Hollywood Moon hs-3

by Joseph Wambaugh

  When they’d talked about it over lunch during a break from the shopping frenzy, Pamela sensed her mother’s anxiety and said, “Mom, I know you think I might get taken over by radicals from the People’s Republic of Berkeley and turned into a campus terrorist, but not to worry. About eighty percent of my dorm mates will be brainy Asian girls with parents calling three times a day to make sure they’re doing violin practice as well as studying every waking moment. I don’t think there’s much chance of getting into trouble up there. It’ll be all I can do to keep up academically.”

  And Dana gazed at her daughter, eighteen years old now, who’d inherited Dana’s wide-set, golden-brown eyes, firm chin, great cheekbones, and lovely long legs. Dana figured she was probably smarter than both her cop mother and lawyer father, who, Dana had to admit, was readily coughing up the money that their daughter needed to get college-bound.

  Dana thought that someday she might actually be able to bring herself to a face-to-face with that lying, skirt-chasing asshole, and hear about his new family: a bucks-up wife with two sons of her own. Dana guessed that by now the boys must resent their stepfather for taking control of their trust-fund management, because Dana was sure that he would have. He was that kind of intrusive, controlling lawyer who could never stop beginning every ponderous pronouncement with “At some point in time.” Dana hated that law school redundancy almost as much as she’d hated his philandering. How he’d managed to provide the seed to produce the splendid girl sitting across from her would always be a mystery.

  Before they finished their iced tea, Dana’s cell chimed, and when she picked it up, a tremulous voice said, “Officer Vaughn?”

  “Yes?” Dana said, not recognizing the caller.

  “It’s Naomi Teller? From Ogden Drive?”

  “Yes, Naomi,” Dana said. “Thanks for calling. Do you have some information for me?”

  “Yes,” Naomi said. “I been thinking about it and I didn’t talk to my mother or dad, but I’d like to talk to you. Could we talk in person? It’s kinda hard to tell it on the phone.”

  “I go on duty late this afternoon. I can meet you just after six P.M. Do you want me to come to your house?”

  “No. I’ll just tell my mother I’m going up the street to visit my friend Liz, but I’ll meet you at the corner of Sunset and Ogden. I’ll start walking at six o’clock.”

  “See you there, honey,” Dana said.

  When Dana closed her cell phone, Pamela said, “Who was that?”

  “A fourteen-year-old girl whose house got attacked by a prowling rock thrower last night. I think she wants to tell me who it was.”

  “Rock thrower?” Pamela said. “I didn’t think you busy LAPD cops had time to be chasing around after rock throwers.”

  “This one’s special,” Dana said. “When we were looking for him, he sneaked up on one of our officers and tossed him into a swimming pool before escaping.”

  “Really?” Pamela said. “How mad was the cop?”

  “You know how your electric toothbrush vibrates?” Dana asked.

  At 3 P.M., Dewey Gleason in his Honda, followed by Tristan Hawkins and Jerzy Szarpowicz in a rented van, were at the car gate of the storage facility in Reseda. Dewey punched in his entry code while the office employee looked out the window. The gate buzzed and swung open. Both vehicles drove in, and Dewey stopped at the office, entered, and spoke to a woman he’d come to know as Bessie on other trips he’d made as Bernie Graham.

  “Dropping off a van, Bessie,” he said. “We’re coming back later.”

  “Okay, Bernie,” she said.

  He often gave her small gifts, and this time he brought a few fan magazines to keep her occupied when he pulled out of the storage facility alone in his car.

  They proceeded to the storage room, and while Dewey unlocked the door, Tristan drove the van around to the next lane of parking spaces.

  While Tristan was gone, Jerzy said to Dewey, “I hope you don’t plan to lock this thing up while we’re inside.”

  “Of course I do,” Dewey said. “My wife’ll be with me when we come back tonight. What’s she gonna say if she sees the thing unlocked?”

  “I don’t know what she’s gonna say,” Jerzy said, “but you ain’t lockin’ us in there.”

  “There’s plenty of air,” Dewey said. “And if you have to take a leak, just do it in there.”

