by J. L. Abramo
“What?” asked Boyle, when Stephens put the receiver down.
“Corpse found in the basement of an abandoned apartment house in East LA. Some kids were playing where they didn’t belong and literally tripped over the body. Young woman, early twenties, no ID. Two gunshots, back of the head, close range. I need to meet O’Brien at the scene.”
“It never ends,” said Boyle.
“Want to ride along?”
“Cute.”
“I’ll call you later, give you the gory details.”
“I can hardly wait. Don’t forget the other thing.”
“Covered,” Stephens said. “Jackson Masters. Frank Raft. Quiet as a mouse.”
GHOST STORIES
Jimmy Pigeon and Roger Rollins sat together on the screened porch looking out onto Lake Tahoe. Rollins had retired to the house on the lake eighteen years earlier, after nearly thirty years as a patrol officer, detective and captain in the Los Angeles Police Department and ten years as a private investigator. Rollins was a widower, father of three grown children and grandfather of eight. When Jimmy’s father was killed in the line of duty in 1958, it was Rollins who rescued the fifteen-year-old from recklessly destroying his life. Years later, Rollins took Jimmy into his PI business as a partner and then the former LAPD Captain turned a blind eye when Jimmy tracked down and executed Will Cady, his father’s murderer. The two men had a bond as strong as blood and Jimmy visited the older man as often as possible. The last time Jimmy had been out to the lake house was less than a month earlier, at a gathering to celebrate Roger’s seventy-seventh birthday.
Now, Jimmy was here to talk about the distant past, to bring Rollins back to World War II and post-war Hollywood when Rollins was a young detective, mobsters rubbed elbows with movie stars, power and fame were bought with dollars and bullets and Charlie Chan was still the rage.
“Why the sudden interest in ancient history? I’ve known you all of your life, we worked together for seven years and you were never interested in a thing I had to say about anything that happened before the Dodgers came out to California,” Rollins said, when Jimmy asked about Bugsy Siegel. “Unless it had something to do with your father.”
“I’m a much bigger fan of the nineteenth century than I am of the twentieth,” Jimmy said. “In my humble opinion, Western Civilization has been going steadily downhill since Archduke Ferdinand was whacked in 1914. I’m looking for a motive for my partner’s murder and Ben Siegel’s name keeps popping up.”
“It was a lifetime ago. I joined the LAPD when I was eighteen years old, fresh out of high school. I spent my rookie year patrolling Hollywood and Vine, 1936, middle of the depression, more homeless and transients then than now. It was like a circus sideshow. I grew up real quick.”
Rollins poured more Scotch before going on.
“The first time I saw Ben Siegel was in February of 1940 at the Academy Awards’ ceremony in the Ambassador Hotel. He was laughing it up with Clark Gable and Bette Davis and looked as if he were there to present an award, or to receive one. I was a twenty-two-year-old uniformed officer, four years in and still wet behind the ears, on security detail at the hotel, wide-eyed, awed by the movie stars and the likes of Ben Siegel. Siegel had been in LA for a few years by then. Jack Dragna ran just about everything illegal before Bugsy arrived, but Dragna had to step down to make room for Siegel. Direct orders straight from Lucky Luciano’s prison cell. Ben Siegel became the arm of Murder, Incorporated in the West and he answered only to Meyer Lansky in New York. He controlled prostitution, the numbers racket, the wire services and he had a stronghold on the film industry through control of the extras’ union. Throughout the forties, the LAPD and the County Sheriff’s Department brass were up for sale to the highest bidders; until William H. Parker became the Chief of Police in 1950 and made the LAPD his own. But for nearly a decade, until he was killed in 1947, Bugsy Siegel was something like the King of LA”
“So, who decided the king must die?”
“I couldn’t tell you who killed Siegel; it’s been a mystery for forty-seven years, as old an open case as the Black Dahlia. But I can tell you who may have benefited most from his demise. Quite a few did.”
“Let’s start with the short list,” Jimmy said.
