The black echo

Part V
Thursday, May 24
It had been a long time for him. And in Eleanor's bedroom, Harry Bosch was clumsy in the way of a man who is overly self-conscious and out of practice. As with most first times he had had, it wasn't good. She directed him with her hands and whispers. And afterward he felt like apologizing but didn't. They held each other and lightly dozed, the smell of her hair in his face. The same apple scent he had encountered in his kitchen the night before. Bosch was infatuated with her and wanted to breathe the smell of her hair every minute. After a while he kissed her awake and they made love again. This time he needed no directions and she didn't need her hands. When they were done, Eleanor whispered to him, "Do you think you can be alone in this world and not be lonely?"
He didn't answer at first, and she said, "Are you alone or are you lonely, Harry Bosch?"
He thought about that for some time, while her fingers gently traced the tattoo on his shoulder.
"I don't know what I am," he finally whispered. "You get so used to things the way they are. And I've always been alone. I guess that makes me lonely. Until now."
They smiled in the dark and kissed, and soon he heard her deep, sleeping breaths. Much later, Bosch got up from the bed, pulled on his pants and went out on the balcony to smoke. On Ocean Park Boulevard there was no traffic and he could hear the ocean's noise from nearby. The lights were out in the apartment next door. They were out everywhere except on the street. He could see that the jacaranda trees along the sidewalk were shedding their flowers. They had fallen like a violet snow on the ground and the cars parked along the curb. Bosch leaned on the railing and blew smoke into the cool night wind.
When he was on his second cigarette he heard the door behind him slide open and then felt her hands come around his waist as she embraced him from behind.
"What's wrong, Harry?"
"Nothing, just thinking. You better watch out. Carcinogen alert. You ever heard of the draft risk easement?"
"Assessment, Harry, not easement. What are you thinking about? Is this how it is most nights for you?"
Bosch turned around in her arms and kissed her forehead. She was wearing a short robe of pink silk. He rubbed his thumb up and down the nape of her neck. "Almost no night is like this. I just couldn't sleep. I guess I was thinking about a lot of things."
"About us?" She kissed his chin.
"I guess."
"And?"
He brought his hand around to her face and traced the outline of her jaw with his fingers.
"I was wondering how you got this little scar here."
"Oh . . . that is from when I was a girl. My brother and I, we were riding on a bike and I was on the handlebars. And we went down this hill, it was called Highland Avenue—this was when we lived in Pennsylvania—and he lost control. The bike started weaving and I was so scared because I knew we were going to crash. And just as he really lost it and we were going down, he yelled, 'Ellie, you'll be all right!' Just like that. And because he had yelled that, he was right. I cut my chin but I didn't even cry. I always thought that was something, that he would try to yell something to me rather than worry about himself at a moment like that. But that was my brother."
Bosch dropped his hands from her face. He said, "I was also thinking that what happened between us was nice."
"I think so, too, Harry. Nice for a couple of nighthawks. Come back to bed now."
They went back in. Bosch first went into the bathroom and used his finger as a toothbrush and then crawled back under the sheet with her. The blue glow of a digital clock on the bedtable said 2:26 and Bosch closed his eyes.
When he opened them again the clock said 3:46 and there was an obnoxious chirping sound coming from somewhere in the room. He realized he was not in his own room. Then he remembered he was in Eleanor Wish's room. As he finally got oriented he saw her shadowy figure stooped next to the bed, her hands going through the pile of his clothes.
"Where is it?" she said. "I can't find it."
Bosch reached for his pants, traced his hands along the belt until he found the pager and turned it off without having to fumble with it. He had done it many times in the dark before.
"Jesus," she said. "That was rude."
Bosch swung his legs over the side of the bed, gathered the sheet around his waist and sat up. He yawned and then warned her that he was going to turn on the light. She said go ahead, and when the light came on it hit him like a diamond burst between his eyes. When his vision cleared, she was standing in front of him naked, looking down at the digital readout of the pager in his hand. Bosch finally looked down at the number but didn't recognize it. He wiped a hand across his face and rustled his hair. There was a telephone on the bedtable and he pulled it onto his lap. He dialed the number and then fumbled with his hands in his clothes for a cigarette, which he put in his mouth but didn't light.
Eleanor noticed her nakedness and walked over to a lounge chair to get her robe. After it was on she went into the bathroom and closed the door. Bosch heard water running. The other end of the line was picked up halfway through the first ring. Jerry Edgar didn't answer with a hello, just "Harry, where you at?"
"I'm not home. What is it?"
"This kid you were looking for, the one on the nine one one call, you found him, right?"
"Yeah, but we're looking for him again."
"Who's 'we'—you and the feebee woman?"
Eleanor came out of the bathroom and sat down on the edge of the bed next to him.
"Jerry, what are you calling me for?" Bosch asked. He was beginning to get a sinking feeling in his chest.
"What's the kid's name?"
Bosch was in a daze. It had been months since he had fallen so deeply asleep, only to be rousted out of it. He couldn't remember Sharkey's real name and he didn't want to ask Eleanor because Edgar might hear and then know they were together. Harry looked at Eleanor and when she began to speak, he touched his finger to her lips and shook his head.
"Is it Edward Niese?" Edgar spoke into the silence. "That the kid's name?"
The sinking feeling was gone. Bosch felt an invisible fist pressing up under his ribs and into the folds of his guts and heart.
"Right," he said. "That's the name."
"You gave him one of your business cards?"
"Right."
"Harry, you aren't looking for him anymore."
"Tell me about it."
"Come on out and see for yourself. I'm over at the bowl. Sharkey's in the pedestrian tunnel under Cahuenga. Park on the east side. You'll see the cars."
The Hollywood Bowl's east parking lot was supposed to be empty at 4:30 A.M. But as Bosch and Wish drove up Highland to the mouth of the Cahuenga Pass they saw that the north end of the lot was crowded with the usual grouping of official cars and vans that signal the violent, or at least unexpected, end of a life. There was yellow plastic crime scene tape strung in a square, boxing the entrance to the stairwell that went down to the pedestrian underpass. Bosch flashed his badge and gave his name to a uniform cop who was keeping the officers-on-the-scene list on a clipboard. He and Wish ducked under the tape and were met by the loud sound of an engine echoing from the mouth of the tunnel. Bosch knew by the sound that it was a generator making the juice for the crime scene lights. At the top step, before they began their descent, he turned to Eleanor and said, "You want to wait here? We don't both have to go."
"I'm a cop, for godsake," she said. "I've seen bodies before. You going to get protective of me now, Bosch? Tell you what. Want me to go down and you stay up here?"
Startled by her abrupt change in mood, Bosch didn't answer. He looked at her a moment longer, confused. He started down a few steps in front of her but stopped when he saw Edgar's large body come out of the tunnel and start up the steps. Edgar saw Bosch, and then Bosch saw his eyes go over his shoulder and take Eleanor Wish in.
"Hey, Harry," he said. "This your new partner? You must be getting along real fine already."
Bosch just stared at him. Eleanor was still three steps behind and probably hadn't heard the remark.
"Sorry, Harry," Edgar said just loud enough to be heard over the roar from the tunnel. "Out of line. Been a bad night. You should see who I got for a new partner, the useless f*ck Ninety-eight Pounds stuck me with."
"I thought you were going to get—"
"Nope. Get this: Pounds put me with Porter from autos. The guy's a burned-out lush."
"I know. How'd you even get him out of bed for this?"
"He wasn't in bed. I had to track him down at the Parrot up in North Hollywood. It's one of them private bottle clubs. Porter gives me the number when we're first introduced as partners and tells me that's where he'll be most nights. Tells me he works a security detail there. But I called the off-duty assignments office at Parker Center to check it out and they got no record. I know the only thing he does there is booze. He must've been practically passed out when I called. The bartender said the pager on his belt went off but he didn't even hear it. Harry, I think the guy could blow a point two right now if we put a Breathalyzer on him."
Bosch nodded and frowned the required three seconds and then put Jerry Edgar's troubles aside. He felt Eleanor step down beside him and he introduced her to Edgar. They shook hands and smiled and Bosch said, "So, what have we got?"
"Well, we got these on the body," Edgar said, and he held up a clear plastic bag. There was a short stack of Polaroids in it. More nude shots of Sharkey. He hadn't wasted any time resupplying. Edgar turned the bag and there was Bosch's business card.
"It looks like the kid was a hustler down in Boytown," Edgar said, "but if you already pulled him in once you already know that. Anyway, I saw the card and figured he might be the kid from the nine one one call. If you want to come down and take a look, be my guest. We already processed the scene, so touch whatever you want. You can't hear yourself think in there, though. Somebody went through and knocked out every light in the tunnel. Haven't figured out whether that was the perp or the lights were knocked out before.
"Anyway, we had to set up our own. And our cables weren't long enough to put the generator up here. It's in there screaming like a five-horsepower baby."
He turned to head back into the tunnel but Bosch reached out and touched his shoulder.
"Jed, how'd you get the call on this?"
"Anonymous. It wasn't a nine one one line, so there's no tape or trace. Came in right to the Hollywood desk. Caller was a male, that's all the dipshit, one of those fat Explorer kids who took it, could tell us."
Edgar turned back into the subway. Bosch and Wish followed. It was a long hallway that curved to the right. The floor was dirty concrete, its walls were white stucco with a heavy overlay of graffiti. Nothing like a dose of urban reality as you are leaving the symphony at the bowl, Bosch thought. The tunnel was dark except for the bright splash of light that bathed the crime scene about halfway in. There Bosch could see a human form sprawled on its back. Sharkey. He could see men standing and working in the light. Bosch walked with the fingers of his right hand trailing along the stuccoed wall. It steadied him. There was an old, damp smell in the tunnel that was mixed with the new odor of gasoline and exhaust from the generator. Bosch felt beads of sweat start to form on his scalp and under his shirt. His breathing was fast and shallow. They passed the generator thirty feet in and in another thirty feet or so Sharkey was lying on the tunnel floor under the brutal light of the strobes.
The boy's head was propped against the tunnel wall at an unnatural angle. He seemed smaller and younger than Bosch remembered him. His eyes were half open and had the familiar glaze of the unseeing on them. He wore a black T-shirt that said Guns N Roses on it, and it was matted with his blood. The pockets of his faded jeans were pulled out and empty. At his side stood a can of spray paint in a plastic evidence bag. On the wall above his head a painted inscription read RIP Sharkey. The paint had been applied with an inexperienced hand and too much had been used. Black paint had run down the wall in thin lines, some of them into Sharkey's hair.
When Edgar yelled, "You want to see it?" above the din of the generator Bosch knew that he meant the wound. Because Sharkey's head was angled forward, the throat wound was not visible. Only the blood. Bosch shook his head no.
Bosch noticed the blood splatter on the wall and floor about three feet from the body. Porter the lush was comparing the shapes of the drops with those on splatter cards on a steel ring. A crime scene tech named Roberge was also photographing the spots. The blood on the floor was in round spots. The wall splatter drops were elliptical. You didn't need splatter cards to know the kid had been killed right here in the tunnel.
"The way it's looking," Porter said loudly to no one in particular, "somebody comes up behind him here, cuts him and pushes him down against the wall there."
"You only got it half right, Porter," Edgar said. "How's somebody come up behind somebody in a tunnel like this? He was with somebody and they did him. It was no sneak job, Porter."
Porter put the splatter cards in his pocket and said, "Sorry, partner."
