Horse had grown up in Smoke Tree and lived there all his life except for the years he was in the service during the Korean War. When Horse had been at Smoke Tree High School, a lot of his classmates talked about getting away from “this hick town.” Not Horse. It was the only place he wanted to live. He was a small town person to his core. Smoke Tree may have been run down, provincial, cloyingly insular, dilapidated and drab, but it was his home. He loved the place and intended to live there for the rest of his life.
Even though they had only been apart since early morning, Horse was looking forward to seeing Esperanza, the wife he loved so much it sometimes made his heart ache. They had been sweethearts since junior high. They married as soon as he got home from Korea.
But first, he went by the office. When he walked into the substation, all was quiet. The relief dispatcher was at his desk doing the Los Angeles Times crossword puzzle.
“Evening, Myles.”
“Evening, Lieutenant. Good trip?”
“Good as could be expected. Glad to be home.”
He walked into his office and turned on the lights.
His desk was covered with call-back slips.
He shuffled through them and put them in the order in which the calls had come in.
He walked out the door and called to the dispatcher.
“Myles, any idea what all these calls were about?”
“Fred told me everyone who called said it wasn’t an emergency, but they all wanted to talk to you, not him.”
Horse walked back into his office and looked through the slips again. He soon realized there was a pattern to them. The first call was from the far north end of town, and last one was from the southern city limit. The other part of the pattern was that they were all from business stretched out along the highway.
He examined the slips again to see if he could find any business owners who might still be at work.
He picked up the slip for William Milner, owner of the largest market in town. Horse knew Billy often worked late on Friday evenings, calling his managers in the other markets and convenience stores he owned in Parker and Blythe.
He dialed the number. It rang for a long time, and Horse was just about to give up when a gruff voice said, “The market is closed.”
“Hello, Mr. Milner. Horse here. Thought I might find you in the office.”
“Evening, Horse. When I called earlier today your dispatcher said you were in San Bernardino. Thanks for calling me back.”
“What can I do for you?”
“Just wanted to report something strange that happened at the store today.
A couple guys came in. They were well dressed: slacks, shirts and ties, blazers. They approached all the cashiers. They showed each of them a picture of a pretty, young oriental woman and asked if they had seen her. None of them had.
But they didn’t stop there. They started walking through the store and showing the picture to customers.
Dave Sodermeyer was up here in the office. He looked out over the floor and noticed what was going on. He went downstairs and talked to the guys. They gave him some song and dance about being private investigators helping a family find a missing daughter.
The older of the two showed Dave the picture and asked him if he’d seen the woman. Dave glanced at it and said he hadn’t.
The younger guy leaned over, took the picture, shoved it in Dave’s face and said, “You didn’t look at it good. Look again.”
Dave told them to quit bothering customers and leave the store.
The younger guy looked like he wanted to make a fuss, but the older one said, “Don’t mind my partner. He’s a little eager,” and they left.
Dave told me there was something about the two that made him not believe their story. And he described the last look the younger guy gave him as pretty hostile.
It seemed like an odd thing. I thought you should know about it.”
“Thanks, Mr. Milner. I’ll look into it.”
When Horse hung up, he picked up the slips and studied them again.
One was for the ’76 station. Horse knew Jim Garret often worked the Friday evening shift at his station.
Garret answered on the first ring.
“Smoke Tree ’76, Jim speaking.”
“Hi, Mr. Garret. Horse here.”
“Oh, hey, thanks for calling back.
Had a couple of guys in here today. Something about them just didn’t seem right.”
“Two guys, well-dressed, with a picture of a woman?”
“Yeah. How’d you know?”
“Just got off the phone with William Milner. They were in his store.
How’d they act at your place?”
“Well, it was like you said, they had a picture. They showed it to me. Young, oriental woman. Real pretty. Looked like some kind of professionally done shot.
Anyway, the passenger showed it to me and asked if I had seen the woman. When I said I hadn’t, the driver told me to take another look. And he didn’t say it in a friendly way.
I wrote down the license number.
The car was a black, Chrysler 300. Nevada license WLP 1537.”
“Good thinking, Mr. Garret. We’ll run the plate.”
“Say, the dispatcher said you were in San Berdoo.”
“Yes. Just got in.”
“Well, thanks for taking the time to return my call.”
“Anytime. ‘Night, sir.”
Horse turned off the lights in his office. As he walked by the dispatcher, Horse gave him the license plate information.
“Myles, run this plate for me. Put the information on my desk.”
“Will do, Lieutenant.”
“Hope we have a quiet night.”
“I’m sure we will, until the bars close.”
The next morning, rested from a good night’s sleep and full of Esperanza’s huevos rancheros and black coffee, Horse was back in his office. The information about the Nevada license plate was on his desk. The Chrysler was registered to the Serengeti Corporation.
Horse began working his way through call-back slips. Because of his good relationship with the community, he did not intend to leave any of those calls unreturned even though he already the information he needed.
