Loew dropped a twenty on the table. 'Again, thank you. Lieutenant, I'll talk to you soon. And gentlemen-Merry Christmas.'
Jack nodded; Loew walked off. Dudley said, 'There's more, lad.'
'More work?'
'Of sorts. Are you providing security at Welton Morrow's Christmas party this year?'
His annual gig-a C-note to mingle. 'Yeah, it's tonight. Does Loew want an invitation?'
'Not quite. You did a large favor for Mr. Morrow once, did you not?'
October '47-too large. 'Yeah, I did.'
'And you're still friendly with the Morrows?'
'In a hired-hand sort of way, sure. Why?'
Dudley laughed. 'Lad, Ellis Loew wants a wife. Preferably a Gentile with a social pedigree. He's seen Joan Morrow at various civic functions and fancies her. Will you play Cupid and ask fair Joan what she thinks of the idea?'
'Dud, are you asking me to get the future LA DA a fucking date?'
'I am indeed. Do you think Miss Morrow will be amenable?'
'It's worth a try. She's a social climber and she's always wanted to marry well. I don't know about a hebe, though.'
'Yes, lad, there is that. But you'll broach the subject?'
'Sure.'
'Then it's out of our hands. And along those lines-was it bad at the station last night?'
Now he gets to it. 'It was very bad.'
'Do you think it will blow over?'
'I don't know. What about Brownell and Helenowski? How bad did they get it?'
'Superficial contusions, lad. I'd say the payback went a bit further. Did you partake?'
'I got hit, hit back and got out. Is Loew afraid of prosecuting?'
'Only of losing friends if he does.'
'He made a friend today. Tell him he's ahead of the game.'
Jack drove home, fell asleep on the couch. He slept through the afternoon, woke up to the «Mirror» on his porch. On page four: 'Yuletide Surprise for «Hope's Harvest» co-stars.'
No pix, but Morty Bendish got in the 'Big V' shtick; 'One of his many informants' made it sound like Jack Vincennes had minions prowling, their pockets stuffed with «his» money-it was well known that the Big V financed his dope crusade with his own salary. Jack clipped the article, thumbed the rest of the paper for Helenowski, Brownell and the cop beaters.
Nothing.
Predictable: two cops with minor contusions was small potatoes, the punks hadn't had time to glom a shyster. Jack got out his ledger.
Pages divided into three columns: date, cashier's check number, amount of money. The amounts ranged from a C-note to two grand; the checks were made out to Donald and Marsha Scoggins of Cedar Rapids, Iowa. The bottom of the third column held a running total: $32,350. Jack got out his bankbook, checked the balance, decided his next payment would be five hundred flat. Five yards for Christmas. Big money until your Uncle Jack drops dead-and it'll never be enough.
Every Christmas he ran it through-it started with the Morrows and he saw them at Christmastime; he was an orphan, he'd made the Scoggins kids orphans, Christmas was a notoriously shitty time for orphans. He forced himself through the story.
Late September 1947.
Old Chief Worton called him in. Welton Morrow's daughter Karen was running with a high school crowd experimenting with dope-they got the shit from a sax player named Les Weiskopf. Morrow was a filthy-rich lawyer, a heavy contributor to LAPD fund drives; he wanted Weiskopf leaned on-with no publicity.
Jack knew Weiskopf: he sold Dilaudid, wore his hair in a jig conk, liked young gash. Worton told him a sergeantcy came with the job.
He found Weiskopf-in bed with a fifteen-year-old redhead. The girl skedaddled; Jack pistol-whipped Weiskopf, tossed his pad, found a trunk full of goofballs and bennies. He took it with him-he figured he'd sell the shit to Mickey Cohen. Welton Morrow offered him the security man gig; Jack accepted; Karen Morrow was hustled off to boarding school. The sergcantcy came through; Mickey C. wasn't interested in the dope-only Big H flipped his switch. Jack kept the trunk-and dipped into it for bennies to keep him juiced on all-night stakeouts. Linda, wife number two, took off with one of his snitches: a trombone player who sold maryjane on the side. Jack hit the trunk for real, mixing goofballs, bennies, scotch, taking down half the names on the «down beat» poll: THE MAN, jazzster's public enemy number one. Then it was 10/24/47-
He was cramped in his car, staking the Malibu Rendezvous parking lot: eyes on two 'H' pushers in a Packard sedan. Near midnight: he'd been drinking scotch, he blew a reefer on the way over, the bennies he'd been swallowing weren't catching up with the booze. A tip on a midnight buy: the 'H' men and a skinny shine, seven feet tall, a real geek.
The boogie showed at a quarter past twelve, walked to the Packard, palmed a package. Jack tripped getting out of the car; the geek started running; the 'H' men got out with guns drawn. Jack stumbled up and drew his piece; the geek wheeled and fired; he saw two shapes closer in, tagged them as the nigger's backup, squeezed off a clip. The shapes went down; the 'H' men shot at the spook and at him; the spook nosedived a '46 Studebaker.
