Milo sat through the orientation, struggling not to succumb to a full-body sweat. Reisan going on about coming down hard on resisters, don't be shy about using your batons. Then, leering, and warning the troops not to kiss anyone because you didn't know where those lips had been. Looking straight at Milo when he'd cracked wise, Milo laughing along with the others and wondering: Why-the-hell-is-he-doing-that? Fighting to convince himself he'd imagined it.
The day of the raid, he called in sick with the flu, stayed in bed for three days. Perfectly healthy, but he worked hard at degrading himself by not sleeping or eating, just sucking on gin and vodka and rye and peach brandy and whatever else he found in the cupboard. Figuring if the department checked on him, he'd look like death warmed over.
V.N. combat vet, now a real-life working detective, but he was still thinking like a truant high school kid.
Over the three days, he lost eight pounds, and when he stood his legs shook and his kidneys ached and he wondered if that yellow tinge in his eyes was real or just bad lighting- his place was a dingy hovel, the few windows it offered looked out to airshafts, and no matter how many bulbs he used, he could never get the illumination above tomb-strength.
The first time in three days that he tried food- a barely warmed can of Hearty Man chili- what he didn't heave whooshed out the other end. He smelled like a goat pen, his hair felt brittle, and his fingernails were getting soft. For a full week later, his ears rang and his back hurt and he drank gallons of water a day just in case he'd damaged something. The day he returned to the station, a transfer slip- Vice to Auto Theft, signed by Reisan- was in his box. That seemed a fine state of affairs. Two days later, someone slipped a note through the door of his locker.
How's your bunghole, faggot?
He pulled into the Healthy Foods lot, stayed in the Taurus, scanned the parking lot for anything out of the ordinary. During the drive from his house to the station, then from Budget to the market, he'd been on alert for a tail. Hadn't picked up any, but this wasn't the movies, and the hard truth was, in a city built around the combustion engine, you could never be sure.
He watched shoppers enter the market, finally satisfied himself that he hadn't been followed, and crossed over to the row of small stores- rehabbed shacks, really- that sat across from Healthy Foods. Locksmith, dry cleaners, cobbler, West Hollywood Easy Mail Center.
He flashed his badge to the Pakistani behind the mail-drop counter- pile up those violations, Sturgis- and inquired about the box number listed on the Jeep's registration. The clerk was sullen, but he thumbed through his circular Rolodex and shook his head.
"No Playa del Sol." Behind him was the wall of brass boxes. A sign advertised FedEx, UPS, rubber stamps, While-U-Wait gift-wrapping. Milo spotted no ribbons or happy-face wrapping paper. This was all about secrets.
"When did they stop renting?" he said.
"Had to be at least a year ago."
"How do you know?"
"Because the current tenant has been renting for thirteen months."
Tenant. Milo pictured some leprechaun setting up house in the mailbox. Tiny stove, refrigerator, Murphy bed, thumbnail-sized cable TV blaring The Pot of Gold Network.
"Who's the current tenant?" he said.
"You know I can't tell you that, sirrr."
"Aw shucks," said Milo, producing a twenty-dollar bill. Keep those felonies coming…
The Pakistani stared at the bill as Milo placed it on the counter, closed his hand over Andrew Jackson's gaunt visage. Then he turned his back on Milo and began fiddling with one of the empty mailboxes and Milo reached over and took hold of the Rolodex and read the card.
Mr. and Mrs. Irwin Block
Address on Cynthia Street. Just a few blocks away.
"Know these people?" said Milo.
"Old people," said the Pakistani, still showing his back. "She comes in every week, but they don't get anything."
"Nothing?"
"Once in a while, junk."
"Then why do they need a POB?"
The clerk faced him and smiled. "Everyone needs one- tell all your friends." He reached for the Rolodex, but Milo held on to it, thumbing back from Bl to Ba. No Bartlett. Then up to P. No Playa del Sol.
The Pakistani said, "Stop, please. What if someone comes in?"
Milo released the Rolodex, and the clerk placed it under the counter.
"How long have you been working here?"
"Oh," said the clerk, as if the question was profound. "Ten months."
"So you've never dealt with anyone from Playa del Sol."
"That is true."
"Who worked here before you?"
"My cousin."
"Where is he?"
"Kashmir."
Milo glared at him.
"It's true," said the man. "He had enough of this place."
"West Hollywood?"
"America. The morals."
No curiosity about why Milo wanted to know about Playa del Sol. Given the guy's line of work, Milo supposed he'd learned not to be curious.
Milo thanked him, and the clerk rubbed his index finger with his thumb. "You could show your thanks in another way."
"Okay," said Milo, taking a very low bow. "Thank you very much."
As he left, he heard the man utter something in a language he didn't understand.
He drove to the Cynthia Street apartment of Mr. and Mrs. Irwin Block, pretended to be a census taker, and enjoyed an affable five-minute chat with the possibly hundred-year-old Selma Block, a blue-caftaned, champagne-haired pixie of a woman so bent and tiny she might very well have fit into one of the mailboxes. Behind her sat Mr. Block on a green-and-gold sofa, a mute, static, vacant-eyed apparition of similar antiquity whose sole claim to physiologic viability was the occasional moist and startling throat clear.
Five minutes taught Milo more about the Blocks than he'd wanted to know. Both had worked in the Industry- Selma as a costume mistress for several major studios, Irwin as an accountant for MGM. Three children lived back East. One was an orthodontist, the middle one had gone into "the financial world and became a Republican, and our daughter weaves and sews hand-fashioned-"
"Is this the only address you keep, ma'am?" said Milo, pretending to write everything down but doodling curlicues. No chance of Mrs. B. spotting the ruse. The top of her head was well below the pad.
"Oh, no, dear. We keep a post-office box over by the Healthy Foods."
"Why's that, ma'am?"
"Because we like to eat healthy."
"Why the post-office box, ma'am?"
Selma Block's tiny claw took hold of Milo's sleeve, and he felt as if a cat was using his arm for a spring post.
"Politics, dear. Political mailers."
"Oh," said Milo.
"What party do you belong to, dear?"
"I'm an independent."
"Well, dear, we like the Green Party- rather subversive, you know." The claw dug in deeper.
"You keep the box for Green Party mailers?"
"Oh, yes," said Selma Block. "You're too young, but we remember the way it used to be."
"The way it used to be when?"
"The old days. Those House UnAmerican fascists. That louse McCarthy."
Refusing the invitation to stay for tea and cookies, he extricated himself from Mrs. Block and drove around aimlessly, trying to figure out his next move.
Playa del Sol. Alex was right, it did have that real estate ring, so maybe the Cossacks did have their hand in this- assisted by LAPD.