Bud flipped a wall switch. The steam died, the mist fizzled. Spade looked over. Bud took his gun out.
KILL HIM.
Cooley moved first: a shield, two girls pressed tight. Bud moved in–yanking arms, legs, nails raking his face. The girls slipped, stumbled, tumbled out the door. Spade said, “Jesus, Mary and Joseph.”
Smoke inside him, brewing up his very own dreamland. Last rites, stretch the moment. “Kathy Janeway, Jane Mildred Hamsher, Lynette Ellen Kendrick, Sharon–”
Cooley yelled, “GODDAMN YOU IT’S PERKINS!”
The moment snapped–Bud saw his gun half-triggered. Colors swirled around him; Cooley talked rapid fire. “I saw Deuce with that last girlie, that Kendrick. I know’d he liked to hurt hooers, and when that last girlie turned up dead on the TV I asked him ’bout it. Deuce, he like to scared me to death, so’s I took off on this here toot. Mister, you gotta believe me.”
Color flashes: Deuce Perkins, plain vicious. One color blinking– turquoise, Spade’s hands. “Those rings, where’d you get them?”
Cooley pulled a towel over his lap. “Deuce, he makes them. He brings a hobby kit with him on the road. He’s been crackin’ all these vague-type jokes for years, how they protects his hands for his intimate-type work, and now I know what he means.”
“Opium. Can he get it?”
“That cracker shitbird steals my shit! Mister, you gotta believe me!”
Starting to. “My killing dates put you in the right place to do the jobs. Just you. Your booking records show different goddamn guys traveling with you, so how do you–”
“Deuce, he’s been my road manager since ’49, he always travels with me. Mister, you gotta believe me!”
“_Where is he?_”
“I don’t know!”
“Girlfriends, buddies, other perverts. _Give_.”
“That miserable sumbitch got no friends I know of ‘cept that wop shitbird Johnny Stompanato. Mister, you gotta believe–”
“I believe you. You believe I’ll kill you if you scare him away from me?”
“Praise Jesus, I believe.”
Bud walked into the smoke. The chinks were still on the nod, Papa was just barely breathing.
o o o
R&I on Perkins:
No California beefs, clean on his Alabama parole–he’d spent ’44–’46 on a chain gang for animal sodomy. Transient musician, no known address listed. K.A. confirmation on Johnny Stompanato–ditto Lee Vachss and Abe Teitlebaum–mob punks all. Bud hung up, remembered a talk with Jack Vincennes–he’d rousted Deuce at a _Badge of Honor_ party– Johnny, Teitlebaum and Vachss were there with him.
Kid gloves: Johnny used to be his snitch, Johnny hated him, feared him.
Bud called the DMV, got Stomp’s phone number–ten rings, no answer. Two more no-answers: the Cowboy Rhythm Band at the Biltmore, the El Rancho. Kikey Teitlebaum’s deli next– Kikey and Johnny were tight.
A run out Pico, shaking off fumes. A keen edge settling in: get Perkins alone, kill him. Then Exley.
Bud parked, looked in the window. A slow afternoon, pay dirt–Johnny Stomp, Kikey T. at a table.
He walked in. They spotted him, whispered. Years since he’d seen them–Abe was fatter, Stomp still guinea slick.
Kikey waved. Bud grabbed a chair, carried it over. Stomp said, “Wendell White. How’s tricks, _paesano?_”
“Tricky. How’s tricks with Lana Turner?”
“Trickier. Who told you?”
“Mickey C.”
Teitlebaum laughed. “Must have a hole like the Third Street Tunnel. Johnny’s leaving for Acapulco with her tonight, and me, I shack with Sadie five-fingers. White, what brings you here? I ain’t seen you since Dick Stens used to work for me.”
“I’m looking for Deuce Perkins.”
Johnny tap-tapped the table. “So talk to Spade Cooley.”
“Spade don’t know where he is.”
“So why ask me? Mickey tell you Deuce and me are close?” No ritual question: what do you want him for? And fat-mouth Kikey too quiet. “Spade said you and him were acquaintances.”
“Acquaintances is right. We go back, _paesano_, so I’ll tell you I haven’t seen Deuce in years.”
Change-up pitch. “You ain’t my _paesano_, you wop cocksucker.” Johnny smiled, maybe relieved, their old cop-snitch game one more time. A look at Kikey–the fat man working on spooked. “Abe, you’re tight with Perkins, right?”
“Nix. Deuce is too meshugeneh for me. He’s just a guy to say hi to once in a blue fucking moon.”