He didn't say anything else. He was fat and broken down the way many cops get when they stay on longer than they should. Porter could still wear a size 34 belt, but above it a tremendous gut bloomed outward like an awning. He wore a tweed sport coat with a frayed elbow. His face was gaunt and as pallid as a flour tortilla, behind a drinker's nose that was large, misshapen and painfully red.
Bosch lit a cigarette and put the burnt match in his pocket. He crouched down like a baseball catcher next to the body and lifted the bag containing the paint can and hefted it. It was almost full, and that confirmed what he already knew, already feared. It was he who had killed Sharkey. In a way, at least. Bosch had tracked him down and made him valuable, or potentially valuable, to the case. Someone could not allow this. Bosch squatted there, elbows on knees, holding cigarette to mouth, smoking and studying the body, making sure he would not forget it.
Meadows had been part of this thing—the circle of connected events that had gotten him killed. But not Sharkey. He was street trash and his death here probably saved someone else's life down the line. But he did not deserve this. In this circle he was an innocent. And that meant things were out of control and there were new rules—for both sides. Bosch signaled with his hand to Sharkey's neck and a coroner's investigator pulled the body away from the wall. Bosch put one hand down on the ground to balance himself and stared for a long time at the ravaged neck and throat. He did not want to forget a single detail. Sharkey's head lolled back, exposing the gaping neck wound. Bosch's eyes never wavered.
When Bosch finally looked up from the body, he noticed that Eleanor was no longer in the tunnel. He stood up and signaled Edgar to come outside to talk. Harry didn't want to have to shout over the sound of the generator. When they got out of the tunnel, he saw that Eleanor was sitting alone on the top step. They walked up past her, and Harry put his hand on her shoulder as he went by. He felt it go rigid at his touch.
When he and his old partner were reasonably away from the noise, Harry said, "So what do the techs have?"
"Not a damned thing," Edgar said. "If it was a gang thing, it's one of the cleanest I've ever seen. Not a single print or partial. The spray can is clean. No weapon. No wits."
"Sharkey had a crew, used to stay at a motel near the Boulevard until today, but he wasn't into gangs," Bosch said. "It's in the files. He was a scammer. You know, with the Polaroids, rolling homosexuals, stuff like that."
"You're saying he's in the gang files but he isn't in a gang?"
"Right."
Edgar nodded and said, "He still could've been taken down by somebody who thought he was a gangbanger."
Wish walked over to them then but said nothing.
"You know this isn't a gang thing, Jed," Bosch said.
"I do?"
"Yeah, you do. If it was, there wouldn't be a full can of paint in there. No gangbanger's going to leave something like that behind. Also, whoever painted the wall in there didn't have the touch. The paint ran. Whoever did it, didn't know about spraying a wall."
"Come here a sec," Edgar said.
Bosch looked at Eleanor and nodded that it was okay.
He and Edgar walked away a few steps and stood near the crime scene tape.
"What did this kid tell you, and how come he was running around loose if he's part of the case?" he asked.
Bosch told him the basics of the story, that they didn't know if Sharkey was important to the case. But somebody apparently did or couldn't risk waiting to find out. As Bosch spoke he looked up over the hills and saw the first light of dawn outlining the tall palms at the top. Edgar took a step away and tilted his head up that way, too. But he wasn't looking at the sky. His eyes were closed. He eventually turned back to Bosch.
"Harry, you know what this weekend is?" he said. "It's Memorial Day weekend. It's the biggest three-day showing weekend of the year. Start of the summer season. Last year I sold four houses on this weekend, made almost as much as I made all year as a cop."
Bosch was confused by the sudden departure in the conversation. "What are you talking about?"
"What I'm talking about is . . . I'm not going to be busting my ass on this case. It isn't going to f*ck up my weekend like the last one. So, what I'm saying is if you want it, I'll go to Pounds and tell him you and the FBI want to take it 'cause it goes with the one you are already working. Otherwise, I'm going to work it strictly as a nine-to-five."
"You tell Pounds whatever you want, Jed. It's not my call."
Bosch started back toward Eleanor, and Edgar said, "Just one thing. Who knew you had found the kid?"
Bosch stopped and looked at Eleanor. Without turning around, he said, "We took him off the street. We interviewed him over on Wilcox. The reports went to the bureau. What do you want me to say, Jed?"
"Nothing," Edgar said. "But, Harry, maybe you and the FBI there should have looked out for your witness a little better. Maybe saved me some time and that boy some life."
Bosch and Wish walked silently back to the car. Once inside Bosch said, "Who knew?"
"What do you mean?" she said.
"What he asked back there, who knew about Sharkey?" She thought for a moment. Then said, "On my end, Rourke gets the daily summary reports, and he got the memo on hypnosis. The summaries go to records and are copied to the senior special agent. The tape from the interview that you gave me is locked in my desk. Nobody's heard that. It hasn't been transcribed. So, I guess anyone could have seen the summaries. But don't even think about that, Harry. Nobody . . . It can't be."
"Well, they knew we found the kid and he might be important. What's that tell you? They've got to have somebody on the inside."
"Harry, that's speculation. It could have been a lot of things. Like you told him, we picked him up on the street. Anybody could have been watching. His own friends, that girl, anybody could have put out the word that we were looking for Sharkey."
Bosch thought about Lewis and Clarke. They must have seen them pick up Sharkey. What part were they playing? Nothing made sense.
"Sharkey was a tough little bastard," he said. "You think he just went walking with somebody into that tunnel? I think he didn't have a choice. And to do that, it maybe took somebody with a badge."
"Or maybe somebody with money. You know he'd go with somebody if there was money in it."
She didn't start the car and they sat in it thinking. Bosch finally said, "Sharkey was a message."
"What?"
"A message to us. See? They leave my card with him. They call it in on a no-trace line. And they do him in a tunnel. They want us to know they did it. They want us to know they've got somebody inside. They're laughing at us."
She started the car. "Where to?"
"The bureau."
"Harry, be careful with that stuff about an inside man. If you go trying to sell that and it's not true, you could give your enemies all they need to bury you."
Enemies, Bosch thought. Who are my enemies this time?
"I got that kid killed," he said. "The least I am going to do is find who did it."
Bosch looked through the cotton curtains in the waiting room, down at the veterans cemetery, while Eleanor Wish unlocked the door to the bureau offices. The ground fog had not burned off the field of stones yet, and from above it looked like a thousand ghosts rising from their boxes at once. Bosch could see the dark gash dug into the crest of the hill at the north side of the cemetery but still could not make out what it was. It looked almost like a mass grave, a long gouge into the hill, a huge wound. The exposed soil was covered with black plastic sheets.
"You want coffee?" Wish said from behind him.
"Of course," he said. He pulled himself away from the curtains and followed her in. The bureau was empty. They went into the office kitchen and he watched as she dumped a packet of ground coffee into a filter basket and turned the machine on. They stood there silently, watching the coffee slowly drip into a round glass pot on the heating pad. Bosch lit a cigarette and tried only to think about the coffee that was coming. She waved the smoke away with a hand but didn't tell him to put it out.
When the coffee was ready, Bosch took it black and it hit his system like a shot. He filled up a second cup and carried both into the squad room. He lit a cigarette off the butt of the first when he got to his temporary desk.
"My last one," he promised when he saw her looking.
Eleanor poured herself a cup of water from a bottle she took from her file drawer.
"You ever run out of that stuff?" he asked.
She ignored the question. "Harry, we can't blame ourselves for Sharkey. If we're to blame, then we might as well offer every person we talk to protection. Should we go up and grab his mother and put her in witness protection? What about the girl in the motel room that knew him? See, it gets crazy. Sharkey was Sharkey. You live by the street, you die by the street."
Bosch didn't say anything at first. Then he said, "Let me see the names."
Wish pulled out the files on the WestLand case. She rifled through them and pulled out a computer printout several pages long and folded accordion-style. She tossed it on the desk in front of him.
"That's the master there," she said. "Everybody who had a box. There are notes written after some of the names, but they probably are not germane. Most of that was if we thought they were scamming insurance or not."
Bosch started unfolding the printout and realized it was one long list and five shorter lists marked A through E. He asked what they were, and she came around the desk and looked over his shoulder. He smelled the apple in her hair.
"Okay, the long list is like I said, everybody who had a box. It's an all-inclusive list. Then we did five breakouts, A through E. The first—that's A—is a breakout on boxes rented within the three months prior to the burglary. Then B, we did a breakout on boxholders who reported no loss at all in the burglary. Then C is the list of dead ends; boxholders who were actually dead or we couldn't find because of changes in addresses or they had given phony information to rent them.
"Then the fourth and fifth breakouts are matching lists from the first three. D is anybody who rented a box in the previous three months and also reported no loss. E is anybody on the dead-end list who was also on the three-month list. Understand?"
He did. The FBI's thinking had been that the vault had to have been cased by the thieves before the break-in and that was most likely accomplished by simply going into the bank and renting a box. That way they had legitimate access; the guy who rented the box could go inside the vault anytime he wanted during business hours and have a look around. So the list including anybody who rented a box within three months of the robbery stood a good chance of also including the scout.
Second, it was likely that this scout would not want to draw attention to himself after the robbery, so he might report nothing stolen from his box. So that would put him on the D list. But if he made no report at all or had given untraceable information on his box rental card, then his name would be on the E list.
There were only seven names on the D list and five on the E list. One of the E names was circled. Frederic B. Isley of Park La Brea, the name of the man who had bought three Honda ATV's in Tustin. The other names had check marks next to them.
"Remember?" Eleanor said. "I said that name would come up again."
Harry nodded.
"Isley," she said. "We think he was the scout. Rented the box nine weeks before the burglary. The bank records show he made a total of four visits to the vault during the next seven weeks. But after the break-in, he never came back, whoever he was. Never filed a report. And when we tried to contact him we found the address was phony."
"Get a description?"
"Not one that would do us any good. Small, dark and maybe handsome was about as good as the vault clerks could do. We thought this guy was the scout even before we found out about the ATVs. When a boxholder wants to see his box, the clerk takes him in, unlocks the little door and then escorts him to one of the viewing rooms. When he's done, they both take the box back and the customer initials his box card. Kind of like at a library. So, when we looked at this guy's card we saw the initials— FBI. You're a man who doesn't like coincidences. Neither did we. We think somebody was having fun with us. Later, it was confirmed when we tracked the ATVs to Tustin."
Harry sipped his coffee.
"Not much good it did us," she said. "Never found him. In the debris of the vault after the burglary we were able to find his box. We printed it and the door. Nothing. We showed the vault clerks some mugs—Meadows was in there—and they couldn't make anybody."
"We could go back to them now with Franklin and Delgado, see if one of them was this Isley."
"Yeah. We will. I'll be right back."
She got up and left and Bosch went back to drinking coffee and studying the list. He read every name and address on the list, but nothing jogged his memory aside from the handful of names of celebrities, politicians and the like that had safe-deposit boxes. Bosch was going over the list a second time when Eleanor came back. She was carrying a piece of paper, which she slid onto his desk.
"I checked Rourke's office. He already sent most of the paperwork I turned in over to records. But the hypnosis memo was still in his in box, so he must not have seen it yet. I took it back. It's useless now and it might be better if he didn't see it."
Harry glanced at the memo and then folded the page and put it in his pocket.
"Frankly," she said, "I don't think any of the paper was out in the open long enough . . . I mean, I just don't see it. And Rourke . . . he's a technocrat, not a killer. Like they said about you at behavioral sciences, he wouldn't cross the line for money."
