by James Ellroy
The Wolf trusted Salvy. He was a discerning beast. He rarely bestowed approval.
“Let me indulge a hunch here. Did you and your stout Kameraden kill sixteen Jap submariners shortly after New Year’s?”
Salvy smiled. “Yes. I received a tip that they were arriving, and carrying a great deal of money. Their plan was to impersonate Chinese men and perform sabotage in and around Los Angeles. We killed the men but did not find the money on the submarine.”
Dudley winked. “Captain Vasquez-Cruz and I found the money and split it. My half was ten thousand dollars. I will acknowledge the sixteen scalps you took, and donate that amount to the Sinarquista war chest.”
Salvy raised his glass. “Meine Kameraden.”
Dudley raised his glass. “Do you have intelligence on a naval attaché named Kyoho Hanamaka?”
“No.”
“Are you privy to plans for an air attack on L.A. later this month?”
“No.”
Dudley said, “I pledge 15% of the profits from my admittedly criminal ventures to our shared cause.”
Salvy said, “I am most humbly grateful, although I must risk your displeasure with two requests.”
“Which are?”
“That you do not permit the sale of heroin to Mexicans, and that you quash all mentions of the appellation ‘Sinarquista’ as they might pertain to this scurrilous investigation of yours.”
“I am in no way displeased, and I am happy to comply.”
Salvy lit a cigarette. “These ventures of yours. Do they proceed apace?”
“Yes and no. I’ll need to speak to Governor Lazaro-Schmidt soon. I require some assistance in the matter of exporting guest workers.”
Salvy laughed. “You deftly omitted the word wetback in my presence.”
Dudley laughed. “Lazaro-Schmidt. I’m assuming that you’ve met the man?”
“I have. He is un hombre simpático, if un hombre quite covetous and greedy. I find his relationship with his sister disturbing, though. She is a concert violist, and quite lovely. I must accede to decorum here and say no more.”
Their waitress hovered. She poured tequila shots and hootchie-eyed dos hombres guapos.
Dudley downed his shot. He got that quick burn and glow. The Wolf licked his glass.
Salvy coughed. “If I were to tell you that I have plans to perform what might be termed ‘cosmetic sabotage’ on U.S. soil—gadfly gestures only—will you intercede and seek to expose me?”
Dudley leaned close. “You must solemnly promise that no American men, women, or children will be harmed.”
Salvy leaned close. “Yes, you have my most solemn word.”
Dudley sighed. “I’ll profess vexation here. Gadfly gestures aside, I’m wondering what the world will be like when all of this is over.”
Salvy twirled his shot glass. “Perhaps Europe and the East will realign. Perhaps the Hitler-Stalin pact will be reinstated as a hedge against chaos and the new American hegemony. I despise communism but quite often fail to see it as fascism’s antithesis. A conference transpired in Ensenada, in the fall of ’40. It was comunista-fascista and purportedly amiable. I have heard that numerous top dogs attended. It was the high-water point of the Nazi-Soviet Pact, and postwar escape strategies were discussed. It was reportedly proclaimed that the war would kill both Stalin and Hitler, along with all paper currencies, save the U.S. dollar. All those in attendance were urged to hoard gold.”
Gold. Ever synchronous. The Spiritus Mundi speaks.
Dudley said, “My fascist brother.”
Salvy said, “A Catholic hegemony. We must stake our loyalty there.”
The Wolf jumped on the table. He cocked his head and howled his love for Salvador Abascal.
63
(LOS ANGELES, 1:00 P.M., 2/9/42)
The lab buzzed. Joan called it Japwerk. She worked Japwerk all day and all night.
Two chemists logged in radios. They scrawled serial numbers and searched for stashed contraband. Their gig was straight Jap internment. Joan’s gig was Jap internment plus klubhaus job.
She culled Rice and Kapek’s Jap busts. She logged arrest and court dispositions. She wrote it all up and cross-referenced it. She determined custody status. She noted habeas writs. She tagged current known whereabouts.
She pulled mug shots and clipped dispo bulletins. It was advance work. Thad Brown had ordered massive roundups. His goal was massive lineups. He’d subdivided the suspect types.
In-custody Japs. Released Japs. Known cholos. Jazz-club denizens. Perverted hepcats. Nazi-esque types.
