Telling Lies

by Wendy Hornsby

  “I will. Good night.” For something to do with my hands, I was fingering the scraps of junk in my coat pockets as I watched him walk away. I pulled out a BART ticket that still had five cents on it, and a gum wrapper. Garth turned at the stairs and started back.

  “Maggie, this is nuts. You shouldn’t be here alone. I don’t believe Celeste for a minute, but something rough is going on. At least come home with me.”

  “I’m fine. There are big locks on the doors and Mrs. Lim is on the lookout downstairs. I’m fine,” I insisted. “Drive carefully.”

  “I’ll call you,” he said again and, after some hesitation, went away.

  I waited in the open door until I heard him going downstairs. I had by then found in my pocket a ticket stub for The Return of the Jedi, reminding me how old the coat was, some used Kleenex, and a small wad of white paper.

  As I went inside and closed the door I was trying to open the wad. It looked as if it had been wet when it was rolled up. Then I remembered the tract that a transient had handed me on the street in front of Lee’s Bakery the night before. I was about to toss it into the bathroom trashcan, when I saw that it wasn’t a commercially printed sheet. It was handwritten. And it was handwritten on one of Emily’s prescription forms.

  “I am Caesar,” the man had said when he handed the paper to me. “Here is the message and the truth.”

  The ink was a little smeared, but “the message and the truth” was clear enough to read: “Maggot, Sorry I couldn’t wait for you. Max is at the Bonaventure. Meet us there. ASAP. Em.”

  There was nothing essentially new in the message. The puzzle was, how did Emily get it into the hands of Caesar, and from his to mine? And when had she written it?

  Obviously, all the answers rested with Caesar. I pulled the apartment door closed after me and ran down the stairs and out onto the street. At some point I thought I should have taken time to change into more practical clothes, but I planned only to go down Hill Street as far as Lee’s Bakery, where I had seen Caesar before. If I didn’t find him, someone might know where he was. I thought I would be out five, maybe ten minutes at the most.

  It was almost eleven and all the choice covered doorways were filled with overnight guests. I stopped at the first recumbent figure.

  “Excuse me,” I said. “May I have a word with you?”

  “Hey man.” A fuzzy head appeared out of a tangle of bedding. “I’m tryin’ to sleep here, man.”

  “Sorry,” I said. “I’m looking for a man named Caesar. Do you know him? He has a dog.”

  “I don’ want no dog, man. I just want to sleep. Don’ you shout at me no mo’.”

  “Sorry,” I said again, and walked on. I found an apparently conscious man sitting upright in his blankets in the recessed entry of the Quong Fook Tong Benevolent Association.

  “Excuse me,” I said, already tired of the routine. “I’m looking for a man named Caesar. He has a dog with him.”

  “Who do you want? The man or the dog?”

  “The man.”

  “You can have me, you sweet thing. And you didn’t have to get all dressed up.”

  “Do you know Caesar?”

  “Sure.” He started to rise. “He’s cooping in this alley back here. Let me show you.”

  I could see the mouth of the alley, and there was no way was going in there, alone or escorted by a platoon of marines, much less with this character.

  “You don’t know Caesar, do you?”

  “Know thyself, that’s my motto.”

  “Thanks anyway.”

  I tried two more sleepers, with similar results. Lee’s Bakery was still open, so I went in. Mr. Lee was working behind the counter in crisp white overalls and a tall white cap. He looked up at me and bowed.

  “May I have some coffee, Mr. Lee?” I asked.

  “You sit,” he said, gesturing toward the tables by the front window. “I bring.”

  I drew my coat closer around me and sat down. I hadn’t realized how cold I was until I came inside where it was warm. The sky had begun to cloud over again and there was a very brisk wind.

  Mr. Lee put a mug of coffee and a plate of pork cookies in front of me.

  “Dr. Emily, she be okay?” he asked.

  “I hope so, Mr. Lee. I hope so.”

  He bowed twice and started to walk away.

  “Mr. Lee,” I called. “Do you happen to know a man named Caesar? I met him outside your bakery last night.”