Bosch looked at her and found himself wanting to say something to please her, to get her back on his side. He could think of nothing and could not understand this new coldness in her manner.
"Forget it," he said, and then, looking down at the lists, he added, "How far did you people check out these people who reported no losses?"
She looked down at the printouts where Bosch had circled list B. There were nineteen names on the list.
"We ran each name for criminal records," she began. "We did a telephone interview and later a face-to-face. If an agent got weird vibes or somebody's story didn't play well, then another agent would come by unannounced to do a follow-up interview. Kind of get another opinion. I was not part of that. We had a second crew who handled most of the field interviews. If there is a particular name there that you are interested in, I could pull the interview summaries."
"What about the Vietnamese names on the lists? I count thirty-four boxholders with Vietnamese names, four are on the no-loss list, one on the dead-end list."
"What about the Vietnamese? There is also probably a breakout, if you look for it, on Chinese, Korean, whites, blacks and Latinos. These were equal opportunity bandits."
"Yeah, but you came up with a connection to Vietnam in Meadows. Now we have Franklin and Delgado, possibly involved. All three were MPs in Vietnam. We've got Charlie Company, which may or may not have a part in this. So, after Meadows became a suspect and you started pulling military records of tunnel rats, did you do any further checking with the Vietnamese on this list?"
"No—well, yes. On the foreign nationals we ran their names through INS to see how long they'd been here, whether they were legal. But that was about it." She was quiet a moment. "I can see what you are getting at. It's a flaw in the way we handled it. See, we didn't develop Meadows as a possible suspect until a few weeks after the robbery. By then most of these people had already been interviewed. After we started looking at Meadows, I don't think we went back to see if any of the names on the list fit in with him. You think one of the Vietnamese could have somehow been part of this?"
"I don't know what I'm thinking. Just looking for connections. Coincidences that aren't coincidences."
Bosch took a notebook out of his coat pocket and started making a list of the names, DOBs and addresses of the Vietnamese boxholders. He put the four who reported no loss and the name from the dead-end list at the top of his own list. He had just finished the list and closed the notebook when Rourke walked into the squad room, his hair still wet from his morning shower. He was carrying a coffee mug that said Boss on the side of it. He saw Bosch and Wish and then looked at his watch.
"Getting an early start?"
"Our witness, he turned up dead," Wish said, no expression on her face.
"Jesus. Where? They get somebody?"
Wish shook her head and looked at Bosch with a face that warned him not to start anything. Rourke looked at him also.
"Does it relate to this?" he said. "Any evidence of that?"
"We think so," Bosch said.
"Jesus!"
"You said that," Bosch said.
"Should we take the case, from LAPD, add it to the Meadows investigation?" He said this looking directly at Wish. Bosch was not part of the decision-making team here. She didn't answer, so Rourke added, "Should we have offered him protection?"
Bosch couldn't resist. "From who?"
A strand of wet hair dropped out of place and across Rourke's forehead. His face flushed deeply red.
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"How'd you know LAPD had the case?"
"What?"
"You just asked if we should take the case from LAPD. How'd you know they had it? We didn't say."
"I just assumed. Bosch, I resent what that implies and I resent the hell out of you. Are you implying that I or someone—If you are saying there is a law enforcement leak on this case, then I will request an internal review today. But I'll tell you right now that if there was a leak it wasn't from the bureau."
"Then where the hell else could it have been? What happened to the reports we filed with you? Who saw them?"
Rourke shook his head.
"Harry, don't be ridiculous. I understand your feelings, but let's calm down and think for a minute. The witness was snatched off the street and interviewed at Hollywood Station, then dropped off at a public youth shelter.
"And, lastly, you're being followed around by your own department, Detective. I'm sorry, but even your own people apparently don't trust you."
Bosch's face grew dark. He felt betrayed in a sense. Rourke could only have known about the tail through Wish. She had made Lewis and Clarke. Why hadn't she said anything to him instead of Rourke? Bosch looked over at her but she was looking down at her desk. He looked back at Rourke, who was nodding his head as if it were on a spring.
"Yes, she made the tail on you the first day." Rourke looked around the empty squad room, obviously wishing he had a larger audience. He was moving his weight from one foot to the other now, like a boxer in his corner impatiently waiting for the next round to begin so he could deliver the knockout punch on a fading opponent. Wish continued to sit silently at her desk. And in that moment it seemed to Bosch to be a million years ago that they had held each other in her bed. Rourke said, "Maybe you should look at yourself and your own department before running around making reckless accusations."
Bosch said nothing. He just stood up and headed to the door.
"Harry, where are you going?" Eleanor called from her desk.
He turned around and looked at her a moment, then he kept walking.
?      ?       ?
Lewis and Clarke picked up Bosch's Caprice as soon as it came out of the federal garage. Clarke was driving. Lewis dutifully noted the time on the surveillance log.
He said, "He's got a bug up his ass, better move up on him some."
Bosch had turned west on Wilshire and was heading for the 405. Clarke increased his speed to stay with him in the morning rush hour traffic.
"I'd have a bug somewhere if I'd just lost my only witness," Clarke said. "If I'd gotten him killed."
"How you figure?"
"You saw it. He stuffed the kid in that shelter and went his merry way. I don't know what that kid saw or what he told them, but it was important enough for him to have to be eliminated. Bosch shoulda taken better care. Kept him under lock and key."
They went south on the 405. Bosch was ten cars ahead, now staying in the slow lane. The freeway was thick with a stinking, polluting mass of moving steel.
"I think he's going for the 10," Clarke said. "He's going into Santa Monica. Maybe back to her place, probably forgot his toothbrush. Or she's coming back to meet him for a nooner. You know what I say? I say we let him go and we go back to talk to Irving. I think we can build something on this witness thing. Maybe dereliction of duty. There is enough to get an administrative hearing. He'd at least get bounced out of homicide, and if Harry Bosch ain't allowed to be on the homicide table then he'll pick up and leave. One more notch on our barrel."
Lewis thought about his partner's idea. It wasn't bad. It could work. But he didn't want to pull off the surveillance without Irving's say-so.
"Keep with him," he said. "When he stops somewhere, I'll drop a quarter and see what Irving wants to do. When he buzzed me this morning about the kid, he seemed pretty stoked. Like things were getting good. So I don't want to pull off without his say-so."
"Whatever. Anyway, how'd Irving know about the kid getting snuffed so fast?"
"I don't know. Watch it here. He's taking the 10."
They followed the gray Caprice onto the Santa Monica Freeway. They were now going away from the working city, against the grain, and were in lighter traffic. But Bosch no longer was speeding. And he went past the Clover Field and Lincoln exits to Eleanor Wish's home, staying on the freeway until it curved through the tunnel and came out below the beach cliffs as the Pacific Coast Highway. He headed north along the coast, with the sun bright overhead and the Malibu mountains just opaque whispers ahead in the haze.
"Now what?" Clarke said.
"I don't know. Hang back some."
There wasn't much traffic on the PCH and they were having trouble keeping at least one car between them and Bosch's car at all times. Though Lewis still believed that most cops never bothered to check if they were being followed, today he was making an exception to that theory with Bosch. His witness had been murdered; he might instinctively think someone had been following him, or still was.
"Yeah, just hang back. We got all day and so does he." Bosch's pace held steady for the next four miles, until he turned into a parking lot next to Alice's and the Malibu pier. Lewis and Clarke cruised by. After a half mile Clarke made an illegal U-turn and headed back. When they pulled into the parking lot, Bosch's car was still there but they didn't see him.
"The restaurant again?" Clarke said. "He must love the place."
"It's not even open this early."
They both began looking around in all directions. There were four other cars at the end of the lot, and the racks on top of them said they belonged to the cluster of surfers rising and falling on the seas south of the pier. Finally, Lewis saw Bosch and pointed. He was halfway to the end of the pier, walking, with his head down and his hair blowing a hundred different ways. Lewis looked around for the camera and realized it was still in the trunk. He took a pair of binoculars out of the glove compartment and trained them on Bosch's diminishing figure. He watched until Bosch reached the end of the wooden planking and leaned his elbows on the railing.
"What's he doing?" Clarke asked. "Let me see."
"You're driving. I'm watching. He's not doing anything anyway. Just leaning there."
"He's got to be doing something."
"He's thinking. Okay? . . . There. He's lighting a cigarette. Happy? He's doing something. . . . Wait a minute."
"What?"
"Shit. We should've had the camera ready."
"What's this 'we' shit? That's your job today. I'm driving.
What's he doing?"
"He dropped something. Into the water."
Through the field glasses Lewis saw Bosch's body leaning limply on the railing. He was looking down into the water below. There was no one else on the pier as far as Lewis could see.
"What did he drop? Can you see?"
"How the f*ck do I know what he dropped? I can't see the surface from here. Do you want for me to go out there and get one of the surfer boys to paddle over and see for us? I don't know what he dropped."
"Cool your jets. I was just asking. Now, can you remember the color of this object he dropped?"
"It looked white, like a ball. But it sort of floated."
"I thought you said you couldn't see the surface."
"I meant it floated down. I think it was a tissue or some kind of paper."
"What's he doing now?"
"Just standing there at the railing. He's looking down into the water."
"Crisis of conscience time. Maybe he'll jump and we can forget this whole damned thing."
Clarke giggled at his feeble joke. Lewis didn't.
"Yeah, right. I'm sure that's going to happen."
"Give me the glasses and go call in. See what Irving wants to do."
Lewis handed over the binoculars and got out. First, he went to the trunk, opened it and got out the Nikon. He attached a long lens and then took it around to the driver's window and handed it to Clarke.
"Get a picture of him out there, so we'll have something to show Irving."
Then Lewis trotted over to the restaurant to find a phone. He was back in less than three minutes. Bosch was still leaning on the rail at the end of the pier.
"Chief says under no circumstances are we to break off the tail," Lewis said. "He also said our reports sucked ass. He wants more detail, and more pictures. Did you get him?"
Clarke was too busy watching through the camera to answer. Lewis picked up the binoculars and looked. Bosch remained unmoving. Lewis couldn't figure it. What is he doing? Thinking? Why come all the way out here to think?
"F*cking Irving, that figures," Clarke suddenly said, dropping the camera into his lap to look at his partner.
"And yeah, I got a few pictures of him. Enough to make Irving happy. But he's not doing anything. Just leaning there."
"Not anymore," Lewis said, still looking through the binoculars. "Start her up. It's showtime."
Bosch walked off the pier after dropping the crumpled hypnotism memo into the water. Like a flower cast on a spoiled sea, it held its own on the surface for a few brief moments and then sank out of sight. His resolve to find Meadows's killer was now stronger: now he sought justice for Sharkey as well. As he made his way on the old planking of the pier he saw the Plymouth that had been following him pull out of the restaurant lot. It's them, he thought.
But no matter. He didn't care what they had seen, or thought they had seen. There were new rules now, and Bosch had plans for Lewis and Clarke.
He drove east on the 10 into downtown. He never bothered to check his mirror for the black car because he knew it would be there. He wanted it to be there.
When he got to Los Angeles Street, he parked in a no-parking zone in front of the U.S. Administration Building. On the third floor Bosch walked through one of the crowded waiting rooms of the Immigration and Naturalization Service. The place smelled like a jail—sweat, fear and desperation. A bored woman was sitting behind a sliding glass window working on the Times crossword. The window was closed. On the sill was a plastic paper-ticket dispenser like they use at a meat-market counter. After a few moments she looked up at Bosch. He was holding his badge up.
