The Man Who Shot Lewis Vance (7 page)

I got up, retrieved the pencil, and returned it to the desk. Phil took it and aimed his next throw at the wall behind me. I let the pencil lie there this time and sat quietly, my hands folded in my lap till the conversation ended and Phil hung up.

“They’re fine,” he said before I could ask about his family. “What do you want?”

“Well—” I began, but he stared at the phone and interrupted me.

“Where am I going to get six policeman a night?”

I shrugged.

“I’ve got a multiple murder in the valley,” Phil said, turning his back to me and talking to the curtains. “I’ve got kids, little kids, seven-, eight-year-olds down at the fanners’ market, dozens of them stealing anything that isn’t nailed down. You know how many policeman are needed to patrol that?”

“Seven,” I guessed.

Phil swiveled around and plumped both hands on the desk.

“Who asked you?”

“You did,” I reminded him.

“What do you want?”

“Hotel dick at the Alhambra, Straight-Ahead Beason,” I said.

“Used to be a cop,” Phil said, touching his forehead to see if he had a fever.

“Used to be a cop,” I agreed. “Got himself shot yesterday. I just saw him at the hospital. He thinks the guy who did it is out there and looking for John Wayne.”

“Looking for John Wayne,” said Phil, looking up from his troubles for the first time and actually listening to me. “Why the hell would someone who shot a hotel dick be looking for John Wayne?”

“Straight-Ahead heard something when he got shot,” I explained.

“And what part aren’t you telling me?” Phil said, knuckles turning white on the desk.

“Nothing,” I said, which was the truth—with the exception of the fact that my gun was gone, Vance was dead and missing, and Teddy Longretti was involved.

“Bullshit,” he said. “What do you want?”

“Someone to keep an eye on Wayne till we find the guy with the gun,” I answered.

“Didn’t you hear what I said when you came in? Everyone wants a cop. I don’t have a cop for you. The young cops are in the Army. I’ve got officers who are too few and too old. If it weren’t for the damn war I’d be one of them. I never would have been promoted.”

“Well—” I tried, but, once again, was interrupted.

“No protection,” he said. “Wayne will have to get his own protection unless you come up with something stronger than the maybe of a stiff-necked house detective who was passing out with a bullet wound in his pride. Cawelti took the Alhambra call. Go see him.”

Sergeant John Cawelti and I were not friends. We had not been friends since our first meeting. I had that effect on people, from hospital desk clerks to cops. Cawelti had the same effect on people. We were not a good pair to co-star in
The New Moon.

“Phil,” I said, playing with the idea of telling him about the gun and body.

“Out,” he said.

I knew better than to argue with Phil, especially when his eyes were turned down and his outstretched hand was pointing at the door. I knew better but I never acted on that knowledge. Bile ran too deep between us. I couldn’t slink out that door, even though I knew that the next step might be a violent chapter in the tale of two brothers.

“Would it make a difference if I said please?” I asked.

“O-U-T. Even Lucy knows what that spells,” he said between clenched teeth.

Lucy was his year-old daughter and my niece. Phil tended to equate our emotional development.

“Okay,” I said, getting up. “Okay. But this attitude of yours seriously jeopardizes the possibility of my getting you a birthday present next month. I was seriously considering a Fred Waring album.”

Phil’s head was down. This was the moment of truth. I could get to the door before him. I was sure of that. He had too much weight on him and had picked up more since his promotion. I wasn’t sure I could make it down the stairs in the dim light before he caught me, however.

I saw the smile. He kept his head down and hid it, but I saw it. Instead of speaking, he simply waved his hand and shook his head as the phone rang. I left as he said on the phone, “Of course, Mrs. Borrows, I haven’t forgotten the neighborhood bond drive.”

I closed the door and walked the long mile to the door of the squadroom. Like Wyatt Earp in
Frontier Marshall
, I took a deep breath and stepped in to meet the equivalent of Ike Clanton.

4
      

T
he smell of food hit me when I pushed the doors open and entered the squad room. It was the familiar smell of a room where men work around the clock and sometimes the people and food they bring in are a bit ripe. The room, cluttered with desks and files, was cleaner than usual. It wasn’t clean, but on Sunday an old colored guy named Nero Suggs had peeled away the top layer of filth and found someplace to dump the waste baskets.