  “Man have dog?”

  “Yes.” I stood up. “Have you any idea where he might be?” He scratched his head. Then he scratched his shoulder. “Possible. Come with me.”

  He headed out the front door, with me close on his heels. We waited for traffic, then crossed the street to a Chevron station on the corner. The station was closed for the night, but there was a light showing from somewhere inside. Mr. Lee rapped on the front window.

  An inside door opened, and I saw the dark shape of a man. He seemed to be very cautious. He looked us over before he came out into the station’s office and turned on the overhead lights.

  “That you, Mr. Lee?” The man didn’t have any front teeth, but he seemed well-scrubbed and he wore fresh blue overalls with a Chevron logo on the sleeve. He unlocked the door and talked to us through a narrow crack. “What do you want?”

  “You know Caesar?” Mr. Lee asked.

  “He’s not here, honest. I told the boss I won’t let Caesar in here no more at night, and I meant it. He never hurt nothing. I mean, I take good care of the place. I wouldn’t let no one touch nothing he wasn’t suppose’ to.”

  A dog sauntered in from the back room and growled at us from behind the man’s legs.

  “Is that Caesar’s dog?” I asked.

  “The boss never said nothing about no dog. ‘Sides, a watch-dog’s good company, don’t you think? I don’t like being in here all alone all night. A good dog’s good company.”

  “Where is Caesar?” I asked.

  “Said he was goin’ over to the Weingart for dinner, see if he could find him a bed. On account of, they won’t give him a bed if he has a dog.”

  “Thank you so much,” I said, slipping him a five from the wad of bills my mother had given me. I walked Mr. Lee back to his store, tried in vain, again, to pay for the coffee, thanked him twice, bowed a few times, then ran to the curb where I had parked Max’s car.

  The Henry Weingart Center is the best financed, most efficiently run shelter and soup kitchen on Los Angeles’s Skid Row. I couldn’t remember exactly where it was. I drove south from the civic center, tracking the density and general direction of the migration of street people until they coaxed out on San Pedro Street. Weingart was in the block after Fifth Street. I parked in a loading zone out front and walked in the front door.

  Weingart was better established, certainly, than Grace House, though the clientele was essentially the same. The place itself was large and clean and well-staffed.

  It had begun to drizzle again. Just inside the door, two staff members were handing out silver survival ponchos. There was a long queue waiting for the ponchos. I walked up to the man who seemed to be in charge.

  “Excuse me,” I said.

  I was roughly nudged aside by a man draped with so many Glad Bag bundles he looked like a kid’s Halloween version of a bunch of grapes.

  “You gotta wait,” he said, crossly. “Can’t just walk into a line like that. Ain’t right. You gotta wait your turn.”

  “Do you know a man named Caesar?” I asked him. “He was coming here for dinner.”

  “Dinner?” He turned to the people behind him in line to affirm how stupid my question was. “If he’s looking for dinner, he done missed it. It’s damn near breakfast time, lady. And you still have to wait in line like everyone else.”

  I moved to the woman behind him. “How about you? Do you know a man named Caesar, usually has a dog with him?”

  “Everyone knows Caesar.” She flipped a hank of gray hair over her shoulder, rearra
nged her army blanket toga, and recited: ” ‘Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once. Of all the wonders that I yet have heard, it seems to me most strange that men should fear seeing death. A necessary end, will come when it will come.’ ” She bowed with a flourish.

  “What you say?” the grape man demanded.

  “Shakespeare,” she said. “Julius Caesar, act two, scene two.”

  “Who’s he? He here tonight?”

  “He is always with us,” the woman sighed. She looked over at me. “The man, Caesar, about whom you inquire, was turned away tonight. He was quite in his cups, you know. The staff here will not admit one in that state. If he’s sleeping in the neighborhood tonight, then he makes the cobbles of the street his pillow.”

  “You’re sure he isn’t in the dormitory?” I asked.

  She rolled her eyes. “I just told you, bitch. They gave the sot the heave-ho.”

