White Jazz

by James Ellroy

  "I understand the dilemma you're in, David. You may think that you can dissemble to us and be less than forthcoming vis-à-vis your organized-crime connections, thus sparing yourself a Syndicate death sentence. You will of course be given Federal protection after your grand jury testimony, but you should know now that lies and lies by omission will not be tolerated."

  Smart fucker.

  Holding back information--bet on it. My big fear: those Fed tails postJohnson. Long-shot stuff, hard to shake: Abe Voldrich snuffed, a blue Pontiac spotted. Jack Woods--nine contract hits minimum--_my_ preferred killer. Jack Woods, proud owner: a powder-blue '56 Pontiac.

  Downtown, the 3rd Street Bridge, Boyle Heights. East to Wabash-- Brownell's Locksmiths--

  A parking-lot drive-up hut.

  Four keys--three numbered--maybe traceable.

  I pulled up, honked. A man right there, customer smile on. "Help you?"

  I flashed my badge and the key fob. "158-32, 159-32, 160-32, and one unstamped. Who did you make them for?"

  "I don't even have to check my files, 'cause that 32 coding's from this rent-a-locker storage place I do all the locker keys for."

  "So you don't know who rented these individual lockers?"

  "Right you are. The unstamped key's for the front door, the number keys are for lockers. And I don't cut no duplicates 'less the manager at the place gives the okay."

  "What 'place'?"

  "The Lock-Your-Self at 1750 North Echo Park Boulevard, which is open twenty-four hours, case you didn't know."

  "You're pretty snappy with your answers."

  "Well . . ."

  "Come on, tell me."

  "Well . . ."

  "Well nothing, I'm a police officer."

  Whiny, wheedling: "Well, I hate to be a stool pigeon, 'cause I sorta liked the guy."

  "What guy?"

  "I don't know his name, but he's that little Mex bantam fights at the Olympic all the time."

  "Reuben Ruiz?"

  "Right you are. He came in yesterday and told me he wanted dupes of the keys with them numbers, like he saw the keys but couldn't get his mitts on the two original sets I cut. I told him, 'Ixnay, not even if you was Rocky Marciano himself.'"

  "You cut _two_ original sets for the Lock-Your-Self place?"

  "One customer original, one management original. The manager sent a guy by for a second customer set, 'cause the people who rented those lockers wanted dupes."

  Set number one--Junior. Set number two--maybe Johnny D.-- Reuben's pal.

  "Officer, them locks and keys are being changed continually to thwart theft. So if you talk to Bob, the manager, will you tell him I'm doing my part toward keeping things--"

  I hit the gas--the lock man ate exhaust fumes.

  o o o

  Echo Park off Sunset--a big warehouse. A parking lot, no door guard--my door key got me in.

  Huge: crisscross hallways, locker-lined. A directory/map up front, number-coded.

  The 32 codings were tagged "Jumbo." Follow the map--two corridors down, left, stop:

  Three floor-to-ceiling lockers six feet wide.

  Scratched up--lock-pick marks.

  Keys in, crack the doors:

  158-32: mink coats hung eight feet deep, six feet wide.

  Seven empty hangers.

  159-32: stoles and pelts-dumped shoulder-high.

  160-32: fox/mink/raccoon coats--fuckloads hung/dumped/piled/ folded/tossed.

  Johnny/Junior/Reuben.

  Dudley Smith, fur-heist boss--scooped/hoodwinked/stiffed.

  Exley and Duhamel--operating WHO?

  Mink--touch it, smell it. Empty hangers--Lucille's fur strip? Johnny trying to sell Mickey Cohen bulk fur??

  Reuben Ruiz: ex--B&E man/burglar brothers.

  His direct key approach--no go.

  Break-in scratches/no door guard/Lock-Your-Self: open twenty-four hours.

  Key clicks/lock clicks/brain clicks--I got my notebook and pen out. Three lockers--I dropped three identical notes inside:

  I want to deal on Johnny Duhamel, Junior Stemmons and whatever or whoever else connects to this. This is for money, independent of Ed Exley.

  D. Klein

  Lock the doors--lock clicks/brain clicks--get to a phone.

  I found a booth across Sunset. Ad Vice, two rings, "Riegle."

  "Sid, it's me."

  "You mean it's you and you want something."

  "You're right."

