"Sounds good to me," I said.
"War Ration Book Two will allow each person, including infants, forty-eight points during the first period, for most canned goods and processed soups, vegetables and fruits, and dried beans and peas. More scarce canned foods will require more points."
"Fascinating," I said, working on my muffin.
"The government has urged us to use more fruits and vegetables, spaghetti, and other foods for which no ration stamps are required."
"I see," I said.
"If you did not get your Book Two last week at the school, you can pick it up between three and five Friday. You have to have Book One with you, however. If you lost Book One you have to apply in writing to the ration board. At the time of registering for Book Two you must declare all the coffee you have on hand in excess of one point per person over fourteen years of age when rationing went into effect November 28 of last year. For each excess pound of coffee, one stamp will be taken from Book One. However, Stamp Twenty-five in Book One is good for one pound of coffee through March 21, which means it must last six weeks instead of five, as before. Stamp Eleven in Book One is good for three pounds of sugar through March 15."
"Could you go over that one more time?" I asked, showing my slightly gap-toothed but reasonably Teel-white teeth.
"You are joshing me," Mrs. Plaut said seriously. "A man in your business has little room for levity."
I was not quite sure what business she was referring to. At various times, Mrs. Plaut believed I was an exterminator or a book editor. I was and had been editing Mrs. P.'s family memoirs for over a year, chapter by chapter as she completed them.
"You are right," I said.
"As I see it, you have an obligation to contribute."
"You can have half my food-ration stamps," I said. "I'm keeping my A, B, and C unit coupons for gas and tires."
"Period Four Coupons," Mrs. Plaut parried.
"Period Four?" I asked, backing up.
"Fuel oil," she said triumphantly.
"They're yours."
She sat back and looked at her boarders; the conquering hero.
"It's been a long war," I said.
"Particularly hard on a sweet tooth," Mrs. Plaut said with a sigh. "More coffee? Another muffin?"
Sweet tooth. I'd forgotten Shelly Minck. I looked at my watch, which told me it was eight. I refused its sprung lies and asked Gunther the time. Without taking his eyes from the muffin, he pulled out his pocket watch and turned it to me. Ten.
" 'Scuse me," I said, getting up and moving fast toward the door.
"Don't forget," Mrs. Plaut said. "The book."
"I won't," I said, not knowing whether she meant the chapter of her book I was supposed to be reading or the ration book she had wheedled out of me.
I went up the stairs fast in spite of the fact that going upstairs fast has thrown my back out six times. As I ran, I pulled a nickel from my pocket and was reaching for the coin slot on the upstairs pay phone while I was still moving. I dialed Shelly's and my office. The phone rang. I let it ring. A dozen times. No answer. Maybe good. If I couldn't reach him, maybe Chief G. Lane Price of the Glendale Police couldn't either. I hung the phone up and started down the stairs. Gunther stood at the bottom looking up.
"I've thought about this ca-gee," he said. "The one in the note you gave me."
I stopped when I got to the bottom and looked at him expectantly.
"It could be the Hungarian word for bad spring wine," he said.
"Doesn't fit," I said, walking toward the front door with Gunther at my side.
"Kah-Chee," he tried. "The Nepalese chant of extreme contrition."
"Not likely," I said, opening the door. The sun was shining.
"Then simply cagey," Gunther went on. "The American slang word for protectively cautious and clever."
"Don't think so, Gunther," I said, stepping out.
"Without knowing how it is spelled, it is difficult to pursue."
"I appreciate that," I said, pulling out my car key.
"The most likely solution, however," Gunther said, "is that KG. are initials, initials of the next victim."
"That one I like," I said. "Keep at it."
"I shall," he said as I hurried down the cement path to the curb where my Crosley was parked.
I got in, started the engine, and waved at Gunther, who was standing solemnly under the photograph of Eleanor Roosevelt nailed to the white wood behind him. Mrs. Plaut thought it was Marie Dressier.
Chapter 4
The Farraday Building is downtown, just off of Ninth Street on Hoover. Parking on the street is a game of chance. The other options aren't much better. No-Neck Arnie's three blocks away, where I'd have to pay half a buck each in and out, or the alleyway behind the Farraday, where derelicts were known to nest, demand tribute and ignore the sacred trust of watching my Crosley.
I found a magical space on the street. Right in front of Manny's taco shop. An omen or a setup for disappointment?
No one was in the lobby which, as always, smelled scrubbed and antiseptic thanks to the efforts of the landlord, Jeremy Butler-poet, former professional wrestler, and, at the age of sixty-three, recent husband and father. The Farraday was his legacy for his wife, Alice, and his infant daughter, Natasha. The bald giant had vowed to keep it free of vagrants, vermin, and mildew.
According to Jeremy, who knew about such things, the Farraday was on the site of the last battle of the Mexican War in 1848. The two-year battle with Spain over who owned California had ended with a rebellion not by the Spanish army but Californios, the descendants of the original Spanish settlers going back to the 1500s. In August of 1848, after the United States had formally defeated Mexico, the U.S. military commander in Los Angeles, Lieutenant Archibald Gillespie, gave the defeated Californios a list of rules about how they were to behave under the new flag. The Californios, who had never considered themselves particularly Mexican and didn't find the U.S. Army or its un-derranked commander in California particularly civilized, put together a rebellion of ranch workers, land owners, and townspeople among the four thousand men, women, and children who lived in Los Angeles. Under the leadership of Andres Pico, brother of the colorfully named governor of Lower California, Pio Pico, the volunteer band did what the Spanish had been unable to do. They threw the American army out of Los Angeles. Gillespie returned. The Californios threw him out once more. It was this second battle which Jeremy claimed was fought on the site of the Farra-day Building.
When Gillespie returned the next time, a month later, with more troops and the title of Military Commander of the South, the Californios were seriously outmatched and they surrendered at Campo La Cienega. Now, almost a hundred years later, the descendants of the Californios, and those who claimed they were, had still not forgiven the U.S. and its army.
I opened the lobby door and stepped into the broad open inner lobby that reached six stories high, with offices on each level. There was an elevator, an ancient, open cage, but I was in a hurry. I climbed, baby-talking my back, asking it to be calm and reasonable.
There was a skylight, small dark panes of glass in the ceiling six stories above the open tiled lobby. The sunlight and dim landing bulbs were enough to light my way past tiers of baby photographers, fortune tellers, talent agencies, importers of who-knows-what, costume jewelers, and publishers of pornography. I was the only private investigator. Sheldon Minck, D.D.S., Master of Dental Hygiene, was the only dentist. We shared an office on the fifth floor.
No, we didn't share an office. Shelly had the office. I sublet a closet with the window overlooking the alley. My office wasn't much larger than the dressing room of the late Al Ramone.