Bad Intent

by Wendy Hornsby

  I reached up and tickled the hard midsection of my one and only, nearly grown offspring, feeling a haughty smugness.

  You make your bed, you lie in it. Four more years and Casey would be an adult, my daily mother work essentially finished. In four more years, in the matter of children, old Scotty would have barely climbed between the sheets.

  “You ready to go home?” I asked. “Take a swim with me?”

  She shrugged. “I’d rather go for pizza.”

  “Fine,” I said. I didn’t feel like eating, but I didn’t feel like going straight home, either. While we straightened the room and turned out lights, I dialed Guido.

  “Mpfh?” he said, picking up on the third ring.

  “Sorry to wake you,” I said. “You could have left the machine on. I just wanted to remind you we’re going out to Central Juvenile Hall in the morning. I’ll be by before nine.”

  “Nine’s more civilized than three. Etta coming?”

  “She didn’t say one way or the other. If she wants a ride, she’ll call.”

  He said something like mpfh again. I took it for good-bye and hung up.

  The building was full of activity. Most of the tenants were free-lancers who rented offices downstairs and studio space upstairs by the hour. The studios were in use around the clock, usually bigger productions by day, small stuff at night whenever time became available.

  Because the elections were only a month and a half away, the studios were solidly booked by political hack crews producing spots for the end-of-campaign TV blitz. All night long candidates walked the corridors in heavy makeup and perfect light-blue shirts. Working vampire hours.

  I knew the people across the hall were doing spots for Marovich. I had seen them hard at it. After I locked my door, I stopped outside their office and listened. Someone was tuned to Satellite Network News, doubtless on the lookout for usable video bites to cannibalize from Ralph. Because Marovich would be footing the bills, I hoped Ralph gouged them more deeply for anything they used than the fifteen hundred I had cut for thirty seconds of Etta.

  That was a cruel thought, I thought. I should give Mr. District Attorney Marovich a chance. Thinking, no time like the present, I knocked on the neighbors’ door.

  Chapter 12

  I gained entry to my neighbors’ office by pulling out a Pass Go card. That is, my business card. I knew my name would carry some cachet with another filmmaker, entree at least, but the version I handed him read: Countryside Film Productions, Margot E. Duchamps—it’s my legal name—and my San Francisco number. I also carry a version with my professional name—Maggie MacGowen—the one I acquired when a TV station genius at my first job decided that Margot Duchamps wasn’t perky enough for western Kansas, and stamped me with my husband’s name.

  Circumstances define which card I pull out. Name recognition that might open certain doors, might get other doors slammed in my face. I play it by ear. My ear said Baron Marovich had acquired some idea who Maggie MacGowen was and would not be especially eager to speak with me, perky or not.

  I learned from my across-the-hall colleagues that Marovich had a taping scheduled upstairs at ten-thirty. That gave me time to get pizza, take Casey home, and drive back again.

  I needn’t have hurried; it was nearly eleven before Marovich dragged into the studio for retooling—a fresh shirt and new makeup.

  My card was on the makeup table among half-a-dozen messages when Marovich sat down on a high wooden stool and gave his face to the makeup woman.

  Marovich was a surprise to me. I had expected the D.A. to be slicker than snot. Face to face, I found him to be very bright, very attractive, and thoroughly personable. We hit it off right away. I think that I represented to him the possibility of some free media exposure, which he cannily courted. He also seemed to like my legs, though he was having some trouble buying my reasons for wanting a word with him.

  “I’m working on a documentary about a group of kids who grew up in the projects,” I said. “Seems to me that every time I turn around I bump into Charles Conklin, or his tailings. If he’s going to be a recurring presence, I need to have some blanks filled in. You probably know more about him right now than anyone. I’d like to use you as a source.”

  Marovich was getting the shine powdered off his face, so he couldn’t frown properly when I said the C word: Conklin. But he got across his displeasure about the topic.

  “Miss Duchamps,” he said, hardly moving his lips, “I’d like to help you, but right now it’s a question of time. I don’t have any. My family thinks I’m a stranger, and the way things are going I won’t see them again, awake, until after the first Tuesday in November. Obligations at the office, demands of a campaign—you understand, I’m sure, why I can’t help you.”