  “You ain’t lockin’ us in there,” Jerzy repeated. “Figure out somethin’ else.” And with that, he took the padlock from Dewey’s hand and said, “I’ll hang on to this.”

  “Shit!” Dewey said just as Tristan came jogging back from parking the van. He was carrying a flashlight, a roll of duct tape, and rags for the blindfolds.

  “What’s the problem?” Tristan said when he saw that they hadn’t yet opened the storage-room door.

  “He won’t let me lock you in,” Dewey said. “It’ll look suspicious if I don’t. It could wreck the whole gag.”

  “I ain’t gonna be locked in that room,” Jerzy said, “and that’s final.”

  “Lemme see that,” Tristan said, indicating the padlock.

  Tristan hung the padlock over the metal door staple and closed the door and folded the hasp over it. “There,” he said. “In the dark it’ll look okay. Make sure your old lady’s standin’ behind you when you pretend to be unlockin’ it.”

  Then he opened the storage-room door and said to Jerzy, “Come on, dawg, let’s get inside and figure how we’re gonna pull our ambush on this here victim and his woman.”

  “This isn’t starting out right,” Dewey said. “This is a bad omen.”

  “Fuck your omens,” Jerzy said. “Just do what we say.”

  So now Dewey could no longer even pretend that he was in charge. These thugs had taken over. Dewey looked at Jerzy and nodded, forcing himself to think only of the money and of driving away from Hollywood forever. He imagined how he’d be laughing out loud every time he thought of this fat pig being left in Frogtown with nothing but his frustrated partner, his boiling rage, and Eunice Gleason.

  There wasn’t a soul at Hollywood Station that day who did not know about the assault on Officer R.T. Dibney the night before. When he came to work, everyone greeted him with a grin, a chuckle, or a wiseass remark. He even saw two Mexican janitors jabbering in Spanish, and one of them waved his arms in a swimming motion while the other cackled hysterically. The Mexican stopped swimming when he saw R.T. Dibney glaring at him.

  R.T. Dibney was expecting more of the same after he changed into his uniform, but walking to the roll call room, he got stopped momentarily by the surfer cops, and they didn’t make any wisecracks or swimming jokes.

  “Dude, we’re into cruising those westside reporting districts until we catch that prowler,” Flotsam said gravely.

  “Thanks,” R.T. Dibney said with some suspicion.

  “We’re gonna get him before this deployment period ends, bro,” Jetsam said.

  Now R.T. Dibney was even more suspicious. It was one minute from the start of roll call. Why were they out in the hallway, offering this moral support?

  Both surfer cops patted him on the shoulder in yet another show of solidarity and slowly made their way into the roll call room, where everyone was already seated in attentive poses, faces to the front. Both Sergeant Lee Murillo and Sergeant Miriam Hermann looked as serious as the troops. He couldn’t figure that out either.

  The surfer cops sat quickly and nobody paid the least attention to R.T. Dibney, who was the last man in, and he made his way to his usual seat.

  But as he prepared to sit, Sergeant Murillo said, “Today, roll call training is about… swimming pool safety.”

  And there on R.T. Dibney’s chair was a child-size, plastic life preserver with a little toy whistle attached to it, and a tag that said, “Next time, just whistle.”

  After the dozen cops and two supervisors got their laughter under control, R.T. Dibney, with mustache twitching, said to all, “I’m gonna find that guy. And when I do, I
just might not be taking prisoners.”

  “You’re a knockout!” Dewey Gleason said to Eunice when she emerged from her bedroom in a knee-length, wraparound, black-and-white flower-print dress from Macy’s. Her strawberry-blonde hair was dyed and highlighted, making her more of a taffy blonde this time, and cut in a chin-length bob. Her nails were coated in clear polish, with the tips whitened for the more natural look, and she wore black, strappy heels that he figured must have set her back a few Franklins.

  “I love your new shoes,” Dewey said.

  Eunice said, “Yeah, well, if I bought shoes to fit the occasion, Musso’s would deserve old leather bedroom slippers.”

