around there. And didn't we say, not many men could put Art down and out just so easy. I'll tell you what's in my mind. just a little easier than I can see that offbeat, implausible plot, I can see him-maybe on the way back to his car-getting jumped by three or four or five louts. Juvenile louts, maybe riding high on liquor or H. And the louts, rolling him, finding out he's a cop, and saying, ‘Hey, let's have some fun with the cop.' And talking it over, forgetting about his wallet-I know he wasn't robbed-looking for his car, finding it. Tying him up in case he came to, while they argued about how to have fun with the big cop- Maybe riding around in both cars awhile, talking it over. And finally- And by that time so high they didn't take any special care about it. They'd have been disappointed the gas didn't explode. Can you see that?'
Palliser said, 'Damnation. That's a story. Looking at it like that-just as a separate thing, I mean- Hell, I've got to say it'd be just a little more likely- I mean, well, expectable, if that's the word for it. But there's nothing to say-'
'We're like lawyers,' said Mendoza. 'We have to go by precedent. The obvious is usually just what happened… I'll just say, let's keep open minds. It could be the way we thought-but it could be something altogether different too.' He dropped his cigarette and stepped on it carefully. 'Let's get back and see if they've picked up Webster.'
At about the same time, Sergeant Nesbitt of the Wilcox Street detective bureau was feeling pleased with himself. There'd been quite a spate of break-ins lately, with practically nothing to go looking on, and it was gratifying to have enough to make a charge on one of them. Three young punks just starting to accumulate records; a good many cops would be seeing a good deal of them from now on. He just thought about that in passing; he wasn't a particularly imaginative man, and crooks were just crooks to him. It was his job to deal with them. He dealt with them very efficiently.
These particular crooks had had a couple of weapons on them-tvvo guns and a switch-blade knife.
He finished writing up his notes on it and said casually on his way out to lunch, 'Oh, Bill. You better send those cannisters down to headquarters Ballistics. They're so damn fussy about checking everything. just in case.'
'O.K., will do,' said Bill, and subsequently sent them, by way of an annoyed plainclothesman who had hoped to finish the Times crossword puzzle before anything came up.
The man full of hate was feeling something new and pleasant now.
He was important. He was the Goddamnedest most important guy in
L.A.
He was in all the newspapers, by God.
It was exciting, it was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to him.
He couldn't make out why. Maybe it was different in a big town? Because there'd been others-he thought back, vaguely, to the others. He remembered a girl, a pretty girl, who had fought him and said, 'Please.' There had been that guy, Dago some kind, he'd been pretty high and hadn't fought him. And a while before that, another woman. He didn't remember where that had been, but in the country somewhere.
Not much fuss made about them. But of course he hadn't stayed around. Maybe there had been at that. He got out his knife and looked at it. He was proud of the knife. He had made it himself, back at Marlett's old farm workshop. Out of a piece of old iron he'd made it, in his spare time, and Jesus, he'd sweated blood over setting them teeth in it, like a saw. It was a good knife. It had made him somebody important.
He was in all the papers. When he'd heard some guys talking about it, in that bar last night, he'd gone out and bought a paper, and managed to spell out what it said. Some of the long words were hard, but he could read most of it. Right on the front page, it had been. Him! The Slasher, they called him. He liked that. He liked the new, exciting feeling of being important.
It was a thing he hadn't expected, hadn't reckoned on at all. He liked looking at the blood, but it was a personal, temporary thing. In a vague way he'd known that if they caught him they'd kill him-the law-just like he'd killed.
He didn't mind. No. His life hadn't been so good a thing to him that he minded. Ever since the fire in the school, back there when he was just a kid…
But now-now he was so important to millions of people!-he would mind. He thought back to the best one, the kid. Oh, Jesus God, he had liked that one, the feel of doing it. The kid, the damned little Mex kid, calling him sir. It had been all there ahead of him, the whole bit-his whole life, sex and fun and liquor and money-why the hell should he have it, when I never had nothing? I took it away from him, he thought. Like God or something.
Important. Hell, the whole state was talking about him, thinking about him. Just because…
He wouldn't have minded, a couple of days ago. Now, he thought furiously, delightedly, he'd like to do a lot more before that happened. Really show them-pay them all back, the whole world, for what they'd done to him. So he minded, now. He was thinking about that now. They'd be looking. Every man's hand against…
But it had always been that way.
He thought, and he made a plan. So they wouldn't find him.
He'd stayed in a lot worse places.
He hadn't much to pick up, in the room. He still had the money he'd saved on that job up north, a lot of money, nearly four hundred bucks. He put the bottle of bourbon into his pocket; and the cigarettes, the paper bag full of doughnuts, the extra shirt and sweater went into the little canvas bag.
He went out of his room, down the hall, and out the back door. Four houses up, along the little alley there, was Los Angeles Street. He walked up it to Temple, and on his way he passed the massive rectangular bulk of the Police Facilities Building, but he didn't know what it was.
As he walked up Temple a plainclothes detective was talking to the landlady in the house he had just left. 'He had such a scarred face? What name did he give you?'
THIRTEEN
Just after four o'clock a very angry man burst in on Sergeant Lake and demanded, 'This is the murder office, where they hunt the murderers? I will sue you all! Every man in the police I will sue! Infame! You call me a murderer, and it's a lie! You slander my good name!' He waved a copy of the Times in one hand and shook his other fist under Lake's nose. He was a little fat man about fifty, with a few strands of black hair plastered across a round bald head, a round olive-skinned face, and a pair of luxurious braggadocio mustaches. 'Scoundrels!' he said richly. 'I denounce you!'
Every man in the office heard him and came to find out what was happening. Mendoza said, 'What's this all about?' and the little man swung to face him.
'Who is the chief man here? It is an outrage! My name you publish in the paper, and say it is that of this madman who kills children! I will sue you all-'
'Now just quiet down and come into my office, and let's hear all about this, Mr…?'
'Oh, you pretend you don't know my name! I am Tosci as you very well know- Francesco Tosci-isn't it plain to see in my own writing here? And I'm a respectable man, never in my life have I killed anyone-it is infamous!' He glared at Mendoza. 'In all the newspapers, plain to be read, my name!'
Mendoza exchanged a glance with Palliser. 'Let's see what you're talking about,' said Mendoza.
