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Richie’s Chino file was still missing—warden’s aides were tossing storage bins for it. Sid Riegle was out chasing Richie—Darktown/Hancock Park—no leads.
Six IA men tapped out: no new Herrick/Kafesjian links. Links extant: Pe
Meg chasing real estate: a Spindrift pad title search. Zero so far, Meg persisting.
The Kafesjians at home, cabin-fevered—Feds out front, Feds out back. Partnered-up-family-tight—no way to tell them:
You and the Herricks—filthy together. Liquor bottles smashed/dogs blinded/music trashed—murder/suicide/castration—I can TASTE it. You’ll tell me, you’ll tell somebody—I’m partnered up strong on my ride down.
Strong and dirty: Exley. Strong/cautious/grasping: Noonan.
Use them both: fight/squirm/lie/beg/ manipulate them.
Exley: Joh
Was/is/could be/would be: DUES TIME. Junior nullified now—Glenda safe—punch my new grief ticket: FEDERAL.
No pre-court testimony taken yet—custody meant interrogation. Noonan—cautious/grasping—shooting me wake-up phone calls:
“You’re commanding a homicide case-how odd.”
“Would Richard Herrick be the Richie you seem to be so interested in? The man Tommy Kafesjian seems to be rather concerned with? Chief Exley told the Herald that you worked on a burglary case that may be tangentially co
“I understand the dilemma you’re in, David. You may think that you can dissemble to us and be less than forthcoming vis-à-vis your organized-crime co
Smart fucker.
Holding back information—bet on it. My big fear: those Fed tails postJohnson. Long-shot stuff, hard to shake: Abe Voldrich snuffed, a blue Pontiac spotted. Jack Woods—nine contract hits minimum—my preferred killer. Jack Woods, proud owner: a powder-blue ‘56 Pontiac.
Downtown, the 3rd Street Bridge, Boyle Heights. East to Wabash—Brownell’s Locksmiths—
A parking-lot drive-up hut.
Four keys—three numbered—maybe traceable.
I pulled up, honked. A man right there, customer smile on. “Help you?”
I flashed my badge and the key fob. “158-32, 159-32, 160-32, and one unstamped. Who did you make them for?”
“I don’t even have to check my files, ‘cause that 32 coding’s from this rent-a-locker storage place I do all the locker keys for.”
“So you don’t know who rented these individual lockers?”
“Right you are. The unstamped key’s for the front door, the number keys are for lockers. And I don’t cut no duplicates ‘less the manager at the place gives the okay.”
“What ‘place’?”
“The Lock-Your-Self at 1750 North Echo Park Boulevard, which is open twenty-four hours, case you didn’t know.”
“You’re pretty snappy with your answers.”
“Well…”
“Come on, tell me.”
“Well…”
“Well nothing, I’m a police officer.”
Whiny, wheedling: “Well, I hate to be a stool pigeon, ‘cause I sorta liked the guy.”
“What guy?”
“I don’t know his name, but he’s that little Mex bantam fights at the Olympic all the time.”
“Reuben Ruiz?”
“Right you are. He came in yesterday and told me he wanted dupes of the keys with them numbers, like he saw the keys but couldn’t get his mitts on the two original sets I cut. I told him, ‘Ixnay, not even if you was Rocky Marciano himself.’”
“You cut two original sets for the Lock-Your-Self place?”
“One customer original, one management original. The manager sent a guy by for a second customer set, ‘cause the people who rented those lockers wanted dupes.”
Set number one—Junior. Set number two—maybe Joh
“Officer, them locks and keys are being changed continually to thwart theft. So if you talk to Bob, the manager, will you tell him I’m doing my part toward keeping things—”
I hit the gas—the lock man ate exhaust fumes.
Echo Park off Sunset—a big warehouse. A parking lot, no door guard—my door key got me in.
Huge: crisscross hallways, locker-lined. A directory/map up front, number-coded.
The 32 codings were tagged “Jumbo.” Follow the map—two corridors down, left, stop:
Three floor-to-ceiling lockers six feet wide.
Scratched up—lock-pick marks.
Keys in, crack the doors:
158-32: mink coats hung eight feet deep, six feet wide.
Seven empty hangers.
159-32: stoles and pelts-dumped shoulder-high.
160-32: fox/mink/raccoon coats—fuckloads hung/dumped/piled/ folded/tossed.
Joh
Dudley Smith, fur-heist boss—scooped/hoodwinked/stiffed.
Exley and Duhamel—operating WHO?
Mink—touch it, smell it. Empty hangers—Lucille’s fur strip? Joh
Reuben Ruiz: ex—B&E man/burglar brothers.
His direct key approach—no go.
Break-in scratches/no door guard/Lock-Your-Self: open twenty-four hours.
Key clicks/lock clicks/brain clicks—I got my notebook and pen out. Three lockers—I dropped three identical notes inside:
I want to deal on Joh
Lock the doors—lock clicks/brain clicks—get to a phone.
I found a booth across Sunset. Ad Vice, two rings, “Riegle.”
“Sid, it’s me.”
“You mean it’s you and you want something.”
“You’re right.”
“So tell me, but I’ll tell you right now this Homicide work is wearing me thin.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning Richie Herrick is nowhere. First Exley issues an APB, then he rescinds it, and we still can’t locate one single white man known to frequent Negro areas.”
“I know, and our best bet is to let Tommy Kafesjian find him for us.”
“Which doesn’t seem too likely with those Armenian humps holed up with Fed surveillance outside their house. Jesus. .
“Sid, write this down.”
“Okay, I’m listening.”
“The storage locker place at 1750 North Echo Park.”
“All right, I wrote it down. Now what?”
“Now you get your civilian car and stake out the entrance and parking lot. You write down the plate numbers on everyone who walks in. Every five or six hours you call in the stats to the DMV, and you go through until tomorrow morning and call me.”
Stage groans. “You’ll explain then?”
“That’s right.”
“It’s the Herrick job?”
“It’s fucking everything.”