Bad Night Is Falling (2 page)

Cady removed his glasses. “I don't need to tell anyone here, the conservatives who control Congress are looking for any excuse not to allow those grants to be issued. These murders must be cleared up if we are to have a chance at realizing something for ourselves.”

“I know we need results,” Absalla said sincerely.

“Not to mention your contract comes up around the same time as the grant application,” Limón needlessly reminded him. “And if the murderers of the Cruzados remain free, let alone if more horrible things happen to other Latino families, this body will take that as a sign we may need to do things differently.”

“Blacks get attacked too,” one of the African-Americans interjected.

“Nobody's saying different,” Mrs. Limón blurted.

Trying to ease the tension, Cady said, “Let's stay together, people. This whole body must examine and discuss the facts. We have to set the example for the rest of the Rancho.” He looked directly at Mrs. Limón. Surprisingly, she bestowed a deferential smile on him without displaying any of her usual combativeness.

Absalla promised to submit a revised patrol plan to the tenants' association by the end of the week. Leaving the multipurpose center, Absalla noted not for the first time the tranquility it was possible to find walking around the projects. Sure, all the cinder block buildings, lying squat and heavy and uninteresting-looking against L.A.'s lethal air, wouldn't be on the cover of
Architectural Digest
anytime soon. And yes, the taupe-colored apartments were in bad need of paint, having last seen a fresh coat sometime during the middle of the Bradley Administration.

But many of the residents took pride in keeping their plots neat, their stoops swept clean. Arrow shirts and prim little girls' dresses hung nonchalantly from clotheslines, and several dogs romped around, wagging their tails, their brown eyes gleaming with playfulness.

As he turned a corner on the row of apartments along Biddy Mason Lane, Absalla spotted several young black men lounging against the fender of a lowered '73 Monte Carlo, the front raised on jack stands. Despite himself, he instantly categorized the youth. Due, he reasoned as he confidently strolled past, to the blaring boom box at their feet and the ubiquitous forty-ouncer being passed around.

He purposefully slowed down. “You young brothers ought to put as much time into cracking a book as you do standing around bullshitting and drinking that piss.”

One of the young men was tall with elongated muscles like an NBA pick. His shirt was unbuttoned, displaying a torso adorned with three California Youth Authority–type tattoos. He bowed slightly. “
A-Salam-aleikum
,” he said, chuckling, and the others also dipped their heads.

“Got some pigs' feet if you want one, Minister Absalla,” another one piped in.

The security chief didn't even bother to shake his head as he moved on. The offices of the Ra-Falcons were located on the second floor of the building housing the laundry rooms. It was a structure on the southwest end of the complex, some distance from the old, defunct Southern Pacific tracks that cleaved diagonally through the Rancho.

Originally, when the place was built in the waning days of FDR's New Deal years, the Rancho, located near the central city, was envisioned as an experiment in planned multiracial living. The Taj, as the old-timers called the place, along with public housing places like Nickerson Gardens and Imperial Courts farther south in Watts, had also been part of that vision. They were all part of a plan that was drafted by the progressives who'd burrowed their way into the local Housing Authority. It was an objective endorsed by the bipartisan reform forces at work in the city in those days.

But those people, and that dream of institutions playing a role in the engineering of racial harmony, had both long since been discarded like so many old bottles.

Absalla's reflections ended as he arrived at the RaFalcons' office. On its steel door was a colorful decal, which displayed a stylized profile of a falcon's head with a golden ankh prominent in the center of its ebon orb. Encircling the head was a border containing various African and Egyptian symbols of the warrior and the harvest.

Before he could grasp the knob, the door swung inward to allow a man with sergeant's stripes on his shirt's bicep and another man, a corporal, into the passageway.

“Brothers,” Absalla greeted the two.

The sergeant, Eddie Waters, said, “Boss man, how'd it go at the meeting?”

“We got to get on this bad, Eddie,” Absalla said, zeroing them both with a stern look.

“I know,” Keith 2X, the other one, answered. “There's already been a retaliation.”

Absalla didn't want to seem out of the loop in front of his crew, but he hadn't heard and so was forced to ask. “What happened? I've been so busy with the tenants' association that I didn't catch this.”

“Old Mrs. Ketchum and her sister got a nasty note tacked to their door last night,” Waters said. “The note said something about how the blacks at the Rancho bring down the place, and how maybe somebody's going to do someming about it.”

“Their apartment's near the Cruzados',” Absalla said. “I guess they didn't see who left the note.”

“No, but it's a sure thing them Los Domingos did it,” Keith 2X replied.

“We're on our way to check it out, and maybe get a little sumptin' sumptin' on them punk-asses,” Waters added with enthusiasm.

“Don't be no provocateurs, you hear,” Absalla warned them. “Just confirm it if you can, understand?”

“We ain't scared of them
mojados
,” Waters spat with bravado.

“Restraint, black man, remember,” Absalla retorted.

“It's cool,” Waters said, and the two started to leave. “Oh yeah, there's an ese in there to see you.” He grinned.

“Who?”

“Surprise.” Waters tapped 2X on the shoulder, and the two departed.

The Ra-Falcons' office was one large room with two feeder rooms off that. A third area had been a walk-in utility closet, but the door had been removed. It now served as residence for a fax and a small refrigerator.

The larger area contained a black vinyl couch trimmed in ash wood with matching chairs scattered about. Several other chairs and desks, spanning various eras and tastes, were also present.

Hunched over the phone at the main desk was a woman who also had sergeant's stripes on the sleeve of her dark blue uniform, LaToyce Blaine. She made small circles with her free hand as she talked, her vermillion nails flashing like dry blood on shark's teeth.

