by James Ellroy
Ellroy whipped out a checkbook and pen. “I’m calling the show Shakedown. It’s your life, times, and moral journey. You were a sack of shit. I’m a zealous Lutheran out to indict your sleazy misconduct and place it within the larger context of scandal-rag journalism and America in the ’50s. Moreover, the actor who portrays you will have scalding-hot love scenes with the greatest actresses of this era.”
I tapped the checkbook. “I fucked Jackie Kennedy in ’53. She was engaged to Jack then. She said I was the biggest and the best.”
Ellroy said, “I fucked Jackie Kennedy in ’54. I was six years old. She said I was bigger and better than you.”
I laffed, I roared, I howled. My gut bounced and banged the table. Ellroy wrote a check and dropped it on my plate. Ten G’s—va-va-va-voom!
He said, “I want to see your FBI file.”
I caught my breath. “It’s on the way.”
“I want to see the diaries that you’ve kept since the late ’40s.”
I went hot-hot and cold-cold. Freon Freddy, Frigid Freddy—make it sound good.
“It’s a fucking myth, kid. I was never much good at writing shit down.”
Ellroy shook his head. “Nix, boss. I spent some time with Harry Fremont the week before he died. He told me you whacked a hood named Ralph Mitchell Horvath in ’49 and started writing the diary then. He said that you wrote it on bookies’ flash paper, in case you had to burn it quick.”
I palpitated and palsied. Old age fucks with your ability to lie.
“Like I said, kid. The diaries don’t exist.”
Ellroy fondled his checkbook. “I’ll let it slide for now. And I’ll come up green if you ever want to reconsider.”
The Valium hit more—I started to go loosey-goosey.
“I want something written into my contract.”
“Tell me.”
“I want a boss guy to play me. Think of Clark Gable crossed with porno cat John Holmes.”
Ellroy yukked. We shook hands. I pocketed the check and signaled Abe Rosen at the counter.
It’s our regular deal. I grease Abe with double sawbucks. I get faux-paged for calls from big machers.
Abe hit the intercom. “Mr. Otash! President Bush is on the line!”
* * *
Memory Lane. It’s the destination for old guys.
Ellroy’s check cleared. I holed up at my pad through Labor Day. My diaries were packed in flame-retardant boxes. They were stashed with some piquant porno pics. Ellroy was back in Connecticut. We talked most nights. I went through my scrapbooks and dished the dirt on my loved ones, lewd ones, and lost ones.
The old photos had my gears going. I’m there with Frank, Dino, and Sammy. I broke legs for them. Why do they seem to be cringing at my touch? There’s pics of my bed at my old Sunset Strip penthouse. I called it the “Landing Strip.” The name derived from my three-ways with stewardesses, starlets, and stars. Liz Taylor and I swung with a stew named “Barb” on many groin-grabbing occasions. There’s pics of my true love, Joi Lansing. We had some goooooooooooood years together. She treated me gooooooooood. I treated her gooooooooood until I treated her baaaaaaaaad. I don’t know why I flip-flopped. My diaries describe that meshuggener metaphysic.
There’s my dictionary and thesaurus. They were teaching tools for the writers at Confidential. Utilize alliteration and inventive slurs. Homos are “licentious lispers.” Dykes are “beefcake butches.” Drunks are “bibulous bottle hounds” and “dyspeptic dipsos.” Vulgarize and vitalize and crazily create a popular parlance. Make it sinfully siiiiiing.
Ellroy’s noxious novels—stamped with my style. Ellroy’s pious putz personality—an odious one to me.
My pals came over on Labor Day. We grilled burgers and hot dogs and killed three quarts of Jim Beam. They left at 2 a.m. A male nurse corps wheeled them down to their limos. The process took half an hour. It was akin to the Berlin Airlift. Walkers crashed, oxygen tanks toppled and rolled. It was fucking hard to endure.
I settled in to watch a Dragnet rerun. I bought the judge in four of Jack Webb’s drunk-driving beefs. I shtupped Jack’s ex-wife, soaring songstress Julie London.
A dozen Famous Amos cookies comprised my late-night snack. I’d seen the episode before. Sergeant Joe Friday busts a hippie punk on a snootful of LSD. I missed Jack. We had some yuks together. He kicked off back in—
A sledgehammer hit my heart. A steel croquet mallet followed. A monster loomed in front of me. He’s Johnnie Ray, he’s Monty Clift, he’s politicians pounded and movie stars mauled—a kaleidoscope of condemnation.