  “Thanks for your help,” I said. I went back out to the street. It was a mob scene, something like the streets of Pasadena the night before the Rose Parade all done in a silver motif. Poncho-clad people lined the sidewalks two and three deep. A canopy of ponchos strung together sheltered a noisy crowd partying to the accompaniment of huge boom boxes. They shared bottles, jostled each other, or just roamed. Lying here and there around the entire area were the silver-wrapped mounds of bodies at rest. Or bodies, period.

  In the grassy verges behind the sidewalk, in the driveways of boarded-up warehouses, people clustered around K-Mart barbecues for warmth. Some of them lounged in plastic lawn chairs, their feet resting on ice chests. Whatever they were doing, everyone faced the street as if waiting for something — I don’t know what, a marching band, a fight, someone to mug, Armageddon.

  A pair of overweight, underage hookers plied the crowd, seeking to exchange a little quick pleasure for a hit of crack. They didn’t seem to be having much success.

  I beckoned them over as they moved off the sidewalk in front of the center and into the street.

  “I’m looking for a man,” I said.

  “Who ain’t?” The taller of the girls laughed behind her hand, modestly covering the gaps among her front teeth. She probably was no more than fifteen, but it was difficult to tell.

  “His name is Caesar. Do you know him?” I asked, slipping her a five.

  “What’d he do to you?” The money disappeared into the top of her black satin shorts.

  “I just want to talk to him.”

  “Maybe I know him, maybe I don’t. No one tells me his name, just what he wants. What does this dude look like?”

  I looked at the men walking by, or sitting at the curb stoned. Caesar looked like all of them.

  “I don’t know,” I said. I didn’t have another five, so I gave her a ten. “Ask around. If you find him, leave a message at the Weingart for Maggie. There’ll be another twenty in it for you if you do. I’ll be back later.”

  “Listen,” the girl said, grabbing my arm as I walked away. “You look more like Hollywood Boulevard than San Pedro Street. They don’t pay so good down here. If you find this Caesar guy, better ask him to pay in advance.”

  “Good advice,” I said. I slid into the Beemer, tucking in my sequin train.

  I locked the car doors and turned on the engine and the cellular phone. I needed some help. There was no way in hell I was going to move more than six feet down San Pedro Street alone.

  From the car, I called the Bonaventure and asked for Uncle Max. He was out. So were Rod and Lucas. After a few minutes of quiet swearing, I took out the card Detective Bronkowski had handed me at the courthouse.

  I placed a call to Parker Center.

  “Robbery-Homicide, Arce speaking.”

  “Hello,” I said. “I’m looking for Detective Bronkowski. Can you page him for me?”

  “He’s out on a call.”

  “How about Mike Flint?”

  “He’s off his beeper. Maybe I can help you.”

  I thought about it. I didn’t want to start at the beginning, try to explain everything to Detective Arce. Actually, that isn’t true. I needed help, and this detective would certainly know what to do. The sticking point was Flint. I had been surprised at how disappointed I felt when Arce said Flint wasn’t available, another little pinch to the already bruised conscience.

  So things between Flint and I had gotten out of hand the night before. I hadn’t made a graceful exit. Bronkowski had let me know that Flint wasn’t feeling so good himself. I wanted to patch things up with Flint. I needed to find Caesar. Seemed they could dovetail.

  “Listen,” I said to Arce, in a pitiful little voice. “I really need to find Mike Flint. Bronk told me to call him if Mike hadn’t shown up by now.”

  “Shown up where?”

  “My house. I hate to bother you, but we had this big fight last night, and I think he’s afraid to come home. I really want to find him.”

  “You’re the squeeze, huh?” he said.

  “I guess.”

  “It’s Saturday night before Christmas. You try the lounge at the academy?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Give them a call. Bartender’s name is Verna. She’ll know if he’s there. If you don’t find Mike, I’ll be through here around midnight. Give me a call.”

  “Thanks,” I said. I hung up and shifted into drive. The L.A. Police Academy was only a few minutes away.