"Do you know a six-letter word for a man of constant sorrow and loneliness?" she asked after sliding the window open and then checking her nail for damage.
"Bosch."
"What?"
"Detective Harry Bosch. Buzz me in. I want to see Hector V."
"Have to check first," she said in a pouty way. She whispered something into the phone, then reached to Bosch's badge case and put her finger on the name on the ID card. Then she hung up.
"He says go on back." She buzzed the lock on the door next to the window. "He says you know the way."
Bosch shook Hector Villabona's hand in a cramped squad room much smaller than Bosch's own.
"I need a favor. I need some computer time."
"Let's do it."
That's what Bosch liked about Hector V. He never asked what or why before deciding. He was a let's-do-it type of guy. He didn't play bullshit games that Bosch had come to believe everybody in his profession played. Hector rolled his chair over to an IBM on a desk against the wall and entered his password. "You want to run names, right? How many?"
Bosch wasn't going to bullshit him, either. He showed him the list of thirty-four names. Hector whistled lowly and said, "Okay, we'll run them through, but these are Vietnamese. If their cases were not worked out of this office their files won't be here. I'll only have what's on the computer. Dates of entry, documentation, citizenship, whatever is on the computer. You know how it is, Harry."
Bosch did. But he also knew that Southern California was where most of the Vietnamese refugees made their homes after making the trip. Hector started typing in the names with two fingers, and twenty minutes later Bosch was looking at a printout from the computer.
"What are we looking for, Harry?" Hector said as he studied the list with him.
"I don't know. What do you see that is unusual?"
A few moments passed and Bosch thought Hector would say nothing was unusual. A dead end. But Bosch was wrong.
"Okay, on this one I think you will find he was connected."
The name was Ngo Van Binh. It meant nothing to Bosch other than it had come from the B list; Binh had reported nothing stolen from his safe-deposit box.
"Connected?"
"He had some kind of pull," Hector said. "Connected politically, I guess you would call it. See, his case number has the prefix GL. Those are files handled by our special cases bureau in D.C. Usually, SCB doesn't deal with people from the masses. Very political. Handles people like the shah and the Marcoses, Russian defectors if they are scientists or ballerinas. Stuff like that. Stuff I never see."
He nodded his head and put his finger on the printout.
"Okay, then we have the dates, they are too close. It happened too fast, which tells me this case was greased. I don't know this guy from Adam, but I know this guy knew people. Look at the date of entry, May 4, 1975. That's just four days after the guy left Vietnam. You figure the first day is getting to Manila and the last day is getting to the States. That leaves only two days in between in Manila for him to get approval and get his ticket punched for the mainland. And at that time, I mean, man, they were coming in by the boatload to Manila. No way in two days unless it was greased. So what that means is this guy, this Binh, already had approval. He was connected. It's not that unusual, because a lot of people were. We got a lot of people out of there when the shit hit the fan. A lot of them were the elite. A lot of them just had money to pay to make them elite."
Bosch looked at the date Binh had left Vietnam. April 30, 1975. The same day Meadows left Vietnam for the last time. The day Saigon fell to the NVA.
"And this DOD?" Villabona said, pointing at another date. "Very short time to receive documentation. May 14. That's ten days after arrival this guy gets a visa. That's too fast for the average Joe. Or in this case, the average Ngo."
"So what do you think?" "Hard to say. He could have been an operative. He could've just had enough money to get him on a helicopter. Lotta rumors still floating around from that time. People getting rich. Seats on military transports going for ten grand. No question visas going for more. Nothing ever confirmed."
"Can you pull the file on this guy?" "Yeah. If I was in D.C." Bosch just looked at him, and Hector finally said, "All
GLs are there, Harry. That's where the people that people are connected to are. Get it?"
Bosch didn't say anything.
"Don't get mad, Harry. I'll see what I can do. I'll make a couple calls. You going to be around later?"
Bosch gave him the FBI's number but didn't say it was the FBI. Then they shook hands again and Bosch left. In the first-floor lobby he watched through the smoked-glass doors, looking for Lewis and Clarke. When he finally saw the black Plymouth turn the corner as the two IAD detectives finished another circuit of the block, Bosch walked through the doors and down the steps to his car. In his peripheral vision he saw the IAD car slow and turn into the curb while they waited for him to get in his car and drive off.
Bosch did as they wanted. Because it was what he wanted.
Woodrow Wilson Drive winds counterclockwise around and up the side of the Hollywood Hills, the cracked, patchwork asphalt never wide enough at any point for two cars to pass without a cautious slowing. Going up, the homes on the left crawl vertically up the hillside. They are the old money, solid and secure. Spanish tile and stucco. To the right, the newer houses fearlessly swing their wood frame rooms out over the brown brush arroyos and daisies in the canyon. They are balanced on stilts and hope and cling as tenuously to the edge of the hill as their owners do to their positions at the studios down below. Bosch's home was fourth from the end on the right side.
As he drove around the final bend, the house came into sight. He looked at the dark wood, the shoebox design, seeking a sign that it had somehow changed—as if the exterior of the house could tell him if something was wrong with the interior. He checked the rearview then and caught the front end of the black Plymouth nosing around the curve. Bosch pulled into the carport next to his house and got out. He went inside without looking back at the tail car.
He had gone to the pier to think about what Rourke had said. And in doing so he thought about the hang-up call that was on his phone tape. Now, he went to the kitchen and played back his messages. First there was the hang-up call, which had come in Tuesday, and then a message from Jerry Edgar in the predawn hours today, when Edgar had called looking for Bosch to get him out to the Hollywood Bowl. Bosch rewound the tape and listened to the hang-up call again, silently chastising himself for not having picked up on its significance the first time he heard it. Someone had called, listened to his taped message and then hung up after the first message beep. The hang-up was on the tape. Most people, if they didn't want to leave a message, would simply hang up as soon as they heard Bosch's tape-recorded voice saying he wasn't in. Or, if they thought he was home, would have called out his name after the beep. But this caller had listened to the tape and then didn't hang up until after the beep. Why? Bosch had missed it at first, but now thought the call had been a transmitter test.
He went to the closet by the door and took out a pair of binoculars. He went to the living room window and looked through a crack in the curtain for the black Plymouth. It was a half-block farther up the hill. Lewis and Clarke had driven by the house, turned around and parked at the curb, facing downhill and ready to continue the tail if Bosch came out. Through the binoculars Bosch could see Lewis behind the wheel, watching the house. Clarke had his head back on the passenger seat and his eyes closed. Neither of them appeared to be wearing earphones. Still, Harry had to be sure. Without taking his eyes from the binoculars, he reached over to the front door and opened it a few inches and closed it. The men in the IAD car showed no reaction, no alert. Clarke's eyes remained closed. Lewis continued picking his teeth with a business card.
Bosch decided that if they had dropped a bug on him, it was transmitting to a remote. It was safer that way. Probably a sound-activated minireel hidden on the exterior of the house. They'd wait until he drove away and then one of them would jump out of the car and quickly collect the reel, replacing it with a fresh one. They could then catch up the tail on him before he got down the hill to the freeway. He walked away from the window and made a quick survey of the living room and kitchen. He studied the underside of tables and electric fixtures but he didn't find the bug and didn't expect to. The smart place, he knew, was the phone, which he was saving for last. It had a ready power source, and placement there would provide sound intake of the immediate interior of the house as well as any conversations that came in through the phone.
Bosch picked up the phone and with a small penknife that was attached to his key chain he popped the cover off the mouthpiece. There was nothing there that shouldn't be. Then he took the cover off the earpiece. It was there. Using the knife he carefully lifted out the speaker. Attached behind it by a small magnet was a small, flat, round transmitter about the size of a quarter. There were two wires attached to the device, which, he knew, was sound activated and called a T-9. One wire was wrapped around one of the phone's receiver wires, piggybacking power for the bug. The other wire went into the barrel of the handset. Bosch gingerly pulled it, and out came the backup energy source: a small, thin power pack containing a single AA battery. The bug ran off the phone's juice, but if the phone was disconnected from the wall, the battery could provide power for maybe another eight hours. Bosch disconnected the device from the phone and placed it on the table. It was now running off the battery. He just stared at it, thinking about what he was going to do. It was a standard police department wire. Pickup range, fifteen to twenty feet, designed to take in everything said in the room. The transmission range was minimal, maybe twenty-five yards at most, depending on how much metal was in the building.
Bosch went to the living room window again to look up the street. Lewis and Clarke still showed no sign of alert or that the bug had been discovered. Lewis was through picking his teeth.
Bosch turned on the stereo and put on a Wayne Shorter CD. He then went out a side door in the kitchen into the carport. He could not be seen from the IAD car. He found the tape recorder in the first place he looked; the junction box beneath the DWP electric meter on the back wall of the carport. The two-inch reels were turning to the sound of Shorter's saxophone. The Nagra recorder, like the T-9, was wired to the house current but had a battery backup. Bosch disconnected it and brought it inside, where he set it on the table next to its counterpart.
Shorter was finishing "502 Blues." Bosch sat in the watch chair, lit a cigarette and looked at the device as he tried to form a plan. He reached over, rewound the tape and pushed the play button. The first thing he heard was his own voice saying he wasn't there, then Jerry Edgar's message about the Hollywood Bowl. Then the next sounds were the door opening and closing twice, then Wayne Shorter's sax. They had changed reels at least once since the test call had been made. Then he realized that Eleanor Wish's visit had been taped. He thought about that and wondered if the bug had picked up what had been said on the back porch. Bosch's stories about himself and Meadows. He grew angry thinking about the intrusion, the delicate moment stolen by the two men in the black Plymouth.
He shaved, showered and dressed in a fresh set of clothes, a tan summer suit with pink oxford shirt and blue tie. Then he went to the living room and loaded the bug and recorder into the pockets of his jacket. He took another look through the curtains with the field glasses: still no movement in the Internal Affairs car. He went out the side door again and carefully climbed down the embankment to the base of the first stilt, an iron I beam. He gingerly made his way across the incline beneath his house. He noticed along the way that the dried brush was sprinkled with pieces of gold foil, the beer label he had picked at and dropped from the porch when he was with Eleanor.
Once he got to the other side of his property, he picked his way across the hill, going under the next three stilt houses. After the third, he scrambled up the hillside and looked around the front corner into the street. He was now behind the black Plymouth. He picked the burrs off the cuffs of his pants and then walked casually into the road.
?      ?       ?
Bosch came up unnoticed on the passenger-side door. The window was down and just before he flung the door open he thought he could hear snoring coming from the car.
Clarke's mouth was open and his eyes still shut when Bosch leaned in through the open door and grabbed both men by their silk ties. Bosch put his right foot on the doorsill for leverage and pulled both men toward him. Though there were two of them, the advantage belonged to Bosch. Clarke was disoriented and Lewis had little more idea what was happening. Pulling them by their ties meant that any struggle or resistance tightened the ties around their necks, cutting off their air. They came out almost willingly, tumbling like dogs on leashes and landing next to a palm tree planted three feet from the sidewalk. Their faces were red and sputtering. Their hands went to their necks, clawing at the knots of their ties as they fought to get air back into their pipes. Bosch's hands went to their belts and yanked away the handcuffs. As the two IAD detectives were gulping air through their reopened throats Bosch managed to cuff Lewis's left hand to Clarke's right. Then, on the other side of the tree, he got Lewis's right into the other set of cuffs. But Clarke realized what Bosch was doing and tried to stand up and pull away. Bosch grabbed his tie again and gave it a sharp yank down, Clarke's head came forward and his face rammed the palm tree. He was momentarily stunned and Bosch slapped the last cuff on his wrist. Both IAD cops were wallowing on the ground then, locked to each other with the palm tree in the middle of the circle of their arms. Bosch unholstered their weapons, then stepped back to catch his own breath. He threw their guns onto the front seat of their car.
