Ellroy, James – Big Nowhere, The THE BIG NOWHERE

Buzz caught up at the desk. Mal was badging the clerk, a scrawny Negro with his shirt cuffs buttoned full in a sweltering lobby. He was muttering,

“Yessir, yessir, yessir,” one eye on Mal, one hand reaching under the desk.

Mal said, “Roland Navarette. Is he still in 402?”

Side 185

Ellroy, James – Big Nowhere, The The hophead said, “Nossir, nossir,” his hand still reaching; Buzz swooped around and pinned his wrist just as he was closing in on a junk bindle.

He bent the fingers back; the hophead went, “Yessir, yessir, yessir”; Buzz said,

“A white man, late twenties, maybe a beard. A jazz guy. He glom horse from Navarette?”

“Nossir, nossir, nossir.”

“Boy, you tell true or I break the hand you geez up with and throw you in the cracker tank at the Seven-Seven.”

“Yessir, yessir, yessir.”

Buzz let go and laid the bindle out on the desk. The clerk rubbed his fingers. “White man, white woman here askin’ same thing twenty minutes ‘go. I tol’ them, I tell you, Roland straighten up, fly right, don’t sell no sweet horsey nohow.”

The punk’s eyes strayed to a house phone; Buzz ripped it out and chucked it on the floor. Mal ran for the stairs.

Buzz huffed and puffed after him, catching up on the fourth-floor landing. Mal was in the middle of a putrid-smelling hallway, gun out, pointing to a doorway. Buzz got his breath, pulled his piece and walked over.

Mal ticked numbers; at three they kicked in the door. A Negro in soiled underwear was sitting on the floor sticking a needle in his arm, pushing the plunger down, oblivious to the noise and two white men pointing guns at him. Mal kicked his legs and pulled the spike out of his arm; Buzz saw a C-note resting under a fresh syringe on the dresser and knew Claire and Loftis had bought themselves a hot lead.

Mal was slapping the H man, trying to bring him back from cloud nine; Buzz knew that was futile. He hauled him away from Mal, dragged him to the bathroom, stuck his head in the toilet and flushed. Roland Navarette came back to earth with shakes, shivers and sputters; the first thing he saw out of the bowl was a .38 in his face. Buzz said, “Where’d you send them white people after Coleman?”

Roland Navarette said, “Man, this a humbug.”

Buzz cocked the gun. “Don’t make me.”

Roland Navarette said, “Coleman gigging at this after-hours on One-O-Six an’ Avalon.”

o

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Watts, code three without a siren. Buzz fingered his billy club; Mal leadfooted through twilight traffic. One hundred and sixth and Avalon was the heart of the heart of Watts: every tarpaper shack on the block had goats and chickens behind barbed-wire fences. Buzz thought of crazed darkies sacrificing them for voodoo rituals, maybe inviting Coleman over for some wolverine stew and a night of jazz hot. He saw a string of blue lights flickering around the doorway of a corner stucco; he said, “Pull over, I see it.”

Mal swung hard right and killed his engine at the curb. Buzz pointed across the street. “That white car was in De Haven’s driveway.”

Mal nodded, opened the glove compartment and took out a pair of handcuffs. “I was going to let the papers in on this, but I guess there’s no time.”

Buzz said, “He might not be here. Loftis and Claire might be waitin’ him out, or there’d of been grief already. _You_ ready?”

Mal nodded. Buzz saw a group of Negroes line up by the bluelit door and start filing in. He motioned Mal out of the car; they hurried across the sidewalk and rode the last jazzbo’s coattails.

The doorman was a gigantic shine in a blue bongo shirt. He started to block the way in, then stepped back and bowed–an obvious police courtesy.

Buzz went in first. Except for blue Christmas bulbs taped to the walls and a baby spot illuminating the bar, the joint was dark. People sat at card tables facing the stage and a combo back-lit by more blue lights: blinkers covered with cellophane. The music was ear-splitting shit, one step down from noise. The trumpet, bass, drums, piano and trombone were Negro guys in blue bongo shirts. The alto sax was Coleman, no beard, a cracked blue bulb blinking across the set of Daddy Reynolds’ eyes.

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