The Quality of the Informant (10 page)

"Do you remember the phony series E bonds that were cashed in the banks along Wilshire Boulevard five years ago?" said the woman.

Carr stepped back in and turned to face her. "Three grand's worth in every bank from downtown Los Angeles to Santa Monica. I remember the case well."

The woman tapped her chest. "Me," she said. "I can tell you now because the statute has run out and I can't be prosecuted."

"It was one of the best bond capers I've ever seen," Carr said. "Four agents spent weeks working on it. All we came up with was a vague description of a woman."

"I wore different wigs," she said. "Paul
LaMonica
was waiting in the car for me outside each bank. I ended up with nothing more than a few bucks out of the deal. There were too many people that had to be pieced off. Hell, at the time
LaMonica
was supplying my smack habit and that's all I really cared about. It was right after that caper that I got busted for marks and ended up doing a year in
Frontera
. I did a lot of thinking when I was in. For the first time in my life I admitted to my true sexuality. For the first time I realized that all of life is based on sex. Admitting my true nature solved virtually all of my problems. For once, I could accept myself. After I was released I kept completely away from the old crowd. I began living a new life. That's why I named this place the New Life Gallery."

"Have you seen
LaMonica
in the past few months?" Carr said.

"He stops by once in a while when he's out of the joint. He always wants me to do some phony paper for him, and I always shine him on."

"Any idea where I could find him?" Carr said.

"What did he do?"

"Escaped from Terminal Island."

"I'm sure you're already aware that all the paper pushers hang out at the Castaways Lounge in Hollywood," she said.

Carr nodded. "I've checked. He's not around there."

"Then I don't know what to tell you. But please, don't come around here anymore. My clientele is frightened of police types. This is more than just an art gallery. To my sisters and me, this is a shrine to women. The art here is a declaration of sexual truth. As a matter of fact, I believe that not being honest with oneself is the root cause of drug addiction. I know that my own problem disappeared as soon as I came out." She plucked a bread-dough plaque of buttocks and breasts off the wall and dusted it on her dress. She re-hung it. "It's been a long journey for me, but I've finally arrived. If you people
would have
knocked on my door a few years ago, I would have jumped through any available window. I was involved in so many crimes that when I was questioned by the cops I had to be told which crime they were talking about in order to confess." She shook her head and smiled.

"Did
LaMonica
phone you a couple of days ago?" Carr said.

"Who told you that?"

"What did he want?"

"As usual he wanted me to do a deal with him. He offered me half of the action, said all I had to do was play a part. I assumed it was some kind of a con scheme."

"Did he give you any details?"

"Paul
LaMonica
doesn't give details. With him, everything is on a need-to-know basis. Had I agreed to come in, he would have waited until the last minute to fill me in on the details, names, and places. He believes in high security. That's all I'm going to say."

"Thanks." Carr turned toward the door.

"Is your sister really one of us?" she asked.

Carr nodded. "Yes," he said in a tone of sincerity. "And I
am
very proud of her." He walked out the door. Kelly followed.

The agents climbed in the G-car. Kelly got behind the wheel and started the engine. "I say,
lez
-be-on-our-way,"
Kelly said. He laughed uproariously. "
My
twin sister in San Francisco!"
He laughed again and Carr joined in. Kelly caught his breath. "I almost had a heart attack trying not to crack up in there! You definitely should get the
Bullshitter
of the Year award for that act." He threw his head back and laughed again.

Carr took out his notepad and made some brief entries concerning the interview. He put the pad away. "Do you think she was holding back?"

"Hard to say."

Carr rubbed his hands through his hair. "If
LaMonica
was going to print counterfeit money, why would he call Rosemary and ask her to 'play a part'?"

"It doesn't make sense," Kelly said. As they drove down Melrose toward the Hollywood freeway, neither man spoke. Kelly signaled, then steered onto a freeway on ramp and accelerated. "I wonder who would pay two thousand dollars for a wood carving of a
cunt
?" he said.

Carr shrugged.

"The
boss'll
be here any minute," said the bearded man standing behind a glass display case filled with cutting mirrors, roach clips, glass beakers, and tiny scales. "He stops by once a week to pick up the till."

"We'll wait," Carr said.

Kelly was busy examining a book he had picked off a wall rack entitled
How to Grow Marijuana Indoors.
He slammed it back on the rack. Two teenage girls carrying schoolbooks came in the door and wandered over to a display of hollowed-out silver dollars and fake soda cans with secret compartments. They giggled. One nudged the other and nodded at the red-faced, staring Kelly. They giggled again and hurried out the door.

There was the sound of a car pulling up in the alley. A prune-faced man with a sharp chin and elbows shuffled in the back door. The clerk whispered to him. He turned around and faced the T-men. "I'm Teddy Mora," he said gravely. "You people looking for me?" He spun a ring of car keys lewdly around his middle finger.

Carr held out his gold badge. "A prisoner escaped yesterday," he said. "He ran in the front door and out the side door of this place like he knew where he was going." He took a mug-shot photo out of his shirt pocket and handed it to Mora. "Do you know him?" Carr said.

