LaBrava

by Elmore Leonard

  Well, there was the training at Beltsville, Maryland. He learned how to shoot a Smith & Wesson .357 Magnum, the M-16, the Uzi submachine gun, different other ones. He learned how to disarm and theoretically beat the shit out of would-be assassins with a few chops and kicks. He learned how to keep his head up and his eyes open, how to sweep a crowd looking for funny moves, hands holding packages, umbrellas on clear days, that kind of thing.

  He spent fifteen months in Detroit, his hometown, chasing down counterfeiters, going undercover to get next to wholesalers. That part was okay, making buys as a passer. But then he’d have to testify against the poor bastard in federal court, take the stand and watch the guy’s face drop—Christ, seeing his new buddy putting the stuff on him. So once he was hot in Detroit, a familiar face in the trade, they had to send him out to cool off.

  He was assigned to the Protective Research Section in Washington where, LaBrava said, he read nasty letters all day. Letters addressed to “Peanut Head Carter, the Mushmouth Motherfucker from Georgia.” Or that ever-popular salutation, “To the Nigger-loving President of the Jewnited States.” Letters told what should be done to the President of the USA, “the Utmost Supreme Assholes” who believed his lies. There was a suggestion, LaBrava said, the President ought to be “pierced with the prophet’s sword of righteousness for being a goddamn hypocrite.” Fiery, but not as practical as the one that suggested, “They ought to tie you to one of those MX missiles you dig so much and lose your war-lovin ass.”

  Maurice said, “People enjoy writing letters, don’t they? You answer them?”

  LaBrava said usually there wasn’t a return address; but they’d trace the writers down through postmarks, broken typewriter keys, different clues, and have a look at them. They’d be interviewed and their names added to a file of some forty thousand presidential pen pals, a lot of cuckoos; a few, about a hundred or so, they’d have to watch.

  LaBrava told how he’d guarded important people, Teddy Kennedy during the Senator’s 1980 presidential campaign, trained to be steely-eyed, learned to lean away from those waving arms, stretched his steely eyes open till they ached listening to those tiresome, oh my, those boring goddamn speeches.

  Maurice said, “You should a heard William Jennings Bryan, the Peerless Prince of Platform English, Christ, lecture on the wonders of Florida—sure, brought in by the real estate people.”

  LaBrava said he’d almost quit after guarding Teddy. But he hung on and was reassigned to go after counterfeiters again, now out of the Miami field office, now getting into his work and enjoying it. A new angle. He picked up a Nikon, attached a 200-mm lens, and began using it in surveillance work. Loved it. Snapping undercover agents making deals with wholesalers, passers unloading their funny money. Off duty he continued snapping away: shooting up and down Southwest Eighth Street, the heart of Little Havana; or riding with a couple of Metro cops to document basic Dade County violence. He felt himself attracted to street life. It was a strange feeling, he was at home, knew the people; saw more outcast faces and attitudes than he would ever be able to record, people who showed him their essence behind all kinds of poses—did Maurice understand this?—and trapped them in his camera for all time.

  He got hot again through court appearances and was given a cooling-off assignment—are you ready for this?—in Independence, Missouri.

  After counterfeiters?

  No, to guard Mrs. Truman.

  A member of the twelve-man protective detail. To sit in the surveillance house watching monitors or sit eight hours a day in the Truman house itself on North Delaware. Sit sometimes in the living room looking around at presidential memorabilia, a picture of Margaret and her two kids, the grandfather’s clock that had been wired and you didn’t have to wind—which would have been something to do—listening to faint voices in other rooms. Or sit in the side parlor with Harry’s piano, watching movies on TV, waiting for the one interruption of the day. The arrival of the mailman.

  “Don’t get me wrong, Mrs. Truman was a kind, considerate woman. I liked her a lot.”

  The duty chief had said, “Look, there guys would give an arm and a leg for this assignment. If you can’t take pride in it, just say so.”

  He glanced at Maurice sitting there prim, very serious this evening. Little Maurice Zola, born here before there were roads other than a few dirt tracks and the Florida East Coast Railway. Natty little guy staring at this illuminated interstate highway—giant lit-up green signs every few miles telling where you were—and not too impressed. He had seen swamps become cities, a bridge extended to a strip of mangrove in the Atlantic Ocean and Miami Beach was born. Changes were no longer events in his life. They had happened or they didn’t.

