My head whizzed. I ate a cracker to normalize my blood sugar. Sol Slotnick stared at me.
I said, “I’ve got a date with Jane tonight, and I’ll put in a good word for you. And I know an FBI man pretty well. I’ll tell him that you’re not making _Wetback!_, and ask him to pass the word along.”
“_You’re_ friends with one of J. Edgar Hoover’s minions?”
“Yeah, Special Agent Pete Van Obst. His wife’s the President of my National Fan Club.”
“What’s the current membership? We might make a picture together, and statistics like that impress financial backers.”
“The current membership is sixty-something.”
“So you add a few zeros and hope they don’t check. Dick, be a gentleman with Jane tonight. Tell her I think she has movie star potential. Tell her you’ve heard rumors that I’m hung like Roy Rogers’ horse Trigger.”
Dismissal time–Sol looked exhausted. I grabbed a few crackers for the road.
* * *
Kay Van Obst brought three .45 autos–FBI issue, “borrowed” from husband Pete. Nancy Ankrum brought a sawed-off loaded with rat poison–dipped buckshot–Caryl Chessman told her where to find one. Add my dad’s .12 gauge pumps and call the pad “Fort Contino”–L.A.’s cut-rate Alamo.
Ammo boxes on the coffee table.
Front and back window eyeball surveillance–four women in rotating shifts.
Four women packing kitchen knives in plastic scabbards–Kay hit a toy store on her way over.
Time to kill before my “Date”–I took a snooze.
Ink-smeared dreams:
COWARD REDEEMED; KIDNAPPERS STILL AT LARGE!
CONTINO FOILS FIENDS; SAVES BACK-UP SINGER FROM TORTURE AND RAPE!
L.A. FUZZ NIX PUBLICITY STUNT SPECULATION: “THIS CAPER WAS REAL!”
Chris held down by salivating psycopaths.
Cops swarming the kidnap shack.
Chief William H. Parker holding up scalps.
CONTINO KIDNAP PLOT REVEALS BIZARRE LINKS TO UNSOLVED MURDERS!!!
REDSKIN RESERVATIONS RAIDED IN SEARCH FOR KIDNAPPERS!!!
APACHE CHIEF SAYS, “HEAP BAD BUSINESS! ME SEND UP SMOKE SIGNALS TO TRAP SCALP KILLER!”
Chris woke me up. “You should get ready. I told Leigh you were jamming with some studio guys, so take your accordion.”
A last headline flickered out:
CONTINO CONQUEST CONTINUES! KIDNAP TOPS LINDBERGH SNATCH IN POPULAR POLL!
* * *
“I’m sure you must think that I’m just a naive young thing. You must think that any girl who hasn’t narrowed her career choices down any better than doctor, lawyer, movie star or recording star must be rather silly.”
Jane picked the restaurant: a dago joint off Sunset and Normandie. The Hi-Hat Motel stood cattycorner–“Vacancy” in throbbing neon made me sweat.
I drank wine. Jane drank ginger ale under protest–feeding minors liquor was a contributing beef.
“I don’t think you’re silly. When I was nineteen I was a recording star, but I just fell into it. You should finish college and let things happen to you for a while.”
“You sound like my dad. Only he doesn’t push the ‘let things happen’ part, because he knows that I have the same appetites my mom had when I was her age. I look like my mom, I act like my mom and I talk like my mom. Only my mom married this rookie cop from Sioux Falls, South Dakota, who got her pregnant when she was eighteen, and I’m too smart for that.”
Scorch/scorch/twinkle–green eyes offset by Chianti bottle candlelight. “Sol Slotnick might fit that ‘let things happen to you’ bill. He likes you, and he’s a legit movie producer who could get you work.”
Jane futzed with her bread plate. “He’s a lech and a fatty-patty. He followed me to my first collective meeting, so he’s one step up from a wienie wagger. My dad used to drive me around when he was a detective in Sioux Falls. He wanted to show me what I had to look forward to as far as men were concerned. He showed me all the pimps and panty sniffers and winos and wienie waggers and rag sniffers and gigolos that he dealt with, and believe me, Sol Slotnick fits right in. Besides, he has small hands, and my mom told me what _that_ means.”
I sipped dago red. Jane said, “You have _big_ hands.”
“Vacancy” throbbed.
Questions throbbed: Who’s gonna know? Who’s gonna care? Who’s gonna tell?