one of the ex-cons, in the shadows of a narrow driveway squeezed between the thrift shop and a check-cashing shop, motioning for me with his forefinger.
“It be hazardous to a brutha’s health talkin’ to you in broad daylight.”
“I understand.”
“When I was comin’ up, I knew Latisha,” he said. “She friends with my big sister. She passed a few years back.”
He stared off into the distance. I waited for him to continue.
“I got sumpin’ for you. Month or two ago, friend of mine talkin’ to a neighbor of Sweet Maxine. She a nice ol’ lady who always baking cookies and such for the young ’uns in the neighborhood. It turn out that Sweet Maxine heard some fool talkin’ ’bout that Chinese who got capped last year.”
“You mean the Korean guy who owned the grocery store at Fifty-fourth and Figueroa?”
“Yeah. That the one. I know Latisha seen something on that killin’ and that why someone take care of her.”
“What did Sweet Maxine hear?”
“Can’t rightly say. All I know is the neighbor say Maxine heard sumpin’, but she ain’t talk to no police. She scared for her own self.”
The man told me where Sweet Maxine lived and disappeared down the back end of the alley. I clenched my fist and pounded it into my palm.
I drove a few miles west, through a working-class neighborhood where all the lawns were freshly mowed, and parked around the corner from Maxine’s house so neighbors wouldn’t see a police car in front. I walked up the steps to the porch of a tidy bungalow. When I saw the row of collard greens planted along the side of the house, I knew Sweet Maxine, like so many of the older blacks in South Central, had grown up in the South. Ringing the bell, I could see an eye peering at me through the peephole. I held my badge up.
A gray-haired woman in her seventies opened the door. She wore a powder blue cotton housedress that had frayed sleeves, but looked freshly ironed, and white orthopedic shoes. “How can I help you, young man?”
I showed her my badge. “Can I come inside?”
“Yes, you can.”
I followed her to the sofa and sat next to her. The tiny living room was immaculate, with plastic slipcovers on the sofa and the chairs. Grammar school and high school pictures of two girls, who I assumed were her daughters, lined a mantel over the fireplace.
“Do you have a card?” she asked.
Handing it to her, I was relieved when she studied it for a moment and dropped it on a coffee table. She didn’t seem to recognize my name or my connection to the case.
“I’m investigating last year’s murder of Latisha Patton.”
“That was a terrible, terrible thing,” the woman said, pursing her lips and shaking her head.
“I heard that you might have some information that could help me.”
She clasped her hand on her lap. “I don’t think so.”
“I understand that you heard something about the case.”
She stared at her hands. “Not really.”
“How long have you lived in this house?”
“My husband and I moved out here from Louisiana in sixty-one. Bought this place in sixty-six.”
“Neighborhood was a lot different then.”
“Sure was. None of this gangbanging and dope selling and gunshots at all hours of the night and young girls selling their bodies for rock cocaine and no-accounts killing each other in the street like they’re dogs. Back then, this street was filled with lots of nice families. Lots of nice kids.”
“You looked out for each other’s kids then.”
“Sure did. That’s the way it was back then.”
“Nobody’s looking out for Latisha’s daughter.”
“I don’t follow you.”
“Her mother was murdered and nobody will help the police try to find the killer.”
“It’s a different world today. Back then folks around here tried to help the police.”
I pointed to the pictures of her daughters. “If one of those beautiful girls were murdered, wouldn’t you be angry if a witness wouldn’t come forward to help the police? And what if this predator then killed another young woman?”
Maxine pulled a lacy white handkerchief out of the front pocket of her dress and gripped it in her right hand.
“Can you imagine how this would prey on the conscience of the witness?”
Maxine dabbed at her eyes with the handkerchief. “I’ve always been cooperative with the police. My late husband used to be a neighborhood watch captain. It’s just that I’m frightened. Latisha tried to be a good citizen. She tried to help. And look what it got her.”
“That will not happen to you. Tell me what you know, and I’ll do everything I can to keep your name out of the investigation.”
She gripped both ends of the handkerchief and pulled tight. “I just heard one little thing.”
“Why don’t you tell me what it was?”
She stuffed the handkerchief in her pocket. “All right then. I spend a lot of time in my backyard, tending to my roses. An alley runs behind my backyard and there’s an old sofa there. A low element hangs back there sometimes. Boys and girls, smoking marijuana and putting God knows what kind of poison into their bodies.
“About a month ago, I was out there in the early evening. I heard two youngsters who were out on the sofa, gabbing.”
“Exactly what did they say?”
“I heard one of them say something like, ‘If there’d been a reward for the Chinaman, Water Nose might have dimed off the fool.’”
“Who’s Water Nose?”
“I have no idea.”
“Anything else you hear?”
“Just enough to know they were talking about the man who killed that Oriental grocer last year.”
“Bae Soo Sung? Who ran the store at Fifty-fourth at Figueroa?”
“Yes. That’s who they were talking about.”
“Do you know who those kids were?”
“No idea. I usually make it a point to go right inside when they start gathering there.”
“Ever call the police on them?”
“It’s safer to just go inside and close my back window. I don’t want those boys doing anything to my car, my house, or to me.”
“Could you tell their race by their voices?”
“African-American. Definitely not a Spanish voice.”
We talked for a few more minutes, and I handed her my card. “If you think of anything else, please give me a call.”
I drove back to Felony Special, pulled up a chair in front of a computer, and checked CalGangs-a statewide law enforcement gang file-but was unable to find a Water Nose. I then walked across the squad room to the gang unit and opened a green metal filing cabinet-known as the Moniker File-which contained the names of thousands of gang members, and included their address, street names, tattoos, and gang affiliation. But, again, I couldn’t find a listing for Water Nose. Finally, I called the Southeast watch commander and asked for the cell number of Chester Pinson, the gang sergeant who’d given me some background on Reginald Fuqua.
I called and told Pinson about my interview with Sweet Maxine. “You know a Water Nose? I can’t find him in the system.”
“I know every O.G., banger, and pooh butt in this division,” Pinson said. “But I never heard of a Water Nose.”
“If you haven’t heard of him, maybe he doesn’t exist.”
“I wouldn’t say that. I’ll tell my guys tonight to jam some of these gangsters and see if they can ID this guy.
