or so on a gun charge, and the boys moved out here, decided to go straight, and went into the jewelry business.”
“How straight?”
“Not that straight. Sid was fined two thousand dollars for perjury, couple years ago, over his questionable ‘acquisition’ of twelve grand in diamonds. Just a fluke-ran into an honest judge. The heist here at the Mocambo is probably the sixth time they’ve been robbed in the last ten years.”
“Arranging the robberies, getting the insurance dough, and reselling the gems?”
“Yeah-and never ‘inside’ jobs, always working with guys like your McCadden Group, which puts the insurance companies in a position to have to pay.”
Ten or twelve minutes later, Abe Ringgold was heading for the men’s room just as Barney was ushering Cathy back to the booth.
Before Barney had a chance to sit down, I got up and grabbed his boxer’s bicep and whispered, “I need your help. How soft are you?”
“I could take any of the pansies in this joint.”
“What about the ones who aren’t pansies?”
He shrugged. “Them, too.”
The men’s room was smaller than a Busby Berkeley set and decorated in the same demented manner as the rest of the Mocambo, red wallpaper trimmed silver and framed expressionistic paintings of South American dancing girls. No attendant on duty. At six urinals were two men: one of them Henry Fonda, the other a guy I didn’t recognize. Only one of the stalls was in use, the feet and trousers down around them apparently belonging to Abe Ringgold.
I waited for Fonda and the other guy to finish pissing and wash up-Barney was already standing outside the door, informing patrons the restroom was temporarily out of service-and then I took a piss myself, because I was there.
Not being a complete prick, I allowed the bald little man with the glasses and dark well-tailored suit and the well-tanned, homely face to wash his heavily jewel-bedecked hands before I grabbed him and slammed him against a red-and-silver wall and placed the nose of the nine-millimeter against the side of his.
“Who the fuck are you?” Abe Ringgold demanded. His eyes were wild but his face tightened in the manner of a guy who’d been in tough spots before. He was the smaller of the brothers, but also the three-fingered one, the former Hymie Weiss bodyguard.
He was about sixty, and no real threat to me-at least I felt that way after I patted him down and found no weapon-but I wouldn’t forget that when this jeweler was a kid he was a gangster shooting other gangsters in my hometown.
“I’m Nate Heller,” I said. I placed the snout of the nine-millimeter right against his lips, like the automatic was giving him a kiss. “Maybe you know who I am.”
“Frank Nitti’s boy,” Abe said matter-of-factly, as if the gun weren’t pressing against his mouth.
I nodded, once. His description of me was an exaggeration I would let stand, in this company.
“Have you ever taken a Chicago lie detector test, Abe?”
“No,” he said, gruffly, eyes settling down, “but I know what it is. Why don’t you skip the shit and just ask me your fucking questions, and see if you like the answers.”
“Fine,” I said, and moved the snout of the gun so that it was just under his chin, creasing a jowl. “Did you have Elizabeth Short killed, Abe?”
Now the eyes went really wild. “What? No! Fuck no! Why the fuck would I do that?”
“To encourage Bobby Savarino to shut his idiot mouth.”
“You’re fucking crazy!”
“You really do know who I am,” I said, and cocked the nine-millimeter.
The words came quickly: “Savarino was squealing on Dragna, you jackass, not me, not me and my brother. And if that dago did try to sell us out, what the hell good would it do him? You think we operate in this town without sanction? You really think we don’t give the cops their taste?”
“You’re saying Dragna did it?”
“How the hell should I know? He’s capable of having somebody killed, sure, but this Black Dahlia deal, it don’t sound like him. Too extreme-calls too much attention.”
“None of that attention’s on him. The cops and papers call it a sex crime.”
“Yeah, that’s a fascinating fucking insight. Why don’t you take it up with Dragna, Heller? And listen, if I did wanna get at Savarino, I wouldn’t hit at him through some goddamn bimbo-he’s got a pregnant wife, for Christ’s sake, that’s his exposure.”
I pressed the gun harder against his throat, making a deep dimple. “You ever hear of a guy named Watterson, Abe? Lloyd Watterson?”
He winced, but his eyes gave no indication he wasn’t telling the truth, when he said, “No. Means nothing to me.”
I liked the way he was afraid, but not pissing-his-pants afraid. He was a tough little man.
Abe glared at me. “Stick that fucking thing in my mouth if you want, get me down on my knees, do the whole corny routine, Heller. You’ll still get the same story.”
I took the gun out of his neck, backed up a step.
“Yeah, I believe I would, Abe.”
“But do you believe me?”
“Yeah. I do.”
“Good.”
The dapperly dressed homely little man straightened himself, smoothed out the front of his suit, went over and checked himself in the mirror. Looking at his reflection, not at me, he said, “Anything else?”
“No. Sorry for the rough stuff. No offense meant-I’m working against the clock here.”
He glanced at me. “None taken. I been there.”
I looked at him hard. “I don’t have to sleep with one eye open tonight, do I?”
Abe shook his head. “Not on my account. I’ll tell my brother we spoke.”
I shoulder-holstered the nine-millimeter, and exited behind Ringgold, relieving Barney of his duties.
“I guess you have gone Hollywood,” Barney said, as we walked back to the table, and the jeweler headed toward his.
“How’s that?”
My old friend slipped an arm around my shoulder. “Wanting time alone with some guy in the john.”
20
The next morning I accompanied Eliot to Central Homicide at City Hall. We took separate cars, because he would be linking up with Harry the Hat, while I would need to drive over to the Examiner building afterward, and check in with Bill Fowley and his boss Richardson; I planned to keep that headline-hungry pair at bay by giving them just enough information from my Florentine Gardens conversations to satisfy them.
After that I would again have to shake loose from Fowley, as I had looming before me the unenviable task of investigating the mob aspect of this murder. Fred Rubinski had confirmed that Jack Dragna held court at Lucey’s at lunch each day-including Saturday, which this was-and it was my intention to beard the Sicilian lion in his den.
Right now, however, on this perfect, smog-free, sunny, blue-skied Los Angeles morning, I was showing an astounded Eliot Ness the entrance to Central Homicide: a ground-floor window you stepped through, going down a three-tier stairway consisting of piled-up cardboard evidence boxes.
Homicide had outgrown the antiquated facilities at Central Station, and moved its offices to the northwest main floor of City Hall. The side window had become an impromptu entrance, as the City Hall front entry was too far out of the way for the lazy dicks. Besides, Robbery and Burglary had transferred their offices here as well, with temporary offices set up in the hallway itself, which was no fun to wade through.
I had been here before, back when I was working the Peete case, and knew the way to where Detective
