The Drop

6

After finally clearing the scene, they took Laurel Canyon Boulevard over the hill to the San Fernando Valley. Along the way, Bosch and Chu traded reports on their efforts of the previous two hours, starting with the fact that the knocking on doors in the hotel had produced not a single guest who had heard or seen anything in regard to Irving’s death. Bosch found this surprising. He was sure that the sound of the impact of the body landing would have been loud, and yet no one in the hotel had reported hearing even that.

“A waste of time,” Chu said.

Which, of course, Bosch knew, was not the case. There was value in knowing that Irving had not shouted as he came down. This fact lent itself to the two scenarios Van Atta had mentioned; Irving had intentionally jumped or was unconscious when he was dropped.

“It’s never a waste of time,” he said. “Did any of you knock on the doors of the pool bungalows?”

“Not me. They’re all the way over on the other side of the building. I didn’t figure it was—”

“What about Crate and Barrel?”

“I don’t think so.”

Bosch pulled his phone. He called Solomon.

“What’s your location?” he asked.

“We’re on Marmont Lane, knocking on doors. Like we were told.”

“Did you get anything out of the hotel?”

“Nope, nobody heard nothing.”

“Did you hit any of the bungalows?”

There was a hesitation before Solomon answered.

“Nope, we weren’t told to hit the bungalows, remember?”

Bosch was annoyed.

“I need you to go back and talk to a guest named Thomas Rapport in bungalow two.”

“Who’s he?”

“He’s supposedly some kind of famous writer. He checked in right after Irving and might’ve talked to him.”

“Let’s see, that’s about six hours or so before our guy jumped. And you want us to talk to a guy who was next in line to check in?”

“That’s right. I’d do it myself but I need to get to Irving’s wife.”

“Bungalow two, got it.”

“Today. You can e-mail me the report.”

Bosch closed the phone, annoyed with Solomon’s tone during the entire call. Chu immediately hit him with a question.

“How’d you know about this guy Rapport?”

Bosch reached into the side pocket of his suit coat and pulled free a clear plastic sleeve containing a DVD.

“There are not a lot of cameras in that hotel. But there is one over the front desk. It’s got Irving checking in and the rest of the night right up until the body’s discovered. Rapport came in right after Irving. He might’ve even ridden up in the elevator from the garage with him.”

“Did you look at the disc?”

“Just the part with him checking in. I’ll watch the rest later.”

“Anything else from the manager?”

“The hotel call logs and the combination that was entered on the room safe.”

Bosch told him the combination on the room safe was 1492 and that it was not a default number. Whoever had locked Irving’s possessions in the safe had keyed the number in either randomly or intentionally.

“Christopher Columbus,” Chu said.

“What do you mean?”

“Harry, I’m the foreigner. Don’t you know your history lessons? ‘In fourteen hundred ninety-two Columbus sailed the ocean blue’—remember?”

“Yeah, sure. Columbus. But what’s it have to do with this?”

It seemed like a stretch to Bosch that the discovery of America was the inspiration for the combination.

“And that’s not even the oldest date connected to this thing,” Chu added excitedly.

“What are you talking about?”

“The hotel, Harry. The Chateau Marmont is a duplicate of a French chateau built in the thirteenth century in the Loire Valley.”

“Okay, so?”

“I looked it up on Google. That’s what I was doing on my phone. Turns out that back then, the average height of Western Europeans was five foot three. So if they copied that place, that would explain why the balcony walls are so short.”

“The balustrades. But what’s that got to—”

“Accidental death, Harry. The guy comes out on the balcony to get some fresh air or something and goes right over the balcony. Do you know that Jim Morrison, that guy from the Doors, fell off a balcony there like that in nineteen seventy?”

“That’s great. What about a little more recently, Chu? Are you saying they have a—”

“No, there’s no history there. I’m just saying. . you know.”

“No, I don’t know. What are you saying?”

“I’m saying that if we have to make this an accident so the chief and the powers that be are happy, then there’s our way to it.”

They had just crested the mountain and crossed Mulholland. They were now dropping down into Studio City, where George Irving had lived with his family. At the next street, Bosch jerked the wheel and pulled into Dona Pegita and stopped. He slammed the car into park and turned in his seat to confront his partner.

“What gave you the idea that we’re looking to appease the powers that be?”

Chu immediately became flustered.

“Well. . I don’t. . I’m just saying if we want — look, Harry, I’m not saying what happened. It’s just a possibility.”

“Possibility, my ass. He either checked in because he wanted to check out, or somebody drew him there, knocked him out and then dropped him. There was no accident and I’m not looking for anything but what really happened. If this guy offed himself, then he offed himself and the councilman has to live with it.”

“Okay, Harry.”

“I don’t want to hear about the Loire Valley or the Doors or anything else that is a distraction. There’s a good chance it wasn’t this guy’s idea to end up on the sidewalk at the Chateau Marmont. Right now it could go either way. And all politics aside, I’m going to find out.”

“I hear you, Harry. I didn’t mean anything, okay? I was just trying to help. Casting a big net. Remember, you told me that’s how it’s done.”

“Sure.”

Bosch turned forward again and dropped the car into drive. He made a U-turn and headed back to Laurel Canyon Boulevard. Chu desperately tried to change the subject.

“Was there anything on the call logs worth looking at?”

“No calls coming in. Irving called down to the garage about midnight and that was it.”

“What was that about?”

“We have to talk to the midnight man — he got out of there before we could hold him. They keep a log in the office down there and it says Irving called to ask him to see if he left his phone in his car. We found the phone in the safe, so either Irving was mistaken or the phone was left in the car and brought up to his room.”

They were silent for a moment as they considered the call to the garage. Finally, Chu spoke.

“Did you check out the car?”

“I did. There was nothing there.”

“Damn. I guess that would have made it easier, if there had been a note or something.”

“Yeah. But there wasn’t.”

“Too bad.”

“Yeah, too bad.”

They rode the rest of the way to George Irving’s home in silence.

When they got to the address that was on their victim’s driver’s license, Bosch saw a familiar Lincoln Town Car parked at the curb. The same two men were in the front. It meant Councilman Irving was on the premises. Bosch got ready for another face-to-face with the enemy.