked uphill on the dirt path. Kupferman was starting to pant and strain a little, so I slowed my pace. When we reached a plateau about one hundred yards up from the parking lot, with a view in all directions, I stopped. By way of introduction, I said: “We’ve met before, Mr. Kupferman. At the Club Utopia, about two weeks before it was bombed. You were sitting at the bar and spilled a drink on me. I’ve got exceptional recall. If it weren’t for that recollection, I wouldn’t have become involved in this affair to the extent that I am.”
Kupferman nodded. He didn’t seem shocked by my reference to the Utopia. “I see,” he said. “That is extraordinary. Of course, I don’t recall it. Exactly what do you know about this ‘affair,’ as you call it, Mr. Brown?”
“Call me Fritz,” I said. “I know everything, except for a few gaps I hope you’ll fill in for me. I know everything about the Utopia bombing, the Welfare scam, Haywood, Ralston, and the fact that Freddy and Jane Baker are really your children.”
Sol Kupferman went pale and for a second started to reel. I put a firm restraining hand on his shoulder. Gradually he calmed himself, the sunlamp tan returning. “And what do you intend to do with this information?” he asked.
“Nothing,” I said. “It dies with me. Jane will never know. You don’t have to worry about Freddy. He’s dead.”
“I know. Jane told me.”
“Cathcart had him murdered.”
“I figured as much.”
“How do you feel about that?”
“Relieved, somehow. Freddy was my son, but he was an animal, and it was all my fault. I gave him up as a child. I’m the guilty one. Freddy just followed his instincts, which were insane.”
“Tell me about that, Mr. Kupferman. There’s one gap in my investigation: you said you gave Freddy up as a child. Why? Who were his first foster parents? There was almost a nine year gap between the birth of your two children. What happened during that time?”
“What will you do if I don’t tell you?”
“Nothing. You’ve been pushed, bled, and tortured enough. I just want to close this thing out in my mind so I can do what I have to do and get it over with.”
Sol sized me up with shrewd blue eyes.
“And Jane will never know?”
“Never.”
I watched Sol weigh the pro’s and con’s of confession. Finally he sighed, and said: “All right. Freddy and Jane’s mother, Louisa Hall, was the love of my life. The most beautiful woman that God ever created. But very disturbed. Suicidal. She loved me, but was abindently attached to her father, who hated me because I was Jewish. He knew of our liaison and mentally tortured her for it. And Louisa took it, withstood it out of love. She couldn’t give up her father and she couldn’t give up me. But she wouldn’t marry me; she knew that it would drive her father away for good. When Freddy was born, something in her snapped. She wanted a baby, desperately; we planned it, I figured that marriage would have to follow, it being 1943. But when Freddy was born, she snapped. She hated him. He repulsed her. She wanted to be rid of him. She wouldn’t nurse him. I had to hire a wet nurse. She gave me an ultimatum: ‘Put him up for adoption or I will leave you forever.’ I couldn’t face that prospect, so I did it. But not through an agency, not formal adoption. I gave him to an old business associate and his wife. They lived near Monterey. They were Russian Jews, immigrants. They Americanized their name to Baker. They gave it to Freddy, even legally adopted him. I got regular reports from Baker, over the years. Freddy was a wild sadistic boy. He killed little animals. I felt guilty, but I put it out of my mind. I was making a lot of money, illegally. I won’t go into it. Things were going well with Louisa. She was getting better, less depressed. In 1951, she told me she wanted another child. After the birth she would marry me. I believed her. We had the baby. Jane was born in March of ’52. Things were good for about a month. We were making wedding plans. I was pulling out of the rackets. Then Louisa’s father committed suicide. Louisa went mad. One evening I caught her trying to strangle Jane in her crib. The look in her eyes, my God!!”
Sol hesitated, faltering, then mustered new resources of candor and went on: “I hired a male nurse to look after Jane. I sent Louisa to the best psychiatrist on the West Coast. He diagnosed her as schizophrenic. I put her into a private sanitarium. When she came out on a visit one day, when Jane was one and a half, we took a drive to the beach and went for a walk on the Palisades. A young couple came by, pushing a baby in a stroller. Louisa saw them and started to scream. She ran to the cliffs, climbed the barrier, and threw herself off. She fell all the way to the Pacific Coast Highway. She died instantly, of course. I was in grief, terrible grief. I blamed myself and I blamed little Jane. I couldn’t live with her. I took her up to the Bakers in Monterey to be with her brother. I told Stas Baker to somehow convince Freddy that Jane was his sister, even though Freddy was old enough to know that Baker’s wife wasn’t pregnant with her. Somehow he did convince Freddy. Maybe just psychically, Freddy knew Jane was his blood.