The Biggest Liar in Los Angeles by Ken Kuhlken (speld decodable readers TXT) 📖

his house, talk to his neighbors. Ask and keep asking till the truth comes, you hear?” His eyes fixed on Tom’s and gave his words the weight of advice about how to live. “You find the answer, come to Socrates.” He handed Tom the steno pad. “Put down your name and where I can find you.”

Tom obliged. He and the publisher shook hands. On the way out, he saluted the barber.

“Get ready, young man,” the barber said. “Gals can’t help it, they be grabbing at your hair.”

Tom would’ve gone directly to the Frank Gaines address, except he felt the need to check on his sister, whom he imagined cruising in a Rolls Royce Silver Ghost.

By the time he arrived at his court, walking upright or straight was out of the question. He weaved along the path hoping the stab of cholla needles might effect a cure quacks in Chinatown charged for. But the cholla let him pass unpunctured. Maybe the cholla was conscious, like Milly used to say plants were. Maybe it pitied him.

He staggered into the cottage and found Florence showing off a new slinky dress to Bud Gallagher. On the edge of the couch, hands on his lap, Bud wore the sober face with which a prudent older fellow should assess sixteen-year-old beauties.

Tom sat in the wooden chair. Gallagher said, “You look worse than Flo let on. Are you going to live?”

“You bring me news? Or flowers?”

Gallagher turned to the girl. “Honey, you want to get out of earshot for a while, I’d be pleased.”

“Aw, Bud, I get a rise out of raw jokes. I’m a big girl, aren’t I?”

Tom pointed the way to her bedroom. “Try on something down to the ankles.”

Florence huffed and sashayed into her room. Bud waited for the door to click shut. Then he leaned toward Tom. “I’ve been thinking. And judging by what you ran into last night, I wish I had started thinking sooner.”

“Just give it to me, Bud.”

“It’s about Mister Woods.”

“Yeah?”

“Well, it’s nothing I’d want to get around. Only for your ears.” He glanced toward Florence’s bedroom and lowered his voice. “Mister Woods may very well belong to the Klan.”

“God, no.”

“Now, it may be talk, and no more. But look here, Sam’s an old cowboy, brought up poor, could’ve heard so much hate, it got into his blood. Tom, I’d bet the bank he didn’t have a thing to do with lynching Frank Gaines. But, life being what it is, I would advise, watch what you do and say around that man.”

 

Eighteen

TOM got a promise from Florence. She would stay home that evening if he did. She made a stew, boiled the beef and vegetables soft on account of his sore jaw. She fed him while he reclined on the couch, shifting this way and that to give each pain a moment’s relief. Afterward, she helped him into bed and tucked him in, then ran next door and borrowed a handful of aspirin from Tomasina Ornelas, who used the stuff for her rheumatism. Florence brought her brother pills and water, and pulled a chair up next to his bed.

“You’re going to tell me a bedtime story?” Tom asked.

“Depends.”

“Uh oh.”

“You’re going to tell me all the secrets?” she coaxed.

“Can’t.”

“Okay, maybe not all, but you can let go some of them.” Tom sought for a morsel to give her, something that would placate without putting in danger a girl apt to talk before thinking and prone to trust too easily. “Tomorrow we’re going to church,” he said. “When we find the guy you recognized, I’ll get some answers.”

“And you’ll cut me in?”

“On what?”

“Answers. Promise?”

“Yeah. Now scram, let me sleep. And, you hear anything funny, anybody coming up the walk, you wake me up. And get my old Louisville Slugger out of the closet and set it by the door. Do that now, would you?”

Tom fell asleep counting his wounds. In the morning, he rolled out of bed onto the floor, crawled to the bedroom door and used the knob to pull himself up.

He roused his sister, limped to the kitchen, brewed coffee and boiled oatmeal. Florence came out in a modest sage green dress with pleats and shoulder puffs, her hair pulled back into a bun. “What do you think of my disguise?”

“Gorgeous. Are you going to lay off the makeup?”

“But Pablo might be there.”

In response to Tom’s glare, she said, “It’s not like we’ve got a date. But you never can tell who’s going to the Sister Aimee show. Am I right?”

Tom imagined himself explaining to Pablo the several reasons why he’d best go shopping for a grown-up doll.

On the trolley Tom and Florence overheard a report that today’s production would be so spectacular. Sister would repeat the same message afternoon and evening, adding new features to each performance, for the folks who cared to attend more than once.

They meandered through the crowds around the entrances, searching for the guy she saw on the beach. When they entered the sanctuary, they stopped and gaped at Eden.

The stage was a tropical paradise. A stream with real water ran through a jungle of vines and potted rubber and carob trees adorned with orchids, lilies, and violets. The stream’s source was a trickling waterfall.

“Looks like Milly’s back yard,” Florence said.

Tom agreed, and viewed the scene with a vague foreboding. He supposed Sister Aimee had reasoned that because the alleged human population of Eden was small, a fifty-voice human choir would look out of place. So each singer wore a smallish pair of angel wings.

On a thick branch of the tallest rubber tree, at the edge of the stage and hovering over the choir, sat a green bird the size of a heavyweight tomcat, its head tilted upward at a dignified angle. It was cinched to the tree by a cord Tom had to focus to see.

“A macaw, right?” he asked his sister.

Florence whispered, “When do the naked people come out?”

Then Sister Aimee glided down the ramp, in a gown of shimmering green. Her arms swept out in circles, as if she were throwing kisses. With classical grace she seated herself at the piano, raised her hands high then lowered them to the keyboard.

As she led off with a minor chord, the bird interrupted.

