Little Mr. Wright said: “Well, now, that is more like it. I want to see my boy. At the hospital, they wouldn’t let me see Junie.”
“No harm in that, but the hospital was right. Without permission from this department, or the district attorney, no one but his lawyer can see a prisoner. How was he, Mr. Leonard?”
The lawyer had said very little so far; which is not the way of lawyers. Since this guy might very possibly be suing me for letting little Junior Wright get shot, I was anxious to know him.
Now, to my amazement, his face was getting red. “I didn’t see him,” he said.
The amazement on my face was not put on. “The hospital must be crazy,” I said. “There’s no way of keeping a lawyer from his client. Didn’t you tell them that?”
“Mr. Wright, Jr., is not my client,” Leonard said.
“He won’t have anything to do with us,” old Mr. Wright said. “He thinks I ruined his life. He’s a very bad boy, lieutenant.” And Mr. Wright began to cry.
Mr. Leonard mopped his face with a very large, very white handkerchief. I found Jack’s box of tissues in his drawer, and gave it to Mr. Wright to cry into.
Then I reached for the phone. “Get me the County Hospital, prison ward. I want to talk to whoever has charge of our prisoner, the one we booked as John Davis. His real name is Something-or-other Wright, Junior.”
Mr. Wright said: “Fitzroy. Our first name is Fitzroy.”
“Fitzroy Wright, Junior, Del,” I said to De Laune on the phone. I hung up.
“As you say, Mr. Wright, Junior is a bad boy. I caught him last night watching my wife take a bath, through the window. Since we’d just had a girl assaulted here –”
What I Was going to explain was why Norman Patterson had shot Junior; but I never had a chance. “Oh, Junie would never do that,” Mr. Wright cried. “He’s very popular with the girls. He can get all the girls he wants! Why, you can’t believe how many of them there used to be, calling him up, chasing him all over the place. It’s what I told those policemen –”
Mr. Leonard came to life. He cried: “Stop it, Mr. Wright. This is a policeman you’re talking to!”
Then they both shut up. I said: “You’d better keep talking.”
Mr. Leonard gave me a lawyer’s look – trained to give nothing away, but to remain genial and frank-looking at the same time. “You have Mr. Wright, Jr.’s fingerprints, lieutenant. You know he has no record.”
“The hell he doesn’t, counsellor. Los Angeles makes him six times, five drunk and disorderlys, one habitual drunkard. Long Beach makes him twice, drunk in a public place, and indecent exposure. There’s another exposure charge out of Santa Monica.”
Mr. Leonard said: “I know those police charges. Making water in an alley.”
I grinned: “You’re not Junior Wright’s lawyer, why worry? In court, they could be made to stand up, together with the peeping Tom charge.”
Mr Leonard said: “Nonsense,” but his client started to cry again.
“You’d better talk to me,” I said. “What you tell me I can use while I’m still in a good mood. What I have to dig out I might get when I’m hot and tired.”
“Treat me just as if I worked for you,” Mr. Leonard said. “Soft talk, police soft talk.”
Then the phone rang. I picked it up, and Mac said he had Dr. Eastman up at County. I said: “Doctor, I’ve got the prisoner’s father here. So far as our department goes, we have no objection to him seeing his son.”
“Oke, lieutenant,” Dr. Eastman said. He had an Eastern voice, New York or Philadelphia, and a lower class one. He sounded tough and cheerful. “Want I should put a bug under the bed?”
“What?”
“I’m a hi-fi fan,” Dr. Eastman said. “Not that being an intern gives me much time. I got microphones and things. I’d be glad to bug the bed for you.”
“No, thanks,” I said. But it was a temptation.
“I doubt if Junior will see the old man,” Dr. Eastman said. “He wouldn’t see the lawyer this morning. Called him the worst crook in Stockton. Sent his temperature up a notch.”
“How is the prisoner?”
“Not good,” the intern said. “Dehydrated, devitaminized, and then shocked from loss of blood. Now, your other case, that prisoner Norman Patterson, whoever shot him would make a surgeon. I couldn’t go through a thigh with less damage if I had a scalpel or an electric knife.”
“Thanks, pal. That was my work.”