We’ll run lineups. We’ll parade the above. 46th Street locals will orb them. Have you seen these dinks at or near the klubhaus?
The job was twelve days in. They’d turned zero at-the-scene eyewits. Thad decreed one last shot at that.
Joan worked. Joan worked, distracted. It was drudgewerk and scutwerk. She worked, bored and gored.
That hate mail. The Back-to-Africa screed. Preacher Mimms, gold heist–linked. The Red Swastika. Salvador Abascal critiques the Ensenada conclave.
Fall 1940. Nazi and Russian hotshots meet. They discuss potential world-war outcomes and ponder potential means of ascent. She read the tract three times. The Nazis and Reds huddle and conclude this:
They must exploit a new postwar gold standard.
That tract gored her. Gold, gold, gold. Gold in the vox populi. Gold, omnipresent. Gold, subsuming her.
She read the Mitch Kupp tract. Her own past and dead father subsumed her. It wasn’t a hate tract. It was scholarly and altogether nuts.
Joan worked. Joan worked, distracted.
Bill and Dudley. Bill’s jealous outburst. Weepy Bill and imperious Dudley. She wants Dudley more than Bill. She wants to talk gold with him. Dudley savaged Orson Welles. The wunderkind saw her naked. It drove Dudley to brutal rage. Bill would have sulked and hexed Welles from afar.
Joan werked. She logged evidence and ran circuits to the Alien Squad pen. She snagged file carbons and checked the Jap-arrest index. She ran into Lee Blanchard, outside the upstairs cot room. He stood by the file bank and flashed a shit-eating grin.
“We turned a habitué. Breuning and Carlisle grabbed him. They’ve got him in #3. Jack H. said you could watch.”
“Who is he?”
“His name’s Harold John Miciak. Breuning told me he’s a lulu.”
Joan stashed her carbons and walked to sweatbox row. #3 was spy-mirrored. A hall speaker spritzed sound. The hallway was SRO.
Jack Horrall. Sid Hudgens. Catbox Cal Lunceford. They played Mr. First Nighter and pressed their snouts up to the glass.
Joan joined them. Sid woo-woo’d her. Call-Me-Jack said, “Hi, Red.”
The sweatbox ran standard. Twelve by twelve, cork-baffled walls, floor-bolted table and chairs. Miciak sat and feigned nonchalance. Breuning and Carlisle hovered. They phone-booked dipshit’s shoulders and head.
The hall speaker spritzed. Breuning said, “Come on, give.” Carlisle said, “We can keep this up all day.” Miciak sustained swats. His forehead and cheekbones grew welts.
He was too thin. He looked used up. He sported a hairnet conk and shaved whitewalls. He wore a gone jacket with wide-wing lapels.
He raised his hands. “Feel free to desist. I always like to absorb some hurt before I grovel and spill. It reestablishes my white-man credentials.”
Breuning and Carlisle desisted. They hankie-wiped their brows. Breuning fed Miciak a cigarette. Carlisle lit it. Call-Me-Jack nudged Joan. Some floor show, huh?
Breuning straddled the spare chair. Carlisle sat on the table. Miciak blew smoke their way. Hudgens and Lunceford yukked.
Miciak cracked his knuckles. “You had some questions about that crib on 46th, right? You were seeking the lowdown from an informed perspective.”
Breuning
said, “Come on, give.”
Carlisle said, “We’ll give you a lunch chit for Kwan’s Chinese Pagoda if you give good.”
Miciak picked his nose. “That’s a swell inducement.”
Breuning said, “Give. We’re not getting any younger here.”
Miciak scratched his balls. “I would call the 46th Street spot an arsenal of democracy and a monument to free-thinking egalitarianism. It’s what you might variously call a fuck joint, a blowhole, a jam-session crib, and a redoubt for thugs, goons, and the pro-Nazi crowd—but hep niggers, nigger jazz musicians, Mexicans, Mexicoons, and square-ass cops are welcome, too. Let me not tread lightly here. You’ve got jazz fiends, hopheads, boozehounds, terp men, bennie eaters, untold numbers of right-wing blowhards and Jew-haters, along with some name jazz guys. You’ve got coons like Wardell Gray, Dexter Gordon, and Charlie Parker—not to mention white cats like Stan Kenton, Art Pepper, and Bart Varsalona. You’ve got coon cops bringing in colored whores they popped for Pros-1 and fucking them upstairs. You’ve got mud-shark white girls who crave dark meat cavorting with shine smut-film actors with king-sized dicks, while the late Georgie Kapek takes pictures and peddles them for fifty cents apiece.”
