Hardboiled Crime Four-Pack

by Jack Bunker

  “Until she tossed him out like a stale baguette,” Claudine notes. “He was very upset.”

  “Who was the guy?”

  “The same scum-suckin’ shit hole, forgive me Lord, what tried to kick me out of my own house after Lana died.”

  I have no idea who he’s referring to. It must show on my face because Claudine fills in the blank.

  “It was zat lawyer.”

  Billy nods. “Gary Fuckin’ Cogswell.”

  I feel snakes constricting my stomach. The consigliere is back.

  THIRTY

  I walk into the barbecue joint, the only non-Ethiopian restaurant within two blocks, and ask for a menu. The old black man behind the counter has a rich mat of hair the color of cotton and a scraggly beard to match. He hands me a well-thumbed cardboard folio. I open it to discover more than forty-five ales from all over the world. Shocked is an understatement. I’d been considering an iced coffee but not anymore.

  “You misspelled ‘triple,’” I say as I read about the Allagash Curieux, a tripel ale aged in Jim Beam barrels.

  “That’s the way it’s spelled, son,” he says. “That means it’s brewed in a style developed in 1934 at the Trappist abbey in Westmalle, Belgium.”

  I feel like an idiot. Not for my ignorance, but for my underestimation of the man. My embarrassment must be obvious. “Don’t fret,” he says. “It’s a common mistake.”

  “I’ll take one,” I say. “With a shot of forgiveness on the side.”

  He chuckles as he grabs a bottle from the cold case behind him.

  I don’t know what this modest smoke shack is doing with such an exotic beer list, but I’m up to my ears in unexplained questions, so I don’t put any effort into finding out.

  I grab a table by the window and stare across and down the street at the Odessa Social Club. I take a sip of the tripel. The rich bourbon flavor is a perfect complement to the thick golden ale. Sadly, I won’t be able to drink the whole thing, because it’s got more than twice as much alcohol as a Guinness, and I need to stay alert.

  I’m in the lull between lunch and dinner, so no one cares how long I sit, but at some point someone’s going to wonder, so I pull a paperback from my pocket and lay it open on the table in front of me. I don’t actually read it, but every few minutes I turn a page.

  I used to take interview transcripts on stakeouts, but I once got so absorbed in my reading I missed a guy with a guitar case going into the Vietnamese manicure parlor I was watching. I only realized my mistake when I heard the gunfire. Not that I could have prevented the three shootings, but I might have been able to call 911 twenty seconds earlier, maybe saved a life. So now I bring along The Bridges of Madison County to eliminate the possibility of getting caught up in the text.

  I’m on my fifth page flip when I see Big Ugly Guy leave the club and head away from me down the street.

  I pull a picture of Cogswell from the back pages of my book to remind myself what he looks like, then slip it back in there. Cogswell is apparently camera shy. Melody had to spend an entire day looking before she finally dug up an old newspaper photo of Vlad the Impaler leaving a courthouse with Cogswell at his side. He’s a short, thick guy, not fat but sort of oval shaped, pasty, sixtyish. His face looks like it’s molded from dough. No cheekbones, no hard edges, lots of sag. It’s a black-and-white, so I can’t tell what color his eyes are, but his hair is either blond or gray, straight, and fine. I asked Jack Angel about Cogswell’s eye color in the pool this morning, but before he could answer he had to take off on a fifty-meter butterfly sprint. I waited my five seconds then took off in his wake. When I got back to the wall, we were both too out of breath to talk. By the end of the workout the question had slipped my mind.

  I order a pulled-pork sandwich to pass the time, and I pay up so I’ll be ready to leave when I need to.

  Ten minutes later a skinny black guy I’ve never seen before walks into the club.

  My food arrives dressed with an outstanding East Carolina vinegar sauce on both the smoked pork and the cabbage slaw that comes with it. Reminds me of when Holly took me to Durham to meet her parents about six weeks after we’d started living together. We went to a Bulls game, and she made me wear her red lace panties for luck. The Bulls lost anyway, but I got lucky that night after her folks turned in. Those were great times.

  The black guy leaves the club seventeen minutes after he entered.

