Mal took the ledger, skimmed it and shoved it back to her. “It’s a fake.
I don’t know what the crossouts mean, but only your signature and Loftis’ are real. The others are traced over, and the minutes are like Dick and Jane join the Party. It’s a fake, and you had it out and ready. Now you explain that, or I go get a material witness warrant for Loftis.”
Claire held the ledger to herself. “I don’t believe that threat. I think this is some kind of personal vendetta with you.”
“Just answer me.”
“My answer is that your young Deputy Ted kept pressing me about what Reynolds was doing on those nights, and when I discovered that he was a policeman I thought he must have convinced himself that Reynolds did something terrible. Reynolds was here then for meetings, so I left this out for the boy to see, so he wouldn’t launch some awful circumstantial pogrom.”
A perfect right answer. “You didn’t know a graphologist would eat that ledger up in court?”
“No.”
“And what did you think Danny Upshaw was trying to prove against Loftis?”
“I don’t know! Some kind of treason, but not sex murders!”
Mal couldn’t tell if she’d raised her voice to cover a lie. “Why didn’t you show Upshaw your real ledger? You were taking a risk that he’d spot a fake one.”
“I couldn’t. A policeman would probably consider our real minutes treason.”
“Treason” was a howler; profundity from a roundheels who’d spread for anything pretty in pants. Mal laughed, caught himself and stopped; Claire said,
“Care to tell me what’s so amusing?”
“Nothing.”
“You sound patronizing.”
“Let’s change the subject. Danny Upshaw had a file on the murders, and it was stolen from his apartment. Do you know anything about that?”
“No. I’m not a thief. Or a comedienne.”
Getting mad shaved ten years off the woman’s age. “Then don’t give yourself more credit than you’re worth.”
Claire raised a hand, then held it back. “If you don’t consider my friends and me serious, then why are you trying to smear us and ruin our lives?”
Mal fizzled at a wisecrack; he said, “I want to talk to Loftis.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“I’m doing the asking. When’s Loftis coming back?”
Claire laughed. “Oh mein policeman, what your face just said. You know it’s a travesty, don’t you? You think we’re too ineffectual to be dangerous, which is just about as wrong as thinking we’re traitors.”
Mal thought of Dudley Smith; he thought of the Red Queen eating Danny Upshaw alive. “What happened with you and Ted Krugman?”
“Get your names straight. You mean Deputy Upshaw, don’t you?”
“_Just tell me_.”
“I’ll tell you he was naive and eager to please and all bluff where women were concerned, and I’ll tell you you shouldn’t have sent such a frail American patriot after us. Frail and clumsy. Did he really fall on a cutlery Side 163
Ellroy, James – Big Nowhere, The rack?”
Mal swung an open hand; Claire flinched at the blow and slapped back, no tears, just smeared lipstick and a welt forming on her cheek. Mal turned and braced himself against the banister, afraid of the way he looked; Claire said,
“You could just quit. You could denounce the wrongness of it, say we’re ineffectual and not worth the money and effort and still sound like a big tough cop.”
Mal tasted blood on his lips. “I want it.”
“For what? Glory? You’re too smart for patriotism.”
Mal saw Stefan waving goodbye; Claire said, “For your son?”
Mal, trembling, said, “What did you say?”
“We’re not the fools you think we are, recently promoted Captain. We know how to hire private detectives and they know how to check records and verify old rumors. You know, I’m impressed with the Nazi you killed and rather surprised that you can’t see the parallels between that regime and your own.”
Mal kept looking away; Claire stepped closer to him. “I understand what you must feel for your son. And I think we both know the fix is in.”
Mal pushed himself off the railing and looked at her. “Yeah. The fix is in, and this conversation didn’t happen. And I still want to talk to Reynolds Loftis. And if he killed those men, I’m taking him down.