middle sixties.'
Conklin had been there during that time, Bosch knew, but he would already have been elected DA. It would seem that he would not have submitted his own prints, especially if he knew there was a print card in a murder book somewhere that could possibly be matched to him.
He thought of Mittel. He would have been out of the DA's office by the time employees' prints were taken as a matter of course.
'What about the federal base?' he asked. 'What if some guy worked for a president and got the kind of clearance you need to go visit the White House, would those prints be in that base?'
'Yes, they'd be in twice. In the federal employees base and in the FBI's. They keep prints on record of everyone they do background investigations on, if that's what you mean. But remember, just because somebody visits the president, it doesn't mean they get printed.'
Well, Mittel isn't a scratch but it's close, Bosch thought.
'So what you're saying,' Bosch said, 'is that whether or not we have complete data files going back to 1961, whoever belongs to those prints I gave you hasn't been printed since then?'
'That's not one hundred percent but it's close. The person who left these prints probably hasn't been printed -at least by any contributor to the data banks. We can only reach so far with this. One way or another we can pull prints on one out of about every fifty or so people in the country. But I just didn't get anything this time. Sorry.'
'That's okay, Hirsch, you tried.'
'Well, I guess I'll be getting back to work now. What do you want me to do with the print card?'
Bosch thought a moment. He wondered if there was any other avenue to chase down.
'Tell you what, can you just hold on to it? I'll come by the lab and pick it up when I can. Probably be by later today.'
'Okay, I'll put it in an envelope for you in case I'm not here. Good-bye.'
'Hey, Hirsch?'
'Yeah?'
'It feels good, don't it?'
'What's that?'
'You did the right thing. You didn't get a match but you did the right thing.'
'Yeah, I guess.'
He was acting like he didn't understand because he was embarrassed, but he understood.
'Yeah, I'll see you Hirsch.'
After hanging up, Bosch sat on the side of the bed, lit a cigarette and thought about what he was going to do with the day. The news from Hirsch was not good but it wasn't daunting. It certainly didn't clear Arno Conklin. It might not even have cleared Gordon Mittel. Bosch wasn't sure whether Mittel's work for presidents and senators would have required a fingerprint check. He decided his investigation was still intact. He wasn't changing any plans.
He thought about the night before and the wild-ass chance he had taken confronting Mittel the way he had. He smiled at his own recklessness and thought about what Hinojos might make of it. He knew she'd say it was a symptom of his problem. She wouldn't see it as a tactful way of flushing the bird from the bush.
He got up and started the coffee and then showered, shaved and got ready for the day. He took his coffee and
the box of cereal from the refrigerator out to the deck, leaving the sliding door open so he could hear the stereo. He had KFWB news on.
It was cool and crisp outside but he could tell'it would get warmer later. Blue jays were swooping in and out of the arroyo below the deck and he could see black bees the size of quarters working in the yellow flowers of the primrose jasmine.
There was a story on the radio about a building contractor making a fourteen-million-dollar bonus for completing the rebuilding of the 10 freeway three months ahead of schedule. The officials who gathered to announce the engineering feat likened the fallen freeway to the city itself. Now that it was back upright, so, too, was the city. The city was on the move again. They had a lot to learn, , Bosch thought.
Afterward, he went in and got out the yellow pages and started working the phone in the kitchen. He called the major airlines, shopped around and made arrangements to fly to Florida. But flying on one day's notice, the best deal he could get was still seven hundred dollars, a shocking amount to him. He put it on a credit card so that he could pay it off over time. He also reserved a rental car at Tampa International Airport.
When he had that finished he went back out to the deck and thought about the next project he had to tackle: He needed a badge.
For a long time he sat on the deck chair and contemplated whether he needed it for his own sense of security or because it was a bona fide necessity to his mission. He knew how naked and vulnerable he had felt this week without the gun and the badge, extremities he had carried on his body for more than twenty years. But he had avoided the temptation to carry the backup gun that he knew was in the closet next to the front door. That he
could do, he knew. But the badge was different. More so than the gun, the badge was the symbol of what he was. It opened doors better than any key, it gave him more authority than any words, than any weapon. He decided the badge was a necessity. If he was going to Florida and was going to scam McKittrick, he had to look legit. He had to have a badge.
He knew his badge was probably in a desk drawer in Assistant Chief Irvin S. Irving's office. There was no way he could get to it and not be discovered. But he knew where there was another one that would work just as well.
Bosch looked at his watch. Nine-fifteen. It was forty-five minutes until the daily command meeting at Hollywood Station. He had plenty of time.
Bosch pulled into the rear parking lot of the station at five minutes after ten. He was sure that Pounds, who was punctual about everything he did, would already have gone down the front hall to the captain's office with the overnight logs. The meeting was held every morning and included the station's CO, patrol captain, watch lieutenant and detective commander, who was Pounds. They were routine affairs and never lasted longer than twenty minutes. The members of the station's command staff simply drank coffee and went through the overnight reports and ongoing problems, complaints or investigations of particular note.
Bosch went in the back door by the drunk tank and then up the hallway to the detective bureau. It had been a busy morning. There were already four men handcuffed to benches in the hallway. One of them, a drug hype Bosch had seen in the station before and used as an unreliable informant on occasion, asked Bosch for a smoke. It was illegal to smoke in any city-owned building. Bosch lit a cigarette anyway and put it in the man's mouth because both his needle-scarred arms were cuffed behind his back.
'What is it this time, Harley?' Bosch asked.
'Shit, a guy leaves his g'rage open, he's asking me to come in. Isn't that right?'
'Tell that one to the judge.'
As Bosch walked away one of the other lockdowns yelled at him from down the hallway.
'What about me, man? I need a smoke.'
'I'm out,' Bosch said.
'Fuck you, man.'
'Yeah, that's what I thought.'
He came into the detective bureau through the rear door. The first thing he did was confirm that Pounds's glass office was empty. He was at the command meeting. Then he checked the coatrack up at the front and saw he was in business. As he walked down the aisle formed by the separation of the investigation tables, he exchanged nods with a few of the other detectives.
Edgar was at the homicide table sitting across from his new partner, who was in Bosch's old chair. Edgar heard one of the 'Hi, Harry' greetings and turned around.
'Harry, wassup?'
'Hey, man, just came in to get a couple things. Hang on a sec, it's hot outside.'
Bosch walked to the front of the bureau, where old Henry of the Nod Squad sat at the desk behind the counter. He was working on a crossword puzzle and Bosch could see several erasure marks had turned the grid
