The Big Nowhere

Dudley lit a cigarette and steered with one pinky. “Yes, a crusading captain might convince the judge that water is thicker than blood. You know, lad, that I’ve a wife and five daughters. They serve well to keep the reins on certain unruly aspects of my nature. If he can keep them in perspective, a family is an essential thing for a man to have.”

Mal rolled down his window. “I have no perspective where my son is concerned. But if I can keep you in perspective until the grand jury convenes, then I’ll be in grand shape.”

Dudley Smith exhaled laughter and smoke. “I’m fond of you, Malcolm—even though you don’t reciprocate. And speaking of family, I’ve a little errand to run—my niece needs a talking-to. Would you mind a small detour to Westwood?”

“A brief detour, Lieutenant?”

“Very, Lieutenant.”

Mal nodded; Dudley turned north on Glendon and headed up toward the UCLA campus, parking in a meter space on Sorority Row. Setting the brake, he said, “Mary Margaret, my sister Brigid’s girl. Twenty-nine years old and on her third masters degree because she’s afraid to go out and meet the world. Sad, isn’t it?”

Mal sighed. “Tragic.”

“The very thing I was thinking, but without your emphasis on sarcasm. And speaking of youths, what’s your opinion of our young colleague Upshaw?”

“I think he’s smart and going places. Why?”

“Well, lad, friends of mine say that he has no sense of his own place, and he impresses me as weak and ambitious, which I view as a dangerous combination in a policeman.”

Mal’s first thought of rising: He shouldn’t have confided in the kid, because half his juice was front just waiting to crack. “Dudley, what do you want?”

“Communism vanquished. And why don’t you enjoy the sight of comely young coeds while I speak to my niece?”

Mal followed Dudley up the steps of a Spanish manse fronted by a lawn display: Greek symbols sunk into the grass on wood stakes. The door was open; the lounge area buzzed: girls smoking, talking and gesturing at textbooks. Dudley pointed upstairs and said, “Toot sweet”; Mal saw a stack of magazines on an end table and sat down to read, fielding curious looks from the coeds. He thumbed through a Collier’s, a Newsweek and two Life’s—stopping when he heard Dudley’s brogue, enraged, echoing down the second-floor hallway.

It got louder and scarier, punctuated by pleas in a whimpering soprano. The girls looked at Mal; he grabbed another magazine and tried to read. Dudley’s laughter took over—spookier than the bellows. The coeds were staring now; Mal dropped his Weekly Sportsman and walked upstairs to listen.

The hallway was long and lined with narrow wooden doors; Mal followed Ha! Ha! Ha! to a door with “Conroy” nameplated on the front. It was ajar a few inches; he looked in on a back wall lined with photos of Latino prizefighters. Dudley and the soprano were out of sight; Mal eavesdropped.

“…bull banks and pinatas and spic bantamweights. It’s a fixation, lassie. Your mother may lack the stomach to set you straight, but I don’t.”

The soprano, groveling, “But Ricardo is a lovely boy, Uncle Dud. And I—”

A huge hand flashed across Mal’s strip of vision, a slap turned to a caress, a head of curly red hair jerking into, then out of sight. “You’re not to say you love him, lassie. Not in my presence. Your parents are weak, and they expect me to have a say regarding the men in your life. I will always exercise that say, lassie. Just remember the trouble I spared you before and you’ll be grateful.”

A plump girl/woman backed into view, hands on her face, sobbing. Dudley Smith’s arms went around her; her hands turned to fists to keep him from completing the embrace. Dudley murmured sweet nothings; Mal walked back to the car and waited. His partner showed up five minutes later. “Knock, knock, who’s there? Dudley Smith, so Reds beware! Lad, shall we go impress Mr. Nathan Eisler with the righteousness of our cause?”

Eisler’s last known address was 11681 Presidio, a short run from the UCLA campus. Dudley hummed show tunes as he drove; Mal kept seeing his hand about to hit, the niece cowering from her genial uncle’s touch. 11681 was a small pink prefab at the end of a long prefab block; Dudley double-parked, Mal jammed facts from Satterlee’s report:

Nathan Eisler. Forty-nine years old. A German Jew who fled Hitler and company in ‘34; CP member ‘36 to ‘40, then member of a half dozen Commie front organizations. Co-scenarist on a string of pro-Russki turkeys, his writing partner Chaz Minear; poker buddies with Morton Ziffkin and Reynolds Loftis. Wrote under pseudonyms to guard his professional privacy; slipped through the HUAC investigators’ hands; currently living under the alias Michael Kaukenen, the name of the hero of Storm Over Leningrad. Currently scripting RKO B westerns, under yet another monicker, the work fronted by a politically acceptable hack writer who glommed a 35 percent cut. Best pals with Le

Former lover of Claire De Haven.

They took a toy-littered walkway up to the porch; Mal looked through a screen door into the perfect prefab living room: plastic furniture, linoleum floor, spangly pink wallpaper. Children squealed inside; Dudley winked and rang the buzzer.

A tall, unshaven man walked up to the screen, flanked by a toddler boy and girl. Dudley smiled; Mal watched the little boy pop a thumb in his mouth, and spoke first. “Mr. Kaukenen, we’re with the District Attorney’s Office and we’d like to talk to you. Alone, please.”

The kids pressed themselves into the man’s legs; Mal saw scared slant eyes—two little half-breeds spooked by two big boogeymen. Eisler/Kaukenen called out, “Michiko!”; a Japanese woman materialized and whisked the children away. Dudley opened the door uninvited; Eisler said, “You are three years late.”

Mal walked in behind Dudley, amazed at how cheap the place looked—a white trash flop—the home of a man who made three grand a week during the Depression. He heard the kids bawling behind wafer-thin walls; he wondered if Eisler had to put up with the same foreign language shit he did—then popped that he probably dug it on general Commie principles. Dudley said, “This is a charming house, Mr. Kaukenen. The color motif especially.”

Eisler/Kaukenen ignored the comment and pointed them to a door off the living room. Mal walked in and saw a small square space that looked warm and habitable: floor-to-ceiling books, chairs around an ornate coffee table and a large desk dominated by a class A typewriter. He took the seat furthest from the squeal of little voices; Dudley sat across from him. Eisler shut the door and said, “I am Nathan Eisler, as if you did not already know.”

Mal thought: no nice guy, no “I loved your picture Branding Iron.” “Then you know why we’re here.”

Eisler locked the door and took the remaining chair. “The bitch is in heat again, despite reports that she had a miscarriage.”

Dudley said, “You are to tell no one that we questioned you. There will be dire repercussions should you disobey us on that.”

“Such as what, Herr—”

Mal cut in. “Mort Ziffkin, Chaz Minear, Reynolds Loftis and Claire De Haven. We’re interested in their activities, not yours. If you cooperate fully with us, we might be able to let you testify by deposition. No open court, probably very little publicity. You slid on HUAC, you’ll slide on this one.” He stopped and thought of Stefan, gone with his crazy mother and her new paramour. “But we want hard facts. Names, dates, places and admissions. You cooperate, you slide. You don’t, it’s a subpoena and open court questioning by a DA I can only describe as a nightmare. Your choice.”

Eisler inched his chair away from them. Eyes lowered, he said, “I have not seen those people in years.”