White Jazz Part 45

"Right you are. He came in yesterday and told me he wanted dupes of the keys with them numbers, like he saw the keys but couldn't get his mitts on the two original sets I cut. I told him, 'Ixnay, not even if you was Rocky Marciano himself.'"

"You cut _two_ original sets for the Lock-Your-Self place?"

"One customer original, one management original. The manager sent a guy by for a second customer set, 'cause the people who rented those lockers wanted dupes."

Set number one--Junior. Set number two--maybe Johnny D.-- Reuben's pal.

"Officer, them locks and keys are being changed continually to thwart theft. So if you talk to Bob, the manager, will you tell him I'm doing my part toward keeping things--"

I hit the gas--the lock man ate exhaust fumes.

Echo Park off Sunset--a big warehouse. A parking lot, no door guard--my door key got me in.

Huge: crisscross hallways, locker-lined. A directory/map up front, number-coded.

The 32 codings were tagged "Jumbo." Follow the map--two corridors down, left, stop: Three floor-to-ceiling lockers six feet wide.

Scratched up--lock-pick marks.

Keys in, crack the doors: 158-32: mink coats hung eight feet deep, six feet wide.

Seven empty hangers.

159-32: stoles and pelts-dumped shoulder-high.

160-32: fox/mink/racc.o.o.n coats--f.u.c.kloads hung/dumped/piled/ folded/tossed.

Johnny/Junior/Reuben.

Dudley Smith, fur-heist boss--scooped/hoodwinked/stiffed.

Exley and Duhamel--operating WHO?

Mink--touch it, smell it. Empty hangers--Lucille's fur strip? Johnny trying to sell Mickey Cohen bulk fur??

Reuben Ruiz: ex--B&E man/burglar brothers.

His direct key approach--no go.

Break-in scratches/no door guard/Lock-Your-Self: open twenty-four hours.

Key clicks/lock clicks/brain clicks--I got my notebook and pen out. Three lockers--I dropped three identical notes inside:

I want to deal on Johnny Duhamel, Junior Stemmons and whatever or whoever else connects to this. This is for money, independent of Ed Exley.

D. Klein

Lock the doors--lock clicks/brain clicks--get to a phone.

I found a booth across Sunset. Ad Vice, two rings, "Riegle."

"Sid, it's me."

"You mean it's you and you want something."

"You're right."

"So tell me, but I'll tell you right now this Homicide work is wearing me thin."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning Richie Herrick is nowhere. First Exley issues an APB, then he rescinds it, and we _still_ can't locate one single white man known to frequent Negro areas."

"I know, and our best bet is to let Tommy Kafesjian find him for us."

"Which doesn't seem too likely with those Armenian humps holed up with Fed surveillance outside their house. Jesus. .

"Sid, write this down."

"Okay, I'm listening."

"The storage locker place at 1750 North Echo Park."

"All right, I wrote it down. Now what?"

"Now you get your civilian car and stake out the entrance and parking lot. You write down the plate numbers on everyone who walks in. Every five or six hours you call in the stats to the DMV, and you go through until tomorrow morning and call me."

Stage groans. "You'll explain then?"

"That's right."

"It's the Herrick job?"

"It's f.u.c.king everything."

CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

Reuben Ruiz--talk, strongarm--whatever it took.

R&I shot me his address: 229 South Loma. Not that far--a quick run over-- brother Ramon on the porch.

"Reuben's at the ravine, bein' a _puto_ for the City of Los Angeles."

Another quick run--Chavez Ravine.

Swarming now-evictions pending. "Police Parking"--a dirt lot going in. Cop cars jammed up tail to snout: Sheriff's, LAPD, Feds.

Hills fronting the main drag; Mex kids chucking rocks. Black & whites scratched and dented.

An access road up--narrow, dusty. I walked it, hit the top, caught the view: Hecklers bucking bluesuit containment--the main road cordoned off. Shack-lined roads/hills/gulleys--eviction notices rife. Camera crews shooting door to door: Feds and a bobbing sombrero.

Dig it: shack dwellers swarming that hat.

I walked down into it; blues juked me through the cordon. Catch the view: s.h.i.+pstad, Milner, Ruiz in bullfighter garb.

Reuben: Pa.s.sing out money, spics swamping him.

"_Dinero!_"

"_El jefe Ruiz!_"

Big-time Mex jabber--incomprehensible.

Milner gaga-eyed: what _is_ this?

I shoved, waved--s.h.i.+pstad saw me. Trembly and flushed--Henstell probably blabbed.

He shoved toward me. We collided: hands on suitcoats instinctive.

"_Gracias el jefe Reuben!_"--Ruiz tossing cash away.

A dirt yard off the road--s.h.i.+pstad pointed over. I followed him--tree shade, a sign: "Notice to Vacate."

"Justify that firebug routine before Noonan revokes your immunity and has you arrested."

Eyeball magnet: Reuben dis.h.i.+ng out greenbacks.

"Look at me, Klein."

At him, lawyer bulls.h.i.+t: "It was nontangential incriminating evidence. It in no way pertained to the Kafesjian family or to any focus of your investigation or my potential grand jury testimony. Noonan has enough on me as it is, and I didn't want to feed him more potential indictable information."

"Attorney to attorney, how can you live the way you do?"

Tongue tied-- "We're trying to help you get out of this alive. I'm developing a plan to relocate you after you testify, and frankly Noonan doesn't think I should be working so hard at it."

"Which means?"

"Which means I dislike him slightly more than I dislike you. Which means he's two seconds away from arresting you and putting you on display as a hostile witness, then releasing you and letting Sam Giancana or whoever have you killed."

Meg jailed/ brutalized/clipped--Technicolor. "Will you relocate my sister?"

"That's impossible. This last escapade has cost you credibility with Noonan, relocation for your sister was not covered in your contract and there is no established precedent for mobsters harming the loved ones of fugitive witnesses."

GET MONEY.

Ruiz throwing it away.

"We're your only hope. I'll square things with Noonan, but you be at the Federal Building by eight A.M. day after tomorrow, or we'll find you, arrest your sister and begin tax-charge proceedings."

Crowd noise, dust. Reuben watching us.

I waved the keys. Sunlight on metal--he nodded.

s.h.i.+pstad: "Klein . . ."

"I'll be there."

"Eight A.M."

"I heard you."

"It's your only--"

"What's Ruiz doing?"

He looked over. "Expiation of guilt or some such concept. Can you blame him? All this for a baseball stadium?"

Reuben walked up.

"Did you come to see _him?_ And what's with those keys?"

"Give me some time with him."