by James Ellroy
“She couldn’t have! Janet was a hophead! She was on dope all the time we lived together—”
Dudley swung his hand in a quick arc, catching Engels on the cheek. Stunned, Engels just stared at him like a reprimanded child.
“I thought you picked up lots of women, lad.”
“I did. I mean, I do.”
“Then how do you know you didn’t pick up one of these women?”
“I…I don’t…”
“Have you killed that many, Eddie?”
“I never killed any—”
Dudley swung his open hand, this time harder, opening up facial cuts inflicted the night before. Engels flailed his arms but remained in a sitting position. His face had shown uncomprehending fear and anger, but now it moved into outright grief. He knew we were closing in.
“Leona Jensen, remember her?” Dudley asked.
Engels hung his head and shook it. Dudley loosened his tie. I moved to the mattress.
“I called Seattle this morning,” I said. “I talked to your dad. I told him we suspected you of killing five women. He said you didn’t have it in you. He said you were a good boy. I believed him, and I believe you. But Lieutenant Smith doesn’t. I’ve told him that there’s no hard evidence to link you to those women he mentioned. I think there’s only one case against you, and I think we can close that one out if you answer the lieutenant’s questions truthfully.”
Engels took his chin off his chest and looked at me dolefully, like a dog waiting to be praised or hit. When he spoke his voice had gone effete again: “Did you really talk to Dad?”
“Yes.”
“What did he say?”
“That he loves you. That your mother loves you, that Lillian loves you most of all.”
“Oh, God…” Engels started to sob.
Dudley spoke up. “All righty, Mr. Engels. Does the name Margaret Cadwallader mean anything to you?”
Eddie’s whole face started to spasm. He brought his voice down to baritone and said, “No,” tremulously.
“No? We have a dozen eyewitnesses who placed the two of you together at the racetrack and at nightclubs on the Sunset Strip.”
Engels shook his head frantically.
“The truth, Eddie,” I said. “For your family’s sake.”
“We da-dated,” Engels said.
“But you broke up?” I continued for him.
“Y-yes.”
“Why, killer?” Dudley bellowed. “Because she wouldn’t let you hit her?”
“I never killed anybody!”
“Nobody said you killed her, homo! Did you hit her?”
“I didn’t wa—she wasn’t…”
“You didn’t what? You fucking degenerate!” Dudley reached his arm back and swung it at Engels in slow motion.
I caught it in mid-swing, grabbing Dudley’s wrist and holding it above my head. “I told you no more of that, Smith!”
“Goddamnit, Inspector, this punk is guilty and I know it!”
“I’m not so sure. Eddie, one thing troubles me. Your Ford convertible was seen parked on Margaret Cadwallader’s street on the night she was strangled.”
Engels moaned, “Oh, God.”
I continued: “What was it doing there?”
“I…lent it to her.”
“How did you get it back?” Dudley interjected.
“I…I…”
“Did you ever fuck her at her apartment, lover-boy?” Dudley bellowed.
“No!”
“That’s funny, we got your fingerprints from her bedroom.”
“That’s a lie! I never been fingerprinted!”
“You’re the liar, lover-boy. You were fingerprinted when the Ventura cops raided a homo hangout you were drinking at.”
“That’s a lie!”
Dudley went into a laughing attack. Perfectly modulated, his musical laughter rose and fell, diminuendoed and crescendoed like a Stradivarius in the hands of a master. “Ho-ho-ho! Ha-ha-ha!” Tears were streaming down his red face. It went on and on while Engels, Breuning, and I stared at him, dumbstruck. Finally, Dudley’s laughter metamorphosed into a huge, expansive yawn. He looked at Breuning. “Mike, lad, I think it’s time to set lover-boy straight, don’t you?”
“Yes, I do, Lieutenant.”
With all eyes on him, Dudley Smith dug into his coat pocket and pulled out Maggie Cadwallader’s diamond brooch. There was absolute stillness in the sordid little room. Dudley smiled demonically and Eddie Engels’s face broke out into a network of throbbing blue veins. He placed his head in his hands and sat very still.
