Guilty or Else jo-1

by Jeff Sherratt

  I dragged myself back to the Vette. An envelope rested on the front seat among the dime-size chunks of glass.

  I pulled it out and ripped it open. Inside was a handwritten note: Quit the case NOW! Or I’ll use this bat on your head instead of the window. We can get to you anytime. Don’t think Sica’s men are going to protect you. Big Jake won’t always be there to cover your back.

  A moment later, Big Jake’s Caddie rolled to a stop next to me. With a cigarette dangling from his mouth, he stuck his head out the car window and appraised the damage. “You see who done it?” he asked.

  “Yeah, a big guy, six-one, six-two, lots of dark wavy hair, a scar on his face.”

  “Sounds like Angelo, one of Karadimos’s best persuaders. He’s only gonna send his primo guys from now on, now that they think I’m on the job.”

  “You know the guy?”

  “Yeah, he’s one of the ratfink soldatos that left Buscetta and joined up with that fat Greek.”

  “I thought you were going to cover my ass!”

  “You told me to take a powder, not hang around. Anyway, you’re in one piece, ain’t ya? So, what’s the problem?”

  It wouldn’t do me any good to get hot; the damage was done. Besides, I did more or less tell Jake to stay away, which might have been a little hasty. “Want some breakfast?” I asked, angling my head toward the coffee shop.

  “Thought you didn’t want to be seen with me, too low down for you.”

  “No, not really, Jake. What I meant-”

  “What I heard ’bout you lawyers is true.”

  “Yeah, what?”

  “Full of bullshit.”

  I sighed. “Yeah, guess so.”

  “Get in the car,” he said.

  I climbed into the passenger seat. “Maybe I made a mistake about you, Jake, about not sticking close by.”

  Jake’s massive hands gripped the steering wheel, squeezing and twisting the rim as he gazed out the front windshield. “I gotta keep outta sight. Joe wants it that way.

  You won’t see me until I show up. No one will. Cops, Karadimos’s torpedoes, nobody. I’ll be invisible, but I’ll be there.”

  It was hard to imagine a guy like Big Jake invisible. He’d be impossible to miss. He’d stand out like a dancing elephant among a bunch of scurrying field mice.

  “Thanks, Jake, I appreciate your help, and I don’t dislike you. It’s just-”

  “O’Brien, let’s get this straight. I don’t give a shit what you appreciate, and I don’t give a damn if you like me or not. Most people don’t. I gotta job to do, that’s all. Let’s leave it at that.”

  I looked at Jake for a long moment, the ugly grimace on his face, and wondered about him. Did he have emotions-fears, highs and lows like the rest of us? Or was his life one deep, black pit of hostility? How did someone become so devoid of moral sensitivity? Was it a handicap to have a soul when one belonged to the mob? Or was it a benefit? He continued to stare out at the parking lot, at the people giving him dirty looks as they walked around his car blocking their path to the coffee shop.”

  “Jake, how is this supposed to work?” I asked.

  Without turning his head toward me, he said, “Told ya before. You do your thing and I’ll do mine. I’ll be there when I’m needed.”

  “You think Karadimos and his gang would really use deadly force to stop me? Or are they just trying to scare me off?”

  He wiggled his chunky fingers in a gimme manner. Jake had more muscles in his fingers that I had in my whole body.

  “Lemme see the note, the one you got from Angelo.”

  I pulled the paper out of my pocket and gave it to him. I had a newfound respect for Jake’s erudition. He read it without moving his lips.

  “Yep, they’ll kill ya all right. That is, if you don’t stop messing with their shit.” He spoke without a trace of emotion in his voice.

  “Are you serious?”

  “Dead serious. But, I’ll stop ’em. I’m not sure why, but Joe wants to keep you alive, for a while anyway.”

  “Suppose I can’t bring Karadimos down. What’s Sica going to do about him?”

  Anger flashed from Jake like a spark from an electrical short. “Keep your trap shut. You got no lines. You ask no questions, goddammit!” He moved in closer. “I’ll say it again, don’t ask questions.” His face looked like a big red balloon ready to burst.

