Джеймс Эллрой - Widespread Panic

I went so?

“Here’s what gets me, son. Whoever it was was some sort of insider, and that fucker sided with that pious son-of-a-bitch Parker, against me.”

I stood up. “Here’s a cue, dad. I’d rather be him than be you.”

Beverly and Hayworth

10/15/57

The wheelman lot. Legions of the lost light and live here. We scrounge for scraps. We dive for divorce dough. I’m El Daddy-O by default and decree. I’m a licensed PI. I’m a DA’s Bureau special deputy. My ex- Confidential status still stamps me a stud. Bondage Bob fired me. I’ve still got my Ranch Market gig. Bob’s got me doing clean-up jobs on a per diem basis. I’m closing out listening posts, tomorrow. Taps, bugs — they’ve got to go. Bob’s divesting and dumping his properties. His profits have dipped looooooow.

He’s Mr. Wholesome now. He told the judge and prosecutors that. Call him Messrs. Bland and Blasé.

I slid low in my sled. I yawned and yodeled Old Crow. I popped two biphetamine and lashed the late-morning blahs. I shared my shit with Robbie Molette. He’s my new sidekick, thus my new Jimmy D. Nasty Nat Denkins dozed in the backseat. He crossed the wheelman color line. He’s now Mr. Darktown Divorce. He’s still got his gig at KKXZ. Confidential still subsidizes the station.

Robbie said, “What’s the deal today?”

I lit a cigarette. “France’s Parisian Room, over on Washington and La Brea. The mark’s an ofay stiff. The girl’s colored. She hops cars at the Parisian and peddles it part-time. The mark’s terrified of exposure. He’s a preacher at a drive-in church in Van Nuys. The wife wants a divorce. Nat’s playing a kitchen cook and bringing lunch over. The pad’s right behind the Parisian. We’ll take down the door and take the pictures. The girl’s in on it. There’s three of us and one of him. We’ll kick his ass and take him to Wilshire Station. The wife and her lawyer want criminal charges filed.”

Robbie yaaawned. He cricked and uncricked his neck. He slept on the lot. He slept in his ’49 Ford. He left his mom and dad’s house. He’s now Mr. Apostasy. He quit boning his kid sister and peddling her beaver pix. The Janey Blaine job tested and torqued him. He cleaned house and wound up here.

I said, “I’ve been teething on Janey. Who she knew, who she tricked with, who she might have met in Beverly Hills that nite.”

Robbie picked his nose. “We’ve been through all that. I’ve been through it with you and the Hats, and Max and Red braced my dad at Metro and polygraphed him. He came up kosher, and you and the Hats made Fat Boy for the snuff. I don’t want to keep on plowing up this old dirt.”

Nasty Nat stirred. “Fat Boy was framed. He’s Emmet Till and the Scottsboro Boys, reborn. I’m referencing him on my ‘Cutie’ tonight.”

I said, “Tell me why.”

“Those Chicom space suits the PD bought spontaneously combusted, in this Police Academy storeroom. Whoosh, they go up in flames. They were defective from the jump. No bad deed goes unpunished.”

Robbie said, “I never thought Fat Boy did it. He always worked with a partner, and he robbed the women first.”

I laffed. The pay phone rang. Nat reached out his window and wrapped the receiver.

He said, “Yeah, we’re here.” He listened. He hung up.

“It’s on. The girl says she’s afraid of the mark. He’s gone kinky on her.”

The Parisian Room. A mock-moderne job with Frenchy accoutrements. The standard counter hut and outside park-and-eat slots.

We pulled in and parked. The girl walked out. She wore a white blouse and pink pedal pushers. She was gawky good-looking, in her own wild way. She wore a black lace hairnet. Her name tag read Babette.

She pointed up to a back-rear apartment. It was second floor/stairway access/ three pads in a row.

She said, “Don’t be too long. He’s on his lunch hour, and he always moves these things along. And he damn sure always jumps on me first thing.”

Robbie winked at her. She rolled her eyes and skipped off. Nat doffed his street duds and slipped on his cook-waiter’s whites. I checked the camera and fitted in a flashbulb strip. Robbie eyeballed the second-floor stairway. He said, “Okay, she’s in.”

A real cook-waiter waltzed up. He handed Nat a big bag of burgers and fries. Nat paid him off.

I watched my watch. I gave the loser lovebirds five full minutes to find that funky fit. The girl screamed, three minutes and eight seconds in.

It rang real. I gunned my sled and peeled through the rear-exit alley. I came up by the stairway and double-parked, snout-out. Robbie moved, Nat moved. I went No and waved them back. I went Sit and This Is Mine.

I got out and ran up the stairs. Scream #2 rang real. The pad was three doors down. I did a spring-and-pivot move and flat-kicked the jamb juncture.

The door caved. I saw them. He had her flat-pinned to the couch. He was naked. She was naked. A foot-long rubber dick extender condom-covered his schlong. He blew on a lit cigarette. He lowered it and burned her back.

She writhed and screamed. He lowered the cigarette and reburned her back. I jumped him and pulled him off. He flailed and sissy-swatted me. His fake dick poked me. I pulled my belt sap and backhanded him in the face. I got his nose and his teeth and broke bridgework. I ripped one nostril loose. His fake dick dipped and wilted. I kneed him in the balls. He puked on my Sy Devore coat.

Somebody Jap-jumped me. A dogpile ensued. It was Robbie and Nat, neighbors and cops. A fat cop applied a headlock. I got loosey-goosey ecstatic. I saw Lois as I went out.

Blackout.

I’ve had them before. I know the messed-up MO. You booze and abuse for weeks running. An altercation ensues. Somebody cuts off your carotid artery. You see shit that is and shit that ain’t there.

Like Lois. Like the backseat of a beat-to-hell prowl car. Like the Wilshire Station drunk tank. Like Jimmy Dean at Ten-Inch Tommy’s — and these bad boys butting Kool Kings on his neck.

Like Max and Red. Holy shit, Freddy — don’t you ever quit ?

I came to at Ollie Hammond’s. Max and Red sat facing me. My neck hurt. Somebody snatched my Sy Devore coat. Where’s Robbie and Nat? What’s the dispo on the sicknik sadist and that colored carhop?

Drinks appeared. We imbibed. Max said, “We squared you up. Your boys took your car back to the lot. We got the girl settled in at Queen of Angels, and we booked shithead for Rape 1 and Mayhem. He’ll do a doomsday dime somewhere.”

Curb-to-curb service. Freddy O.’s our boy. Bill Parker wants something. They’re here to ask.

I said, “I appreciate all this. Thanks. Now, let’s go out and kill some 211 guys and blow off some steam. Maybe clear some pending homicides on the books.”

Max said, “Freddy’s miffed.”

Red said, “It’s a delayed reaction to Fat Boy.”

Max said, “We did a favor for Freddy’s pal, Jack. It’s called ‘snipping loose ends while you punch a shithead’s ticket that deserved to be punched in the first place.’ ”

Red said, “Freddy knows the rules. He’s got scalps on his belt. He’s just momentarily aflutter with Senator Jack and his vision of ‘an America that provides for all her people.’ ”

I laffed. I raised my drink. I went Touché.

Max said, “What did Jack pay you, Freddy? Don’t disappoint us and tell us you didn’t shake him down.”

I said, “The bite was fifty g’s. I got the package. Too bad it was all counterfeit.”

Max and Red roared. I re -roared. Montego Bay, Manhattan, the mountains on the moon. O bird thou never—