“Do you know where we got that, Eddie?” I asked.
“Yes,” he said, his voice gone high.
“Did you get it from Margaret Cadwallader?”
“Yes.”
“Did you pay for it?”
Engels started to laugh—high, feminine laughter. “Baby, did I pay for it! Oh, baby! Pay and pay and pay!” he shrieked.
Dudley butted in: “I’d say Margaret paid for it, lover-boy—with her life. You beat ’em, you kill ’em—and now you steal from ’em. Do you desecrate their corpses, lover-boy?”
“No!”
“You just kill them?”
“Ye— No!”
“What were you going to do with that brooch, you filth? Give it to your lezbo sister?”
“Aaarrugh!” Engels screeched.
“Did your unholy sister teach you to eat cunt, lover-boy? Did you hate her for it? Is that why you hate women? Did she piss on you? Did she make you lap her on your knees? Is that why you kill women?”
“Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes,” Engels screamed, his voice a shrieking, cacophonous soprano. “Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes!”
Dudley threw himself on Engels, lifted him from the bed and slammed his back repeatedly into the wall. “Tell me how you did it, killer! Tell me how you croaked lovely Margaret and we won’t tell your mommy and daddy about the others. Tell me!”
Engels went limp as a rag doll in Dudley’s hands. When Dudley finally released him he crumpled to the bed and moaned hideously.
Dudley pointed to the bathroom. I followed him in. There was a giant cockroach crawling out of the filthy bathtub. “Cock-sucking cockroaches,” he said. “They sneak into your bed at night and suck your blood. Dirty cocksuckers.” He bent down and let the bug crawl onto his hand, then he closed his fist around it and squashed it into a greenish-yellow pulp. He rubbed the oozy remains on his trouser leg and said to me: “He’s about to crack, lad.”
“I know that,” I said.
“You’ll be the one to give him the final push.”
“How?”
“He likes you. He’s queer for you. His voice goes queer whenever you’re close to him. You’re his savior, but you’re about to become his Judas. When I loosen my tie, I want you to hit him.” I looked into Dudley’s mad brown eyes and hesitated. “It’s the only way, lad.”
“I…I can’t.”
“You can and you will, Officer,” Dudley hissed in my face. “I’ve had enough pretty-boy prima donnaism from you! You want a piece of this collar and you’ll crack that fucking pervert in the face, hard! Do you understand, Underhill?”
I went cold all over. “Yes,” I said.
* * *
—
We reassembled in the little room that now looked as battered as Eddie Engels himself. Dudley gestured to Mike Breuning’s steno pad: “Every word, Mike.”
“Right, skipper.”
I brought Engels a glass of water. Knowing what I had to do, I didn’t compound it by being nice to him. I just handed him the water, and when he gave me a smile, I gave him a deadpan in return.
“All right, Engels,” Dudley said. “You admit to knowing Margaret Cadwallader?”
“Yes.”
“Yes.”
“And hitting her?”
“No, I couldn’t. She…look, I could turn snitch for you.” Eddie tried desperately. “I know lots of people I could turn over. Dope addicts, pushers. I know some stuff from my navy time.”
Dudley slapped him. “Hush, handsome Eddie. It’s almost over now. We’re going to fly your lovely sister, Lillian, down here. She wants to talk to you about lonely Margaret. She wants you to confess and spare your family the anguish of an indictment on five counts of murder.”
“No, please,” Engels whimpered.
“Lieutenant, I won’t have it,” I said angrily. “We’ve got no evidence. All we’ve got is the Cadwallader croaking. We can indict on that.”
“Oh shit, Inspector. We can get indictments on at least five counts. We can go the whole hog! Let’s get Lillian Engels down here, she’ll drum some sense into little Eddie’s head, like she’s always done!”
“Please, no,” Engels whimpered.
“Eddie,” I said, “do your parents know you’re homosexual?”
“No.”
“Do they know that Lillian is a lesbian?”
“No. Please!”
“You don’t want them to find out, do you?”