Local residents often called his department instead of the Smoke Tree Police because they knew Horse ran a much tighter ship. The Smoke Tree Police Department was a famously incompetent bunch, run by a chief who had come in from out of town. Horse was a local boy many of them had known for years. Also, the STPD had a collection of officers who were mostly rejects from other departments, so it was easy to understand why the locals preferred the sheriff’s department.
As he worked his way through the slips, he became more and more intrigued. The two men had worked the town from north to south, hitting service stations, restaurants and motels. Horse wondered where they had gone once they were finished. Their choices were east to Kingman, south to Parker, or back to wherever they had come from.
Horse picked up the phone and called the little diner just across the Arizona border in Topock. The men had been there. The waitress who had served them was the owner’s daughter, and she said they had showed her the picture. She also told him the younger of the two men had been crudely flirtatious, and something about him made her very nervous. She had been glad to see them leave.
When Horse asked if she’d noticed where they were headed when they left, she told him they had driven across the highway and down the road toward Shorty’s Camp. A call to Shorty’s revealed the men had driven east from there on the old Gold Road. If they’d stayed on that road, they’d have wound up in Oatman.
Horse dialed the Oatman Hotel. There was no answer. That was not surprising since the place was a hotel in name only. It was really a big building full of empty rooms except for the saloon on the ground floor.
Horse spent the rest of the morning catching up on some other things that had come up during his absence.
After he got back from lunch, h
e dialed the hotel again.
Maggie McKellep answered. When he described the two men who had been in Smoke Tree and asked her if they had been in her place, she told him an interesting story.
When she finished recounting the events of Friday night, Horse asked her if there was any chance she remembered the names the two men had used at the saloon.
“Yes, I do. Because the band was so noisy, I made them show me the badges. The names were Kinston and Blake.”
“And it said ‘detective’ on the shields?”
“That’s right. Gold shields.”
“One more question, Maggie. You said this Spider guy recognized one of the men and called him by name. Do you remember that name?”
“Yes. It was the older man, the man at the microphone. Spider called him Guido Battagliano.”
After he thanked Maggie for the helpful information, he leaned back in his chair and put his feet up on the desk for a long think. Then he picked up the phone and called the Mohave County Sheriff’s Department and asked for his favorite contact, Captain Taylor. The captain wasn’t in, but when Horse asked, the dispatcher said there had been calls that morning about two men who claimed to be Las Vegas Police Detectives showing a picture around town.
Horse had just put the phone down when his dispatcher buzzed on the intercom.
“Call for you Horse. Mr. Milner.”
Horse picked up.
“Morning, Mr. Milner.”
“Morning, Horse.
Say, those guys who were in the store on Friday?”
“Yes?”
“They were in my store in Parker a while ago. Showed the picture to the cashiers. This time they claimed to be police detectives from Las Vegas.”
“Thank you, sir. These guys left quite a trail. Be interesting to see where they turn up next.”
Horse ended the call and dialed the Las Vegas Police Department.
The LVPD had a reputation for corruption unmatched by any other department in the United States except for the Clark County Sheriff’s Department. Horse knew the mob ran Las Vegas. That was no secret. But he also knew they had compromised the LVPD and the Sheriff’s Department to the point that they were practically extensions of the criminal organizations themselves. The two agencies shared jurisdiction, with the LVPD taking half of the town and the Sheriff’s Department controlling the rest, plus the rest of Clark County.
When he reached the department, he was told the two detectives he wanted to talk to were both retired.
By the time Horse left the office that evening, he had decided he was going to pay the Serengeti a visit. He knew it was customary to contact local law enforcement when entering their territory. He also knew if he did that he might as well tell the Serengeti he was coming.
Chapter 6
Las Vegas, Nevada
Monday, May 15, 1961
Horse
On Monday morning at eleven o’clock, Horse parked his cruiser in the parking lot at the Serengeti Hotel and Casino. He locked his handgun and holster in the trunk, along with his shotgun.
He had heard eleven o’clock was the worst time of day for a business meeting because people were getting hungry and irritable and thinking more about lunch than the meeting. That suited Horse just fine. He didn’t want this to be a pleasant visit.
By eleven fifteen, he was waiting outside the executive offices. He had been announced. He was not kept waiting long. A woman emerged from the double doors behind the receptionist.
“Lieutenant, Mr. Mazzetti will see you now.”
As he was ushered into an impressively large office, a smiling, darkly handsome man with capped, white teeth stood up behind his desk and extended his hand.
“Good morning, Lieutenant. I’m Eddie Mazzetti. What brings the San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department to the Serengeti today?”
Horse shook the extended hand. He did not return the smile.
“Business.”
“Please, Lieutenant, have a seat.”
“That won’t be necessary. This won’t take long.
You let a couple of your boys off the leash. They ended up in my backyard.”
“Really? My boys? I’m not sure I follow you.”