There were four or five cops around beside Cawelti and a couple of citizens and citizens who prey on citizens. Cawelti was sitting at his desk off to the right, just a little removed from his fellow officers. He was one-finger typing a report, and his red face and poor complexion and his reddish straight hair parted down the middle like a comic bartender’s stood out across the room. A thin guy of about sixty in a suit was sitting on the chair within easy reach of Cawelti. I couldn’t tell if the graying wisp was a good citizen or a bad guy. I could see he was scared, as if someone were about to hit him. I took two steps toward Cawelti’s desk and Cawelti reached over and slapped the man in the head.

“Don’t hit me in the head like that,” the man said, recoiling and holding his slapped head with an open palm.

Cawelti didn’t apologize or promise better things for the future. He went back to his report. When I was a foot or two from the desk, the wispy man looked up at me ready to protect himself from an attack on a new front.

“Cawelti,” I said, but he didn’t grunt, just pondered over the spelling of some troublesome word. He made a decision and went on. In the corner a couple of fat cops thought of something funny. One of them thought it was so funny he spilled half his coffee on an unoccupied desk. He didn’t bother to clean it up.

“Sergeant,” I tried. The wispy man in the chair shivered.

“Peters,” he said without looking back at me, “go away.”

“I’m here about the Beason case,” I said.

“There is no Beason case,” Cawelti said, getting in two more letters on his typewriter. “Hotel dick gets shot by hash-headed hotel clerk. Clerk grabs ten grand from the safe and runs. What do you think we’re going to do, send out an all-states on Teddy Spaghetti? Maybe we should call back the troops from Europe, go house to house. I’ve got to work here.”

“A man’s been shot,” I said. “I’ve always been able to rely on your compassion.”

“Go tell your jokes to your brother,” he said. “I’ve got a murder case I’m wrapping up. Beason will get better. Long-retti will turn up on a garbage heap some morning. Case closed.”

“But—” I began, and he turned to face me. As he turned, his eyes met those of the thin man with the white hair and the neat suit. Before the man knew what was coming, Cawelti reached out and hit him again with an open palm, this time on the other side of the man’s head.

“I told you, don’t hit me,” the man said. Then he looked at me for help. “You heard me tell him. It hurts to be hit like that.”

Cawelti shrugged and gave me his attention. “I’ve got paperwork on this weed,” he said, nodding at the slapped man. “Mr. Patterson of the firm of Patterson and Walker owns the New Hollywood apartment building on La Cienega. You know it?”

“New building, about fourteen stories, went up just before the war started,” I said.

Cawelti nodded yes and went on.

“Mr. Patterson here made a mistake. He gave the tenants long leases and reasonable rents. Times were still a little hard. Then the war comes and rents fly and everyone’s moving to Los Angeles to make war money building boats and airplanes and Mr. Patterson starts feeling sorry for himself for all the money he could be making so he tries to get his tenants to move. Mr. Patterson here is ingenious at making his tenants move and breaking their leases, aren’t you, Mr. Patterson.”

Patterson cringed, expecting another blow, but didn’t answer.

“Threats from hired hands, mysterious break-ins, plumbing problems,” Cawelti went on. “Then Mr. Patterson makes a mistake. Up on the tenth floor lives an old guy with a heart problem.”

“Ninth floor,” Patterson corrected.

“Mr. Patterson fixed the light on the elevator so that when the old guy gets on, the lights go bam-bam-bam. The old guy looks up and thinks maybe the elevator is falling and he’s only going to be fit for burial in a Mason jar when it hits bottom. Old guy gets a heart attack. Vacant apartment. Only trouble is, Mr. Patterson didn’t have time to fix the elevator lights again before we found the naughty little trick.”

“I didn’t do this thing,” Patterson protested to me, turning in his chair, palms up, pleading. I was unconvinced.

“Proving it is proving hard but not impossible,” Cawelti went on, giving Patterson a look that promised pain. “And Mr. Patterson is not cooperating. He is not confessing like a good citizen.”

“So you haven’t got time for Beason,” I concluded.

“You got it,” he said, returning to his report.

“Beason tells me that Teddy and some guy he’s working with named Alex are out to get a movie star,” I said. “Two hash heads loose with a gun shooting at a movie star could embarrass you, John.”

“Don’t call me John,” he said without turning. “You want to walk out of here instead of crawl, don’t call me John. In fact, don’t call me at all, just get out now.”

“Right,” I said. “If John Wayne catches a bullet in his teeth, I’ll tell the
Times
how interested the police were in keeping him alive.”

