Bill fulfilled his pledge to me. My heart swelled. My well-aimed smack in the mouth surely did it. Brenda drained her third gin fizz and lit a cigarette; I jumped at my chance to ask a question.
“Brenda, what’s going on with Elmer and Annie Staples?”
Brenda tittered and formed a circle with her left forefinger and thumb. She poked her right forefinger through the middle of the circle. It was international sign language for fuckee-fuckee.
“Well, Citizen, to begin with, Annie likes it more than she should, given that she repeatedly does it for money. Second, I told Ed Satterlee that he could use my Miracle Mile wall peek to get some footage on Annie in the kip with some Commie psychiatrist, and I heard a rumor that Elmer got embroiled in that play. I confronted him, but he refused to blab. Annie’s always been too smart for her own good, which don’t sit right for a line girl. To top it off, I saw Annie in Hollywood last week. She was hobknobbing with Sid Hudgens at Breneman’s Ham ’n’ Eggs, all huddled up thick as thieves.”
89
(Ensenada, 10:00 P.M., 3/7/42)
The walls were thin. His suite adjoined theirs. The walls were sound sieves. He sat at his desk and worked through the tiff.
Ashida read photostats. He’d submitted stat requests and gotten fast replies. Treasury and Alameda PD kicked loose. LAFD Arson stats had been pledged.
He read. He took notes. He sat up against a sieve wall. The two suites ran contiguous. He worked and eavesdropped.
1927. Fritz Eckelkamp’s heist spree. Liquor-store jobs. Cash on hand, always. The quick in-and-out. Alameda PD snags Fritz. He falls behind multiple counts.
Claire shrieked. She defamed the Redheaded Succubus and the Nazi Half-Breed Whore. Dudley shrieked. She was the whore. She was a Dope-Addict Shrew and a Mex- and Nigger-Fucker. She fucked that Putrid Puto Jorge and that Nigger Welterweight in L.A.
Ashida read stat pages. Alameda PD supplied a background sheet. He traveled back to Weimar Berlin. Willkommen, Herr Jap.
Claire shrieked. Dudley shrieked. They traded You’re the Dope Fiend barbs. Claire defamed Ace Kwan. Dudley demeaned the Jew Maestro. Claire went singsong. Somebody-stabbed-you/somebody-stabbed you/I-think-it-was-a-girl.
Fritz was a Sparticist. He fought Brownshirt thugs and swung a nail-studded plank. He robbed diamond merchants at gunpoint. He firebombed a bierhaus and fried two Brownshirts to a crisp.
Ashida wrote, “FE precedes all criminal cases and all intrigues. FE as precipitating agent? FE escapes from gold train, 5/18/31. Catalytic moment of all cases combined?”
Claire called Dudley Pussy-Whipped and Shanty Irish Scum. Dudley called Claire a Round-Heeled Poseur. A silent gap stretched. Then they laughed, then they moaned, then bedsprings creaked.
Ashida ran from it. He sat in the lobby bar and nursed a dry sherry. It was late. The lights were dim. He was the sole patron. Joan Klein messed around at the piano.
She possessed some skill. Her forte was hybrid improvisation. She melded Chopin and Gershwin tonight. Ashida caught strains of a jumpy mazurka and Concerto in F.
Young Joan. She’s Dudley’s and Claire’s odd creature. The hotel management indulges her. She’s become Spanish-fluent in record time. The head barkeep pays her a pittance to play show tunes. She wows patrons with her oddball transcriptions.
She wrapped up Chopin Meets Gershwin. She hit two sour notes and went out with a bang. Ashida applauded. Young Joan walked over and sat down with him.
She sipped his sherry, uninvited. She cleaned her glasses with his napkin. People recognized it. She had Dudley Smith’s eyes.
“Comrade Chopin drank patent compounds and went insane. Comrade Gershwin died from a brain tumor. The fascist patriarchy stifles the creative class and drives them nuts.”
Ashida smiled. “Comrade Stalin’s agrarian purges have left four million dead. Consider that the next time you start fomenting.”
Young Joan waved faux wolfsbane. “Uncle Hideo’s a square, but he’s not a fascist, like a certain party I could name. The jury’s out on Uncle Hideo, in more ways than one.”
Ashida waved faux wolfsbane. “Stop being cryptic and uncanny. Stop making with the non sequiturs and comrade talk. Nobody knows what you’re talking about half the time.”
Young Joan replaced her glasses. Her small eyes magnified.
“Aunt Claire took Cousin Beth and me to this swift party. Everybody talked in non sequiturs. I met Bertolt Brecht and Orson Welles. Comrade Welles squeezed my knee and called me ‘cutie.’ I met some swell string players from the Dresden Staatskapelle, and I drank absinthe and had visions.”
Ashida grinned. He indulged the girl more than he should.
“What did you see, specifically?”
“I saw this violinist named Ruth Szigeti making the beast with two backs with Robert Taylor, while Miss Barbara Stanwyck herself watched. Then I saw this man named Comrade Meyer Gelb hit Comrade Ruth up for a blow job, and try to get her to snitch out Trotskyites in this studio orchestra.”
Meyer Gelb. From the mouths of babes. This loopy child source.
“What else did you see?”
“Nothing. Visions are visions, and I’m not going to tell you I saw something I didn’t. I’m not going to lie just to entertain you, when you think I’m just a silly girl playing Mata Hari.”
Ashida went Stop it. “Don’t misunderstand me. I don’t think that at all.”
“Don’t underestimate me, Uncle. If I’m just this silly girl, then why does Juan Pimentel pay me to get next to you and pump you for information?”
Pimentel was an invert. Maricón en español. Pimentel possessed sonar and radar. Pimentel sensed inversion in him.
RHIP. Ashida had master keys. They unlocked the SIS squadroom and all the file banks. He was Dudley’s exec now. It covered him. Boss, I was just working late.
Pimentel perved on him. Pimentel had no shame. Pimentel corrupted a mere child and sicced her his way.
Ashida unlocked the squadroom door and hit the fluorescents. Bright tube light bore down. SIS kept intel files on all the Baja Staties. They were deemed corruption-prone.
Statie folders filled up two file banks. N to Q filled a full drawer. Green sheets detailed suspect history. Addendums listed “Possibly Related Intel.”
Ashida unlocked the drawer. The Pimentel file was stuffed between Pecheco and Pizzaro. One green sheet poked out the top. Ashida plucked it and skimmed it. The sheet revealed this:
Pimentel, Juan Ramon. DOB 5/26/11. Suspect Personal History. One derogatory report.
“Arrested in raid on homosexual nightclub. 2/19/37. San Diego PD.”
Ashida flipped the green sheet. Three intel notes were typed on the back.
“Subject Pimentel alleged to be highly skilled in area of telephone (pay-phone) technology.”
“Subject Pimentel holds graduate degrees from Mexican Polytechnical Institute, Guadalajara. Purportedly attended technical institute in Germany. Purportedly knowledgeable in microdot technology.”
“Subject Pimentel purportedly attended assumed subversive conference/Ensenada, mid-11/40. Conference purportedly brought together high-ranking Soviet and Nazi intelligence officers. Subject Pimentel purportedly assigned chauffeur duties & was spotted with Abwehr Commandant Wilhelm Canaris & Gestapo chieftain Ernst Kaltenbrunner.”