“A black Chrysler, Nevada license plate WLP 1537, was in Smoke Tree, California, on Friday afternoon. The two guys driving it worked the town, passing themselves off as private investigators. Ring any bells?”
The man pretended to think it over.
“I don’t think so, but that might be one of our cars. I’ll have to check to see if one has been stolen.”
“Come on, Mr. Mazzetti, you and I both know it wasn’t stolen. And these two guys had private investigator licenses. Looked like the real thing, according to my sources.”
“And your sources were …?”
“The owner of a number of markets, for one.”
“Some guy peddlin' pork roasts and produce? I’m supposed to be impressed?”
Horse did not respond.
‘“But let’s say, Lieutenant, that we do own such a car and it wasn’t stolen. So what?”
“That’s where it gets interesting. The two wiseguys in the car turned up that evening at the saloon in the Oatman Hotel where they introduced themselves as LVPD detectives Kinston and Blake.”
“Lieutenant, as you may or may not know, we work closely with the Las Vegas PD to suppress crime in Las Vegas, but I don’t think I recognize those names.”
“Maybe that’s because they’re retired.
And somehow, Mr. Mazzetti, your two men got hold of their badges and were flashing them around. But someone in the saloon recognized one of your guys, a Guido Battagliano, and called him by name. I still don’t know the name of Mr. Battagliano’s associate, but I’m sure you do.”
“These are serious allegations, Lieutenant.”
“Yes, they are. Impersonating a sworn officer of the law is a felony.”
“And you say this incident took place in Oatman?”
“That’s right.”
“Isn’t that in Arizona?”
“I see you studied a map before you sent these boys on their little errand.”
“And that makes it a matter for the Arizona authorities, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, it does. I’ve passed the information on to the Mohave County Sheriff’s Department.”
“Funny. I haven’t heard from them.
You don’t seem to be sayin’ this Mr. Battagliano and his associate impersonated sworn officers of the law in your jurisdiction, so since I’m a very busy man, maybe you could explain your business here so I can get back to work.”
“I’ll get right to it.
Your boys were circulating a picture of a young woman they were trying to find, apparently on your behalf. If this woman has committed some kind of a crime, why didn’t you have the LVPD contact my office and ask for my help? Could it be that you don’t want whatever happened on the record? Not even with a department everyone knows you have in your pocket?
And while we’re talking about this, I think the same two guys were in Baker early one morning back in March. They broke down the door of a motel and shoved the picture of a woman in the face of the young kid who was working there. Demanded to know if he’d seen her. Scared the hell out of him.”
“Come on. Lieutenant, why would the Serengeti be tryin’ to find some Japanese broad?”
Horse smiled for the first time.
“I didn’t say the woman was Japanese.”
Eddie was silent for a few moments. Then he pressed his intercom.
“Alicia? The lieutenant’s leavin’ now.
Please come in, show him out.”
“Before I go, here’s the most important thing.
The reason the guy in Oatman recognized this Battagliano is because Battagliano did a stretch with him at Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary. Not a place they send small-time offenders.
So here’s the message: keep your greaseballs out of my county.”
Eddie’s ey
es went cold.
“Greaseballs? A crude word, lieutenant. And pretty close to “greaser,” wouldn’t you say?”
“Just not as honorable.”
“And I have a final thought for you, Lieutenant. I’m sure the Serengeti has some friends in San Bernardino County government.”
Horse laughed.
“I’d like to see that!”
Alicia entered the room.
Eddie held up his hand.
“You’d like to see what, Lieutenant?”
“You sleazy bastards trying to get Sheriff Bland in your pocket.”
“Wasn’t talkin’ about the sheriff. Talkin’ about his bosses. The Board of Supervisors. I’m sure we’ve comped one or two of them, time to time.”
“Sheriff Bland is an elected official. He only answers to the voters.”
Eddie smiled.
“And just like in Clark County, the Board of Supervisors controls his budget.”
“But not one of them would like to get in a political pissing contest with a very popular sheriff who has a flawless reputation.”
Horse was angry, but he did not raise his voice.
“Do what you want up here in Clark County, Mr. Mazzetti. But don’t let it ooze over the border into my county. If these guys, or any of your other thugs, show up in my part of San Bernardino County again, they won’t like what will happen. And neither will you.”
He turned past an open-mounted Alicia and left the room.
Chapter 7
Smoke Tree, California
And the mountains
Of the Eastern Mojave Desert
June 8, 1961
Aeden Snow
It was already one hundred degrees at ten a.m. on June eighth in Smoke Tree, California. I was sweating heavily as I finished loading cement blocks, two by fours, sheets of plywood and drywall, bags of cement, and rolls of tarpaper and roofing material onto an International flat bed at Smoke Tree Hardware and Building Supply. A string of shiny, black, yellow-eyed starlings watched me from the telephone line next to the yard. I lashed everything down and then re-checked to make sure the load was secure. The big springs were compressed so far that the bed was nearly touching the back wheels.
Mojave Desert Sanctuary Page 8