by L. A. Morse
Yeah, as soon as I saw old Lance tooting around among the beautiful people, I thought he looked real good for my boy. And I hoped he was, because I’d dealt with a couple of dozen other Lances over the years, and I knew, no matter what, I’d never be so old and feeble that I couldn’t get the better of someone like that. He was all flash and glitter on the surface, all loud confidence, but there was nothing inside. One good tap and he’d shatter like a sucked egg.
The more I saw of him as he went from place to place like a hungry bee, the better I liked him for the part, but he never settled long enough in one spot for me to get close. Finally, at the fourth little chi-chi cafe, a place now called Sebastian’s, which I remembered from the forties, when it hadn’t had a name but had served decent hot dogs, he sat down for the first time.
Luck stayed with me as a parking space opened up just past the café, and I pulled in. I slicked myself down a little and strolled into Sebastian’s, trying to look like I hadn’t made a mistake. This was a little tough, since I was at least as old as the combined ages of any three people there. Hell, my shirt was older than most of them. My clothes weren’t skintight; then again, neither was my skin. And I didn’t have on a neat little gold earring. My entrance caused a silence like what must’ve occurred when Red Death revealed himself at the masked ball.
As I sat down two tables away from Lance, I heard someone say, “Jesus, look at that.”
“I hope I die before I get that old,” said a female refugee of anorexia nervosa who didn’t look like she’d last the month.
“Gives me the fucking creeps.” This from a three-hundred-pound guy covered with thick black hair and little else.
“Maybe he’s someone important.”
“No fucking way. He’s too old.”
“Yeah.”
“Shee-it!”
As usual they assumed I couldn’t hear. I sat there smiling like I knew something they didn’t. Which I did: it was that I was their future. Ah, to be young, stupid, and blind.
Not surprisingly, no waiter approached my table. Just as well. The menu seemed to consist solely of Perrier, at three-fifty a pop. Price aside, that stuff always played havoc with my guts, like I’d swallowed an inflated balloon.
After a couple of minutes, conversations started back up again. Other than profanity, they seemed to consist of few words except “percent,” “gross,” “net,” “package,” “tie-in,” “deal,” and a lot of big numbers. I realized that everyone in the place was just like Lance. There wasn’t a real proposition in the bunch, only hustle, but no one seemed to notice.
Finally I got what I came for, when Lance started talking to someone at the next table about a deal he had going. Until then he’d been sipping his Perrier, but he couldn’t keep quiet any more than he could stop moving. He sounded like a hootchy-kootchy carnival barker trying to pass off a fat fifty-year-old stripper as the Queen of Sheba. His harsh nasal whine was about as euphonious as grinding gears, but unfortunately it wasn’t anything like that weird voice Sal had described. Pity. Lance Silver was a crook, all right. He just wasn’t my crook.
I stood up, glancing at my watch. I called to the waiter and said that when—I gave the name of the current head of Paramount—came by, he should say that I couldn’t wait any longer, but that I’d be over at Universal for the next couple of hours. I left to a silence at least as profound as that which had greeted my arrival.
I smiled. No one is easier to hustle than a hustler.
It took me twenty minutes to drive to the Bel Air address of Dr. Harold Jackman—who I thought was probably once a Jacoby—a successful cosmetic surgeon. Jackman was in Aruba performing a hush-hush tuck on some sagging celebrity, but his big black Caddy was in town. So was his kid, Austin, who’d been having a good time cruising around in Daddy’s Seville. I gathered from Bitchy, who was the one who’d spotted him, that the kid was about seventeen or eighteen. That was younger than what I thought I wanted, but Bitchy said the kid was strange. Considering the source, I had no idea what that could mean, but I figured I should check him out.
There was no sign of the car or the kid. I decided to give it some time and parked opposite the house.