  “Absolutely,” I said. He couldn’t turn his head and I didn’t like talking to the side of his face. So I pulled up a second stool next to him, leaned my elbows on my knees and talked to his image in the mirror. “I understand how a campaign can put pressure on a family. Any time a parent is away from home for an extended period there can be disastrous ramifications. Take Conklin’s son, Tyrone, as an example. Tyrone is in Central Juvenile waiting to be tried for murder.”

  He laughed. “Are you suggesting that if I don’t go straight home my kids will end up in the slam?”

  “Nope. I’m sure your wife is a paragon and has things well in hand. Tyrone Harkness’s mother was a junkie.”

  “Might explain a lot,” he said.

  “It might. The two young witnesses against Conklin grew up on the same block as Tyrone. One of them was a hooker, the other one is a librarian. The question is, what made the difference?”

  Mention of the witnesses made a shadow cross his face. But he still liked my legs well enough to hang in with me.

  I leaned closer to him, aiming to project befuddled sincerity. “I find the ‘what if’s’ to be absolutely compelling, don’t you? What if Tyrone’d had a father who could provide him with a safety net, some guidance? Would the boy Tyrone is accused of killing be sitting down to dinner tonight with his family? Would his own two babies now have a role model and guide to see them safely through the perils of childhood?”

  “Vicious cycle.”

  “Yes it is,” I said. “Charles Conklin’s conviction trails an endless wake of grief. If the man was innocent, if he was wrongfully deprived of all those years he should have been with his family, then it is truly a gross tragedy. But after `oops,’ what can be said?”

  “Oops is a good start,” he said, smiling, cracking the makeup that filled in his crow’s feet. The makeup person was holding a white card behind his head so she could see in shadow, as the camera would, any stray wisps of hair. Marovich was being very patient with the fussing.

  “Why do I feel I’m being interviewed?” he asked.

  “Just conversation,” I said. I picked up a comb, dampened it with hairspray, and smoothed some fluff that had breached the surface of his helmet of salt-and-pepper hair. “You do see the poignancy?”

  “Uh huh,” he said, dubious. “Let me first correct one misstatement. I have never suggested that Conklin was innocent. His guilt or innocence is irrelevant. What is relevant is this: Charles Conklin was convicted on tainted evidence. He has a right to a new trial. But after fourteen years, a trial would be an exercise in futility. Justice demands he be set free.”

  “Do you believe he’s guilty?”

  He shrugged. “Guilt is an altogether different issue.”

  I pressed, gesturing with the comb. “When you go on national television with that jackass evangelist and say nothing when he gets red in the face asserting Conklin’s innocence, and you sit next to his defense attorney and nod when she lisps out her rage at the injustice of sending a poor lamb to prison, then it seems to me you express tacit agreement with them.”

  “I was merely one viewpoint on a panel,” he said, defensive.

  “An awfully quiet one. You looked like a fellow traveler. I heard no debate about
fine points of the law, only protestations of the man’s innocence.”

  He drew back to look at me directly. “Jesus,” he said. “You’re tough. In my defense I say again, guilt is not the issue.”

  “Maybe not in court, but in the real world guilt is absolutely the issue. The witnesses and the investigating cops, and I suppose the jail-house snitch, are taking a heavy beating. They stand accused of doing something corrupt and cannot defend themselves. They don’t have your access to the media, and the media apparently is not interested in what they might have to say.”

  “You seem to know a lot about it.” He eyed the comb in my hand, wary, maybe evaluating how much damage it was capable of inflicting.

  I slipped the comb into his breast pocket. “You and I both know that Charles Conklin is a career criminal with a rap sheet about half as long as he is tall. Child molestation, pandering, dealing, theft, you name it. If he hadn’t gone down for shooting Officer Wyatt Johnson, he would have tumbled on something else. Unless he got shot on the street first. Right?”

  “If Conklin held to pattern.”