"You're dead," Clarke finally managed to croak through his swollen throat.
They worked their way up into standing positions, the palm tree between them. They looked like two grown men caught playing ring-around-the-rosy.
"Assaulting a fellow officer, two counts," Lewis said. "Conduct unbecoming. We can get you for a half-dozen other things now, Bosch." He coughed violently, spittle hitting Clarke's suit coat. "Unhook us and maybe we can forget this."
"No way. We aren't forgetting a f*cking thing," Clarke said to his partner. "He's going down like a flaming a*shole."
Bosch took the listening device out of his pocket and held it out on his palm for them to see. "Who's going down?" he asked.
Lewis looked at the bug, recognizing what it was, and said, "We don't know anything about that."
"Course not," Bosch said. He took the recorder out of his other pocket and held that out, too. "Sound-sensitive Nagras, that's what you guys use on all your jobs, legal or not, isn't it? Found it in my phone. Same time I notice that you two dummies have been following me all over the city. Don't suppose you guys also dropped the bug on me so you could listen as well as watch?"
Neither Lewis nor Clarke answered and Bosch didn't expect them to. He noticed a small drop of blood poised at the edge of one of Clarke's nostrils. A car driving on Woodrow Wilson slowed and Bosch pulled his badge and held it up. The car kept going. The two IAD detectives did not call for help, which made Bosch begin to feel he was safe. This would be his play. The department had taken such bad publicity for illegally bugging officers, civil rights leaders, even movie stars in the past, that these two were not going to make an issue of this. Saving their own hides came before skinning Bosch.
"You got a warrant saying you can drop a bug on me?"
"Listen to me, Bosch," Lewis said. "I told you, we—"
"I didn't think so. Have to have evidence of a crime to get a warrant. Least that's what I always heard. But Internal Affairs doesn't usually bother with details like that. You know what your assault case looks like, Clarke? While you two are taking me to the Board of Rights and getting me fired for dragging you out of the car and getting grass stains on your shiny asses, I'm going to be taking you two, your boss Irving, IAD, the police chief and the whole f*cking city to federal court on a Fourth Amendment case. Illegal search and seizure. I'll throw in the mayor, too, How's that?"
Clarke spit on the grass at Bosch's feet. A drop of blood from his nose fell onto his white shirt. He said, "You can't prove that came from us, 'cause it didn't."
"Bosch, what do you want?" Lewis blurted out, his rage turning his face a darker red than it had been when his tie had been tightened like a noose around his neck. Bosch started walking in a slow circle around them, so they had to constantly turn their heads or bend around the palm trunk to watch him.
"What do I want? Well, as much as I despise you two, I don't really want to have to drag your asses into court. Dragging them across the sidewalk was enough. What I want—"
"Bosch, you ought to get your f*ckin' head examined," Clarke burst out.
"Shut up, Clarke," Lewis said.
"You shut up," Clarke said back.
"Matter of fact, I have had it examined," Bosch said. "And I still would rather have mine than yours. You'd need a proctologist to check yours out."
He said this as he circled close behind Clarke. Then he moved out a few steps and continued to make the rounds. "I'll tell you what, I'm willing to let bygones be bygones on this. All you have to do is answer a few questions and we're square on this little mix-up. I'll cut you loose. After all, we're all part of the family, right?"
"What questions, Bosch?" Lewis said. "What are you talking about?"
"When'd you start the tail?"
"Tuesday morning, we picked you up when you left the FBI," Lewis said.
"Don't tell him shit, man," Clarke said to his partner.
"He already knows."
Clarke looked at Lewis and shook his head like he couldn't believe what he was hearing.
"When'd you drop the bug in my phone?"
"Didn't," Lewis said.
"Bullshit. But never mind. You saw me interview the kid down in Boytown." It was a statement, not a question. Bosch wanted them to think he knew most of it and just needed the gaps filled in.
"Yeah," Lewis said. "That was our first day on it. So you made us. So f*cking what?"
Harry saw Lewis pull his hand toward his coat pocket. He quickly moved in and got his hand in first. He pulled out a key ring that included a cuff key. He threw the keys into the car. Behind Lewis, he said, "Who'd you tell about it?"
"Tell?" Lewis said. "About the kid? Nobody. We didn't tell anybody, Bosch."
"You write up a daily surveillance log, don't you? You take pictures, don't you? I bet there's a camera in the backseat of that car. Unless you forgot and left it in the trunk."
"Course we do."
Bosch lit a cigarette and started walking again. "Where did it all go?"
It was a few moments before Lewis answered. Bosch saw him make eye contact with Clarke. "We turned in the first log and the film yesterday. Put it in the deputy chief's box. Like always. Don't even know if he looked at it yet. That's the only paper we've done so far. So, Bosch, take these cuffs off. This is embarrassing. People seein' us and all. We can still talk after."
Bosch walked up between them and blew smoke into the center of the huddle and told them the cuffs stayed on until the conversation was over. He then leaned close to Clarke's face and said, "Who else was copied?"
"With the surveillance report? Nobody was copied, Bosch," Lewis said. "That would violate department procedure."
Bosch laughed at that, shook his head. He knew they would not admit any illegality or violation of department policy. He started to walk away, back to his house.
"Wait a minute, wait a minute, Bosch," Lewis called out. "We copied the report to your lieutenant. All right? Come on back."
Bosch did and Lewis continued. "He wanted to be kept apprised. We had to do it. The DC, Irving, okayed it. We did what we were told."
"What did the report say about the kid?"
"Nothing. Just some kid is all. . . . Uh, 'Subject engaged juvenile in conversation. Juvenile was transported to Hollywood Station for formal interview,' something like that."
"Did you ID him in the report?"
"No name. We didn't even know his name. Honest, Bosch. We just watched you, that's all. Now uncuff us."
"What about Home Street Home? You watched me take him there. Was that in the report?"
"Yeah, on the log."
Bosch moved in close again. "Now here's the big question. If there is no complaint from the bureau anymore, why is IAD still on me? The FBI made the call to Pounds and withdrew the complaint. Then you guys act like you were called off but you weren't. Why?"
Lewis started to say something but Bosch cut him off. "I want Clarke to tell me. You're thinking too fast, Lewis."
Clarke didn't say a word.
"Clarke, the kid you saw me with ended up dead. Somebody did him because he talked to me. And the only people who knew he talked to me were you and your partner here. Something is going on here, and if I don't get the answers I need I'm just going to lay it all out, go public with it. You are going to find your own ass being investigated by Internal Affairs."
Clarke said his first two words in five minutes: "F*ck you."
Lewis jumped in then.
"Look, Bosch, I'll tell you. The FBI doesn't trust you. That's the thing. They said they brought you into the case, but they told us they weren't sure about you. They said you muscled onto the case and they were going to have to watch you, make sure you weren't pulling a scam. That's all. So we were told to drop back but stay on you. We did. That's all, man. Now cut us loose. I can hardly breathe, and my wrists are starting to hurt with these cuffs. You really put them on tight."
Bosch turned to Clarke. "Where's your cuff key?"
"Right front pocket," he said. He was cool about it, refusing to look at Bosch's face. Bosch walked around behind him and reached both hands around his waist. He pulled a key ring out of Clarke's pocket and then whispered in his ear, "Clarke, you ever go in my home again and I'll kill you."
Then he yanked the detective's pants and boxer shorts down to his ankles and started walking away. He threw the key ring into the car.
"You bastard!" Clarke yelled. "I'll kill you first, Bosch."
As long as he kept the bug and the Nagra, Bosch was reasonably certain Lewis and Clarke would not seek departmental charges against him. They had more to lose than he. A lawsuit and public scandal would cut their careers off at the stairway to the sixth floor. Bosch got in his car and drove back to the Federal Building.
Too many people knew about Sharkey or had the opportunity to know, he realized as he tried to assess the situation. There was no clear-cut way of flushing out the inside man. Lewis and Clarke had seen the boy and passed the information on to Irving and Pounds and who knew who else. Rourke and the FBI records clerk knew about him as well. And those names didn't even include the people on the street who might have seen Sharkey with Bosch, or had heard that Bosch was looking for him. Bosch knew that he would have to wait for things to develop.
At the Federal Building, the red-haired receptionist behind the glass window on the FBI floor made him wait while she called back to Group 3. He checked the cemetery again through the gauze curtains and saw several people working in the trench cut in the hill. They were lining the earth wound with blocks of black stone that reflected sharp white light points in the sun. And Bosch at last believed he knew what it was they were doing. The door lock buzzed behind him and Bosch headed back. It was twelve-thirty and the heavy squad was out, except for Eleanor Wish. She sat at her desk eating an egg salad sandwich, the kind they sold in plastic triangle-shaped boxes at every government building cafeteria he'd ever been in. The plastic bottle of water and a paper cup were on the desk. They exchanged small hellos. Bosch felt that things had changed between them, but he didn't know how much.
"You been here since this morning?" he asked.
She said she hadn't. She told him that she had taken the mugs of Franklin and Delgado to the vault clerks at WestLand National and one of the women positively identified Franklin as Frederic B. Isley, the holder of a box in the vault. The scout.
"It's enough for a warrant, but Franklin isn't around," she said. "Rourke sent a couple crews to the addresses DMV had on both him and Delgado. Called back in a little while ago. Either they've moved on or never lived in the places in the first place. Looks like they're in the wind."
"So, what's next?"
"I don't know. Rourke's talking about closing shop on it until we catch them. You'll probably get to go back to your homicide table. When we catch one of them, we'll bring you down to work on him about the Meadows murder."
"Sharkey's murder, too. Don't forget that."
"That, too."
Bosch nodded. It was over. The bureau was going to close it down.
"By the way, you got a message," she said. "Someone called for you, said his name was Hector. That was all."
Bosch sat down at the desk next to hers and dialed Hector Villabona's direct line. He picked up after two rings.
"It's Bosch."
"Hey, what're you doing with the bureau?" he asked. "I called the number you gave and somebody said it was the FBI."
"Yeah, it's a long story. I'll tell you later. Did you come up with anything?"
"Not much, Harry, and I'm not going to, either. I can't get the file. This guy Binh, whoever he is, he has got some connections. Like we figured. His file is still classified. I called a guy I know out there and asked him to send it out. He called me back and said no can do."
"Why would it still be classified?"
"Who knows, Harry? That's why it's still classified. So people won't find this shit out."
"Well, thanks. It's not looking that important anymore."
"If you have a source at State, somebody with access, they might have better luck than me. I'm just the token beaner in the bean-counting department. But, listen, there is one thing this guy I know kind of let slip."
"What?"
"Well, see, I gave him Binh's name, you know, and when calls back he says, 'Sorry, Captain Binh's file is classified.' Just like that is how he said it. Captain, he called him. So this guy musta been a military guy. That's probably why they got him out of there and over here so fast. If he was military, they saved his ass for sure."
"Yeah," Bosch said, then he thanked Hector and hung up.
He turned to Eleanor and asked if she had any contacts in the State Department. She shook her head no. "Military intelligence, CIA, anything like that?" Bosch said. "Somebody with access to computer files."
She thought a moment and said, "Well, there is a guy on the State floor. I sort of know him from D.C. But what's going on, Harry?"
