Voodoo, Ltd.

Twenty-four

After Georgia Blue had let him out at the intersection of Santa Monica and Wilshire Boulevard in Beverly Hills, Booth Stallings made an anonymous phone call to the Santa Monica police and told the woman who answered that she could find the stolen Lincoln Town Car on the fourth level of the Santa Monica Place mall’s garage.

Stallings then found a nearby cafe, went in and breakfasted on waffles, sausages and coffee. After paying the bill, he strolled down Wilshire until he came to a bank, where he purchased a certified check in the amount of $2,000 made out to Rosa Alicia Chavez.

Coming out of the bank, Stallings noticed a quick-service printshop that didn’t look busy. He went in, smiled at the owner, laid two $100 bills on the counter and said he’d bet $200 the shop couldn’t provide him with a dozen business cards in thirty minutes. “You lose,” the owner said as the $100 bills vanished into his pocket. Thirty minutes later Stallings walked out of the shop with a dozen business cards that read: “Jerome K. Walters, Executive Vice-President, Independent Limousine Operators Association.” There was also a made-up address on Colorado Boulevard in Santa Monica and some equally fictitious phone and fax numbers.

Fifteen minutes later Stallings walked into the Budget office and identified himself as the renter of the stolen Lincoln Town Car. The clerk was a pretty young woman in her mid-twenties who seemed to be brimming over with goodwill. She told him her name was Gloria and that the Santa Monica cops had just called to say they’d found the Lincoln, practically undamaged, in the Santa Monica Place mall.

“What d’you mean ‘practically’?”

“Well, we had to send a locksmith and the cops are going to keep it a few days to check for prints and stuff.”

“That’s not going to cost me extra, is it?”

“Course not, silly.”

“Good,” Stallings said, then frowned and added, “Look, Gloria, I’ve got my president and vice-president in from London and they aren’t exactly overjoyed to wake up their first morning in Malibu and find their wheels gone. So I think I’d better rent ’em something that’s not so easy to steal — maybe even something foreign and fancy.”

“We have a pretty white Bentley.”

“Too much flash for them. What about a nice black Mercedes?”

“Well, we have a black 500SL, a black 300E and one that’s really nice, a black 560SEL.”

“I’ll take the 560.”

“You want full coverage this time?”

“You bet,” Stallings said.

On the eastern edge of Venice, Stallings got out of the big Mercedes sedan, went up the short concrete walk and onto the porch. There he knocked at the door of the brown house that was the dark twin of the small yellow one across the street and five doors down. A plump middle-aged woman in curlers opened the door.

“Miss Chavez?” Stallings said, knowing it wasn’t.

“Whaddya want?”

“You are Miss Chavez?”

“No, I’m Helen from next door. Rosa’s still all shook up.”

“Poor Carlos,” Stallings said with a doleful headshake. “Poor Miss Chavez. We’re all so very, very sorry.”

“Who’s we?”

“The ILOA.”

“What’s that?”

“The Independent Limousine Operators Association.”

Helen from next door turned her head to call, “Rosa. Some guy’s here from the limo drivers.” She turned back to Stallings and said, “You better come on in.”

Stallings went in and found himself back in the early 1960s. On the floor was a Stonehenge cotton shag rug in shades of white, red, brown and black that was a duplicate of one Stallings and his late wife had bought in 1961 at the Hecht Company in Washington, D.C.

There was also a tweedy couch on chrome legs and a wing-back chair upholstered in a nubby green fabric. The coffee table was of oiled teak and its smaller cousin, a side table, was placed next to the green chair. Scandinavian modern thirty years later, Stallings thought as he sat down uninvited in the wingback chair.

The young woman on the tweedy couch wore a plain black T-shirt and black jeans. She sat, her knees pressed together and clutching a balled-up handkerchief. She had a pretty oval face despite her swollen eyes, a too-pink nose and no makeup of any kind. Stallings guessed she was 23 or 24. She stared at him, sniffed and asked, “You knew Carlos?”

Stallings handed her a business card. She read it carefully, then looked at him and said, “He didn’t tell me he’d joined anything.”

“He only joined last month, around the first of the year.”

“And you came by to say you’re sorry he’s dead. That’s nice. I thank you.”

“I also came to tell you about the death benefits,” Stallings said and shot a go-away look at the still-hovering Helen from next door.

Helen said, “I’ll be back in a few minutes, hon.”

After she left, Stallings took out the certified check, rose and presented it with some formality to Rosa Alicia Chavez.

“Two thousand?” she said with disbelief.

Stallings shook his head regretfully, sat back down and said, “I’m sorry it’s so little, but he was a member for such a short time.”

“So much,” she said.

“I know this is difficult, Miss Chavez, but one of the main reasons for the limo drivers association is to look after each other and stop terrible things like this from happening.”

She nodded, again studying the check. “You wanta ask me some questions, right?”

“If it won’t upset you too much.”

She looked up. “I can tell you what I already told the cops.”

“That’d be fine.”

Rosa Alicia Chavez talked for nearly five minutes about the Lincoln Town Car she had seen speeding away from Carlos’s house. She gave its year of manufacture, its color, its probable Blue Book value and its license number. She then talked about the man she called “el chino grande,” and also the other one, who she said was real tall and dark and mean-looking. She described how they had rushed out of Carlos’s house, sped off in the Lincoln and what she would like to do to them — especially el chino grande. Stallings took notes.

After she finally ran down, he said, “Did Carlos recendy mention any strange or difficult clients?”

She shook her head. “Just the ingleses.”

“The English?”

She nodded with an expression that was a curious mixture of revulsion and fascination. “A man and a woman who tell Carlos they are Mr. and Mrs. But he tells me they look like twins.”

“You mean brother and sister?”

“Yes, brother and sister,” she said, shuddering slightly.

“Did he mention their names?”

“No, he just says he drives them to a place in Topanga Canyon and then goes back and gets them maybe a week later and drives ’em someplace else.”

“He say where?”

“To a motel.”

“In L.A.?”

“In Oxnard.”

“Did he say which one?”

She studied the check again, then looked up and said, “All he tells me is they’re locos and he drives ’em to Oxnard, a motel there. You think maybe these locos are mixed up with the big Chinese and the tall guy with the real dark tan?”

“I don’t know. It’s possible, of course.”

“So if I don’t tell you what motel Carlos took ’em to, you’re gonna take back the check, right?”

“No.”

She waved the check a little, almost admonishing Stallings with it. “Look. If this is some kinda trick or joke, I don’t think I can stand it.”

“It’s no trick or joke and you have our deepest sympathy,” Stallings said and rose.

She looked up at him and said with great formality, “I thank you for coming and for the money. You’re a very nice man. Can I offer you something to drink — some coffee maybe?”

He smiled. “Thank you, no.”

“Can I ask one more question?”

“Of course.”

“How long were you a limo driver?”

“Over thirty years.”

She nodded gravely and said, “I thought it must be something like that.”