  One of the green signs, mounted high, told them Daytona Beach was 215 miles.

  “Who cares?” Maurice said. “I used to live in Daytona Beach. First time I got married, October 10, 1929—wonderful time to get married, Jesus—was in Miami. The second time was October 24, 1943, in Daytona Beach. October’s a bad month for me. I paid alimony, I mean plenty, but I outlived ’em both. Miserable women. In ’32, when I worked for the septic tank outfit and wrestled alligators on the weekends? It was because I had the experience being married to my first wife.”

  “What about the lady we’re going to see?”

  “What about her?”

  “You ever serious with her?”

  “You’re asking, you want to know did I go to bed with her? She wasn’t that kind of girl. She wasn’t a broad you did that with.”

  “I meant did you ever think of marrying her?”

  “She was too young for me. I don’t mean she was too young you wanted to hop in the sack with a broad her age, I mean to get married and live with. I had all kinds of broads at that time. In fact, go back a few years before that, just before Kefauver, when I had the photo concessions and the horse book operation. I’ll tell you a secret. You want to know who one of the broads I was getting into her pants was at the time. Evelyn, at the gallery. She was in love with me.”

  “I don’t think you’ve introduced me to any who weren’t.”

  “What can I say?” Maurice said.

  “How old’s the woman we’re going to see?”

  “Jeanie? She’s not too old. Lemme think, it was ’58 I gave her a piece of the hotel. Or it might’ve been ’59, they were making that movie on the beach. Frank Sinatra, Edward G. Robinson . . . Jeanie was gonna be in the picture, was why she came down. But she didn’t get the part.”

  “Wait a minute—” LaBrava said.

  “They wanted her, but then they decided she looked too young. She was in her twenties then and she was gonna play this society woman.”

  “Jeanie—”

  “Yeah, very good-looking girl, lot of class. She married a guy—not long after that she married a guy she met down here. Lawyer, very wealthy, use to represent some of the big hotels. They had a house on Pine Tree Drive, I mean a mansion, faced the Eden Roc across Indian Creek. You know where I mean? Right in there, by Arthur Godfrey Road. Then Jerry, Jerry Breen was the guy’s name, had some trouble with the IRS, had to sell the place. I don’t know if it was tax fraud or what. He didn’t go to jail, anything like that, but it cost him, I’ll tell you. He died about oh, ten years ago. Yeah, Jeanie was a movie actress. They got married she retired, gave it up.”

  “What was her name before?”

  “Just lately I got a feeling something funny’s going on. She call me last week, start talking about she’s got some kind of problem, then changes the subject. I don’t know if she means with the booze or what.”

  “You say she was a movie actress.”

  “She was a star. You see her on TV once in a while, they show the old movies.”

  “Her name Jeanie or Jean?”

  “Jean. Jean—the hell was her name? You believe it? I’m used to thinking of her as Jeanie Breen.” Maurice pointed. “Atlantic Boulevard. See it? Mile and a half. You better get over.” Maurice rolled his window down.
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  “Jean Simmons?”

  “Naw, not Jean Simmons.” Maurice was half-turned now, watching for cars coming up in the inside lane. “I’ll tell you when.”

  “Gene Tierney?” Laura. He’d watched it on television in Bess Truman’s living room. “How’s she spell her name?”

  “Jean. How do you spell Jean? J-e-a-n.”

  Jean Harlow was dead. LaBrava looked at the rearview mirror, watched headlights lagging behind, in no hurry. “Jeanne Crain?”

  “Naw, not Jeanne Crain. Get ready,” Maurice said. “Not after this car but the one after it, I think you can make it.”

  3

  * * *

  THEY PARKED IN THE REAR and walked around to the front of the one-story building on Northeast Fourth Street, Delray Beach. From the outside the place reminded LaBrava of a dental clinic: stucco and darkwood trim, low-cost construction; a surface that appeared to be solid but would not stop a bullet. A laminated door that would not stop much of anything. LaBrava, former guardian of presidents and people in high places, automatically studying, making an appraisal. Oh, man, but tired of it. In an orange glow of light they read the three-by-five card taped to the door.

