Shakedown

by Gerald Petievich

  "Thanks," Novak said. He ambled to a cigarette-burned dinette table, discreetly avoiding a yellowed brassiere that was lying on the floor. He sat down. The table was a sea of wadded-up Kleenex surrounding a ceramic bowl filled with a dark liquid. Next to the bowl was an empty box of hair dye, a sheet of newspaper, a Playgirl magazine.

  "I'm assigned to the Federal Organized Crime Strike Force. We investigate extortion committed to collect debts. It's against federal law."

  "Well, you must have a hell of a lot of business in this town."

  "May I call you Tex? The nickname was in the police report."

  She came to the dinette table and flicked an ash into a plastic ashtray brimming with purple-lipsticked butts.

  "Might as well," she said nervously. "That's what everybody else calls me." She pulled a chair back from the table, sat down.

  "Tex, there's a chance that you might get called before a federal grand jury to testify about who broke that man's leg."

  "I got nothing to testify to because I didn't see a damn thing. I was drunk."

  "You were working that night."

  "That doesn't mean I wasn't drunk."

  "Funny things happen around a bar all the time. I wouldn't blame anyone for not wanting to get involved. Particularly when it involves some heavies ... leg breakers."

  Tex removed the towel covering her wet hair. With cigarette dangling, she dipped the comb in the bowl, then ran the dripping implement through her hair. She tapped the comb on the newspaper. It made a line of black dots. "If somebody don't pay their gambling debts in this town and get theirselves in trouble it's none of my damn business." She set the cigarette in the ashtray, took a few more comb strokes.

  "The U.S. attorney-in-charge of the Strike Force is making a big issue out of the case," Novak said. "He wants to make an example out of witnesses like yourself who refuse to make statements against leg breakers."

  She stopped combing. "What do you mean, make an example?"

  "He says that if people won't do their citizen's duty he'll swear them in in front of a federal grand jury anyway, and if they refuse to testify he'll throw them in jail for contempt." Novak reached into his suit jacket, took out a subpoena. "I'm sorry. This isn't my idea." He set the subpoena on some wadded Kleenex next to the bowl of dye.

  Her eyes were on the subpoena. "There's people around the Plush Pony who'd kick my ass if they so much as heard I was within a mile of a federal grand jury. They would kick my ass till my nose bleeds. Or worse.

  "Maybe the subpoena will make it easier for you. No one could blame you for testifying to keep yourself out of jail."

  "Don't give me that thing. I'll leave this town before I'll testify."

  "This is a federal investigation. If you left town a material-witness warrant would be issued for you. You'd be arrested and brought back."

  Tex tossed the comb down on the newspaper. "I haven't done anything wrong," she said, her voice cracking. "Why should I have to testify?"

  Novak sat there a moment as if he was making up his mind. Then he picked up the subpoena. "Could I trouble you for a cup of coffee?" he said.

  "Coffee?"

  "I could sure use a cup."

  Tex left the sofa. She found a clean cup in the cupboard, spooned in instant coffee, added water, set the cup inside a microwave oven. She closed the oven door. The microwave hummed. She looked at him. He slipped the subpoena back into his suit jacket.

  "I don't know the man who got his leg broke. He was in the bar and that's all I know," she said, facing the oven.

  "I'm not interested in the victim, only in the leg breakers."

  "The FBI man who interviewed me that night...Mr. Tyde? He wasn't very interested. He only stayed a few minutes."

  "Do you know a man named Ray Beadle?"

  "No."

  The microwave oven stopped humming. She opened the oven door, took out the coffee, set it in front of him. He thanked her.

  "He hangs out in the Plush Pony," Novak said.

  "I'm a cocktail waitress. I may have served him. You take sugar?"

  Novak shook his head. "Black's fine." He sipped the bitter coffee. "A lot of ex-cops hang out there, right?" he said.

  "That's why I like working there. I don't have to worry about getting raped," she said, sitting down at the dinette table. "And if I wanna make it with someone I don't have to worry about getting AIDS." She picked up her comb, dipped it.

