The Straight Man - Roger L Simon (23 page)

"The devil you are!" He turned away. "We
got a liar out here, Granma!"

"We better call the police. I'm gonna call 'em
right now, Billy."

"Where are the medicines, Billy?" I said.

"What is this? You get away from here. You ain't
supposed to come here .... Granma, you got the police?"

"
Uh-huh. I'm talkin' to 'em now. You want the
small-bore or the recoilless?"

Billy didn't say anything.

"
What happened to Stanley Burckhardt?"

"Who?"

"Fat man, around fifty. A private dick."

"That wasn't my business. They took him away."

"Who? The Koreans?"

"Ain't no Koreans in this. Koreans religious
people, holy people."

I grabbed Billy by the shirt and pulled him to the
door.

"
Who took Burckhardt?"

"I was tryin' to help you, mister, and now you
tryin' to get me killed. You ain't supposed to be here. Get away. Get
away .... Granma, get that small-bore. Granma, fast!"

"You're the guy who put Burckhardt on my tail,
aren't you? The twenty-three-year-old."

"Someone was lyin' to us. They said they was
holy people. They said they was with the Korean, but they wasn't."

"You mean whoever convinced Vasile to let them
into the penthouse of the Picasso pretended they were part of the
Reverend Wu's church?"

Billy nodded frantically. "They knew all about
it. They promised us Bibles."

"But you guys didn't know they were gonna get
rid of Ptak, did you? Commit a cardinal sin. And now you're feeling
guilty."

"You gonna get me killed. I know'd it. Just like
poor Vasile. I swore I'd never tell. I swore. Lord have mercy on
those who do His work. Granma!"

"Unburden yourself, Billy. Repent! Who was it'?"

Through the window slat, I could see the shadow of
the old woman outlined against a church calendar as she advanced
toward the door with a shotgun.

"A dark-haired guy. Thin face." I described
the New Yorker for him.

"I ain't gonna tell you, mister. I ain't ever
gonna tell you." He suddenly slid down against the door,
slumping to his knees and leaving me staring straight at Granma who
was pointing the small-bore in my face with a lunatic gleam in her
eyes.

"Turn tail, boy!" She cocked the gun for
emphasis, but she didn't need to. I already had the distinct
impression she meant it.

"It's okay. It's okay," I said, backing
away past an old rusted-out Dodge parked in their driveway.

I got in my car and drove down the block, parking
around the corner of the next intersection. In about five minutes a
couple of prowl cars roared up the street, their sirens wailing. I
sat there for a while, thumbing through Sandollar's Billboard,
waiting for them to leave and wondering who, if it wasn't the
Koreans, had Billy so frightened. It was clear that whoever it was
had duped Nastase into allowing him or them into the penthouse,
drugged Ptak, bumped him off, and then took care of Nastase and
probably Burckhardt to keep it covered up. No wonder Billy was
panicked. With a record like that, who wouldn't be? It was a lot more
than he bargained for when he signed up to enlighten godless commies
with Bibles for Bucharest.

In about ten minutes, one of the cop cars came by
with Billy and his grandmother ensconced in the backseat. I figured
the other one was waiting back at their house for my return. But by
then I wasn't that interested. My attention was elsewhere. It was
focused on the full-page ad on the back of Billboard.

19

Two hours later I was still staring at the ad, pacing
about my apartment and trying to put the pieces together, when the
bell rang. I opened the door and Chantal burst in, wearing a cloche
hat and a black trench coat. She started talking the moment she
entered. "Look, I know apologies are useless, but I'm sorry. It
was stupid of me, getting up and blabbing in front of all those
people. I never should've done it. I was just too headstrong to admit
it. You get that way, don't you? Take a position and you can't back
off and then you regret it ten minutes later?"

"If it's ten minutes later, I usually try to
come back and patch things up as quickly as possible."

"Well, that's not me. I mean, not usually. I
never go back. But I'm here now. Doesn't that count for something?"
She looked at me hopefully. "Anyway, whatever happens, I
couldn't drop the case just like that. I mean, it's pretty
interesting and everything. So this morning I decided to follow Emily
again, and I took some pictures you might want to look at." She
put a manila envelope on my coffee table.

"Pictures, huh?" I looked at her. She had
turned around and was facing the sofa, tapping her toe and staring at
the ceiling, trying not to look nervous. This woman was something—the
most extreme case of tough/tender I had encountered since Barbara
Stanwyck in Golden Boy. I had to admit it—I was thrilled she was
back.

"Aren't you going to take your coat off'?"
I said.

"Oh, yeah. Sure." She wheeled around,
peeling off the hat first. Her red hair cascaded down on the black
coat.

"Look, uh," I continued, trying to stick to
business, "you know that gorgeous Art Deco wreck on Sunset, the
building right down the hill here?"

"You mean Astro House? The one everyone dreams
about remodeling?"

"
Yeah. But no one thinks it's really worth the
investment." I walked up to her and put the Billboard in her
hand, pointing to the back page. "Look."

She stared down at a slick airbrushed layout of a
1930s-type Chrysler Building skyscraper dominating the Strip. Little
miniature DC-3's were circling its spire as they did in the old
Universal Pictures logo with RKO-like radio waves shooting out of its
antenna in the form of musical notes. Down below a line of Maseratis,
Porsches, and Lamborghinis awaited a parking valet beneath a large
porte cochere
with the
name of the establishment written in brilliant rose neon across the
top: Neutron City.

"Neutron City . . ." she repeated.

"
Sounds familiar, doesn't it?"

She looked at me, puzzled.