“You’re good,” the doc said. Then, off the phone he said: “What?” and when he got back to me, said: “County detective says Patterson’s daughter came to, but she won’t talk. Says she saw nothing.”
We exchanged so-longs, and I hung up. “You heard that,” I said. “You get to see your son whether you cooperate with me or not. It he wants to see you, which I gather he doesn’t.”
“You could order him to,” Mr. Wright said. “You’re a police officer.”
“I could order you to talk, but you wouldn’t. If your lawyer here told you I could order a prisoner to talk to his family, get a new lawyer.” And I gave Mr. Leonard my brightest smile.
“You know I didn’t say that,” he said.
“No. You know the law. Mr. Leonard, what was Junior – no, when was Junior picked up on a possible assault charge?”
He said: “You have his record.”
“And it doesn’t show there. But there are times when a man’s arrest doesn’t show. When he’s dismissed and his family has influence.”
Mr. Leonard said: “Let’s get back to the hospital, Mr. Wright.”
They left without shaking hands.
Now I could start looking for Walt Adams. But instead I leaned back in Jack’s chair, and thought. Junior Wrights face was not scratched; his hair was not the same colour as that found in Nora Patterson’s fingers. He was not the man she’d fought with.
But he was the man who was shot in my custody. There still might be a case against me. And the worse Junior’s record was, the cleaner I looked for bringing him into custody. . . .
Jack Davis came in. “Call me a coward,” he said. “I hung out in the radio room till I saw they were gone. . . . What’s the matter, Andy?”
“Our wino friend was once picked up on a criminal assault charge. Somebody, probably mouthpiece Leonard, got the thing off the blotter.”
Jack shrugged. “We know he isn’t the guy who attacked Nora,” he said. “Walt Adams is.”
“Last night, in the garage at my place, we were sure the other way around.”
Then I remembered that I was in Captain Davis’s chair. I got up and moved to the seat Mr. Wright had had.
Jack Davis made the swivel chair creak as he flung himself into it. “What the hell are you trying to say, Andy? That the lab up at County goofed?”
“Did you meet that Sergeant Ernen? He doesn’t goof.”
Jack’s face began to glow red. “You can’t have it both ways. Me, I don’t put a hell of a lot of faith in lab work; and on the other hand, you and this Ernen convinced me the little wino couldn’t have done it. What do you want?”
“A clean case that will stand up in court. I want money to go up to Stockton and get the whole story on Junior Wright.”
Jack Davis slammed his flat hand down on his desk. “This is a small department.”
“Mr. Bartlett wired that he’d stand behind us.”
“Behind you,” Jack Davis said. He was jealous; he was the chief, he didn’t like the idea that I was getting too prominent. And maybe he kept remembering I’d been his superior in the Army, was still a grade over him in the Reserve. He stood up now, and pounded a clenched fist into the palm of the other hand. “Mr. Bartlett is not going to be paying our way forever,” he said. “The people who own houses here will be the taxpayers. It’s up to us to cooperate with them.”
I looked at him. He had been my friend a long, long time. “You joined the gun club, Jack?”
He returned my stare. “I am chief of this force.”
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And there we had it. Bailey Spratt had gotten to him. I didn’t know how; maybe by offering him extra pay as an arms instructor to the gun club. Maybe by flaunting his political influence. Being an Inspector of Deputies was bigger than being chief of Naranjo Vista. . . .
But my last friend was gone.
“Okay, Jack,” I said. “Want to use my resignation?”
The red had been ebbing; now it flooded back into his full cheeks. “Don’t be a damned fool, Andy. What’ll you do? Go back into the Army and be sent overseas while Olga takes a room in a college dormitory?”
“I’ve been handed a case. I want to run it out my own way. Okay, you don’t want to spend money; but I’ll pay my own way to Stockton, when I finish up a thing or two here. We’ll take up the resignation when I finish this case.”
“Put out an APB on Walt Adams, and you can close it tonight. And forget the resignation.”
“Walt Adams has a gun,” I said. “If he’s crowded, he’ll kill himself.”
Jack Davis swung around his chair until he was looking out the window at peaceful, sunny Naranjo Vista. Over his shoulder, he finally said: “Well?”