Arnold ‘The Brain’ Rothstein was assassinated in New York City in 1928. Case unsolved. His death initiated a bloody war between Joseph Messeria and Salvatore Maranzano for control of the New York rackets. Three young hoodlums saw the conflict as an opportunity. Meyer Lansky, Charles ‘Lucky’ Luciano and Frank Costello worked each side against the other and by the early thirties both bosses, Maranzano and Messeria, had been violently killed. Cases unsolved.
Charlie Luciano became cappo di tutti cappi.
In 1936, Thomas Dewey successfully prosecuted Luciano; Luciano was handed a thirty to fifty year prison sentence.
Dewey then turned his attention to Meyer Lansky.
Lansky’s Achilles heel was Ben Siegel, the mob’s most prolific assassin. It was decided Siegel should get as far away from New York as possible. He was sent west.
Luciano was locked up and Meyer Lansky was protecting Luciano’s interests. Lansky insisted Siegel be given charge of operations in Los Angeles. Luciano felt obliged to comply. When Ben Siegel headed out to California, Jack Dragna ran the show in LA. From his prison cell, Luciano sent word to Dragna that Jack would have to step down and answer to Siegel. Jack Dragna resented his demotion from the start. Dragna’s second in command, Mickey Cohen, saw Siegel’s arrival as a chance to move up the ladder.
Siegel landed in LA with Moe Sedway in tow. Sedway was a childhood friend and the level head. Benjamin Siegel was immediately bewitched by Hollywood. Bugsy sent word to Lansky that Dragna was welcome to continue running gambling and prostitution. Siegel was interested in the movies. The mob was bringing in a fortune controlling extras and stage-hands, extorting payment from the studios by threatening to bring productions to a halt. Siegel left Moe Sedway to the mechanics and he spent his own time rubbing elbows with the movie stars. Before long Benny Siegel was a fixture at the biggest Hollywood events. Mickey Cohen often at his side.
Siegel was on top of the world, it seemed as if nothing could bring him down.
Then he met Virginia Hill.
And stumbled upon Las Vegas.
By early 1947, Siegel was standing on feet of clay.
He had sunk millions of New York mob dollars into the Flamingo in Las Vegas, which opened on Christmas Eve 1946 with less than overwhelming success. Lansky dispatched Moe Sedway to Vegas to check out the deteriorating situation. And while Siegel and Sedway spent more and more time away from the coast, Jack Dragna and Mickey Cohen jockeyed for control of criminal operations in LA. When a few million dollars of New York money invested in the Flamingo turned up missing, Siegel was suspect. Ben was ordered back to Los Angeles to do some explaining.
On June 19, 1947, Virginia Hill and Ben Siegel both left Las Vegas. Hill was on her way to Europe, by way of New York, carrying a black briefcase which may or may not have held two million dollars cash. The briefcase may or may not have been turned over to Meyer Lansky in New York to buy her life. Siegel returned to Beverly Hills to wait for word of a meeting to discuss the Las Vegas fiasco.
On the twentieth of June, Siegel was assassinated.
By the following day, Moe Sedway had taken control of the Flamingo on behalf of Meyer Lansky, while Los Angeles became the battleground for a power struggle between Jack Dragna and Mickey Cohen.
“Who won that battle?” Jimmy asked.
“It was a tug of war, lines were drawn. Dragna had ‘friends’ in the LAPD, Cohen had allies in the Sheriff’s Department. In Hollywood, there was a struggle over who would control extras and stagehands. Dragna backed the existing union, Cohen stood behind the Teamsters. Lansky stayed clear of it. Luciano had been deported to Sicily a year before Bugsy was killed, he probably didn’t figure in the move on Siegel. Lansky had a very soft spot in his heart for Siegel, so it�
��s doubtful he ordered the hit; though he may have looked the other way.”
“It seems as if Dragna, Cohen and Sedway are at the top of the short list,” Jimmy said.
“No one believed Moe Sedway was involved in the murder of Bugsy Siegel. The two men went back a long way. Dragna was actually better off with Siegel still breathing and he knew it. Siegel let Dragna control the gambling, drug and prostitution operations and Mickey Cohen couldn’t make any moves against Dragna while Siegel was alive. On the other hand, with Bugsy gone, Cohen lost almost all of his inroads to the Hollywood power brokers. In time, Cohen and Dragna both gave up on Hollywood and concentrated their battle on controlling the more lucrative criminal pursuits. Drugs and gambling. For the first time in decades the film industry was free from gangland extortion and film studio heads were finally able to make some really big money.”