"Could that have been what Mike was shouting
from the penthouse? Not nestron, neutral, or nastral. Or even neuter.
But Neutron . . ." I took the magazine from her and read from
the ad copy: " 'Future Home of the World's Greatest Recording
Studio and Radio Broadcast Facility. The New Capitol of Pop at the
Old Astro Building. The Past Lives in the Future and the Future Lives
in the Past in this Multimillion-dollar State-of-the-Art Renovation
that Begins Next Week. Who Says that Rock 'n' Roll Is Dead? Reserve
Space at the Neutron Now. Contact: 555-3023."

"What's that?"

"According to the Haines Directory"—I
gestured to my microfiche, which had a reverse phone book on
film—"it's something called Sassafras Productions."

"Who're they?"

"
Well, I don't know for sure, but I just spent
an hour at Tower Records, snooping around the oldies bin, and it's a
pretty strange coincidence. Remember that group about five years ago,
the Headless Chickens?"

"The one with the creepy bass player in the
clear vinyl jump suit?"

"Right. The guy who bit live animals on stage
for p.r.? Anyway, that was a Sassafras Production for Licorice
Records."

"
Sandollar's old company." She looked back
down at the Billboard ad. "A multi-million-dollar renovation"
she said.

"I thought he was sick of the music business."

"It's an addiction. He told me himself."

"And he's supposed to be broke."

"
Yeah. Funny, isn't it? You'd think with his
track record, no one would touch him."

"Then where'd he get the . . . ?" She
stopped and looked at me.

I didn't answer.

"Cosmic Aid." She let the words out slowly.
I nodded.

"
Out of the mouths of starving Africans . . ."

"Into the ears of the people who wanted to feed
them. Nice trick, huh?"

"What a prick," she said. "What an
incredible prick."

"Yeah, twenty-five millions' worth. And I bet he
doesn't leave tracks. He's probably keeping it all in cash and we'd
have to show where he got it in the first place. With a charity, that
could take years."

"Well," she said. "Now I'm really sure
you ought to look at those pictures."

20

"So you don't like her pictures," I said.
"That's kind of an insult, you know. The lady was a professional
photographer in D.C. for two years."

"I didn't say I didn't like her pictures. I just
said the risk entailed is more than the possible gain."

"More than the gain? Right now you've got one
client hiding under a rock and the other one's being railroaded onto
Death Row."

"I wouldn't worry about that. California hasn't
pulled the plug on anybody since Caryl Chessman."

"Yeah, but they've kept a lot of people
waiting."

It was the following night and I was riding through
South L.A. in the back of a rented T-Bird. Chantal was sitting next
to me. Purvis Wilkes, Otis's manager/lawyer, was in the front next to
a black behemoth named Omar, who as yet hadn't said one word.

"Look, I want to see the man himself," I
said. "I'm sure he's capable of making his own decisions."

"He's not in L.A."

"
Don't give me that shit, Purvis. His brother's
up against the wall and if he wasn't here, we wouldn't be this far
along in the first place."

At that point, we were making a right onto Slauson,
not more than a few blocks from where, about a dozen years ago, the
SWAT team dusted the SLA in their safe house. We made another right
onto Compton and continued through the invisible county line where,
for reasons known only to some long-deceased bureaucrat, the city of
L.A. became the city of Florence and then became L.A. again in the
section the world knew as Watts, famed for its riot and for its
subsequent generations of Eastern tourists who would gawk and say,
"It doesn't look so bad here."

But the four of us in the car weren't saying anything
as we drove, continuing past the Rodia Towers and the old Red Car
tracks until we turned once more onto a tiny side street lined with
rusted oil barrels and junked cars called 111th Place. A couple of
brothers in black berets and motorcycle jackets with skull and bones
on the back were standing at the front end by one of the cars when we
rounded the corner. We slowed as we approached them, waiting for them
to nod before we moved on. I glanced over at Chantal who was staring
calmly in front of her with her fingers tucked under my leg. Two
houses ahead, I saw a light go on in the window and then go off.

We veered behind a row of barrels, bouncing over a
lawn, and pulled up along the side of that house. Chantal and I
started out of the car, when two other brothers emerged as if out of
nowhere, thrust us up against the hood of the T-Bird, and began to
pat us down. Wilkes watched, half smiling. When they were satisfied
we were clean, they led us into the house. Wilkes followed a few
steps behind while Omar, never moving from the car, sat and waited.

The living room was totally dark when we got in. In
the filtered window light, I could just make out the figure of King
King sitting in the corner smoking a thin cigar. He waited for us to
sit on the couch before he spoke.

"
You cause problems, cowboy. Problems in the
entertainment business and problems in . . . the pleasure business."

"
I think they'd have problems of their own."

"And you brought a bitch. You didn't say you
were bringing a bitch."

"
She's my partner."

"I don't trust men who work with bitches. They
get led around by their cock."

"What about women who work with men?" said
Chantal.

"What do they get led around by?"

"
I haven't figured that one out yet." King
King laughed softly and smoked awhile. "So you have some
pictures."

"Y0ou interested?"

"
I don't know. This thing is a great risk."

"Yes, it is. It seems they're very well
protected. Even better than I thought."

"And this has to be done now?"

"
So I'm informed."

"How many do you provide?"

"
Just the two of us."

"
And the rest are supposed to come from me."

"Four good people would be enough. Any more and
it could be cumbersome. That's c—u—m—" The look on his
face said he wasn't in the mood to make an addition to his private
dictionary.

"
And what happens to the money?"

"It can't go back into your business."

"
You are a moralist, Mr. Wine."

"
No, I just don't think much of what you do."