“There’s an ID on your 187. Martin Mitchell Goines, male Caucasian, DOB
11/9/16. Two convictions for marijuana possession, two years County for the first, three to five State for the other. Paroled from San Quentin after three and a half, August of ’48. His last known address was a halfway house on 8th and Alvarado. He was a State parole absconder, bench warrant issued. Under employment he’s listed as a musician, registered with Union Local 3126 in Hollywood.”
Danny thought of the Buick stolen outside a darktown jazz club. “Have you got mugs?”
“Just came in.”
He put on his sugar voice. “Help me with paperwork, sweet? Some phone calls?”
Karen’s voice came out whiny and catty–even over the static. “Sure, Danny. You’ll pick up the mugshots?”
“Twenty minutes.” Danny looked around and saw that the print tech was back at work. He added, “You’re a doll,” hoping the girl bought it.
o
o
o
Danny called Nestor J. Albanese from a pay phone on Allegro and Sunset.
The man had the raspy voice and skewed speech of a hangover sufferer; he told a booze-addled version of his New Year’s Eve doings, going through it three times before Danny got the chronology straight.
He was club-hopping in darktown from 9:00 or so on, the bop joints around Slauson and Central–the Zombie, Bido Lito’s, Tommy Tucker’s Playroom, Malloy’s Nest. Leaving the Nest around 1:00 A.M., he walked over to where he thought he left his Buick. It wasn’t there, so he retraced his steps, drunk, figuring he’d ditched the car on a side street. The rain was drenching him, he was woozy from mai tais and champagne, he took a cab home and woke up–still smashed–at 8:30. He took another cab back to South Central, searched for the Buick for a solid hour, didn’t find it and called the police to report it stolen. He then hailed another taxi and returned home again, to be contacted by the watch sergeant at the West Hollywood substation, who told him his pride and joy was a likely transport vehicle in a homicide case, and now, at 3:45 P.M. New Year’s Day, he wanted his baby back–and that was that.
Danny 99 percent eliminated Albanese as a suspect–the man came off as legit stupid, professed to have no criminal record and seemed sincere when he denied knowing Martin Mitchell Goines. He told him the Buick would be kicked loose from the County Impound inside three days, hung up and drove to the Station for mugshots and favors.
Karen Hiltscher was out on her dinner break; Danny was grateful she wasn’t around to make goo-goo eyes and poke his biceps, copping feels while the watch sergeant chuckled. She’d left the mugshot strip on her desk. Alive and with eyes, Martin Mitchell Goines looked young and tough–a huge, Butch-Waxed pompadour the main feature of his front, right and left side pics. The shots were from his second reefer roust: LAPD 4/16/44 on a mugboard hanging around his neck. Six years back; three and a half of them spent in Big Q. Goines had aged badly–and had died looking older than thirty-three.
Danny left Karen Hiltscher a memo: “Sweetheart – will you do this for me? 1 – Call Yellow, Beacon and the indy cab cos. Ask about pickups of single males on Sunset between Doheny and La Cienega and side sts. between 3:00 to 4:00
a.m. last nite. Ditto pickups of a drunk man, Central and Slauson to 1200 block S. St. Andrews, 12:30 – 1:30 a.m. Get all log entries for pick-ups those times Side 19
Ellroy, James – Big Nowhere, The and locations. 2 – Stay friendly, ok? I’m sorry about that lunch date I cancelled. I had to cram for a test. Thanks — D.U.”
The lie made Danny angry at the girl, the LASD and himself for kowtowing to teenaged passion. He thought of calling the 77th Street Station desk to tell them he was going to be operating in City territory, then kiboshed the idea–it was too much like bowing to the LAPD and their pout over the Sheriff’s harboring Mickey Cohen. He held the thought, the contempt. A killer-hoodlum who longed to be a nightclub comic and got weepy over lost dogs and crippled kids brought a big-city police department to its knees with a wire recording: Vice cops taking bribes and chauffeuring prostitutes; the Hollywood Division nightwatch screwing Brenda Allen’s whores on mattresses in the Hollywood Station felony tank. Mickey C. putting out his entire smear arsenal because the City high brass upped his loan shark and bookmaking kickbacks 10 percent. Ugly. Stupid. Greedy. _Wrong_.