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

ask, isn’t that a job for the feds. He says they need the help of a real cop, and we need somebody to look out for the city’s interests, and I should tell Vi I’ll be gone about a week. He wants my report next Wednesday.”

He leveled his gaze on Tom. “Next Wednesday, see?” He raised his eyebrows.

“What am I missing?” Tom asked.

Florence raised her hand. “The election. Tuesday. Don’t you get it, Tommy. They’re sending Leo out of town until the day after.”

“Family’s got one informed citizen. See, I ask if all this keeping tabs on you, and shipping me off, came out of his fertile mind, or from Davis himself. He points straight up."

“Meaning who? Hearst? Chandler?”

“Kent Parrot.”

Every USC ballplayer and fan knew plenty about Kent Parrot, a hard-hitting linebacker some years back. These days, Boss Parrot not only ran the Harbor Commission, but called the plays for the Police Department and coached Mayor Cryer on the ins and outs of the politics racket. The last Tom heard, a couple of Parrot’s intimates were gambling hall tycoon Charlie Crawford and bootlegger Tony Cornero.

Una ran across the yard and begged Florence to climb the magnolia to her tree house, a platform about eight feet up. While Tom watched them shimmy up the knotted rope, a connection knocked him lightheaded.

Sister Aimee preached to a parrot. Nobody with any sense would attribute the work of a mind as keen and crafty as the Sister’s to coincidence.

Leo said, “Let me in on it.”

Tom recounted the parrot sermon. Because Una was close above them, a word got slightly revised. “I’d bet my life savings Sister Aimee was sending a message.”

“His life savings is way less than a nickel,” Florence called from the tree house.

Leo asked, “Message to who?”

Florence started down the rope. “Let’s go ask her. I want to meet that dame.”

Una followed. As she touched ground, she grabbed Florence’s hand. “My cornbread’s going to burn. Mama let me make the cornbread.”

While the girls were gone, Tom used the privacy. He pulled out the latest Forum about the coming attack on the Klan. He passed it to Leo and watched him read. Leo shook his head, handed the broadside back, and reached for his flask.

“What do you figure,” Tom asked. “How many of your cops belong to the Klan?”

Leo growled, “You think they report to me? Hey, if I went out looking for Klansmen, one first place I’d stop would be Angelus Temple.”

Tom said, “You’d come up empty.”

“Oh, would I? Could be we’re again running into your failure to keep up with the news. It’s common knowledge that the Klan made some deal to protect the little huckster.”

Tom felt his face bristle, and heard his voice rise. “What I hear, no matter they’re fans of hers, she’s none of theirs. They show up at the temple, she puts them in her place.”

“Sure, I heard that story. Could all be for show. Tom, has the pretty little humbug artist got her claws into you?”

Only because Tom saw Vi and Una marching his way, he managed to keep from replying with fighting words and going home hungry.

Twenty-five

LITTLE Una delivered plates and spoons. Vi set a crock of chili and a bowl of salad on the table and marched back to the house. Una ran after her and soon returned with cornbread and butter. Vi didn’t return. Noticing the look Florence gave him, Leo said, “Chili gives her gas.”

Tom and Florence feasted. Afterward, when Una had finished nibbling her corn bread, Leo said, “Dolly, go help mom.”

Una grabbed Florence by the wrist and tugged until she gave in. Once the men were alone, Tom said, “I got Frank’s address in Mud Town. Rode down there and talked to a couple of neighbors. One said rumors were flying that Frank killed his woman, and her being white, any true-blue white boy might’ve done it. Another blamed Harry Chandler.”

“Let’s hope they’re wrong.”

“Why’s that?”

“Harry’s a devil. Looks like mama’s boy, acts like a deacon. But you don’t own the city of angels unless you’ve got a tolerance for murder. If Chandler lynched your man, I fear you won’t last the week.”

“Do Chandler’s union busters drive Chevrolets?” He reported the neighbor’s sighting of a Chevrolet that stormy Sunday.

