“Hello, are you still there, Bill?”
“Sorry, I was thinking about General Taylor.”
“He was a great man,” the Washington Bureau Chief of Newsweek agreed. Ben Bradlee changed the subject without warning. “The admirals should actually be worrying about the Brits,” he declared. “If you think people in this country feel bad about the war, try thinking about it from the Brits’ perspective. The guys from their embassy tell me the first thing the RAF knew about the October War was when they saw the missiles heading their way. Everything that has happened since then has confirmed what they knew the day after the war. That we’d betrayed them.”
“That’s not true, Ben. You and I both know that’s not true. That’s just communist propaganda…”
“I thought Curtis LeMay killed all the communists?”
Westmoreland belatedly realised calling Ben Bradlee had been a bad idea. He said nothing.
“Apart from the one’s hiding in cupboards all over the USA,” the Newsweek Bureau Chief continued sarcastically, “according to J. Edgar Hoover!”
The Army man hung up.
Chapter 26
Sam Brenckmann had not seen Johnny Seiffert since before the October War, and if he had never seen him again it would have been way too soon. This being the case suddenly finding the San Francisco based agent, fixer and sometime drug dealer barring his way into the Troubadour flanked by two very large, unshaven Neanderthals wearing scuffed leather jackets was, therefore, an extremely unwelcome surprise. He had learned to keep away from Hell’s Angels in particular and bikers in general in the last year. Hearing the throaty approach of Harley-Davidsons most sensible people headed for cover, especially out in the country where a lot of small communities and road stops had been taken over by the roaming black-clad gangs. Johnny Seiffert’s minders looked like knuckle-draggers, soldiers who had failed to find a home; the one thing the gangs were not short of was muscle and some of the better organised chapters were picky about who they let in.
“I own you!” Johnny Seiffert declared, fearless with his gorillas at his back. He was a man of average height in his forties just beginning to go to seed who looked vaguely ridiculous in over-tight blue jeans, cowboy boots and a jacket that ought to have had sequins. He usually wore a hat to conceal his thinning hair; today he was sporting a neatly trimmed beard and wore a thick, heavy gold chain around his neck.
Even if he had never met Johnny before Sam would have realised that this encounter was not going to end well. The little shit would not have come all the way down to LA with two goons if all he wanted to do was talk. A less rational man than Sam Brenckmann would have tried to run away but he was not going to get far carrying his guitar. The instrument itself, a second hand Martin to replace the one he had had to leave behind in Bellingham, was light enough, but its case was not. Given the World in which they now lived he had acquired the most heavyweight, bomb proof case he could lay his hands on; it was seriously weighty and so bulky that not even an Olympic sprinter could have out run Johnny Seiffert’s Neanderthals with it swinging from one arm. The sensible thing to do would have been to have dropped the guitar and fled the scene — which was what he and Judy had done in Bellingham — but that was never going to happen again. Well, unless it was a straight choice between the guitar and Judy.
Besides, he was not in a running away mood.
“How do you figure that, Johnny?” Sam inquired, thinking he ought to feel a lot more afraid than he actually did.
“You signed a contract!”
“Sue me,” Sam suggested flatly.
The two gorillas were shifting on their feet, growling, wanting to get on with their fun, sizing up the long haired, rangy musician with hungry contempt.
Oh, shit!
This is going to hurt!
“I don’t recollect you getting me any gigs lately?” Sam observed. This was not entirely fair because obviously, the little shit had probably thought he was dead. Notwithstanding, it was not unreasonable to expect the onus to be on one’s manager’s side of the deal to know if one was alive or dead. “You still owe me my fees for the North-East tour with the Limonvilles,” he added flatly.
Sam had played this reunion out in his head many times over the last year. Johnny Seiffert had turned Miranda against him, sent him off to the boondocks of the Western World with a bunch of talentless Texan rednecks and very nearly got him killed.
Belatedly recognising the violence in the younger man’s eyes Seiffert took a step back. He turned to the less vacant-looking of his associates, and opened his mouth to speak.
“I just called the West Hollywood PD,” said a new, very familiar voice from behind the three men blocking Sam Brenckmann’s view down the sidewalk.
The bikers turned to face the tall, wild-haired, beanpole figure who had silently emerged from the alley behind the Troubadour. The larger than life, notoriously eccentric club owner was hefting a double barrelled shotgun, a big piece, eighteen or twenty gauge, Sam guessed.
“You guys probably don’t want to be around when they get here,” Doug Weston grinned at the two hulking Hell’s Angels. “I already got protection, boys,” he went on, “my chapter ain’t going to take kindly to you crapping on their ground. You don’t want to hang around in this town, you dig?”
The club owner was dressed in what looked like multi-coloured pyjama bottoms and not a lot else apart from a battered Stetson. He looked surreal and the gun, which he waved here and there as he spoke, added an undeniable ‘through the looking glass’ sobriquet to the moment. People passing by were beginning to notice the ‘situation’ developing outside the Troubadour and getting under cover.
Unaccustomed to having to do their own thinking Johnny Seiffert’s muscle hesitated.
“Okay, have it your way,” Doug Weston guffawed.
Sam suspected that his friend was a little high.
“You boys lie down on the sidewalk before I blow your fucking heads off!”
Yeah, Doug was high.
The bikers must have thought so too because they prostrated themselves at Johnny Seiffert’s feet in a hurry.
“We can talk about this,” their boss said to Doug Weston as if the slowly, unpredictably gyrating muzzles of the heavy gauge shotgun were no more than Scotch mist. “I’ve got rights. You’ve got rights. We can talk about…”
“You ain’t got no rights over the kid, Johnny!”
“I’ve got a contract!”
“You never paid the kid his end of tour fee tour for the Limonville Brothers gig,” Doug Weston pronounced triumphantly. “That sounds like breach of contract to me?”