Back when Viv Daley and Georgie Adams had first been partnered, Sergeant Murillo had taken her aside in the sergeants’ room and said, “I know that Adams is an acquired taste. I was wondering if you’re happy working with him?”
Viv Daley said, “Sarge, I wouldn’t trade him for anybody at Hollywood Station. When the Gypsy’s got your back, a girl couldn’t be more safe at a sleepover in the Lincoln Bedroom.” Then she added, “Except for when Bill Clinton lived there.”
Viv and Georgie drove to Louis Dryden’s apartment building on Franklin Avenue and slid the detective’s business card in the jamb of Dryden’s front door where he couldn’t miss it, then began patrol and cleared for calls. While driving eastbound on Hollywood Boulevard on the way to their area, they saw that the Street Characters were out in force in front of Grauman’s Chinese Theatre. The recession had brought hard times to even some of the costumed performers, who posed for photos with tourists and received voluntary tips for it. They were not allowed by law to panhandle or make demands of the tourists.
Newscasters gleefully reported to their audiences whenever tensions arose around the Grauman’s forecourt, where the handprints and footprints of famous movie stars were set in the cement pavement. On a recent occasion, Elmo the Muppet had been arrested for aggressive panhandling, and so had the dark-hooded character from Scream. Street Character Freddy Krueger was also busted for taking his role too seriously and allegedly stabbing someone. Mr. Incredible had been jailed, as had Batman and Chewbacca from Star Wars. So far, the several Darth Vaders had behaved themselves, but Spider-Man, or rather one of several using that costume, got popped by Hollywood cops for slugging somebody.
As 6-X-76 passed Grauman’s, Georgie Adams said, “I’m gonna be real disappointed if SpongeBob Square-Pants ever gets busted for something. I always liked him on TV.”
“I never much liked Spider-Man,” Viv said. “Too creepy. Crawling around like an insect and all that.”
“Let’s make a pass by that apartment house we’re supposed to check,” Georgie said. “Then I can log it and get it over with. Sounds like it’s just a PR job the detectives are foisting off on us poor overworked bluesuits.”
In the last of the daylight, when the summer sun was settling down behind the Pacific Ocean, giving Hollywood its special rosy glow, the old apartment building in Little Armenia looked impregnable to the officers of 6-X-76.
“This is bullshit,” Georgie Adams said. “Real-estate guys like Dryden don’t kill their squeezes themselves. They hire it done. He’d just find an Eighteenth Streeter or some other local crusier and put a ticket on her.”
“The detectives said he’s supposed to be into crystal meth,” Viv reminded him. “A desperate guy on ice might do anything when he gets all spun out.”
“Anyways,” Georgie said, “even Spider-Man himself couldn’t get in there.”
“Spider-Man,” Viv said, mulling it over. She then drove around to the alley behind the building and parked by the attached carport.
“What’re you looking for, sis?” Georgie wanted to know.
“Any sign of a trail from his web-shooter,” Viv said with a sly smile. “I think old sticky foot could get into her apartment.”
“How?”
“There,” she said, pointing to the neighboring apartment building.
The building was in the process of being renovated and reroofed before the winter rains came. An eight-foot temporary chain-link fence was all that secured the construction site. Rolls of tar paper and shingles were visible inside the fence where workers had left them, along with two aluminum extension ladders.
“So?” Georgie said.
Viv said, “He could climb over the fence and borrow one of those extension ladders.”
“So?” Georgie said. “She’s on the third floor. Most ladders don’t go that high unless you’re a firefighter on a truck.”
Viv said, “He could use the ladder to get onto the carport roof and then pull it up and extend it high enough to do the job.”
“You got some imagination, sis,” Georgie said. “But there’s no accessible window over the carports.”
“But from that point he could get clear to the roof of the building.”
“Then what?” Georgie said. “He goes down her chimney? News flash, sis. There ain’t no chimneys.”
“I noticed the small window on the south side,” Viv said. “She keeps it wide open. I’ll bet there’s no AC in that little place and she needs ventilation. He could scoot to the edge of that flat roof on his belly, lower his legs down in front of the open window, and swing right into her apartment.”
“Like a spider?” Georgie said mischievously.
“Like a meth-crazed, desperate tweaker,” Viv said. “With all those paranoid tweaker thoughts spinning through his head.”
“That’s probably the kitchen window there on the south side,” Georgie said. “I’ll bet it’s over the sink. If he went in there, he’d land in her garbage disposal and she could just turn it on and flush that fucking spider right down the drain.”
“You are such an asshole, Gypsy,” Viv said, poking him in the shoulder when her partner showed her his wicked little grin.
Despite Georgie’s protests, Viv managed to find time to drive by the apartment building and check out the alley two more times.
On their last check of the evening, Georgie Adams shined the spotlight on the graffiti sprayed on the stucco wall of the building on the alley side. There were gang slogans and the letters AP for “Armenian Power” written large.
Georgie said, “At least the Armenian cruisers respect education. All their graffiti is spelled right.”
At 9:15 P.M. on that moonless night, when the smog and overcast blowing in from the ocean hung low over the Los Angeles basin, there was a ruckus on Hollywood Boulevard that brought four of the midwatch units responding. Catwoman, who had tried in vain to look like Halle Berry, head-butted Superman for muscling in on her tourist tips and knocked him right on his ass in Grauman’s forecourt. The boozy superhero ended up dazed on John Wayne’s boot prints and yelled to everyone that he was going to murder Catwoman.
This Superman was not one of the younger Street Characters and didn’t much resemble the movie version’s. He had a nose full of broken veins, and a double chin, and was starting to get a middle-aged paunch that his costume with all the built-in muscles couldn’t hide. When he got to his feet, he lurched at the plucky Catwoman, who held her ground with claws extended. But then Marilyn Monroe, who was actually a forty-year-old transvestite named Melvin Pickett, came to Catwoman’s aid.
Superman grabbed Catwoman, who fought back and tried to kick him in the groin. When Superman drew back a fist, Marilyn Monroe stepped in and belted Superman across the mouth with her leather purse, which was heavy with rolls of quarters she’d collected for the Sunset Strip Beautification Project. There was a major donnybrook going on by the time the first black-and-whites arrived.
Six-A-Fifteen from Watch 3 showed up before any of the midwatch units, and that turned out to be unfortunate for Superman. The cop driving 6-A-15 was Preston Lilly, who’d served thirty-five years with the LAPD, twenty-two of them at Hollywood Station. He was a large, square-shouldered man with a massive shaved skull the color of old ivory. His eyes were gray and spaced too far apart, making them seem out of sync when aimed in your direction. Some people said that looking into the face of Preston Lilly was like looking at an enormous pale eel. He had already decided to retire before the end of the year, and he was sick of working 6-A-15 because he was always getting bullshit calls to the rich whiners in the Hollywood Hills.
“You can never make them Hills dwellers happy,” Preston Lilly complained to his partner, a Cuban immigrant named Mario Delgado. “A bunch of guys with too much money and a bunch of trophy wives with too much time on their hands. They like to bitch just for the sake of bitching.”