“That woman? That Vernal Listen, let me tell you about that piece of goods. Was months ago she was pregnant, and...”
Johnny Mack had shown up with the pregnant Verna several months before. He’d bunked downstairs with Cliff, Verna upstairs with Ethel and her family. At first.
“Wasn’t enough that girl was a whore, but then I started missing things, things you could pawn, y’know? And any money around the house.” She shook her head in remembered outrage. “That damn girl was a junkie! A junkie whore, he brings her into my house, where I’m raising my kids! I threw her out, don’t know where she went. Johnny Mack moved out of Cliff’s place, too — and I don’t know where he went, either. I know neither one of ’em will set foot in my house again.”
“Would Cliff know where Johnny Mack is? I really ought to pay him back this money...”
“Me and Cliff aren’t that close, mister.”
Tranquillini said, with the manner of a man who’s had a twenty-dollar lunch rather than a hot dog out of a cardboard boat, “Did Mr. Pivarski give you the letter, or did he give it to Miss Onoda?”
“He gave it to me. I read it and then gave it to her.”
“Did Miss Onoda make any comment upon reading it?”
“She asked me to call Mr... to call your office.”
“And you did.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And what did you say the date was?”
“November fifth.”
“And you got no answer at my office, none at all. Did Mr. Pivarski have any comments while all this was going on?”
“He was not present. I’d left him by my desk...”
“Of course. And Mr. Pivarski then was invited back to the private office and Miss Onoda signed the bottom of this famous letter in his presence, and—”
“Objection to counsel’s use of the word ‘famous.’ ”
“Sustained.”
Tranquillini nodded acquiescence. “Sorry, Your Honor. Now, it was after this conversation, Mr. Simson, that the money was tendered and the letter signed.”
“Yes, sir.”
“And you knew of this letter from November fifth of last year until this very day, didn’t you, Mr. Simson? You have never forgotten Pivarski bringing that copy of the letter from his attorney, have you? Not for an instant.”
“I recall the letter,” said Simson stubbornly.
Tranquillini addressed the bench almost off-handedly.
“Respondent has previously placed before you as Exhibit A for Identification, an affidavit signed by Mr. Simson. I now would like that affidavit introduced into evidence.”
“Any objection?”
“Yes.”
The Hearing Officer hesitated. “I take it this is being offered for the purpose of impeachment, Mr. Tranquillini?”
“We object that it does not impeach the witness’s testimony,” said Delaney.
“That’s up to the Hearing Officer,” Tranquillini retorted.
“We will take a half-hour recess while I study this document. I will rule upon it at that time.”
DKA was not an agency that specialized in electronics, but being in the detective business they had a certain familiarity with bugs and their detection. As Kearny and O’Bannon moved about his private office, they carried a short-wave radio, very slowly taking the tuner across the spectrum of bands as they did.
“I’m telling you,” said O’B, “that the ’Niners have the best defensive front four in football right now.”
“Even if I give you that,” said Kearny, who lived in Raider territory, “they don’t have the offensive punch of the Raiders. I think...” With sudden clarity, his voice was also coming from the radio. “...that the Raiders are going to the Super Bowl again this year. I don’t think” — he switched off the radio — “... there is a team in pro football who can stop them.”
O’Bannon spoke regretfully, “Well, hell, Dan. I have that Crescent Motors flooring check to get out this afternoon. I’ve been carrying it around for two days...”
“I’ll get that billing file from your car.”
Neither man spoke again until they were outside and standing under the skyway where their voices were half-drowned in the thunder and growl of overhead traffic, just in case someone was getting really fancy and using a shotgun mike on them from some adjacent building. “Infinity transmitter in the phone, like I thought,” said Kearny.
Infinity transmitters, sometimes called butterfly mikes, are tiny senders which operate without wires or outside connections. They broadcast not only phone conversations but anything within thirty feet of the phone, once they have been activated by the phone being rung from outside and an electronic signal being sent to them. A voice-activated tape recorder takes down whatever is said.
“Somebody spent a lot of time and money on this one,” said O’B. “Think one of our people let them through the alarms?”
“More likely they got a wiring diagram from the alarm company and cut our electricity from outside long enough to go in and plant the thing. Two, three minutes inside is all they would need. I’ll be going back to the hearing in a bit, I can alert Giselle, but would you find a pay phone and call Sacramento? Tell them to radio Ballard on the CB and find out where he’s staying and tell him not to phone in. No explanations. I don’t want our office up there knowing what’s going on.”
“Will do.”
Kearny returned to his office and lit a cigarette and stared at the bugged telephone. Who? Some agency of the State? He rejected that out of hand, as he did anyone from the city cops. So it was the organized crime people who ran Padilla Drayage as one of their quasi-legal fronts. The bug had served them well, alerting them to Benny Nicoletti’s secret witness; but that wasn’t why it had been placed — that had just been a bonus. What was there in the DKA license squabble with the State that was worth all that time, effort and expense?
There was only one answer: to find out how close Bart Heslip was getting to Verna Rounds, so they could get to her first. But why? What could she possibly know that would be of use to them?
Maybe he’d know more after he talked with Benny Nicoletti tonight. In person. Find out when Benny’s witness was discovered, when he’d cracked, when Benny had talked with Pivarski at Hawkley’s office — things like that. Meanwhile, he had time to catch the end of Hec’s attack on Jeffrey Simson.
“Complainant’s objection is overruled,” said the Hearing Officer. “The document will be received in evidence as Respondent’s Exhibit A.”
“I believe that is all of this witness,” said Tranquillini.
“Any redirect?”
Delaney picked up his copy of Simson’s affidavit. “Did you prepare this document, Mr. Simson?” He looked over at the court reporter. “I am referring to Respondent Exhibit A.”
“I wrote what is there, yes, sir.”
“Mr. Dan Kearny asked you to prepare this document, did he not, on October twenty-second of this year?”
“I believe that was the date.”
“Are the words in this document your own words, Mr. Simson?”
“Well, sir, it’s... hard to answer that just yes or no. Mr. Kearny and Mr. O’Bannon came to my apartment in Los Angeles and they... were present at the time I wrote it. As... each sentence was written, Mr. Kearny was looking... at the wording of my sentences...”
You are goofing it, Johnny-me-bhoy, thought Tranquillini as he mentally rehearsed his objection. This line of questioning makes it impossible for you to claim that Simson altered circumstances in his affidavit to help out his old friend Dan Kearny.