The Quality of the Informant (19 page)

LaMonica
put his arm around her shoulder just in case anyone was watching. They strolled slowly along the corridor.

"What the hell do I do now?" she whispered.

LaMonica
looked up and down the hall. "Counter offer with fifty thousand and don't come off it," he said. "Give him three days to make up his mind."

LaMonica
led her back into the room. She sat down on the bed again. Lockhart stood on the balcony. His face was damp, oily.

"Those people will put a contract out on me if they don't get the checks," Sandy said, wiping a tear. "They'll come after me. That means I won't be able to work at a regular job or go anywhere near my friends or family. I'm probably stupid for not giving them the checks and having it over and done with...but I hate them. My Freddie would turn over in his grave." Her hands wiped tears from her eyes. "I need at least fifty thousand. I need it because I have four kids. I can't work. We'll have to move." Her eyes sought the ceiling, "I wish to God I had never seen the damn checks."

Lockhart stood up. He hoisted his trousers over the mound that was his belly. "We're not able to pay any more than I have offered. I'm sorry," he said.

"That's final," Sandy said. "If that's the way you people feel about me, then the hell with it! Day after tomorrow I'm turning the checks over to the Italians. It's worth a hundred grand to avoid the death sentence!" She cupped her face in her hands and sobbed.

Omar Lockhart waddled to the door and opened it wide. "I'm sorry," he said. He walked out, closing the door gently behind him.

Sandy waved an extended middle finger at the door.
LaMonica
grabbed her arm and swung her to him. His hand closed over her mouth. His lips were at her ear. "Don't say a word," he whispered. She stared at
LaMonica
with a look of fear as he released her arm and picked up the chair Lockhart had been sitting in.
LaMonica
turned it over and examined it closely, then set it down without making a sound. Dropping to his knees, he searched under the table next to it. He motioned to her and she joined him under the table. He pointed to a black object the size of a dime. It was fastened under the rim of the table with a
gumlike
substance.

They crawled out from underneath the table and stood up.
LaMonica
took a pen and pad out of his pocket and wrote, "Cry for a while, then tell me your mind is made up about the fifty thousand. Make up a story about how much debt you're in after Freddie's death, and so on." He showed her the note. The sobs began.

They did not check out of the room for over an hour.

****

Chapter 17

THE STOCKY bald man waiting in the Treasury Field Office reception area wore an expensive looking blue suit. There were grease spots on his silk necktie. Carr introduced himself, and the man handed him a business card. It read:

OMAR T. LOCKHART

DIRECTOR OF SECURITY

TRAVELERS CHEX, INCORPORATED

HOUSTON, TEXAS

They shook hands. "The secretary checked a name for me in your files...Freddie Roth," Lockhart said in a panhandle drawl. "She said you handled the case."

Carr nodded. "Roth is dead," he said. "Murdered over a year ago."

"That's a ten four," Lockhart said. "And how was he killed, if I may ask?"

"Head blown off," Carr said. "Underworld dispute over some counterfeit bonds he had printed. Why are you interested in old Freddie?"

"It's a confidential matter," said Lockhart. "Can you tell me anything about Freddie's young girl friend?"

Carr shrugged. "Have no idea. I know he used to live with a gal in El Monte."

"Did Roth ever print any counterfeit checks?" Lockhart asked. The look on his face was extremely inquisitive.

"Yep," Carr said. "Printed anything he could get a sample of. Did it his whole life. Checks, money, bonds, passports you name it."

"Would you mind if I took a look at your file on Roth?" Lockhart said.

"Yes, I would mind,"
Carr
said. "Particularly since you don't seem to want to tell me what this is all about."

"Sorry," said the fat man. "I just can't do that at this point."

"Then it's been nice talking with you." Carr turned, walked back into the office, and sat down at his desk. He continued thumbing through a stack of intelligence reports and initialing each page as required by the agent in charge.

Kelly looked up from his newspaper. "Who was that?"

"A private eye. He wanted some info on Freddie Roth," Carr said.

Kelly grunted. He folded the sports page.

The telephone rang and Carr picked up the receiver. It was Calhoun. "A white boy just showed me a sample twenty. I told him to come back in an hour. You'd better get on down here." The telephone clicked.

"Calhoun's got one," Carr said. He stood up and shrugged on his suit jacket. Kelly folded the newspaper and stuffed it into his coat pocket. He followed Carr out the door.

Carr steered north on Vermont Avenue toward Hollywood. At a stop light Kelly finished reading his newspaper, then tossed it in the backseat. "I hate this paper," he said. "The editorials are antipolice." He turned to Carr. "Ever ask yourself why?"

"Why what?"

"Why a newspaper would be against the police?"

"No," Carr said. His mind was on the chalk outline of Linda's body on the floor of her living room.

"It's because the editors are out-and-out Communists," Kelly said.

Charles Carr drove slowly by Calhoun's hot dog stand. There were no customers. He pulled over to the curb two doors up. Leaving the keys in the ignition, he climbed out of the sedan and sauntered back to Calhoun's counter.