From the little Bitchy had said, I had the idea that Austin Jackman was one of those Southern California brats who’d been given every advantage his parents never had, and who knew a good thing when he saw it. Most of the kids around looked to be pretty decent, trying—not always successfully—to cope with where and when they’d had the misfortune to grow up, and with whom. More than a few, though, were amoral, self-centered little rodents for whom the word “no” was a meaningless exhalation of sound. If Austin was one of those, virtually anything was possible.
I’d also noted that he didn’t live that far away from Sal, and it was not implausible that he and Sal’s grandson knew each other. It was an ugly idea, but I wondered if maybe the thing was a hoax, if Tommy had been a willing participant in his “kidnapping.” I had no reason for thinking so, other than that it wouldn’t be the first time for something like that. Bah! Nonsense. If that was the case, then you went through with the drop; you didn’t stage a stick-up. Besides, Sal said that Tommy was a good kid. On the other hand, Dr. Jackman probably said the same thing about his.
Before I could further tie myself up in knots with my speculations, the object of them appeared, with a squeal of brakes and smoking rubber, as two tons of dark-green Caddy hurtled up the driveway, hardly damaging a pyracantha bush and stopping a good six inches short of the garage door. Hi, everybody! Austin’s home!
When he got out of the car with a bunch of his yahoo friends, I saw he was a skinny little mutant in designer jeans and a T-shirt with a salacious tongue on the front.
The biggest part of him was a nose that testified to his erstwhile Jacobyness. I wondered if it could possibly have been hidden under a ski mask... or even a diving helmet.
They disappeared into the house before I could form any further impressions. I gave them a few minutes, then went up and rang the doorbell.
A girl opened the door. She had long, shining blond hair, a complexion like fine satin, and eyes with all the liveliness and intelligence of a pair of opaque marbles.
“Is Dr. Jackman here?” I said.
The girl looked blankly at me, and I repeated the question. She giggled, said “Dr. Jackman,” and giggled again. She floated toward the living room, leaving the front door wide open. I followed. Though my appreciation was strictly academic, I did notice that her tight jeans and skimpy top in no way hid what was under them. While I sure as hell wouldn’t want to be the age of these kids again, I did acknowledge there were certain compensations.
I shook my head. “J. Spanner: Salivated himself to the point that he dried up and blew away.” Come oh, you old fart.
Austin was lying on the floor with a set of large headphones encasing his narrow skull. A couple of his pals were sitting at a glass coffee table, sluggishly shoving around big piles of different-colored capsules.
The girl poked Austin with her foot several times before he slowly and with difficulty raised himself to a sitting position. He looked around a little, then took off the headphones. Even from ten feet away, the sound coming out of them, something like the roar of a jet engine, was uncomfortably loud.
“A patient to see you, Dr. Jackman,” the girl said, giggled, then fell silent.
Austin looked at me under half-closed eyes, with his mouth hanging open.
“You’re not Dr. Jackman,” I said.
Austin considered this for a while before he said, “My father’s away. You wan’ a ‘scrip? I’ll wri’ you a ‘scrip.” He blearily looked around, I supposed for his father’s prescription pad. Nice to see a kid following in his dad’s footsteps.
I sighed. Austin was out. Sal had said the guy’s voice was high and funny, like a record being played too fast. Austin sounded like he was talking under water, with a mouthful of mashed potatoes. Besides, I doubted that anyone in what was probably a perm
anent barbiturate fog could have managed the stick-up.
“Wan’ some reds? Yellows? ‘Ludes?”
I shook my head.
“Ups? Wan’ some ups? Loo’ like you coul’ use some ups.”
I could use something, that was for sure, but I shook my head.
“Wan’ fuck Serena? Serena, go fu’ th’ old man.”
The girl smiled placidly.
I confess I considered it—for about three seconds—before I shook my head.
Austin looked at me and shrugged in defeat. Exhausted by his efforts at hospitality, he heavily fell back on the floor. Tried to get the headphones over his ears, but it was too much trouble and he gave it up.
I went to the front door and looked back. No one had spoken or moved. It was exactly like the courtyard at Sunset Grove. I left.