  Another hour passes. I order an iced coffee but hold onto my half-finished beer and half-eaten sandwich. At some point I’m going to have to relinquish my perch and return to my car, but a guy in a car looks conspicuous, so I’m putting it off as long as I can.

  My coffee comes. I keep flipping pages.

  As early-bird dinnertime approaches, the old man comes around to ask if there’s anything else he can get me. I tell him no, I’m still working on my sandwich, which is something of a stretch after ninety minutes. He asks if I’d like it reheated, but I tell him I’m fine. He obviously wants to reclaim my table, but the place is still empty except for a few people who’ve come and gone for takeout, so I figure I’ve got at least another half hour before I cost him any money. As luck would have it, I don’t need the time.

  Less than ten minutes later, a new, silver BMW 750Li pulls up across the street. A short blond man gets out. He’s facing the club so I can’t see his face, but the limp, the egg shape, and the hundred-thousand-dollar ride are dead giveaways. I can’t believe my luck. Less than three hours of waiting, and I hit pay dirt. I watch Gary Cogswell hobble into the Odessa and try to imagine what it would feel like to dive off a fourth-floor balcony besotted with Cuervo.

  I gobble down the rest of my sandwich, cold but still good, and take one last sip of the Curieux, warm but still good. I reluctantly abandon the rest of the beer, wave to the old man, and head out through the sweet-smelling hickory haze of his converted oil-drum smoker on the sidewalk.

  My car is parked on the opposite side of the street from Cogswell’s, which means I’m facing the wrong direction. I drive down the street and hang a U, then pull into the curb about three-quarters of a block behind the BMW.

  I don’t wait long. Cogswell leaves the club about twenty minutes later. I follow him up Highland, past the Hollywood Bowl, and onto the Hollywood Freeway.

  As soon as we hit the freeway our progress slows. I tail him at 10 mph past Universal Studios toward the Valley through the Cahuenga Pass, where the Second Battle of Cahuenga was fought in 1845, pretty much sealing California’s independence from Mexico. On one hillside there were three small cannons and just two on the opposite hill. Both sides ran out of ammunition and had to resort to recycling the balls lobbed at them by the other. The characters in this drama are remembered only as street names today—Pico, Alvarado, Micheltorena—but back then, they battled to the death. At least to the death of one horse and one mule. A hundred and fifty years later someone dumped a headless cabby in the pass, which is when I learned its history.

  Cogswell unexpectedly slides over two lanes to the right at the freeway interchange, shaking me out of my reverie. He’s switching from the Hollywood North to the Ventura West or, as we say in LA, he’s “transitioning.” Only in California can they make a freeway maneuver sound like a lifestyle choice.

  I have to move fast to stay on his tail. I flick on my turn signal, but cars are bumper to bumper, and no one’s letting me in. I lean on my horn and push my nose into the next lane, wedging into the few feet between an old Ford Fairlane and a new Accord. The Accord jams on his brakes, and I see him mouthing profanities, but he chooses to drop back rather than smash into my fender. I pull a similar move to slip over one more lane and illegally zip across the painted road divider. Completing my rude transition, I cut off a Ram-tough Dodge truck to muscle my way into the flow about a half dozen cars behind Cogswell.

  I pray he didn’t make his sudden freeway shift in order to spot a tail because if he did, I just blew my cover. Amateur time. I should have been riding the outside lane,
just to broaden my options in case he decided to do exactly what he just did. I’m starting to doubt the wisdom of that tripel ale, even if I did leave half of it behind.

  I take a few deep breaths to slow down my pulse and track Cogswell’s driving for signs that he’s seen me. So far, so good. No sudden acceleration, no darting in and out of traffic, no swerving down an off-ramp. He’s just tooling along. Maybe I got lucky. Maybe he wasn’t trolling for tails. Maybe he just forgot where he was going for a minute.

  Cogswell leads me off the freeway at Hayvenhurst and weaves northwest into the flats of Encino where the well-heeled homeowners trade the views of the hills for lots that are deep enough to accommodate swimming pools, tennis courts, and guesthouses. On a street I’ll never be able to afford to live on, Cogswell pulls into his driveway, and an electric gate rolls open. A motion-sensing video camera swivels to watch the gate close behind him, and a brace of sizable Doberman pinschers trot after his Beamer into a six-car garage.