“No!” He screeched the word, his voice breaking. He wrapped his arms around himself and rocked back and forth.
“We can spare them, Eddie,” I said. “You can confess to Margaret, and we won’t file with the grand jury on the others. Listen to me, I’m your friend.”
“No…I don’t know!”
“Sssshhh. Listen to me. I think there were mitigating circumstances. Did Margaret taunt you?”
“No…yes!”
“Did she remind you of Lillian? Of all the bad things in the past?”
“Yes!”
“Evil things? Dreadful, awful things that you hate to think about?”
“Yes!”
“Do you want it to be over?”
“Oh, God, yes,” he blubbered.
“Do you trust me?”
“Yes. You’re nice. You’re a sweet person.”
“Then tell me about Margaret.”
“Oh, God. Oh, please, God.”
I put my hands on Engels’s knee. “I care, Eddie. I really do. Tell me.”
“I can’t!”
Out of the corner of my eye I saw Dudley loosen his necktie. I steeled myself, then got up and faced Engels. He looked up at me, beseeching me with wide brown eyes. I curled my hand into a fist and swung it full force at the side of his nose. It cracked, and blood and cartilage fragments burst into the air. Engels grabbed at his bloody face and fell back on the mattress.
“Confess, you goddamned murderer!” Dudley screamed.
I stood there, shaking. Engels rolled to his side on the mattress and blew out a noseful of blood. When he spoke his voice was resigned and sorrowful. “I killed Maggie. No one else. It was all mine. No one else’s. I killed her and now I have to pay. She didn’t deserve it, but she had to pay, too. We all have to pay.” Then he passed out.
Breuning was scribbling furiously, Dudley was grinning like a sated lover, and I stood there trying to drum up some exhilaration for my compromised victory.
No one spoke, and then I realized I had to move fast to salvage even this compromised glory. I left the room abruptly, then ran across the street and found a pay phone. I dialed Lorna at work.
“Lorna Weinberg,” she answered.
“This is Fred, Lorna.”
“Oh, Freddy. I—”
“He confessed, Lorna. To Margaret Cadwallader. We’re taking him in. Probably to the Hall of Justice jail. I don’t think it’s a grand jury case. I think he’ll plead loony. Will you get the papers ready?”
“I can’t until I have the arrest report. Freddy, are you all right?”
“I do…yes, sweetheart, I’m fine.”
“You don’t sound fine. Will you call me when Engels is booked?”
“Yes. Can I see you tonight?”
“Yes, when?”
“I don’t know. I might be wrapped up tonight writing reports.”
“Just come over when you’re finished, all right?”
“Yes.”
“Freddy?”
“Yes?”
“I…I’ll…tell you when I see you. Be careful.”
“I will be.”
* * *
—
Engels was in handcuffs when I got back to the interrogation room. He was wearing tan slacks, sandals, and a Hawaiian shirt that Carlisle had brought from his apartment.
Breuning was taking down his statement: “…And I panicked. I thought I heard noises from upstairs. I hopped out the kitchen window. I was afraid to get my car. I ran to some bushes by the freeway ramp. I hid out for…hours…then I took a cab home…” Engels’s voice trailed off. He looked at me and spat blood on the floor. His nose was purple and hugely swollen, and both his eyes were black.
“Why, Engels?” Breuning asked.
“Because someone had to pay. It shouldn’t have been someone as sweet as Maggie, but it just happened.”
Dudley clapped me on the back. “Mike and I are taking Engels to the H.O.J.J. You go home. We have to corroborate on our statements. You were brilliant, lad, brilliant. The sky’s the limit for you once this thing has been sorted out.”
“Wrong, Dudley,” I said, making my move at last. “I’ll go with you. It’s my collar. You can file your report, and Engels’s confession, but it’s my collar. I filed my report with the D.A.’s office the day before we arrested Engels. It tells the truth from the beginning. You’ve been meaning to fuck me out of this collar and I won’t have it. You try, and I’ll go to the papers. I’ll tell them your little Dahlia story and how you kidnapped Engels and beat the shit out of him. I’ll throw my career down the toilet if you try to take this collar away from me. Do you understand?”
