Elmer butted in. “Nobody’s judging you for those points, boss. Everybody’s got operating costs. You know damn well that Brenda and me are letting Jack H. dip his beak.”
Biscailuz winked at me. “Miss Lake’s got judgment written all over her. I know girl Bolsheviks when I see them.”
I laughed and lit a cigarette. Bill lit up out of my pack.
“There’s a great deal of seditious drop mail passing through Bev’s. I want to raid the premises and seize it. Wallace Jamie and the Ness family hold the deed to Bev’s, and a priest named Joe Hayes has a profit percentage. We’re not looking for publicity, and we’re not looking to turn this into indictments. We only want to depose Wallace Jamie, in order to turn leads on the klubhaus job and two related cases from ’31 and ’33.”
Elmer butted in again. “I know you know Ed Satterlee, boss. A little birdie told me Ed was looking to hang a search subpoena on Bev’s, but you kiboshed it. Ed’s Fifth Column up the wazoo, to the extent that Mr. Hoover’s got him under house arrest. That’s the sort of shitheel who sends drop mail through Bev’s. We figure these here traitors are beset by factionalism, and Ed was looking to gain some sort of advantage with that subpoena plan.”
The Sheriff drained his third cocktail. “Let’s see if I’m reading you right. This ‘we’ you keep mentioning is you two policemen and Miss Lake. You’re not proxies for the PD, which means you’re open to a little horse trading. Which means you’ll throw Uncle Clean Gene a bone.”
Bill fumed. I kicked his leg under the table. My message was Concede. We need him more than he needs us.
“Ed Satterlee told Elmer that he’d accord him the opportunity to erase his own name on any Fed-probe recordings currently held in custody. I’ve been charged to erase recordings that might implicate Chief Horrall. With Satterlee suspended from duty, a new strategy to enter the evidence vault will have to be conceived and executed. If such a plan can be implemented, I’d enter the vault myself, and erase every single wire-recorded mention of your name.”
Biscailuz winked at me. The novelty of a woman in the room floored him. Brenda wasn’t sure which way he bounced. He ordered girls out of the girl book. He kept a copy of the boy book handy.
“That’s okay for starters, Bill. It takes care of me, but it doesn’t take care of mine. For what it’s worth, I like Wallace Jamie, and if he’s Fifth Column, I’m a Hottentot. Moreover, his Uncle Eliot will be mayor of Cleveland soon, and I want him to owe me. So, I won’t permit you to depose Wallace, but I will permit you to seize anything and everything on-site at Bev’s.”
Elmer butted back in. “You ain’t said what you mean by ‘mine.’ ”
“ ‘Mine’ means ‘me and all my deputies.’ ‘Mine’ means ‘erase every spool in Fed custody, to make damn sure me and mine don’t get smeared.’ ”
Bill said, “It’s a deal.” Clean Gene dropped his eyeglass case and ducked below the table to retrieve it. He wanted to look up my skirt. I’d have to tell Brenda: the Sheriff veers toward girls.
Bill and I tucked in at the Ambassador. We discussed the Lesnick burglary first thing.
Doctor Saul hadn’t reported it. That much was sure. Bill threw feelers out at Beverly Hills PD. Elmer and Buzz robbed his office and desecrated it. Their wall artwork defamed the Kameraden. Saul Lesnick — j’accuse. We’re onto you and yours.
“We,” “We’re,” “Us.” Sheriff Gene picked up on it and parlayed it to his tactical advantage. I extended “We” to include Annie Staples, and described our phone chat early this morning. Annie called me. She said she was servicing Saul Lesnick tomorrow night; the assignation would take place at Brenda’s Miracle Mile trick spot. This was to our benefit. Doctor Saul unburdened himself to Annie and would most likely whine about the burglary-desecration. And Elmer would be there to film it.
Room service delivered club sandwiches and coffee; Bill and I lunched on the bed. Assignation, rendezvous, shack job. Bill crossed himself every time I said the words.
“The phone records,” he said. “What’s the first thing that comes to mind? Where do they most conclusively point?”
I said, “To collusion and conspiracy. And, given what we know about the principals, a conspiracy that must be judged as politically and socially diffuse.”
“And what string of calls plays most out of sync with the rest?”
“Ed Satterlee’s late-night calls to Lyman’s and Kwan’s. Two all-night PD watering holes. The calls serve to pose the question: ‘Who was Ed the Fed looking for?’ ”
Bill snagged his trousers off the floor. He dug through the pockets and pulled out three mimeographed sheets of paper. The cheapo typeface and multiple exclamation points screamed Sid Hudgens! I breezed through the text; it was the Sidster’s privately circulated subscription scandal sheet.
The inimitable Sidster. Ever alert for watchful postal inspectors. He laid out the lurid lowdown — but stopped short of pure pornography. He used initials in lieu of real names. He gave you the tantalizing tattle and dystopian dish. Celebrity abortions, miscegenist liaisons, lezbo love nests. Alluring alliteration. Muff-munching matrons at the Lincoln Heights Jail. Doped racehorses and fixed fights. Draconian drag queens. A regular “Police Blotter” feature. Perennial poop. Filmland fellators and cunning linguists, caught “in flat-footed flagrante.”
I laughed out loud. Bill said, “We shake down Sid for his subscriber list. We lay out Dudley and all the known Kameraden. You write the text, and insert the appropriate initials. We wallpaper Dudley, the comrades, and every conceivable man jack that might be inclined to do the Dudster dirt.”
D.S.: that hellhound Hibernian. Malevolent Mexicans. S.L.: that sicknik psychiatrist and shitbird shrink. Feckless Fascists and riotous Reds. Waterlogged wetbacks. Pustulant policemen and jungle-bred Japs.
I fell off the bed, laughing. I’d never laughed so hard. I thought my roars would never stop.
113
(Lone Pine, 2:00 P.M., 3/30/42)
They reset the stage. The burn-ward room, the bed, the chair. Benzedrine in the fluid bag. The burn salve and charred-flesh stink.
The Mummy and Mr. Moto. Their second encounter. A vitalized Hanamaka. Ashida, poised to interrogate.
“Tell me about the klubhaus, Sensei. You might begin by giving me your overall impressions.”
Hanamaka plucked at his bedsheets. He was drug-vitalized. His mind sped. His limbs spastic-twitched.
“Egalitarian and degenerate. Those two words define the klubhaus. Mr. Hudgens of the Herald is quite the cheeky man. The German spelling of house. A touch first bestowed by policemen, there on the scene. One can be certain of that.”
Ashida said, “The sexual activity. The use of narcotics. The seemingly at odds political views.”
Hanamaka grinned. Sensei Death rides again. His breath was foul. His teeth rattled. He oozed putresence.
“ ‘At odds’ aptly describes the atmosphere. ‘Fugitives from normalcy’ might best describe the klubhaus clientele. There were no racial or political barriers to hinder conversation. The constant jazz music served to alleviate tension. There was a single consensus among the fugitives. ‘The most discordant jazz is our voice.’ ”
Ashida prickled. The queer white boy. A jazz player. His Jap sword man pal. Elmer J. shared the lead.