Calhoun spoke as if he were out of breath. "This white boy wanted to sell me five hundred bucks' worth of twenties for a hundred-dollar bill. I told him to come back in an hour with the whole package. That was forty minutes ago."

"Who is he?"

"I don't know his name," Calhoun said. "I always called him Curly. He used to be banging around here. I think he was dealing weed. A couple of months ago he must've made
hisself
a real good score. He started driving a sports car and I seen him with a blonde. A good-looking gal with a nice ass."

"What does he look like?"

"Curly hair and sort of a peach fuzz beard. I figured him for a user because he's always sniffling his nose and sometimes he wears a long sleeved shirt even when it's hot as hell. He drives a white Porsche."

Carr gave a knowing nod.

"You know the
muthafucka
?"

"I think so," Carr said. "Kelly and I will be across the street in that alley." He pointed. "Once you see the funny money, give us a wave. Tell him you don't like the quality and you're not interested. When he leaves, we'll follow. "

Calhoun winked.

Carr returned to the sedan. He climbed in and started the engine. As he pulled into an alley facing the hot dog stand, he told Kelly what he'd just learned. Minutes later the young man in the white Porsche pulled up in front of Calhoun's. He exited the Porsche and headed for the counter carrying a brown paper sack. After speaking briefly with Calhoun, he handed over the bag. Calhoun opened it, looked inside, and handed it back. As the young man stuffed the sack under his shirt, Calhoun's fingers made a discreet wave.

Charles Carr started the engine. The young man gestured angrily at Calhoun, then shook his head in a disgusted manner and shuffled back to the Porsche. As he drove north on Vermont, Charles Carr pulled into traffic a half block behind the sports car.

"If he sees us, he'll throw his package," Kelly said.

Carr nodded. The Porsche turned right on Hollywood Boulevard. Carr stepped on the gas and made the same turn. The streets were crowded with the usual mixture of tourists and leather freaks, teenage whores, men dressed as women, and muggers of all races. It seemed that everyone wore sunglasses.

"We're far enough away," Carr said. "Let's do it."

Kelly reached under the seat and pulled out a red light with a magnetic bottom. He plugged it into the cigarette lighter. The red light flashed. With a hook shot reach, he mounted it on the roof of the sedan. The Porsche accelerated and swerved right onto a residential street. As the driver tossed the brown bag out the window, Carr braked sharply. Kelly swung open the passenger door and retrieved the bag.

Carr floored the accelerator. The Porsche's tires squealed as it rounded another corner onto a busy street. The Porsche was almost a block ahead as the G-car made the turn. It swerved to avoid a double-parked truck and sideswiped a station wagon coming from the other direction. The Porsche vaulted a curb and crashed into the side of an apartment house.

Carr slammed on the brakes. The T-men jumped out of the sedan and approached the sports car with guns drawn. The driver struggled frantically to start the engine. Carr swung open the door and yanked the man out by his hair. Kelly frisked him and snapped on handcuffs.

"How long have you been following me?" he said.

"All day," Carr said. Kelly led the man back to the sedan.

After the arrival of tow trucks and police cars, and the signing of various forms, they proceeded to the Field Office with the prisoner.

"I can help you guys out again if you will do something for me," the young man said.

"We're listening," said Kelly, who was sitting in the back seat next to him.

Carr steered onto the freeway toward downtown.

"I think I know who the printer is."

"Who is it?" Kelly said.

"What'll you do for me?" he said.

Nothing was said for a while. The freeway signs read "Broadway," "Los Angeles Street." Carr steered onto an off ramp and headed down a hill toward the Federal Building.

"The printer's name is
Paulie
and he's a friend of Teddy Mora. He lives down in Ensenada. That's what I heard."

"Have you ever met him?" Carr said.

"No. I've just heard talk."

"Thanks a lot for the tip," Kelly said.

"I guess that means you're not going to give me a break," the young man said.

"That's right," Kelly said.

"I
wanna
see my lawyer."

Carr and Kelly spent the next few hours on the usual processing: taking fingerprints, filling out forms, preparing affidavits and reports. It was dark by the time they booked their prisoner into the Los Angeles County jail.

Early the next morning Carr and Kelly met in the reception area of the United States attorney's office, a handsomely carpeted room decorated with framed photographs of the president, the attorney general, and the latest U.S. attorney, a former local presidential campaign manager. During the hour they spent waiting, the receptionist, a red haired woman wearing a shapeless polka dot dress, phoned her mother, painted and blew dry her fingernails, phoned a friend and discussed a television program, thumbed through a movie magazine, and painstakingly switched stations on a tiny transistor radio several times.

Finally, Reba
Partch
, wearing a white skirt and sweater with yellowed underarms, hustled in the front door carrying a large straw purse in one hand and a hairbrush in the other. She applied brush strokes to her
dandruffy
Brillo
pad as she strode to the receptionist's desk. The receptionist handed her some phone message slips and nodded at Carr and Kelly.
Partch
glanced at the T-men as if they were mannequins. She flicked dandruff off her shoulders and proceeded to her office.