They railed at me. J’accuse, j’accuse, j’accuse!!!!! They hurled ingots at my chest. I gasped. My left arm exploded. I hit the medical-emergency button on my phone.
Then some pinpoint fades to black. Then my pad turns topsy-turvy. Then a big crash and my door shattered like my left arm. Then the mask on my mouth and a fraction of my sight back. Then the gurney, the white-coat men, and the swoop aloft.
One coat guy looked like James Ellroy—but I knew it couldn’t be. An image came to me. It was bright, vivid, old. I saw a little red wagon. I saw words on a strip of red paint. Everything started to fade then. The white-coat man morphed into Ellroy. I still knew it couldn’t be.
Ellroy said, “Hey, Freddy. What’s shaking?”
My breath rasped. I knew I only had two words left.
I said, “Red Ryder.”
2
James Ellroy’s journal
7/12/92
Freddy, I hardly knew ye.
I dug you—but didn’t respect you. There’s a distinction. How’s the afterlife, fuckhead? Repent, you reptile. Yeah, I ripped off your raucous way with words. But I’m not you—you homo hater, dyke defamer, and racist raconteur.
The obits ran tripartite. The prime gist: ex-cop Otash hires on with Confidential. He runs an intelligence network and gathers information on celebrity hijinks. Part two was more pithy: Freddy was a longtime extortionist. His intelligence network supplied the dirt for his shakedown racket. Part three jazzed me. The scandal-rag era bellied up in ’59. Confidential—kaput. Desperate Freddy pulled a racetrack caper. He doped a nag named Wonder Boy and lost his PI’s license. He became a mob lapdog. Jimmy Hoffa hired him to get the goods on JFK shtupping Marilyn Monroe. His aging Marine Corps goons spilled the tale to reporters. Freddy bugged Peter Lawford’s beachfront fuck pad and caught Jack in the sack. Ooooooooooooh, daddy-o: my pulsatingly possible TV show could run indefinitely!!!!!
I got the word on Freddy’s death and flew back to L.A. quicksville. The papers were full of Otash lore. Yawn: his adversarial relationship with LAPD chief William H. Parker. His ’57 interview with TV ham Mike Wallace. His relationship with Confidential’s pervo publisher, Bondage Bob Harrison. Snore: “Fred Otash was the founding father of the tabloid-TV era.” Snooze: “Otash defined the paranoiac horrors of the Red-Scare Decade.” An ex-Liberace bun boy dropped a pearl in with the dross: “I know that Freddy got Lee out of a jam in the early ’50s, but he damn well got paid for it.”
Freddy owned a condo off the Sunset Strip. My first task: intercept his FBI Freedom of Information Act file. I talked to Freddy on the day he died. The file hadn’t arrived. I’ve called the building’s manager every day since. I impersonated Freddy’s lawyer and said I was expecting some files from the feds. The man called me as I left for the airport. Sir, that box just arrived.
I rented a car at LAX. I drove to Chez Otash and snatched the file posthaste. A small UPS box held all the material. I carried the box to my car and tore into it.
Every page was heavily ink-redacted. Odd lines were untouched. Sixteen pages of blacked-out lines and this:
“Accused of extortion,” “accused of bribery,” “accused of harassment,” “accused of suborning perjury,” “accused of jury tampering.”
Please—give me some shit I don’t know.
A photo ID sheet was included. I recognized pics of Freddy’s squeeze, Joi Lansing, and Freddy’s snitch-pal, ’50
s-cool James Dean. Bob Harrison—mucho snapshots. Liberace—of course. Liz Taylor—sure. Her ex-hubby Michael Wilding? Yeah, I get it. Ward Wardell, Race Rockwell, Donkey Don Eversall? Freddy mentioned them. They were fruit hustlers in his stable.
The file was a bust.
That left Freddy’s secret diaries.
Freddy said they did not exist.
They might be locked in a bank vault and thus out of reach. They might be packed in a box in that condo across the street.
Do it, dipshit. Life itself is the Big Shakedown, and you can’t let this one go.
* * *
I broke in that night.
It wasn’t hard. I threw my weight at a loose stretch of the door-doorjamb juncture. The door popped easy. I carried a penlight and prowled in the dark.
I tossed the cabinets. I eyeballed the shelves. I displaced 10,000 leisure sweatsuits. Freddy’s scrapbooks were useless. His gold Rolex was a fake. I found a Nazi Luger in the sock drawer. I found a stack of porn vids under the sink. I hit pay dirt in a hall closet.