“I don’t close cases that way.”
Jack Davis shook his head. “This damned suburb has got you soft. You’re a cop, not a Boy Scout. With Walt Adams dead and the case closed, we can all go back to getting along with each other. He was your friend, sure, but look what he did.”
“If he did it.”
“His own wife, his own doctor admitted he had scratches on his face. And he lammed. He’s not your pal the gentle schoolteacher any more; he’s a felon.”
“When a jury says he is.” But I sounded sour, even to myself. I’d gotten mad, and because of that I was talking like a – I don’t know what. Police experience told me you couldn’t always go by the book, but here I was, talking like a book cop. . . . That was it. I had always had the greatest contempt for book cops. The way to work is to do what you have to do, and then fix the record to show you did it the regulation way. I said: “If you want to put out an APB on Walt, do so. But do it yourself, or order me to do it in writing. If you want the investigation of Junior Wright stopped, put that in writing, too.”
Jack Davis said: “Did you ever try cracking walnuts with that nose of yours?” and before he’d finished, his phone had rung. He picked it up.
The voice on the other end was hearty; I could hear it clearly. It said: “Hi, chief, this is your friend Bailey Spratt. . . .”
I walked out of Jack Davis’s office, and left the pieces of an old friendship on the floor.
My car was out back; I told the duty sergeant I was going home, and went. Olga was there. Usually I managed to pick her up at the bus stop when she got home from school, but this wasn’t usually.
She wasn’t alone. Her pal Hal Levy was in my living room, and they were drinking coffee together. I stood in the middle of the living room floor and said: “Get out of here.”
Hal Levy blinked. Olga said: “Take your hat off, Andy.”
I took my hat off and threw it on the couch. Then I took off my coat and threw it after the hat. I said: “Doctor, get out, or I’ll throw you out.” My wife was regarding me with a strange, strange look.
Hal Levy stood up. He said. “Andy, you need some rest. What have I done? I might even have been acting within my ethics.”
“You covered for Walt Adams. That’s withholding evidence from the police. Okay. But Walt Adams has scrammed, taking a gun with him, and some cop is liable to be shot picking Walt off. Or Walt is just as liable to turn the gun on himself.”
“More liable,” Olga said. “Walt wouldn’t hurt anyone.”
“Don’t give me any of your psychology,” I said. “Walt Adams assaulted the Patterson girl!”
“Stop yelling at me,” Olga said.
Now I was not only a Boy Scout, but the den mother was bawling me out; I’d been demoted to Cub. I said: “Okay, okay.”
Hal Levy opened his mouth, looked at me, and shut it again.
Olga said: “If Walt lost his temper, he might hit somebody. But assault – it’s out of the question.”
“What do you know?”
“I’m a psychologist,” Olga said. “Also, I’m a girl. I know.”
“Oh, my good Lord.” I went across the room and picked up my hat and jacket, carried them out. Over my shoulder I said: “Hang around, doc. You and the little woman can discuss my psychopathic personality.”
That wasn’t a bad crack; it made me feel a little better. A shower shoved me along the road. I noticed that Olga had pulled the shade in the bathroom all the way down and fastened it.
When I came out, Olga had on a pair of black slacks and a cherry-red sweater and had pulled her hair back in a long pony tail. She said: “There’s coffee hot. Take some.” Dr. Hal Levy had dematerialized.
“What in the world are you doing in those slacks? I didn’t even know you owned them.”
“Oh, I got them once when I wanted to look like Jane College. Instead, I decided they made me look forty instead of thirty.”
“Twenty-seven,” I said, automatically.
She grinned. “You’re feeling better. Shall we go?”
“Huh?”
“Skid Row,” Olga said. “I don’t look like I’m dressed for the opera, do I?”
I shook my head. “How in the world –”
“Where else would Walt be?”
“Tijuana. Oregan. Down at San Pedro, looking for a boat to China.”
Olga said: “Do you really believe that, Andy? Walt isn’t running away; he’s the type that would be anxious to be punished. But first he has to debase himself. Walt’s got a limited imagination and a limited body of information. He wouldn’t know any place lower than Skid Row in Los Angeles.”
