9cb261f7cd45f33ca37c87fa6590aac1

Parking himself under a bush, he proceeded to wash his face with loving care. He liked fish but not the after-taste. His tail swished a few times. He was a little put out be­cause the woman, who always slobbered over him, had picked him up bodily, when he had done nothing whatso­ever, and ejected him. He couldn’t tolerate females who rubbed their faces against him, which she always did. He liked sentiment as much as the next cat but too much was nauseating.

His facial finished, he strolled two houses down the street, hugging the shadows, and turned into an alley, one of the few in Sherman Oaks.

Keeping a distance of a hundred feet, Zeke followed him. “Informant proceeding to South Street . Suggest all units shift one block over but maintain same pattern.”

As Zeke slipped silently along, hugging the shadows him­self, he listened to reports from the units. D.C. passed off one scope and onto another. A sound cone unit turned him over to another. And radio cars rolled along streets parallel to the alley.

At the alley’s end, D.C. crossed the street and passed a couple locked in embrace in a car. They remained unaware of Zeke walking by them.

D.C. took a footpath that bisected a vacant yard. He walked boldly under a lighted window, through which could be heard a man and woman quarreling. He reached another alley, flanked with the ugly rear ends of decrepit apartment houses. The cry of a baby unhappy with his new world floated from a nearby window.

He proceeded more cautiously now, as if remembering an unfortunate experience suffered in this area. He flattened down to a belly crawl under a child’s wrecked wagon, and listened intently to the night’s sounds. At the same time his sharp eyes surveyed the layout ahead foot by foot. This was the kind of reconnaissance that would insure a cat a ripe old age.

Next he stole along a fence and up to a back door, and scratched hard. If he remembered correctly – and he always did – this place should be good for a handout of liver. When no one answered he emitted a low, beseeching, pitiful meow, which, translated, said he was dying of hunger.

Zeke said into the transistor mike, “Informant at back kitchen door of apartment building due south of Minton Street, east of Anderson . Will seventeen ascertain exact ad­dress and stand by near front of building for further instruc­tions?”

“Seventeen proceeding as instructed.”

The determined scratching and persistent meowing pro­duced results. The door opened a few inches, and eyes pivoted about to determine whether D.C. had brought a friend. The door swung back, revealing a young man. He said, “Why, hello, kid, where you been? Come on in.” D.C. entered quickly, and the door closed just as quickly behind him.

Zeke said, “Informant entered apartment. Request ten take over stakeout at back entrance.”

He moved fast through the night, gaining the sidewalk, and once on it, ran to Anderson , turned right, and entered the building by the front entrance. He slipped down a long, narrow, dark corridor that led to rabbit-hutch apartments to determine the number of the one D.C. had entered. Return­ing to the foyer, he tapped softly on the manager’s door, and then a little louder. The time, he noted, was ten forty-two. His fingers worked nervously as he waited.

The door opened an inch to permit a battered, wrinkled character in her mid-sixties to stare at him out of eyes half-asleep. Zeke identified himself, showed his credentials, and, as she opened the door wider to study them, pushed his way in.

When the letters FBI dawned on her, she awoke as if slugged by a shot of whiskey, which was what she poured as Zeke asked about the people in apartment number ten. She offered him a drink in a water glass that had a nicked rim. When he refused, she dropped the weight from her feet into a historic armchair that was beginning to lose its stained innards. “Nice folks,” she said. “A married couple and her brother. Never gave me no trouble. But I keep it that way here. I tell ‘em I don’t care what they do but do it quiet.”

She finished off the whiskey. “They’re leavin’ tomorrow. The brother got a job up at San Jose , and I’m glad because I’ve been worryin’ ‘bout ‘em since the men couldn’t find no work and the woman’s been ailirt’.”

“What does she look like?”

“Never set eyes on her. Wouldn’t know her from Whistler’s mother if I was to see her. Husband said she’d taken to her bed, but now you ask me ‘bout ‘em, can’t recol­lect seein’ a doctor around, and I don’t miss much. But some people’s odd. Don’t like to call a doc. Had a brother once, just wanted to curl up like a dyin’ worm

.”

27

As Zeke knocked softly on the door to number ten, his right hand slipped by way of reassurance to the holster at his side under the unbuttoned coat. He had removed his tie, loosened his collar, and mussed his hair. He should have left off his coat, too, but he needed it to conceal the holster.