get the Hollywood franchise next year and they hired us back in May to work with them.”
Under Bosch’s questioning, Rosen explained that the city awarded geographic franchises for taxi service. The city was divided into six taxi zones. Each zone had two or three lease or franchise holders, depending on the population of the district. The franchising controlled where in the city a company could pick up fares. Of course, a taxi with a fare onboard could go anywhere instructed.
The designation allowed them to sit on taxi stands and at hotels or cruise for fares and take phone requests within their franchise zone only. Competition on the streets for fares was sometimes fierce. Competition for a franchise designation was equally so. Rosen explained that Regent Taxi already had a franchise in South L.A. but was seeking a more lucrative assignment in Hollywood.
“When was that going to come up?” Bosch asked.
“Not till after the new year,” Rosen said. “George was just getting started on the application.”
“How many franchises are given in Hollywood?”
“There are only two and they are two-year terms. They stagger them, so one comes up for renewal or reassignment every year. Regent has been waiting for this upcoming year because the current franchise holder coming up for renewal has problems and is vulnerable. George told the clients that their best shot was in the coming year.”
“What’s the name of the company that’s vulnerable?”
“Black and White. Better known as B and W.”
Bosch knew that there had been an issue a decade or so ago with B&W Taxi painting its cars so that they looked a little too much like police cars. The LAPD had complained and the company changed their design to a black and white checkerboard scheme. But he didn’t think this was what Rosen meant by the company’s being vulnerable.
“You said it has problems. What problems?”
“Well, for starters, they’ve had three DUIs in the last four months alone.”
“You mean cabdrivers driving drunk?”
“Exactly, and that’s the ultimate no-no. That doesn’t go over well with the city franchise board or the city council, as you can imagine. Who wants to vote for a company with that record? So George was pretty confident that Regent could get the franchise. They’ve got a clean record, plus they’re minority owned.”
And he had a father who was a powerful member of the city council, which appointed the members of the franchise board. Bosch was intrigued by this information because it all came down to money. Somebody making it and somebody losing it. That often played into the motivations for murder. He got up and stuck his head into the back room, telling Hadlow and Chu that he would want to take any files relating to the taxi franchise matter.
He then came back to Rosen and moved the interview back toward the personal side of things.
“Did George keep any personal files here?”
“Yes, he did. But they’re locked in the desk and I don’t have the key.”
From his pocket Bosch pulled the keys that had been taken from the Chateau’s valet and impounded along with Irving’s car.
“Show me.”
Bosch and Chu emerged from the office at noon and headed back to the PAB. Chu carried the box containing the files and other materials they had seized with Hadlow’s approval under the authority of the search warrant. This included the records pertaining to the most recent projects George Irving had been working on or planning, as well his personal files, which contained a number of insurance policies and a copy of a will that was dated only two months earlier.
As they walked, they discussed their next moves. They agreed that the rest of the day would be worked inside the PAB. They had several records to study concerning Irving’s projects and will. Reports were also overdue from Glanville and Solomon concerning their interview of the guest who checked in behind Irving at the Chateau Marmont and the canvasses conducted in the hotel and on the hillside neighborhood behind it.
“It’s time to start the murder book,” Bosch said.
It was one of his favorite things to do.
17
The world might have gone digital but Harry Bosch had not gone along with it. He had become proficient with a cell phone and a laptop computer. He listened to music on an iPod and every now and then read the newspaper on his daughter’s iPad. But when it came to a murder book he was still, and always would be, a plastic and paper man. He was a dinosaur. It didn’t matter that the department was moving to digital archiving and there was no space in the new PAB for shelves to hold the thick blue binders. Bosch was a man who kept traditions, especially when he believed those traditions helped catch killers.
To Bosch, a murder book was a key part of an investigation, as important as any piece of evidence. It was the anchor of the case, a compendium of every move made, interview taken, piece of evidence or potential evidence gathered. It was a physical component with weight and depth and substance. Sure, it could be reduced to a digital computer file and put on a thumb drive, but somehow that made it less real to him, more hidden, and this felt disrespectful to the dead.
Bosch needed to see his work product. He had to be constantly reminded of the burden he carried. He had to see the pages grow as the investigation proceeded. He knew without a doubt that it didn’t matter if he had thirty- nine months or thirty-nine years left on the job, he would not change the way he went after killers.
When they got back to the Open-Unsolved Unit Bosch went to the storage cabinets that ran along the back wall of the room. Each detective in OU had one cabinet. It was not much bigger than a half locker because the PAB was built for the digital world, not the stalwarts of the old ways. Bosch used his storage space primarily to hold old blue binders from solved murder cases past. Those cases had been pulled from archives and digitized in an effort to create space. The documents were scanned and shredded and the empty binders destined for the city dump. But Bosch had rescued a dozen and hidden them away in his storage locker so that he would never have to go without.
He now took one of the precious binders, its blue plastic faded by time, from the locker and went to the work cubicle he shared with Chu. His partner was removing Irving’s files from the box and stacking them on top of the file cabinet that adjoined their two desks.
“Harry, Harry, Harry,” Chu said when he saw the binder. “When are you going to change? When are you going to let me join the digital world?”
“In about thirty-nine months,” Bosch said. “After that you can put your murder files on the head of a pin, for all I’ll care. But until then, I’m—”
“—going to do it the way you’ve always done it. Right, yeah, I get it.”
“You know it.”
Bosch sat down at his desk and opened the binder. He then opened his laptop. He had already prepared several reports for inclusion in the book. He started sending them to the unit’s communal printer. He thought of reports due from Solomon and Glanville and scanned the cubicle for an interoffice envelope.
“You get anything from Hollywood?” he asked.
“Nope,” Chu said. “Check your e-mail.”
Of course. Bosch went online and found that he had two e-mails from Jerry Solomon at Hollywood Division. Each contained an attachment that he downloaded and sent to the printer. The first was a summary of the canvass of the hotel conducted by Solomon and Glanville. The second summarized the canvass of the nearby neighborhood.
Bosch went over to the printer and grabbed his pages out of the tray. On his way back he saw Lieutenant Duvall standing outside his cubicle. Chu was nowhere in sight. Bosch knew that Duvall wanted an update on the Irving case. In the past twenty-four hours she had left him two messages and an e-mail, all of which he had failed to return.
“Harry, have you gotten my messages?” she asked as he approached.
“I got them but every time I was going to call, somebody called me first and I got distracted. Sorry, Lieutenant.”
