All debits, but on the plus side Dudley’s ranting didn’t put out information restricted to Lesnick’s files, leaving that avenue of manipulation still open. What was troubling was a cop as smart as the Irishman taking a nondirect attack so personally, then hitting his “brother officer” below the belt.
Pendejo.
Scared.
And Dudley Smith knows it.
At home, Mal took advantage of the empty house, dumping his sweaty clothes, showering, changing to a sport shirt and khakis and settling into the den to write a long memo to Loew–heavily stressing that there should be no further direct questioning of UAES members until their decoy was planted–a decoy now being a necessity. He was a page in when he realized that it had to be partly a gloss job–there was no way to accurately describe what happened at Variety International without portraying himself as a weakling or a fool. So he did gloss it, and filled up another page with warnings on the Loew choice for troubleshooter–Buzz Meeks–the man who held the possible distinction of being the single most crooked cop in the history of the Los Angeles Police Department–heroin skimmer, shakedown artist, bagman and now a glorified pimp for Howard Hughes. After that page, he knew it was futile; if Meeks wanted in he was in– Hughes was the heaviest contributor to the grand jury bankroll and Meeks’ bossman–what he said would go. After two pages he knew why the tack wasn’t worth pursuing: Meeks was absolutely the best man for the job. And the best man for the job was afraid of him, just like he was afraid of Dudley Smith. Even though there was no reason for the fear.
Mal threw the Meeks memo in the wastebasket and started thinking decoy. The LAPD Academy was already out–straight arrow youths with no spark for impersonation. The Sheriff’s Academy was unlikely–the Brenda Allen mess and the LASD sheltering Mickey Cohen made it unlikely that they would lend the City a smart young recruit. Their best bet was a rank-and-file City officer, smart, good-looking, adaptable and ambitious, mid to late twenties, a malleable young man without a hard-edged cop quality.
Where?
Hollywood Division was out–half the men had been implicated over Brenda Allen, had had their pictures in the paper, were running scared and angry and wild–there was even a rumor floating around that three men on the Hollywood Detective Squad had been behind last August’s shootout at Sherry’s–a botched snuff attempt on Mickey Cohen that wounded three and killed a Cohen utility trigger. Out.
And Central was packed with unqualified rookies who made the Department because of their war records; 77th Street, Newton and University featured outsized crackers hired on to keep the Negro citizenry in line. Hollenbeck might be a good place to look–but East LA was Mex, Benavides, Lopez and Duarte still had ties there, and that might blow their decoy’s cover. The various detective divisions were a possible stalking ground–if they could find a man who didn’t come off as irredeemably jaded.
Mal grabbed his LAPD station directory and started scanning it, one eye on the wall clock as it inched toward 3:00 and Stefan’s home-from-school time. He was about to start calling CO’s for preliminary screening talks when he heard footsteps in the hall; he swiveled in his chair, dropped his arms and got ready to let his son dogpile him.
It was Celeste. She looked at Mal’s open arms until he dropped them; she said, “I told Stefan to stay late after school in order that I should talk to you.”
“Yes?”
“The look on your face does not to make this easy.”
“Spill it, goddamn you.”
Celeste clutched her beaded opera purse, a favored relic of Prague, 1935. “I am going to divorce you. I have met a nice man, a man who is cultured and will make Stefan and me a better home.”
Mal thought: perfect calm, she knows her effects. He said, “I won’t let you. Don’t hurt my boy or I’ll hurt you.”
“You cannot. To the mother the child belongs.”
Maim her, let her know he is the law. “Is he rich, Celeste? If you have to fuck to survive, you should fuck rich men. Right, Fräulein? Or powerful men, like Kempflerr.”