Dudley winked. Dudley slipped him a border pass and a ten-dollar bill.
Hector took off. He amscrayed, vamoosed, and vanished in five seconds flat.
Dudley stepped from the car. He sniffed the air. He felt raindrops. He pulled his piece and walked up to the door.
It was locked. He stepped back and threw his weight. He slammed hard and shouldered the door in.
He looked right and saw dumped furniture. He looked left and saw a blood-spattered wall.
19
(Los Angeles, 4:30 P.M., 1/4/42)
Morgue Powwow. One forensic agenda. ID the Charred-Box Man.
Morgue personneclass="underline" Joan, Dr. Nort, Hideo Ashida.
They measured Box Man. Joan stifled a yawn. She’d indulged a late night at Lyman’s. She’d hit the sack at 5:00 a.m.
Ashida placed the bones on a gurney. Dr. Nort unrolled his tape. Joan steadied Box Man. Dr. Nort marked the height at seventy-five inches.
Joan said, “He was six-three. If we factor in erosion at the joints and the compression of the spine that comes with age, we can posit that he was as tall as six-four and a half in his youth.”
Dr. Nort poked odd bones. “He was tall, and heavyset. Note the pelvic width.”
Ashida measured the back-to-front rib cage. He got a fifty-two-inch circumference.
Joan said, “Big man.”
Dr. Nort said, “He must have gone two forty-five. His spine’s crunched. Note the socket frays. You carry that much weight, you pay a price. I’ll go out on a limb. He went DOA in his early forties.”
Joan jiggled the foot bones. “Hey there, cutie.”
Ashida flushed. He balled his fists and glared.
“We’re having a scholars’ lark here, Miss Conville. I should add that our late friend in no way constitutes a breaking case, while the lab is currently backlogged with breaking-case evidence, which demands our more immediate attention.”
Joan flushed. She balled her fists and glared back.
“We’re backlogged with Japanese-property confiscations, Dr. Ashida. I think you might feel a certain ambivalence about that aspect of our work. I deem that understandable, and I can hardly condemn you for dragging your feet and exploiting our late friend’s reappearance, so that you might abstain from facilitating your own countrymen’s misfortune.”
Oooh — hear that pin-drop silence? Now, hear it streeetch.
Joan glared at Ashida.
Ashida glared at the floor.
Dr. Nort said, “Children, enough.”
Joan lit a cigarette. Dr. Nort, ditto. Ashida looked up. Joan blew smoke in Box Man’s face. Dr. Nort laughed.
They all stretched and unclenched. They put out some small talk. Safe topics — the weather, the war, the ’42 congressionals. The PD’s Fed-probe travails.
Ashida coughed. “We can check CCC worker lists and DB lists in the newspapers. We’ve got report carbons stored somewhere, and the fire department Arson Squad must have a comprehensive file.”
Dr. Nort said, “That’s assuming our late friend was a CCC worker.”
Joan said, “We can cross-check the death lists to height listings on California drivers’ licenses and CCC registration cards. We can cross-check those names against missing-persons reports.”
Dr. Nort tapped Box Man’s skull. He’d extraction-bored the bullet hole last night.
“I dug out the spent. It’s flattened and badly decomposed.”
Ashida said, “I’ll examine it at the lab. I might determine a partial make on the lands and grooves.”
Joan said, “We could try for a match to ballistics bulletins from ’33. We could run test fires with old custody guns.”
Dr. Nort slow-cruised Joan. She knew the drill. The cruise ran head to toe. It was half-leer comprehensive.
“How did you get this job anyway?”
Joan laughed. “I was drunk New Year’s Eve. I hit a car and killed four Mexicans. Bill Parker goes for me, and I’m sure you can fill in the rest.”
Dr. Nort went oooh-la-la. Ashida balled his fists and glaaaared.
Oooh-la-la? Well, not quite.
Joan walked to Lyman’s. She was cash-flush. She’d hit an Alien Squad crap game and won forty scoots.
The game ran most Sunday nights. Wendell Rice and George Kapek draped the squadroom floor and steered the show. Bluesuits and Bureau men rolled.
Lee Blanchard and Elmer Jackson rolled hot. Joan put five on the pass line and let it ride. She cashed out right on cue. Forty clams — Man-O-Manischewitz!
The boys called her “Red.” That’s a new one. Elmer slipped her a mash note. She ruffled his hair and laid one on him. Rice and Kapek wolf-howled. Catbox Cal Lunceford roared.
Joan cut south on Hill. She counted back to New Year’s Eve and ran highlights. Her Navy life then, her PD life now. The show ran four days, door-to-door.
She liked the PD. She liked Mike Lyman’s Grill. She perched there and eavesdropped most nights. She rebuffed passes and logged scuttlebutt. She learned the personnel.
There’s Two-Gun Davis. He’s tonged up. He speaks Chinese and drills underage slash. There’s Lee Blanchard — shacked with PD siren Kay Lake.
Big Lee did not drill Kay. His abstinence stemmed from old grief. La Kay scorched for Bill Parker. Whiskey Bill scorched back. He refused to pounce. His abstinence stemmed from his dead-dog marriage and prim Catholic guilt.
Rumors. Barroom scuttlebutt. The skinny, the dish, the drift.
Lyman’s back room. The PD’s haven and redoubt. Here’s how it commenced:
A beaner exposed himself to Mike Lyman’s niece. Sensitive Mike was distraught. Sergeant Buzz Meeks shot Whipout Juan dead. Grateful Mike bestowed the back room.
She joked with Buzz at Lyman’s. They had a running shtick. “I’m too tall for you, sweetie.” “Yeah, but I know how to climb.”
Joan hit 8th Street and breezed into Lyman’s. She clocked tableside traffic and breezed to the back room.
There’s Oooh-La-La Bill. He’s Two-Fisted Bill now. He’s wolfing a highball and a club sandwich. His uniform’s a mess.
Joan said, “Don’t spoil your dinner.”
“That can’t be an invitation.”
“I’m rich tonight. You should take advantage.”
Parker tossed his sandwich and brushed off stray crumbs. The wastebasket thunked.
“You’ve got me thinking there’s a catch.”
“ ‘Catch’? Me? As catches go, you’re the master.”
“Well...”
“Come on. I owe you dinner, at least.”
Parker blushed. It was almost endearing. Joan almost swooned.
They ate at the Biltmore. It was swank meets plush de-luxe. Joan had roast sirloin. Parker had apricot duck. Their table overlooked Pershing Square.
Soapbox pundits declaimed. Partisan crowds egged them on. Fistfights ensued. White winos shrieked at colored winos and vice versa.
A bar waiter brought cognacs. Parker lit their cigarettes. Joan said, “Tell me what you’re thinking.”
Parker warmed his snifter. “That I should be fighting this war.”
“I’ve heard the stories. Chief Horrall won’t let you enlist, despite your stated intention to steal his job and enact reforms that might well land him in jail, if the Fed probe fails to do so first.”
Parker smiled. “You’re a quick study.”
“I am, yes.”
“What else have you heard?”
“Tales of your feud with Dudley Smith. Intimations that then-Sergeant Smith clashed with you on the Watanabe case, and perhaps rigged a convenient solution, abetted by Dr. Hideo Ashida.”