  I drive about a hundred feet past his house and make a right turn onto another street I’ll never live on. Then I turn around, drive back toward the corner to park facing his street, just close enough to the corner to be able to see his driveway.

  I grab my trusty SLR and take a few snaps of the place.

  As day turns to dusk I see lights go on in various rooms at various times in the house. A few cars pass on the quiet street, but no one stops at Cogswell’s. The street is unlit, which makes my job that much easier since I don’t have to worry about being conspicuous. I just have to worry about staying awake.

  Like much of the architecture in LA, Cogswell’s house is faux Spanish Colonial—exterior stuccoed to give it a whitewashed adobe facade, windows and doorways arched, and the pitched roof rippled with terra-cotta tile.

  The sprawling two-story house is aglow in security lights, making it stand out against the darkening night like a stage set. I can see smoke coming out of one of five chimneys, even though it’s ninety degrees out. I’m sure Cogswell’s idea of warming the hearth is to hit a wall-switched igniter, fire up the gas logs, and turn up the AC. The guy must have a carbon footprint the size of Godzilla. Though I shouldn’t talk. I’ve got my engine running to power the air while I wait. Maybe I’ll buy some carbon credits.

  About half past eight a red Thunderbird—one of those retro jobs they tricked out for the fiftieth anniversary—pulls up with a tall woman at the wheel. The motion-controlled security lights snap on, and I take a few shots with the Nikon. She punches a code on the security keypad to open the gate, so I know she’s no casual visitor, but she parks on the drive, not in one of the two empty garage spots, so she probably doesn’t live in the house. At least not full time.

  She throws open the car door a little too hard, and it bounces back. She puts her arm out to keep it from closing on her. Then a pair of long lovely legs swivels out of the driver’s seat. Even from a hundred yards away I think I recognize those gams. Then the rest of her gets out of the car, confirming my conjecture. It’s the statuesque star of Cheeks Asunder. What the hell is she doing here?

  She fiddles with her keychain and finds the right key. I take one last snapshot as porn entrepreneur Jane Porter unlocks Cogswell’s front door and disappears inside.

  THIRTY-ONE

  Over the next three hours I’ve got plenty of time to ruminate. I know Gary Cogswell was having more than a casual fling with Lana Strain while he was working on her will. I know that just before she was killed she broke up with him and that it hit him hard. I know he holds an executive-level position with Russian mobster Vlad Bakatin. I know the Russian Mafia is heavily invested in the $12-billion-a-year San Fernando Valley porn industry. I know Cogswell appears to be shacking up with a porn heavyweight. I know Ginger generated hundreds of thousands of dollars, if not millions, for Fun with Dick and Jane Productions and was irreplaceable. I know someone murdered Lana twenty years ago, and someone murdered Ginger last week. I know that someone absconded with the bulk of Lana’s estate, and the likely culprit is Cogswell.

  A lot of facts but no through line.

  My phone beeps. A text message. I have a love-hate relationship with those things. It’s okay to get them, but a pain to send them. Maybe if I didn’t know how to touch-type, it wouldn’t be so bad, or maybe if my phone had bigger keys. I can read the numbers all right, but I need glasses to read the letters. Drives me nuts when people use words instead of digits for their phone numbers. 1-800-Dentist. 1-800-Flowers. 1-800-Fuck You.

  I flip open my phone to see a message from Gloria: “no gc trail.” I.e., no traces of calls, e-mails, IMs, PMs, or tweets to or from Gary Cogswell in Ginger’s phone or digital records. If Ginger had stumbled onto some evidence that Cogswell had embezzled from her, she might have tried to contact him to demand her money back. If she hadn’t called him, but somehow he found out she was onto him, he might have tried to contact her to threaten or deny. But the police found no evidence of any contact.

  Without contact, it seems unlikely that Cogswell killed Ginger to stop her from revealing irregularities in his handling of her inheritance. I don’t count it out, but it slides toward the bottom of my probability chart.