  "If you could help me clear up a few things, maybe it wouldn't be necessary for you to testify. Whatever you tell me would be just between the two of us."

  "I don't know."

  "I'm trying to give you some slack. If I wasn't, I could just serve the subpoena on you and let nature take its course.

  "Ray Beadle is a real honest-to-Christ gentleman. He and I had a few drinks one night and ended up here at two in the morning. Rather than trying to put the make on me, he just had a drink and left. I thought that was damn nice. It's not often I get treated like a lady."

  "Have you heard the name Eddie Sands?"

  "I may have."

  "What's he into?"

  With her hair hanging dark and wet, Tex reached for her cigarette. It had gone out. She relit the butt, blew smoke. "I don't have no idea what he's into. Eddie ... well, I guess you know he just got out?"

  "Right."

  "He could have taken Ray down with him when he got arrested. Ray told me that."

  "On what?"

  "They were into some shakedowns and stuff when they were on the police department. They would take a guy's money and then let him go."

  Tex picked up the bowl, carried it, moved across the room to the kitchen counter. She poured the hair dye over the dirty dishes piled in the sink.

  "What else do you know about Eddie Sands?"

  "He just got married to a woman named Monica Brown. She pulls confidence games. That's what I've heard."

  "What variety?"

  "Phony stock and investments, I think. Eddie's really in love with her. I can tell that kind of thing. God knows

  I've been in love enough times myself " She took a big drag from her cigarette and smashed it into the ashtray.

  "Thanks for taking the time to talk to me," Novak said as he stood up. He made his way to the door.

  "That's all? I'm not gonna have to testify?"

  "Tex, never say that a fed hasn't done you a favor."

  SIXTEEN

  It was Sunday.

  Eddie Sands, whose body clock was still on prison time, woke up early and spent an hour or so reading the newspaper, sipping coffee, and munching cinnamon toast, things he had often dreamed of doing when he was in prison.

  Monica, barefooted and wearing a loose-fitting robe, wandered through the living room into the kitchen. She picked up the coffeepot off the kitchen stove, poured a cup. She yawned. "I had a weird dream last night. I was floating across Las Vegas in a hot-air balloon and people were shooting at me with rifles, trying to kill me. The bullets were coming through the floor of this wicker-basket thing under the balloon, so I was hiding in a corner of the basket." She blew on the coffee.

  "What finally happened?" he said, after a while.

  "I was pressing so hard against the side I could feel the wicker biting into my face. The bullets kept popping through the floor closer and closer to me ... ping, ping, ping. All of a sudden, the side of the basket breaks open and I go tumbling out. As I was falling through the air I was trying to scream, but I had no voice." She sipped coffee.

  A telephone rang. Sands picked up the receiver.

  "Is this Edward Sands?"

  "Who's calling?"

  "Special Agent Novak, FBI. I'd like to get together with you for a few minutes today."

  "What about?" Sands said after a pause.

  "I'd prefer to talk in person. Can you meet me in my office at the federal courthouse ... say in an hour?"

  Another long pause.

  "I guess so," Sands said.

  "I'll give your name to the guard at
the back door." The phone clicked. Sands eased the receiver down to the cradle. "The FBI wants to talk to me."

  "Oh, no. Oh, God."

  He left the table, moved across the living room to the window. "If they were going to arrest me they wouldn't have called. They would have come here."

  "This is Sunday," she said. "They wouldn't be working on a Sunday if it wasn't something important." She came to him. "What if it's Bruce O'Hara? What if he went to them?"

  "The feds like to play head games. They like to fuck you around. There is nothing to worry about," he said, though he knew there was.

  He showered, shaved, and dressed carefully, taking his time because he didn't want to let the feds think he had hurried to meet them. But on the other hand, he didn't waste a lot of time. He certainly knew it wasn't a good idea to piss off a cop.

  As he drove into the rear parking lot of the modern Las Vegas Federal Courthouse, Sands checked his wristwatch. It had been slightly over an hour since he'd received the phone call. He parked his car in the near-empty lot and made his way to the rear door of the building. A uniformed building guard unlocked the door from the inside. Sands gave his name. The guard, a sleepy-eyed black man, led him to the fourth floor. The guard knocked on a door marked "Organized Crime Strike Force," then withdrew. Almost immediately, Novak opened the door. He introduced himself courteously, without offering his hand, then led Sands into an interview room off the reception area. He closed the door behind them.