“I got a pretty extensive body of information, and I wouldn’t know any place much lower myself.” I realized I was still popping my eyes at her. “You figured this all out with psychology?”
“Sure,” Olga said. “Well, the clothes you got out helped me.” I had pulled on my gardening slacks and an old Army windbreaker. “How did you figure it out?”
“Some things I don’t figure. I just go by past experience.”
“One way or the other,” Olga said, “we manage to have togetherness. How much of a job is it to search Skid Row?”
“Leadpipe cinch. About a mile long, maybe a hundred bars. And the guys drift, they don’t stay in one place. We drift, too; we’ll see every bum who hasn’t passed out, in the course of a couple of hours. They just drift. I don’t know why.”
“I’ll explain it to you sometime,” my psychologist wife said. “And don’t say I’m not going. You’re Walt’s friend, but you’re a policeman. If he sees you, he might do something foolish. If I put the collar on him, he’ll go along like a little angel.”
I followed her to the front door.
Chapter Fifteen
Skid Row is no longer on Main Street in L.A.; it has moved a couple of blocks east. We left the car in a parking lot, and hit the skids.
The road to hell is not glamorous. It has neon lights in all colours – rich reds and deep greens and electric blues and hard, sunny yellows – and it has noise – the noise of juke boxes, of three-men cowboy bands, of squabbles in the bars that don’t pay for music, but depend on their neighbours.
It had smells, certainly. Smells of unwashed men, of Woolworth-perfumed women, of greasy hamburger frying in its own ample fat, and of potatoes frying in never-changed cottonseed oil, and over all the smell of cheap, sugary wine and of vomited, half-digested beer.
It has no sights, unless people are sights; it’s just the one sight over and over again, the slack face, the giggling mouth, the unlaughing eyes, the faint gleam of cold-sweat on pallid skin. There are no males and no females among the bums; just things that used to have sex.
We tramped from bar to bar, drinking bar whisky, water on the side, a tight-pants Jill and her out-at-the-knees Jack.
You don’t get drunk on one shot of bar whisky on Skid Row. The stuff’s eighty proof, all right, or maybe eighty-six, but the sham glass has a thick bottom, and the line stops at half an ounce.
But you get a headache, or at least I do, but then, liquor has seldom done a thing for me.
Olga was different. A martini girl, she and her friends need a few to get going on their endless, happy, learned discussions. Eight of these drinks were just about the equal of two home-mixed martinis. I figured; and after a block or two, Olga was animated and beginning to enjoy herself.
“Look at that one,” she said. We were just crossing a street, about to embark on our third dreary block. A wind had come up, and papers, dust and frying smells whipped around us.
“That one,” was a very young man. He ambled along with his mouth open, a little shine of saliva at the edge of his lips. His filthy hula shirt was out around his hips, his cotton cord slacks were shiny with grease. His hard eyes were on the ground; they shone under a mat of blond hair.
Behind him a pace or so ambled another lad, almost as spectacular, but a little cleaner.
“Shut your mouth, Jack,” I said. “You’re over-acting.”
The hard eyes glinted at me a moment, and then he had ambled past. But the mouth shut. “I’ll show you their car,” I said to Olga.
“What’s this all about?”
“Undercover cops,” I said. “Rookies assigned to the Narcotics Squad, trying to make a buy. Any sober guy would spot them, but some of the small-time pushers are hopheads or winos themselves.”
“But they’d never arrest anyone worth catching.”
“I know. But they keep the small-fry on the go, and besides, it’s a good way of shaking out rookies who aren’t really going to like police work once they’re trained. Don’t give it more than a passing glance, but see the hand-pencilled number on that licence plate? Police car. Here. Watch how these cops don’t look at it.”
Los Angeles, like most southwestern cities, does not go in for foot patrol, a modernization I don’t agree with. But Skid Row can’t be handled from a car; so down the street came two more rookies, uniformed ones, walking tall and proud in their summer blues, guns at their belts, nightsticks in their hands, badges freshly polished.
A Nice Girl Like You (Lt. Andy Bastian Mysteries Book 2) Page 13