  “I’m not going to ask any questions. Like you said, you do your thing, and I’ll do mine.”

  “Okay, O’Brien, I gotta get outta here. Don’t call the cops about the car. Don’t want the bastards snooping around. They’d get in my way.”

  At eight-thirty, I went back to my Corvette, cleaned up the glass, and set out for the office. Jake said he would follow me at a safe distance. He wanted to lay back and see if I was being shadowed by any of Karadimos’s heavy artillery.

  Although I couldn’t kid myself about why Jake was trying to protect me, I knew it was a lot healthier having him around. But I also knew I was just a guy caught in the middle of the local Mafia and their new rivals. Things could change and I knew I was as useless and expendable as the Nehru jacket hanging in my closet.

  C H A P T E R 24

  When I arrived back at the office, Rita had the new coffeemaker assembled and plugged in. “Hey Boss, did you see the new coffeepot? It’s the latest thing.”

  “Yeah, it’s super,” I said. “Do you think you can figure out how to make coffee with the thing?”

  “Of course, a child could make a great cup with this pot,” she said as she scooped Yuban into the machine.

  “Oh.”

  “By the way, Joyce called. She said she has some more information about a company called Hartford something. She wants you to call her back. I’ll get her on the line if you want.”

  “You work the coffeepot. I’ll call her myself.”

  I remembered what Joyce told me about Hartford Commodities, the company that leased the Buick that had tailed me for a couple of days.

  I picked up the phone and dialed. “Joyce, it’s me, O’Brien. Rita said you have some information.”

  “It came this morning,” Joyce said. “Hartford Commodities, remember? Controlled by Triple A Holdings, Incorporated?”

  “Sure, I remember. Triple A is the offshore corporation. Have you found out who the real owners are?”

  “No, but they use Mutual Trust as their correspondent bank. Mutual is headquartered in Los Angeles. But here’s the important part: Thomas French, an attorney here in Downey, has fiduciary control over Triple A’s accounts. He handles all the transactions, including signing checks,” Joyce said. “There’s more. French also sits on the board of the Bank. Do you know this guy?”

  Yeah, I knew French: Welch’s lawyer, the guy who gave me the brush-off. “I don’t know him personally, Joyce. But I know who he is.” I paused and thought for a second. “What kind of business is Hartford, anyway? What do they do?”

  “It’s a produce company, started after the war by a guy named Sam Higgins. They import cantaloupes from Mexico. That sort of thing.”

  “From Mexico?”

  “Yes, but Hartford was sold to Triple A shortly after Higgins died a few years back. The documents relating to the Higgins estate and the company’s sale are missing. The secretary of state’s office is in the process of logging all their files into a computer. The missing documents will eventually show up. And when they do, I’ll call you.”

  “How long will that take?”

  “A few months, at most.”

  “Oh.”

  “Jimmy, if it’s important, Sol can assign an investigator to check out the company using the shoe leather approach.”

  “What’s that?”

  “You know, snoop around, go to the last known address, ask questions. Detective work, a real investigation. I just tapped into the records, had a friend in Sacramento pull the file.”

  “Better wait on that, Joyce. I’ll talk to Sol first. By the way, did you find out anyth
ing yet about Fischer, the pilot?”

  “No, sorry. It’s still early, but Sol has a couple of our best men working full time on it. I’ll call you soon as we get anything.”

  I hung up, leaned back in my chair and reflected on the news, trying to make sense out of it.

  The connections: Gloria Graham/Welch/Karadimos, and now French. The Saturday flight, not logged. Welch’s pressure on Johnson-Karadimos’s pressure on me. What about the bank? Cantaloupes from Mexico, Joyce said. What was I missing? I shook my head and tried to clear my mind; nothing came.

  I remembered a guy from years back, a guy who might know something. I put my feet on the floor and reached for the phone.

  As a cop, I worked out of the Newton Street precinct of the LAPD, which covered the produce district located between Seventh Street and Olympic Avenue. I’d made friends with some of the brokers and dealers who did business there.