  “Tell me why, in all the fuss about this gross injustice, no one has mentioned Conklin’s record.”

  “Because it isn’t germane.”

  “What is germane, then?”

  He picked up the stack of messages with my card on top, and started to rise. “The cops fucked up.”

  I rose with him. “Cops that fuck up attract a lot of press.”

  “Margot.” The way he said it sounded like a challenge. “What is it, exactly, that you want?”

  “I want to talk to the witnesses.”

  “Go ahead.”

  “I’ve tried. Hanna Rhodes was a body under a sheet before I connected with her. LaShonda DeBevis is doing a good impression of the invisible man. And I understand that when anyone tries to contact Detective Jerry Kelsey, your office puts out a tail. Exactly who does George Schwartz work for?”

  “Margot,” he said again, slowly, looking hard at my card. “I guess Maggie could be short for Margot.”

  “No. For maggot. My older brother and sister used to call me maggot.”

  “And MacGowen?”

  “My husband’s name.”

  I had not read him well. Once he made the connection, he was amused by me in the way a cat is amused when he has a rat squirming under his paw. I’d never been so sympathetic with rats before.

  “Now I get it,” he said. “I know what you want from me.”

  “What?” I asked.

  “Absolution for Mike Flint.”

  “No.” I matched his slow, considered tone. “I want the truth, the whole truth, and you know the rest of it. Don’t feed me any more bullshit fine points of the law or fairy tales about dashed innocence. It is unconscionable the way you have exploited real people just to get your face on the tube as much as you possibly can before the election.”

  He flushed. “That’s not what I’ve done.”

  “That’s how I read it. That’s how I will present it unless I am persuaded otherwise. I can have a red-hot package ready in time for the early news broadcasts tomorrow. Network news. With photos and footage. The lead will probably be some variation on ‘Conklingate.’ The theme will be boundless ambition. Where were you at two-thirty this morning, Mr. District Attorney, when Hanna Rhodes took a couple in the chest? Where was your investigator, George Schwartz? What the hell are you up to?”

  He reacted the way a seasoned courtroom attorney should. He stonewalled all expression.

  Roddy O’Leary, Marovich’s campaign manager, came in just then, and I knew there would be no more discussion. Roddy was visibly unhappy to see me, but he came over and gave me a big smooch anyway.

  “Working late?” he said, putting himself between me and the candidate.

  “Normal hours for me,” I said. “You know, no rest for the wicked.”

  He gave me a token chuckle. He said, “Studio time is expensive. You two want to debate, find a cheaper hall. Mr. D.A., they’re waiting for you on the set. At their rates, every minute wasted is the equivalent of two-hundred direct-mail fliers. So, let’s go do it.”

  Marovich fixed the knot in his tie as he studied me, memorized me. “Nice meeting you.”

  “LaShonda DeBevis,” I said. “Get me access to LaShonda DeBevis.”

  “I don’t have her,” he said. He walked away shielded by the considerable mass of old Roddy.

  “You’d have made a good she-wolf,” I said to Roddy as I gathered my things, “the way you watch over your cubs.”

  “I do what it takes,” he said. “Anything it takes.”

  “Anything?” I asked.

  “What’s on your mind?”

  “George Schwartz. How far will you have him go?”

  “Schwartz, you say?” Roddy turned his hands up. “Never heard of the guy. Nice talking to you, MacGee. I gotta go to work.”

  All the way home, I tried to sort what I knew from what I surmised. As always, the first column was tremendously shorter than the second.

  Mike was in the kitchen with the telephone against his ear and a pencil poised above a notebook. The stills I had taken the night before were spread out on the table, along with stills made from Guido’s videotape. I picked one up, a blow-up of the back end of a car. The quality was flat and fuzzy, but I could read the license plate. I could read license plates in eight or ten other shots as well.

  “When did you see Guido?” I asked.

  “Didn’t. I talked to him this morning. He had this stuff sent over while we were at the game. For a commie, your Guido’s damn smart. Hector says hi.”

  “Me, too,” I said. “And Guido isn’t a commie. He’s a democrat.”

  “Same thing.”