Sister Aimee turned and gawked as if astonished the creature could talk, never mind what she thought she heard him say. Likewise, every choir member turned to watch the bird.

The macaw rotated his head, took them all in, then repeated his commentary. “Aw, go to hell,” he squawked.

For some moments, aside from tortured sighs and muffled giggles, a deep silence reigned. When Sister broke from her shock, she flew to her feet, tiptoed toward the green pagan, lifted her hands, and cooed, “My dear fellow, haven’t you heard the good news?”

“Aw, go to hell,” the bird replied.

Sister rushed back to the piano and cued the choir to “The Old Rugged Cross,” a number they apparently hadn’t arranged. Half of them stood mute, the rest sang the lyric with no attempt at harmony.

After the song, Sister leaped from her bench, strode toward the bird, and demanded, “What do you think of that?”

The bird squawked, “Aw, go to hell.”

“Oh, you are a brazen and cold-hearted sinner,” Sister declared with a mighty passion. The bird glanced here and there, lifted a wing, and used a claw to scratch underneath.

Sister stood with hands on her hips while she informed the bird of the blessings Adam and Eve enjoyed, “until vanity like yours, sir, tore asunder the precious mantle of innocence that had clothed them. Oh,” she cried, “what a striking type you are of our fore-parents who stole and ate the fruit of the forbidden tree. No doubt the old serpent has whispered in your ear, ‘Eat thereof. Ye shall not surely die.’ You believed that old liar. You ate and then, guilty and sinful, you sought to hide yourself behind the trees of deception.

“But just as surely as Adam and Eve heard the footfalls of Almighty God, just as surely as God called out, Adam, where art thou,’ just as surely as He discovered, condemned, and punished their sin, just so surely shall His divine law seek and overtake you, oh proud green sinner.” Sister’s arms shot heavenward.

The bird squawked, “Aw, go to hell.”

Sister reached out as though inviting the wretch into her arms. “Oh, hear your deserving fate. Plunged into the blackness of the darkest dungeon, your chains clanking on the dank flagstones as you writhe in the anguished throes of remorse, you shall cry aloud, ‘Oh, bitter chains of justice. Is there no escape from thee?’ And the voice of relentless law shall echo, ‘An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. You who would send your brethren to hell, are to hell justly assigned.”

The horror on faces Tom noted as he glanced around told him more than a few believed the preacher’s accusations were meant for them as well as the obstinate bird.

Sister glided backward to the piano. Eyes on the macaw, she played and sang as though to him alone. The choir and congregation joined in. As if their corporate voices might win the green sinner’s soul, they sang,

What can wash away my sin?

Nothing but the blood of Jesus.

The final verse and refrain, they sang a capella, because Sister had leapt to her feet and dashed to stand beneath the rubber tree.

“Come forth,” she pleaded. “You are free. Another has died in your place, one named Jesus has borne your cross and paid the price of your redemption. Come forth, come forth.”

Sister visibly trembled while she turned and faced the congregation, arms wide as if to embrace them all. “Come forth, oh trembling souls, why sit longer in the valley of the shadow of death? The door is open, the chains are broken. Come forth. Come forth.”

She wheeled toward the bird, her arms stretched like those of a pass receiver desperate to make the catch.

For once, the bird kept its peace.

Sister Aimee swung around toward the congregation. “The Spirit calls, ‘Come forth, the sunlight of God's love and mercy awaits you.’ Will you turn just now to Calvary, and gaze into the face of your Savior?”

Folks began making their way to the aisles and toward the front. A winged fellow slipped out of the choir and seated himself at the piano. Accompanied by hundreds, Sister sang,

Jesus paid it all.

All to him I owe.

Sin has left a crimson stain,

he washed it white as snow.

“Aw, go to hell,” the bird squawked.

Tom and Florence followed a stream of folks toward the nearest exit, Florence in the lead. As they reached the sidewalk, she stood on tiptoes and craned her neck. A squeal issued out of her. She grabbed her brother’s arm. “There he is. See, brown coat, black hair, gray trousers, shorter than the rest of them.”

Tom hustled off, pardoning his way through a mob of chattering tourists.

The man stood lighting a cigarette and glancing around. When he spotted Tom, the cigarette dropped. He wedged between the other men and bolted across the street into the park.

Tom, though no speedster, and even while muscle and bone-sore, was still fast enough. He dashed past the hanging tree. The man kept tossing glances over his shoulder. He ran a path between the lake and Glendale Boulevard, through a game of catch, a klatch of aged fishermen, and a party of waddling mallards.

Tom threw a tackle, waist high. The man splatted face first on the muddy ground. He groped for a pocket of his baggy trousers. Tom grabbed the arm, wrenched it up and backward.

The man yelped, “Hey, whatsa matter, you crazy?”

Tom stared at the tiny right ear, which made the man as one of the Casa del Mar thugs. Tom lifted and marched him to a nearby eucalyptus, spun him around, and slammed his backside into the trunk.

“Who killed Frank Gaines?”

“Lemme go."

Tom threw a backhand. The man’s head smacked the tree trunk. “Who killed Frank Gaines?” Tom shouted.

The man thrashed, trying to break the grip on his arm. “How should I know?”

When Tom heard Florence call his name, he supposed she had enlisted help. He didn’t stop to question, until two strong men caught hold of his elbows, tugged them backward, and cuffed him.

Nineteen

TOM estimated his cell was on about the tenth floor of the Hall of Justice. Through the open but barred window he smelled what he guessed was pork frying in lard. Some out of work fellow peddling tacos to the gang of spectators ogling the steel frame for the