  “Anyway, you look terrific,” Dewey said with less enthusiasm.

  Eunice hadn’t had a compliment from Dewey in so long, she didn’t know how to respond. She removed the cigarette protruding from the left side of her freshly glossed lips and said, “A girl has to get gussied up once in a while to feel like a girl.”

  Waxing theatrical, Dewey said with a flourish, “Her flesh is luminous in velvet shadows. A figure from Rembrandt, who will turn all heads in Musso and Frank!”

  Eunice looked at him and said, “Don’t overact and go all burbly. When your chirp level gets elevated, you make me think you have ulterior motives, Dewey.”

  That wiped the smile off his face and gave him a jolt of alarm. The goddamn woman had a sixth sense! He’d have to watch every word he said tonight if he was to get her to that storage room in Reseda. The booze would help if he could entice her to swill it while she was busy flirting with the kid. Suddenly, the whole elaborate plan seemed half-baked, and he felt the confidence leaking out of him. But then he only had to think of that meth demon and his sly little partner and remember that they owned him now. That was enough to give him the resolve to get through this gag and hope that he really was the actor he’d always believed he was.

  Malcolm Rojas was showered and shaved and wearing a lemon-yellow, long-sleeve shirt that his mother had ironed. He arrived early and was standing nervously in the parking lot behind Musso amp; Frank when Dewey drove the Honda in. Malcolm wondered why someone as successful as Bernie Graham didn’t have a better car, but he figured it must be part of doing what the man always referred to as a gag, and not wanting to draw attention in any way. Malcolm couldn’t understand the relationship that Bernie Graham had with his secretary, Ethel, and wondered if it was romantic. All Malcolm knew for sure was that he didn’t like the way Ethel looked at him and smiled at him, as though she wanted to put her hands in his hair the way his mother had done until he’d put a stop to it. And then, when they got out of the Honda, there was something about Ethel, all dressed up with her hair really blonde now, something that made him think of his mother.

  “What’s wrong, kid?” Dewey said as he and Eunice approached Malcolm.

  When they shook hands, Malcolm’s palm was wet and clammy. “Oh, nothing,” Malcolm said, and the image vanished.

  Eunice smiled coquettishly and said, “Are you hungry, Clark?”

  “Not real hungry,” Malcolm said, “but I’m sure it’ll happen when I smell the food in there.”

  Five minutes after they cleared from roll call, Dana Vaughn had a surprise for Hollywood Nate.

  “What was it that the Oracle always told you about police work?” she said.

  “He said that doing good police work was the most fun we’d ever have in our entire lives. He was nearly sixty-nine years old when he died, so I think he knew a few things about the Job.”

  “How would you like to do some pretty good police work tonight?”

  “Like what?”

  “Popping the guy who pushed R.T. Dibney into the swimming pool.”

  “What’re you talking about?”

  “The kid, Naomi Teller? She called me. I think she wants to give up the person who tossed the rock. I’m betting it’s some little jerkoff from school that she doesn’t want her mom to know about.”

  “You haven’t told anyone about the phone call?”

  “No, I thought it’d be cool to bust the kid ourselves and let you come up with something funny when R.T. Dibney finds out about it.”

  “Yeah!” Hollywood Nate said eagerly. “Maybe I’ll text him and offer to trade the kid for the keys to his new Acura. Something like that.”

  “I thought you’d enjoy it, honey,” Dana said.

  Naomi Teller was standing on the west side of Ogden Drive just south of Sunset Boulevard at 6:10 P.M., as promised. She looked especially young in low-rise jeans, a cutoff “Pink” jersey, and tennis shoes, especially since she was still a year or more from acquiring the womanly curves that the style required.

  Dana pulled to the curb and said to Nate, “You better take a short walk and let us girls talk it over.”

  “Roger that,” he said, getting out of the car and holding the passenger door open for the girl to get in.

  When Naomi was in the passenger seat next to Dana, she said, “I was wondering if pushing the officer into the swimming pool is real serious?”

  “It’s an assault on a police officer,” Dana said. “People don’t do it every day, that’s for sure. Are you worried about what’ll happen to the rock thrower?”