  "I hope I didn't alarm you," Novak said, as they both took seats at the table, which had nothing on it except an ashtray.

  "What's up?"

  "Your name came up during the course of an investigation," Novak said offhandedly. He shrugged off his suit jacket, hung it neatly on the back of a chair. "Kinda hot in here. Care to take off your coat?"

  Sands, who was becoming irritated, shook his head no.

  "You were just released from Terminal Island."

  "That's right. And I used to be a Metro detective, and I just got out of the joint, and it's Sunday, and you called me down here to ask me some questions. So go with the questions."

  Novak nodded politely. "I checked your file," he said. "You were convicted of doing some favors you shouldn't have done for Tony Parisi-for giving him inside information on police investigations, fixing cases for people who worked for him. He must have trusted you."

  "That was before I got caught."

  Calmly, Novak folded his hands. "What are your plans now that you're out?"

  "Haven't made any plans."

  "Have you seen Tony Parisi since you were released?"

  "I've seen a lot of people since I got out. I don't keep a list."

  "Tony's done real well in the past couple of years. He's used his muscle in the right places. In fact, you could say he's got a lock on the town. The casinos are bending over for him. In Las Vegas he's the man to see."

  Eddie Sands drummed his fingers absentmindedly, then thought better of giving away the fact that he was nervous. He stopped.

  "Having been a Metro detective," Novak continued, "you know how it is when somebody gets big in town. The analysts in D.C. write up an organized-crime profile. Then they lean on the Strike Force to do something about it. They want results."

  "What exactly are we talking about?"

  "Pardon me?"

  "Am I being investigated?"

  "No, just Tony Parisi."

  "Then what say we cut the smokescreen bullshit and get to the point?" Sands said.

  "I apologize for taking your time on a Sunday," Novak said. "The reason I called you down here was to give you an opportunity to assist in the Parisi investigation. We're looking for someone who can help us put the picture together on Parisi."

  "Okay, you're looking for a super-snitch who can do Tony Parisi. Well, I don't know anything about Parisi, and even if I did, I would rather eat a hundred miles of shit than rat on someone. See, nobody likes a stool pigeon. Not cops, not crooks. Nobody in the whole wide world, including you, has any respect for a goddam rat."

  "I'm talking about paying a sizable reward for each piece of information, plus expenses. Putting you on the federal payroll," Novak said.

  "You must think you're talking to some clown you picked up off the street."

  "No, I think I'm talking to a guy with a lot of street sense. That's one thing cops like you and me have that no one else in the world can buy-street sense. We know how the game is played."

  "Being an informant is too far for me to go, Novak. That's the name of that motherfucking tune."

  Novak took a government ballpoint pen from his shirt pocket. He set it on the table, spun it like a propeller. "Somebody will."

  "Huh?"

  "What I'm saying is that somebody will go that far. Somebody who has a problem and wants it solved, somebody who wants to make a lot of government reward money. Somebody who Tony stepped on, maybe a competitor, will come out of the woodwork and set Tony up.

  Eddie Sands cleared his throat. He feigned being attentive, the way crooks used to with him when he was on the police department.

  "It happened to Al Capone," Novak continued. "It happened to Joey Gallo. And it'll happen to Tony Parisi. One of Tony's friends will turn, and Tony will go to the joint."

  Eddie Sands gave a scornful laugh. "So what? Do I give a shit about Tony Parisi? Go ahead and lock him up.

  "Before Tony is locked up, there'll be a big grand-jury investigation. People will be named. A lot of them will go to prison. The question is, on which side of the witness stand would you rather be?"

  "When I was a cop I used to give that same little lecture to bullshit people into becoming informants," Sands said. "I had a lot of luck with it." He considered laughing as he made his point, thought better of it, and just smiled instead.

  "How did you treat those who wouldn't cooperate?" Novak said. His expression was icy.