"Can you call him and tell him you need a favor?"
"He doesn't talk on the phone, not about business. We'll just have to go down there."
He stood up. Outside the office, while they waited for the elevator, Bosch told her about Binh, his rank, and the fact that he left Vietnam on the same day as Meadows. The elevator opened and they got on and she pushed seven. They were alone.
"You knew all along, that I was being tailed," Bosch said. "Internal Affairs."
"I saw them."
"But you knew before you saw them, didn't you?"
"Does it make a difference?"
"I think it does. Why didn't you tell me?"
She took a while. The elevator stopped.
"I don't know," she said. "I'm sorry. I didn't at first, and then when I wanted to tell you I couldn't. I thought it would spoil everything. I guess it did, anyway."
"Why didn't you at first, Eleanor? Because there was still a question about me?"
She looked into the stainless steel corner of the elevator.
"In the beginning, yes, we weren't sure about you. I won't lie about that."
"What about after the beginning?"
The door opened on the seventh floor. Eleanor moved through it, saying, "You're still here, aren't you?"
Bosch stepped out after her. He took hold of her arm and stopped her. They stood there as two men in almost matching gray suits charged through the open elevator door.
"Yes, I'm still here, but you didn't tell me about them."
"Harry, can we talk about this later?"
"The thing is, they saw us with Sharkey."
"Yes, I thought so."
"Well, why didn't you say anything when I was talking about the inside man, when I was asking about who you told about the kid?"
"I don't know."
Bosch looked down at his feet. He felt like the only man on the planet who didn't understand what was going on.
"I talked to them," he said. "They claim they just watched us with the kid. They never followed up to see what it was about. Said they didn't have his ID. Sharkey's name wasn't in their reports."
"And do you believe them?"
"Never have before. But I don't see them involved in this. It just doesn't fit. They're just after me and they'll do anything to get me. But not take out a witness. That's crazy."
"Maybe they're feeding information to someone who is involved and they just don't realize it."
Bosch thought about Irving and Pounds again.
"A possibility. The point is, there is an inside man. Somewhere. We know this. And it might be from my side. It might be yours. So we have to be very careful, about who we talk to and what we're doing."
After a moment he looked straight into her eyes and said, "Do you believe me?"
It took her a long time, but she finally nodded her head. She said, "I can't think of any other way to explain what's happening."
Eleanor went up to a receptionist while Bosch hung back a bit. After a few minutes a young woman came out from a closed door and showed them down a couple of hallways and into a small office. No one was sitting behind the desk. They sat in two chairs facing the desk and waited.
"Who is this we're seeing?" Bosch whispered.
"I'll introduce you, and he can tell you what he wants you to know about him," she said.
Bosch was about to ask her what that meant when the door opened and a man strode in. He looked to be about fifty, with silvery hair that was carefully groomed and a strong build beneath the blue blazer. The man's gray eyes were as dull as day-old barbecue coals. He sat down and did not look at Bosch. He kept his eyes exclusively on Eleanor Wish.
"Ellie, good to see you again," he said. "How are you doing?"
She said she was doing fine, exchanged a few pleasantries and then got around to introducing Bosch. The man got up and reached across the desk to shake hands.
"Bob Ernst, assistant deputy, trade and development, nice to meet you. So this is an official visit then, not just dropping by to see an old friend?"
"Yes, I'm sorry, Bob, but we are working on something and need some help."
"Whatever I can do, Ellie," Ernst said. He was annoying Bosch, and Bosch had only known him a minute.
"Bob, we need to background somebody whose name has come up on a case we are working," Wish said. "I think you are in a position that you could get that information for us without a great deal of inconvenience or time."
"That's our problem," Bosch added. "It's a homicide case. We don't have a lot of time to go through normal channels. To wait for things from Washington."
"Foreign national?"
"Vietnamese," Bosch said.
"Came here when?"
"May 4, 1975."
"Ah, right after the fall. I see. Tell me, what kind of homicide would the FBI and the LAPD be working on together that involves such ancient history, and history in another country as well?"
"Bob," Eleanor began, "I think—"
"No, don't answer that," Ernst yelped. "I think you are right. It would be best if we compartmentalized the information."
Ernst went through the motions of straightening his blotter and the knickknacks on his desk. Nothing was really out of order to begin with.
"How soon you need the information?" he finally said.
"Now," Eleanor said.
"We'll wait," Harry said.
"You realize, of course, I may not come up with anything, especially on short notice?"
"Of course," Eleanor said.
"Give me the name."
Ernst slid a piece of paper across his blotter. Eleanor wrote Binh's name on it and slid it back. Ernst looked at it a moment and got up without ever touching the paper.
"I'll see what I can do," he said and left the room.
Bosch looked at Eleanor.
" 'Ellie'?"
"Please, I don't allow anybody to call me that. That's why I don't take his calls and don't return them."
"You mean until now. You'll owe him now."
"If he finds something. And so will you."
"I guess I'll have to let him call me Ellie." She didn't smile.
"How'd you meet this guy, anyway?"
She didn't answer.
Bosch said, "He's probably listening to us right now."
He looked around the room, though obviously any listening devices would be hidden. He took out his cigarettes when he saw a black ashtray on the desk.
"Please, don't smoke," Eleanor said.
"Just a half."
"I met him once when we were both in Washington. I don't even remember what for now. He was assistant something-or-other with State back then, too. We had a couple of drinks. That's all. Sometime after that, he transferred out here. When he saw me in the elevator here and found out I was transferred, he started calling."
"CIA all the way, right? Or something close."
"More or less. I think. It doesn't matter if he gets what we need."
"More or less. I knew shitheads like him in the war. No matter how much he tells us today, there will be something more. Guys like that, information is their currency. They never give up everything. Like he said, they compartmentalize everything. They'll get you killed before they tell it all."
"Can we stop talking now?"
"Sure . . . Ellie."
Bosch passed the time smoking and looking at the empty walls. The guy didn't make much of an effort to make it look like a real office. No flag in the corner. Not even a picture of the president. Ernst was back in twenty minutes, and by then Bosch was on his second half-cigarette. As the assistant deputy for trade and development strode to his desk empty-handed, he said, "Detective, would you mind not smoking? I find it very bothersome in a closed room like this."
Bosch stubbed the butt out in the small black bowl on the corner of his desk.
"Sorry," he said. "I saw the ashtray. I thought—"
"It's not an ashtray, Detective," Ernst said in a somber tone. "That is a rice bowl, three centuries old. I brought it home with me after my stationing in Vietnam."
"You were working on trade and development then, too?"
"Excuse me, Bob, did you find anything?" Eleanor interjected. "On the name?"
It took Ernst a long moment to break his stare away from Bosch.
"I found very little, but what I did find may be useful. This man, Binh, is a former Saigon police officer. A captain. . . . Bosch, are you a veteran of the altercation?"
"You mean the war? Yes."
"Of course you are," Ernst said. "Then tell me, does this information mean anything to you?"
"Not a lot. I was in the bush most of my time. Didn't see much of Saigon except the Yankee bars and tattoo parlors. The guy was a police captain, should it mean something to me?"
"I suppose not. So let me tell you. As a captain, Binh ran the police department's vice unit."
Bosch thought about that and said, "Okay, he was probably as corrupt as everything else that went with that war."
"I don't suppose, coming from in the bush, you know much about the system, the way things worked in Saigon?" Ernst asked.
"Why don't you tell us about it? Sounds like that was your department. Mine was just trying to keep alive."
Ernst ignored the shot. He chose to ignore Bosch as well. He looked only at Eleanor as he spoke.
"It operated quite simply, really," he said. "If you dealt in substances, in flesh, gambling, anything on the black market, you were required to pay a local tariff, a tithe to the house, so to speak. That payment kept the local police away. It practically guaranteed your business would not be interrupted—within certain bounds. Your only worry then was the U.S. military police. Of course, they could be paid off as well, I suppose. There was always that rumor. Anyway, this system went on for years, from the very beginning until after the American withdrawal, until, I imagine, April 30, 1975, the day Saigon fell."
Eleanor nodded and waited for him to go on.
"The major American military involvement lasted longer than a decade, before that there was the French. We are talking many, many years of foreign intervention."
"Millions," Bosch said.
"What's that?"
"You are talking about millions of dollars in payoffs"
"Yes, absolutely. Tens of millions when added up over the years."
"And where does Captain Binh fit in?" Eleanor asked.
"You see," Ernst said, "our information at the time was that the corruption within the Saigon police department was orchestrated or controlled by a triad called the Devil's Three. You paid them or you did not do business. It was that simple.
"Coincidentally, or rather not coincidentally, the Saigon police had three captains whose domain corresponded, so to speak, quite nicely with the domain of the triad. One captain in charge of vice. One narcotics. One for patrol. Our information is that these three captains were, in fact, the triad."
"You keep saying 'Our information.' Is that trade and development's information? Where are you getting this?"
Ernst made a movement to straighten things on the top of his desk again and then stared coldly at Bosch. "Detective, you come to me for information. If you want to know where the source is, then you have made a mistake. You've come to the wrong person. You can believe what I tell you or not. It is of no consequence to me."
The two men locked eyes but said nothing else.
"What happened to them?" Eleanor asked. "The members of the triad."
Ernst pulled his eyes away from Bosch and said, "What happened is that after the United States pulled military forces in 1973 the triad's source of revenue was largely gone. But like any responsible business entity they saw it coming and looked to replace it. And our intelligence at the time was that they shifted their position considerably. In the early seventies they moved from the role of providing protection to narcotics operations in Saigon to actually becoming part of those operations. Through political and military contacts and, of course, police enforcement they solidified themselves as the brokers for all brown heroin that came out of the highlands and was moved to the United States."
"But it didn't last," Bosch said.
"Oh, no. Of course not. When Saigon fell in April 1975, they had to get out. They had made millions, an estimated fifteen to eighteen million dollars American each. It would mean nothing in the new Ho Chi Minh City and they wouldn't be alive to enjoy it anyway. The triad had to get out or they'd face the firing squads of the North Vietnamese Army. And they had to get out with their money. . . ."
"So, how'd they do it?" Bosch said.
"It was dirty money. Money that no Vietnamese police captain could or should have. I suppose they could have wired it to Zurich, but you have to remember you are dealing with the Vietnamese culture. Born of turmoil and distrust. War. These people did not even trust banks in their homeland. And besides it wasn't money anymore."
"What?" Eleanor said, puzzled.
"They had been converting all along. Do you know what eighteen million dollars looks like? Would probably fill a room. So they found a way to shrink it. At least, that's what we believe."
"Precious gems," Bosch said.
"Diamonds," Ernst said. "It is said eighteen million dollars' worth of the right diamonds would easily fit in two shoe boxes."
"And into a safe-deposit box," Bosch said.
"That could be, but, please, I don't want to know what I don't need to know."
"Binh was one of the captains," Bosch said. "Who were the other two?"
"I am told one of them was named Van Nguyen. And he is believed to be dead. He never left Vietnam. Killed by the other two, or maybe the North Vietnamese Army. But he never got out. That was confirmed by our agents in Ho Chi Minh after the fall. The other two did. They came here. And both had passes, arranged through connections and money, I suppose. I can't help you there. . . . There was Binh, who it seems you have found, and the other was Nguyen Tran. He came with Binh. Where they went and what they did here, I can't help you with. It's been fifteen years. Once they came across they were no longer our concern."
"Why would you allow them to come across?"
"Who says we did? You have to realize, Detective Bosch, that much of this information was put together after the fact."