“Bootleggers go for Chevrolets,” Leo said.

'So do I, in my dreams," Tom said. He finished his lemonade, poured a refill, and pointed to Leo’s flask. “Emma Gordon heard talk about Frank peddling booze.”

“There we go,” Leo said. “Frank pulled a fast one, they gave him what he had coming and figured if they’re going to bump off the guy, they might as well double down, send your little preacher up the river.”

“Frame Sister Aimee for a murder. Who’s going to buy that?”

“Even so, what’s it take to send her supporters packing? And without that judge chum of hers and the rest cutting deals in city hall, she goes down on the fraud charges. Then half the city’s churchgoers step out on a bender, to dull their grief. The other half go on a bender celebrating. Both ways, the bootleggers make like Midas.”

“Suspect one,” Tom said, “union busters. Two, bootleggers. Three, some creep thinks he’s Galahad and blames Frank for Harriet’s dying.”

“Good. And, if your man Socrates is on the level, we had best choose one of those thousands of suspects as the killer, and deliver the guy to certain concerned citizens. Or else a bloodbath ensues. How many days have we got?”

“A few, let’s hope.”

Leo picked up his flask, gave it a shake, and grumbled as he heaved himself off the bench and plodded toward the house.

Before he returned, Florence came out alone. She sat next to her brother and put a hand on his knee. “Tommy, I’ve been thinking.’

“I thought you were making pudding.”

“Which doesn’t require my whole brain. See, I figure you need my help. Now listen. I’ll skip school a few days. Tell the Egyptians I’m sick. I won’t even go to the Top Hat. You and me and Leo, we’ll be a team.”

Tom said, “You know the rule. Skip school, I take every one of those flapper outfits you’ve worked for, borrowed, stolen, or sweet talked some chump out of, and give them to Miss Elva’s boarding house and finishing school.”

“Phooey.” She made a pout and lifted her hand from his knee. “You’re all talk.”

“How about that pudding?”

As she practiced her sashay crossing the lawn, she passed Leo on his way out. He allowed himself a double-take before continuing to the picnic bench. “Think she knows what that move of hers can do to a man?”

“Let’s get back to business.”

Leo doctored their lemonade. Tom said, “Try this. Say the killer’s a cop on the take, and his bootleggers are getting nervous about the Klan siding with the temperance crowd, which includes Sister Aimee. And the killer cop is holding something over Davis, or over Parrot and the City Hall gang.”

“Maybe he cuts a deal with Hearst,” Leo said. “Or with Chandler. But if you can tell me one previous instance when those two agreed on anything, I’ll give you my Packard.”

“Suppose one of the tycoons is holding a card the other doesn’t want him to play.”

“What card?”

Tom sat wracking his brain while Una ran back and forth delivering tapioca pudding heaped with whipped cream and Florence brought and lit a kerosene lantern. All through dessert, he groped and came up with nothing. Tomorrow, he promised himself, he would go to the library and read every local newspaper of the last month or so.

Una fell asleep with her head on Florence’s lap. Florence, sitting close to Leo, looped an arm around his and watched her brother with a look that kept switching between a bestowal of respect and a glare.

“Back to the murder,” Tom said. “Suspect five. Some disenchanted fanatic. Or a zealot of some other brand.”

Leo said, “A loony the Reverend Robert Shuler’s campaign against the little swindler heated to the boiling point.”

“What’s your gripe with Aimee?” Tom snapped.

“Aimee, is it?”

Tom scowled.

“She’s a crook.”

Florence gazed up at Leo with an impish smile. “You wouldn’t be one of those thinks us girls ought to stick to making chili and changing diapers?”

Leo snorted.

“You want to look into the death of Frank’s woman?” Tom asked. “Harriet. Maybe Harriet Gaines. Unless you’re leaving right away for Owens Valley.”

“Why should I go to Owens Valley? Mulholland can go to Owens Valley, do his own dirty work.”