Jack ate cement, prayed the rosary. A shot ripped his shoulder; a shot grazed his legs. He crawled under the car; a shitload of tires squealed; a shitload of people screamed. An ambulance showed up; a bull dyke Sheriff's deputy loaded him on a gurney. Sirens, a hospital bed, a doctor and the dyke whispering about the dope in his system-blood test validated. Lots of drugged sleep, a newspaper on his lap: 'Three Dead in Malibu Shootout-Heroic Cop Survives.'
The 'H' guys escaped clean-the deaths pinned on them.
The spook was dead at the scene.
The shapes weren't the nigger's backup-they were Mr. and Mrs. Harold J. Scoggins, tourists from Cedar Rapids, Iowa, the proud parents of Donald, seventeen, and Marsha, sixteen.
The doctors kept looking at him funny; the dyke turned out to be Dot Rothstein, Kikey Teitlebaum's cousin, known associate of the legendary Dudley Smith.
A routine autopsy would show that the pills taken out of Mr. and Mrs. Scoggins came from Sergeant Jack Vincennes' gun.
The kids saved him.
He sweated out a week at the hospital. Thad Green and Chief Worton visited; the Narco guys came by. Dudley Smith offered his patronage; he wondered just how much he knew. Sid Hudgens, chief writer for «Hush-Hush» Magazine, stopped in with an offer: Jack to roust celebrated hopheads, «Hush-Hush» to be in on the arrests-cash to discreetly change hands. He accepted- and wondered just how much Hudgens knew.
The kids demanded no autopsy: the family was Seventh-Day Adventist, autopsies were a sacrilege. Since the county coroner knew damn well who the shooters were, he shipped Mr. and Mrs. Harold J. Scoggins back to Iowa to be cremated.
Sergeant Jack Vincennes skated-with newspaper honors.
His wounds healed.
He quit drinking.
He quit taking dope, dumped the trunk. He marked abstinent days on his calendar, worked his deal with Sid Hudgens, built his name as a local celebrity. He did favors for Dudley Smith; Mr. and Mrs. Harold J. Scoggins torched his dreams; he figured booze and hop would put out the flames but get him killed in the process. Sid got him the 'technical advisor' job with «Badge of Honor»-then just a radio show. Money started roffing in; spending it on clothes and women wasn't the kick he thought it would be. Bars and dope shakedowns were awful temptations. Terrorizing hopheads helped a little-but not enough. He decided to pay the kids back.
His first check ran two hundred; he included a letter: 'Anonymous Friend,' a spiel on the Scoggins tragedy. He called the bank a week later: the check had been cashed. He'd been financing his free ride ever since; unless Hudgens had 10/24/47 on paper he was safe.
Jack laid out his party clothes. The blazer was London Shop-he'd bought it with Sid's payoff for the Bob Mitchum roust. The tassel loafers and gray flannels were proceeds from a «Hush-Hush» expose linking jazz musicians to the Communist Conspiracy-he squeezed some pinko stuff out of a bass player he popped for needle marks. He dressed, spritzed on Lucky Tiger, drove to Beverly Hills.
A backyard bash: a full acre covered by awnings. College kids parked cars; a buffet featured prime rib, smoked ham, turkey. Waiters carried hors d'oeuvres; a giant Christmas tree stood out in the open, getting drizzled on. Guests ate off paper plates; gas torches lit the lawn. Jack arrived on time and worked the crowd.
Welton Morrow showed him to his first audience: a group of Superior Court judges. Jack spun yarns: Charlie Parker trying to buy him off with a high-yellow hooker, how he cracked the Shapiro case: a queer Mickey Cohen stooge pushing amyl nitrite-his customers transvestite strippers at a fruit bar. The Big V to the rescue: Jack Vincennes single-handedly arresting a roomful of bruisers auditioning for a Rita Hayworth lookalike contest. A round of applause; Jack bowed, saw Joan Morrow by the Christmas tree-alone, maybe bored.
He walked over. Joan said, 'Happy holidays, Jack.'
Pretty, built, thirty-one or two. No job and no husband taking its toll: she came off pouty most of the time. 'Hi, Joan.'
'Hi, yourself. I read about you in the paper today. Those people you arrested.'
'It was nothing.'
Joan laughed. 'Sooo modest. What's going to happen to them? Rock what's-his-name and the girl, I mean.'
'Ninety days for the girl, maybe a year honor farm for Rockwell. They should hire your dad-he'd get them off.'
'You don't really care, do you?'
'I hope they cop a plea and save me a court date. And I hope they do some time and learn their lesson.'
'I smoked marijuana once, in college. It made me hungry and I ate a whole box of cookies and got sick. You wouldn't have arrested me, would you?'
'No, you're too nice.'
'I'm «bored» enough to try it again, I'll tell you that.'
His opening. 'How's your love life, Joanie?'
'It isn't. Do you know a policeman named Edmund Exley? He's tall and he wears these cute glasses. He's Preston Exley's son.'
Straight-arrow Eddie: war hero with a poker up his ass. 'I know who he is, but I don't really know him.'
'Isn't he cute? I saw him at his father's house last night.'
'Rich-kid cops are from hunger, but I know a nice fellow who's interested in you.'
'You do? Who?'
'A man named Ellis Loew. He's a deputy district attorney.'