Ernst stood up then. That was all the information he would decompartmentalize for today.
Bosch didn't want to go back up to the bureau. The information from Ernst was amphetamine in his blood. He wanted to walk. He wanted to talk, to storm. When they got in the elevator he pushed the button for the lobby and told Eleanor they were going outside. The bureau was like a fishbowl. He wanted a big room.
In any investigation, it had always seemed to Bosch, information would come slowly, like sand dropping steadily through the cinched middle of an hourglass. At some point, there was more information in the bottom of the glass. And then the sand in the top seemed to drop faster, until it was cascading through the hole. They were at that point with Meadows, the bank burglary, the whole thing. Things were coming together.
They went out through the front lobby and onto the green lawn where there were eight U.S. flags and a California state flag flapping lazily on poles posted in a semicircle. There were no protestors on this day. The air was warm and unseasonably humid.
"Do we have to walk out here?" Eleanor asked. "I would rather be upstairs, where we'd be near the phones. You could have a coffee."
"I want to smoke."
They walked north toward Wilshire Boulevard.
Bosch said, "It's 1975. Saigon is about to go down the sewer. Police Captain Binh pays people to get him and his share of diamonds out. Who he pays, we don't know. But we do know that he gets VIP treatment all the way. Most people took boats out, he flew. Four days from Saigon to the States. He is accompanied by an American civilian adviser to help smooth things. That's Meadows. He—"
"He may have been accompanied," she said. "You forgot the word 'may' there."
"We're not in court. I'm saying it the way I see it might've been, okay? Afterward, if you don't like it, you say it your way."
She raised her arms in a hands-off kind of way and Bosch continued.
"So, Meadows and Binh are together. Nineteen seventy-five. Meadows is working refugee security or something. See, he's getting out of there, too. He may or may not have known Binh from his old sideline, dealing heroin. The chances are he did. He was probably, in effect, working for Binh. Now, he may or may not have known what Binh was carrying with him to the States. Chances are he at least had an idea."
Bosch stopped to organize his thoughts and Eleanor reluctantly took over.
"Binh takes with him his cultural dislike or distrust for putting his money in the hands of bankers. He has an additional problem, too. His money is not kosher. It is undeclared, unknown and illegal for him to have. He can't declare it or make a normal deposit because this would be noticed and then have to be explained. So, he keeps this sizable fortune in the next best thing: a safe-deposit vault. Where are we going?"
Bosch didn't answer. He was too consumed by his thoughts. They were at Wilshire. When the walk sign flashed above the crosswalk they went with the flow of bodies. On the other side of the street they turned west, walking along the hedges that bordered the veterans cemetery. Bosch took over the story.
"Okay, so Binh's got his share in the safe-deposit box. He starts the great American dream as a refugee. Only he's a rich refugee. Meantime, Meadows comes back after the war, can't get into the groove of real life, can't beat his habit, and starts capering to feed it. But things aren't as easy as in Saigon. He gets caught, spends some time in stir. He gets out, goes back, gets out, then finally starts blocking some real time on federal raps on a couple of bank jobs."
There was an opening in the hedge and a brick walkway. Bosch followed it and they stood looking at the expanse of the cemetery, the rows of carved stones a weather-polished white against the sea of grass. The tall hedge buffered the sound from the street. It was suddenly very peaceful.
"It's like a park," Bosch said.
"It's a graveyard," she whispered. "Let's go."
"You don't have to whisper. Let's walk around. It's quiet."
Eleanor hesitated but then trailed him as he followed the bricks beneath an oak tree that shaded the graves of a grouping of World War I veterans. She caught up and continued the dialogue.
"So we have Meadows in TI. Somehow, he hears about this place Charlie Company. He gets the ear of the ex-soldier-slash-minister who operates the place, gets his backing and gets early release from TI. Now, at Charlie Company, he connects with two old war buddies. Or so we assume. Delgado and Franklin. Except there is only one day that all three of them are at Charlie Company at the same time. Just one day. Are you telling me they hatched this whole thing on that one day?"
"I don't know," Bosch said. "Could've been, but I doubt it. It might have been planned later, after they made that recontact at the farm. The important thing is that we have them together, or in close proximity, in Saigon, 1975. Now we have them together again at Charlie Company. After that, Meadows graduates, takes a few cover jobs until he finishes parole. Then he quits and disappears from view.
"Until?"
"Until the WestLand burglary. They go in, they hit the boxes until they find Binh's box. Or maybe they already knew which one was his. They must have followed him to plan the job and find out where he kept whatever was left of his share of the diamonds. We need to go back to the vault records and see if this Frederic B. Isley ever visited at the same time as Binh. I bet we find that he did. He saw which box was Binh's because he was in the vault with him at the same time.
"Then during the vault break-in, they hit his box and then all the others, taking everything as camouflage. The genius of it was that they knew Binh couldn't report what was taken from him because it did not exist, legally. They knew this. It was perfect. And what made it that way is them taking all the other stuff, to cover for the real target. The diamonds."
"The perfect crime," she said, "until Meadows pawned the bracelet with the jade dolphins on it. That gets him killed. Which brings us back to the question we had a few days ago. Why? And another thing that makes no sense: why, if he had helped loot the vault, was Meadows living in that dump? He was a rich man not acting like a rich man."
Bosch walked in silence for a while. It was the question he had been formulating an answer to since halfway through the meeting with Ernst. He thought about Meadows's eleven-month lease, paid in advance. If he were alive, he would be moving out next week. As they walked through the garden of white stone, it all seemed to fit together. There was no sand left in the top of the hourglass. He finally spoke.
"Because the perfect crime was only half over. By pawning the bracelet, he was giving it away too soon. So he had to go, and they had to get that bracelet back."
She stopped and looked at him. They were standing on the access road next to the World War II section. Bosch saw that the roots of another old oak had pushed some of the weathered stones out of alignment. They looked like teeth waiting for an orthodontist's hands.
"Explain that to me, what you just said," Eleanor said.
"They hit several of the boxes to cover that all they really wanted was what was in Binh's box. Okay?"
She nodded. They still weren't walking.
"Okay. So in order to keep that cover, what would be the thing to do? Get rid of the stuff from all the other boxes so it would never turn up again. And I don't mean fence it. I mean get rid of it, destroy it, sink it, bury it for good, somewhere it would never be found. Because the minute the first piece of jewelry or old coin or stock certificate turns up and the police find out about it, then they've got a lead and they'll come looking."
"So you think Meadows was killed because he pawned the bracelet?" she said.
"Not quite because of that. There is some other current moving through all of this. Why, if Meadows had a share of Binh's diamonds, would he even bother with a bracelet worth a few thousand bucks? Why would he live the way he lived? Doesn't make sense."
"You're losing me, Harry."
"I'm losing myself. But look at it this way for a minute. Say they—Meadows and the others—knew where both Binh and the other police captain, Nguyen Tran, were, and where each of them had stashed what was left of the diamonds they had brought over here. Say there were two banks and the diamonds were in two safe-deposit boxes. And say they were going to hit them both. So first they rip off Binh's bank. And now they are going for Tran's."
She nodded that she was following along. Bosch felt excitement building.
"Okay. So these things take time to plan, to put the strategy together, to plan it for a time the bank is closed three days in a row because that's how much time they need to open enough boxes to make it look real. And then there is the time needed to dig the tunnel."
He'd forgotten to light a cigarette. He realized now and put one in his mouth, but started talking again before lighting it.
"You with me?"
She nodded. He lit the cigarette.
"Okay, then what would be the best thing to do after you have hit the first bank but before the second one is taken down? You lie low and you don't give a goddam hint away. You get rid of all the stuff taken as cover, all the stuff from the other boxes. You keep nothing. And you sit on the diamonds from Binh's box. You can't start to fence them, because it might draw attention to you and spoil the second hit. In fact, Binh probably had feelers out, looking for the diamonds. I mean, over the years, he was probably cashing them in piecemeal and was familiar with the gem-fencing network. So, they had to watch out for him, too."
"So Meadows broke the rules," she said. "He held something back. The bracelet. His partners found out and whacked him. Then they broke into the pawnshop and stole the bracelet back." She shook her head, admiring the plan. "The thing would still be perfect if he hadn't done that."
Bosch nodded. They stood there looking at each other and then around at the grounds of the cemetery. Bosch dropped his cigarette and stepped on it. At the same moment they looked up the hill and saw the black walls of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.
"What's that doing there?" she asked.
"I don't know. It's a replica. Half size. Fake marble. I think they move it around the country, in case somebody who wants to see it can't make it to D.C."
Eleanor's breath caught sharply and she turned to him.
"Harry, this Monday is Memorial Day."
"I know. Banks closed two days, some three. We've got to find Tran."
She turned to head back to the bureau. He took a last look at the memorial. The long sheath of false marble with all the names carved into it was embedded in the side of the hill. A man in a gray uniform was sweeping the walkway in front of it. There was a pile of violet flowers from a jacaranda tree.
Harry and Eleanor were silent until they were out of the cemetery and walking back across Wilshire toward the Federal Building. She asked a question Bosch had been turning over in his mind and studying but had no good answer for.
"Why now? Why so long? It's been fifteen years."
"I don't know. Just might be the right time, that's all. People, things, unseen forces, sort of come together from time to time. That's what I believe. Who knows? Maybe Meadows forgot all about Binh and just saw him one day on the street and it all came to him. The perfect plan. Maybe it was someone else's plan or it really was hatched on that one day the three of them were together at Charlie Company. The whys you never really know. You just need the hows and the whos."
"You know, Harry, if they're out there, or I should say, under there, digging a new tunnel, then we have less than two days to find them. We have to put some crews underground and look for them." He thought that putting a crew in the city's tunnels looking for a possible entrance to a bandit tunnel was a long shot. She had told him there were more than 1,500 miles of tunnels under L.A. alone. They might not find the bandits' tunnel if they had a month. The key would be Tran. Find the last police captain, then find his bank. There you find the bandits. And the killers of Billy Meadows. And Sharkey.
He said, "Do you think Binh would give Tran to us?"
"He didn't report his fortune was taken from the vault, so he doesn't seem like the type that's going to tell us about Tran."
"Right. I think we should try finding him ourselves before we go to Binh. Let's make Binh the last resort."
"I'll start on the computer."
"Right."
The FBI computer and the computer networks it could access did not divulge the location of Nguyen Tran. Bosch and Wish found no mention of him in DMV, INS, IRS or Social Security files. There was nothing in the fictitious name filings in the Los Angeles County recorder's office, no mention of him in DWP records or the voter or property tax rolls. Bosch called Hector Villabona and confirmed that Tran entered the United States on the same day as Binh, but there was no further record. After three hours of staring at the amber letters on the computer screen, Eleanor turned it off.
"Nothing," she said. "He's using another name. But he hasn't legally changed it, at least in this county. Nobody has the guy."
They sat there dejected and quiet. Bosch took the last swallow of coffee from a Styrofoam cup. It was after five and the squad room was deserted. Rourke had gone home, after being informed of the latest developments and deciding not to send anyone into the tunnels.
"You know how many miles of underground flood-control tunnels there are in L.A.?" he had asked. "It's like a freeway system down there. These guys, if they are really down there, could be anywhere. We would be stumbling around in the dark. They'll have the advantage and one of us could get hurt."
Bosch and Wish knew he was right. They gave him no argument and set to work finding Tran. And they had failed.
"So now we go to Binh," Bosch said after finishing his coffee.