Miciak stopped flat. Miciak mugged at the mirror. Miciak performed a smut-film trick. He stuck out his tongue and stretched it up to his nose.
The hallway crowd slack-jawed it. Joan lit a cigarette. Call-Me-Jack popped digitalis. The Sidster sucked his pocket flask.
Breuning said, “Don’t stop now.”
Carlisle said, “We’ll throw in free-drink coupons for Kwan’s.”
Miciak lit a cigarette. “Let us not euphemize or tread lightly here. You might call this exalted spot a lewd liaison lair. You’ve got divorced cops with no place to live paying the late Wendell Rice a buck a night to sleep on the floor. I would call the late Rice and Kapek the overlords of this hallowed joint. They’re selling confiscated Jap flags and crib sheets for the war-hire cop exams, not to mention confiscated Jap swords, daggers, and guns to these Mexican zoot punks out in Boyle Heights. The late Sensei Rice showed me a bayonet that must have been solid gold, all inlaid with this hammer-and-sickle design, made out of real rubies—”
Joan dropped her cigarette. It bounced off the mirror ledge and singed her skirt. She fretted her gold cuff links, and—
“—and you got this kid Link Rockwell. He’s on leave from the Navy, and he’s this jig preacher’s pal. He sells tickets to these sex shows upstairs—and you got lots of pro-Nazi, pro-Jap, and pro-Sinarquista talk, and lots of Sieg Heil, and hate tracts being passed around, and traffic cops fixing tickets for a buck a pop, and auto-theft cops selling hot cars and counterfeit license plates, and—”
Joan lit a fresh cigarette. Her hands shook. She looped back to the gold bayonet. She fretted one gold cuff link clean off.
Jack H. grabbed her arm and steered her down the hall. He was I-need-a-drink trembly and pre-heart-attack flush.
“It’s the guns, Red. It’s all bad, and the guns are the worst of it. Check the Alien Squad’s gun-confiscation roster and note all of Rice and Kapek’s filings. Cross-check that against the lab’s ballistics-comparison log, and pray that we’re not too far exposed and deep in the hole. Do it now, and I’ll owe you a very large favor.”
* * *
—
Kay was late. Joan hogged their regular booth at Dave’s Blue Room. She sipped her third scotch mist and chain-smoked. She respooled Japwerk and Jackwerk. It comprised a six-hour sprint.
She logged 161 guns. They ran the gamut. Revolvers/automatics/rifles/shotguns. Rice and Kapek seized them all. They were all missing.
Gone meant gone. They’re not in the lab vault. They’re not in the Central Station and/or DB vault. There’s no backup paperwerk. They haven’t been test-fired. There’s no ballistics-comp sheets.
She did the werk. Lee Blanchard kibitzed. He laid out THIS BIG SNAFU and the upshot.
Breuning and Carlisle hard-nosed Miciak. They took him to the Lyman’s sweat room and black-gloved him. He gave up relative bupkes. He refused to rat his other klubhaus confreres. He said that Rice and Kapek bought off a slew of Newton Street blues, and quashed reports of klubhaus misconduct. The haus thrived behind quasi-official approval. Local yokels ignored it. Preacher Mimms owned the property. He greased the yokels with fat Christmas baskets. They recruited saps for his back-to-Africa shuck. The klubhaus was protected and sacrosanct.
Breuning and Carlisle beat Miciak half-dead. Thad Brown halted it. He drove Miciak to Queen of Angels and pledged a waltz on two 459 warrants. Miciak was half-dead and relieved.
She werked. She reported to Jack Horrall. Call-Me-Jack pledged his large favor. It floored her. She got floored twice in one day. Miciak blabs. Wendell Rice shows off this gold bayonet. Pinch me, I’m—
There’s Kay. She’s wearing her houndstooth-huntress ensemble. The black beret clashes. The saddle shoes are pure Kay.
Joan said, “You’re late.”
Kay slid into the booth. “Ask me why I’m late.”
“Why are you late?”
“I’m late, because I ran into Jack Horrall. He told me the whole story three times, and to his credit, he never once mentioned your legs. I’m late, because I was looking for a certain item in sterling silver.”
