I called Ralston at his house in Encino and told him our plans had been changed: he was to meet me at the Bank of America branch on Van Nuys and Tujunga in North Hollywood at ten o’clock Monday morning, and was to bring a list of all his D.P.S.S. contacts. I asked him if Cathcart had been in touch with him, and he said yes, that he had told Cathcart I was spotted, drunk, asking questions in Palm Springs. Cathcart had seemed to like that. Ralston was being a good scout, so I threw him a bone of encouragement, saying that he’d be in for a nice financial surprise on Monday, then hung up.
I killed the rest of the weekend fantasizing myself as a rich man. A quarter of a million in cold cash, carefully invested, would keep me off the streets for the rest of my life. I thought of possible investments, creative ones, and came up with a great idea: a classical music store. Records and tapes from the most prosaic to the most esoteric. A music book store second to none: biographies of composers, pictorial histories and sheet music. A Hollywood Boulevard cultural oasis. Rock-and-roll morons would be politely but firmly sent away. I would manage the store and Walter would be my aide-de-camp. I would retain my P.I.’s license and the office as a tax dodge. I would search out moderately good string players to join Jane in playing chamber pieces. Jamming with musicians of similar ability would have a salutary effect on her...
I would buy a big rambling house in the hills and several friendly dogs. Jane and I would have our separate lives, each revolving around music — Jane’s cello lessons and constant practice, my taking care of the store. At night we would sit in our living room and listen to music, then go upstairs and make love. Eventually, we would have children, preferably daughters. It would be a good life. It was possible now.
I left Ventura at seven-thirty Monday morning. Nine forty-five found me stationed across the street from the B. of A. at Van Nuys and Tujunga in North Hollywood. I was nervous, but felt safe: there was nothing transpiring outside the bank that resembled a setup. Ralston was securely under my thumb.
He showed up a few minutes later. He pulled into the bank parking lot, got out, and stood nervously by his car. He was wearing sunglasses, presumably to hide his battered face. I walked across the street and joined him. He didn’t say anything, just stared at me through his dark glasses. “Good morning, Ralston,” I said.
He cocked his head. “Good morning,” he replied.
“Are you feeling all right?” I asked. He nodded again. “Good,” I said. “Take off your glasses. We’re going to be making some heavy withdrawals and I don’t want you looking like a gangster about to split the country.”
He did it and I was amazed: his nose was hardly swollen, although it was purple-tinged, and his eyes were barely blackened.
“Let me outline my plan,” I said. “I want you to drive your car. We will hit every bank I have passbooks to. You will withdraw all but five hundred dollars from each account. In hundreds and fifties. Twenties are okay, too, if it’s all they have. Try to be inconspicuous. Tellers are required to report large deposits, but not withdrawals. You deposited the money, right?”
“Right.”
“Good. Then some of the tellers will remember you. I’ve got our itinerary all mapped out. We’ve got a long day ahead. Did you bring the information I asked for?”
“Yes.” Ralston fished in his coat pocket and handed me a neatly printed list of names. I winked at him and gave him a blue cardboard passbòok, pointing to the front door of the bank.
“Do your stuff, Daddy-O,” I said.
While he took care of business, I scanned the list of names, which were set up in columns, as in the manner of bookie ledgers I had seen. The names, all men’s, in one column followed by phone numbers in the other. Since several of the numbers were identical, I concluded they were office phones.
Ralston returned after a few minutes and motioned nervously for me to get into the car. Once inside, he reached into his pocket and handed me a roll of crisp new bills. I counted them, then broke out laughing: ninety-three C-notes. He started up the car. “Onward, Hot Rod,” I said.
We drove from one end of the Valley to the other, then over Coldwater Canyon to Beverly Hills and from there to the Miracle Mile, becoming richer and richer in the process. Before we left the Valley, I stopped at a supermarket and grabbed a large brown shopping bag. Soon it was jammed with cash.
While Hot Rod was making a withdrawal on Wilshire in Beverly Hills, I stashed the bag under my suitcoat and walked across the street to the Mark Cross Leather Goods Shop and bought a huge leather suitcase, paying for it with four crisp, brand-new C-notes. Back in the car, I lovingly transferred the bills from paper bag to suitcase. I felt very high, much like I did the first few times I got drunk.
Hot Rod returned, dumped $7,400 in centuries and fifties in my lap and gave me a pained look. We had been conversing very little. He had confirmed what I thought about the phone numbers — miracle of brevity, they were the actual at work phone numbers of the Welfare contacts — but all my other attempts at conversation went sullenly ignored. I had emasculated this man and he would not kiss my ass or give me the satisfaction of compounding his capitulation.
It gave me pause. I would need him to get at Cathcart. If he fingered me to old Haywood, it would be ink on my death warrant.
I checked my watch and counted the remaining bankbooks. It was 2:10 P.M. and there were nine remaining, containing a total of over $70,000. I estimated we had at least $265,000 in my suitcase. I looked at Ralston and slapped his shoulder, then tossed the passbooks into his lap. “For you, Hot Rod,” I said. “Over seventy thou. Spend it in good health.”
Ralston smiled briefly, then shook his head. “You’re out of your fucking mind to think you can get away with this,” he said. “You don’t know Cathcart. He’s out of his mind, too, but in a different way. You better blow the country now, while you’ve got a chance, because sooner or later he’ll find you. Then it’s all over.”
“No, you’ve got that wrong. Let’s reverse it. Sooner or later I’ll find him. Then it’ll be all over.”
“You’re crazy, Brown.”
“Not really. Tell me about Cathcart. I know he’s brilliant and I know he’s an iceberg. Big fucking deal. But I’m curious about one thing: with all his money, why does he continue to be a cop?”
Ralston didn’t even have to ponder this question. “Because he loves it. All the good guys versus the bad guys shit. He eats it up. He hates niggers. He’s always talking about keeping the niggers under control so they won’t revolt. He says he loves doing his part to keep the Welfare State solvent, that it’s a counterrevolutionary broadside. He says sooner or later the niggers will breed to the point that they’ll have to be dealt with violently, but in the meantime they provide a scapegoat for the poor white moron to hate, and it’s important to keep them strung out on dope, in jail, and on Welfare. It’s spooky. I don’t particularly like niggers, but I don’t want to hurt them. Cathcart’s cuckoo on the subject.”
“Did he supply Henry Cruz and Reyes Sandoval with heroin as payment for killing Fat Dog?”
“How did you know about that? They’re dead.”
“I know. I killed them.”
Ralston reacted with a contorting of his whole face. “Are you going to hit Cathcart?” he asked incredulously.
“Hit Cathcart? Hit?” I answered, equally incredulous. “Who do you think I am? Marlon Brando in The Godfather? I don’t want to hit Cathcart, I want to become his buddy. I’m a nigger trainee with aspirations. All I want is a million-dollar Welfare check and a lifetime supply of soul food. Then I’ll convert to Judaism and join Hillcrest. You can fix me up with a good caddy when I learn to play golf.”