  "So tell me, but I'll tell you right now this Homicide work is wearing me thin."

  "Meaning?"

  "Meaning Richie Herrick is nowhere. First Exley issues an APB, then he rescinds it, and we _still_ can't locate one single white man known to frequent Negro areas."

  "I know, and our best bet is to let Tommy Kafesjian find him for us."

  "Which doesn't seem too likely with those Armenian humps holed up with Fed surveillance outside their house. Jesus. .

  "Sid, write this down."

  "Okay, I'm listening."

  "The storage locker place at 1750 North Echo Park."

  "All right, I wrote it down. Now what?"

  "Now you get your civilian car and stake out the entrance and parking lot. You write down the plate numbers on everyone who walks in. Every five or six hours you call in the stats to the DMV, and you go through until tomorrow morning and call me."

  Stage groans. "You'll explain then?"

  "That's right."

  "It's the Herrick job?"

  "It's fucking everything."

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  Reuben Ruiz--talk, strongarm--whatever it took.

  R&I shot me his address: 229 South Loma. Not that far--a quick run over-- brother Ramon on the porch.

  "Reuben's at the ravine, bein' a _puto_ for the City of Los Angeles."

  Another quick run--Chavez Ravine.

  Swarming now-evictions pending. "Police Parking"--a dirt lot going in. Cop cars jammed up tail to snout: Sheriff's, LAPD, Feds.

  Hills fronting the main drag; Mex kids chucking rocks. Black & whites scratched and dented.

  An access road up--narrow, dusty. I walked it, hit the top, caught the view:

  Hecklers bucking bluesuit containment--the main road cordoned off. Shack-lined roads/hills/gulleys--eviction notices rife. Camera crews shooting door to door: Feds and a bobbing sombrero.

  Dig it: shack dwellers swarming that hat.

  I walked down into it; blues juked me through the cordon. Catch the view: Shipstad, Milner, Ruiz in bullfighter garb.

  Reuben:

  Passing out money, spics swamping him.

  "_Dinero!_"

  "_El jefe Ruiz!_"

  Big-time Mex jabber--incomprehensible.

  Milner gaga-eyed: what _is_ this?

  I shoved, waved--Shipstad saw me. Trembly and flushed--Henstell probably blabbed.

  He shoved toward me. We collided: hands on suitcoats instinctive.

  "_Gracias el jefe Reuben!_"--Ruiz tossing cash away.

  A dirt yard off the road--Shipstad pointed over. I followed him--tree shade, a sign: "Notice to Vacate."

  "Justify that firebug routine before Noonan revokes your immunity and has you arrested."

  Eyeball magnet: Reuben dishing out greenbacks.

  "Look at me, Klein."

  At him, lawyer bullshit: "It was nontangential incriminating evidence. It in no way pertained to the Kafesjian family or to any focus of your investigation or my potential grand jury testimony. Noonan has enough on me as it is, and I didn't want to feed him more potential indictable information."

  "Attorney to attorney, how can you live the way you do?"

  Tongue tied--

  "We're trying to help you get out of this alive. I'm developing a plan to relocate you after you testify, and frankly Noonan doesn't think I should be working so hard at it."

  "Which means?"

  "Which means I dislike him slightly more than I dislike you. Which means he's two seconds away from arresting you and putting you on display as
a hostile witness, then releasing you and letting Sam Giancana or whoever have you killed."

  Meg jailed/ brutalized/clipped--Technicolor. "Will you relocate my sister?"

  "That's impossible. This last escapade has cost you credibility with Noonan, relocation for your sister was not covered in your contract and there is no established precedent for mobsters harming the loved ones of fugitive witnesses."

  GET MONEY.

  Ruiz throwing it away.

  "We're your only hope. I'll square things with Noonan, but you be at the Federal Building by eight A.M. day after tomorrow, or we'll find you, arrest your sister and begin tax-charge proceedings."

  Crowd noise, dust. Reuben watching us.

  I waved the keys. Sunlight on metal--he nodded.

  Shipstad: "Klein . . ."

  "I'll be there."

  "Eight A.M."

  "I heard you."

  "It's your only--"

  "What's Ruiz doing?"

  He looked over. "Expiation of guilt or some such concept. Can you blame him? All this for a baseball stadium?"

  Reuben walked up.

  "Did you come to see _him?_ And what's with those keys?"

