Ellroy, James – Big Nowhere, The THE BIG NOWHERE

Danny turned on the sink faucet with a knuckle, lowered his head, splashed and drank. Looking up, he caught his face in the mirror; for a second he didn’t think it was him. He walked back to the main room, took rubber gloves from his evidence kit, slipped them on, returned to the bathroom and sifted through the clothing, dropping it on the floor.

Three pairs of pants. Three skivvy shirts. Three rolled-up pairs of socks. One sweater, one windbreaker, one sports jacket.

Three victims.

One other doorway.

Danny backed out of the bathroom and pivoted into a small kitchenette, expecting a gigantic rush of crimson. What he got was perfect tidiness: scrub brush, Ajax and a soap bar lined up on a rack above a clean sink; clean dishes in a plastic drainer; a 1949 calendar tacked to the wall, the first eleven months ripped off, no flotations on the page for December. A telephone on a nightstand placed against the side wall and a battered Frigidaire next to the sink.

No blood, no horror artwork. Danny felt his stomach settle and his pulse take over, jolts like wires frazzling. Two other stiffs dumped someplace; a B&E

on LAPD turf–Hollywood Division, where the Brenda Allen mess was the worst, where they hated the Sheriff’s Department the most. His violation of Captain Dietrich’s direct order: no strongarm, no prima donna in the City. No way to report what he found. An outside chance of the killer bringing number four here.

Danny gulped from the sink, swathed his face, let his gloved hands and jacket sleeves get sopping. He thought of tossing the pad for a bottle; his stomach heaved; he picked up the phone and dialed the station.

Karen Hiltscher answered. “West Hollywood Sheriff’s. May I help you?”

Danny’s voice wasn’t his. “It’s me, Karen.”

“Danny? You sound strange.”

“_Just listen_. I’m someplace where I shouldn’t be and I need something, and I need you to call me back here when you’ve got it. And nobody can know.

_Nobody_. Do you understand?”

“Yes. Danny, please don’t be so rough.”

“_Just listen_. I want your verbal on every dead body report filed city and countywide over the past forty-eight hours, and I want you to call me back here with it, _quick_. Ring twice, hang up and call again. Got it?”

“Yes. Sweetie, are you all–”

“Damnit, _just listen_. I’m at Hollywood-4619, it’s _wrong_ and I could get in big trouble for being here, so don’t tell anybody. _Do you fucking understand_?”

Karen whispered, “Yes, sweetie,” and let her end of the line go dead.

Danny hung up, wiped sweat off his neck and thought of ice water. He saw the Frigidaire, reached over and opened the door, bolted for the sink when he caught what was inside.

Two eyeballs coated with clear jelly in an ashtray. A severed human finger on top of a package of green beans.

Danny vomited until his chest ached and his stomach retched itself empty; he turned on the faucet and doused himself until water seeped inside his rubber gloves and he snapped that a sopping wet cop couldn’t forensic a crime scene that Volimer or Maslick would have killed for. He turned the water off and shook himself half dry, hands braced against the sink ledge. The phone rang; he heard it as a gunshot, pulled his piece and aimed it at nothing.

Another ring, silence, a third ring. Danny picked up the receiver. “Yes?

Karen?”

The girl had on her singsong pout. “Three DOAs. Two female Caucasians, one male Negro. The females were a pill suicide and a car wreck and the Negro Side 57

Ellroy, James – Big Nowhere, The was a wino who died of exposure, and you owe me the Coconut Grove for being so nasty.”

Eight walls of blood spritz and a would-be lady cop who wanted to go dancing. Danny laughed and opened the icebox door for more comic relief. The finger was long, white and thin, and the eyeballs were brown and starting to shrivel. “Anywhere, sweetie, anywhere.”

“Danny, are you sure you’re–”

“Karen, listen real close. I’m staying here to see who shows up. Are you working a double shift tonight?”

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