Cawelti spun around, suddenly very angry or very interested. The move was so quick that Patterson leaped from his chair with a howl.

“Sit down,” Cawelti yelled. Across the room the cops stopped joking for a minute in the hope of seeing some real mayhem, but Patterson sat down and Cawelti just stared red-faced at me. The cops went back to their coffee and ringing phones.

“John Wayne, someone might be trying to kill John Wayne?” he asked.

“Could be,” I said.

“Shit. They can’t do that.” His right hand went out and grabbed the nearest piece of paper, crunching it into an ugly Christmas ball. He stood up leaning toward me. He had me by about three inches.

“I’ll find that little son of a bitch,” he hissed. “Kill John Wayne. What the hell is this world coming to?”

Patterson shrugged, but Cawelti didn’t see him.

“Wayne’s the only damn movie star who means anything except for Spencer Tracy,” Cawelti explained. “I’ll get on it but you better be giving me this straight. And what’s it all got to do with you?”

“It’s my gun Teddy has,” I explained.

Cawelti’s red face looked like a traffic light.

“Beason borrowed it,” I improvised. “He had trouble with his own. Both of us have permits. When this Alex shot Beason, he took my thirty-eight from him.”

Cawelti looked down at his desk, his hands supporting him amid the pile of papers. He turned to Patterson and said, “Do you believe this guy?”

Patterson knew a cue when he heard one. He shook his head no.

“I know I’m going to get shit for an answer, but I’ll ask anyway. It’s my job. Why John Wayne? Why the Duke?”

“Wayne’s a client.” I plunged in even deeper. “Maybe Teddy’s gone off the top. He knew me, doesn’t like me. Maybe he saw me with Wayne. In fact, I had a late dinner with Wayne last night at Manny’s on Broadway.”

Cawelti cocked his head like a bird.

“Check with Manny if you don’t believe me. Check with Wayne.”

“I could meet John Wayne,” Cawelti said.

“Sure, I th—”

“I’ll look for Teddy and the gun. You stay with Wayne,” Cawelti said. “And I want to talk to Wayne. That’s part of the deal.”

I could have pointed out that citizens shouldn’t have to make deals to get the police to protect them, but I had some part of my brain still functioning. I nodded in agreement.

“Now get out. I think there’s a lot of shit about this thing you’re not dumping on my desk,” Cawelti said, and he was damn right. “I’ll find out what it is and we’ll have that little talk I’ve been promising you. I can be a persuasive talker, can’t I, Mr. Patterson?”

“Very persuasive,” Patterson agreed.

“I’ll be in touch,” I said, turning to leave and almost bumping into a cop dragging a man in a trench coat behind him. The cop, named Bresnahan, was handcuffed to the trench-coated guy, who wore a little white cap. The trench coat flopped open for a second as the man teetered, revealing nothing but his scrawny body.

“Toby, how’s it going?” Bresnahan said, yanking the flasher up to his feet.

“Fair enough,” I said. “There’s an Army Boxing Show at the Hollywood Legion Wednesday.”

“Naw,” said Bresnahan, who had done some amateur fighting. “Their hearts aren’t in it unless rankings are on the line. I’ll wait till the war’s over and the guys with heart come back.”

Behind me I could hear Cawelti explaining to Patterson how John Wayne got his nickname “Duke.”

“It was his dog,” Cawelti said seriously, as if explaining history to a dense student. “He had a dog named Duke when he was a kid. Glendale firemen started calling the kid
and
the dog Duke and it stuck.”

Someone moaned behind me as I went out the squad room door. I would have put my money on Bresnahan’s flasher, but Cawelti’s good moods didn’t last very long and Patterson might be on the floor with remnants of some cop’s Italian beef dinner and the blood of the guilty and innocent alike.

Cawelti had given me two things I hadn’t had when I came in, a headache and the information that Teddy not only had my gun and Vance’s corpse but $10,000. Ten grand was a lot for a dump like the Alhambra to have in the safe. I’d have to ask Straight-Ahead about it when he was up and marching.

I got my first death threat of the day when I got back to my office in the Farraday. I had parked in No-Neck Arnie’s garage, answered politely when he asked me how the car he had sold me was doing, told him I wasn’t ready to fix the door that wouldn’t open, and hiked the two blocks to the Farraday. My back jingled nervously and I told myself to call Doc Hodgdon, the old orthopedic specialist who I played handball with at the Y on Hope and who, occasionally, got me back on my feet when my limbs creaked or cracked.