Florence said, “I’ll bet Sister Aimee knows everything that goes on in this town.”

“What makes you think she’s so smart?” Leo asked.

“Well, if she isn’t so smart, how’s she know who’s the biggest liar in Los Angeles.”

“Who says she does?”

“There’s a handbill going around,” Tom said. “She’s going to preach on the topic.”

“On Tuesday, November second,” Florence said. “I can hardly wait.”

“Election day. Day before I’m due home from the Sierra.” Leo made a face Tom interpreted as to mean the election was behind this whole ugly business.

Vi came out and called Tom to the phone.

All the caller said was “Hi there” before Tom recognized the sultry voice. Madeline, the heartthrob city clerk. “I get a coffee break at 9:30,” she said. “Tomorrow, I’m going to bring my friend. He cleans up after the coroners. We’re going to talk about Frank Gaines. Want to join us?”

"Count on it," Tom said. He would’ve accepted if Madeline and her friend were going to talk about Parchesi.

“Uncle Sam’s Automat,” Madeline said. “Coffee’s on me, this once.”

Though Tom and Florence promised they would be happy riding the streetcar home, Leo insisted on driving. But Vi blocked the door and told her husband, “The way you’ve been drinking, before you go off on a drive, get yourself into the men’s room.While you're there, wash your mouth out”

“Men’s room you call it,” Leo grumbled, “with all those doilies?”

Vi waited until the bathroom door shut, then she studied Florence and must’ve decided the girl was old or wise enough to acknowledge the ways of the world. She laid a hand on each of them and pulled them closer. “Leo had a pal, way back before prohibition, used to meet and play billiards, go surf fishing, do whatever men do. You might’ve read about Sid Fitch?”

“The bootlegger,” Florence said. “A shootout with the cops. A few weeks ago. That Sid Fitch?”

“You might call it a shootout,” Vi said. “Leo calls it a massacre. It got him back drinking. Now the booze won’t let go.”

Twenty-six

ON the way home, along Wilshire, Tom tried to imagine how Leo must feel about his pal getting tommy-gunned by his fellow detectives. Florence tapped her brother’s leg and pointed past Leo at the vast and stately Ambassador Hotel. “Who’s going to take me to the Coconut Grove, you or Pablo?”

“Next payday,” Tom said. “Say, Leo, I let Sister Aimee know this Fenton Love usher of hers is a cop who’s been shadowing me.”

“That makes two reasons you both are going to swear not to get caught out alone after dark.”

“And the other reason?” Tom asked.

“Teddy Boles beats up on you. Then you thrash Teddy. Whose turn is it?”

“Who’s Teddy Boles?” Florence demanded. “Okay, I get it. He’s the guy you jumped. Right, Tommy?”

Tom nodded. Nobody spoke during the last mile.

In the cottage, Tom knew sleep was a long shot, with theories and questions competing for his mind, and with Florence staring daggers he supposed wouldn’t relent until he came clean or tossed her some distraction.

When he flopped into the padded armchair, she scooted a wooden chair up close and sat with crossed arms like an indomitable schoolteacher.

“Teddy Boles is Milly’s fellow,” he said.

She unfolded her arms and slapped her bare knees. “Oh Lord. You don’t suppose Mama put him up to it?”

“What do you think?”

“Why, though?”

Tom shrugged.

“God, Tommy, what makes her so loco?”

“You tell me.”

“The way I remember, it’s like some devil gets into her. Remember the tar pits?”

“Sure.” Tom remembered so well, his palms went clammy. “And the time, out in the garden, she was talking with another gal, and next thing you know she’s stabbing a pitchfork into the ground and shouting about Pastor William Seymour. Kept calling him a liar, ranting at the other gal, that one who dressed like a gypsy.”

“Always wore two or three big flowers in her hair.”

“That’s the one. Must’ve been a sidekick of Milly’s in that bunch, what’d they call it? Something about Eden. Anyway, it’s coming back to me, Milly telling this gal how