  "Give me some time with him."

  "Is it personal?"

  "Yeah, it's personal."

  Shipstad walked; Ruiz passed him and winked. Rockabye Reuben: bullfight threads, grin.

  "Hey, Lieutenant."

  I twirled the keys. "You go first."

  "No. First you tell me this is just two witness buddies gabbing, then you tell me popping Mexican bantamweights for robbery don't push your buzzer."

  Bulldozers down the road--a shack crashed.

  "_Keys_, Reuben. You saw the originals, memorized the numbers and tried to get that locksmith to cut dupes, and there's tool marks on the lockers at that storage place."

  "I didn't hear you say anything like 'This is just two guys who'd like each other to stay out of trouble talking.'"

  Gear whine/wood snap/dust--the noise made me flinch. "I'm way past arresting people."

  "I sort of thought so, given what the Feds been saying."

  "Reuben, _spill_. I've got this half-assed notion you want to."

  "Do penance, maybe. Spill, I don't know."

  "Did you boost some furs out of those lockers?"

  "As many as me and my righteous B&E buddies could carry. And they're gone, in case you want a mink for your slumlord sister."

  Flowers sprouting next to weeds; smog wafting in.

  "So you bagged some furs, sold them and gave the money to your poor exploited brethren."

  "No, I gave a silver fox pelt to Mrs. Mendoza next door, 'cause I popped her daughter's cherry and never married her, _then_ I sold the furs, _then_ I got drunk and gave the money away."

  "Just like that?"

  "Yeah, and those stupidos down there'll probably spend it on Dodger tickets."

  "Reuben--"

  "Fuck it, all right--me, Johnny Duhamel and my brothers took down the Hurwitz fur warehouse. You were maybe pushing that way when I saw you in my dressing room, so now you tell me what you got before I sober up and get bored with this penance routine."

  "Let's try Ed Exley operating Johnny."

  Smog--Reuben coughed. "You picked a good fucking topic."

  "I figured if Johnny talked to anybody, it was you."

  "You figured pretty good."

  "He told you about it?"

  "Most of it, I guess. Look, this is, you know, off the record?"

  I nodded--easy now--cut him rope.

  Tick tick tick tick.

  Jerk the rope: "Reuben--"

  "Yeah, okay, I guess it was like this spring, like April or something. Exley, he read this newspaper story about Johnny. You know, a what you call human-interest story, like here's this guy in graduate school working all these jobs, he used to be a comer in the Golden Gloves, but now he's gotta turn pro even though he don't want to, 'cause his parents croaked and stiffed him and his school, and how he's broke. You follow me so far?"

  "Keep going."

  "Okay, so Exley, he approached Johnny and what you call manipulated him. He gave Johnny money and paid off his college loan, and he paid off these debts Johnny's parents left. Exley, he's like some kind of rich-kid cop with this big inheritance, and he gave Johnny this bonaroo fucking amount of money and paid these reporter guys to write these other, you know, similar-type newspaper stories about him, playing on this angle that he had to turn pro out of, you know, financial necessity."

  "And Exley made Johnny tank that one pro fight he had."

  "Right."

  "And the newspaper pieces and the tank job were to set Johnny up as some sort of hard-luck kid, so it would look realistic when he applied to the LAPD."

  "Right."

  "And Exley got Johnny eased into the Academy?"

  "Right."

  "And all this was to set Johnny up to work undercover."

  "Right, to get next to some people or something that Exley had this hard-on for, but don't ask me who, 'cause I don't know."

  THEM/Dan Wilhite/Narco--mix them, match them--

  "Keep going."

  Bobs, feints--Reuben oozed sweat. "So Exley, he got Johnny this outside work while he was in the Academy, this gig where he what you call infiltrated these Marine Corps guys who were beating up and robbing all these rich queers. That punk Stemmons, you know, that ex-partner of yours, he was Johnny's teacher at the Academy, and he read this report that Johnny wrote on the fruit-roller gig."

  "And?"

  "And Stemmons, he was both, you know, attracted to and, what you call it, repelled by homos. He had the hots for Johnny, which embarrassed the shit out of Johnny, 'cause he's a cunt man from the gate. Anyway, Johnny busted up the fruit-roller ring, and the Marine Corps police, they got, you know, convictions against the guys. Johnny graduated from the Academy and got assigned to the Detective Bureau right off, 'cause the queer gig made him look righteous good, and 'cause being a Golden Gloves champ gave him some righteous prestige. Anyway, that Irish guy, you know, Dudley Smith, he took a shine to Johnny and got him assigned to the Mobster Squad, 'cause he wanted an ex-fighter for this strongarm work they do."

