Danny Upshaw beat up Gene Niles. The City cops hated the County cops.
When Niles was tagged as missing, LAPD would be like flies over shit on a green kid already in shit up to his knees.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
Danny was trying to get Felix Gordean alone.
He’d begun his stakeout in the Chateau Marmont parking lot; Gordean foiled him by driving to his office with Pretty Boy Christopher in tow. Rain had been pouring down the whole three hours he’d been eyeing the agency’s front door; no cars had hit the carport, the street was flooded and he was parked in a towaway zone with his ID, badge and .45 at home because he was really Red Ted Krugman. Ted’s leather jacket and Considine’s sanction kept him warm and dry with the window cracked; Danny decided that if Gordean didn’t leave the office by 1:00, he’d lean on him then and there.
At 12:35, the door opened. Gordean walked out, popped an umbrella and skipped across Sunset. Danny turned on his wiper blades and watched him duck into Cyrano’s, the doorman fussing over him like he was the joint’s most popular customer. He gave Gordean thirty seconds to get seated, turned up his collar and Side 137
Ellroy, James – Big Nowhere, The ran over, ducking rain.
The doorman looked at him funny, but let him in; Danny blinked water, saw gilt and red velvet walls, a long oak bar and Felix Gordean sipping a martini at a side table. He threaded his way past a clutch of businessman types and sat down across from him; Gordean almost swallowed the toothpick he was nibbling.
Danny said, “I want to know what you know. I want you to tell me everything about the men you’ve brought out, and I want a report on all your customers and clients. I want it now.”
Gordean toyed with the toothpick. “Have Lieutenant Matthews call me.
Perhaps he and I can effect a compromise.”
“Fuck Lieutenant Matthews. Are you going to tell me what I want to know?
_Now_?”
“No, I am not.”
Danny smiled. “You’ve got forty-eight hours to change your mind.”
“Or?”
“Or I’m taking everything I know about you to the papers.” Gordean snapped his fingers; a waiter came over; Danny walked out of the restaurant and into the rain. He remembered his promise to call Jack Shortell, hit the phone booth across from the agency, dialed the Hollywood Station squadroom and heard,
“Yes?,” Shortell himself speaking, his voice strained.
“It’s Upshaw, Jack. What have you got on–”
“What we’ve got is another one. LAPD found him last night, on an embankment up from the LA River. Doc Layman’s doing him now, so–”
Danny left the receiver dangling and Shortell shouting, “Upshaw!”; he highballed it downtown, parked in front of the City Morgue loading dock and almost tripped over a stiff on a gurney running in. Jack Shortell was already there, sweating, his badge pinned to his coat front; he saw Danny, blocked the path to Layman’s examination room and said, “Brace yourself.”
Danny got his breath. “For what?”
Shortell said, “It’s Augie Luis Duarte, one of the guys on your tailing list. The bluesuits who found him ID’d him from his driver’s license. LAPD’s had the stiff since 12:30 last night–the squad guy who caught didn’t know about our team. Breuning was here and just left, and he was making noises that Duarte blew _his_ tail last night. Danny, I know that’s horseshit. I was calling around last night looking for you, to tell you our car thief and zoot stick queries were bust. I talked to a clerk at Wilshire Station, and she told me Breuning was there all evening with Dudley Smith. I called back later, and the clerk said they were still there. Breuning said the other three men are still under surveillance, but I don’t believe him.”
Danny’s head boomed; morgue effluvia turned his stomach and stung his razor burns. He beelined for a door marked “Norton Layman MD,” pushed it open and saw the country’s premier forensic pathologist writing on a clipboard. A nude shape was slab-prone behind him; Layman stepped aside as if to say, “Feast your eyes.’