by James Ellroy
Your cousin and buddy
Charlie.
Charlie, my friend, if you knew the kind of people your erstwhile cousin hung out with, you wouldn’t be Ha! Ha!’ing quite so much. Bad-ass dobermans are not much use against shotguns, arsonists, and crooked cops.
I tossed the letter into the glove compartment. Augie Dougall was headed to Cathedral City now, running from the frying pan into fire. If he traveled by bus his most logical point of departure would be Santa Monica Greyhound on 5th and Broadway. I drove there, fast.
The woman at the counter told me an extremely tall funny-looking man aged about fifty had purchased a ticket for the 7:15 bus for Palm Springs. That was enough for me. I hit the Santa Monica Freeway to the Harbor, to the Pomona. Soon I was passing through the depressing Eastern suburbs of L.A. with my top up, air conditioner on full and cassette player blasting Wagner. I was filled with expectancy and the calm certainty that whatever awaited me in the desert would not be dull.
I stopped in Riverside for gas, then switched on the radio for the rest of my journey. I found a Palm Springs station and lucked into a news report on the caddy killings. It was obvious they had taken the desert resort community by storm. The newscaster went on dramatically: there were no clues, the motive was still “up in the air,” Gaither and Marchion had no known next of kin, while George Hansen’s wife had been informed of his death. Another newscaster took over and announced that he had a Special Report on the world of caddies. I turned the volume up.
The newsman, his voice dripping with sentiment, began:
“I’ve known a lot of caddies in my time. A lot. They’re a strange, adventurous lot. A group of men for whom freedom and love of golf reign supreme. Many of them have given up on the idea of family life and a nine-to-five job just to be where the golf action is. Caddies love golf and they know the courses where they work like the backs of their hands. And what golf stories they have to tell!!
“When I was broadcasting at KMPC in Los Angeles, it was my pleasure to play golf with Dick Whittinghill at picturesque Lakeside Country Club in North Hollywood. I remember one caddy we had, a scruffy character named Leo. Leo was a golf authority who compared certain aspects of Dick’s swing to that of the great Jimmy Demarit. Dick used to keep a bottle of vodka in his bag and he often invited Leo to join him in a drink. It was Leo’s custom to walk ahead of his players to identify their balls. Dick would always yell to him ‘Have I got a shot, Leo?’ and Leo would drop the bags and do a little jig right there on the golf course! It was wonderful to see! One day Dick hit his ball right up behind a tree. It was a crucial shot. Dick and I were playing a five dollar Nassau and he needed to win this hole. Leo wasn’t dancing any jigs when he walked to Dick’s ball. When Dick called out ‘Have I got a shot to the green, Leo?’ Leo called back, ‘You have several shots to the green, Mr. Whittinghill!’ Spoken like a true caddy!
“Caddies are being phased out, sadly, in favor of golf carts. What a shame. A caddy can take ten shots off a high handicappers game. The pro’s couldn’t do without their caddies. I’ve known a lot of caddies, yes sir. Some drank too much, some talked too much, and some were too opinionated. But I have never met a stupid caddy or one who didn’t love the game of golf and the club where he worked.
“Now this tragedy. Right here in Palm Springs, the golf capital of the world. The authorities tell us there were drugs involved! I say ‘Baloney.’ I have known many caddies who imbibed a bit too much, but never have I known a caddy to take drugs! Never have I known a caddy who would knowingly disgrace the game of golf!
“Robert Marchion, George Hansen, Stanley Gaither, the heart of every golfer in America mourns for you and prays for a swift, merciless justice for your killer. We thank you from the bottom of our collective heart for your service—greens read well, good yardage calls, traps raked and heavy bags cheerfully toted. God bless you in your final resting place. This is Don Castleberry, signing off with Special Report. Have a good day.”
I couldn’t think for my sudden anger. My mind was seized with a boundless hatred for America. America, with its optimism, boosterism, and yahooism that opted for sentiment over truth every time. America, that would turn the truth of the lives and deaths of three men into a cheap advertisement for an infantile game.