  “No, I’m kinda scared about what might happen to me if I snitch. ’Cause I’m pretty scared of him. I think he’s not quite right up here.” She tapped her temple with a fingernail decorated by a little Walk of Fame star.

  “Tell me about him,” Dana said.

  “I met him when I was walking home last week, and I gave him my number. And I went and had a burger with him yesterday when he called me after he got off work. That’s all I did with the guy, but he’s, like, nineteen years old. My mom’d have a fit if she knew I got in a car with a guy his age that I didn’t even know.”

  “Did he say where he worked?”

  “No.”

  “What kind of car?”

  “A red Mustang. A real old one.”

  “What’s his name, Naomi?”

  “Clark. He says it’s Clark Jones, but I don’t believe he’s a Jones. He looks like a Gomez maybe. He’s real cute with great teeth and big dimples.”

  Dana smiled at that and said, “Why’d he throw the rock through the window?”

  “Because after he bought me the burger, he thought I was his girlfriend or something. There was stuff kinda weird about him, and I got scared and wished I’d never got in his car. When he called me later, I told him he was too old for me. I did it, like, real nice and all, but he got way mad. He called me a bitch, and I hung up on him.”

  “Do you know where he lives?”

  “No, he never said.”

  “When he called you at home, was it on your home phone?”

  “No,” Naomi said, “on my cell.”

  “Bingo!” Dana said. “You’ve got his cell number in your phone, then?”

  “Oh, yeah,” Naomi said. “In fact, I put it in the list the first time he called.” She pulled her phone from the pocket of her jeans, scrolled to “Clark,” and said, “Here. You can write it down.”

  Dana pulled out her notebook and did just that, and then she said, “Now I’d like the best description of him that you can give me. You think he might be Hispanic, and he’s nineteen years old, right? How tall is he?”

  “Not tall,” Naomi said. “I’m five foot six, and he’s only a couple inches taller.”

  “How much does he weigh? Take a guess.”

  “He’s thin. So how much would that be?”

  “About a hundred and forty or so. Any tattoos?”

  “Not that I could see.”

  “How about the color of his hair and eyes?”

  “Real pretty brown eyes with long lashes,” Naomi said. “And real dark curly hair, almost black.”

  Dana made notes and then said, “Long hair, short hair?”

  “Just a regular guy’s haircut,” Naomi said, “except it was thick and curly. It curled over his ears. Most girls would die for hair like that
.”

  And then Dana Vaughn’s demeanor changed, and Naomi thought her questions seemed a bit more urgent.

  Dana looked at her notes and back at Naomi and said, “When was the first time you saw Clark?”

  “Last week,” Naomi said. “I forget what day. Maybe Friday?”

  “What was he wearing then?”

  “He wore a T-shirt and jeans and tennis shoes,” Naomi said.

  “What color was the T-shirt?”

  “Blue. Light blue.”

  And now Naomi saw even more of a change in the officer when she leaned forward and said, “When you were having your burger yesterday, where were you?”

  “At Mel’s Drive-In on the Strip,” Naomi said. “It was pretty expensive, I think.”

  “Did you notice anything different about him yesterday? Anything about his face or other parts of his body?”

  “Like what?”

  “Any fresh scratches or bruises anywhere?”

  “Just skinned-up knuckles on both hands. And a little bruise under his eye. He said he beat up a couple of guys at his job that were bullies. I didn’t really believe that either.”

  And now there was no question in Naomi’s mind: This police officer was super-interested in Clark Jones. In fact, the officer looked as though she wanted to call out something to her partner, who was waiting twenty yards away on the sidewalk.

  “Anything else?” Dana asked.

  Naomi said, “I think Clark is kind of a bragger who makes up things. Like about his Persian mother and his French father. I didn’t believe that either. We talked about guys like him in class. They have a mental problem, maybe because of drugs or something. It makes them behave… grandy-something.”

  “Grandiose?”

  “Yeah, that’s it,” Naomi said. “He talks, like, way grandiose.”