  I looked at my watch: 10:30 A.M., a little late in the day for these people to be working. They usually started at around two in the morning and quit when their delivery trucks returned before ten. But one old guy, Barney Corby, a melon broker, always stayed late. He was like the proverbial little old lady, knew all the gossip in the neighborhood and didn’t mind spreading it around.

  The information operator rattled off Barney’s phone number and I dialed it. When he answered, I said, “Hi, Barn. Jimmy O’Brien. You’re still working late, I see.”

  “Jimmy, great to hear from you. Yeah, but I don’t come in so early anymore. Getting up there, you know. I’ll be eighty-four next month.”

  We talked a bit about the old times and discussed getting together for lunch one of these days. But he didn’t seem too excited about the idea after I told him I’d quit drinking.

  “Maybe you can help me, Barney. I’m working on a case and the name Hartford Commodities came up, a produce outfit. You know the company?”

  “Hartford, sure I know them. Used to have a packing shed down on Terminal Ave.”

  “Used to? They’re not there anymore?” I asked.

  “They closed up. Moved out. Still have their shipping rights and a telephone number, but no trucks, or customers. It’s a dummy corporation.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Just a shell. Very strange. When I called the old phone number, it referred me to their new number. I called because I had a customer for them.”

  “What did they say?”

  “Nothing, nada. They had one of those newfangled answer machines, some kind of a tape recorder. Left several messages. I think I did it right. But anyway, I never heard back.”

  “Maybe they were busy,” I said.

  “Maybe the trustees don’t give a damn about new business.”

  “Trustees? Is the company in bankruptcy or something?”

  “No, it’s held in trust. Some kind of offshore corporation owns the company now.”

  “When was it sold?”

  “It’s been a few years. A real hush-hush deal. But I used to do a lot of business with Hartford before the old man died and left it to his stepson. He ran it into the ground, never worked the business. Fooled around with chippies, then got involved in politics.”

  “Politics?”

  “Yeah, didn’t I mention it? The old man who started the company was Senator Berry Welch’s stepfather.”

  C H A P T E R 25

  Shortly after I got off the phone with Barney, Rita came in with a steaming mug. “Hope it’s okay,” she said.

  The last thing I needed at that moment was a caffeine kick. After what Barney had said, my heart was beating a mile a minute, but I figured one sip wouldn’t kill me. I put the cup to my lips and tasted the coffee. “Wow,” I said. “This is the best cup of coffee you’ve ever made.” I wasn’t kidding, it was that good.

  She beamed. “Thanks, Boss. It’s the new pot. Hard to make a bad cup with it. Has a timer on the thing, goes on and off automatically. What will they think of next?”

  “Don’t know, Rita.”

  “Maybe a computer to replace lawyers.”

  “Think so?”

  She winked. “It won’t have your blue eyes, though. I’ll miss that.”

  “Aw, Rita…”

  “Sorry about your car window.”

  Earlier I’d told her kids playing baseball broke the window. I didn’t like telling her white lies, but didn’t want her to worry. “I’m not one to mope.”

  “Can you give me a minute, Jimmy? There’s something we should discuss.”

  I grabbed the phone, and started to dial. “Sure, Rita,” I said. “But first I have to talk to Sol. The case is starting to heat up. I’ll come out and talk after this call, okay?”

  She turned and I watched the sway of her hips as she gracefully left the room. I finished dialing, and Sol came on the line.

  “Hi, Jimmy. I’m just walking out the door.”

  “Sol, I just found out something important.”

  “Okay, meet me at Rio Hondo. I’ve got a tee off time in forty-five minutes. I’ll be on the practice green. I have news, too. We can talk while I warm up.”

  “Why can’t we talk on the phone?”

  “See you in ten minutes.” He hung up.

  As I rushed past Rita’s desk, she looked at me and started to say something, but I kept going. When I climbed in the driver’s seat of my Corvette, I remembered she wanted to talk to me about something. I made a mental note to call her from the clubhouse at the golf course.

  As I drove, I let the facts of the case rattle around in my brain. I wondered about Welch’s old company being sold to a trust controlled by an offshore corporation. Was Welch still involved? If so, what was he trying to hide? Maybe he didn’t want the government to see the company books. Could this whole thing be some kind of elaborate tax dodge? A tax dodge wouldn’t have henchmen in a Buick shadowing me, though. No, there was more to it than a simple accounting matter.

