(Los Angeles, 3/19/70)
Stragglers left Sultan Sam’s. Sambo locked up. Dwight perched in the rear lot.
Afro music pulsed inside. A copmobile cruised Central. The stragglers oink-oinked. The cops let it slide. The spooks outnumbered them.
Dwight checked his watch. Joan phone-dropped him. The lot at 2:00 a.m. That made her eight minutes late.
The music downshifted to bebop. Dwight laid his piece on the briefcase. He got the shit through customs. He split the D.R. in short-hair sync.
His White House contact called. Nixon was agitated, verging on pissed. Some Commies sabotaged the casino sites. La Banda tagged it 6/14.
Dipshit got out in pre-sync. Dwight carved him and robbed him and told him how to lie. Get to L.A. and work the Bowen wire. Let Mesplede mourn the dope. Tell him Clyde Duber needs you.
Dwight rolled up his window and earplugged the bop. He hit L.A. and put out feelers. Tell her we’re on, she’ll get it, she’ll know. He braced every left-wing denizen on Planet Earth. It took six full days.
Headlights strafed him. A ‘63 Dodge pulled into the lot. Dwight blinked his brights. The Dodge blinked back. Dwight grabbed his shit and got out of the car.
Joan pulled up beside him. She doused her lights and kept the motor running. An alley lamp backlit her. She looked done in, verging on fraught.
“You never said good-bye.”
“It didn’t seem necessary. I knew we were incomplete.”
“Where were you?”
“I’m not telling you.”
“Tell me what’s wrong.”
“No. I’m not going to.”
Dwight touched her hair. Joan leaned into his hand for a heartbeat.
“We’re on?”
Dwight passed her the briefcase. “Get it to BTA through a cutout. Keep your name out of it if you can. We want Bowen to think it’s a windfall. Kid, we got lucky, it just dropped on your head.”
A horn honked. Dwight aimed at the sound. Joan reached out and eased down his gun hand.
“I need you to say it.”
Dwight leaned into the car. Joan pressed his hand to the doorsill.
“We should say it. Belief works that way.”
Dwight said, “Nobody dies.”
(Los Angeles, 3/19/70)
Dead air. Dawn air and insomnia-the shits.
The bug post was a shine shack on Marsh Bowen’s block. The feed lines ran through overhead phone wires. Extraneous calls popped in. You heard a coon cacophony.
Funny and diverting. Non-lethal. Lots of pimp talk and holy roller spiel.
Crutch yawned. He was jet-lagged four days on. Big Dwight scripted him. Froggy saw his carved-up back and fucked-up room and bought it. Clyde needs me, Boss. Go, my son. You will be avenged.
Convergence: a faux-Commie dope rip-off and real sabotage.
Froggy called and broke the news. The 6/14ers torched the sites. The Midget was prepping a Big Red Roundup.
Crutch shifted his headphones. A call hit the air: the asthmatic biddy next door.
Mama wheezed and ragged Governor Ray-gun. Crutch rode out a nerve jolt. He bugged Sam G.’s suite. He heard Sam and Celia talking. She pumped him on the casino sites. He remembered high school Latin. Post hoc, propter ergo hoc. After this, because of this.
Yeah, but:
It felt dumb, it felt wrong, it felt un-Celia and un-Joan.
Mama wheezed-Ray-gun cut my welfare check. Crutch got antsy. He dumped the headphones and pulled off his shirt.
A wall mirror faced the console. Crutch stood up and craned for a look. The wound was scabbed over and peeling. Scar lines extended. The numbers were visible, the branding might stick.
He kept looking. He glanced at the console. His Joan pix were there on the ledge.
The math came to him. One year, eight months and twenty-seven days. He had tracked her that long.
The red light blinked. Bowen-incoming call.
Crutch slipped on his headphones. He heard Bowen, yawn-voiced. He heard “Marsh, it is Leander James Jackson.”
A happy cat. Cheery. Big Haitian lilt.
Greetings ping-ponged and devolved into off-the-pigs chat. That Haitian sound. “Baby boy”-the late Luc’s verbal tic.
Wait-
Leander James Jackson. Laurent-Jean Jacqueau. The same initials.
Haitian men. Jacqueau, the Tonton traitor. Jacqueau, the 6/14 convert. Jacqueau, unfindable in the U.S.
Line static, feeder fuzz, reverb and squelch.
Bowen: inaudible/”Have to score smack.”
