"By now?" said Milo. "This wasn't the first time?"
Silence. "We've had a few other calls there. Tried to contact the parents, no luck, they're always out of town."
"Spoiled brats."
Del Monte laughed. "You didn't hear that from me. Anyway, what's up with all this?"
"Tracing a 187 victim's whereabouts."
Silence. "Homicide? Nah, no way. This was just kids partying and playing music too loud."
"I'm sure you're right," said Milo. "But I've got rumors that my db might've attended a party on the Westside, so I've gotta ask. What's the name of the family that owns the house?"
Longer silence. "Listen," said Del Monte. "These people- you do me wrong, I could be parking cars. And believe me, no one saw anything worse than drinking and screwing around- a few joints, big deal, right? Anyway, we closed it down."
"I'm just going through the routine, Officer," said Milo. "Your name won't come up. But if I don't check it out, I'll be parking cars. Who owns the house and what's the address?"
"A rumor?" said Del Monte. "There had to be tons of parties Friday night."
"Any party we hear about, we look into. That's why yours won't stick out."
"Okay… the family's named Cossack." Del Monte uttered it weightily, as if that was supposed to mean something.
"Cossack," said Milo, keeping his tone ambiguous.
"As in office buildings, shopping malls- Garvey Cossack. Big downtown developer, part of that bunch wanted to bring another football team to L.A."
"Yeah, sure," lied Milo. His interest in sports had peaked with Pop Warner baseball. "Cossack on Stone Canyon. What's the address?"
Del Monte sighed and read off the numbers.
"How many kids in the family?" said Milo.
"Three- two boys and a girl. Didn't see the daughter, there, but she could've been."
"You know the kids personally?"
"Nah, just by sight."
"So the boys threw the party," said Milo. "Names?"
"The big one's Garvey Junior and the younger one's Bob but they call him Bobo."
"How old?"
"Junior's probably twenty-one, twenty-two, Bobo's maybe a year younger."
More than kids, thought Milo.
"They gave us no trouble," said Del Monte. "They're just a couple guys like to have fun."
"And the girl?"
"Her I didn't see."
Milo thought he picked up something new in Del Monte's voice. "Name?"
"Caroline."
"Age?"
"Younger- maybe seventeen. It was really no big deal, everyone dispersed. My message said you're Central. Where was your db found?"
Milo told him.
"There you go," said Del Monte. "Fifteen miles from Bel Air. You're wasting your time."
"Probably. Three hundred partying kids just caved when you showed up?"
"We've got experience with that kind of thing."
"What's the technique?" said Milo.
"Use sensitivity," said the rent-a-cop. "Don't treat 'em like you would a punk from Watts or East L.A. 'cause these kids are accustomed to a certain style."
"Which is?"
"Being treated like they're important. If that doesn't work, threaten to call the parents."
"And if that doesn't work?"
"That usually works. Gotta go, nice talking to you."
"I appreciate the time, Officer. Listen, if I came by and showed a photo around, would there be a chance anyone would recognize a face?"
"Whose face?"
"The vic's."
"No way. Like I said, it was a swarm. After a while they all start to look alike."
"Rich kids?"
"Any kids."
It was nearly 10 A.M., and Schwinn still hadn't shown up. Figuring sooner rather than later was the best time to spring Janie's photo on Del Monte and his patrol buddies, Milo threw on his jacket and left the station.
Del Monte had been decent enough to call and look where it got him.
No good deed goes unpunished.
It took nearly forty minutes to reach Bel Air. The patrol office was a white, tile-roofed bungalow tucked behind the west gate. Lots of architectural detail inside and out- Milo would've been happy to make it his house. He'd heard that the gates and the private-cop scrutiny had been instituted by Howard Hughes when he lived in Bel Air because the billionaire didn't trust LAPD.
The rich taking care of their own. Just like the party on Stone Canyon: ticked-off neighbors, but everything kept private, no nuisance call had reached the West L.A. station.
Del Monte was at the front desk, and when Milo came in, his dark, round face turned sour. Milo apologized and whipped out a crime-scene snap he'd taken from the pile Schwinn had left in his desk. The least horrifying of the collection- side view of Janie's face, just the hint of ligature ring around the neck. Del Monte's response was a cursory head flick. Two other guards were drinking coffee, and they gave the picture more careful study, then shook their heads. Milo would have liked to show Melinda Waters's photo, but Schwinn had pocketed it.
He left the patrol office and drove to the party house on Stone Canyon Drive. Huge, redbrick, three-story, six-column Colonial. Black double doors, black shutters, mullioned windows, multiple gables. Milo's guess was twenty, twenty-five rooms.
The Cossack family had moved to something more generous.
A huge dry lawn and flaking paint on some of the shutters said the maintenance schedule had slackened since the house had emptied. Shredded hedges and scraps of paper confettiing the brick walkway were the only evidence of revelry gone too far. Milo parked, got out, picked up one of the shreds, hoping for some writing, but it was soft and absorbent and blank- heavy-duty paper towel. The gate to the backyard was bolted and opaque. He peered over, saw a big blue egg of a pool, rolling greenery, lots of brick patio, blue jays pecking. Behind one of the hedges, the glint of glass- cans and bottles.
The nearest neighbor was to the south, well separated from the colonial by the broad lawns of both houses. A much smaller, meticulously maintained one-story ranch emblazoned with flower beds and fronted by dwarf junipers trimmed Japanese-style. The northern border of the Cossack property was marked by a ten-foot stone wall that went on for a good thousand feet up Stone Canyon. Probably some multiacre estate, a humongous chateau pushed back too far from the street to be visible.
Milo walked across the dry lawn and the colonial's empty driveway, up to the ranch house's front door. Teak door, with a shiny brass knocker shaped like a swan. Off to the right a small cement Shinto shrine presided over a tiny, babbling stream.
A very tall woman in her late sixties answered his ring. Stout and regal with puffy, rouged cheeks, she wore her silver hair tied back in a bun so tight it looked painful, had sheathed her impressive frame in a cream kimono hand-painted with herons and butterflies. In one liver-spotted hand was an ivory-handled brush with pointed bristles tipped with black ink. Even in black satin flat slippers she was nearly eye level with Milo. Heels would have made her a giantess.
"Ye-es?" Watchful eyes, deliberate contralto.
Out came the badge. "Detective Sturgis, Mrs…"
"Schwartzman. What brings a detective to Bel Air?"
"Well, ma'am, last Friday your neighbors had a party-"
"A party," she said, as if the description was absurd. She aimed the brush at the empty Colonial. "More like rooting at the trough. The aptly named Cossacks."
"Aptly named?"
"Barbarians," said Mrs. Schwartzman. "A scourge."
"You've had problems with them before."
"They lived there for less than two years, let the place go to seed. That's their pattern, apparently. Move in, degrade, move out."
"To something bigger."
"But of course. Bigger is better, right? They're vulgarians. No surprise, given what the father does."
"What does he do?"
"He destroys period architecture and substitutes grotesquerie. Packing cartons pretending to be office buildings, those drive-in monstrosities- strip malls. And she… desperately blond, the sweaty anxiety of an arriviste. Both of them gone all the time. No supervision for those brats."