There was a lot going on there that I didn’t understand, and I didn’t even want to try. I had changed my mind about Austin. He wasn’t a creep. He was just sad.
I got back in my car. I was tired. To tell about it, it doesn’t sound like much, but it had been a long day, a hell of a lot longer than I was used to. I knew I couldn’t do any more, and headed back to the Valley.
I had mixed feelings about the day. In a way, I’d been very lucky and accomplished a lot. To run down three suspects in one day was way better than I had any right to expect. But the results had all been negative. At this rate—and I couldn’t count on continuing this fast—it would take at least five more days to cover the short list. Sal hadn’t heard yet, but we had to figure we had only a few more days, at most.
I needed a break. Did I ever.
On the radio the newscaster announced that the government had determined a new poverty line. Well, it was certainly something to shoot for.
I hardly thought at all about doped-up, luscious little Serena.
* * *
Back home I found O’Brien stretched out on the couch, snoring wetly, his big belly going up and down. The television was blasting some raucous game show.
“Hi, honey, I’m home!” I said.
“Ah, Jake.” O’Brien blinked a couple of times and sat up. “How’d it go?”
I told him.
“Leo called,” he said. “They ran down twenty more.”
“And?”
“Negative.”
“Well, at least that doesn’t add anything to my list. How did you make out? Or need I ask?”
“I tell you, Jake, the things my liver has done for you.”
“I thought you were going to take it easy.”
“I got my reputation to consider.”
“Some reputation. Anyway, what’d you find out?”
“I went to three places and saw fifteen, twenty guys.”
“And had a drink with each one.”
“Well—”
“I know. You got your reputation to consider.”
“Christ, you have to be sociable. You can’t come on like, an asshole.”
“Okay, okay. What did you get?”
“No one’s ever heard of any of the people on your list.”
“Swell. It figures.”
“Hold on. I said people. You’ve also got a car registered to a company.”
“Yeah. Something called—what is it?—Trans-Global Import/Export.”
“Right. Seems that this company is connected.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yeah. I didn’t find anyone who knew much about it, but a few of the guys knew the name, and the word seems to be that it’s pretty well connected, all right.”
“Hmm.”
When you thought about it, it was obvious that any company with a name like that had to be a front. Only I hadn’t thought about it. Automatically gave the company car the lowest priority on my list. I wouldn’t have done that fifteen years ago. And just when I thought I was doing pretty well.
Trans-Global was now right at the top. I couldn’t say why, but I had a strong feeling about it, like I sometimes used to get when I knew I was close to whatever it was I wanted. The whole setup felt right. The style had been neat, professional. I didn’t think it was a mainline company activity, though. Shit, if the mob was involved, they didn’t need to get into something as messy as kidnapping. More likely it was an independent action. Someone at Trans-Global heard something, and decided to cut himself in for a nice little score.
Damn! It smelled good to me.
“You got that look, Jake.”
I nodded. “We needed a break. I sure hope this is it.”
I no longer felt tired. I wanted to get on it, but I figured there was nothing to be done until the morning.
So I fixed dinner. I got a container of homemade menudo, Mexican tripe stew, out of the freezer and started it heating. One thing about being broke, I’d sure learned to cook up a storm using spare parts, the kind of stuff that ordinarily went into pet food. Homemade or canned, it looked like that was my future.
While the menudo was simmering, I got a call from Sal. I told him about Trans-Global and asked if he’d heard of it. There was a long silence before he said he hadn’t. He sounded really strange and I asked him if he was all right. He said he was, but I still thought there was something different. We talked for a few more minutes and I told him what I would do. Once again he reminded me that time was running out and urged me to stay with it.
After we hung up, I tried to determine what was different about him, but I couldn’t figure it. It was almost as though he sounded relaxed for the first time since this started, but unless there was something he wasn’t saying, there was no reason for that. Or maybe he intuitively had the same feeling about Trans-Global that I did.
