Ready to end the workday, I called my service from the pay booth in the parking lot.
An earful: Robin would be delayed till ten, and a particularly obnoxious Encino attorney wanted my help on a festering custody case. He knew I worked only for the court, not as a hired gun, and he hadn’t paid his bill for a consultation I’d done last year. Delusions were everywhere.
The fifth message was from Milo: “I’ll be at my desk by seven-thirty, get in touch.”
The operator said, “He sounded pretty irritated, your detective friend.”
I drove to the station, announced myself at the desk, waited as the clerk called up to the Robbery-Homicide room. Uniforms passed in and out. No one paid me any attention as I scanned the Wanted posters. A few minutes later the stairwell door opened and Milo bounded out, brushing hair off his forehead.
“Let’s go outside, I need air,” he said, not bothering to stop. His suit was the color of curdled oatmeal, the right lapel stained with something green. His tie was
tight, his neck was suffering, and he looked like a poster boy for National
Hypertension Week.
We reached the sidewalk and started walking up Butler. Dry, acidic heat hung in the air and I wished I’d stopped for a cold drink.
“Nothing on Pelley, yet,” he said, “so don’t ask. It’s the Beatty twins who’ve been occupying my day. Brother Leroy told people he had an acting gig.”
“Which people?”
“His fellow juiceheads. Willis Hooks and I were down at the murder scene this evening. Not far from a liquor store where Leroy used to hang, along with some other grape-suckers. Couple of them said Leroy had bragged about becoming a movie star.”
“How long ago was this?” I said.
“Time isn’t a strong concept with these guys, but they figure three, four months.
Leroy also told his drinking buds he was gonna get his brother involved with the movie-said once the director found out he had a twin, he offered to pay more. The winos thought he was just running his mouth, ’cause Leroy tended to do that when he got sufficiently drunk. They didn’t even believe Leroy had a twin. He’d never mentioned Ellroy.”
“Did Leroy report back after the filming?”
“No. He returned a week later, cranky, refusing to talk about it. If he’d gotten hold of any cash, no one saw it. His buddies figured he’d gone on a bender, flushed it all down his gullet.”
“Or Mr. Griffith D. Wark stiffed someone else,” I said. Now my mind was racing.
Fragments of history coming together… pieces fitting…
“I thought of that,” he said. “None of them saw any tall white guy chatting up
Leroy.”
“Did Ellroy’s drinking pals have anything to say about the movie?”
“Aguilar hasn’t found any pals for Ellroy yet. He seems to have been the loner twin, lived by himself near the train tracks. One of the conductors remembers seeing him from time to time, stumbling around. Figured he was crazy because he was always talking to himself.”
He scratched the side of his nose. “So here I am, stuck with the movie angle again.
Maybe it’s a link between Dada and the twins, but still no tie-in with Claire.
Except for the fact that she went to the movies. Hell, can’t you see me explaining that to her parents? I showed her picture to the bums and they didn’t recognize her.
No surprise, why would she have gone down to some South Central wino kip? I’m gonna head back tonight to that place in Toluca Lake where Richard used to wait tables-the
Oak Barrel. It’s a long shot, but maybe Claire dined there. For all we know, Mr.
Wark picked up both of ’em there-and incidentally, you were right about Wark being
D. W. Griffith’s middle name. I looked it up. So this asshole sees himself as a cinema hotshot.”
He scratched his head. “This is exactly the kind of flaky bullshit I hate dealing with. Why would Wark-or anyone else-bump offhis cast?” “Keeping the budget low?” I said. “Better not give the studios any ideas. Seriously, what’s going on here? And how-and why-would a robot like Peake be clued in?” “Maybe Wark’s filming murder.” “A snuff thing?”