After a few moments my anger subsided. I was in the desert now, the smog was behind me. It was sweltering outside, but the arid landscape was beautiful. I was snug in my air-conditioned cocoon, and in the matter of the people versus Haywood Cathcart, Richard Ralston, and Fat Dog Baker, I was the arbiter of justice, not America.
Palm Springs shot up in the distance, a green shimmering oasis in my tinted windshield. Cathedral City, if my memory served me, was to the southeast of the Springs, a working-class community on the edge of the desert mountain range. I got Augie Dou-gall’s letter out of the glove compartment and checked the return address: Charles Dougall, 18319 Eucalyptus Road, Cathedral City.
I passed through Palm Springs on Palm Canyon Drive, the ritzy main drag. The expensive boutiques and gift shops that lined its immaculate sidewalks were closed for the summer. Only a few restaurants, coffee shops, and gas stations seemed to be open. The few people about seemed in a hurry, rushing toward some air-conditioned sanctuary. I took Palm Canyon out of town to where it turned into a desert highway, winding around to Cathedral City and Indio.
Cathedral City was as I remembered it—dusty residential streets crowded with old wood frame and faded stucco houses reaching up toward some scrub-covered mountain too insignificant to name. I bumbled on to Eucalyptus Road, almost missing it, jamming right at the last second. I put my car in low and climbed up slowly, scanning the house numbers.
18319 was midway between highway and mountainside. It was white with aluminum siding, the dream house of a modest dreamer. There were small statues of forest animals guarding both sides of the narrow walkway. They had been pink once, but were now faded almost white by the sun. I parked and alighted from my car, shedding my suitcoat as the sun hit me like a blast furnace. I rang the doorbell and was answered by a dog’s furious barking. Old bad-ass Rudolf, no doubt. I rang again. There was no one but Rudolf at home.
I drove to a gas station, and asked the attendant if he knew where the freeway embankment was where the three guys got shot. I gave him a big ghoulish smile. He returned it and we related, one ghoul to another. Before giving me detailed instructions on how to find it, he elaborated his theory of the killings: the “Mafia” was responsible. The three dead caddies wouldn’t cut them in on their golf course dope action, so they had to be “snuffed.”
I thanked him for his help and took off for the scene of the crime. I was there within five minutes. It was just an innocuous freeway off-ramp, the wide overpass providing shelter from the sun. It looked like a good place to get drunk and shoot the shit. Only today the sand flats on both sides of the roadway were jammed with cars, working-class men in Bermuda shorts, housewives with children in tow and low-rider types in tank tops and cut-offs, spilling forward to see the place where death and drama happened. I joined them and right away found my prey in the middle of the crowd, standing a head taller than everyone else.
I walked up behind him and tapped his shoulder. He turned around. I could tell he recognized me immediately. “Hi, Augie,” I said, “remember me?” He looked around for a means of escape. I glimpsed an eerie intelligence in his eyes.
“I remember you,” he said, “from the Tap and Cap. You were looking for Fat Dog. What do you want?”
“I want to make sure the thing that happened to Fat Dog doesn’t happen to you.”
“What happened to Fat Dog?”
“He’s dead.” I grabbed my necktie, twisted it up to form a hangman’s noose and contorted my face. Augie grimaced. He was very scared. “A lot of people have been dying, Augie. Thanks to your old buddy, Hot Rod Ralston. You’re next unless you talk to me.”
“Hot Rod said that Fat Dog just got hurt.”
“The big hurt, the fina
l one. Talk to me.”
Augie gulped and moved his feet in a little dance of fear. He was sweating now, but not from the heat, and I sensed that he wanted to talk. I went on. “I talked to the barman at the Tap and Cap this morning. He said you came up here to help the cops find out who killed those three caddies. The barman thought you were crazy, acting like a kid. But I don’t. I think you’re a good man and you’ve got a lot of guts. If we work together we can crack this thing. What do you say?”
“I say right on! I say Augie Dougall’s taken enough shit in his life. I say fuck ’em all and save six for the pall-bearers.”
“Good man. Let’s get out of this heat. I’ve got a car with air conditioning.”