Dudley Smith had gone beyond red to a trembling purple. His big hands twitched at his sides. His eyes were tiny pinpoints of hatred. Spittle formed at the corners of his mouth, but he didn’t utter a sound.
* * *
—
I beat them downtown.
The steps at the Hall of Justice were already jammed with reporters. Old Dudley, in true ham fashion, had prepared them for his arrival.
I parked on First off Broadway and stationed myself on foot on the corner to wait for my colleagues and our prisoner. They rounded the corner a minute later, and stopped for the light. Breuning glowered at me from the driver’s seat. I opened the door and got in; Dudley and Engels were sitting in the back.
Dudley said, “You’re through, Judas,” and Engels hissed at me through gritted teeth.
I ignored them both and said, bluff-hearty in an imitation of Dudley’s brogue: “Hi, lads! Just thought I’d drop by for the booking. I see the press is here. Grand! I’ve got a lot to tell them. Dudley, have you heard of the latest anthropological discovery? Man descended not from the ape, but from the Irishman! Ho-ho-ho! Isn’t that grand?”
“Judas Iscariot,” Dudley Smith said.
“Wrong, Dud. I’m the Irish Santa Claus. Beggora!”
We pulled to the curb in front of the maze of reporters, and I pinned my badge to the lapel of my wrinkled suit coat. Dudley shoved the handcuffed Engels out the door of the car, and we both grabbed his arms and led him up the steps to the Hall of Justice. Someone yelled, “Here they are!” and a mob of shirt-sleeved newshawks descended on us like vultures, throwing questions indiscriminately amidst the explosion of flash bulbs.
“Dudley, how many did he get?” “Did he confess, Dudley?” “Smile, killer! This is for the L.A. Daily News!” “Tell us about it, Dud!” “Hey, it’s the cop who killed those two Mexican gunse
ls. Talk to us, Officer!”
We waded through them. Engels kept his head down, Dudley beamed for the cameras and I kept it stoical. We were met in the vestibule of the building by the head jailer, a sheriff’s lieutenant in uniform. He led us to an elevator, where a deputy shackled Engels’s legs. We rode up to the eleventh floor in silence. We watched as Engels was uncuffed and shackled, issued county jail denims, and led to a one-man security cell. Safely locked in, he stared at me one last time and spit on the floor.
The lieutenant spoke: “You men are wanted immediately at Central Division. The chief of detectives himself called me.”
Dudley nodded, stone-faced. I excused myself, took the steps down to street level, and walked out the front door, to be mobbed by reporters. Some recognized me from my previous notoriety and hurled questions as I made for the sidewalk.
“Underhill, whose arrest is it?” “What happened?” “Dudley says this guy’s a loony. Can you make him for any unsolved jobs on the books?”
I ignored them and pushed myself free as we hit the sidewalk. I ran all the way to Central Division headquarters on Los Angeles Street, four blocks away. Sweating, I tore through corridors, stopping for a moment to compose myself before I knocked on the door of Thad Green, the chief of detectives. His secretary admitted me to his waiting room. Dudley Smith was already there, sitting on the couch, smoking. We stared at each other until the buzzer on the secretary’s desk rang and he said, “You can go in now, Lieutenant Smith.”
Dudley walked into the pebble-glass-doored inner sanctum, and I waited nervously, furiously thinking of Lorna in an effort to quiet my mind. Dudley emerged half an hour later, walked right past me and out the door.
A voice from within the chief’s office called, “Underhill” and I went in to meet my fate. The chief sat behind his huge oak desk. He acknowledged my salute with a brisk nod of his iron gray head. “Report, Underhill,” he said.
* * *
—
When I finished, still standing, the chief said, “Welcome to the detective bureau, Underhill. I’ll issue a statement to the press. The D.A.’s office will be in touch with you. I want a full written report in two hours. Don’t talk to any reporters. Now go home and rest.”