  Linkage clicking in--no surprises yet.

  "And?"

  "_And_ somehow Stemmons found out that Exley was what you call operating Johnny, _and_ he pulled this wild queer number on him, _and_ it disgusted Johnny, but he didn't beat that _puto_ faggot silly, 'cause Stemmons was this hotshot evidence teacher cop who could screw Johnny on this gig he was fuckin' embroiled in with Exley."

  Popping punches, popping sweat--little moves synced to his story.

  "And?"

  "_And_ you cops always pull that 'and' bit to keep people talking."

  "Then let's try 'so.'"

  "_So_ I guess it was about this time that Johnny got tangled up in the fur job. He said he had inside help, and he just hired on me and my brothers to do the hauling work. He was doing these other so-called bad things, and I figured it was strongarm shit on the Mobster Squad, but Johnny said it was lots worse, like so bad he was afraid to tell his good buddy Exley about it. Fucking Stemmons, he was talking all this criminal-mastermind noise up to Johnny, and I don't know, but somehow he found out about Johnny and the fur heist."

  Ruiz shit-eater-grinning--punched out, winded.

  "When did Johnny tell you all this?"

  "After the fur heist, when we put on gloves and he told me to give him this penance beating."

  "And around that time Stemmons tried to horn in on Johnny's part of the fur job."

  "Right."

  "Come on, Reuben. Right, _and?_"

  "And Johnny told me the fur job was an Exley setup from the gate. It was part of his what you call cover, and Exley was in with that guy Sol Hurwitz. Hurwitz was some kind of gone-bust gambler, and fuckin' richkid Exley, he bought all the furs and told Johnny how to stage the heist."

  AUDACIOUS.

  Links missing.

  Exley
's heist/Dudley Smith's investigation--why did Exley assign someone that good?

  Linkage chronology--pure guesswork:

  Johnny offers Mickey Cohen hot fur.

  Dud gloms the Cohen lead and scares Mickey shitless.

  Exley intercedes.

  Exley operates Mickey--_toward what end?_

  Mickey, skewed behavior--movie mogul, Darktown bungler--he still won't pull his Southside slots.

  Chick Vecchio--Mickey linked.

  Chick--finger man--Kafesjian movie time.

  Mickey and Chick--linked to:

  THEM/Narco/Dan Wilhite.

  Links:

  Missing/hidden/obscured/twisted CRAAAZY--

  Reuben--punched out, grinning: "So, I guess all this is just between us witness buddies."

  "That's right."

  "Is Johnny dead?"

  "Yes."

  "Too bad he never got married. Mea fucking culpa, I could of dropped a nice mink coat on his widow."

  Crash noise--another shack went down.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  Stone's throw: Chavez Ravine to Silverlake. Over to Jack Woods' place--his car outside.

  Powder blue gleaming: Jack's baby.

  The front door stood ajar--I knocked first.

  "I'm in the shower! It's open!"

  I walked in--brazen Jack--phones and bet slips in plain view. A wall photo: Jack, Meg and me-the Mocambo, '49.

  "You remember that night? Meg got plowed on brandy alexanders."

  Meg sat between us--hard to tell whose girl.

  "You're cruising down memory lane pretty steep, partner."

  I turned around. "You clipped a guy for Mickey a couple of days before. You were flush, so you picked up the tab."

  Jack cinched his robe. "Is this the pot calling the kettle black?"

  "Did you pop Abe Voldrich?"

  "Yeah, I did. Do you care?"

  "Not exactly."

  "Then you just came by to rehash old times."

  "It's about Meg, but I wouldn't mind an explanation."

  Jack lit a cigarette. "Chick Vecchio bought the hit for Mickey. He said Narco and Dan Wilhite wanted it. Voldrich was the Kafesjian family's bagman to the LAPD. Chick said it was Mickey's idea, that the Feds had turned Voldrich as a witness, and Mickey wanted his connections to the Kafesjians snipped. Ten grand, partner. My consolation prize for that hump Stemmons dying on me."