And I examined the past six months. It was all there:
The money Lee had been spending in Mexico was probably a separate stash of robbery swag.
On New Year’s Eve I heard him weeping; Baxter Fitch had made his blackmail demand a few days before.
That fall, Lee had sought out Benny Siegel–in private– every time we went to the fights at the Olympic; he was trying to talk him into killing Bobby De Witt.
Right before the shoot-out, Lee had spoken on the phone to a snitch–allegedly about Junior Nash. The “snitch” had fingered Fitch and the Negros, and Lee came back to the car looking spooked. Ten minutes later four men were dead.
On the night I met Madeleine Sprague, Kay shouted at Lee: “_After all that might happen_”–a portentous line, probably her predicting disaster with Bobby De Witt. During our time working the Dahlia case, she had been jittery, morose, concerned for Lee’s well-being, yet weirdly accepting of his lunatic behavior. I thought she was upset over Lee’s obsession with Betty Short’s murder; she was really running toward and from the fairy tale’s finale.
It was all there.
“Give it all up.”
When my refrigerator was empty, I took the patented Bucky Bleichert retreat down to the market to stock up. Walking in, I saw a box boy reading the local section of the morning _Herald_. Johnny Vogel’s picture was at the bottom of the page; I looked over the kid’s shoulder and saw that he’d been dismissed from the LAPD on a graft whitewash. A column over, Ellis Loew’s name caught my eye–Bevo Means was quoting him that “The Elizabeth Short investigation is no longer my raison d’etre–I have more pertinent fish to fry.” I forgot all about food, and drove to West Hollywood.
It was recess. Kay was in the middle of the schoolyard, supervising kids flopping around in a sandbox. I watched her awhile from the car, then walked over.
The kids noticed me first. I flashed my teeth at them until they started laughing. Kay turned around then. I said, “It’s the patented Bucky Bleichert advance.”
Kay said, “Dwight”; the kids looked at us like they knew it was a big moment. Kay caught on a second later. “Did you come here to tell me something?”
I laughed; the kids chortled at another shot of my choppers. “Yeah. I decided to give it all up. Will you marry me?”
Kay, expressionless, said, “And we’ll bury the rest of it? The f-ing dead girl too?”
“Yes. Her too.”
Kay stepped into my arms. “Then yes.”
We embraced. The children called out, “Miss Lake’s got a boyfriend, Miss Lake’s got a boyfriend!”
o o o
We were married three days later, May 2, 1947. It was a rush job, the vows given by the LAPD Protestant chaplain, the service held in the backyard of Lee Blanchard’s house. Kay wore a pink dress to satirize her lack of virginity; I wore my blue dress uniform. Russ Millard was best man, and Harry Sears came along as a guest. He started out with a stutter, and for the first time I saw that it was precisely his fourth drink that quashed it. I got the old man out of the rest home on a pass, and he didn’t know who the hell I was, but seemed to have a good time anyway–swigging from Harry’s flask, goosing Kay, hopping around to the music from the radio. There was a table laid out with sandwiches and punch, hard and soft. The six of us ate and drank, and total strangers walking down to the Strip heard the music and laughter and crashed the party. By dusk the yard was filled with people I didn’t know, and Harry made a run to the Hollywood Ranch Market for more food and booze. I unloaded my service revolver and let the unknown civilians play with it, and Kay danced polkas with the chaplain. When darkness hit, I didn’t want it to end, so I borrowed strings of Christmas lights from the neighbors and strung them over the backdoor and the clothesline and Lee’s favorite Yucca tree. We danced and drank and ate under a fake constellation, the stars red and blue and yellow. Around 2:00 A.M., the clubs on the Strip let out, revelers from the Trocadero and Mocambo made the scene, and Errol Flynn hung around for a while, his tux coat doffed for my jacket, replete with badge and pistol medals. If it weren’t for the thunderstorm that struck, it might have gone on forever–and I wanted it to. But the crowd broke up amidst frantic kisses and hugs, and Russ drove the old man back to the rest bin. Kay Lake Bleichert and I retired to the bedroom to make love, and I left the radio on to help distract me from Betty Short. It wasn’t necessary–she never crossed my mind.