The hell with it. I went back to the menudo. O’Bee was looking dubiously at it.
“What’s that?”
I told him.
“Christ, Spanner, I think you’d eat anything that didn’t eat you first.”
“It’s good. It’s supposed to be just the thing if you’ve overindulged. Mexicans swear by it.”
“They can swim in the shit, for all I care. I’m not about to start eating cow’s guts.”
“You know, you’re really a delight to have around.”
“Ah, you love it.”
I made him a chicken sandwich, of which he ate very little. He hardly seemed to eat these days.
We played a couple of hours’ of cribbage before I went to bed. O’Bee said he’d stay up a little longer.
I woke up in the middle of the night and saw a light coming from the living room. I looked in. O’Brien was still sitting in an armchair, a lamp on low, not dozing, not reading, not watching television. Just sitting.
It didn’t look like he wanted company, so I went back to bed.
CHAPTER TEN
Early the next morning I was parked off of Vermont, opposite the seedy four-story building where Trans-Global was located. Most of the other occupants seemed to be either dealers in fabric remnants or jobbers of junk products no one had ever wanted. From what I could tell, Trans-Global had a couple of small rooms on the top floor. Totally unprepossessing, it was a perfect front. If, of course, that’s what it was.
It was only a few blocks from here, in ‘37 or ‘8, that I’d tangled with a phony Russian spiritualist who’d been conning wealthy widows in Pasadena. My client got her money back, I got a black eye, and Rasputin got five to ten. When he got out, I heard he married one of his former patrons and spent the rest of his days hosting social functions to raise funds for the Republican party.
At about ten-thirty the big black Olds, SAM 726, pulled up. Trans-Global certainly kept comfortable hours. Two hulking bruisers got out of the front seat. They wore dark, ill-fitting polyester suits, and it looked like their combined I.Q. wouldn’t make a three-digit number. Either one of them could have been a prime candidate for the part of the sap man. One scanned the street while the other opened the rear door. The guy that got out stood about as tall as the bruisers’ armpits. He had on an expensive cream-colored suit and a b
ig-collared silk shirt open at the neck. He was in his middle twenties, I guessed, but he could have passed for fourteen. His round, unlined face displayed the total innocence of a choirboy or a psychopath. Whatever he was, he sure didn’t belong in that office building, and it looked like the rumors O’Bee had picked up were correct. Also, the feeling I had last night was stronger than ever. If this wasn’t my boy, I didn’t think I’d ever find him.
The three of them went inside, and I stayed in the car and waited. A couple of hours later, the kid came out, accompanied by one of the bruisers. He got in the back seat again and they pulled away. I made a hasty U-turn and followed.
Aside from what must have been a lunch break at a fancy Italian restaurant, they stopped at a whole series of adult bookstores and movie parlors. Most were crummy little storefronts whose windows had been painted over. At the few where I could see in, it appeared the kid was greeted with not much pleasure but a lot of deference. He and the proprietor would then disappear into a back room and reemerge ten or twenty minutes later. The proprietors always seemed happy when the kid left. I began to get an idea of at least some of the things Trans-Global was importing and exporting.
After spending most of the afternoon parked in front of dirty bookstores, I decided I’d better do something. While the kid was looking better and better to me, I needed confirmation before I put in any more time.
When the pair went into the Marquis Pleasure Center, I gave them a couple of minutes. Then I tried to look like a degenerate, which may not have been too difficult, and shambled in after them.
Jesus! Welcome to the modern world, Jake Spanner. Holy shit!
Judging from the nifty leather outfits and curious metal implements that filled half the store, there was little doubt which marquis they had in mind. Christ! To even dream about this stuff thirty years ago would have been sufficient grounds for committal. If I’d thought I’d seen it all, I was wrong, and I had to keep reminding myself to keep my mouth closed. My life hadn’t exactly been sheltered, and my imagination was pretty good, but there was a lot of stuff there whose use I couldn’t even begin to guess at.