  I had been to the academy some years ago to watch a boxing demonstration given by women police officers. We had celebrated the victory of an amazon brunette named Officer Bambi by getting blind drunk in the academy’s lounge. I don’t remember how I got home from there, but I knew I could easily find the academy again; it sits at the far edge of the Dodger Stadium parking lot, in the hills of Elysian Park.

  The sky opened up. I turned on the windshield wipers, put my foot on the accelerator, and headed straight north out of downtown, just following the signs to Dodger Stadium.

  The Police Academy looks more like a rustic lodge than an urban-combat training facility. Built of natural river rock and heavy timbers, it is nestled into a canyon filled with lacy eucalyptus. The view of downtown, when the sky is clear, is magnificent.

  The parking lot that curved up the hill past the rifle range was full. So I went back down front and found a space between two black-and-white units in the lot below the gift shop. The stone walkways were uneven and slick with rain. I managed to make it up the stairs to the lounge without permanent injury.

  Inside the door, there was a coat rack. I decided it would be prudent not only to keep my coat on, but also to keep it buttoned.

  I was working my way toward the bar when I was intercepted by an officer in motorcycle boots, jodhpurs, and a plain black sweatshirt. His boots creaked as he walked.

  “Looking for a friend?” he asked, parking a foot on the rung of a stool and striking a John Wayne pose.

  “I’m looking for Mike Flint,” I said. “Have you seen him?”

  He leaned into me. “Never heard of him.”

  “He’s a detective from Major Crimes Section.”

  He shook his head. “What does he look like?”

  “A squint. Gray suit, gray hair.”

  “Lot of suits here. What does he have that I can’t offer you?”

  I extended my index finger stiffly in front of his nose. “Can you make a woman scream for mercy six times in a row without ever …” I let my index finger droop, slowly.

  He laughed and put his foot down. “Mike’s inside. I think you deserve each other.”

  “Thanks.” I walked on in and searched through the crowd.

  The near end of the lounge is a big horseshoe-shaped standing bar; the far end is clusters of small tables, a dinky dance floor, and big doors that lead out to the rock garden. A lot of love blooms in the rock garden at night, I remembered Officer Bambi telling me. Tonight it was wet outside, and the doors were closed.

  This was a noisy group. Not exactly the same mob I
had seen earlier at the Century Plaza. Working people at the end of their work day. No one was in full uniform, there were no badges showing, but the body language separated police from civilian guests—a certain swagger, men and women both, an air of authority, a watchfulness, a bulge at the waist about the size of a 9mm automatic. Scattered among them, like flower garnishes in a field of navy blue and medium gray, were young women with heavy makeup, short skirts, lots of moussed hair.

  I spotted Mike Flint at a table near the rock garden doors. The sweet young thing with him was sipping something pink with paper umbrellas stuck on the rim of the glass. I couldn’t tell whether he was trying to get lucky or babysitting.

  He didn’t seem overly happy to see me, but I walked over and put my hand on his shoulder, anyway.

  “Hi, Mike,” I said, drawing it out. “How’ve you been?”

  “Where’s my tape?” he said.

  “That’s all you have to say to me after last night?”

  The girl with him sucked the pink stuff through her straw as if she was on a timer.

  “Will you excuse us?” I said to her.

  She looked at Flint for a cue.

  “Be right back, sweetie,” he said. “This won’t take long.” Flint picked up the beer he’d been nursing and led me to a corner table. He pointedly sat down on the far side. Nothing really had happened between us after drinks at the Bonaventure, nothing serious. Just fooling around. Once when my hand was on his chest, I felt the tape he had taken from Emily’s answering machine in his pocket. Somehow, the tape had ended up in my own pocket. It was a tacky thing to do. I wasn’t altogether sober, and I was desperate to hear the tape again, carefully. Cheesy excuse, but the best I had.

  “I’m sorry,” I said.

  “Sorry? That’s it? You get me all fired up just so you can pick my pocket. You steal evidence, you get me in trouble, then you come sniffing around here looking like Garbo in heat. Where did you get that dress?”

  “Garbo?” I said. “How old are you, anyway?”

  “You know what I mean. Jeez, look at that dress.”