  “I’m a democrat.”

  If he heard me, he didn’t bother to retort. He was back on the phone with Hector. I got a soda from the refrigerator and drank it while I eavesdropped. Mike would read a license number to Hector on the phone. Hector was, I presumed, plugging the numbers into the Department of Motor Vehicles computer and sending back to Mike the names and addresses of the owners.

  I rested my arm across Mike’s shoulders and watched him write Ozzie Freemantle, 1931 112th Street. He thanked Hector and hung up.

  I asked, “Can’t Hector draw a suspension for unauthorized use of the files?”

  “If he does, I’ll make it up to him. Anyway, who’s gonna beef him? Hec is a homicide dick working a case.”

  “But you’re not.”

  Mike pulled me down to his lap. “But who’s gonna tell?”

  “Me,” I said. “I just bawled out the district attorney for not playing by the rules. You think I’m going to live with cheating in my own home?”

  “Damn right. If I’m a cheater, you’ll live with it.”

  “You’re pretty sure of yourself, Mike Flint.” I nestled my face into the soft crook of his neck and closed my eyes while he rocked me. I felt sleep-deprived and would have been very happy to spend the next eight or so hours right there on his lap. “Pretty damn sure of yourself.”

  “Tell me about the D.A.”

  I yawned. “Later, okay? I have to be up early to get Casey to school. I’m going to bed now.”

  “I’m off, remember? I’ll drive Casey.”

  “Okay, but one condition.” I managed to stand up. “If anyone follows you, I don’t want you to beat him up until after you have dropped off my baby. Got it?”

  “Got it.” He laughed.

  I took him by the hand and gave him a pull. “Come on. Bedtime for cheaters.”

  Chapter 13

  Etta didn’t call Wednesday morning. I thought maybe she was still partying with Baby Boy. Or maybe he had worn her out so that she couldn’t drag herself down the street to a pay phone. Whatever the reason Etta didn’t call, I was relieved to be saved the long detour into Southeast L.A.

  At eight-thirty, when I got on the freeway, the air was already hot and the sky was a ridiculously showy blue. The day’s ra
tion of smog still hovered in a low, dense brown layer along the ocean horizon, waiting for a change in the wind. At the tail end of morning rush hour, traffic down the Hollywood Freeway to Guido’s house was heavy but moving steadily.

  According to the news on the radio, the pro-Conklin demonstrators outside Parker Center had grown both in number and in volume. The police department had asked all of its workers to enter the building through the guarded, covered garage on San Pedro Street for their own safety. Two members of the police commission had nearly come to blows during last night’s meeting called to discuss how the department would proceed. I turned the radio off.

  Guido lives in a rugged canyon behind the Hollywood Bowl, his small gem of a house surrounded by groves of eucalyptus and dusty pine. Though he is only ten minutes from the festering armpit of the city—his description—once you turn off Highland Avenue and start up his winding road you are deep in wilderness. So, okay, maybe it’s an illusion of wilderness and locals dump their bodies off the side of his road with scary regularity. Still, at night coyotes howl at the moon from the rise behind his house.

  When I crested the top of his steep drive, I found Guido sitting on his front step in a patch of sunlight. Lazily, he got to his feet.

  “I was sitting here thinking,” he said, sauntering over as I got out of my car, “how nice it would be to drive up the coast today, maybe stop somewhere north of Malibu for a late breakfast. There’s an antique camera store around Oxnard somewhere. Maybe it’s in Ojai. I’ve been meaning to check it out. It’s gorgeous up there this time of year, orange trees in blossom everywhere.”

  “Nice try,” I said. “It took me three days of fast talking to get permission to bring the equipment into Juvenile Hall. I don’t want to go through that again, even for orange blossoms. Tell you what, though. When we’re finished with Tyrone, I’ll you over to Lawry’s California for huevos rancheros. I’ve always wanted to go there.”

  “Can’t.” He sighed dramatically. “They closed it down a couple of years ago. By the time I get to Ojai, the camera store will probably be long gone, too. Listen to me, Maggie, carpe diem. “