The Boy Who Never Grew Up (39 page)

“What if somebody’s still back there?” He was frightened.

“Want to wait in the car?” I asked gently.

He stuck out his snow-shovel jaw. “I want to help. Johnny’s my friend.”

“Then come on.”

“Wait.” He stopped at the flower bed by the front steps and scratched around in the soil. He grabbed onto something, hefted it in his hand. A rock to throw. It had worked the last time he’d been in a fight—with Neal Bricker. It would work now. “Okay, Meat, let’s go,” he said with grim determination.

There was a gate at the side of the house. A narrow brick path led to the back. I opened the gate and waited for Lulu to go first. She looked up at me, waiting for me to go first. I sighed and hobbled in.

The side drapes were open. The lights inside fell on empty rooms. No furniture. No people.

“Who else knows he’s staying here?” I asked Matthew, as we worked our way back.

“I really don’t know, Meat. He only moved in last night. Didn’t need any help. Just grabbed his sleeping bag and moved right in.”

The backyard was floodlit. It was a small yard, most of it brick patio. There was a hot tub, unoccupied. French doors led inside to the kitchen, also unoccupied. The music was louder back here. I could recognize it now. Fats Domino.

“JOHNNY?!” Matthew called out, clutching his rock. “IT’S MATTHEW, JOHNNY!”

A neighbor’s dog barked. There was no other response.

Matthew looked around uncertainly. “Should we call the police?”

I tried the French doors. They were unlocked. “Stay out here, Matthew.”

Lulu wanted to stay out there with him. But she tagged along with me, after some heavy coaxing.

It was an old-fashioned kitchen. Salmon-colored tile on the counters, pea-green linoleum on the floor. The stove and fridge were from the fifties. A boom box sat on top of the fridge. The Fat Man was singing “Blueberry Hill,” his rich, boozy boogie-woogie pouring over the house like heavy syrup. A swinging door led into the dining room, which was L-shaped and completely bare, except for a beer bottle which lay broken in a puddle on the floor. I bent down and stuck a finger in the puddle. Still cold. I moved on, Lulu at my side.

Nothing at all in the living room. A short hallway off it led to two bedrooms, one empty. The other had a sleeping bag spread out on the hard wooden floor. An overturned carton served as a nightstand. The phone was on it, an ashtray and an AK47 assault rifle. I bent over and sniffed it. It hadn’t been fired recently. I didn’t touch it. I moved on, Lulu at my side.

There was a bathroom. I went in, hoping the shower curtain was wide open. I wasn’t feeling very nervy.

It was closed. I stared at it, heart pounding. I looked down at Lulu. She was looking up at me. It wasn’t as if she’d never seen
Psycho
. I looked at her pleadingly. Grudgingly, she poked her large black nose in there. A contented snuffle followed. I yanked the curtain open. Nothing.

I went back in the living room. The Fat Man was still singing about Blueberry Hill, Clarence Ford’s mournful alto sax alongside him. My eyes fell on the steep, narrow staircase up to the tower. Somehow, I’d known it would be the tower. A vague memory of an anthropology professor telling me that people often climb when they’re cornered, even if it offers them no means of escape. An instinct that goes back to our cave-dwelling days, when trees were our only refuge from predators in open country.

I started up the stairs. Lulu stayed right where she was. It was the tower, all right.

He was wedged just inside the doorway, shirtless and shoeless, blood splattered over the floor and on the wall behind him. He lay face up, eyes wide open. No question what his attitude was—he was dead, and selling it hard. One shot had been to his head. His yellow dreadlocks were soaked with blood. The other shot was to the groin. The Zorch killing, all over again.

I heard footsteps on the stairs behind me.

“Find anything yet, Meat?” Matthew called out. And then he came in. A strangled sob came out of him. “Oh, God, no! No, no, no!”

“Go back outside, Matthew.”

“Where does this end?” he moaned. “Where, Meat? Where?”

I could answer that one now. It would end right here. Part of it would anyway. Because there would be no
Badger Goes to Hollywood
or
Badger All Alone
or whatever the hell he was going to call it. Badger was no more. Someone had made absolutely sure of it. But I said nothing. I just led Matthew back outside and took his rock away from him and tossed it into the shrubbery. Then I called Lamp.