  CRISIS CENTER

  South County Mental Health

  EMERGENCY SCREENING SERVICE

  They had to ring the bell and wait, Maurice sighing with impatience, until a girl about twenty-one with long blond hair opened the door and Maurice said, “I come to get Mrs. Breen.”

  “You’re Mr. Zola, right? Hi, I’m Pam.”

  She locked the door again and they followed her—broad hips compacted within tight jeans—through an empty waiting room and hallway, LaBrava looking around and judging this place, at the low end of institutional decor. He had never seen so many stains and burns. Like people came in here to throw up or set the place on fire with cigarettes. There were cracks and broken holes in the dull-yellow drywall, fist marks. He could see people trying to punch their way out. They came to a doorway, the room inside was dark.

  “She’s in here. Asleep.”

  Maurice stuck his head in. “She’s on the floor.”

  “There’s a mattress,” Pam said. “She’s fine, didn’t give us a bit of trouble. The cops that brought her in described her condition as staggering, speech slurred, I guess she didn’t know where she was.”

  Maurice said, “Was there a problem, a disturbance of any kind?”

  “Well, not really. I mean there’s no charge against her. She was walking down the street with a drink in her hand.”

  Maurice frowned. “A drink? Outside?”

  “They said she came out of a bar, on Palmetto. They saw her on the sidewalk with the drink and when they pulled over she threw it at them. Not the glass, the drink. I guess she was, you know, so bombed they thought they better bring her here.” Pam looked at the doorway. “Why don’t you go in with her? Let her wake up to a familiar face.”

  “Why don’t I get her out of here,” Maurice said. He went in the room.

  LaBrava followed Pam. They came to a room filled with fluorescent light that was about fifteen-by-twenty: a metal desk standing between two mattresses on the floor, a line of metal chairs along the inside wall and a back door wtih double locks. The stains and burn marks seemed magnified in here. LaBrava saw skinny legs with dried sores, a light-skinned black girl asleep on the mattress in front of the desk. He saw a drunk, dirty from living in doorways, that familiar street drunk, soft mouth nearly toothless, cocking his head like a chicken. The drunk sat in the row of folding chairs. Next to him an elderly man sat rigid, his shirt collar buttoned, hands flat on bony thighs. He said to LaBrava, “You ever see an eagle?”

  Pam, sliding behind the metal desk that was covered with forms and scrawled notes, said, “Walter—”

  LaBrava said, “Yeah, I’ve seen an eagle.”

  The rigid man said, “Did it have hair?”

  “The one I saw had feathers.”

  The rigid man said, “Oh.” He looked at Pam now. “You ever see an eagle?”

  Pam said, “Excuse me, Walter, but I have to finish with Earl first. Okay? Be nice.” She glanced down at a clipboard. “Earl, if I call this person Eileen, will she come and get you?”

  “She don’t keep up her house,” the drunk said. “You go in the kitchen . . . I tell her, Jesus Christ, get some wash powder. I can’t live in a place like that.”

  Pam looked up at LaBrava in the doorway. “Sit down. Make yourself at home.”

  He took the end seat, two metal chairs away from the drunk hunched over his crossed legs, the drunk staring, trying to focus, saying, “Do I know you?”

  “I don’t know,” LaBrava said, “we might’ve met one time. How you doing?”

  “See, I don’t want to go to court drunk. I don’t want to go in there, maybe get sick.”

  Pam said, “Earl, I told you, there no charges against you.” She said, “You ever drink anything like aftershave?”

  “No, not ever. Just some home brew, some wine. Eileen, if I’m staying over there, she fixes these toddies are nice. Bourbon and ice cubes, you sprinkle some sugar on top. ’bout a teaspoonful’s all . . .”

  A scream came from a room close by, a wail of obscenities that rose and died off, and LaBrava looked at Pam, expecting her to get up.

  “It’s okay. One of our consumers,” Pam said. “She’s catharting, sort of working it out on her own. But there’s someone with her, don’t worry.”

  “Consumer,” LaBrava said.