“Including Reginald Masters?” Jimmy asked.
“Particularly Reginald Masters,” Rollins said, “and he’s outlived all of them. Why do you ask about old man Masters?”
“Because Masters has outlived them all, benefited from the demise of Warner Oland and Bugsy Siegel and moved into the mansion they both once resided in. And because a young woman who looks an awful lot like Virginia Hill was seen in front of that mansion recently,” said Jimmy. “That’s why.”
“How old a young woman?”
“Twenty, twenty-five tops,” Jimmy said.
“Virginia Hill died in sixty-six,” Rollins said. “If she had a daughter, and I’ve never heard of one, the woman would have to be closer to thirty.”
“How about a granddaughter? What if she ran to Europe in forty-seven to have a child? There could possibly be a granddaughter, twenty years old or early twenties.”
“Are you thinking Benny Siegel’s granddaughter?”
“It’s feasible.”
“At Reginald Master’s mansion? Recently. Why?”
“That, my friend, is the sixty-four thousand dollar question. And Lenny Archer died trying to answer it.”
Jackson Masters lay awake in his bed, his wife asleep at his side, his two children sleeping in rooms across the hall.
He had been at the Criminal Courts Building for most of the afternoon. He had been summoned in for a mandatory meeting of all members of the District Attorney’s Office to discuss immediate strategies with regard to the arrest at Rockingham the day before.
It was the very last place he had wanted to be on a Saturday afternoon. He was at his desk, shortly after the meeting, when his telephone rang. A woman caller.
The woman would not identify herself. She claimed to have knowledge which tied Masters to Detective Raft of the County Sheriff’s Department. She added that she had been questioned by a private investigator who had appeared very interested in any connection Raft may have had to the DA’s Office. She had decided to withhold her knowledge until she had the opportunity to talk with Masters, to ask his advice about what to reveal. She said she was looking for good reasons to forget what she knew and she would give Masters sometime to think about it. She would call again on Monday to find out how many good reasons Masters could give her for keeping silent. Masters easily translated her message. How much money was it worth? Before he could say a thing, the woman had disconnected.
Masters’ wife stirred beside him. He closed his eyes and feigned sleep. When she became still again, his eyes popped open. He stared up at the ceiling. He was fairly certain the woman was Pam Walker, a restaurant manager who had been brought in for questioning after Raft’s death. He had warned Raft against using a civilian. He guessed it was Jimmy Pigeon who’d been asking questions. He was also fairly certain Walker knew nothing specific, but the last thing he needed was to have his name connected in any way to the name Frank Raft.
Masters stared up at the ceiling. He had no idea what he would do when the woman called again, or how he would be able to get any rest until she did.
The two men sat looking out at the dark lake. Jimmy had accepted Rollins’ offer of the guest room for the night and would head back to Los Angeles in the morning. They had shared the best part of a fifth of Scotch over the past four hours, grilled a couple of steaks, baked potatoes and talked old cases as they worked on the bottle. Rollins now sat silently. He seemed lost in thought.
“What’s on your mind, Roger?” Jimmy asked.
“I was in Sacramento this morning, got back here just before you arrived. A reunion of California veterans of the 79th Infantry Division for the fiftieth anniversary of our combat engagement in Normandy. June 18, 1944. We planned the event nearly a year ago. Thirty-seven veterans of the campaign showed up and we were virtually ignored. Little if any press leading up to the event this past week, no TV cameras or major daily reporters present. Hundreds of lives were lost in the weeklong assault on Fort du Roule south of Cherbourg, but the media is much more interested in the double homicide in Brentwood. Not to trivialize the loss of those two lives, but I’m guessing there were dozens of innocent people killed that same day who no one but family is going to hear much about. I don’t know, Jimmy, I just don’t get it. Maybe I’m getting too old, out of touch, but it seems odd to me. Celebrity victims have always stolen the headlines. Now celebrity suspects and perpetrators are going to do the same. I suppose what I’m saying is, don’t expect much interest in the death of an anonymous private investigator or a local journalist.”