Mora glanced at the photo and handed it back to Carr. "I'm an absentee landlord," he said. "I don't live in Los Angeles. This place is owned by a corporation."

"We figured you might know the guy," Carr interrupted. "His name is Paul
LaMonica
."

Teddy Mora shook his head. "Never heard of him. Is there anything else?"

"Yeah," Kelly said, examining a hashish pipe on the counter. "How long do you think it'll be before you'll be able to sell dope to the kiddies right along with all the paraphernalia?"

Teddy Mora twirled the car keys. His gaze shifted from Carr to Kelly and back to Carr. "Is that about it? I have things to do around here."

"
LaMonica's
a fugitive," Carr said. "We're real interested in finding him. You've been around long enough to know what I mean. If we can't find him, we'll be back. And that's a promise not a threat."

Ignoring them, Mora turned and spoke casually to his clerk. The agents exited the front door.

Kelly drove along Hollywood Boulevard on the way back downtown. When they stopped at a red light, there were straggly-haired teenage boys on each of the four street corners. One of the young men gave a groin-pump greeting to a passing convertible driven by an older man wearing dark glasses. The man pulled the convertible to the curb and the boy approached.

"Child prostitutes, stores that sell dope fixings..." Kelly muttered in a defeated tone. "The whole country is turning to shit. Sometimes I think I'd like to take my wife and kids, chuck everything, and live up in the mountains away from it all. No mind-rotting
TV,
no forced busing, no dope." He shook his bear-sized head.

"
LaMonica
comes into town," Carr said, staring at the road ahead. "He stops by the Castaways Lounge and meets with Teddy Mora. They talk business. Linda gets her hooks in and invites him over-"

"For one of her Mata
Hari
-style interrogations," Kelly interrupted.

"
LaMonica
makes a telephone call from her place," Carr continued, "and uses the name Bob French. He tells her he plans to leave town the next day." He rubbed his chin. "
LaMonica
came to L.A. to get something he needed, or maybe to sell a package of bad paper." He had a puzzled expression.

"It could be anything," Kelly said, coming out of his fugue.

"Four-Lima-four from Los Angeles base," blared the Treasury radio. Carr opened the glove compartment, pulled out the microphone, and answered.

"Meet Detective Higgins at the L.A. morgue, third floor."

"Roger," Carr said.

****

Chapter 9

CARR AND Kelly stepped into the morgue elevator and waited for the doors to close. There was an odor of formaldehyde. "Hold it!" shouted someone in the hall. Carr pushed the "open door" button. A freckled man in a pale green surgical outfit backed into the lift, pulling a gurney with a sheet covering everything on it except a yellowed toe.

Kelly grimaced and pushed the third-floor button.

"You guys here for a murder autopsy?" said the medic. A surgeon's cap balanced precariously on a mop of curly red hair. His voice had a tone of anticipation.

Kelly shook his head no. He stared at the yellow toe.

"This turkey electrocuted himself," said the red-haired man. "He wrapped an electrical wire around his head, grounded himself in his bathtub, and lust put in the old plug.
Zappo
!"

Kelly shook his head sadly. "Poor guy," he said.

The elevator stopped. The doors opened. "He got a real
charge
out of it!" the doc said. He laughed and waited for the agents to join in. When they didn't, he rolled the body out of the elevator and headed the opposite way down a sterile-looking corridor.

"That's why I hate to come here," Kelly said as they walked down the hall. "These people are all creeps. Real honest-to-god one-hundred-percent
creeps."

Carr nodded.

Higgins, a fortyish, crew-cut man who was the size of a football lineman, beckoned them into an office. They sat down around a table covered with bloody knives in transparent plastic envelopes and enlarged color photos of death scenes. One photo was a close-up of the belt around Linda Gleason's neck.

"I'm waiting to observe my second autopsy for the day," Higgins said. "Some gang murders that happened last night." He ran a hand through his stubble of blond hair. "I've got a few minutes, so I'll give it to you briefly. Your girl died of strangulation and she had multiple head injuries. The murderer bashed her brains in with a heavy lamp base. He did this after he choked her out with a belt. There were no fingerprints in the apartment except for hers and those of a couple of bartenders from the Castaways Lounge she was balling. I showed
LaMonica's
photograph to every resident of the apartment house. No one could identify him, including the old lady next door. She wasn't wearing her eyeglasses. "

"What about the taxi dispatchers?" Carr said.

"Just getting to that," Higgins said. "The taxi company logs show no fare to Linda Gleason's address all day, which probably means that the cabby who drove
LaMonica
over there pocketed the fare." Higgins stretched his arms over his head. "So unless you can capture
LaMonica
and talk him into giving us a confession complete enough so that we can corroborate everything he says, we have no murder case." He turned his palms up.

Carr raised his eyebrows. He shook his head. "I've read all his previous arrest reports.
LaMonica
doesn't confess when he gets arrested. He always goes to the joint without saying a word."