"You're right, Freddy. That was unworthy of me. Let's go. I've had enough for today."
I drove Beckworth back to his car, then went home to my apartment in Santa Monica. I showered and changed. Then I put my off-duty .38 snub-nose into a small hip holster and attached it to my belt next to my spine in case I went dancing and got romantic. Then I got into my car and went looking for women.
I decided to follow the red trolley car. It ran from Long Beach all the way up into Hollywood. It was Friday night, and on weekend nights the red car carried groups of girls looking for an evening's fun on the Strip that they probably couldn't afford. The red car ran slightly elevated on a track in the middle of the street, so you could hardly see the passengers. Your best bet was to drive abreast of it and watch the girls as they boarded.
I liked L.A. girls the best, they were lonelier and more individual than girls from the "suburbs," so I caught the red car at Jefferson and La Brea. I wanted to give myself five minutes or so of suspense before the Wilshire Boulevard bonanza: clusters of salesgirls from Ohrbach's and the May Company, and secretaries from the insurance companies that lined L.A.'s busiest street. I kept my '47 Buick ragtop with the gunsight hood ornament dead even with the red car and watched keenly as passengers boarded.
The parade up to Wilshire was predictable—old-timers, high school kids, some young couples. At Wilshire, a whole knot of high-voiced gigglers jumped on board, pushing and shoving goodnaturedly. It was cold out; overcoats obscured their bodies. It didn't matter; spirit is more important than flesh. They boarded fast, so I couldn't discern faces. That put me at a disadvantage. If they got out at Fountain or Sunset en masse, I would have to park quick and chase them with no time to work on a line suited to one particular woman.
But it didn't matter, not tonight, because on La Brea just short of Melrose I saw her, running out of a Chinese restaurant, handbag flying by its straps, framed for a few brief seconds in the neon glow of the Gordon Theater: an unusual-looking girl, identifiable not by type, but by an intensity of feeling. She seemed to have a harried, frightened nervousness that blasted open the L.A. night. She was dressed with style, but without regard for fashion: men's baggycuffed slacks, sandals, and an Eisenhower jacket. Men's garb, but her features were soft and feminine and her hair was long.
She barely made the red car, hopping aboard with a little antelope bound. Her destination eluded me—she had too much stuff to be running for the Strip. Maybe she was headed for a bookstore on Hollywood Boulevard, or a lover's rendezvous that would ace me out. I was wrong; she got off at Fountain and started walking north.
I parked in a hurry, placed an "Official Police Vehicle" sign under my windshield wiper and followed her on foot. She turned east on De Longpre, a quiet residential street on the edge of the Hollywood business district. If she was going home I was out of luck for tonight—my methods required a crowded street or public place, and the best I could hope for was an address for future reference. But I could see that half a block up two black-and-whites were double-parked with their cherry lights on: a possible crime scene.
The girl noticed this, hesitated, and walked back in my direction. She was afraid of cops, and this compounded my interest. I decided to risk all on that fear, and intercepted her as she passed me. "Excuse me, miss," I said, showing her my badge. "I'm a police officer, and this is an official crime scene. Please allow me to escort you to a safe place."
The woman nodded, frightened, her face going pale and blank for a brief moment. She was very lovely, with that strength-vulnerability combo that is the essence of my love and respect for women. "All right," she said, adding "Officer" with the thinnest edge of contempt. We walked back towards La Brea, not looking at each other.
"What's your name?" I asked.
"Sarah Kefalvian."
"Where do you live, Miss Kefalvian?"
"Not far from here. But I wasn't going home. I was going up to the boulevard."
"Whereabouts?"
"To an art exhibit. Near Las Palmas."
"Let me take you there."
"No. I don't think so."
She was averting her eyes, but as we got to the corner of La Brea she gave me a spirited, defiant look that sent me. "You don't like cops, do you, Miss Kefalvian?" I said.
"No. They hurt people."
"We help more people than we hurt."
"I don't believe it. Thank you for escorting me. Good night."
Sarah Kefalvian turned her back to me and started striding off briskly in the direction of the boulevard. I couldn't let her go. I caught up with her and grabbed her arm. She yanked it away. "Look," I said, "I'm not your average cop. I'm a draft dodger. I know that there's a Picasso exhibit at that bookstore on Las Palmas. I'm hot to learn culture and I need someone to show me around." I gave Sarah Kefalvian the crinkly smile that made me look a bashful seventeen. She started to relent, very slightly. She smiled. I moved in. "Please?"
"Are you really a draft dodger?"
"Kind of."
"I'll go with you to the exhibit if you don't touch me or tell anyone that you're a policeman."
"It's a deal."
We walked back to my illegally parked car, me elated, and Sarah Kefalvian interested, against her will.
The exhibit was at Stanley Rose's Bookshop, a longtime hot spot for the L.A. intelligentsia. Sarah Kefalvian walked slightly ahead of me, offering awed comments. The pictures were prints, not actual paintings, but this didn't faze her. It was obvious she was warming to the idea of having a date. I told her my name was Joe Thornhill. We stopped in front of "Guernica," the one picture I felt confident enough to comment on.
"That's a terrific picture," I said. "I saw a bunch of photographs on that city when I was a kid. This brings it all back. Especially that cow with the spear sticking out of him. War must be tough."
"It's the cruelest, most terrible thing on earth, Joe," Sarah Kefalvian said. "I'm devoting my life to ending it."
"How?"
"By spreading the words of great men who have seen war and what it does."
"Are you against the war in Korea?"
"Yes. All wars."
"Don't you want to stop the Communists?"
"Tyranny can only be stopped through love, not war."
That interested me. Sarah's eyes were getting moist. "Let's go talk," I said, "I'll buy you dinner. We'll swap life stories. What do you say?" I waggled my eyebrows a la Wacky Walker.
Sarah Kefalvian smiled and laughed, and it transformed her. "I've already eaten, but I'll go with you if you'll tell me why you dodged the draft."
"It's a deal." As we walked out of the bookstore I took her arm and steered her. She buckled, but didn't resist.
We drove to a dago joint on Sunset and Normandie. En route I learned that Sarah was twenty-four, a graduate student in History at U.C.L.A. and a first-generation Armenian-American. Her grandparents had been wiped out by the Turks, and the horror stories her parents had told her about life in Armenia had shaped her life: she wanted to end war, outlaw the atom bomb, end racial discrimination, and redistribute the wealth. She deferred to me slightly, saying that she thought cops were necessary, but should carry liberal arts educations and high ideals instead of guns. She was starting to like me, so I couldn't bring myself to tell her she was nuts. I was starting to like her, too, and my blood was roiling at the thought of the lovemaking that we would share in a few hours' time.
I appreciated her honesty and decided that candor would be the only decent kind of barter. I decided not to bullshit her: maybe our encounter would leave her more of a realist.
The restaurant was a one-armed Italian place, strictly family, with faded travel posters of Rome, Naples, Parma, and Capri interspersed with empty Chianti bottles hanging from a phony grape arbor. I decided to forgo chow, and ordered a big jug of dago red. We raised our glasses in a toast.