“I think I can count on one LAPD detective and one Santa Monica newspaper editor to pay attention,” said Jimmy.
“I hope you’re right,” Rollins said. “What now?”
“Try to find the girl.”
A clock inside the house chimed twelve times.
“Jesus, where does the time go,” Jimmy said. “I think I’ll turn in. I can’t remember what day it is.”
“It’s Sunday now,” Rollins said. “Funny.”
“What’s that?”
“Monday is the twentieth of June. The anniversary of the day Bugsy Siegel met his maker.”
Seth Cady sat on a worn leather armchair holding a baseball bat. The chair had been sloppily repaired, back and seat, with silver duct tape. The baseball bat dripped blood onto the cracked linoleum floor. The room he sat in was on the third floor of a run-down apartment building in downtown Oakland.
Cady had arrived an hour earlier, direct from nearly twenty-five years in a prison cell.
Time added for bad behavior.
In 1958, eighteen-year-old Seth Cady and two older men had robbed a jewelry store in Santa Clara. Steve Gold and Al Linger were apprehended with the stolen jewelry, fleeing the scene. Seth got away. The following day, Seth’s older brother, Will Cady, turned himself in as the third man in the jewelry heist. Will Cady needed an alibi, something to put him a good distance away from the fatal shooting of a police officer in Los Angeles on the same night.
A few months before Linger, Gold and his brother were released from prison in 1970, Seth was convicted and locked up for shooting and nearly killing a clerk during a liquor store robbery in Nevada. Cady got word about his brother’s death a month later. Killed, execution style, no suspects.
Less than twelve hours after his release, Seth Cady had found Al Linger in the seedy Oakland tenement.
It took less than an hour for Cady to learn Steve Gold had died of cancer five years earlier and to learn the name of the man who had visited Gold and Linger twenty-four years earlier asking questions about Seth’s brother shortly before Will Cady was killed.
Seth stood, struck the dead body of Al Linger one more time, tossed the baseball bat onto the duct-taped armchair, grabbed the loaded handgun and the four hundred dollars in cash he had found in Linger’s dresser drawer and left the apartment.
Cady walked the few blocks to the bus terminal and he purchased a one-way ticket for Los Angeles to search for Jimmy Pigeon.
LEAVING LAS VEGAS
June 19, 1947.
Ben Siegel and Virginia Hill both left Las Vegas, both for the last time, in opposite
directions.
Forty-seven years later. June 19, 1994.
Jimmy Pigeon woke early Sunday morning. Disoriented at first, not sure where he was. He heard the distinct sounds of surf and wildlife coming off Lake Tahoe through the open window of a guest room in Rollins’ house. He felt anxious, in a hurry to get back to Los Angeles to discover what, if anything, Vinnie Strings and Ray Boyle had learned.
Rollins was preparing breakfast when Jimmy came down. He insisted that Jimmy stay long enough to eat.
“Why do you seem so certain your partner’s death has something to do with Siegel’s death, a shooting that’s never been considered anything more than a mob hit?”
“All I’m really sure about is that Lenny’s death had nothing to do with drugs. Lenny’s reference to Chan in a postcard, the photograph of the Virginia Hill look-alike, the fact that the man who Frank Raft killed in the barber shop was named Sedway. Something in or about the mansion figures in; it’s too much for coincidence.”
“And remind me, Jimmy, what’s driving you, considering the fact that even Lenny’s brother seems satisfied the men who actually murdered Lenny have both been killed?”
“It’s not enough, Roger. You taught me that yourself. You don’t have to pull the trigger to be guilty. Both you and my father taught me to never bail out, to follow up to the end. Lenny was beaten and tortured. Tully and Raft are not the end of it. And it’s not just Lenny. At least five others have been murdered beside Tully and Raft. Ray Boyle was nearly killed and more may be in danger.”
“Keep that in mind, Jimmy,” Rollins said.
Twenty-four hours after leaving Las Vegas, Seth Cady ate breakfast at the counter of a greasy spoon in downtown Los Angeles, appropriately named the Terminal Diner, after the overnight bus ride from Oakland. As he worked on his bacon, scrambled eggs and potatoes, he leafed through the phone directory under private investigators.