Photos: plastic-sheathed and lovingly preserved.
Marlon Brando with a dick in his mouth.
Lena Horne muff-diving Lady Bird Johnson.
And—
A box full of bookies’ flash paper.
I skimmed a few pages. Freddy block-printed legibly. He deployed a calendar-page motif to encapsulate anecdotes. It was lurid lightning in a bottle. It was the Hellacious Holy Grail and the Demonic Dead Sea Scrolls.
The entire TV series and a corresponding run of novellas came to me rápidamente.
A photo fell out of the box. Holy shit—Rin Tin Tin fucking Katharine Hepburn.
I grabbed the box and put the photo in my pocket. My wife Helen was a big Hepburn fan.
3
Downtown L.A.
10/4/52
Calendar sheets ruffled. Paper wilted and blew. I recalled that hot summer and those fall storms. I was working the Central day watch. I’d disbanded my burglary gang. Two of my men got hooked on Big H. They were decidedly desperate and snitch-prone. I’d gambled away all my gelt. I was living on a schmuck cop’s pay and was suffused with the blues. William H. Parker became chief in ’50. He instituted righteous reforms and riddled the ranks with a phalanx of finks to sniff out miscreants and misconduct. I drove a Lin-coon Coon-tinental coon-vertible. I won it in a niggertown card game. It was a “suspect expenditure.” Parker’s boys tattled to the hellhound jefe. I got called in and grindingly grilled. Parker warned me not to be a Bolshevik and said, “I’ve got my four eyes on you.”
The rain was a mad monsoon. Wild winds whipped me on my footbeat. I stopped at a Gamewell phone and called the station. The deskman told me to hotfoot to 668 South Olive. They were shooting a Racket Squad episode in the lobby. They needed a hard boy to shoo off autograph hounds.
I headed over there. I caught a taut tailwind and slalomed most of the way. It was a medical building with a pharmacy and adjoining lobby. I caught a frazzled fracas on the set right off.
Lights, cameras, boom mikes—and action.
A jug-eared cat was hassling a boss blonde. He wore pegged chinos and a gone jacket. She was built from the ground up.
The cast and crew eyeballed the scene. Jug-ears grabbed the blonde’s arm and applied abrasions. It gored my gonads and hit my heartstrings. I walked up behind him. He saw my shadow and swiveled. I broke his nose with a palm shot. I looped a left to his larynx. I kneed his nuts as he dropped.
The blonde’s jaw dropped. I tipped my hat to her.
Jug-ears cradled his busted beak and moaned for his mama. The cast and crew clapped.
The blonde said, “He’s my ex-husband. He stiffed me for three months’ alimony.”
I kicked him in the head and lifted his wallet. He mama-moaned anew. The cast and crew wolf-whistled.
The wallet weighed in heavy. I fanned the cash compartment and counted a sea of C-notes. I handed them to the blonde. She dropped them in her purse and dropped a dollar on her ex-hubby. She said, “For old times. He was good in the sack.”
I laffed. I reached in my pocket and handed her a card. Understated class: my name, phone number, and “Mr. Nine Inches.”
She dropped the card in with her cash stash. A guy yelled, “You’re up, Joi! Scene 16-B!”
She winked and walked away from me. I handcuffed Jug-ears behind his back and pay-phone-called the station. Holly-weird: they filmed the scene with the ex coma-conked and cuffed on the floor.
I walked outside and smoked a cigarette. A black-and-white cruised by and hauled the ex to Georgia Street Receiving. I thought of Ralph Mitchell Horvath. A kid brought me a cup of coffee and returned my calling card. She’d written on the back:
“Joi Lansing. 39-25-38. Googie’s, tonight at 8:30.”
* * *
I had a wolf’s lair above the Strip. It was furnished with Jap flags and shadow-boxed Lugers. I never made it overseas. I spent the war at Parris Island, South Carolina. There’s a periscope affixed to my back porch. I use it to spy on neighbor women.
I’ve always voyeurized.
I’ve always studied people.
I’ve always wanted to know their secret shit.
My bedroom featured a walk-in closet. I blew my burglary stash on Sy Devore suits. My dresser drawer was full of lacy lingerie. My lynx-like lovers left me magnificent mementoes.
I’ve got a file on Ralph Mitchell Horvath. I culled it from PDs and penitentiaries statewide. I knew all Ralphie’s secrets.