Jackson: squelch/”In my country, it is known as the ‘beast from the East.’ ”
Squelch/fuzz/static. A stray call cuts in. Wheezy Mama’s back. Ooooh, that Ray-gun.
Big Dwight. The bootjacked dope. The black-militant gig-
File work.
Read files when tweaked. Read files when bored. Read files when up all night, hammered. “Read files” was his mantra. It consoled his ass and work-supplied him.
It was 7:10. Crutch bombed to Clyde Duber Associates and let himself in. Clyde and Buzz showed up nineish. That gave him file time.
Clyde’s hobbyhorse-the armored-car job. Four file cabinets.
Crutch pulled up a chair and pulled folders. They were re-pulls. He knew the file sideways and backward. Old facts hit him: names, dates, locations. Forensic stats, scorched bodies. Did a second heist man ex-cape? Photos: Scotty B. scowling. Scotty hard-nosing male Negroes.
A loose sheet fell out. Crutch unfolded it. A hand-drawn street map. 84th and Budlong, 2/24/64. X marks for the slaughter. Little houses street-numbered and sketched to scale.
Crutch studied the map. Something skimmed his skull. Some other file, some other fact, some complementary numb-
Oh, yes. That’s it. Safe guess: Clyde doesn’t know.
Marsh Bowen lived on that block then. He was nineteen. He was fresh out of Dorsey High. He lived with his mom and dad.
File work.
Read files when bugged. Read files when buzzed. Read different files when other files scorch you.
Crutch holed up at the Vivian. He studied his mother’s file. He picked at his 6/14 scabs and grooved on the scarring. Zombie Zone outtakes zapped him.
THE ELECTRIC CHAIR, THE EYES, THE HANDS AND FEET. La Banda stunts and the black guy’s hands melted.
He got scared. He popped two red devils with an Old Crow chaser. It un-scared him. He grabbed his binoculars and aerial-peeped.
Barb Cathcart watered her front lawn. She wore a shift dress. A cool wind gave her goose bumps. Gail Miller’s mom breezed with the mailman. Old lady Miller hated him. He picture-peeped Gail and snapped a shot of her bush. He got kicked out of Hollywood High.
The phone rang. Crutch jumped on it.
“It’s Crutchfield.”
“Donald, I am outraged.”
Cool it-he doesn ‘t know/he can’t know.
“What happened, Froggy? Tell me.”
“Wayne performed the sabotage. He was seen purchasing explosive material. He desecrated the northern sites in order to blame 6/14. He very obviously enlisted Communists to assist him. I think his putain Rouge comrades are the ones who robbed you.”
“Froggy, tell me-”
“Balaguer has made an expediently reasoned decision. He has decreed no reprisals on Wayne. He has decided that 6/14 should pay and that future dissidents should be taught a lesson. Tiger Krew will be part of this, which mandates your immediate return.”
He got sweaty hands. The phone slipped. It hit the floor. The receiver cracked.
The red devils hit full-on. He hated-hexed Wayne, pins to eyeballs. He got this voodoo-vile idea.
He knew her name and her job stats. He wrote the note at the Barstow rest stop. He used the hood of his car as a desk.
Dear Mrs. Hazzard,
I work for your friend Wayne Tedrow in numerous illegal capacities. He routinely underestimates me and refers to me as “Dipshit.” I suspect that Wayne has been less than candid about events in his recent past and that you may have doubts about his stability and moral character.
Your doubts are fully justified. Wayne was involved in the murder of Rev. Martin Luther King in April 1968, and was a suspect in the murder of his own father two months later. It is highly probable that he was involved in the tragic shooting deaths of your husband and a West Las Vegas criminal later that summer. You deserve to know these things. I intend you no harm; I only want to set you straight.
Yours truly,
A Friend
Hot potato.
The union was just off Fremont. His buzz was waning. Drop it, hex him, don’t candy-ass.
The office crew was filing out. People fast-walked to their cars. Crutch double-parked and scanned faces. He saw the woman approach an Olds 88.
He got out and sprinted at her. People ducked and went What? She turned around and saw him. He quick-read her eyes. Who’s this crazy young man?
He dropped it on her and ran around the corner. He ducked into a carpet joint and had three quick belts. It glued his shit together. He got this devil-may-care rush.
Fremont ran one way. The window overlooked the street. She had to drive by. Where’s that Rocket 88?
He waited twenty minutes and walked back to his sled. He gave the parking lot a look-see.
She was braced up against the Olds, sobbing. Her fingers were bloody. She was grabbing at the doorsill to hold herself up.
Los Angeles,