  I turned into the Rio Hondo Country Club parking lot, killed the engine, and walked into the pro shop. The guy there said Sol was already on the practice green. I saw him through the window. He had on a yellow alpaca sweater, bright blue slacks with white shoes, and was crouched on his haunches holding a metal rod of some sort. One end of the three-foot long rod rested on the grass, and he held the other end about two feet off the ground.

  When I walked over to him, he was rolling golf balls down the groove in the inclined rod. “Hey, Sol, what’s that thing?”

  He glanced up, didn’t say anything, then looked down at the ball as it rolled to a stop about ten feet from the end of the rod.

  “Sol, what the hell are you doing? Is that the way you putt, roll a ball down a piece of steel?”

  “It’s aluminum, a Stimpmeter. Had it made special. I use it to check the speed of the greens. Someday all the golf courses will have one, but…” He took a tape measure out of his pocket and measured the distance the ball had traveled. “Nine feet, two inches, pretty fast.”

  Nothing Sol did surprised me anymore. “Does that help your game?”

  “I’m playing your old friend, Judge Johnson today. I’ll need all the help I can get. He’s good and he cheats on his handicap.”

  “Yeah, he used to cheat a lot when we were on the job together. Mostly on his wife.”

  “I gotta put this thing away before he sees it.” Sol said, indicating the aluminum rod. “Don’t want him stealing my secrets. C’mon, we’ll talk on the way to my car.”

  As we walked back to the parking lot, I told Sol about my conversation with Barney. “So the Buick that shadowed me is related to Welch’s old company. That says a lot.”

  “Not necessarily evidence of murder.”

  “Yeah, but we know Welch and Karadimos are connected. Karadimos’s plane was flown down the day of the murder, and Karadimos is threatening me. Now it looks like Welch is the guy who had me followed. That means they’re both in on it together. I’ve got enough for reasonable doubt. It’s looking good.”

  “Wh
oa, slow down, Jimmy. There’s an old Jewish saying. Don’t count your chickens-”

  “I didn’t know that was a Jewish saying.”

  “Yeah, we have sayings for everything. It means-”

  “I know what it means, Sol.”

  “Let me finish. It means, mach nit kain tsimmes fun

  Dem.”

  “Oh, that explains it.”

  “See, before you start counting chickens-”

  “I’m not counting chickens.”

  “Forget about chickens. You have to think about what Welch and Karadimos are up to,” Sol said. “Think about this: Karadimos is a crook and we figure he’s working with Welch. Maybe Gloria found out something that she shouldn’t have.”

  “I’ve been thinking about those calls Gloria had made that day.”

  Gloria placed two long-distance phone calls on the day she died, the first one at around three in the afternoon to a Kansas number. The police didn’t investigate that call other than to report that it had been made to a friend. The second one about an hour later had been routed to the Sacramento Inn. It turned out to be a dead end. The hotel had no way to trace the call to any particular room.

  “Didn’t we figure her Sacramento call was to Welch?” Sol asked as he opened the trunk of his Lincoln Continental Mark IV. He tossed in the rod and pulled out his golf bag. Leaning against the side of his car, he said, “It’d be good to know what they talked about on that last phone call.”

  “What about the earlier call to her high school friend in Kansas? Wasn’t she the girl who told you Gloria and Welch were having an affair?”

  “Yeah, Bonnie Munson. Lives in Manhattan, Kansas. She went to high school with Graham. That’s how we found her. We called the school and talked to a teacher. The teacher remembered Gloria, told us Bonnie had been her best friend.”

  “Do you think Bonnie would talk to me if I called her?” I asked.

  “No, I don’t think so. My investigators called her several times. She clammed up when they tried to get her to talk in depth about Gloria’s relationship with Welch. I felt there was more troubling Bonnie about Gloria than just the affair, but that’s just my thinking. I even called her myself, but could get nothing more out of her. She hung up on me.” Sol shook his head. “Nah, she won’t talk to you, Jimmy.”