“Bleichert code three!”
I waded in, jabbing with my stick, the weapon hitting shiny brass buttons and campaign ribbons. I caught clumsy truncheon blows on my arms and shoulders and pressed forward so the marines would be denied swinging room. It was like being in a clinch with an octopus, and no referee or three-minute bell, and on instinct I dropped my baton, lowered my head and started winging body punches, making contact with soft gabardine midsections. Then I heard, “Bleichert step back!”
I did, and there was Lee Blanchard, the nigger knocker held high above his head. The marines, dazed, froze; the club descended: once, twice, three times, clean shots to the shoulders. When the trio was reduced to a dress blue rubble heap, Blanchard said, “To the halls of Tripoli, shitbirds,” and turned to the pachuco. “Hola, Tomas.”
I shook my head and stretched. My arms and back ached; my right knuckles throbbed. Blanchard was cuffing the zooter, and all I could think to say was, “What was that all about?”
Blanchard smiled. “Forgive my bad manners. Officer Bucky Bleichert, may I present Señor Tomas Dos Santos, the subject of an all-points fugitive warrant for manslaughter committed during the commission of a Class B Felony. Tomas snatched a purse off a hairbag on 6th and Alvarado, she keeled of a heart attack and croaked, Tomas dropped the purse, ran like hell. Left a big fat juicy set of prints on the purse, eyeball witnesses to boot.” Blanchard nudged the man. “Habla Ingles, Tomas?”
Dos Santos shook his head no; Blanchard shook his head sadly. “He’s dead meat. Manslaughter Two’s a gas chamber jolt for spics. Hepcat here’s about six weeks away from the Big Adios.”
I heard shots coming from the direction of Evergreen and Wabash. Standing on my toes, I saw flames shooting out of a row of broken windows, crackling into blue and white flak when they hit streetcar wires and phone lines. I looked down at the marines, and one of them gave me the finger. I said, “I hope those guys didn’t get your badge number.”
“Fuck them sideways if they did.”
I pointed to a clump of palm trees igniting into fireballs. “We’ll never be able to get him booked tonight. You ran down here to roust them? You thought–”
Blanchard silenced me with a playful jab that stopped just short of my badge. “I ran down here because I knew there wasn’t a goddamn thing I could do about restoring order, and if I just stood around I might have gotten killed. Sound familiar?”
I laughed. “Yeah. Then you–”
“Then I saw the shitbirds chasing hepcat, who looked suspiciously like the subject of felony warrant number four eleven dash forty-three. They cornered me here, and I saw you walking back looking to get hurt, so I thought I’d let you get hurt for a reason. Sound reasonable?”
“It worked.”
Two of the marines had managed to get to their feet, and were helping the other one up. When they started for the sidewalk three abreast, Tomas Dos Santos sent a hard right foot at the biggest of the three asses. The fat PFC it belonged to turned to face his attacker; I stepped forward. Surrendering their East LA campaign, the three hobbled out to the street, gunshots and flaming palm trees. Blanchard ruffled Dos Santos’ hair. “You cute little shit, you’re a dead man. Come on, Bleichert, let’s find a place to sit this thing out.”
o o o
We found a house with a stack of daily papers on the porch a few blocks away and broke in. There were two fifths of Cutty Sark in the kitchen cupboard, and Blanchard switched the cuffs from Dos Santos’ wrists to his ankles so he could have his hands free to booze. By the time I made ham sandwiches and highballs, the pachuco had killed half the jug and was belting “Cielito Lindo” and a Mex rendition of “Chattanooga Choo Choo.” An hour later the bottle was dead and Tomas was passed out. I lifted him onto the couch and threw a quilt over him, and Blanchard said, “He’s my ninth hard felon for 1943. He’ll be sucking gas inside of six weeks, and I’ll be working Northeast or Central Warrants inside of three years.”