James Ellroy - L. A. Confidential

Or it was some other bunch of boogies riding around, blasting the air in Griffith Park, killing six people at the Nite Owl. Their 1948-50 Ford/Chevy/Merc was never located because the purple paint job was homemade, never listed on a DMV form.

Brainwork from a guy who never thought he had much of a brain-and he didn't make a shine gang for the snuffs, because-

The Englekling brothers sold their printshop mid-'54, then dropped off the face of the earth. Two years ago, he issued a "Whereabouts" bulletin: no results, no positive results on the cadaver bulletins he'd been tracking statewide: zilch on the brothers, no stiffs that might be the real Duke Cathcart. And- six months ago, following up in San Berdoo, he got a hot lead.

He found a San Berdoo townie who'd seen Susan Nancy Lefferts with a man matching Duke Cathcart's description-two weeks before the Nite Owl killings. He showed him some Cathcart mugshots; the man said, "Close, but no cigar." The Nite Owl forensic had Susan Nancy "flailing" to touch the man sitting at the next table: Duke Cathcart, really the impersonator, supposedly unknown to her. Why were they sitting at «different tables?» The kicker: he tried to interview Sue Lefferts' mother, a chance to run the boyfriend by her. She refused to talk to him.

Why?

Bud packed up: mementoes, ten pounds of paper. Stalemates for now-no new whore leads, the Nite Owl dead until he braced Mickey Cohen. Out to the elevator-adios, Homicide.

Ed Exley walked by staring.

He knows about Inez and me.

Stakeout: Hank's Ranch Market, 52nd and Central. A sign above the door: "Welfare Checks Cashed." January 3, relief day-check-cashers shooting craps on the sidewalk. Surveillance Squad 5 got a tip-some anonymous ginch said her boyfriend and his buddy were going to take the market off, she was pissed at the boyfriend for porking her sister. Jack in the point car, watching the door, Sergeant John Petievich parked on 52-scowling like he wanted to kill something.

Lunch: Fritos, straight vodka. Jack yawned, stretched, cut odds: Aragon vs. Pimentel, what Ellis Loew wanted-he was supposed to meet him at a political soiree tonight. The vodka burned his stomach; he had to piss wicked bad.

Horn toots-his signal. Petievich pointed to the sidewalk. Two white men entered the market.

Jack walked across the street. Petievich walked over. A frame on the doorway, a look in. The robbers at the checkstand, backs to the door-guns out, spare hands full of money.

No proprietor. No customers. A squint down the far aisle- blood and brains on the wall. SILENCER. BACK DOOR MAN. Jack shot the heisters in the back.

Petievich screamed; back door footsteps; Jack fired blind, chased. Bottles broke over his head: blind shots, silencer rounds-no noise, muffled thwaps. Down the far aisle, two dead winos, a door closing. Petievich fired, blew the door off-a man sprinted across the alley. Jack emptied his piece; the man vaulted a fence. Shouts from the sidewalk; crapshooters cheering. Jack reloaded, jumped the fence, hit a backyard. A Doberman jumped at him, snarling, snapping teeth in his face-Jack shot him point-blank. The dog belched blood; Jack heard shots, saw the fence explode.

Two bluesuits hit the yard running. Jack dropped his gun; they fired anyway-wide-blowing out fence pickets. Jack put his hands up. "Police officer! Police officer! Policeman!"

They came up slow, frisked him-peach-fuzz rookies. The taller kid found his ID. "Hey, Vincennes. You used to be some kind of hotshot, didn't you?"

Jack cold-cocked him-a knee to the nuts. The kid went dqwn; the other kid gawked.

Jack went looking for a place to drink.

He found a juke joint, ordered a line of shots. Two drinks killed his shakes; two more made him a toastmaster.

To the men I just killed: sorry, I'm really better at shooting unarmed civilians. I'm being squeezed into retirement, so I thought I'd 86 a couple of real bad guys before I capped my twenty.

To my wife: you thought you married a hero, but you grew up and learned you were wrong. Now you want to go to law school and be a lawyer like Daddy and Ellis. No sweat on the money: Daddy bought the house, Daddy upgrades your marriage, Daddy will pay for tuition. When you read the paper and see that your husband drilled two evil robbers, you'll think they're the first notches on his gun. Wrong-in '47 dope crusader Jack blasted two innocent people, the big secret he almost wants to spill just to get some life kicking back into his marriage.

Jack downed three more shots. He went where he always went when with a certain amount of shit in his system-back to '53 and smut.

He felt safe on the blackmail: his depositions for insurance, the Hudgens snuff buried-»Hush-Hush» resurrected it, got nowhere. Patchett and Bracken never approached him-they had the carbon of Sid's Big V file, kept their end of the bargain. He heard Lynn and Bud White were still an item; call the brainy whore and Patchett memories-bad news from that bad bloody spring. What drove him was the smut.

He kept it in a safe-deposit box. He knew it was there, knew it excited him-knew that loving it would trash his marriage. He threw himself into the marriage, building walls to keep them safe from that spring. A string of sober days helped; the marriage helped. Nothing he did changed things-Karen just learned who he was.

She saw him muscle Deuce Perkins; he said "nigger" in front of her parents. She figured out his press exploits were lies. She saw him drunk, pissed off. He hated her friends; his one friend-Miller Stanton-dropped out of sight when he blew «Badge of Honor». He got bored with Karen, ran to the smut, went crazy with it.

He tried to ID the posers again-still no go. He went to Tijuana, bought other fuck books-no go. He went looking for Christine Bergeron, couldn't find her, put out teletypes that got him bupkis. No way to have the real thing-he decided to fake it.

He bought hookers, shook down call girls. He fixed them up to look like the girls in his books. He had them three and four at a pop, chains of bodies on quilts. He costumed them, choreographed them. He aped the pictures, took his own pictures, recaptured; sometimes he thought of the blood pix and got scared: perfect matches to murder mutilations.

Real women never thrilled him like the pictures did; fear kept him from going to Fleur-de-Lis-straight to the source. He couldn't figure out Karen's fear-why she didn't leave him.

A last drink-bad thoughts adieu.

Jack cleaned up, walked back to his car. No hubcaps, broken wiper blades. Crime scene tape around Hank's Ranch Market; two black-and-whites in the lot. No reprimand note on his windshield-the vandals probably stole it.

He hit the bash at full swing: Ellis Loew, a suite packed with Republican bigshots. Women in cocktail gowns; men in dark suits. The Big V: chinos, a sport shirt sprayed with dog blood.

Jack flagged a waiter, grabbed a martini off his tray. Framed pictures on the wall caught his eye.

Political progress: «Harvard Law Review», the '53 election, a howler shot: Loew telling the press the Nite Owl killers confessed before they escaped. Jack laughed, sprayed gin, almost choked on his olive. Behind him: "You used to dress a bit more nicely."

Jack turned around. "I used to be some kind of hotshot."

"Do you have an excuse for your appearance?"

"Yeah, I killed two men today."

"I see. Anything else?"

"Yeah, I shot them in the back, plugged a dog and took off before my superior officers showed up. And here's a news flash: I've been drinking. Ellis, this is getting stale, so let's get to it. Who do you want me to touch?"

"Jack, lower your voice."

"What is it, boss? The Senate or the statehouse?"

"Jack, it's not the time to discuss this."