  I turn on the radio to see if there’s a Dodgers game on. There isn’t. I pick up my dad’s old Zeiss opera glasses. I found them in the glove compartment of his car when they hauled it out of the ravine after he killed himself in what my mother still calls “the accident.” I slip the strap around my neck, as he taught me always to do, and focus on Cogswell’s house. There’s nothing to see. There’s nothing but stillness outside the house, and all the windows are either shaded, draped, or dark.

  I’m bored. I call my mother.

  “Nenad! What a surprise!” She’s the only person on earth who calls me by my given name. It’s apparently Serbian or Croatian for “unexpected.” Since neither side of my family hails from the Balkans, I have no idea how my parents came up with it, but I suspect my birth wasn’t part of their master plan.

  “How are you?” I ask.

  “I’m doing fine for a sixty-six-year-old widow with ulcers, arthritis, cataracts, and a weak heart who lives alone and never hears from her son.”

  I picture her in a paisley polyester blouse and purple capris, clashing with the floral-print sofa she’s sitting on in front of the TV. She’s watching either Hallmark or the History Channel with a cigarette in her mouth and her bulbous feet propped up on the Queen Anne coffee table. I can hear the jangle of her junior high school charm bracelet and can picture her nervously twisting it back and forth on her left wrist. It’s a habit she’s had as long as I can remember, but she can only do it when her hands are free. That means she’s not knitting or doing the crossword.

  “What are you watching?” I ask.

  “What do you care?” she replies. “Does it make any difference? Holly calls more than you.” My ex-wife has lunch with my mother every Friday like clockwork. The two of them share a special bond: their disappointment in me. Their standing date helps keep that bond alive.

  “Just trying to make conversation.”

  “I worry about you.”

  “I do, too, Ma. What do you hear from Teddy?”

  “You mean my son with the job?”

  “Yeah. That one.”

  Teddy is my younger brother who I talk to about once a year. My mom speaks to him every Sunday, ten a.m., but I doubt he does much speaking back. Though he teaches astrobiology, he doesn’t communicate with earthlings very well. Between the two of us, Ma’s pretty much given up on grandkids.

  “I spoke to him Sunday. He’s doing fine.”

  “Oh yeah? What’s he up to?”

  “You know. The same.”

  In other words, she has no idea. It amazes me that he can teach when, in my experience, he can barely string a sentence together.

  “And what about you, Ma? Anything new?”

  The motion detector lights go on in Cogswell’s compound just as she starts telling me about some Gilbert and
Sullivan sing-along she went to with her friend Edna Keppler, who she’s known since college when they both volunteered for Eugene McCarthy’s 1968 presidential campaign.

  Cogswell’s gate slides open, and the red T-bird rolls out. Chances are, Cogswell’s in for the evening, so I figure I’ll stick to Jane, see if she’s got any more surprises up her sleeve. I crank up the engine and cradle the phone to keep track of my mother’s voice. When she stops talking I say uh-huh, and she starts up again. I feel conspicuous, as if driving with a phone to my ear is a full-blown felony.

  “You should have heard “Tit-Willow.” It was absolutely heartbreaking!”

  I pass under Cogswell’s security lights and pray he’s not looking out the window. I keep my headlights off so Jane doesn’t see me fall in behind her but when she turns at Ventura, I flick them on. In boulevard traffic she won’t notice.

  I slip into an easy tail. Jane’s a civilian; no reason why she’d know how to spot me, even if she thought to look. I keep my eye out for cops because of the cell phone. Gloria would ride me no end if I lost a tail because I was pulled over by the Bluetooth patrol.

  I tune back into my mother’s monologue about Gilbert and Sullivan. “When Gilbert was two, he was actually captured by a gang of Italian brigands and was held for twenty-five pounds ransom. And that’s where the Pirates of Penzance came from! Can you imagine?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  Jane leads me up to Mulholland, where I promptly lose my mom along with my cell signal. I’m guessing she’ll rave about the major general’s song for another ten minutes before she realizes I’m gone. I drop the cell in my shirt pocket and breathe a sigh of relief.

  We wind along the ridge of the Santa Monica Mountains, glimpsing breathtaking views before Jane drops down into Benedict Canyon. At Sunset she heads east past the ever-pink Beverly Hills Hotel and the mansions that once reigned over a glorious boulevard before it became a virtual highway.