  The girl had a nice smile, very natural; she seemed too young and vulnerable to be working here. Psych major no more than a year out of college. “That’s what we call the people we screen. They’re not, you know, patients technically till they’re admitted somewhere. This’s just a temporary stop more or less.”

  The drunk said, “Then I’m leaving.” He got up, stumbling against the rigid man, pushed off and tilted toward the girl lying on the mattress before finding his balance. He reached the back door and began working at the locks.

  Pam said, “Come on, Earl, sit down and be good. You have to stay here till you’ve sobered up and you’re a little more appropriate.”

  Earl turned from the door, falling against it. “More ‘propriate? Shit, I’m ‘propriate.”

  “You are not,” Pam said, a young schoolteacher at her desk. “Please sit down so we can finish.”

  The drunk fell against the chairs, almost into the rigid man whose hands remained flat on his thighs. The girl with sores on her legs moaned and rolled from her side to her back, eyes lightly closed, lids fluttering in the overhead light.

  LaBrava was looking at her and Pam said, “She’s Haitian. She got stoned and walked out on the Interstate. A car had to swerve out of the way and hit another car and one of the drivers, I don’t know which one, had to have twenty stitches in his head.”

  The drunk said, “Shit, I was at Louisville Veterans, they put sixty-four stitches in my leg. Boy jammed a bottle, broke it off, jammed the end of it in my leg. See? Right there. Sixty-four stitches. Doc said he stopped counting.”

  “It’s a beauty,” LaBrava said. “Cut you good, didn’t he?” He saw the drunk look up.

  LaBrava turned. Maurice was standing over him.

  “Get the camera.”

  LaBrava kept his voice down. “You sure you want to? Maybe they won’t like it.”

  Maurice said to the girl, “Sweetheart, would you do something for my friend here? Unlock the door? He’s got to get a camera outta the car.”

  Pam let him out the back telling him to knock and she’d open it again.

  What Maurice wanted to do—LaBrava was sure now—was take a picture of his friend smashed, bleary-eyed, then show it to her tomorrow. “See what a beauty you are when you’re drunk?” Shame her into sobriety. But if the woman had a problem with booze it would be a waste of time. He wouldn’t mind, though, getting a shot of Earl. Earl showing his scar. Shoot it from down on the floor. The guy’s leg crossed, pants pulled up, shin in
the foreground, shiny crescent scar. Earl pointing with a dirty fingernail. Grinning near toothless, too drunk not to look proud and happy.

  Bending over in the trunk LaBrava felt inside the camera case, brought out the Leica CL and attached a wide-angle lens.

  Headlights flashed on him, past him. By the time he looked around the car had come to a stop parallel to the building, its dark-colored rear deck standing at the edge of the floodlit area that extended out from the back door. LaBrava felt in the case again for the flash attachment. He straightened, slamming the trunk closed.

  A young guy was out of the car. Big, well-built guy in a silver athletic jacket, blue trim. Banging on the door now with the thick edge of his fist, other hand wedged in the tight pocket of his jeans. LaBrava came up next to him. The guy grinned, fist still raised, toothpick in the corner of his mouth.

  “How you doing this evening?” Slurring his words.

  He was thick all over, heavily muscled, going at least six-three, two-thirty. Blond hair with a greenish tint in the floodlight: the hair uncombed, clots of it lying straight back on his head without a part, like he’d been swimming earlier and had raked it back with his fingers. The guy wasn’t young up close. Mid-thirties. But he was the kind of guy—LaBrava knew by sight, smell and instinct—who hung around bars and arm-wrestled. Homegrown jock—pumped his muscles and tested his strength when he wasn’t picking his teeth.

  LaBrava said, “Not too bad. How’re you doing?”

  “Well, I don’t idle too good, but I’m still running.” With a back-country drawl greasing his words. “You gonna take some pitchers?”

  “I’m thinking about it.”

  “What of, this pisshole? Man, I wouldn’t keep goats in this place.”

  “I imagine they don’t have much of a budget, run by the county,” LaBrava said. Hearing himself, he sounded like a wimp. He had the feeling he would never agree with this guy. Still, there was no sense in antagonizing him.