They still had the best chili dogs in town at Pinks, an aging, somewhat grungy stand down on La Brea and Melrose. Particularly if you loaded them down with cheese, onions, and jalapeño peppers. We devoured two of them apiece in the front seat of Lamp’s car, the wrappers spread across our laps and Lulu sniffing at us disagreeably. There was a time, not so long ago, when finding somebody dead would make me sick. Now it made me ravenous. This was not something I liked about myself.

Sheldon Selden and Sarge had been home in their beds when I phoned. They tore up to the Stanley Hills Drive house right away to see to Matthew, who couldn’t seem to stop crying. The poor guy was shattered. Shelley and Sarge seemed more stunned than anything else. Joey Bam Bam arrived soon after they did, followed by the endless chain of TV news vans. Bam Bam did the talking to the cameras. He was the only one who wanted to.

Lamp sucked on his orange soda through a straw and took a bite of his chili dog. “The thing I don’t understand,” he said, munching, “is that the kid has an assault weapon sitting right there by his phone.”

“Loaded?”

“You bet your sweet patootie it was loaded. He hears what he thinks is a prowler. He’s frightened, he’s paranoid. Why the heck doesn’t he use it?”

“I wondered about that myself,” I said, polishing off my second chili dog. “It must have been someone he felt he had no reason to fear. Were the neighbors any help?”

“None,” replied Lamp.

“How about the murder weapon? Was it left behind again?”

“We haven’t found it yet. Could be out in the bushes somewhere.” Lamp wiped his fingers with a napkin. “Who worked you over tonight, Hoagy?”

“What makes you think someone worked me over, Lieutenant?”

“The way you move around.”

“Just a natural part of the aging process,” I assured him, massaging my throbbing knee. “It’ll happen to you one of these days.”

He stared at me.

“It was nothing,” I said. “And you?”

“What about me?”

“Saturday night in the big town. Single, good-looking guy—what were you up to?”

“Volunteer counseling at a youth center,” he replied. “Saturday’s the toughest night of the week for a lot of them, staying away from the drugs and the gangs and stuff.”

It was my turn to stare.

“Well, heck,” he said, reddening. “Somebody has to give a tinker’s whoosis about them.”

I reached over and touched his arm.

“What was that for?” he asked.

“Just making sure you’re real. I have my doubts sometimes.”

He grinned at me and started up the car. “Guess I’d better run you home.”

“I happen to be a million miles from nowhere, Lieutenant,” I said gloomily. “And that’s a long, long way from home.”

“You sound like you need some sleep.”

“I need something.”

La Brea was deserted and quiet. Lamp drove with both hands on the wheel and observed all speed limits. “Like who, Hoagy?” he said, his eyes on the road. “Who would Johnny feel he had no reason to fear?”

“Anyone from the Bedford Falls family, for starters.”

“What about Norbert Schlom? Would he have let him in?”

“Possibly. Schlom was tight with Zorch, whom Johnny loved. Norb could have talked his way in. Told him he had something for him. Sure. Was the roundup at the Schlom corral over with?”

“Good and over with. Cops on the gate cleared out by twelve.”

“They were real ones?”

“Who?”

“Nothing. Don’t mind me.”

“Understand Trace Washburn made quite some scene there,” he said.

“He did. Evidently, Pennyroyal broke it off with him.”

Lamp made a right onto Washington Boulevard and took that into Culver City. “Aren’t you going to say something clever, Hoagy?”

“Clever?”

“Like ‘Good chance for you to move in on her, Lieutenant, har-har.’ That sort of thing.”

“No, I’m not,” I said heavily.

He shot me a worried look. “No offense, but I didn’t like the sound of that.”

“No offense, but that makes two of us.”

He clucked at me disapprovingly. “You’re getting mixed up with her, aren’t you?”

“Let’s say I’m doing my best not to, and …”

“And?”

“And I sure as hell wish Merilee would call. One little call.”

“Why don’t you call her?” he suggested.

“That wasn’t the deal.”

“Want me to call her for you?”

“And say what?”

“That you’re in trouble. That you need to talk to her. Heck, I don’t know.”

“Thanks, Lieutenant, but it’s her call to make.”

He shook his head. “Cheese and crackers, you’re stubborn.”

“Everyone ought to be good at something.”

We rode in silence a while, Lulu snoring softly in my lap.

“What happened to Washburn after his little scene?” Lamp asked.

“Cassandra took him home, I imagine.”

“To his shack in Trancas?”

“More likely to her bed in the Four Seasons.”

“She’s involved with him?” he asked, surprised.