He poked a Mexican sissy in reform school. He fathered two half-wit kids. He pimped his wife to cover his poker debts. He scored prescription goofballs from a Chink pharmacist.
It bought me some distance on Ralphie. The more you know about people, the less they get to you. I’ve known that godless gospel since my crib.
I dressed sharp for Joi Lansing. I wore my crocodile loafers and slipped my heater into a shoulder rig. A spritz of Lucky Tiger—and a two-minute stroll to the meet.
Googie’s was a coffee cave on Sunset and Crescent Heights. The Space Age aesthetic rubbed me raw. Fluorescent lights, Naugahyde, chrome. A hopping hive for showbiz shitheels headed for hell.
I walked in and watched Joi Lansing table-hop. She wore a too-tight gown and a mink stole with a pawnshop tag attached. The joint was bustling about a sneak peek in Glendale. A Googie’s regular had an on-screen love scene with Bob Mitchum. Bad Boy Bob kept slipping her tongue. They shared a reefer in the RKO backlot. She blew him in Howard Hughes’s limousine.
A hubbub juked the joint—I knew I radiated FUZZ. I crashed into a booth and unbuttoned my jacket. A fag flamed by and ogled my piece. He joined a hen party one booth over. More dirt spilled: the barman at the Cockpit Lounge ran an all-boy slave auction. Adlai Stevenson got enthralled and embroiled. The hens hooted—ha, ha, ha!
Joi sat down. I pointed to the pawnshop tag. She pulled it off and dropped it in the ashtray.
I said, “Thanks for the invitation.”
Joi said, “Thanks for the revenge. That guy fractured my left wrist on Saint Patrick’s Day ’49.”
“You’re too young to have an ex-husband.”
“Yeah, and I’m estranged from number two. I’d head to Reno for a quickie, but it might not work. We got hitched in TJ, so the paperwork could get dicey.”
“Is there anything I can do?”
“Well, you’re a policeman.”
I lit a cigarette and held the pack out. Joi shook her head.
“He’s on parole, and he’s a grasshopper. You could call Narco.”
I shook my head. “Give me his address. I’ll think of something.”
“He’ll be here at 9:30. He’s been living at the Y since I kicked him out, and the fry cook takes his phone calls. He’s a non-union grip. I stiffed him a fake message after I met you. You’re a producer at Fox with a job for him. You’re meeting him in the parking lot.”
I laffed. “You just assumed that I’d do it?”
Joi laffed. �
��Come on, Freddy. That stunt you pulled downtown and ‘Mr. Nine Inches’? What won’t you do for money or gash?”
A Mex busboy sidled by. I grabbed a belt loop and stopped him. He saw my roscoe and got the wigged-out wetback shakes.
I stuffed a twenty in his shirt pocket. “Go to the kitchen and get me a bag of weed. You’ll be on the night train to Culiacán if you don’t deliver.”
Pancho genuflected and took off. Joi laffed and bummed a cigarette. I blew a high smoke ring. She blew a higher one. It hit the ceiling and mushroomed.
The Mex came back with the goods. I told him to scram. The hen party squawked a new nugget: Ava Gardner dumped Sinatra for a heavy-hung shine.
I said, “What’s your real name?”
Joi said, “Joyce Wassmansdorff.”
“Give me the fill-in.”
“I’m from Salt Lake City. I’m 24. I went to the MGM school and went nowhere.”
“But now you’re up and coming?”
Joi stubbed out her cigarette. “I’m uncredited in six pictures and credited in four. I’ve got Racket Squad, Gangbusters, and a comedy with Jane Russell in the can.”
“Give me some dirt on Russell.”
“What’s to give? She’s a goody two-shoes married to that quarterback for the Rams.”
My stomach growled. I noshed a breadstick and eyeballed the room. Easy make: the two crew cuts by the takeout stand were Parker boys. Harry Fremont pointed them out to me last month. They were purse-lipped Puritans out to bag bent cops.
Joi said, “You’ll need money to enjoy my company.”
I smiled and re-eyeballed the room. A punk I popped for flim-flam made me and beat feet. Joi said, “It’s 9:30. Look for a little guy with a big pompadour.”
I walked back to the parking lot. Pompadour lounged on a ’51 Merc. I got close to him. He orbed my shoulder rig and went Oh, shit. He wore light-colored slacks. Piss coursed and covered his cuffs. I deferred to diplomacy.
“Don’t contest the divorce. I’ll negotiate your alimony payments. Send the check directly to me. I’ll take my cut and deliver the rest to Miss Lansing.”