We walked to the car. I locked us in and put the air on full. Augie fiddled with the seat release, finally pushing it all the way back to provide adequate leg room. He had at least three inches on me.
“A lot of people think you’re nothing but a big dummy, don’t they, Augie? But I know different. I’m a trained observer and I can tell intelligence when I see it, I’ll tell you what I’m interested in: Fat Dog, Ralston, some sort of Welfare scam and how it all ties in to Sol Kupferman. Be honest, Augie. I heard that conversation you had with Ralston yesterday. He means to hurt you, he thinks you’ve been lying to him. We can’t let that happen. I’ll start by laying my cards on the table. Fat Dog Baker firebombed the Club Utopia back in ’68. Let’s go from there.”
Augie went ashen faced. He started to cough and lit a cigarette. When he spoke his voice was breaking. “Jesus God. You know. And Hot Rod knows and God knows who else. Jesus.”
“How did you find out, Augie?”
“Fat Dog told me, when he was drunk. I believed him. He hated Kupferman because Kupferman was taking care of his sister. He used to get his rocks off by starting fires. I believed him.”
“Did you put Omar Gonzalez onto Ralston?”
“Yeah. I knew something funny was going on between Fat Dog and Hot Rod. Fat Dog gave Hot Rod a lot of shit, and Hot Rod’s a bad man to fuck with. Once they was having an argument at the first tee and Hot Rod says ‘Don’t forget what I know about you, you bastard.’ So I figured he knew. I figured if he knew, he might have written it down somewhere. That’s why I called Gonzalez. I remembered him from the Joe Pyne Show. I figured maybe I could get at Fat Dog and Hot Rod through him.”
“Why did you want to get back at them?”
“For treating me like a slave! Like a retardo! Always laughing at me for being so tall! Augie, the stick! But I’ll show them! I’ll get the scrapbook and name names! I’ll go to the police and be a hero! I’ll …”
I placed a gentle hand on his arm. “What do you know about this scrapbook, Augie? The first I heard about it was yesterday.”
“I don’t know nothing about it, except Burger Hansen and Bobby Marchion was killed for it. They was both old running partners with Fat Dog. Burger used to be in the golf ball business with him. That’s why they was killed. It’s got to be. They was just drunks and loopers. Nobody murders people like that. They used to get drunk and smoke dope under that embankment. They never hurt nobody. Now they’re dead. That’s wrong! It’s evil!”
“I agree. And the evil is about to stop.” I tried a stab in the dark: “Tell me about Ralston’s Welfare scam, Augie.”
Augie’s face went blank. “What Welfare scam?”
“You tell me.”
“I don’t know nothin’ about no Welfare scam. Hot Rod’s got this hotel he owns where all these bums on Welfare live. Winos. He collects their checks each month and takes out for their rent and bar tab. Is that what you mean?”
“No, Augie. I was just thinking out loud.”
“Hot Rod’s evil. You got to be evil to do something like that. Hot Rod don’t care about nothin’ but money and fucking women. Once he showed me these naked pictures he took of Fat Dog’s sister with her legs open. He told me he fucked her. I knew her. She was a sweet young girl. She used to cook really good spaghetti at the caddy lunchstand. And Hot Rod talked about her like she was scum.”
“You mark my words, Augie, within one week Hot Rod Ralston is not going to have a pot to piss in. Four people that I know of are dead because of him and he’s going to pay for it.” Augie looked at me with unabashed hero worship. “One last thing,” I said, “you told Ralston yesterday that Cal Myers told Fat Dog about me on the golf course. Exactly what did he say?”
Augie screwed his face in a memory search: “That you was a private eye in name only. That you was on the sauce. That you weren’t as smart as you thought you was. That you liked to give people shit.”
“That’s all?”
“That’s all I can remember.”
“And Fat Dog said he was going to ‘use’ me for something, right?”
“Right. But he didn’t tell me what it was.”
“You sure?”
“Yeah. I remember I asked him, but he said never mind. Fat Dog could be real silent and crafty like. What are you gonna do now?”
“Talk to Burger Hansen’s widow, look for the scrapbook. What about you?”
