“Couldn’t,” said Milo. “She’s gone. Disappeared four days after Novato got hit. No one’s seen or heard from her since.”
Surprise widened Smith’s weary eyes. He said, “Who’s on the case?”
“Hal Mehan out of Pacific. He’s on vacation, back in two weeks. From what I can gather, he did the usual missing-persons stuff, found out she hadn’t packed or taken money out of the bank. Followed it for a couple of weeks and told her friends to hire a P.I. or forget about it. Told her neighbor it looked like foul play out on the streets.”
Smith’s foot tapped faster. “Mehan know about Novato?”
“The friends say they told him.”
Smith said, “Hmm.” His eyes half-closed.
Milo said, “Yeah, I know, he coulda told you. Shoulda. But the bottom line is you didn’t lose anything. He dead-ended, moved on to greener pastures. The next-door neighbor saved her mail- I just had a look at it. Not much of it, just junk and a few bills.”
Smith continued to look perturbed. “Who are these friends of hers? No one in the neighborhood seemed to know much about her. Only one who knew anything at all was the guy next door, some kind of English rabbi. He the one who saved the mail?”
Milo nodded. “Just spoke to him. The friends were a few old folk she knew from temple. Acquaintances more than friends. According to them she wasn’t sociable, kept to herself.”
“That’s true,” said Smith. “Man, that was some little old battle-ax.”
“They also said she didn’t have any family. Same as Novato.”
Smith said, “Think that means anything?”
“Who knows?” said Milo. “Coulda been misery loving company. Two loners finding each other.”
Smith said, “Black kid and an old white woman? Some company. Or maybe the two of them were up to something, huh? When I went around there on the Novato thing, saw how hostile and radical she was, how she didn’t even want me to come inside, I asked around about her being involved in a dope thing. Asked the neighbors about people coming in and out at weird hours, fancy cars parked outside- the usual thing. No one knew anything.”
“No one still does,” said Milo. “There’s one other thing you should know. A few days after she was gone, someone burglarized her place. The rabbi’s too. Took small stuff, trashed everything, wrote nasty stuff on the walls.”
“What kind of nasty stuff?”
“Anti-Semitic. And something about remembering John Kennedy, in red paint they’d stolen from the garage. That jibe with any of the gang stuff you’ve been seeing?”
Smith said, “Kennedy? No. There’s some punk band- the Dead Kennedys. That’s all that comes to mind.” He thought. “If they got the paint right there, doesn’t sound like they came to paint.”
“Could have been just an opportunist junkie,” said Milo. “Asshole got caught up in the intruder high and got artistically inspired.”
Smith nodded. “Like a shitter.” To me: “There’re these guys break into houses, steal stuff, and dump a load on the floor. Or the bed. What do you think of that, psychologically? Or philosophically?”
“Power trip,” I said. “Forbidden fruit. Leave a signature someone’ll remember. Same as the ones who ejaculate. Or eat all the food in the fridge.”
Smith nodded.
“Anyway,” said Milo, “just thought you should know about all this.”
“Thanks,” said Smith. “In terms of a dope thing, I ran Novato through NCIC, the moniker files, DEA, called every smart narc in the Department as well as the Sheriff’s guys. Nothing. The kid had no name in the business.”
“Maybe he was a newcomer,” said Milo. “Trying to move in on someone and it got him dead.”
“A newcomer,” I said. “Novato. I’m pretty sure that’s Spanish for ‘novice.’ ”
Both of them looked at me.
I said, “Latin name on a black kid. It could be an alias.”
“El Novato, huh?” said Smith. “Well, it’s not a moniker- least not one of the ones we’ve got on file. Guess it could be an alias.” He enunciated and put on a Spanish accent. “El Novato. Kind of like El Vato Loco. Sounds like something out of Boyle Heights, but this bro was black.”
“Anything left of the fingers to print?” said Milo.
Smith shook his head. “You saw the pictures.”
“How’d you ID him?”
“Wallet in pocket. He had a driver’s license- that’s it- and a business card from the place he worked at, some grocery. I called his boss, asked him about any family to notify. He said he didn’t know of any. Later, after no one had claimed the body, I called the boss again, told him if he wanted, he could claim it, give it a decent burial.”
“Spoke to him, too,” said Milo. “He cremated it.”
“Guess that’s a decent burial,” said Smith. “Doesn’t make much difference one way or the other when you’re that way, does it?”
More screams from down the alley. The same two people tearing at each other with words.
Smith said, “I’ll probably be back in the near future, pick up one of their bodies. Anything more you want to know about Novato?”
Milo said, “That’s all that comes to mind, Maury. Thanks.”
“Far as I’m concerned, Milo, good riddance. If he was a businessman on top of doping, and getting hit slowed his business, I’m even happier. One less piece of shit to keep track of.”
Smith dropped his cigarette and ground it out with his heel.
“How well did the Burden girl know Novato?”
“They were seen talking to each other. Probably means nothing. I’m just following the chain wherever it leads. If there turns out to be a connection, I’ll call you in.”
“Yeah,” said Smith. “That’d be real nice. Meantime, how about you remember me when the West L.A. roster opens up. I put in an application last year- no vacancies. Wouldn’t mind getting over to civilized territory. Catch a little breathing time between homicidal incidents. Your promotion, you could have some say in it, right?”
“That kind of thing gets handled higher,” said Milo, “but I’ll do my best.”
“Appreciate it. Could use some civilization.”
“So he was a doper,” I said, after Smith had driven away. “So much for Dinwiddie’s expertise.”
“Wishful thinking,” said Milo, “does strange things to the old judgment quotient.”
He avoided the streets on the way back, getting on the Harbor Freeway and taking it through the downtown interchange into the West Side of town. Neither of us said much. Milo seemed eager to get away.
I got to Linda’s apartment at eight. She came to the door wearing a black silk blouse, gray jeans, and black western boots. Her hair had been done up, fastened by a silver comb. She had on large silver hoop earrings, blush that accented her cheekbones, more eye shadow than I’d seen before, and a look of reserve that forced its way through her smile. I was feeling it, too- a reticence, almost a shyness. As if this were a first date: everything that had happened two nights ago had been a fantasy, and we needed to start from scratch.
She said, “Hi, right on time,” took my hand, and led me inside. There was a bottle of Chablis and two glasses on the coffee table, along with dishes of sliced raw vegetables, crackers, dip, and cubes of cheese.
She said, “Just a nip before dinner.”
“Looks great.” I sat down. She took a place beside me, poured wine, and said, “How about a toast?”
“Let’s see. Things have been pretty nuts lately. So how about: to boredom.”
“Hear, hear.”
We touched glasses and drank.
She said, “So… what’s new?”
There was plenty to tell her: Mahlon Burden in his natural habitat, Novato and Gruenberg. Savaged cars. Neo-Nazis in suburbia, a crack alley…
I said, “Let’s honor the toast for a little while.”
She laughed and said, “Sure.”
We munched vegetables, drank some more.
“Got something to show you,” she said, got up, and crossed the room toward her bedroom. The jeans showed off her shape. The boots had very high heels and they did something to her walk that convinced me two nights ago had been real.