“I wouldn’t exactly call it involved.”

“I hear he was three sheets to the wind.”

“Appeared to be.”

“Too wrecked to take out Johnny?”

“That’s hard to say, Lieutenant,” I replied. “He
is
an actor, let’s not forget.”

“You mean he could have been faking?”

“Could have been. Although I’m not sure Johnny would have rushed to let him in. I don’t believe the two of them were particularly—” I stopped short.

“Were particularly what, Hoagy?”

“Trace played Johnny’s father in the three Badger movies. I hadn’t considered that before. I don’t know why.”

All was quiet at the Bedford Falls gate. The pack of reporters was still up at the death house on Stanley Hills Drive. The guard waved us on through. Lamp eased his car slowly through the darkened lot toward my bungalow.

“Try and think like a cop now, Hoagy,” he commanded.

“Must I, Lieutenant?”

“What can we learn from Johnny’s murder? What can we conclude? Ask yourself—Why kill Johnny?”

“To stop Matthew’s new movie in its tracks,” I replied. “No better way to do that than to kill the star.”

“Is that what this has been about? Stopping a movie?”

“It’s been about stopping Matthew. Stop him and you stop Bedford Falls. Whoever is behind all of this wants the studio. The fire was a warning, but it didn’t deter him. So stronger measures were called for.”

Lamp scratched his chin. “Johnny was killed the same exact way as Zorch. One shot to the head, one to the groin. There’s a definite sexual message here. Toss in Geoffrey Brand and we’ve got ourselves three dead gays. Are we looking at someone who can’t stand gays?”

“Shambazza wasn’t gay,” I pointed out.

“That’s true,” he admitted. “Still think it’s Schlom?”

“Has to be. He wants Bedford Falls, and he doesn’t care how he gets it. It’s Schlom.”

“What about Selden?” he countered. “He was against this movie, wasn’t he?”

“He was. In fact, he begged me this morning to try to talk Matthew out of it. But you’re overlooking one vital point.”

“Which is?”

“Schlom is scum.”

He grinned at me. “You really want him, don’t you?”

“I really want him.”

“He the one who beat you up tonight?”

That one I left alone.

There was an empty parking space behind my bungalow next to the Vette. Lamp pulled into it and shut off the engine.

“That sure is some neat car,” he said, gazing at the Vette wistfully.

Lulu stirred. I opened my door. She hopped out.

“Go after him, Lieutenant.”

“I can’t, Hoagy. I have no case against the man. No evidence, no nothing.”

“He’s scum, Lieutenant. He brutalizes. He rapes. He eats wood. God knows what he alone has done to deplete the Brazilian rain forest.”

“Hoagy, will you listen to yourself?”

“I try not to, as a rule.”

“Look, I know Schlom’s not a very nice guy. But that’s simply not enough to go on.”

“Why, because he’s a respected pillar of the community?”

Lamp’s jaw muscles tensed. “I don’t deserve that,” he said softly. He was hurt.

“You’re right, you don’t. I’m sorry, Lieutenant. It’s just that, hell, this is the movie business. When in doubt as to who is getting fucked by whom you need only ask yourself who stands to profit the most. Therein lies your fucker. And Schlom is our fucker—to the tune of over three hundred million dollars.”

“That may be, Hoagy. But I still can’t grab a rope and go find the nearest tree. The law is the law. There’s no evidence against him. We get some, he’ll go down for it. You have my word on it. But until we do, I have to leave him be.”

We sat there in silence.

“Boy, I sure do hate this case,” Lamp confessed wearily.

“Any particular reason?”

“Think about it, Hoagy. Schlom and Selden talk real good for it. But who in the heck doesn’t? Charmaine Harris? She’s got the same motives and opportunities as Selden right on down the line. Bunny Wax does, too. And then there’s Toy to consider. …” He shook his head. “I’m pulling the handle on a big slot machine, Hoagy. I’m standing in a Las Vegas casino watching those tumblers spin round and round, waiting for the lemons to line up so it’ll all go click and the coins will spill out. Only they won’t. They just keep spinning round and round and …”

Only something did go click all of a sudden. In my brain. Of course. Why hadn’t I seen it before? It had been there all along. Right there before my eyes. “You’re a genius, Lieutenant.”

He frowned. “Why, what did I say?”

I climbed out of the car unsteadily. My head was doing the spinning now.

“Are you okay, Hoagy?”