“Hide out with my cousin. When you go to the cops, will you tell them I helped you?”
“In spades, Augie. But you can’t stay here in Cat City. Someone was looking for the scrapbook at your cousin’s place. You’ve both got to blow town. You got bread?”
“Not much.”
I checked my wallet and laughed. Forty-three dollars. In the course of the last three weeks I had dished out more money to informers and victims and to assuage my guilty German soul than I had earned in my first year as a cop. “I’m Tap City, Augie,” I said, “but I’ll tell you what to do. Cal Myers owes me one—you get back to L.A. and call him. Tell him Fritz Brown said for him to lay a grand on you. Don’t mention this case or what it’s for. If he won’t give you the bread, say this: January 29, 1971. That will pry it out of him.”
“Ain’t that like blackmail? I know Cal Myers. he’s a hard case and a cheap loop. Catbox Cal they call him, ’cause he’s always in the sand trap.”
“Don’t worry. He’ll kick loose. I’ll take you back to your cousin’s pad. When he gets back, tell him you’ve both got to split for a few weeks. Has he got a car?”
“Yeah.”
“Good. Get in it and take off.” I started up my own battered chariot, pulled it off the shoulder and pointed it towards Charlie Dougall’s house. “Do you know Hansen’s wife, Augie?” I asked.
“Well enough,” he said. “She’s a good old girl. Loopers who get hitched up have a knack for picking loyal women. She put up with a lot of shit from old Burger. She didn’t like his drinking, though. She’s in A.A. herself, that’s why Burger used to get bombed under the freeway. Marguerita wouldn’t let him drink at home. You know, Fritz, I feel good. It’s real funny. I don’t know what’s going to happen, where I’m going to, but I feel like I’ve done something. Something real. For the first time.”
“You have, Augie. You’ve done something very few people could have done.”
“You really think so, Fritz?”
“I know so, Augie.” I pulled up in front of his cousin’s house and handed him one of my business cards. “Here’s my card, Augie. Call me in two weeks and I’ll tell you how this thing came out. In the meantime, get out of town and be careful.”
We shook hands solemnly, then Augie broke into a big loving grin and extricated his Abraham Lincoln frame from my Camaro. I waited until he was safely inside the house, then split.
The Desert Flower Trailer Park was in Section 14, Palm Springs’ poverty pocket. I had been hearing about Section 14 for years. Middle-class elitist cops, connoisseurs of low-life, spoke with awe of the tawdry, unpaved collection of tarpaper shacks, trailer parks, and abandoned cars that existed just half a mile off of Palm Canyon Drive. Every commercial center has to have a slum to house its destitute, and Palm Springs was no exception. Only here the dichotomy was more obvious and the center of desolation more isolated: two minut
es from downtown Palm Springs in the middle of a gigantic sand flat, Section 14 stood, not quite visible from the broad streets that formed its perimeter, lest it ruin some tourist’s vacation with intimations of reality. Dog packs were rumored to roam through it at night, searching out cats and desert rodents for food. Most of its population—drunks, Welfare recipients, car washers and restaurant workers at two dollars an hour—sought air-conditioned refuge during the summer days and returned to swelter at night.
As I pulled off Ramon Road and drove north on Section 14’s garbage-strewn dirt access road, I felt timeless, like a Steinbeckian capitalist exploiter. The Desert Flower Trailer Park was on the south border of Section 14, saving me a trip into its dark inner sanctum. There were no flowers to be seen, desert or otherwise; only a permanently-grounded fleet of beat up, tarnished, small traders, most of them sans cars. I looked at my watch. It was 7:04 and getting dark. There was no one around. I parked my car and locked it, surveying it in the process. It was nine model years old and dusty. It blended right in. If I was lucky no one would deface it out of envy or resentment.
At the head of the two long lines of trailers was a shack marked “Office.” I banged on the door. An elderly woman in a robe answered, smelling of gin. I inquired after Marguerita Hansen. The old woman perused me from head to toe. “Cop?” she said. I nodded affirmatively. “At the very end on the left, number twenty-three.” She slammed her door, blowing dust on my trouser leg.
