Potshot

Chapter 39

LATE IN THE afternoon, I sat in Dean Walker's office, enjoying the a/c. One of his patrol cops was at a desk up front doing paperwork, with a translucent Bic ballpoint.

"You know the Dell collects protection money from town businesses," I said.

"Know it, yes; prove it, no."

"Do they have a regular collection schedule?"

"Every Thursday."

"So why not catch them doing it and bust them?"

The patrol cop stopped writing for a moment, then continued.

"Several reasons," Walker said.

He had his feet up on the corner of his desk, dark leather cowboy boots gleaming in the sun that filtered in through the tinted windows in the front.

"One," Walker said. "They do it privately, in somebody's office with the door closed. Two, even if I arrested somebody, there'd be no witnesses, and I couldn't hold them. Three, there's forty of them and five of us."

I nodded.

"I didn't know you knew Lou Buckman from L.A.," I said.

Walker didn't register anything, but he took a moment to answer.

"You've been investigating," he said.

"You lived in her neighborhood."

"I did," Walker said.

"And you were a cop there," I said.

"Un-huh."

"L.A. or Santa Monica?"

"L.A. I was a detective. Ramparts Division."

"So how'd you end up here?" I said.

Walker shrugged.

"It was time to stop being a big city cop," he said. "Hell it was time to stop being a cop altogether, but I didn't know how to do anything else."

"Well at least you've reduced the scale," I said. "The Buckmans have anything to do with you coming here?"

"They had a little business out here summers. They mentioned there was an opening."

"Perfect," I said. "Did they mention the Dell?"

"When I took this job the Dell was just a bunch of stumblebums squatting in the old mining shacks. They didn't turn into a problem until The Preacher showed up."

"You happen to remember Lou Buckman's maiden name?" I said.

"Allard," he said. "Mary Lou Allard."

"Nice woman," I said.

He nodded.

"Nice woman."

"You know Mark Ratliff in L.A., too?"

"Yep."

"You know how he ended up here in the same town as two of his neighbors in Santa Monica?"

"Must have heard about it from Lou and Steve," Walker said. "Like me."

"And he wanted to get out of the Hollywood rat race?" I said.

Walker smiled.

"He was trailing the other rats by considerable," Walker said.

"What kind of guy is he?"

Walker shrugged again.

"Hollywood guy," Walker said.

"I heard he had a fling with Lou."

Walker's face hardened. I could see the lines deepen on either side of his mouth.

"That's a fucking lie," he said.

I nodded.

"The best kind," I said.

"He was shagging around after her at a couple of parties we went to. But she brushed him off. Stevie was going to punch his lights out."

"We?"

"We what?"

"You said `we' went to a couple of parties. You married?"

"Divorced."

"Grounds?" I said.

"She knows, and I know," Walker said. "You don't need to."

"What is your ex-wife's name?" I said.

"Same answer."

I nodded.

"When you've got one that works, may as well stay with it."

"I'm sick of talking to you, pal," Walker said. "Beat it."

Arguing with him about that didn't lead anywhere. The patrol cop was still concentrating on his report sheet so hard that I wondered, as I left, whether it might begin to smolder.