“Hold on,” she said to whoever she was talking to. “Five-O in there to see you,” she whispered to Absalla.

The security chief didn't break stride as he went into one of the lesser rooms that served as his inner office. He came upon a Latino, who he made to be a Chicano, dressed in an olive green gabardine suit. He wore a bronze-hued tie, offset by a dark green shirt.

The cop, who'd been looking at a mounted photo of Absalla leading a contingent at the Million Man March, turned to greet him. “I'm Lieutenant Marasco Seguin,” the man with the drooping mustache said. He handed Absalla a card.

On the card's left corner was a raised-relief image of a detective's shield in silver. Superimposed over that was a gold banner proclaiming his rank in blue lettering, City Hall in gold, and below that a bar in gold with his badge number in blue. The card stated that Seguin worked out of Wilshire Division on Pico.

Absalla put the card on his desk and stood looking at the clean-decked cop. “Look, Lieutenant, a couple of detectives from Newton have already been all over me about this Cruzado mess.” He let his annoyance show. “'Sides, aren't you out of your division?”

Seguin scratched at his chin. “This is an investigation the brass wants solved, with haste. I'm temporarily reassigned, and in charge of Fitzhugh and Zaneski's investigation.”

Absalla was tempted to tell Seguin he'd found Zaneski particularly funky to deal with, but he wasn't sure this Chicano would empathize with a black man's plight. He moved behind his desk and they both sat down.

“Why is this murder so important to the LAPD?” Absalla asked.

“It's a little unusual even for the Rancho to have a triple homicide in one night.” He paused a beat, and as he went on, a sour look contorted his face. “Especially when one of them was a little child.”

“And the city wants the turnover of the Rancho and other public housing units to go through,” Absalla observed. “No more matching funds the county is obligated to pony up if there's no federal program. The cost savings must look real good to the county supervisors what with the budget shortfalls we always have.”

“Sometimes interests collide, Mr. Absalla,” Seguin countered. “Some of your employees have records, don't they?”

“You know they do. I've asked all of them if they know anything, and they say they don't. These young folk who are the Ra-Falcons have demonstrated time and again they are no longer following the life, Lieutenant.”

He put his hand flat on the desk like a distended creature. “I vouch for each and every one of them.” His gaze didn't move off Seguin.

The cop said nothing and Absalla continued. “And it's still anyone's guess on who did the firebombing. I heard that Cruzado may have been mixed up in some kind of trouble back in his hometown in Mexico. That's why he came up here.”

“I'd like copies of everybody's personnel record, Mr. Absalla.”

“I don't think so without a court order.”

“This isn't about you against the blue-eyed devil, man. This is about finding the guilty.”

“A ten-year-old black boy named Troy was gunned down three months ago in what we gleefully call a cycle-by. Where was your special assignment then?” Absalla demanded.

“Sometimes it takes the deaths of one too many innocents to make things happen.”

The right kind of innocents. “Uh-huh.”

“I'll have the court order in the morning, Mr. Absalla.” Seguin stood up, unconsciously fingering his tie. “I want to repeat that the department is looking for a slam dunk on this. Cooperation can go a long way.”

“I'll bear that in mind.”

“Please do.”

Seguin left and Absalla sat looking intently out the grilled window at a cracked concrete walkway and one of those plastic tricycles designed to look like a rocket sled. After some moments, he got up and went back into the outer room.

Blaine was busy filling out her patrol report from last night. An oldies soul station played softly on the radio near her.

“Who was that brother you mentioned to me?” Absalla asked, moving about the room like a panther in search of meat.

The sergeant's braided head tilted toward the ceiling. “Ah, Pope or something like that.”

“And he's a private detective?”

The young woman shook her braids. “I think so. At least, he helped a girlfriend of my friend whose boyfriend was shot to death.”

He didn't bother to follow that trail. “Get his number, will you?”

“What you up to, Antar?”

“About not being put in a trick bag.” With that the stocky, shaved-headed Muslim went back into his office, closing the door tightly against what he could feel was a mother of a storm gathering.

Two

I
van Monk used the end of his finger to get at some grit the wind off the Pacific had blown into a corner of his eye. Unlike his old lady, he was not big on the lure of the outdoors and all its wonders. That's why the good Lord created concrete and takeout for guys like him.

“So that's what's been going on since the murders about three days ago,” Absalla said, taking another bite of his swordfish.

“I know Seguin. Is that another reason you want me to look into the Cruzados' murders?” Monk gulped down more of his delicious lemonade.

Three healthy, young women in jean shorts and taut bikini tops Rollerbladed past their outdoor table on the Venice boardwalk. Various men of differing ages and shapes gave them appreciative attention. Absalla was gauging his lunch guest. “I didn't know that.” A halting crept into his voice. “You telling me this because there's only so far you're willing to go?” A forkful of swordfish and wild rice rested in his hand.

“No,” Monk said casually. “I'm just pointing out something that would come up sooner or later, and wanted to get it out of the way. Marasco and I are cool about working the same side of the street.”

The food slowly made its way to the stolid face. He chewed slowly and asked, “You have a lot of friends in the police department?”

“Marasco's it.”

“How'd you two meet?”

Monk tugged at the underside of his goatee. “A story only worth telling on a bar stool sometime. Have the cops questioned your Ra-Falcons?” He finished his glass. He spotted a knot of people gathered on the sand. They were watching a man in a turquoise turban juggle two live chain saws. He shifted his gaze back to his potential employer.