Joan laughed. “He served drinks in his office. He said, ‘Don’t you dare cry,’ and ‘Quit blushing, you’ve earned it.’ ”
Kay laced up their hands. “What’s the first thing you thought of?”
“You know what it is.”
“Tell me. Confirm how well I’ve come to know you.”
Joan sipped scotch and bitters. The room went too warm. She reached over and reset Kay’s beret. She’d seen Elmer J. do it. He always pulled up the stem.
“I’ve achieved rank parity with William H. Parker. It’s the first thing that popped into my head.”
Kay lobbed a small jewel box. Joan snagged it on the fly. She snuck a look and saw two captain’s bars.
“Don’t you cry, sister. Don’t you dare blush, because you’ve earned it.”
Joan wiped her eyes. “My academy class convenes in October. I’ll ace the pistol range. I used to shoot rabid bats, back at home. I’d nail them from forty yards out.”
Kay lit a cigarette and killed off Joan’s cocktail. The jewel box glowed. The silver bars threw sparks.
“Go home and put some words on paper. Send one up for the ones you left behind. They don’t have your grit, and they’ll never have your luck.”
* * *
—
She prayed for a blackout. Army searchlights strafed the sky, just so. She wanted to count moon craters. Empirical science meets God. Tell me what all this means.
No blackout. Easy come, easy go. It scotched her shot at cheap metaphysics. She took Kay’s advice instead.
She scrawled up her diary. She described the Big Snafu and critiqued her antithetical lovers. She pondered the second gold bayonet. She wrote her name and rank twenty times.
The doorjamb creaked. She looked over. Bill Parker stood in the doorway. He’s in uniform. He’s half-gassed and grinning. He’s cock-of-the-walk smug and proud.
Joan said, “You’re just standing there. You usually walk straight up and kiss me.”
“Don’t look so disappointed. I pulled a coup at the grand jury today. I could have gone home and told my wife, but I came here instead.”
Joan tossed him a breath mint. It hit his gun belt and fell to the floor.
“You could have told Kay Lake. Your wife ignores you, and Kay lusts for you. I don’t really consider your wife much of a rival.”
“You’ve got no beef with Kay. The two of you are friends now.”
Joan tossed a breath mint. It hit his badge and fell to the floor.
“Tell me about your coup, and I’ll tell you ab
out mine.”
Bill weaved and steadied himself. The doorway held him up.
“I nailed those Fed fuckers, and I nailed Jack Horrall. I pulled some wire mounts in December, when the probe was first announced. I gave up Jack H. and told the jury that he ordered it. They granted me full immunity. They were going to rubber-stamp no-bills. Now, they’re going after Jack, Fletch Bowron, Ray Pinker, and the Jamie kid for real. I’ll be the star witness, and I’ll be sitting in Jack’s chair inside six months.”
Joan tossed a breath mint. It hit his necktie and fell to the floor.
“Bravo, Bill. Now, go tell Kay and Dudley. Then all the ones you care about will be up to speed.”
“You’ve got a lot of goddamned nerve, bringing Dudley up to me.”
Joan said, “I’ll tell Dudley. It’s what you really want. Everything you do is about you and Dudley, so why should I deny you that joy?”
64
(ENSENADA, 8:00 A.M., 2/10/42)
He returned to the charnel house. Dudley ordered a search. He picked through scorched cadavers and phone-line debris.
Forty-two bookies perished. Most were Fifth Column–adjunct. Their deaths served no purpose. No hard leads accrued.
Ashida sifted rubble. Juan Pimentel searched for lockboxes and safes. A.M. arc lights were up. Statie goons watchdogged the location.
It was the one Baja relay spot. It immolated in ten seconds flat.
Ashida sifted plaster dust. Blasted teeth jammed up his net. He relived the explosion. Fleeing bookies trampled him. He pumped his shotgun and blew their limbs off. He stumbled out the door.
He replayed it awake. He redreamed it asleep. He smelled it right now.
Ashida sifted dust. He snared wood husks and scorched Bakelite chunks. Crazy Juan waved a skull and made kissy sounds. The plaster grit expelled gastric juices. Forty-two men burned alive.
A wedding band dropped from his sift net. It was pure gold.
Joan called him last night. She relayed the Miciak mess. She stressed Wendell Rice and his gold bayonet.