  There was a long silence. They stared at each other, neither one flinching or blinking.

  "I guess that means you're gonna try to squeeze me into being an informant," Sands said.

  "Thanks for coming in," Novak said.

  Sands rose, moved to the door. Novak kept his eyes on him all the way out of the room.

  Outside in the courthouse parking lot, Red Haynes, having used a Slim Jim lock-picking device to gain entry, sat in the front seat of Sands's car. He examined the miscellanea in the glove compartment, carefully piling the items on the seat next to him in the same order as he had removed them, all the while keeping his eye on the door of the building that faced the parking lot.

  When he found something important, he noted it on a pad which he kept in his shirt pocket. So far, the list read:

  1. One receipt for a necklace costing $3,467.57 from David and David, a jewelry store located in the Hilton Hotel on the Strip.

  2. One map of Beverly Hills, bearing a penciled circle on Rexford Drive.

  3. Car-rental papers reflecting that Sands had rented the car in Los Angeles under his own name.

  4. One credit-card sales receipt reflecting a purchase of gasoline at a service station in Beverly Hills.

  He was just about through when the building guard exited the door of the courthouse, looked in his direction, and putting two fingers to his lips, gave a whistle, then hurried back inside.

  SEVENTEEN

  Haynes shoved the items back in the glove compartment, stepped out of the car, and closed the door carefully. As he moved quickly across the parking lot and around the side of the building, he saw the guard open the door. Eddie Sands stepped out and headed toward his car.

  At the front door of the courthouse, which faced Fremont Boulevard, Red Haynes let himself in with a key.

  Novak was waiting in the lobby. "Come up with anything?"

  Haynes pulled out his pad. "Not a hell of a lot. He rented the car a week before he was released. Filled the tank in Beverly Hills once. Has a Beverly Hills map with a mark on Rexford Drive. He bought a thirty-five-hundred-dollar necklace t
wo days ago at the Hilton."

  Novak nodded.

  Haynes shoved the notebook back in his shirt pocket. "What did he have to say?"

  Novak moved to the glass door facing the street. He watched as Eddie Sands drove out of the parking lot and entered the stream of traffic on the busy boulevard. "He says he doesn't want to play informant. He's a stand-up guy.

  "Now what?"

  John Novak was in a trance. "Parisi helped Sands get out of the pen," he said. "Parisi mentions the name Bruce O'Hara in front of Bruno. Sands gases up his car in Beverly Hills, while he's on prison work release."

  "Dope. It must have something to do with dope," Haynes said. "Bruce O'Hara is probably a dope addict, like everybody else in Hollywood. A nose-packer. Who the hell knows?"

  Novak shrugged, continued to stare at nothing in particular. "So let's ask him."

  The next day, in the desert about a hundred miles east of Los Angeles, Novak made a left turn off the interstate highway and, following the directions given him over the phone by Bruce O'Hara's Hollywood secretary, continued along a dirt road leading toward the base of a small mountain range. Haynes pointed to a solitary, weather-beaten single-story dwelling far in the distance, amid sagebrush and cacti.

  "That's the kind of place I'd like to live in when I retire," Haynes said.

  "There's nothing out here."

  "That's the point. No neighbors. No relatives. No crooks. No Elliot. Just peace and quiet twenty-four hours a day."

  "You'd go crazy."

  "I already am crazy."

  Novak said nothing.

  "Can you imagine this bearded wimp who's never worked a day in his life getting paid to sit behind a desk and tell people to run if they feel stress?"

  To Novak's right, near some large sand dunes, was a formation of film trucks and other studio vehicles. Novak maneuvered the G-car over to the trucks. He stopped in front of a middle-aged uniformed studio cop who was rubbing a piece of ice across his sunburned forehead. Novak showed his badge. "FBI. We're here to see Mr. O'Hara." Without replying, the studio cop turned and marched toward a sand dune where a group of camera and sound technicians were arranged around three men costumed in the kepis and short-sleeved khaki uniforms of the French Foreign Legion. He waited as a man with a clapper moved in front of the camera. The studio cop said something to one of the men. The man turned in the direction of the G-car.