"You think he'll cooperate?" she said. "He'll know that if we want Tran, then we must know about their past. About the diamonds."
"I don't know what he'll do," he said. "I'll go see him tomorrow. You hungry?"
"We'll go see him tomorrow," she corrected and smiled. "And yes, I'm hungry. Let's get out of here."
They ate at a grill on Broadway in Santa Monica. Eleanor picked the place, and since it was near her apartment Bosch's spirits were high and he was relaxed. There was a trio playing in the corner on a wooden stage, but the place's brick walls made the sound harsh and mostly unnotable. Afterward, Harry and Eleanor sat in a comfortable silence while nursing espressos. There was a warm-ness between them that Bosch felt but couldn't explain to himself. He didn't know this woman who sat across from him. One look at those hard brown eyes told him that. He wanted to get behind them. They had made love, but he wanted to be in love. He wanted her.
Always seeming to know his thoughts, she asked, "Are you coming home with me tonight?"
?      ?       ?
Lewis and Clarke were on the second level of the parking garage across the street and down a half block from the Broadway Bar & Grill. Lewis was out of the car and crouched at the guardrail, watching through the camera. Its foot-long lens was steadied on a tripod and pointed at the front door of the restaurant, a hundred yards away. He was hoping the lights over the door, by the valet's stand, would be enough. He had high-speed film in the camera, but the blinking red dot in the viewfinder was telling him not to take the shot. There still wasn't enough light. He decided he would try anyway. He wanted a hand shot.
"You're not going to get it," Clarke said from behind him. "Not in this light."
"Let me do my work. If I don't get it, I don't get it. Who cares?"
"Irving."
"Well, f*ck him. He tells us he wants more documentation. He'll get it. I'm only trying to do what the man says."
"We should try to go down there by that deli, get a closer—"
Clarke shut up and turned around at the sound of footsteps. Lewis kept his eye to the camera, waiting for the shot at the restaurant. The steps belonged to a man in a blue security uniform.
"Can I ask you what you guys are doing?" the guard asked.
Clarke badged him and said, "We're on the job."
The guard, a young black man, stepped closer to look at the badge and ID and raised his hand to hold it steady. Clarke jerked it up out of his reach.
"Don't touch it, bro. Nobody touches my badge."
"That says LAPD. You all check in with Santa Monica PD? They know you're out here?"
"Who the f*ck cares? Just leave us alone."
Clarke turned around. When the guard didn't leave, he turned back and said, "Son, you need something?"
"This garage is my beat, Detective Clarke. I can be wherever I want to be."
"You can get the f*ck outta here. I can—"
Clarke heard the camera shutter close and the sound of the automatic wind. He turned to Lewis, who stood up smiling.
"I got it—a hand shot," Lewis said as he stood up. "They're on the move, let's go."
Lewis collapsed the telescope legs of the tripod and quickly got in the passenger seat of the gray Caprice they had traded the black Plymouth for.
"See ya, bro," Clarke said to the guard. He got in behind the wheel.
The car backed out, forcing the security guard to jump out of the way. Clarke looked in the rearview mirror smiling as he drove toward the exit ramp. He saw the guard talking into a hand-held radio.
"Talk all you want, buddy boy," he said.
The IAD car pulled up to the exit booth. Clarke handed the parking stub and two dollars to the man in the booth. He took it but didn't lift the black-and-white-striped pipe that served as a gate.
"Benson said I have to hold you guys here," the man in the booth said.
"What? Who the f*ck is Benson?" Clarke said.
"He's the security. He said hold it here a minute." Just then, both IAD officers saw Bosch and Wish drive by the garage, heading up to Fourth Street. They were going to lose them. Clarke held out his badge to the booth attendant.
"We're on the job. Open that goddam gate. Now!"
"He'll be along. I gotta do what he say. Else I'll lose my job."
"You open that gate or you're going to lose it, pecker-wood," Clarke yelled.
He put his foot down and revved the engine to show be meant to drive through it.
"Why you think we got a pipe 'stead a flimsy piece a wood. You go ahead. That pipe'll take out your windshield, mister. You do what you want, but he's coming right along."
In the rearview, Clarke saw the security guard walking down the ramp. Clarke's face was becoming blotchy red with anger. He felt Lewis's hand on his arm.
"Cool it, partner," Lewis said. "They were holding hands when they came out of the restaurant. We won't lose them. They're only going to her place. I'll bet you a week's driving that we'll pick 'em up there."
Clarke shook his hand off and let out a long breath; that seemed to bring a more placid tone to his face. He said, "I don't care. I don't f*cking like this shit one bit."
On Ocean Park Boulevard Bosch found a parking space across from Eleanor's building. He pulled in but made no move to get out of the car. He looked at her, still feeling the glow of a few minutes before but unsure where they were going with this. She seemed to know this, maybe even feel it herself. She put her hand on top of his and leaned over to kiss him. She whispered, "Come in with me."
He got out and came around to her side. She was already out and he closed the door. They rounded the front end of the car and then stood next to it, waiting for an approaching car to pass by. The car's high beams were on and Bosch turned away and looked at Eleanor. So it was she who first noticed the high beams drift toward them.
"Harry?"
"What?"
"Harry!"
Then Bosch turned back to the approaching car and saw the lights—actually four beams from two sets of square side-by-side headlights—bearing down on them. In the few seconds that were left Bosch clearly came to the conclusion that the car was not drifting their way but rather driving at them. There was no time, yet time seemed to go into suspension. In what seemed to him to be slow motion, Bosch turned to his right, to Eleanor. But she needed no help. In unison, they leapt onto the hood of Bosch's car. He was rolling over her and they were both tumbling toward the sidewalk when his car lurched violently and there was a high-pitched keening sound of tearing metal. Bosch saw a shower of blue sparks pass in his peripheral vision. Then he landed on top of Eleanor on the thin strip of sod that was between the curb and the sidewalk. They were safe, Bosch could sense. Scared, but safe for the moment.
He came up, gun out and steadied by both hands. The car that had come after them was not stopping. It was already fifty yards east, heading away and picking up speed. Bosch fired one round that he thought ricocheted off the rear window, the bullet too weak at that distance to penetrate the glass. He heard Eleanor's gun fire twice at his side, but saw no damage to the hit-and-run car.
Without a word they both piled into Bosch's car through the passenger door. Bosch held his breath while he turned the key, but the engine started and the car squealed away from the curb. Bosch rocked the steering wheel from side to side as he picked up speed. The suspension felt a little loose. He had no idea what the extent of the damage was. When he tried to check the side-view mirror he saw it was gone. When he turned on the lights, only the passenger-side beam worked.
The hit-and-run car was at least five blocks ahead, near the crest where Ocean Park Boulevard rises and then drops from sight. The lights on the speeding car went out just as it dropped over the hill out of sight. He was heading for Bundy Drive, Bosch thought. From there a short jog to the 10. And from there he would be gone and they'd never catch him. Bosch grabbed the radio and called in an Officer Needs Assistance. But he could not provide a description of the car, only the direction of the chase.
"He's going for the freeway, Harry," Eleanor yelled. "Are you okay?"
"Yeah. Are you? Did you get a make?"
"I'm fine. Scared is all. No make. American, I think. Uh, square headlights. No color, just dark. I didn't see the color. We won't catch him if he makes the freeway."
They were heading east on Ocean Park, parallel to the 10, which was about eight blocks to the north. They approached the top of the crest, and Bosch cut off the one working headlight. As they came over, he saw the unlit form of the hit-and-run car passing through the lighted intersection at Lincoln. Yeah, he was going for Bundy. At Lincoln, Bosch took a left and floored the gas pedal. He put the lights back on. And as the car's speed increased there was a thumping sound. The front left tire and alignment were damaged.
"Where are you going?" Eleanor shouted.
"I'm going for the freeway first."
Bosch had no sooner said that than the freeway entrance signs came up and the car made a wide, arcing right turn onto the ramp. The tire held up. They sped down the ramp into the traffic.
"How'll we know?" Eleanor shouted. The noise from the tire was very loud now, almost a continual throbbing.
"I don't know. Look for the square lights."
In one minute they were coming up on the Bundy entrance, but Bosch had no idea whether they had beaten the other car or if it was already well ahead of them. A car was coming up the ramp and into the merging lane. The car was white and foreign.
"I don't think so," Eleanor called.
Bosch gunned it to the floor again and moved ahead. His heart was pounding almost as fast as the tire, half with the excitement of the chase, half with the excitement of still being alive and not broken on the street in front of Eleanor's apartment. He was gripping the steering wheel at the ten and two o'clock positions, urging the car on as if he held the reins of a galloping horse. They were moving through sparse traffic at ninety miles an hour, both of them looking at the front ends of the cars they passed, searching for the four square lights or a damaged right side.
A half-minute later, Bosch's knuckles as white as bones wrapped around the wheel, they came upon a maroon Ford going at least seventy in the slow lane. Bosch swung out from behind and passed alongside. Eleanor had her gun in her hands but was holding it below the window so it could not be seen from outside the car. The white male driver didn't even look over or register notice. As they pulled ahead, Eleanor shouted, "Square lights, side by side."
"Is it the car?" Bosch called back excitedly.
"I can't—I don't know. Can't see the right side for damage. It could be. The guy isn't showing anything."
They were three-quarters of a car length ahead now.
Bosch grabbed the portable pull-over light off the transmission hump on the floor and swung it out the window onto the roof. He switched on the revolving blue light and slowly began to angle the Ford onto the shoulder. Eleanor put her hand out the window and signaled the car over. The driver began to comply. Bosch braked sharply and let the other car shoot by onto the shoulder, then Bosch swung his car onto the shoulder behind it. When both had stopped alongside a sound barrier wall Bosch realized he had a big problem. He put on the high beams, but still only the passenger-side headlight responded. The car in front was too close to the wall for Bosch and Wish to see if the right side was damaged. Meantime, the driver sat in his car, mostly shrouded in darkness.
"Shit," Bosch said. "Okay. Don't come up till I say it's clear, okay?"
"Got it," she said.
Bosch had to throw his weight hard against the door to open it. He came out of the car, gun in one hand and flashlight in the other. He held the light out away from his body and trained its beam on the driver of the car ahead.
The roar of passing traffic in his ears, Bosch started to shout, but a diesel horn drowned him out and a blast of wind from the passing semi shoved him forward. Bosch tried again, shouting for the driver to stick both hands out the side window where Bosch could see them. Nothing.
Bosch shouted the order again. After a long moment, with Bosch poised off the left rear fender of the maroon car, the driver finally complied. Bosch ran the flash beam through the back window and saw no other occupants. He ran up and put the light on the driver and ordered him to step out slowly.
"What is this?" the man protested. He was small, with pale skin, reddish hair and a transparent mustache. He opened the car door and stepped out with his hands up. He was wearing a white button-down shirt and beige pants held up by suspenders. He looked out into the passing field of cars, almost as if beckoning for a witness to this commuter's nightmare.
"Can I see a badge?" he stammered. Bosch rushed forward, spun him around and slammed his body into the side of his car, his head and shoulders over its roof. With one hand on the back of the man's neck, holding him down, and the other holding the gun to his ear, Bosch shouted to Eleanor that it was clear.
"Check the front side."
The man beneath Bosch let out a moaning sound, like a scared animal, and Bosch could feel him shaking. His neck felt clammy. Bosch never took his eyes off him to see where Eleanor was. Suddenly her voice was right behind him.
"Let him go," she said. "It's not him. There's no damage. We've got the wrong car."